Baby J Bday Eve

Hanukkah Snake

Berkley, or "Berkie," is an adorable red-tailed Colombian boa constrictor. He travels around in N's pocket, whether across town on the subway or across the world on transcontinental flights. He is only a few months old now, but will eventually grow up to 11 feet.

A Comparative Study of Phone Music at Asian Missions to the World Trade Organization

One can learn a lot about a country from the music it plays to you while you are on hold with their diplomatic representatives.

Cambodia: Mountain woodwinds. I am soothed.

Japan: New Jersey mall Christmas carols.

Korea: What you would hear in an Asian hotel elevator c. 1987. Saxophones, gongs.

Malaysia: Razzmatazz show tunes.

Singapore: No music. Natch.

Taiwan: HORRID high pitched whistling such as a toy keyboard might play. Off key. My ears bleed.

Thailand: Romantic French crooning.

Vietnam: No 'hold' function. Phone is placed on desk while the interlocutor seeks someone else to deal with me, or is passed hand-to-hand around the one room of the mission. Much shouting in Vietnamese. Hanoi street market.

In which I bang on for pages and pages and thus doing save the world

Read it. I'm talking to you.

Giving thanks

Many things to be thankful for this year, one of which was introducing A to family Thanksgiving with these people.
Here eating pad thai after being plied with negroni, just like the Pilgrims.
Also had plenty of the traditional stuff:
Embarrassment on all sides was kept within tolerable levels.
A was a very good dancing monkey, had them eating (gianduiotti) out of his hand. Even leaped across the table to rip a spoon out of mom's grip during a compulsory fun activity. So proud.

Photos courtesy of levitating cousin Ohng:

Spicy food, zesty song

Nothing keeps you young like ma la and karaoke.

New Wild Boar Village

Etymology is great fun, as this post describes. Names we think of as proper nouns in fact mean things:

New York? “New Wild Boar Village.”
(Apparently, York, in England, derives from the Old English eofor for wild boar and the Latin vicus for village.)

Great Britain? “Great Land of the Tatooed.”

Grozny? “The Awesome.”

London? “Hill Fort.”

Happy World Toilet Day!

I Sing For Toilets from Gino Federici on Vimeo.

It's amazing what one finds when searching for information on the World Trade Organization. Like this important announcement from another WTO:

Today is World Toilet Day!!!

Apparently 2.6 billion people in the world lack proper toilets. To help us remember, they have come up with "three we's" of toilet advocacy. We we we.

Indeed, this is not the only pun they have developed to promote the cause. There is also the Let's Observe Ourselves (LOO) campaign, which aims to get people to pay more attention to their habits. (Er, let's NOT, shall we?)

But they can also be rather direct. The third "we" is "WE DESERVE BETTER PLACES TO DEFECATE -- PROPER TOILETS". Well, yes, that about sums its up.

Unsurprisingly, the organization is based in Singapore. I'm just glad WTD is not tomorrow, when this important cause would be overshadowed by an even more important event.

Sunshine!

Internationally acclaimed painter DKlein has just completed her latest project, "Country Sun," at the 48th St. Gallery. The world thanks her for this artistic gift.

VICTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Put this on.

Here we go

Tuscan weekend fun

Weeks of anticipation finally give way to chestnuts, films, excessive giggling, torrential rains, fog, real estate, lashings of hysteria, A. In short, bliss.

Dumplings and two-for-one vod-poms all night long

As a birthday should be.

My thoughts exactly

Community-based furnishing

Had quite a mix of people over last night to see the place. All guests were required to bring a useful household item, of which I am in need. Just as in traditional societies where the entire community pitches in to build a dwelling, so did I call upon my friends to, as it were, mix dung and mud into a sticky consistency to spread over my thatched walls.
Included in the haul: A lovely sponge and scrubby thingy from W, some Hale family heirlooms back from N, funky martini glasses from A, a printer from M, ecological napkins from V, and an enlarged picture of a famous pop star from S (pictured):
Then this morning I took delivery of two new roommates:
Got them from shady Russians on 28th st. who insisted I pay in cash. No doubt smuggled out of central Africa to finance some insurgency. But they're pretty!

And note, no bamboo. Yet.

Of Montreal

Saw these guys tonight, hoping that Kevin's glam-rock theater of the absurd would translate into a fantastic live show.



It didn't. Just a jumble of confused metaphors lacking stagecraft, showmanship, and--critically--musical talent. And not for lack of trying--there were ninjas, tigers, gallows, and even a real live Lady Godiva-esque white horse. But it never amounted to anything, just came-off as self indulgent, even masturbatory, art school crap. Oh well.

The City Taketh; the City Giveth

Spent the evening running around town in a GIANT rental truck picking up various used furnishings I got on the internet. Absolutely terrifying . Fortunately the lovely M was along to provide moral support and muscle.

The last item of the night was an office chair. I had returned the truck by this point because I could easily wrangle a rolling chair on the subway. Went to the yuppies' house and bought their chair for a pittance. But I had barely rolled it half a block when I come across, on the curb, a superior chair! One of those high-tech ergonomic sitting machines that Anne-Marie complains Princeton wastes all its money on. After ascertaining that the chair was in fact abandoned, I added it to my herd and rolled down 15th St, sheparding my charges like some modern-day goatherd.

Before I get even half a block more I am stopped by a frat-boy / banker-type man who says, wow, what a nice chair and asks me if I would part with it for a sum of money. I decide that the sitting-machine, while valuable and ergonomic, is a bit too 'corporate' for my grad-student decor. And I quite like the other chair anyway. I say yes. He asks how much. I say the first number that pops into my head. He pulls out his wallet and gives it to me. He takes his chair and rolls one way, I take mine and roll home. And now as I write this I am reclining comfortable, enjoying excellent lumbar support. But I can't help but think what it would be like with the one that got away...

The Crib

I have a new place! Many of you have been pestering me for details about it, presumably because you take an interest in my life. Or maybe just because you want a nice place to stay in NYC. I suppose they're not mutually incompatible motives.
With flagrant disregard for the democratic process, I now live on 48th street in Hell's Kitchen. The neighborhood lays to the west of Times Square and takes it's name from the centuries of gang warfare that took place here. In cinematic term, the area's ill repute began with Gangs of New York and ended with West Side Story, both of which were set in the 'hood.
But Midtown proved too close to allow HK to remain uncivilized, so once Giuliani ran the pornographers out of Times Square, the gentrifying masses swept West to the tree-lined streets of tenements beyond. The result is quite a pleasant if somewhat neutered residential neighborhood where yuppies and Puerto Rican abuelas live happily side-by-side. The lack of edgyness is somewhat compensated by the corresponding lack of strutting hipsters. This is my spot in it:
I found this abode thanks to M, who used to live next door. The real tenants have moved to Ireland and so are subletting to me at their very attractive rent-stabilized rate. I just love American socialism. Yes it may be illegal, but it's also the only way one can live on this island on a student stipend!

The apartment is on the fourth floor, the top. It peaks up a story higher than the rest of the buildings on the block, so gets some great views of Midtown. You can also climb up the fire escape to the roof for expansive vistas.

The living room:

The living room with visitors:
The boudoir:

The Liliputian kitchen:
Regin confronts the bathroom / the gaping maw of the inferno:
As you can see, I need things. The apartment came rather unfurnished and so I've composed a wedding registry-esque list of home furnishings to acquire. Feeling very domestic. High on the list is a sofa (would-be visitors, take note!). This is basically all I own in life:
And the TV was left here. If anyone wants it you're welcome to it, though it has been working well as a bench.

So, in sum, I am very pleased with this place. Provided I don't get evicted, it will be a good base for now. Come visit!

Moving day

Eight large boxes of books down 3 floors and then up four more, plus a few clothes and things. And packing-unpacking, cleaning, etc.

Needless to say, I am EXHAUSTED!!!! And I caught the dreadful cold my relatives were passing around as a Rosh Hashanah gift.

BUT, the upside is this is what I'm looking at as I fall asleep...



Details soon.

94% chance Obama wins

This week's statistical exercise was to calculate the chance that Obama will win more than 50% of the popular vote on November 4th as a function of economic growth (or lack thereof) and the fact that the Republicans have been in office for two terms. The result: 94% chance he wins!

You can probably think of a few relevant variables that have been left out. Like racism. But unfortunately we can't test that because it's never happened before. There are some 'studies' that claim to show black candidates face a 10-15% handicap, but none of these are generalizeable to a national election.

So I remain cautiously optimistic.

Presidential Debates + Gin Club

Even though the debate kind of sucked in that it was all boring and shit, the gin club aspect was AMAZING. Learned so many new things. And then Australian pubs--just because. I'm sure there will be pictures at some point. But now bed.

Can't wait for the vice-presidential debates!

And the winner is...

Only five of you voted in my poll of where I should live, and one of them was me. Since I don't know how many people read this blog, I can't say exactly what the rate of voter participation was, but let's just say it was EXECRABLE.

I try to give the people democracy, but they don’t want it. So much for that. From now on this blog will be run like the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Anyway, on to the (illegitimate) results. It was a tie for first place between the West Village and Chelsea, with Chinatown in second place and Hell’s Kitchen a distant last. The tie is actually quite convenient because it expands the range of choices.

Well that was a fun exercise. Now I just need to find an actual apartment…

Juana Molina

Good things come from Argentina.



Check out Un dia

New Jenny Lewis

Promises good things.



Skip to 1:09.

It's worse than back hair

This amused me.

There it goes again

The blue screen of death

gives me no respect.

Damn you, Lenovo.

Where should I move?

YOU have the power to decide*! Complete the survey on the right.

*But not really.

Make new friends, but keep the old

We don't remember much of what came before, but now the slate is clean and this time we'll better document things.