Self-Aggrandizement: City Life Archives

Annualized
Filed March 30, 2009 12:35 PM.

As a San Francisco kid, borne of moderate temperatures and low humidity, I spend New York winters shivering violently, wishing for summer to arrive, and New York summers sweating through the sweltering heat, wishing for the return of winter cold.

But, for about a month of spring, and a month of fall, the weather is perfect, absolutely beautiful. During that month of fall I think, there's no better place in the world to live than right here. And then during that month of spring I think, holy shit my eyes and ears and nose are itching so much that I should probably just shoot myself in the head.

I'm not sure what personally hugely allergenic tree, grass, or shrub it is that exists here on the East Coast yet remains blissfully absent on the West. But, whatever it is, I grew up without it, and therefore without any real seasonal allergies.

So, each year, at the start of April, as the pollen count climbs, hay fever catches me completely and totally off guard. Even this year, when I bought NasalCrom months in advance, and swore to start actually taking it a few weeks in advance of allergy season as the box presribes, I wasn't ready. Because, this weekend, as my eyes started to redden, my nose began to itch and run, it still took me a few days to realize that, wait, I've seen these symptoms before!

So, NasalCrom it is. Plus whatever left-over allergy pills I can dig up from the back of our medicine cabinet. And maybe some of those anti-histamine eye-drops because, let's face it, I'm a total pansy about all of this, and will drive everyone nuts with the complaining otherwise.

Wish me luck. And, if you have any drug recommendations, lifestyle tips, or other thoughts for a still relative allergy retard, certainly send them my way.

Future Perfect
Filed December 22, 2008 3:13 PM.

As I've mentioned before, Jess and I are looking to move. Over the course of the last couple of years, Times Square has grown and grown, increasingly eating our neighborhood, and - most recently - entirely taking over our corner. This time of year, I can barely push my way through the lines of tourists waiting for uptown double-decker sightseeing buses as I head to work. And, to add insult to injury, in a climate of downward spiraling real estate cost, our landlord is trying to raise our rent.

So, we're leaving.

Jess, however, already has. At least mentally. While we're still just knee-deep in the apartment search process, she's nearly finished decorating our notional apartment.

She has colors picked out for various rooms, magazine and blog photos clipped for layout inspiration, and a growing wish-list of replacement furniture and art, as much of what I own is old, well loved, and certainly ready to retire.

The problem is, Jess can't resist the siren song of an excellent deal. And, worse, she's a consummate deal-finder. So, though the apartment is still imagined, the furniture we've begun to accumulate for it is real. Real, and very large.

This past week, for example, she found a high-end, multi-thousand dollar armchair, at 90% off. Not long before that, she found a giant Ming lamp, similar to one they sell at William Sonoma Home for about $800, at an antiques warehouse for $10.

Fortunately, it all barely fits. At least until the new sleeper couch and recliner - both significantly discounted, and both delayed by custom upholstery - arrive.

The countdown is on.

Overheard, 50th and Broadway
Filed August 26, 2008 10:49 AM.

Early 20's babysitter, to the two little kids with whom she was holding hands:

"You know what this is? This is Time Square. It's a place that people who don't live in New York like to visit."

What the Hell(s Kitchen)
Filed August 5, 2008 6:33 PM.

When I moved into my apartment, some three years ago and change, I really liked Hell's Kitchen. I had already lived in the neighborhood for several years, and was moving just two blocks down and a half block to the east.

But that small distance was a big change. It put me on the corner of 8th Ave, less than ten blocks up from the heart of darkness: Times Square.

Which was bad. And with each passing year, got worse. The area gentrified. More and more tourists poured down my block.

By now, on my way to work, I have to elbow through crowds of gawkers from fly-over states. (A family of ten standing motionless in the middle of the sidewalk as the father points: "look, Martha, it's a tall buildin'!")

During 'christmas season' (September through February), I have to divert my commute entirely - five blocks up, five blocks back down - just to avoid the enthralled-to-standstill Rockefeller Center crowds. ("Look, Martha, it's a tall tree!")

Jess arrived long after the neighborhood's grit had been largely polished away, never lived closer to 9th Ave to see that there really are (or, at least, were) restaurants and shops nearby aside from the Olive Garden and the Phantom of Broadway Gift Shop ("We have good price I [HEART] NY shirt!").

So, not surprisingly, she hated it from the get-go. Not our apartment itself, which we both really like. But, in short, pretty much everything within a ten block radius of our front door.

And, increasingly, so do I. So, post-wedding, we'll be kicking off an apartment search.

It's a terrible, terrible time to do so. Sales prices are on the verge of 'readjustment', yet rental prices are fast on the climb.

Still, for the sake of our sanity, we're not sure we really have a choice.

As for specifics - like neighborhood - we're not yet entirely sure. Maybe downtown. Or uptown. In short, pretty much anywhere but where we are right now.

They say Time Square's the core of the Big Apple; by now, we're both pretty sure it's the pits.

Dear People of Williamsburg:
Filed June 26, 2008 11:29 AM.

You're trying way too hard.

Sincerely,

joshua

I'm Meeeeeelting
Filed June 9, 2008 6:18 PM.

It's 101 degrees here in Union Square, the humidity is off the charts, and, of course, the air conditioner in the Cyan office decided today would be a great time to take the afternoon off.

It's time for a drink.

Sounds of Silence
Filed June 4, 2008 3:26 PM.

New Yorkers generally maintain that our reputation for standoffishness is unfounded, that we're actually a rather friendly group.

And, by and large, I'd agree.

Except for in my apartment building, where none of the tenants talk to any of the other tenants. Ever.

I'd noticed this when I first moved into the building three or four years back, but hadn't thought of it again since, until Jess observed the same thing a month or so back.

In her prior Murray Hill digs, she pointed out, neighbors would say hello waiting for the elevator, chat idly on their way to and from their front doors. But, in our current building, a veil of silence descends at the lobby, and doesn't let up until people slam their apartment doors behind them.

We've tried to bend that unwritten rule - a simple 'have a good day' on the way out of the elevator, a 'how are you?' on the way in - with zero results. The tenants stare at us blankly, or continue to intently examine the walls.

At this point, I'm considering options for upping the ante - breaking into song and dance in the lobby, doing elevator handstands - but I'm a bit worried even that might not yield a response. Stepford, indeed.

Fleas
Filed April 14, 2008 11:42 AM.

It was only thanks to inclement weather that I yesterday avoided attending the new Brooklyn Flea Market.

Jess, who has an impeccable eye for all things fashion and furniture, and can quickly pick out gems hidden in long racks of crap, loves flea markets, thrift and vintage stores.

I, on the other hand, try as a general rule to avoid places that reek of mothballs and armpit. Walking down scented aisles, I can't help but think that whomever each vintage dress previously belonged to is probably now long since dead, and quite possibly from some terrible skin-borne affliction transmissible by their old clothing.

So, in short, I'm not a huge fan. But, in my best attempt at being a good fiance, I come along. It's an effort only partially appreciated by Jess, who (correctly) accuses me of hovering over her the entire time. Not, as she thinks, because I'm trying to get her to leave, but instead because I'm trying to gain some safe harbor from proximity to the only person in the place for whose hygeine habits I can personally vouch.

Still, odds are good, once the weather warms, we'll be Brooklyn bound after all. I just hope that, in the weeks between, I'll find some good leads on a cheap Hazmat suit.

The Blues
Filed January 14, 2008 4:52 PM.

Since Jess moved in a year or so back, 'my' apartment has slowly evolved into 'our' apartment. Furniture has moved around, been replaced. New art has appeared, along with more blankets, pillows and trays than I can count. And, as of this weekend, the bedroom has changed colors.

Yes, after much deliberation over the differences between Polar Sky and Polar Ice, Seaside Blue and Ocean Blue, we finally bit the bullet and purchased several buckets of one of those, though I'm no longer sure exactly which.

Painting the bedroom of a small one-bedroom apartment is a great way to make yourself glad that you at least don't live in an even smaller studio, because emptying the contents of said bedroom into the living room makes for a very, very tight fit.

We did that moving, and then the painting itself, on Saturday, in a single stretch that extended from afternoon into evening. Then, on Sunday, we went back and filled in the patches we'd inadvertently left completely white in the later, sunlight-less stretches of the day before.

The end result? Surprisingly good. The coat of light grey-tinted blue makes the room feel a bit more a real home, less an impersonal, temporary rental. And while we're still reeling from the cleanup efforts (the brunt of which has been handled by Jess, who spent today at home repairing the wreckage), it looks good enough that, in another couple of weeks, we just might forget what a pain in the ass the whole process is, and take on the rest of the apartment.

Dropping the Ball
Filed December 19, 2007 12:29 PM.

For the past five years, I've lived in Hell's Kitchen - a fast-gentrifying neighborhood to the west of Times Square. And I really like Hell's Kitchen. Especially as Ninth Ave., between 42nd and 57th, is full of an ever-increasing array of interesting little restaurants and bars.

Jess, however, hates Hell's Kitchen. She thinks it's dirty, overrun by tourists, and perhaps not even really a neighborhood (a contention backed earlier this week by my cousin Barbara, an editor at the NY Times).

This time of year, from Thanksgiving through New Years, a part of me can't help but agree with her.

My previous commute, to an office in East Midtown, took me daily through Rockefeller Center. Except during the holiday stretch, when I'd walk five blocks out of my way, just to avoid the tree-gawking crowds.

Now my commute takes me just a couple of blocks through Time Square, to the 49th St N/R/W subway stop, en route to Cyan's newer Union Square digs. Yet most evenings this month, emerging from the subway, I've barely been able to elbow my way back home, past tourists so overwhelmed by the display of neon lights they apparently lose their ability to walk or step the hell out of the way.

And it only gets worse. On New Year's Eve Day, the police barricade off our corner, as people begin streaming in by 9:00 in the morning to secure themselves ball-watching spots. Getting in and out requires ID, or (as in past years, before I relinquished my Californian license) toted phone and electric bills.

Which is one reason why, ideally, Jess and I may not be heading out at all. Despite a handful of celebratory possibilities, I'm not sure any of them compete with mini egg rolls, pigs-in-blankets, crap champagne, and a chance to stay quietly in our apartment, pretending we don't, at the stroke of midnight, live a few blocks up from the temporary epicenter of the entire world.

Setting it Straight
Filed December 17, 2007 3:44 PM.

I was waiting in line to buy lunch today, when the movie Old School came on TV, just in time for me to catch this scene:

Frank: I told my wife I wouldn't drink tonight. Besides, I got a big day tomorrow. You guys have a great time.

College Student: A big day? Doing what?

Frank: Well, um, actually a pretty nice little Saturday, we're going to go to Home Depot. Yeah, buy some wallpaper, maybe get some flooring, stuff like that. Maybe Bed, Bath, & Beyond, I don't know, I don't know if we'll have enough time.

Which, I think, is a totally unfair portrayal of real relationships. Because in my case, it was actually Sunday rather than Saturday, and The Container Store and West Elm rather than Home Depot and BB&B.

Taxi Stories II
Filed December 13, 2007 2:41 PM.

He picked the guy up in front of Veselka, on the Lower East Side. Fat, bald, just past middle age. Clearly Eastern European, and completely drunk.

Hey, guy, where are you going?

No answer.

Guy?

Snoring from the back seat.

He pulled over the cab, came around back to wake the man up.

Hey buddy, where are you going?

"Take me New York!"

You're already there.

"TAKE ME NEW YORK!!"

This is New York.

Confused: "What? How I get here?"

Taxi Stories
Filed December 12, 2007 2:52 PM.

[I talk to taxi drivers. I know most New Yorkers don't. But I'm curious to hear their stories, their thoughts on our city. Hence this new intermittent reporting series, relaying at least a bit of what I find out.]

The lady got in the back seat, thoroughly sloshed. It was shortly after 4:00 in the morning. They were at the southwest corner of fifty-fourth and eighth.

"Take me to fifty-fourth and eighth," she slurred.

They went back and forth a few rounds - he explaining they were already there, she (increasingly vehemently) telling him to shut up and do his job.

So he drove across fifty-fourth, turned down Broadway, back onto fifty-third, then up eighth. A perfect one block circle.

Which corner?

"The near right, please," she replied. Exactly where he'd found her.

She opened the door with some difficulty, leaned back to slip a twenty through the divider.

"Thanks," she said. "And keep the change."

Bus-ted
Filed August 20, 2007 1:11 PM.

Yesterday afternoon, I almost got in a fight with a bus driver. It wasn't an MTA bus driver, but rather the driver of one of the big blue double-decker tour buses, the kind that loop out-of-town visitors past the city's landmark.

The driver had stopped at a red light, then suddenly lurched forward into the crosswalk, almost killing a group of children crossing the street a few steps ahead of me. So, like any good New Yorker, I banged the bus' front window with my fist, told the driver he was a fucking moron and that he'd almost killed the kids, and suggested he get his head out of his ass to watch where he was going.

This, apparently, didn't sit well with the fellow. But as he was well strapped into his seat, I was two-thirds the way down the block before he managed to stick his head out the door to curse me in response.

Fortunately, I was at that point on my way back from brunch with Jess and her visiting sister Nina, and Jess managed to restrain me from returning to take up the driver's stream of street-fight challenges. Still, I suspect it was largely Nina who gets the credit for defusing the fight. Because later that afternoon, once Nina had boarded the Amtrak back home to Boston, some giant fat lady shoved Jess on the sidewalk in front of a store, and it was all I could do to restrain her from a similar throw-down.

We're small. But we're feisty.

Out of the Frying Pan
Filed August 7, 2007 6:20 PM.

I lived. My fingers survived. As did my sense of fast-improving cooking prowess. In fact, the teacher - a former professor at Le Cordon Bleu - even pulled me aside with a couple of the other attendees, to assign more advanced homework for the week:

First, find a wine we buy frequently, and create a dish to complement it. Second, roam the Union Square Greenmarket in search of a vegetable we'd never before tasted, then use that as the basis of a second dish to pair with the first.

While reports on both should follow, tonight, according to Jess' and my Tuesday tradition, we're taking advantage of the freshest fish day of the week, and heading out for sushi. Not to Mizu (our usual stop, and some of the best bang for the sushi buck in the city), but to Matsuri.

The sushi there is a step down in quality, and a step up in price, but it's also far closer to the Highline Ballroom, a concert venue where we'll be catching Julian Velard and the Groove Collective later in the evening.

Tomorrow evening, I'm teaching at CrossFit NYC, my parents come into town, and one of Cyan's investors is passing through. And the week gets busier from there.

Which makes me, as ever, wonder why - unlike most of Europe - we don't get to take of the entire month of August. Or, in my case, even part of it. Because I could sure as shit use a break.

Fetch Me Some Depends
Filed July 17, 2007 6:13 PM.

Twenty-seven went out with a bang. As the manager of Russian Samovar said, closing the bar on my Saturday night birthday party, "your friends, they drink like little horses."

Which is true. But I fit right in, having drank like a horse this weekend myself, Thursday through Monday, evenings and afternoons.

Five straight days of dubious sobriety. After which, I woke up this morning, the second day of being twenty-eight, made it out the door largely because Jess literally dragged me behind her, and got on the subway thinking:

No, seriously, I'm really getting too old for this.

Chicken Soup
Filed July 9, 2007 1:18 PM.

[I am a story repeater. Mainly because I have terrible, terrible memory for what I've said, when, and to whom. But also because some stories are too good to give up.

So, though I briefly blogged it in the past, though I recounted it on the first episode of my and Sarah Brown's podcast, when Chicken Soup for the Twenty-Something Soul contacted me for a submission, I had no choice but to retell my infamous beans-throwing date.]

Shortly after I moved to New York City, I met a girl at an art gallery. She worked for the gallery, I was there for the opening of a friend's show, and we hit it off making jokes about the snottier-looking patrons.

I asked her out on a first date. To play things safe, I pushed for early evening drinks. That way, if the date went badly, I could keep it short; if it went well, I could *still* keep it short, end on a high note, and leave her wanting more.

Fortunately, the first date - at a Gatbsy-esque bar in Midtown - went off without a hitch. So it was with high hopes that I headed to our second date, dinner at a trendy Mexican restaurant on the Upper East Side.

That date, too, started strong. Until the waiter didn't bring us our basket of chips quickly enough.

"This is ridiculous," the girl exclaimed. Ridiculous? We were talking about *chips*. No big deal.

But to her, apparently, it *was* a big deal. So, after two or three more chip-less minutes, she got up, found the waiter, and yelled. Then, for good measure, and at ever-escalating volume, she found the manager and yelled at him, too.

By this point, it was immensely clear that my date had absolutely zero relationship potential. I had somehow found the highest maintenance girl in all of New York City. But I vividly remember thinking, "I'm out of college, I'm an adult now; I should at least be civil, and make it through the rest of the evening."

I thought, perhaps, that a round of margaritas might help calm things down.

I was wrong.

By now, of course, the waiter hated us. My date had yelled in his face, had gotten him in trouble with the manager. So, not surprisingly, he was a bit rude. To which, in response, my date was even ruder. Over the course of appetizers and a few more drinks, the situation continued to devolve.

The waiter delivered our main courses with a snide comment. My date said something in reply. Back and forth they went, until something he said crossed her final line.

My date picked up her plate of beans. And threw them at the waiter.

She was seated on my left, the waiter stood to my right. So the beans flew, as if in slow motion, right in front of my face.

I remember wondering, beans mid-air, what might happen on impact. Would the waiter punch her? Punch me? Throw something back, leaving me smack in the middle of a giant food fight?

With a splat, the beans hit, and the world caught up to speed. The waiter, however, didn't. He stood there in shock, a mass of pintos slowly dripping down the front of his shirt.

My date stood up.

"Well, I never!" she declared. And she walked out.

This was a small restaurant - maybe twenty tables. By this point, every single patron was staring at me.

"Get out!" the manager bellowed. "And never come back."

Mortified, I backed my way slowly across the floor, apologizing profusely - to the waiter, to the manager, to anyone still willing to make eye contact.

I opened the front door, stepped outside, and found the girl standing there, fuming.

"Well," she said, "where are we going next?"

At which point, I turned, and started running down Lexington Avenue as fast as I could. And I still remember thinking, finally looking back over my shoulder a few blocks later, "well, at least she doesn't have my phone number."

Lunch Bell
Filed May 23, 2007 1:54 PM.

I can always tell I've gone too long since breakfast when the wafting deep-fryer fumes from the Taco Bell just outside my office window start to smell really, really good.

Zip It
Filed April 30, 2007 1:48 PM.

Leasing a car:

Lease, Honda Civic: $225
Auto Insurance: $265
Garage: $280
Gas: $100

Monthly Total: $870

Zipcar:

4 x all day Saturday & Sunday: $680
8 x 3 hours weekday: $190

Monthly Total: $870

Far Flung Foodie
Filed April 16, 2007 3:28 PM.

A month or two back, walking with Jess through Central Park, we passed through Time Warner Center on our way back home. And as we needed to buy a few ingredients for dinner, we headed downstairs to Whole Foods.

A mere eight blocks from our apartment, that Whole Foods had still, previously, seemed needlessly far to go for groceries. But, perusing produce and inspecting butchery, it became clear that Whole Foods' foods were indeed wholly better, quite possibly worth the trip.

So, since then, we've been buying food there. But not all our food, and not our non-food items. Because, for many basics, the price difference for the same thing at any of our more local supermarkets seems too offensively large for me to stomach. And also because, for countless other items, such as plastic cups or Coke, the only available Whole Foods versions appear to be made entirely of hemp.

Of course, as soon as you diverge from the American supermarket model, from the idea that the best way to buy food is to have it all collected in one central place, you instead begin sliding down the slippery slope of preferring quality, and of consequently convincing yourself that shopping three different places for a meal isn't any crazier than two, which isn't so much saner than four, then five, etc.

Pretty soon, aided and abetted by the (aside from this weekend) warming weather and your central location, you find yourself, Sunday afternoon, not only at Whole Foods but also the Food Emporium and Amish Market and Duane Reade and that place with the good cookies on Ninth Avenue and the mochi ice cream you can pick up the next afternoon at the place near your office and also don't forget to stop at the Stiles Farmer's Market while it's open because they have such great local produce for so cheap.

And the worst part is, it self-reinforces. Because, after all that walking around, you're so completely starved that the foods you've assembled from across the City taste like - whether or not they really, actually are - the best you've ever eaten.

Herbed
Filed February 28, 2007 5:42 PM.

About a month ago, Jess bought a white plaster planter shaped like a lion off of eBay, which (in case she's reading this site) I totally, totally love, despite any earlier comments I may have inadvertently made to the contrary.

Anyway, it became pretty clear that the planter looked naked without a plant, so, also about a month back, we headed down to the Chelsea Garden Center, which actually isn't in Chelsea, but in a strange shed of a building way, way out in the westernmost reaches of the Garment District. And, while we were there buying a small Dragon's Blood tree (which, sadly, is far less Harry Potter than the name might imply) it also occurred to me, looking at the bags of potting soil, that I hadn't repotted my little jade tree in the five or six years I'd been living in New York.

The jade tree came from a clipping of a much larger jade tree in the atrium of my parent's house in California, which in turn came from a clipping of another much larger jade tree in the atrium of the house of my mother's graduate advisor at Stanford. And, given its long and illustrious lineage, I figured my jade plant was well worth a bag of potting soil. So, I bought one, and handily replanted the jade.

After which, I was still left with 95% of a very large bag of planting mix. I discovered at about the same time that I had left a clove of garlic on our counter long enough (about this, I am not proud) that it had actually started to sprout. So, I took a couple of plastic containers, filled them with the leftover mix, and planted three of the sprouting cloves.

And, lo and behold, they started to grow. Excited about this - as it brought back happy memories of the farm on my elementary school (which is a whole other blog-able set of stories, actually) - I then headed onto Amazon, and purchased an herb garden planting kit, hoping to round out the blossoming garlics with oregano, basil, rosemary, dill, and anything else that might thrive at windowsill.

And though we still need to find another, hopefully non-lion (not that I don't love, love, love that lion if you're still reading Jess!) planter to contain it all, and though it still has a bit more growing to do before the tiny plants would well handle the hop into new plantered soil, my little garden is growing. Bolstered by the jade's strong example, I don't doubt it will continue to thrive.

Which, until the spring comes and I can once again wander through Central Park, is as close to pretending I live somewhere far greener and more temperate than this city that I can get.

Doggy Style
Filed February 18, 2007 4:23 PM.

When I was about twelve years old, on the way back from a weekend of skiing, my family stopped at a pet shop in Calaveras County, and bought a puppy.

My brother and I were, of course, ecstatic. But, within a week or two, it became immensely clear that my father - allergic both to the dog, and to everything the dog would roll around in outside in our backyard - couldn't live in the same house without becoming a blearily red-eyed, constantly sneezing and coughing histaminic mess.

While we briefly contemplated getting rid of our father (an option for which my brother and I heavily lobbied), in the end, it was the dog that went, handed off to a happy family with kids my brother and I esteemed as far, far luckier than we. And ever since, my brother and I have both coveted the dogs of others and badly wanted ones of our own.

I'm reminded of this each time I head up - as this weekend - to visit Jess' family in Boston. Her parents own a Portuguese Water Dog, Pablo, who's less than a year old, sweet tempered, and exceedingly cute. At the end of each visit, Jess and I return to New York determined to get a dog.

By now, however, it's not the dictates of cruel parents, but of equally cruel landlords that prevent dog ownership - our building, like many in New York, doesn't allow pets. But, as we're likely to move regardless once our lease ends at the end of the year, Jess and I have put 'dog friendly' atop the list of requirements for potential apartments.

So, still, a bit of waiting. But I don't much mind. After fifteen years with my eyes on the furry prize, I'm sure I can hold out puppy-less for a bit longer yet.

Licensed
Filed January 15, 2007 2:57 PM.

They say it takes seven years to become a New Yorker. And though I've only been here for five and a half, I am now, officially speaking at least, a good step closer. As of last week, I no longer have a California drivers license, and am instead awaiting the mailed arrival of my first New York license.

Granted, this a step most people take within the mandated thirty days of arriving in a new state. But I've been lazy. Without a car, I've had no need to hit the local DMV, and California allowed renewal of my expired prior license by mail.

Of course, I've thought about getting a New York license before. In fact, shortly after I moved here, when September 11th hit and I was living a half block from the UN, I took to carrying my telephone bill in my pocket so police officers would let me through UN barricades and back to my own apartment. And it occurred to me then that I should probably make the license switch to something bearing my actual address.

So, in September 2001, I printed the requisite forms out online, and put them in a folder atop my desk. Where, I am ashamed to say, they sat for the five years since. Sat despite the desk itself having been twice moved to new apartments.

Perhaps the delay has been psychological, symptom of my conflicted feelings about abandoning my West Coast roots. Give up a California I.D., and, at least in some small way, give up my tie to California.

I don't know if I believe that less now, or if I just feel a bit more ready to declare allegiance to this city. But, for whatever reason, at the end of last week, something snapped. Enough seemed enough. I picked up the folder, headed to the DMV License Express, sat, sat, sat, sat, had a bad picture taken, filled out some forms, only winced slightly when they stapled my yielded California license to those forms, and walked out the door with a bona-fide, verified NYS Department of Motor Vehicles Interim License (as the piece of folded paper proudly proclaims).

New York, New York. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere, indeed.

You're Taking the Couch
Filed January 2, 2007 11:24 PM.

With Jess now fully moved in, we seem to be facing the imminent arrival of a third, phantom roommate: Jae Chang. I have no idea who Jae is, but his Wall Street Journal has begun appearing on my doorstop, and his bank statements in my mailbox. I'm not sure if he, himself, intends to make an appearance, though the management office assures me they haven't double-booked the apartment and that such an occurrence should be unlikely.

Which is good. Thus far, two has been excellent enough to make three, proverbially, certainly a crowd.

The Tipping Point
Filed December 28, 2006 11:26 PM.

A few weeks back, a card slid under the door of my apartment, wishing me Happy Holidays, and listing out the twenty-seven people who work in my building. That's right, twenty-seven. Six doormen, eight porters, seven handy-men, etc., etc.

The message was clear, and it wasn't that those twenty-seven people were sincerely hoping I was enjoying my December.

In any other area of my life, I pride myself on being a big tipper. It costs relatively little in the grand scheme of things, and I feel happily magnanimous any time I give a cab driver an extra two dollars, tip a waiter beyond twenty percent.

But in this situation, I felt a bit odd. I knew five or six of the folks on that list, and had never even seen, much less interacted with, most of the rest. Did I therefore just assume that those unnoticed people - say, security guards I'd never found about at even the darkest hours of the night - were still providing some secret yet equally valuable, tip-worthy service? Did I consequently dump my holiday tip wad into one undifferentiated pool? Or did I fork over the bills more strategically, rewarding those I knew, those who had actually improved my life in some way over the past year, and - more selfishly - those who might remember the tip as having come from me, and treat me accordingly through the year ahead?

On top of that, I wondered, how much was I talking about here? Scouring the web, I found building staff tip recommendations ranging from $50-100 a head. Most, however, seemed to refer to places with four- or five-person staffs, rather than for a giant apartment coterie such as mine, where such tipping could total nearly three grand.

In the end, and after much angsting, I split the difference: I tipped very well he five guys I knew, tipped more modestly the super and the rest, and overall still probably spent enough to rent an apartment for much of the year in any less ridiculously priced part of the country. Even so, alongside the smiles I'm receiving from those happily tipped folks, I'm also bracing myself for whatever quiet retribution their more cheaply rewarded brethren might devise.

Mainly, however, I'm just jealous of the old, crazy guy down the hall. Sure, he might be totally batshit. But I suspect he pleased the staff immensely with tips of buttons and sticks of chewing gum. And, at this time of year, that's peace of mind no amount of sanity can buy.

Hot & Cold
Filed December 11, 2006 1:18 PM.

Winter is finally upon us, with temperatures this weekend dropping to windy low twenties. Which, as I'm reminded every year, is actually very, very cold. Especially if you're a total pansy who grew up in temperate Northern California.

Indeed, fair Palo Alto prepared me little for life in this city, where each year swings from icily frostbitten January to steamy, sweltering August, and back again. Oddly enough, even the temperature of water out of New York faucets is far more extreme - the hot literally scalding, the cold glacially chilled from miles of subterranean, sub-subway travels. It's something I remember from my many visits while growing up, and something I painfully relearned in my last apartment, where the shower spray swiftly and continuously swung each morning forty degrees in one direction and then the other.

Fortunately, the shower in my current apartment is rather more stable. But Jess, who may be made of asbestos, tends to leave all faucets cranked to their steaming peak heats. That isn't all bad, though: boiling water averaged against bitter outdoor freeze apparently leaves me somewhere near that Palo Alto middle ground my wimpy senses still seem to expect.

Insider
Filed November 30, 2006 10:52 PM.

Fending off a cold, and still recovering from week after week of travel, I'm looking forward immensely to a weekend of chicken soup on the couch as rain pitter-patters on my apartment's windows.

It doesn't take much to make me happy.

Alive
Filed October 11, 2006 3:22 PM.

Just a quick note to any family and friends who may have heard the breaking news that a small plane just hit a building on the Upper East Side, to say that I'm alive, David's alive, my girlfriend's alive, and all of Cyan's employees are alive.

Back to work.

9/11
Filed September 11, 2006 2:51 PM.

Five year anniversary. Headed to the roof with my trumpet, played Taps facing downtown. Read the Mourner's Kaddish, a hebrew prayer of remembrance. Never forget.

Expedition
Filed August 27, 2006 3:09 PM.

About a year back, I was struck by the idea of walking Manhattan from tip to tip. Foolishly, I shared this with my long-standing friend Jenny, who liked the concept enough to actually agree to do it with me.

The trip is 13.4 miles as the crow flies, and closer to 15 along any walkable route, which should have led either of us to conclude that's more than anyone is meant to walk in an afternoon. But, as Jenny recently won the New Jersey marathon, she's clearly missing the part of her brain that tells her to stop after hoofing some reasonable distance. In my case, I have no other defense than that I'm a complete idiot.

So, yesterday, just before noon, we headed up the 1/9 subway line to the 215th Street stop. Yes, the 215th Street stop. Apparently, Manhattan has lots and lots of streets. And nearly a third of them are below Houston, once you run out of numbered ones.

Nonetheless, we subwayed up, and we started walking back down. At first it was along streets like Nagle and Isham that I'd never even heard of before, much less realized were major thoroughfares on this island where I live. In upper Inwood, the Siberia of Manhattan, we passed stores selling live chickens, and stopped to use the bathroom at a McDonalds where I was nearly unable to purchase bottled water, seeing how none of the people behind the counter spoke English.

We trekked through Washington Heights and saw adds for sodas (Energy 69!) that absolutely don't exist below 125th St, and arrays of dresses on sale in front of small shops for under five bucks a piece. Then down through Harlem, where we passed McDonalds and Papa Johns' on every other corner, trekking all the way to Morningside Heights and the top of Columbia before we spotted our first Starbucks or sushi joint.

By the time we'd made it to the Upper West Side, we were less than halfway, and already looking rough. The day was overcast and muggy, we had sweated through our clothing, and we were possibly hungry, though too churned up from constant walking to want to actually eat.

Near the Museum of Natural History, we stopped in at my brother's apartment, where he handed off a pair of rum and Cokes like Gatorade passed to long distance runners.

A bit further still, at Columbus Circle, we decided maybe eating wasn't such a bad idea after all. So, we stopped at Bouchon Bakery in Time Warner Center, relishing the sitting even more than the first-class eats.

In Hell's Kitchen, I stopped to lance the blisters that had formed on the back of both of my feet, and to drop off an apparently unneeded, but somewhat pokey, umbrella hauled in my backpack. And then we got back on the road.

It was at about this time that I started trying to pansy out. I had several good ideas, such as subwaying down to the next-to-last stop then walking the final stretch. Or calling it for the day and picking up the second half of the trek on a subsequent weekend. Both, I reckoned, qualifying as tip-to-tip travel, at least with explanatory footnote.

But, Jenny, being far more used to motoring mechanically through such minor problems as excruciating knee pain, kept us moving ahead. By this point, clearly neither of us were enjoying the walking, though we had reached a point of sufficient delirium that we were still happily laughing through it, talking loudly about people we passed and wondering what they might be making of our bedraggled, foot-shuffling duo.

We walked through Chelsea, the West Village, SoHo, and TriBeCa, though by that point my recollections are largely a blur. I do recall stopping at a firehouse, ostensibly to get an estimate of remaining distance, though mainly so Jenny could put the moves on a cute firefighter.

We kept walking. Down past Ground Zero, through the financial district, and, limpingly out to South Ferry. By 6:15, we stood looking at the Statue of Liberty, wondering why we didn't feel accomplished and elated so much as in need of somewhere flat to lie down.

The South Ferry stop on the 1/9 was closed. So, one foot placed gingerly in front of another, we walked back up a bit, staggering down into the Whitehall subway station, then slumping into the seats of an uptown R train.

Back at the top of Times Square, I saw Jenny off on her ride further uptown, headed home, showered, then went back out the door. And while dinner at Blue Smoke and drinks at Pete's Tavern were both excellent, it's nearly a miracle I made it ambulatorily from one to the other.

This morning, scuttling plans for vacuuming on the grounds that it involved even small amounts of moving around my apartment, I instead searched online to price out Rascal and Jazzy scooters. If I ever walk again, it will be too soon.

Good Day, Sunshine
Filed April 30, 2006 8:19 PM.

With the spring sun once again radiant atop the New York skyline, I spent this afternoon wandering the streets, mainly observing, in store window reflections, that I am exceedingly, cadaverously pale.

I am, by nature, a light-skinned person - having inherited my coloring more from my red-haired mother than my oft-mistaken-for-Italian father. But, after a winter spent in New York City, blanching under the glow of overhead fluorescents, I've moved well past past 'fair', and into 'look kids, there's Casper!'

Still, there's more than just vanity behind my concern. Research seems to indicate that being tan is actually good for your skin, whereas it's getting tan, and particularly getting tan fast, that's particularly dangerous. And as, during the summer, I'm likely to be spending long hours on at least some days under beating solar rays, I'm hoping to ease myself in, rather than scorch to lobster on a first extended outing.

So, over the course of the next few weeks, I've been trying to engineer my schedule to allow for at least short periods of daily time in the sun. And, equally so, trying to schedule them as, say, shirtless morning jogs; having learned from past years how permanent a base my first spring sun forays can leave, I'm eager to avoid a repeat of one year's redneck-ready farmer tan.

Mainly because I realize I'll eventually want to hit a beach. And I don't own nearly enough NASCAR-logoed bathing suits to back up the look.

Loopy
Filed March 18, 2006 6:05 PM.

As I've written about in the past, people tend to tell me things; taxi drivers in particular. This morning, for example, on the way back home from brunch in Chinatown, one told me this:

At about 5:00 in the morning, a young woman flagged him down at the corner of 56th and 7th.

"Where to?" he asked.

"56th and 7th," she replied.

As he tried to point out that they were already at 56th and 7th, it became quickly clear that the woman was exceedingly, belligerently drunk. So, after a few minutes of slurred excoriation, the driver shrugged and told her to buckle up. He drove a block down, a block West, a block up, and a block back East - a perfect one block loop.

"Which corner?" he asked.

"Near left," she replied. The exact same one on which he had just found her.

The fare was the morning minimum: $3. She handed him a $10.

"Keep the change," she said, "for getting me here so quickly."

Synchronicity
Filed February 28, 2006 9:06 AM.

I was in the Delta Grill for a business lunch yesterday, talking about films Cyan had recently acquired, and about other films we were still trying to chase down, like the great Slamdance documentary Holy Modal Rounders - Bound to Lose.

And just as the description "like a non-fiction Mighty Wind" came out of my mouth, the front door directly across from me opened, and in walked Michael McKean.

[Bemusedly Shaking Head]
Filed January 9, 2006 11:04 PM.

Why, in short, I'm not a member of the Yale Club of New York:

“Blazers & Bling” All-Ivy Dance at The Yale Club

Friday, February 24, 9:00 pm - 1:00 am

The Yale Club turns into a nightclub for an evening of preppy fabulous fun. Roll up in your Benz to the Tap Room where young members from the Ivy League circuit will be chillin. Once (and if!) you get past the velvet ropes, the DJ will be spinning four hours of hot tracks to get your freak on. Early birds are in for a treat since Patrón Tequila is sponsoring a complimentary open bar until 10:00 pm. Starting with the Patrón Spirits Company will make your night “Simply Perfect.” Beer, wine, and soda are included throughout the night along with other discount drink specials. If you dare, don your Prada sunglasses in the roped-off VIP area, where bottle service will be available for big spenders. Complimentary hors d’oeuvres including cheese and chocolate fondue are included. The cost is $30 in advance or $40 at the door, cash only, at the bouncer’s discretion, open only to Ivy Club members and their guests (Club I.D. required). Bring five of your friends and you come free. The dress code is “preppy fabulous,” so wear your best blazer, status denim, and iced out jewels to rock Club YC. Dressed to the 9’s in your finest Louis Vuitton or Lilly Pulitzer, be prepared to dance the night away on Vandy Avenue. Word up, you Ivy playas…

Sadly, I'm not making that up.

Back Together Again
Filed January 9, 2006 6:03 PM.

Since I first noted the slow disintegration of my cherished possessions, household entropy has continued at a distressing pace, spreading to, apparently, pretty much everything I own.

By now, the list of items that have broken at some point in the last two-and-a-half months includes:

Overhead kitchen light
Shure E4c headphones
External computer monitor
Desk keyboard drawer
Dishwasher
Plasma television
Treo 600
Cordless land-line phone
Folding music stand
Bathtub drain

And though my first attempts at home repair ended rather poorly, today, I think, I finally stemmed the tide. Armed with a slew of hardware store odds and ends, I managed to piece my desk back together, and to clear out my bathtub drain, albeit not without shedding large amounts of sawdust snd chemical-infused water throughout much of my apartment.

With my landlord stopping by tomorrow to fix a few of the remaining items, and with exceedingly kind gifts and hand-me-downs on their way from my parents, friends, and relatives, I should, shortly, be back to square one.

In other words: I'm ready to let the next round of falling apart begin.

Weathered
Filed November 18, 2005 6:55 PM.

I remember, as a kid, being endlessly fascinated by vertical cutaway maps of the miles beneath New York City. Layer after subterranean layer, the parking garages piled atop subways atop water mains atop the electrical grid. I loved that each layer seemed to exist in silent parallel to the ones above and below. That each was its own little world.

I thought of those maps again this afternoon, climbing down the stairs to the C/E subway line. While the day's suddenly wintry air whipped along the sidewalks above, thirty feet below, the stop was still, luke-warm, stale. And, as I passed into a waiting subway car, I hit yet another little weather system. Though, during the summer, the subways are brisk, ventilated by strong air conditioning, now, as the heaters are just put back into use, each car bakes slowly in its own languid cloud.

Nine years after coming East from Northern California, I'm still a bit unused to these manufactured ecosystems. Growing up, we had no air conditioning, only ran the house's radiant heat during wintry nights. The difference between temperature indoors and out was usually, quite literally, a matter of degree.

But here, on the East Coast, the little worlds we create seem to operate in complete divorce from/ the larger one surrounding them. In the midst of summer, as humidity threatens to turn spontaneously into midair raindrops and the mercury clears 100, we push air-conditioners to full throttle, toting sweaters to the office to wear over short sleeves. In winter, we bundle layer upon layer to brave snow-bound treks, only to enter homes and stores so blisteringly heated we strip to near our skivvies the moment we clear the door.

Which, for years, always struck me as rather strange. But, today, as I rode the subway and thought of those cutaway maps, started to make a bit more sense. New York, after all, is nothing but a collection of separate little worlds, of sewers and cables and subways below, of streets and buildings and even taller buildings above. And while each might be intimately intertwined with the others, with so many all wedged in to such little space, we've no choice but to pretend they're all separate, parallel, self-sustaining. No choice but, as the wind howls outside our windows, to crank the heat to full high in our little apartments, tied so tightly to the millions surrounding us, yet desperately, willfully, setting ourselves apart.

Things Fall Apart
Filed October 28, 2005 5:34 PM.

In the past few days, my physical belongings have been self-destructing at an alarming pace. The right earbud on my Shure E4c's stopped playing. The screen on my Treo 600 suddenly developed rainbow stripes, and ceased responding to touch. And then, this morning, with an alarming thud, the keyboard drawer fell clean off of my desk.

Which, in short, has left me more than a bit paranoid: avoiding walking under light fixture or sitting too close to my heavy bookshelf. I may not have a clue what's about to come down next, but I'll be damned if it takes me with it.

Sweater Weather
Filed October 3, 2005 6:35 PM.

Normally, trips out to the Bay Area leave me with a severe case of climate chagrin. With New York drippingly humid, or frigidly icicled, Palo Alto weather mocks me with its comparative moderation.

But, this time of year, for a month (or, in good years, two), New York weather miraculously pulls ahead of Palo Alto's, passes nearly through perfection.

Right now, back in NYC, leaves are turning, the air is cooling to a crisp, bright edge, a box full of wool knits waits to be unpacked from closet-top summer storage. And I can't wait to head home.

Was I the Only One
Filed September 30, 2005 5:18 PM.

who didn't get the memo that today was apparently 'sudden change over to fall weather' day?

Distanced
Filed May 15, 2005 5:07 PM.

Among the random topics on which Google deems me an expert is the important science of urinal etiquette. Which, for female readers, is essentially the code of conduct that dictates all men's room behavior: conversations stop, even mid-sentence, at the door; a veil of silence descends; eye contact - even oblique - becomes strictly taboo.

Apparently, this runs counter to female bathrooms, places where even inter-stall conversations are reportedly common. The reason, I've hypothesized, is men's rooms' total lack of physical privacy. Sure, urinal use might leave you, equipment in hand, shoulder-to-shoulder with a complete stranger. But so long as you both steadfastly refuse to acknowledge each other's very existences, you can continue on as if there's nothing unusual about the situation.

Recently, I've begun to suspect something similar is at work in much of New York life. Consider that most of us, for example, live in hundreds-of-unit apartment buildings, yet never meet more than one or two neighbors. Separated by acres of grassy space, the next-door Smith's sex life is a fascinating topic of dinner discussion; faced nightly with aural evidence of such, it becomes a bit too close for comfort.

Packed liked sardines into the can of our little island, we silently ride elevators and subways, elbow our way down crowded streets and supermarket aisles, and load full our iPods with hours of musical detachment. Were we to see the surrounding hordes as real people, rather than as obstacles on the noisy slalom course of city life, the constant empathizing required would fast run dry our emotional reserves. But create just enough psychological distance 90% of the time, and we're spared the ability to communicate and share with the people in our lives who matter most during the other 10%.

So, as summer tourist season rolls around, if you're planning to pass through New York City, if you love it as much as we do, and if you want to help keep the city moving seamlessly ahead: shut the hell up and leave the people you see on the street the fuck alone. It's the neighborly thing to do.

In the Details
Filed May 3, 2005 3:02 PM.

Good: When the subway pulls to a stop with the doors directly in front of where you're already standing.

Bad: When your ride home lasts two stops longer than your conversation with an acquaintance you just bumped into on the car.

The S-A Block Party
Filed March 20, 2005 11:03 PM.

With spring upon us, and barbecue season consequently at hand, I spent the afternoon thinking about neighbors. About how, in suburban locales, people often meet other people who live nearby. And about how those of us who live in bigger cities rarely do.

For example, despite having lived in my new apartment for over three months, I've so far met just three of the fifteen or twenty people on my floor; and I'm embarrassed to admit I no longer even remember those three neighbors' names.

But if the problem is bad in cities, it's even worse online. Each day, my referrer log racks up a slew of visitors, and - even generously assuming regular visits by friends, colleagues, ex-girlfriends and my mother - I can only account for a startlingly small percentage. In short, dear readers, I have no idea who the hell you are.

So, in a move that's either inspired in its community-building impulse, or insane in its likelihood of inspiring restraining orders, I'm fixing to change that, by inviting you to come one, come all to the very first Self-Aggrandizement Block Party.

On Tuesday, March 29th, at 9:00pm, I'll be parking myself in the back booth of B.B. Doyle's Pub & Restaurant, 302 W. 51st St. at 8th Ave., and I'm hoping you'll swing by to join me for a drink or three.

I'll be the guy with a rose in his lapel (who, more conveniently, also looks pretty much identical to his photo). See you there.

Culture Chameleon
Filed March 17, 2005 12:52 PM.

While I am, in fact, mostly comprised of Russian and Austria-Hungarian blood, you apparently wouldn't know it by looking. Warranting a guess, people place my roots all over the globe - France, England, Australia, any number of points throughout Eastern Europe.

And, of course, Ireland. Especially during the summer, when time in the sun combines with my mother's (and great-grandfather's) testarossan genes to bring out red highlights, to amber-tint my scruffy beard, people often assume I must have a few O'Malley's somewhere up my family tree.

So perhaps it should have come as little shock when, on my way out this morning, Bill, our building's day doorman, pulled me conspiratorially aside. How did I feel, he wanted to know, about everyone taking over our holiday? As a fellow Irishman, was I proud to see St. Patrick's picked up by the unwashed masses, or dismayed that a fine piece of our heritage had been thoroughly Americanized and altogether watered down?

Not wanting to burst Bill's bubble, I skirted the question, and said I at least intended to swing by the parade. He scoffed. The parade? The parade? He was sure, he told me, that my clan's forefathers would far rather I celebrated in true Irish style: heading off to a local pub for live Celtic music and uncounted pints of Guinness.

And while, so far as I know, those clan forefathers don't actually, in my case, exist, I still wouldn't want to disappoint. For today, at lest, whatever the facts of my roots, I'll be playing by plausible appearance alone. Today, I'll be as Irish as I can. By which I mean, working to live up to my favorite (and technically, only) Gaelic phrase:

"Ta me are meisce" (say "taw may air mesh-keh") - I am extremely drunk.

fishbowl
Filed February 9, 2005 8:37 AM.

Growing up in a California house full of skylights and glass walls, I'm a huge fan of natural light. Which is one of the biggest appeals of my new apartment: with giant windows running along the front of my living room, and along two sides of the bedroom, sun streams in, and I can stare out at the city bustle on the street corner below.

Only recently, however, has it started to dawn on me that a window, by definition, works both ways. In other words, while I can look out, people can look back in as well. Not the people on the street, fortunately, as I'm high enough up to be out of the line of sight of pedestrian traffic, but certainly the lawyers in the huge office building directly across 8th Avenue.

I tend to forget about the lawyers, as, most of the time, they seem to completely forget about me. Working from home, I have the general sense that I could tap-dance naked in front of my window and still not generate much interest.

But, as the lawyers seem to work far too many hours to sustain even the vague semblance of a nightlife, a window-side female invariably causes them to sit up and take notice.

In the last week or two, due to the string of excellent repeat dates, and a slew of equally excellent evenings drinking with close female friends eager to critique my apartment decoration efforts, I've had attractive females passing through my apartment more evenings than not.

So by now, at eight o'clock, the lawyers across from me start frequently glancing in my direction, scoping out the evening's potential for vicarious entertainment. I could, I suppose, draw the blinds (seeing as I'm not one, the contents of this site to the contrary, to derive real-life exhibitionist pleasure), but the evening city view is far too good to ruin for the sake of keeping out occasional stares from overworked drones I'm unlikely to ever actually meet.

Still, given the number of different girls that have passed through, and given the exceedingly unglamorous life I lead the rest of the time, I'm sure they've (rightly) determined I'm no 'new date each night' Cassanova. Instead, I suspect they're convinced I'm simply moonlighting as a pimp.

Never one to pass up a good opportunity, I'll therefore be picking up a set of dry-erase markers and scrawling my phone number on the office-facing window. While my visiting friends don't seem to mind being part of an ongoing faux-reality-TV show, I'm sure they'd be much happier if it was pay-per-view.

on the move
Filed December 14, 2004 12:33 PM.

I'm in. And despite having, after two weeks of vagrancy, returned to a spot less than two blocks from where I lived before, it still feels like a different world. I'm reminded of E. B. White's This is New York, in which he tells the story of a woman who moves five blocks uptown, heads to the butcher shop she's been frequenting for years, and finds the butcher crying tears of grateful joy: "You've come back!" he exclaims.

New York is an odd city like that, a place where, in any given few square blocks, you can find everything you need. Several hundred yards from my old apartment, and I've already shopped at a hardware store, a dry cleaners, a drug store and a supermarket other than the ones I primarily used over the last two years.

---

Another thing about the new apartment: it has doormen. Which, in the minds of most New Yorkers, is a big plus. I can have packages delivered, screen visitors with a live person rather than an intercom, and generally look swank. But, at some level, contrary to the apparent nature of this site, I'm an intensely private person. Which makes me vaguely distrust the whole idea of doormen; I don't like someone knowing when I come and go, and with whom.

---

Deja vu: Although the bedroom is a different shape, and the closets are slightly repositioned, the apartment is otherwise nearly identical to the first I lived in when I came to New York.

---

With the same layout, my old furniture, bought for that first apartment, would have been a perfect fit. Sadly, over two years of intensive roommate use, little of it was in good enough condition to justify carting in. So, once again, it's back to furniture shopping. And to frequent Bed, Bath & Beyond trips, where they still don't like people riding in carts on the shopping cart escalator. Apparently, the apartment has come full circle, and so have I.

empty nest
Filed December 1, 2004 9:44 PM.

After several days of packing everything I own into a vast array of small boxes, I'm out of the old apartment (the so-called 'Gotham Sugar Shack'), and awaiting the lease start of the as-yet-unnamed new. Depending, as ever, upon the kindness of strangers, for the next week I'll be holed up at 85th and 2nd, in the currently unused NYC pied-à-terre of my parents' Palo Alto next-door neighbor.

And while the Upper East Side feels foreign, the apartment itself is a strange bit of deja vu, laid out almost exactly like the one into which I'll be moving two weeks hence. The main difference is in furnishing: my current collection, having slowly decayed over two rough years of roommate use, largely stayed behind in the move, leaving me nearly furnitureless. The borrowed apartment, on the contrary, is fully decked, with exactly the sort of things I'd buy given more money and better taste - minimalist without being cold, designer without being pretentious.

Still, sitting alone in the apartment does allow me to imagine at least a bit of what my life should likely be once I move in to the new place. And, mainly, I feel oppressed by the quiet. It reminds of returning from sleep-away summer camp, as I did each August; after spending my nights in a bunk-filled cabin, packed like sardines with seven or eight other campers, the solitude seemed unnaturally quiet. The sounds of snoring, of tossing and turning, of the fat kid's barely audible asthmatic wheeze - all the things that irked me while at camp, that kept me up through nights - now seemed to leave behind gaps once gone. Each year, it would take me a week or two to readjust, to once again come to love the soundless nights achieved by simply closing my door.

But, for those first few nights, the change was jarring - perversely missing the boisterous crowd, I'd wish that, at least for a bit of the evening, I could once again be overwhelmed by the obnoxious sounds of it all.

This time through, though, as strange as the blissful quiet seems, I'm not too concerned about painful withdrawal. If I need a quick dose of loud and obnoxious, there are bars at every New York corner, filled with rowdy drunks all through the night.

jinx
Filed November 22, 2004 12:01 PM.

In a combination of Thanksgiving family obligation and West Coast business meeting necessity, I'm in California through early next week.

Even three thousand miles from home, though, there seems to be no escape: last night, at Palo Alto's Rose & Crown pub, I struck up a conversation with the people at the next table, only to discover that they, too, were New Yorkers on a brief Thanksgiving jaunt west, and that they, too, live in Hell's Kitchen, literally just around the corner from my apartment.

Clearly, I'm much less original than I'd previously thought.

hep cat
Filed November 19, 2004 2:58 PM.

On the corner of 50th and 8th, I was stopped by an old black guy asking for a light.

Sorry, I told him; I didn't have one.

That's okay, he replied, pulling a bottle of whiskey from his jacket pocket, then offering me a drink. I declined.

But how could I refuse, he asked, when he was drinking to the memory of Ray Charles?

He was a piano player himself, he informed me, to which I replied that I play the trumpet. That stopped him for a second; closing one eye, he looked me up and down, then asked: play jazz?

My affirmative reply launched him into a street-corner test:

q. You know Clifford?

a. Sure.

q. Who play drums with him?

a. Max Roach.

q. What they play?

a. Joy Spring, Cherokee, Bouncing with Bud...

q. What key Joy Spring in?

a. F.

q. Sing it.

And so on. After about ten minutes, he closed one eye again, gave me a second up and down.

For a little white kid, he observed, you know your jazz.

Then he whipped a napkin out of his pocket, scrawled down a phone number and address.

We jam here, he told me, every Sunday from ten at night. Ain't got no little white kids yet, but if you can play jazz as well as you can talk it, swing on by.

Oh I will, I told him. Without a doubt.

movin' on out
Filed November 18, 2004 3:23 PM.

Despite normally being a quick and confident decision maker, when it comes to certain purchases, I am exceedingly over-careful. I blame this on my parents, who, before buying nearly anything, extensively research, unflinchingly field-test and compulsively over-analyze every single possible choice. To wit, they're currently replacing their bed - what should, traditionally, be a half-afternoon excursion - though something on which they've managed to spend the majority of the last few weeks. Having gone so far as to buy and return mattress candidates and to stock up on a vast array of bed-top paddings, by now, they're doubtless well enough versed to pen a collection of volumes on the particulars of pallet purchasing.

I bring this up in the context of my apartment search, which has so far taken me to look at nearly every single one bedroom in all of New York City. That's only slightly hyperbolic, as my viewing has taken me to nearly fifty potential replacements. After over-extended consideration, though, I finally managed to suck it up, make up my mind and sign a lease. A veritable bluebird of happiness, the new digs are just around the corner from where I live now. And I couldn't be more thrilled with them.

Except for one minor problem: my lease here ends, unextendably, December 1st. My lease there begins, inflexibly, December 15th. And while my attempts at negotiating that date forward did yield a free year's membership in the building's gym, it didn't budge the move-in date, by even a few minutes. So, for two weeks, I'll officially be homeless.

Wary of Franklin's admonition (that fish and house-guests stink in three days), I'm planning out those two weeks using as many friends' and family members' couches as possible, to spread the infliction of myself as thinly as possible. Even then, I'll doubtless chafe under the peculiarities of jumping into other people's lives and daily rhythms. My grandmother, for example, who lives down at 1st and 20th, has kindly volunteered her house for as long as necessary; due to her 5:00am wake-up time, however, I suspect my relatively nocturnal ways might literally kill me if I took her up on the extended offer.

So, with suitcase in hand, I'll be jumping from place to place, convincing myself that I don't really need the rest of my (soon-to-be) boxed and stored stuff. Which, I'm pretty sure I actually don't. And, even if I do, there's nothing like a stretch of urban nomadism to make me appreciate it all (sink-side suction-cup sponge holder! How I've missed you!) once I have it back.

take me home
Filed October 27, 2004 11:36 AM.

After two years of excellent parties and disastrous house-cleaning, my Sugar Shack roommates and I are headed our separate ways, leaving me, once again, on the apartment hunt. Having fallen increasingly in love with the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, I'm not likely to move far. And, fortunately, there seem to be endless no-fee one-bedrooms recently vacated within just a few blocks of my current 51st and 9th corner.

Less fortunately, it's clear why most of the former tenants moved out - for one reason or another, each apartment leaves more than a bit to be desired. But, if I learned anything from my two prior moves, it's that apartment hunting, like so many other things in life, is a numbers game. As I saw literally dozens of places before signing either of my last two leases, I've disallowed even fleeting moments of refrigerator-box-in-Central-Park despair until I've scoured at least thirty potential apartments this time through.

So, over the next few weeks, during all the spare spaces in my day, I'll be dropping by pre-war walk-ups and modern elevator buildings, buzzing supers and phoning in management companies. And, in the end, I'm fairly certain the pavement pounding will pay off. I don't mind the time spent at all, so long as it garners me the sort of apartment every New Yorker's looking for: one that inspires at least a little bit of hatred in anyone who finds out how little I'm paying for so very much.

vigilante justice
Filed August 31, 2004 11:54 AM.

On my way home yesterday afternoon, I passed a hot dog stand that regularly sits on our corner. A crowd of men in khakis and Polo button-downs was gathered around, each ordering up hot dogs - most with extra ketchup.

"How much per dog?" someone asked. The normal price: $1 even. But the guy behind the stand looked down at the Republican National Convention Delegate tags hanging around their necks, looked back up, and with only a slight small replied, "$2.50 a piece."

wisdom from tea
Filed June 29, 2004 4:02 PM.

Some things I've learned in my recent Coffee Shop spree:

1. Time from drinking an entire Venti China Green Tips Tazo Tea to needing to pee, really, really bad: approximately one hour, fifteen minutes.

2. Consequences of making a bathroom trip to relieve tea-full bladder: this being New York (and therefore, simply asking someone to watch my laptop not being a real possibility), having to unplug and pack up laptop, and - worse - having to sacrifice prime outlet-adjacent table space, all for that stupid ninety second trip.

3. Symptoms of therefore trying to tough my way through the increasingly full bladder (in order of chronological occurrence): frequent seat shifting, tapping foot spastically, pressing knees together, autistic-like rocking, cold sweats, burst bladder, unconsciousness, death. (Note: all symptoms after cold sweats projected rather than previously experienced.)

4. Time the hot girl who looks sort of like Pocahontas shows most days to work at the corner table near the front window: between 1:00pm and 2:15pm.

5. Number of times furtive eye contact has been made with Pocahontas over the past two weeks: countless.

6. Likelihood of me stopping being such a fucking pansy and just going over and introducing myself: frankly, not good.

7. Likelihood of me instead walking over to the table of Inconsiderate Cell Phone Guy, picking up his skim latte, and pouring it over his head: better than the Pocahontas odds to begin with, and increasing rapidly.

8. Strategic thought of the day: pouring said latte onto ICPG would be an excellent conversation starter with the lovely Pocahontas.

selling out
Filed June 27, 2004 12:59 PM.

About six months back, I discovered that I can actually be fairly productive. The thing is, I also discovered that I can only be fairly productive when removed from my desk.

Normally, I'm an inveterate multi-tasker. I can't do just one thing at a time, and, as a result, often end up doing too little of too many things to actually ever get any of them done.

The discovery, though, was that if I pull myself outside of my usual work environment (by parking in a coffee shop, or coffeeing in a local park), I can suddenly focus in on a single project and blaze away.

Based on that revelation, I became a regular at the Coffee Pot, a cute little independent coffee shop around the corner from my house. Then, after a while, I also started occasionally heading to Starbucks (around the corner in the other direction) - for variety.

But there was a problem. After a few visits, I realized that I actually liked Starbucks better than the Coffee Pot. And I felt oddly terrible about that. I mean, I always root for the underdog, and the long-standing Coffee Pot (by now, a Hell's Kitchen institution) was certainly the David of this fight, warding off the evil, multinational, McHomogenizing Goliath that is Starbucks, Inc.

I knew that, I really did. But the chairs at Starbucks were more comfortable, and the music was much, much better. The Coffee Pot played crappy local radio, whereas the Starbucks around the corner one afternoon cycled through a set including Lucinda Williams, Death Cab for Cutie, Clem Snide, Guster and Neutral Milk Hotel - none of which would ever, ever pop up on New York radio, despite having regular places in my own playlist rotations.

And then, of course, there was the broadband thing. As a T-Mobile customer, adding unlimited HotSpot service was relatively cheap, meaning I could stop into nearly any Starbucks in the city, pick up their wi-fi, and get to work. At the Coffee Pot, I'd used my cell phone as a wireless modem, and made do with the pokey dial-up speed. But after years of broadband, stepping back to (circa 1995) 24kpbs was more than a bit painful.

So, the chairs, the music, the wi-fi, it all added up. And by now, I'm a Starbucks regular who occasionally hits the Coffee Pot, rather than the other way around. Still, I have discovered that if I ask for a single tea bag, they'll give me a Venti tea for the price of a Tall. Sure, I feel like a douche-bag every time I say "Venti" to one of the baristas, but it's entirely worth it; I may still be shopping at Starbucks, but fifty cent discount by fifty cent discount, I'm doing my small part in sticking it to the man.

price check
Filed June 18, 2004 8:18 AM.

Sitting on the stoop yesterday with Colin and Yoav, we got to discussing FreshDirect. While Colin and I had both used the service heavily when it started out, both of us had fallen off it. Colin, who had just ordered from them again for the first time in months, was unhappy to see that they tacked on a $4.95 delivery charge - something they'd done from the start, though about which he had forgotten. Making matters worse, he wasn't even sure that FreshDirect was any cheaper than our local supermarkets.

And, in fact, neither was I, which is why I stopped using the service. But, to be honest, I didn't really have a clue - it just seemed like it might have been more expensive. So, in a bout of curiosity, I decided to investigate. I present the results here, in what Colin has kindly describe Manual Froogle:

Food	Fresh Direct	Food Emp.	Grist.	Amish Market	Stiles Market
Cheerios (15oz)	4.19	4.99	5.19	5.69
Milk (1/2 Gallon)	1.99	2.27	2.39	2.39
Jumbo Eggs (Dozen)	1.69	2.59	1.69	2.49	1.29
Salmon (per lb)	5.99	9.99	6.99	8.99
Rib Eye, Choice (per lb)	9.99	14.59	15.99	11.99
Chicken Breast (per lb)	4.39	6.59	4.99	5.49
Strawberries (16oz)	2.99	4.99	3.99	2.49	1.50
Bananas (per lb)	0.49	0.99	0.59	0.59	0.29
Navel Oranges (each)	0.49	0.74	0.99	0.69
Vine Tomatoes (per lb)	2.49	2.99	2.29	1.49	1.5
Haas Avocado (each)	1.99	2.50	1.99	1.79
Thom.' English Muffins (6 ct)	2.69	2.89	2.89	2.89
Tropicana OJ (64oz)	2.59	3.89	3.99	3.49
Progresso Chx Soup (19oz)	2.39	2.69	2.59	3.19
De Cecco Spaghetti (16oz)	1.19	2.19	1.5	1.98
Delivery Fee	4.95
Total	50.50	64.89	58.06	55.64

% Overpay		28%	15%	10%

As you can see, almost every item was cheaper at FreshDirect, except for two items on sale at Gristedes, and the few items I could pick up at the local farmers market.

Food Emporium, where I'm embarrassed to admit that, due to proximity, I'd been doing much of my shopping, came out by far the worst. And the Amish Market, which I'd always reserved for special occasion shopping, due to a belief that it was somewhat overpriced, actually came in second best.

Further, this seems to be a clear case of not getting what you pay for, as the steaks I've previously purchased from FreshDirect or the Amish Market (the cheapest two) were by far the best of the bunch.

So, there you have it. I will, undoubtedly, be returning to using FreshDirect regularly, as, even with the $4.95 delivery fee tacked on, it's the cost-effective choice, and, from my experience, delivers the best quality of the bunch.

Plus, I don't even have to get off my ass to do my shopping. That's what I call a win-win situation.

sabroso
Filed June 17, 2004 2:00 PM.

Having lunch at Iguana, a little Mexican restaurant in our neighborhood, my brother asked if they sold lemonade.

"Not usually," the waiter replied, "but today I will have the old man make it for you."

The old man? We contemplated this pronouncement for a few minutes until, lo and behold, a stooped and wizened old man, who looked to be at least ninety years old, ambled out of the kitchen with glasses and a teapot.

"I have made for you de limonada," he announced. "Choo has never taste limonada as good as dis in you life."

And he was right.

loquacity
Filed May 26, 2004 5:44 PM.

Given my verbose writing style, it should come as no surprise that - in real life - I'm a talker. And, frankly, I've been one for most of my life. My parents' frequently tell me that, during my first days at preschool, when asked if I wanted some crackers at snack time, I apparently replied: "actually, I think I'd prefer a croissant."

Still, despite my garrulous nature, I'm also fascinated by people. So I ask questions, and force myself to shut the hell up and listen. Amazingly, when people know you're really paying attention, realize you actually care about their answers, they'll spill the beans - even those beans closely held and rarely discussed. On an almost daily basis, I seem to hear, 'wow, I can't believe I just told you that; I haven't talked about that with anyone before."

Which, while often fascinating and flattering, occasionally leads to rather unexpected results. Last night, on a long cab ride home in the wee hours of the morning, I suddenly remembered an equally long cab ride, almost exactly a year back. That night, for about twenty minutes, the cab driver regaled me with stories about his childhood, about the psychological effects of having a father unable to truly express his emotions. By the end of the ride, I was the one thinking, "I can't believe he just told me that." Or at least that's what I was thinking when I wasn't focusing all my attention out the window, looking for a soft landing spot should he verge any further into serial killer territory, necessitating my jumping out of the moving vehicle.

transmogrification
Filed May 16, 2004 1:27 AM.

With summer weather now more or less upon us (discounting the chance spring shower), most of my New York hipster shoes have gone back into the closet for warm weather hiatus, replaced by the trusty California-boy standard flip flops.

Slipping them on, my gait changes immediately. My steps are easy, deliberate. And so my pace slows - I'll get there when I get there.

Gradually, the shoe shift makes its way up through the rest of my body. My movements become smooth, relaxed. The constant concerns crowding my brain step aside for thoughts dominated by the words 'dude' and 'rad'.

Work becomes less natural - the constant glow of the monitor no longer draws me, moth-like, to productivity. Instead, I catch myself looking to the window, where the bright sun beckons me outside.

I try and focus on the tasks at hand, but with the flip flops on, my brain is elsewhere, somewhere where I can feel coarse sand between my toes, cool salt-water on slightly burnt skin.

back on top
Filed May 12, 2004 3:05 PM.

When the building I live in was sold, about six months back, the new management company closed off the entrance to the building's roof deck, barricading the door with a rather threatening emergency fire alarm.

At first, we weren't entirely sure that the alarm was even activated, though shortly after it's installation, one of our building-mates, perhaps similarly uncertain, apparently decided to check, and for the balance of one fall weekend the piercing alarm rang continuously down our stairwell.

At this past weekend's Mothers' Day party, however, I met our neighbors two flights up, and mentioned missing roof access as weather the warmed, as I'd previously often headed up, laptop in hand, to bang out work. They, in turn, replied that, with a bit of MacGyver ingenuity, they'd managed to disable the alarm and bust free the roof-bound door.

So, once again, I have a roof patio. Once again, I have sweeping night vistas of Midtown and the Hudson River. Once again, I'm tremendously pleased with where I live.

in passing
Filed April 11, 2004 1:52 PM.

I'm walking back from the Easter concert, decked out in my nattiest pinstripe suit, gig bag slung over my shoulder. I'm looking down as I walk, smiling to myself about the surprisingly smooth performance. I look up - just in time to catch the eye of Jane Krakowski, heading the other way down 9th. She smiles, demurely looks away. I float the rest of the way home, harboring a new celebrity crush.

separate lives
Filed April 9, 2004 11:09 AM.

Aside from occasional lapses in house-care, my roommates are two excellent guys to live with. Fun, considerate, willing (at least most of the time) to pitch in on collective housework. And, most importantly, amenable to us all living parallel, yet rather separate, lives. Which isn't to say we don't hang out regularly. Just that, when we aren't doing something collectively, we each more or less let the other two do their own thing. The large size of our apartment (large, at least, by New York standards, having both two separate living rooms and a sizable eat-in kitchen) certainly helps, as we rarely end up all piled up in the same tight space.

Increasingly, however, that 'separate lives' philosophy seems to be yielding unintentional results. Throughout the last month, for example, a half-eaten slice of cake in a plastic takeout box has been sitting on the top shelf of our refrigerator. And though, to me, a month of refrigerator time would place most pastry well beyond the realm of edibility, I've left the thing sitting there out of consideration, assuming that whichever roommate it belonged to was saving it for some specific (elbeit hopefully non-gustatory) reason. Apparently, however, my roommates had been leaving the cake untouched for the same reason, each of us assuming it must belong to one of the other two. In fact, while we still don't know who the cake belongs to (or how it materialized in our refrigerator), we at least determined that it was safe to finally toss. Still, had one of my roommates not broached the subject in a joke about it while all three of us were in the same room, I'm completely convinced the thing would have sat ensconced on the top shelf for at least another four or five months.

Similarly, despite there being only three of us in the apartment, our shower rack now contains eight separate bottles of face wash. I'm entirely certain that only one is mine, and I'm also fairly sure that, even in their most metrosexual moments, neither of my roommates would purchase two kinds of face wash simultaneously, much less the four or five required to reach our grand count. Where did the extras come from? Can we get rid of them? Occasionally, while showering, I think of asking both roommates. But, really, why bother? We're happy living our separate lives, and we certainly have plenty of space.

freeloading the big apple
Filed March 29, 2004 2:32 PM.

As Times columnist Charlie LeDuff famously observed, "New York is a lot like a shit sandwich. The more bread you have, the less shit you taste." Sadly, with the cost of city living perpetually on the rise, that observation holds now more than ever. Which isn't to say, however, that our fair city can only be enjoyed with a wad of $100's in your back pocket. With a bit of ingenuity, and a willingness to depend on the proverbial kindness of strangers, anyone can live the good life in New York for essentially no money at all. 'How?', I hear you ask. Read on.

Step 1. Eating

Your first stop: high end grocers. The Amish Market, Whole Foods, the Chelsea Market - any of these is packed with enough free samples to make a meal. The secret to avoiding incurring the wrath of salespeople is to look genuinely intent on shopping. Carry a basket. Put things in. Eat some free samples. Take things out. Head back for more free samples. Voila.

Of course, sometimes even the cheapest of individuals feels the need to sit down for a meal. That's where churches and synagogues come into play. Nearly all are brimming with lunch discussions and potluck dinners. Proselytizing and pizza. Can't stomach the holier-than-thou moral integrity these people beam as you take their food? Head over to a twelve step program meeting instead. Plenty to eat, and certainly nobody ready to judge.

Once the weather warms, you can also pop into Central Park looking for barbecues. With a big drunken crowd of revelers, nobody's going to stop the one guy they don't completely recognize in line for a burger.

Bonus tip: looking for dessert? Ten cents will buy you a cone at your neighborhood ice cream store. Then simply request a taste spoonful of all 31 flavors. Compacted together, those little bits easily add up to one (deliciously free) full scoop.

Step 2. Drinking

Of course, real New Yorkers know that food stands well behind drink in the order of life, so you'll be pleased to hear that unpaid liquor flows freely throughout the city. Start the evening at a Chelsea gallery opening. Wander around, glass in hand, squinting thoughtfully at the carefully framed spray-painted sweat socks and the like. If a salesperson stops next to you, look slightly towards them, shake your head slightly, and say something like "intriguing..." That should buy you plenty of time to grab another glass.

If you're a mid-day drinker (or, as we in the know say, alcoholic), kill pre-gallery time at open houses. Scour the Times for any residence listed for more than $2M, then dress the part and bring a date. Free drinks (and, likely, freshly baked banana bread, to scent the house with domesticity) are yours for the taking.

Like to smoke when you drink? Well then Mayor Bloomberg's done you a world of good. No longer able to smoke comfortably indoors, a crowd of addicts has doubtless packed near the doors of whichever establishment you're frequenting. The brotherhood of nicotine, strengthened through months of such enforced outdoors huddling, means you can bum away with reckless abandon.

Step 3. Staying Fit

All that free food and liquor gone straight to your hips? Don't worry friend, because fitness can be had on the cheap in NYC as well. Your first path: trial memberships. Every gym in the city offers them, from one week spans all the way up to a free test month. With over 400 'health clubs' listed in the phone book, by skipping from gym to gym, you can stay fit well into old age.

But let's say you're the trendier sort, perhaps looking to do a bit of soul-soothing Yoga (to balance out the karmic wrongs engendered by all your freeloading). No problem! Just head onto Friendster (you knew it had to be useful for something) and search for the word yoga. There's at least a 50% chance that any females living in Williamsburg whose names pop up are instructors-in-training, looking to log teaching hours. Free private instruction, yours for the taking.

Step 4. Entertainment

Feeling fit, feted and faded from the past three steps, you're now doubtless looking for a bit of fun. Fret not, as New York is known around the globe for its excellent theater, attracting uneducated yokels the world over to things their simple minds couldn't possibly comprehend. This month, head over to the American Airlines theater about an hour after the crowds first file in, and you'll doubtless find a hearty Midwestern couple jumping ship at the first intermission, muttering about why this Pinter fellow can't seem to just tell a story. Ask them for their tickets, and as your daily good deed, point them to their hotel two blocks up Time Square, lest they wander all the way down to TriBeCa before realizing they don't have a clue where they are. Don't worry about the missed first half; most playwrights save the best for last anyway.

Looking for lighter fare? Loiter outside the city's larger movie theaters, looking for women in their early twenties wielding clipboards. They're recruiting for test screenings (a misnomer, as distributors really couldn't care less what you think) for pre-release films. Sure, there's a better than 50% chance whatever you end up seeing will star Ashton Kutcher, but it's free, free, free!

Step 5. Edification

Feeling a bit punk'd by your film, you'd best set out to feed your brain. Head over to Barnes & Nobles, which I encourage you to view as your free lending library of brand spankin' new books (with only small deposit required). In short, buy a book or two that seem interesting. Read them on your own time. Come back several weeks later and say, "I read these two books; they were quite good. But now I'd like to abuse your overly generous return policy to trade them in for two others." Repeat ad infinitum.

If timelier information is what you seek, head down to your neighborhood coffee shop, on weekdays after 11:00am, or weekends after 1:00pm. Copies of the city's countless newspapers doubtless lay strewn on the floor. With a bit of search, you might even find one in which the crossword puzzle hasn't already been partially filled in (erroneously, of course, and in ink).

Step 6. Utilities

Tired out, it's time to head home. Sadly, no tips on how to go rent free, as that pesky landlord fellow seems to get a bit snippy if you try. And don't even bother trying to stay with friends - New Yorkers have a nose for the sort of houseguest likely to overstay their welcome. You won't make it past the buzzer should you hit their front door with bags in tow.

Utilities, however, are a bit more flexible, at least so long as you're willing to whine your way to success. Free phone minutes, months of cable service, they're all yours to be had if you can put the fear of you leaving for a competitor into their customer service rep's mind. Complain, complain, complain. If you're a real New Yorker, it should come easily.

Step 7. Style

Caught yourself in the mirror while wheedling your cell phone company and realized your look's way out, did you? Then it's time for a bit of discount store arbitrage. Pop into Syms or Century 21 and stock up on discounted designer couture. Then train on out to the Nordstrom's at the Short Hills Mall, which sports a return policy even more generous than the Barnes & Noble kindness you previously abused. Enough cycles, and you've pocketed enough money to make the eventual purchase (from the initial discount store, naturally) more than pay for itself.

All dolled up, your unkempt 'do likely looks out of place. Happily for you, New York is full of hairdressing schools looking for victims, er, volunteers to help students hone their scissor skills. Still, word is out and New Yorkers are broke, so waiting lists have begun to spring up at most such establishments. If your mane begins to look too shaggy to weather the wait, I've also heard excellent things about the trainees at either of the city's fine dog grooming academies.

Postlogue
So, there you have it. With no money down, this little beauty of a city can be yours, all yours. Or course, at some point you'll likely realize that all the time spent trying to live on the cheap could instead be channeled more effectively towards such fruitful pursuits as, say, looking for a job, or marrying an investment banker. Even then, only enough scrill to swim through (a la Scrooge McDuck) will lift you into the holy grail of New York High Society. Think Eyes Wide Shut, though with women WASPy enough to write thank you notes.

[Word to Yoav "King of Cheap" Fisher, who helped brainstorm this piece while brewing coffee late yesterday evening.]

Saturday night zenith / nadir
Filed March 1, 2004 4:25 PM.

Highlight:

Walking back to my apartment, at about 4:00 in the morning, I pass a guy on my block standing next to the open door of his car, blasting hip hop into the night at top volume. A young woman, in pajamas, pokes her head out a nearby window to ask politely if he might turn down the volume. The guy flips her off. Before I can say something, her upstairs neighbor, a gentleman easily in his 70's, pops out his window as well, and, in true New York style, lets fly with a barrage of eggs. Car guy jumps into his vehicle and gets the hell out of there.

Lowlight:

After several rounds of drinks, one of the Cunningham dancers admits to having recently ended a ten-year relationship with her former high school calculus teacher.

"Why did you finally end it?" someone asks.

"I don't really know," she replies. "After a while, it just started feeling really derivative."

freeloading nyc
Filed January 26, 2004 6:14 PM.

A new addition to 'troublemaking' in the 'plus' section of the site, covering how to live the good life in the Big Apple, on the cheap.
_______________________________

like living inside a firetruck
Filed October 30, 2003 10:50 PM.

Over the past few days, my roommates and I have been busy prepping for our upcoming All Hallows Eve shindig, transforming our humble apartment into the Hell's Kitchen Museum of Curious Deaths.

Somewhere along the way, Colin suggested we paint one of our two living rooms red, and before enough common sense set in to stop us, we had picked up a few cans of "Lipstick Red" paint and a few rollers and brushes.

The results, I must say, are remarkably better than I expected. Observe Colin putting the finishing touches on the second coat:

103003 red room.jpg

We're so pleased, in fact, that we're thinking of turning the second living room blue. Eggshell begone!

easily pleased
Filed October 29, 2003 10:07 AM.

I must embarrassedly admit to a surprisingly strong feeling of accomplishment when a subway pulls up such that one of the doors opens precisely in front of where I'm standing.

honestly, i really should be batman
Filed October 25, 2003 10:14 PM.

Continuing my trend of playing superhero, I took a few punches this evening while stepping in to break up a fight on the A train between a drunk construction worker and a homeless panhandler.

For reasons that weren't entirely clear, the construction worker started swearing at the panhandler somewhere just below 42nd street; by the time we hit 34th street, they were chest to chest, screaming into each other's faces. As the rest of the passengers pushed back towards the far ends of the car to avoid the confrontation, I slowly inched my way up to the two, just in case.

At some point, the construction worker just started swinging, and after a few shots to the face the homeless guy basically crumpled. As the construction guy reared back for another solid John Wayne, I stepped in from the side, grabbing his collar and opposite sleeve in a solid underhook. With the momentum of his cocking back to throw the punch, I was able to push him backwards several feet, then brace well enough that I could keep him (despite his larger size) a few feet away from the homeless guy. After a bit of flailing at me, the construction worker seemed to calm down enough that I could keep the two separated until we hit the next station, at which point the homeless guy booked it out of the car, and I followed suit. Don't know what happened to the construction worker, though as several passengers that disembarked with me started relating what had happened to the station manager, I suspect he was pulled at the next stop.

Fortunately, the homeless guy got out with just a bloody lip and a black eye, and I left feeling no worse than at the end of kickboxing practice. As I headed up to the stairs, though, an older woman who had been on the car stopped me. "It was a wonderful thing you did back in that subway," she said, continuing "I would have jumped in to help you myself, but I didn't have anything heavy enough in my purse."

karmic circle
Filed September 24, 2003 11:03 PM.

While waiting to meet a friend outside the restaurant where we'd be having dinner, I ended up chatting briefly with a gentlemen visiting NYC from Arizona, recommending several tourist attractions as well as the restaurant at which I was about to dine (the lovely Caffé Linda).

Apparently he appreciated the suggestions, as when I asked for the bill, I was told the gentlemen had just paid for our dinner as well as his own on his way out.

searching doggedly
Filed September 18, 2003 11:12 PM.

New York is a city full of dogs. More than any other urban center I've visited, it teems with canine companions. Mornings and weekends, the streets are lined with a vast array of sizes and breeds out for much-needed walks, their poop-scooping owners closely in tow.

Each time I see one of those dogs pass, I'm inevitably struck by the similarity between the dog and its owner. Head to any park in the city, and the old claim - that people look like their pets - is immediately and empirically observable as true.

Which, over the past few years, has been a cause of slight distress to me. Because, while my current travel schedule and living situation don't easily accommodate a four-legged friend, I'd certainly love to pick up a pooch at some point in my not-too-distant future. And, frankly, I had no real idea what sort of dog would be my match. Obviously, such decisions beg the question of who does the adapting; do people start looking like their dogs, dogs like their people, or do both meet somewhere in between? Whatever the answer, it certainly seemed to me imperative to find a dog that might bring out the very best parts of myself.

So, this evening, while procrastinating on completing a major business document, I set out to wade through the furrier parts of the internet, searching for a breed from which I might one day draw a dog of my own. After several hours search (sadly, I'm not kidding about that time tally), I've settled upon the rather definitive answer: I am, apparently, a beagle person.

Beagles, it seems, are quick, clever, happy and curious, though fare rather poorly in obedience training, having an unusually strong sense of wanting to do things their own way. Small, slender and muscular, they need lots of exercise, bore easily if not mentally stimulated, and seem to have a knack for getting into trouble by following their nose.

Who knows. Next time I have work I'm trying to avoid, I might even set out to preemptively find some good potential beagle names.

bob and weave
Filed September 2, 2003 11:04 PM.

I'm endlessly fascinated, on rainy days, by the silent air-rights negotiations held, via hand feints and furtive glances, between people passing each other while holding umbrellas on crowded streets.

show a little leg
Filed July 6, 2003 12:29 PM.

After weeks and weeks of rain, the New York skies are once again a clear and (relatively) bright blue, with temperatures soaring to the mid-nineties. Meaning that, throughout the city, New Yorkers are busy wandering the sweltering streets in their favorite pairs of blue jeans.

Sure, anywhere else in the country, pulling out your trusty dungarees as the mercury pushed 100 would seem (at best) somewhat suicidal. But in New York, it's a way of life. To many New Yorkers, there is no temperature so high, no air so thickly humid, that it might justify the sartorial holocaust of baring their knobby knees, nearly translucent from a winter of nothing but sickly yellow indoor lighting.

But don't cry for us; we knew what we were getting into when we moved here. After all, New York has always been a city of form before function, a world fashion capital (vying only Paris and Milan) collectively obsessed with haute couture. Which, consequently, dictates a remarkably small number of acceptable summer alternatives to the denim standard: for young women, the classic a-line skirt; for gay men (or displaced Europeans), slides and capris; and for straight men such as myself, khakis, khakis and more khakis, as far as the eye can see (though only with flat-front and straight-leg; certainly never the pleated business-casual monstrosities filling your father's closet).

But what about shorts? I hear you say. Not bloody likely. You might as well strap on a fanny pack and a pair of Tevas (worn with socks, naturally), emblazoning "clueless Midwestern tourist" on your forehead and resigning to pitying looks of "why don't you just go back to your fly-over state, you mouth-breathing, NASCAR-watching troglodyte?"

With trucker hats on the out and out, however, and blue-collar chic in general on the decline, Williamsburg hipsters are busy searching for new ironic fashion trends, and I'd put even money on faux-tourist becoming the next big thing. So perhaps it is time to forget the NYC jeans tradition; it's the jean shorts that may be on the cutting edge.

And at the end of the day, of course, it doesn't really much matter what you wear, because we New Yorkers don't really have a clue what we're talking about. For all its veneer of cool, New York is a slightly desperate city: Millions of people wanting to be different, though only in the same way as everyone else. A horde of reluctant fashionistas, following trends not because we actually give a shit, but because we're terrified of looking like outsiders. Sheeplike followers desperately yet surreptitiously eyeing each other to make sure we haven't missed new and ever more cutting-edge trends.

So wear whatever the hell you want. But do it like you mean it. Exude confidence and a steely-eyed glint that says "if you don't realize how much better dressed than you this outfit makes me, you clearly need to renew your subscriptions to Paper, Nylon, Flaunt and Ocean Drive." Or just wear jeans; no matter how fashion-backwards you may feel, in New York City, a good pair of 501s will never steer you wrong.

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