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7/28/04
Do you know what sucks? Working five days a week like you're supposed to. And I'm only temporarily filling in at the ad agency library, and it's not super taxing or anything. I just don't like having to wake up early and be anywhere in particular on a daily basis. Oh, and I have my last class now, too. All day Friday and Saturday, so Sunday is my only free day. What a crock. Sunday, on my real birthday, I braved the new Atlantic Terminal mall opening. Jesus Christ. Actually it was almost exactly as harrowing as I'd anticipated. No celebrities, just lots of face painting (why do people equate painting children's' faces with celebratory fun?), a woman dressed like a princess, guys dressed like ringmasters on stilts, girls dressed like newsies (my personal favorite), a scrawny guy in a Spiderman costume who'd pose with kids for polaroids, and a band of guys playing steel drums. I only lasted about 20 minutes before succumbing to claustrophobia, it was shoulder-to-shoulder human traffic. Are people really this chain store deprived? Actually, shopping wasn't even a realistic option because maneuvering a cart or gaining access to shelves was impossible with all the gawking. Ooh, Advil. Dog food…wow, never seen that before. And I'm a little nervous because we did survey the Chuck E. Cheese's on the top floor and there was a line wrapped around a bunch of velveteen ropes inside and went all the way out the door.My planned party will be next Saturday, the first Saturday they will have been open. And I don't think they even serve alcohol, a stealth flask will be a necessary accouterment (I hope they don't frisk, you never know the weirdness that could ensue with a Brooklyn outpost of a beloved U.S. chain). Monday night I did my formal birthday dinner at brand new uber-chic Thai restaurant, Kittichai. I don't really have a strong desire to eat at of-the-minute, obnoxiously trendy and intimidating restaurants (like Spice Market, which I did for James's birthday in May), but I do like trying innovative and/or upscale takes on S.E. Asian food because I'm crazy fixated on the cuisine and use special occasions to check out what's going on at the higher end of the spectrum. I wasn't so concerned about the scene (apparently, it has been closed on Sundays so people like Alek Wek can throw parties), but had read an article in Saveur about Bangkok chefs (which isn't available online), and Ian Chalermkittichai, who is the chef at the Soho restaurant using half his surname. It's not the sort of food you really get in NYC, so I was curious. Anyway, the space is pretty in that minimal, design-y, zen way that boutique hotels seem to embrace (it had the same West Elm, but more expensive vibe as the place we stayed at in New Orleans, Loft 523, which wasn't even pricey, particularly compared to most of the spendy, cramped, overblown décor French Quarter hotels), the food was along the lines of Southern Thai Ceviche of Diver Scallops, Caviar & Lemongrass wrapped in an egg nest and Marinated Loin of Lamb with trio of eggplants, foie gras & Thai basil pesto. That sort of thing. I was pleased to order cocktail of calamansi juice (I told you the fruit was going to be the It citrus of 2004), coconut milk, Grand Marnier and Skyy vodka. I'd order drinks like that all the time if I didn't have issues with spending $11 on liquid. The most amusing aspect of the evening (apart from James sharing the rest room with Mario Batali) was being seated next to the May/December table. First, it was the classic couple: a 50-ish guy with a super tiny, large breasted, early-20s blonde who drove me nuts because she called the kaffir lime key lime. They were replaced by German equivalents. They were more subtle, the Euro female had simple, chin length brown hair and minimal makeup (and thankfully since she wasn't speaking English I couldn't deduce if she was mangling the pronunciation of ingredients). She was wearing a ribbed white tank top that covered her up to her collarbones instead of a low-cut lacy camisole top like the other trollop, but after sneaking a few glances, I did note that it was quite snug and that she also had quite large breasts in proportion to the rest of her. It must be nice to have a sugar daddy to woo you through costly coriander and lemongrass concoction. It sucks that that my much older boyfriend never, ever ate (seriously, he had some intestinal problem--the guy had a 27" waist). Anyway, I was going to briefly talk about New Orleans because haven't yet and my trip was already weeks ago, now. Our last moments in the city, packing and watching TV, were enhanced by the appearance of Bonnie Root in a movie on A&E. She's really haunting me these days. So, New Orleans was crazy humid and hot, cockroaches scuttle about on the sidewalk (you almost never see them out of apartments in NYC), everything is fried, and you can drink and smoke yourself silly for cheap. New Orleans feels like a real place, distinct and specific like NYC. Memphis could be anywhere, and to a lesser degree the same is true with Nashville, but New Orleans is totally itself. It's old and ratty and mixed-up, but cosmopolitan and un-judgmental too. I don't often see myself living anywhere (not that I love NYC, but I'm at a loss for adequate replacement options), but New Orleans could work, at least intermittently. It would be a great place for a second home (can you believe I just said that? I don't even have a first home. Which reminds me, on Sunday James and I also went to an open house, which I'd never done. We really only were nosy about this new construction, The Maritime, because it's only a block from our apt. and we've been curious about what it looks like inside. All these couples who were probably younger than us were all frenzied signing paperwork, calling their lawyers, and getting all wound up. And not to be a snot, especially since I have zero money myself, but the building was pretty blah, our apt. is nicer and considerably larger. If want flash and glitz, dammit. Saturday night, we drove by the much-protested Gretsch Building in Williamsburg, and saw this creepy Jessica Alba-ish creature dancing in front of her huge, curtain-less window while laundry was spinning in the background. Then a beefy, bald Vin Diesel-esque monster came up behind her. We were on our way to a party where everyone wanted to hear ghost stories. I thought the two luxury loft dwellers were haunting enough to merit ghost story status. My point is that if I could buy, I'd want a crazy-ass ostentatious apartment, no sad Brooklyn starter-condo next to the BQE. But apparently, it's the thing to do if you want to avoid the eventual dread and malaise that coats the soul after a bout of long-term Brooklyn living.) It seems like anyone I meet who's only a bit older and more established than myself has a weekend place Upstate or somewhere in Pennsylvania. Why not a second home in New Orleans? For the price of a mediocre one-bedroom Brooklyn apt., you could have a cute three-bedroom house. I couldn't live in New Orleans full-time, though. I might start feeling out of touch, but mostly I fear that I'd end up weighing 500 pounds in no time flat (to my horror, I recently discovered that I've gained about eight pounds since moving in with James. That's like two pounds a month, which must get nipped in the bud immediately [well, starting Monday, I need to celebrate my birthday this weekend]. See, I'm totally easily influenced by others, I can't say no to goodies when everyone else is eating them.) From a casual visual survey, that level of heft isn't all that rare (though New Orleans only ranks 21st just ahead of NYC at 22nd on a list of America's Fattest Cities. Detroit's the winner). There are some extremely large people in New Orleans. We ate at La Peniche, which was gayer than I recall from last time, I was the only female in the place. It was mostly fussy, middle-aged couples, but there were also a few police officers, bikers and young, super queeny types. It was a little freaky because they had a bar on the door (it's 24-hours) and would have to let you in, we noticed they had a knife next to the bar, which unnerved us a bit. I guess there had been robberies in the area recently. But I would say that one out of every three men they let in the door was morbidly obese, you know, not just chunky or even fat, but medical disability, handicapped parking obese. I'm the last person to talk about healthy lifestyle habits, but it was making me feel panicky watching them mindlessly, silently eating fried item after fried item, then smoking. I started wondering if there was one of those at work, it was so prevalent. (Um, I've always thought this fat encouragement thing was a little oddball, but "inflation," now that's just messed up. Especially since it seems to involve cartoons, particularly manga-styled ones.) So, in New Orleans we got to drive over the longest bridge in the world, see my childhood classmate in another made for TV movie, sample dill pickle flavored chips, go nuts eating pralines, po' boys, gumbo (and I'm not even that into Cajun food, it's that "trinity" of onions, bell peppers and celery that gets me. I could live a full life without ever eating bell peppers or celery. James and I decided that the secret roux ingredient must be dirt. Well, not really, but all the gumbo, jambalaya, etouffee, etc. has that swampy, earthy taste.) beignets, and generally grow closer to morbid obesity. Good fun. The only thing I shunned was sweet tea. I'm just not fond of sugary beverages. Lordy, enough of my yapping, here are some poor pictures to look at instead.

Me being 32 in front of a shower curtain (I'm wearing clothes).

7/22/04
I’ve been looking high and low for NYC denim shorts aficionados, but have (unsurprisingly) come up empty handed. Well, nearly. I did see one woman working the look in the Rockefeller Center F train station, but she was scrutinizing a hand held map. I’ve been getting worked up because the new downtown Brooklyn Target is slated to open Sunday, and on my birthday, no less. But all the wind was knocked out of my sails when I found out about the heinous beyond belief, invite-only opening party that took place last night. Is nothing fucking sacred anymore? I feel like I’ve been backstabbed by a good friend. I had been planning on throwing my birthday party at the new Chuck E. Cheese's that's part of this mall, but now I just feel empty inside. I'm afraid pizza and video games might not even ease the pain of turning 32 and knowing from here on out, it's all downhill. There'll always be a generation of young and younger hipsters born just to rain on your parade. I’ve started a new chain store review section to try and bring this whole shopping thing back down to earth. I’ll add juicy photos tomorrow, it’s almost 1am and I can’t find the stupid software for my camera.

7/17/04
I’m so bad with photos. I even bought a new 64 mb memory chip for my camera so I’d have plenty of room to take snapshots while out of town. But I doubt I took more than twenty photos and I haven’t bothered to download them yet (it’s a pain because my computer is old [though it’s only about a month old to me—periodically computers are trashed wherever James works, this is the third free one I’ve received, and he just brings them home] and the USB thing is somewhere on the back and I’m too lazy to mess with it). It’s just easier to describe things anyway, and besides I never get the photos I actually want because I’m more of a car traveler than a foot traveler, and I’m not inclined to stop and get out whenever I see anything of interest. And most things of interest tend to involve people, and I’m nervous about invading personal space, especially when the thing I might want to take a photo of is funny to me but probably not to them. So, here’s a rundown of things that struck me while away. I was surprised that Nashville and Memphis were so totally different, but I don’t see why not. They’re only three hours apart, but so are Portland and Seattle and people always think they’re the same and lump them together but they have their own (equally bland) personalities. Nashville is tiny, I mean the downtown is like three blocks, and totally country in a cowboy hat way. They’re all biscuits and fried chicken where Memphis is bbq and more bbq. Sure, there’s a cheesy, touristy component, but compared to Memphis it’s nothing. Memphis killed me and we were there less than 24 hours. Nashville seemed quainter, even though I was spooked by a news story about a guy in a car with his mom getting shot and killed for asking for directions in what seemed like a non-bad part of town. The part of that story I was fixated on was how the shooting took place on Lafayette St. and they pronounced Lafayette like LE fayet (does that make sense?) like Fayette rhymes with weigh it. I couldn’t wait to see how they’d pronounce Lafayette in New Orleans because I remember being disturbed last time I’d visited that they call Chartres St. Charters. They have this whole French history thing going, but they murder all the words in peculiar ways. And you have to say it like they say it or you look pretentious and stupid. It’s like the whole foyer or foy-ay deal. I say foy-ay, but that’s probably annoying. Memphis seemed like where you might get shot, not really Nashville. It’s not like in NYC where there are many situations where you’re the only white person around, but everyone’s accustomed to being around a mix of cultures where in Memphis it was like everyone had their distinct parts of town and you weren’t supposed to stray. I think New Orleans is actually worse that way, which gives the city this ominous edge (there was a news report about how they want to increase police presence and that they only have 1600 police officers, which is shockingly insane for a city of that size, just shy of half a million. No wonder the place feels so ripe for crime. Interestingly, this CNN report has Memphis as the fifth unsafest city, Nashville at 12th, New Orleans way down at 27th. New York isn’t even on the list of 29 cities.) Nashville had Jack in the Box, James’s obsession, and a drive through Thai restaurant next door, which became my fixation even though I never ate there. Nashville has great old-school cafeterias that serve lime cream salad, and family-style dining where you have to sit with strangers Chinatown-style, but actually pass and share food and talk a little to each other (it was a little scary, but the food was so good I got over it). Restaurants close at 8pm, which is tricky because if you’re used to eating lunch in the late afternoon, you don’t have a dinner appetite by 5pm like you’re supposed to. I didn’t eat a single crunchy vegetable, greens, beans, corn and everything else is stewed down to a nice mush with pork fat. Downtown Memphis was a scary ‘90s suburban theme park. Everything is sanitized and new and bright and neon. All the restaurants look like upscale chains, but probably aren’t. They have names like Café 61 with route 61 memorabilia and Swigs with a neon sign that has clinking martini glasses for the W. There are lots of families, twentysomethings who are way into mojitos and cosmos and black kids doing street performances, acrobatics and bending over backwards literally for money. Beale St. is totally a mini Bourbon St. minus the nudity and 24-hour bars. They have the street blocked off to traffic, cops man the ends so you don’t bring drinks out of the strip, and they sell ticket armbands, which I never understood. It was totally “Blueshammer.” I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. As we were heading back to the parking garage, this group of college-aged guys was marveling to the one female accompanying them, “anything can happen downtown.” And I was like wha? They add a new coconut shrimp dish at Hard Rock Café? The guy sketching your caricature gives you bigger boobs in your drawing than you really have? A Disney Cruise might have more edge than “downtown.” But then, Nashville has the absolutely insane Opryland convention center that everyone will tell you to visit. “It’s like New Orleans under glass.” I had no idea what they meant, but they’ve created this Epcot version of New Orleans with botanical gardens, shops, food court and a little river with boats, all air-conditioned and overlooked by hotel rooms. There’s a lengthy plaque listing all the bodies of water around the world, categorized by country and state, that were “merged” into their weirdo man made river. I was pleased to see the Gowanus Canal had made it in. There was a D.A.R.E. convention going on and there were lots of people in bad suits and kids with Christian t-shirts. I had no idea D.A.R.E. was still even a thing, but afterwards couldn’t help but notice numerous D.A.R.E. bumper stickers everywhere we drove in the South. I thought ‘80s nostalgia was just a Williamsburg annoyance, but apparently they’re digging it down there too. Just say no. That’s not all that Brooklyn shares in common with the South, they also have a fondness for chicken bones strewn about the sidewalks. I was really pleased to see picked clean bones gracing parking lots in Nashville and Memphis. So we didn’t do a whole lot of anything while out of town, just drove a lot, ate copious amounts of food, shopped at malls and regional grocery stores and marveled at cheap real estate (it’s probably no surprise that for the price of a one bedroom apt. here we could own a seven room near mansion with a pool on acreage). I discovered how much I love biscuits and homemade preserves, fondness for fried chicken, pork anything and pecan pie was no surprise. I liked how drinks and cigarettes were both cheap as hell (two drinks with top shelf liquor were like $8 and cigarettes were around $2.50 a pack—what are they here? $7 and some change? I don’t know, I don’t buy them anymore because psychologically that makes me think I’m not really a smoker. I just smoke insanely whenever they’re presented to me.), and that it wasn’t inappropriate to imbibe and/or smoke with a baby on your lap. Ashtrays are on every table in every bar and restaurant, which freaked me out a little, I’ve already acclimated so much to the ban in NYC and spent so many years in healthy, P.C. Portland that I’d forgotten that in much of the country they really don’t give a shit. My only regret is not trying red velvet cake (oh, and the deep-fried pickles—they’re crazy for that flavor—dill pickle flavored potato chips are everywhere too), but there’s a local guy who’s famous for his version, and he’s practically up the street, so it’s not the end of the world. I’d have to say the most disturbing trend I noticed was bad, bad denim shorts. I forget how isolated NYC is. Apparently, denim shorts have swept the nation and I’ve been blind to the whole thing. I wouldn’t be exaggerating to say that 95% of the women were wearing the hideous things. And it’s really a harder look to pull off than you’d think. Curveless teens can sort of get away with it, it’s not really my style, but they look benign on young, straight bodies. But most of the women who wear them have thick super tan legs. These shorts are stuffed to the brim with meaty ham hock thighs so they end up fitting more like bicycle shorts. It’s so not attractive, I don’t know why they do this to themselves. An A-line, above the knee skirt would be way more stylish and flattering. Do they not get Queer Eye and What Not to Wear in the rest of the country? And they’re paired with chunky white tennis shoes and white socks. The men aren’t guiltless, they all do pleated khaki shorts, polo shirts and the same white sock and shoe combo. They, however, might add a cowboy hat for flair. I haven’t spoken much at New Orleans yet, it’s a different story than Tennessee and I don’t have time for that now, but they do share the same timeless style. It was ubiquitous. Take away all the goths (see, the ‘80s are big all over. Actually, they do a reverse of the middle-American bad denim. Instead of women in bad shorts, they have men in bad skirts), and you have an entire city filled with fitted denim and khaki. Dammit, I just discovered something good about Beale St. How on earth did I miss deep-fried burgers?

7/15/04
So, I’m back from my mini Southern vacation. The bulk of it was fine, it was just the start and finish that taxed the nerves. I was being so crazy and anal about planning, making an itinerary, getting directions and contact info for every little hole in the wall and must-see stop. I was pretty pleased with my thoroughness until we went to check in at the airport and I was missing my driver’s license. I could’ve sworn I’d seen it in my wallet the day before, but it was nowhere to be found. And I didn’t have any government ID or credit card with photo, which would’ve sufficed as substitutes, just school and work IDs and a Costco card with my picture. Eventually, they did give me a boarding pass, but I would still need my ID for my return flight and to get the rental car in Nashville, James could drive, but the fun of the whole vacation was that I’d get to drive around (his car is a stick and I’m one of those retards who never learned). There wasn’t time to get a cab back home and back to the airport, plus I wasn’t willing to pay the probable $80 fare. Fed Exing was the only possibility, and at least I had a suspicion of where it might be in the apt. and if not I definitely knew where my passport was. So, it worked out and it got overnighted to Nashville. Then yesterday, coming home, the 2.5 hour nonstop flight ended up taking over six hours and included an emergency stop in D.C. (Time-wise, I guess it didn't kill me to get in at 10:30pm instead of 6pm, but James had to be back at LaGuardia for a 6am flight to Boston, so it was a bit of a pain.) Because of the bad weather in NYC we couldn’t land, and just hovered in a holding pattern for an eternity somewhere in Virginia, then ran out of fuel and had to land, then we had to sit on the plane for another eternity. I guess it beat getting knocked out of the sky by turbulence and lightning, but there’s nothing worse than being stuck on a plane filled with cell phone-armed New Yorkers anxious to get home. Especially since they’d ran out of little pretzels and only had tap water to sate us. And I was so mad at myself because yesterday before catching the flight I was going to get a muffaletta for the road, but at the last minute decided against it because I’d already eaten myself silly the entire week and decided I needed to do a bad food detox at least until my birthday (which is in ten days, frightenly enough, and I don’t even have a single thing planned). I was cursing my foray into good health after being trapped on that plane empty handed. Anyway, the trip was fun, but I’ll have to detail it later because I’m not feeling so hot. I’m not sure what new hypochondrical diagnosis I’ll come up with, but so far I’m dizzy, my eyes hurt and I feel off kilter. I swear I have permanent low-grade vertigo, like when I close my eyes I feel spinny. I haven’t had time to do much of anything since getting back, even using the computer makes my head hurt and induces nausea, but I did manage to find a post on a Neurology forum that sounds exactly like me. And you just know this poster is like 80 years old and a nut. Damn, I’m just creeping up on 32—what’s going to happen when I’m genuinely old and falling apart?

7/6/04
Ok, so I used to think that no one in recent history could top that horrible dancing Six Flags Guy for unstalkability, but I’ve found a candidate. I only sporadically watch Jeopardy, but have been glued to the set for the past few weeks because I’m determined to see that asswipe Ken Jennings get booted off. He’s been on there for over a month (they never should’ve repealed that five time winning maximum thing) and has amassed nearly $800,000, and the thing is that he’s totally unsmart. He’s this bland, Salt Lake City, family values freak with a skill for rote knowledge and memorization, apparently. There’s nothing remotely interesting or intelligent about him, and he makes me feel physically violent. I’m serious, he’s totally going to induce severe high blood pressure. And you know the man has fans. It’s bad enough to have to sit through that part after the first commercial break where they tell their stupid personal anecdote, but after dumb story #25 it becomes abusive. And I also think it’s totally rigged and they’re giving him lame competition because the questions aren’t that freaking hard, and the other two contestants either can’t even ring in at all, or when they do fuck up the answer. I know in games past there have been much stronger players, at least equal or better than Ken. I honestly think they’re trying to get a contestant to reach the million dollar mark and generate publicity because there’s no other excuse for this nobody’s winning streak. Please, please, please get a higher caliber of contestant on soon or I might have to go out to the Sony Pictures studio and fuck shit up (not meaning that my supreme trivia knowledge would fuck their shit up, I mean I might have to pull a Tonya Harding or something). Anyway, I’m supposed to be finishing up my packing, not slagging off Ken Jennings. Tomorrow I’ll be in Nashville, and maybe the change of scenery will do me good.

7/4/04
I could really take or leave Independence Day, it’s not so thrilling as holidays go. But what did thrill me to no end was seeing an ad for The Ranch a Showtime movie about a mustang ranch type brothel that will air tomorrow (Monday) night. Sure, a gritty melodrama about prostitutes trying to make it, written and produced by a former Party of Five writer is good enough on its own, but I became extra gleeful when I noticed occasional actress, and former grade and middle school classmate Bonnie Root is one of the leading cast members. Every few years she pops up random roles, usually playing troubled and/or alcoholic teens. I was surprised how many bit parts she’s had in TV shows But seeing as how she’s 31-32 now, I hope they at least have bumped her up to portraying a twentysomething. However, judging from the two publicity Showtime stills showing her drink in hand, she is likely still doing the character with a drinking problem shtick. It’s funny because I hadn’t given Bonnie thought in eons, but a couple weeks ago some stranger emailed me wanting to know if I knew anything current about her because he’d recently seen a TV movie (from ’97) where she played teenage alcoholic and killed her friend drunk driving. This guy was a recovering alcoholic, was touched by her performance, and found my mention of her from 2000. Cyberspace is an odd thing. There’s been a lot of talk with friends about boobs lately, I’m not sure why. Like whether yours are “good” or “bad.” You know, pert and full, regardless of size with a small nipple or conical and saggy, regardless of size with big nipples like National Geographic breasts. Also, whether you’re brown or pink nippled. Realistically, everyone’s all over the place and imperfect, but it’s a common suspicious that everyone else must have better breasts. But strangely enough, these conversations made me think back to swimming lessons in 5th grade P.E. We had to take a school bus to the highschool, and it just sucked because you had to change in front of each other (changing for gym didn’t happen till middle school) and not just in your underwear, but naked and showering to get chlorine out. Plus, I hated swimming and was a giant for my age, but got put with the beginners in 4 ft. water because I was such a baby about getting in the water. It’s really dumb to be made to jump in 4 ft. water when you’re 5’6. But anyway, I was totally trying not to stare at anyone while getting dressed (and it was especially awkward since I was one of the only ones who had a bra already) but caught a topless Bonnie Root out of the corner of my eye, and she had tiny, barely there, ten year old boobs but they totally had that idealized “good” shape already, not like mine at all. I was like fuck when she grows up she’s going to have perfect boobs. What are the odds I’ll be able to confirm my 1982 suspicions tomorrow night? I mean, these are prostitutes, it’s Showtime...there’s going to be naked flesh. Life’s too good.

7/2/04
Just because I have a sudden preoccupation with cars hitting pedestrians (there was another one yesterday), doesn't mean I'm oblivious to the spate of recent subway shootings. I know, I know, putting a cap in a stranger's skull does seem trendier than vehicular homicide, but I'm still going with the less flashy car killings for hot new NYC crime. You know, the upside to all this "summering" business is a much more pleasant city for the rest of us. Being the Friday before a three-day holiday weekend, I was able to get a seat on the subway (and were plenty to spare) and the obnoxiously crowded deli where I often grab lunch was totally desolate (there might've been one other customer in the entire place). Who knows what other wonders await me the rest of the weekend? So, I went totally nuts yesterday buying all sorts of things I don't really need and can't really afford. I easily spent a week's pay (keeping in mind that a week's pay for me isn't exactly an exorbitant sum) on things like lime green fishnets, this totally unnecessary satin bag with a jaguar on it (though I paid $19, not $44), Lancome foundation (I usually just wear drugstore brands) in the palest color they make, which is creepy--with my real hair color just shy of black I'm a total natural born goth, ridiculously impractical white Esprit shoes (I thought they were nurse-like and completely adorable with the tread in the shape of mini hearts, but every inch of the shoe is white, the sole, the heel, the interior. After half a day of wearing them, they're already getting filthy) and countless other items of clothing, jewelry and make up. I'm a cheapskate, no single item was over $35, but even good deals add up. Oh, and then yesterday I also scheduled a haircut at a salon in Nashville that charges the same ($60) as where I go in NYC. That's probably spendy for Nashville, but their website was cute. I'm a superficial retard, alright?

7/1/04
Stuck in town this weekend? Well, too fucking bad. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read iterations of that phrase in the last few weeks, but then, you already know my pet peeve with writers who think every single person in the city somehow summers at the end of week. Actually, I won’t be stuck in town next weekend, but I don’t know if the south qualifies as a summering destination. I’m so full of free time, it’s insane. No more school and only three days (two supervised) of work a week (though after I come back from vacation mid-July, I will be temping at the ad agency I interned at last semester). And you’ve got to know I’ve been squandering it (though I have been pretty good about sticking to my increased gym regimen. Not so much out of a love of exercise, but because I know I’m going to be eating fried food and massive desserts like nobody’s business while out of town. The way I eat, I’m lucky if I even break even with my attempts at exercise). All my underwear has gone bad at one (no, not shit stains, it just seems stretchy and ratty all of a sudden) so I’m going to brave Century 21 in a little bit instead of doing things around the house that need to be done. I actually miss being closer to the Bay Ridge Century 21 and going to the weirdo Bay Ridge location of my former gym where they’d play classic rock instead of top 40 hip hop. I used to do the kill three-to-four birds with one stone thing where I could also go to the gym, Dee and Dee, and assorted crappy stores while actually wearing my ugly work out clothes (I hate changing at the gym, it’s not so much a modesty thing as much as just hating to carry around another outfit and shoes all day then taking the extra five minutes to put it on) and not doing my hair or make up because who the hell do I care about in Southern Brooklyn? Really, who do I care about in Southern Manhattan either, but I feel more self conscious about being a schlub there, or even around here (here meaning Carroll Gardens) for that matter. Because as much as I complain about the fit white couples, the dogs and the babies, there are also attractive folks around here too. Speaking of infants, the 20-something twosome who subscribe to Dwell and Adbusters (the mail left for them is the only clue I really have to their personalities. Have I mentioned the tenants in this building hate us? The baby couple, the three college kids from Chicago who live right above us, and the middle aged black woman with a grown daughter who live on the top floor. Seriously, they’re all friends with each other and garden out front and when we told them they couldn’t put their stupid bench in front of our window they weren’t too pleased. We’re the ones who live in the garden and first floor apartments, not them, and we don’t want people sitting right in front of our view and listening to every word they yap--we can hear them bitching about us out front already as it is. They called James an old man, which sort of did crack me up. I mean, the second floor had a giant outdoor terrace with plants, benches, grill, etc. I don’t know why they feel the need to also cultivate the front yard.) and live on the third floor just had a baby Sunday. It only makes me glad there’s a second and fourth floor to buffer us on the first. My only question is why do people with babies think that strollers belong in common areas? My last apartment, they would park the stroller in front of my front window outside. Here, the kid is only a couple days old and they’ve already started leaving a massive stroller right in the entryway. I don’t go leaving things out in the hall just because I don’t want them or have room for them in my apt. I guess bikes or other valuable hefty items someone might steal, but who wants a germy baby stroller? I’m almost inclined to hide the damn thing just to teach them a lesson about keeping track of their own property. Oh, for the record there’s already been someone run over by a car since the new month has started.