Waiting to Get There. Usually on the A/C/E in Chelsea, New York City.

Most people are their own worst enemies when it comes to dressing right for cross country skiing. The possibility of being cold gives noobies panic attacks. They think to themselves, "It's better to be warm than cold because you can always take something off." I'll grant you, there's some logic there, but only if you dress so it's possible to remove a layer and not be left in only your sweaty underpants. If I were a brand new, or almost brand new, cross country skier, this is what I would wear. But first, let me run through my assumptions: I'm assuming you will fall down a few times. It's almost inevitable, even if you are a downhill skier. Some of the best schadenfreude I've ever had the pleasure of indulging in was watching cocky-ass downhill skiers put on a pair of cross country skis for the first time ever. It takes them about five minutes to get their shit together, but those five minutes are bloody terrific. I'm assuming you'l...

To be candid, I was taken by surprise last night at Penny Arcade's performance at St. Anne’s Theater in DUMBO. Apparently, when I buy tickets to shows, I’m more of a “look at the pictures” kind of online shopper. Here’s the show promo: I thought we signing up for some sort of drag cabaret. I thought there might be cake. I was wrong.  In case you are unfamiliar with the work of Penny Arcade, as I was until yestereve, let me clue you in. She’s a 60ish ingenue formerly of the Andy Warhol set. She's hell bent to rage against the machine for 90 minutes. Except it’s not a rant. It’s art. This was a thing in the early 80s downtown. I can distill 90 minutes with Penny Arcade into four bullets, and I mention this because it’s actually my main point. But here we go: Penny Arcade considers herself in the “control group” immune from the idiocy perpetuated by uptight suburbanites and their entitled lily-livered, gay and straight children who indulge in artisanal r...

To get into the luxury boxes in Madison Square Garden, you gotta know a guy. Or Diana. She gives you these big fancy red tickets and you plan all week how you'll approach the ensuite buffet.  Tom, Stacie and I arrived early. We wanted to take full advantage of the amenities. This was an astute move since Tom required six trips through the metal detector to successfully empty all his pockets. We stepped out of the damp and noisy crowd and into a serenely quiet private elevator reserved for suite guests. A tall man looking awfully suburban was already in there. He chatted up the elevator guy. He said to us in a jocular tone, "So nice to get out of the plebeian masses." We didn't do a fist bump or anything, but there were "same here" looks all around.  Then the suburban man told the elevator guy he was going to the 9th floor. We said we were on the 7th, closer to the stage. The man gave us a mock salute. We totally won that round. Upon arrival, we ...

I went to the alternative doctor today to see what could be done about these sinus headaches. He looked at my tongue and told me my digestive system was weak. He advised me to immediately: Give up coffee. No dairy. No gluten. Quit drinking. Go to bed before 11pm. (He actually said 10pm, but given that 10pm is like the middle of the afternoon, I am deliberately not hearing that right.) I didn't even make it 2 hours. Tomorrow I will try again.  NaBloPoMo #28. 2 More Days!

A pressed cloth napkin on Greenwich Avenue near 7th. I imagine someone got up from a lovely brunch and made it the whole way out onto the street before the napkin static-clinging to their pants tumbled to the curb. A huge dead rat on 8th Avenue by 15th Street. The rat was grey and very well fed. It lay on its side, in the dead center (ha ha) of the sidewalk. Someone had carefully stuck a red baseball cap on the rat's head. At first, I thought it was a "Make America Great Again" hat, but it turns out it was not.  NaBloPoMo #27

Friday turned into Saturday and family turned into friends. Then other friends bearing Gibson Les Pauls and Fender amps (twinsies!). And drums. And a ukulele. And some kind of weird cigar box slide guitar thing. We found Tom a microphone and. Band Night. Darcey with the recap: "I don't mind talking into a microphone. But singing...." "I can play Gs and As all day." "We should be called The Soft Pants." Now it's 1:30AM and we're watching old music videos. Everlong. Closer. Karma Police. Toxic. Toxic?

Our family knows how to do Thanksgiving. We stick to a tight agenda: 9:00 - Arise. 9:00-12:00 Eat Breakfast. 12-4:00 Eat Lunch. 4:00-6:30 Eat Dinner. 6:30-7:30 Play heavily censored Cards against Humanity. Great for the under 10 and over 70 crowd. Also the 10-70 crowd. 7:30- 8:30 Play some new charades game with the phone on your forehead that was on the Ellen Show and somehow Tom cottoned onto. Turn off all the lights and play a cut-throat game of hide-and-go-seek in the dark. 8:30-9:00 Watch OK Go videos. Fight over which one is best. 9:00 - Build an elaborate nest out of pillows for Mark to sleep in. 9:15 - Go to Bed. NaBloPoMo #24!

I don't know why Daniel Kitson doesn't wear velour trousers. I think he would relish velour. He reminds me of the kind of guy who would appreciate an excellent soft pant. During Mouse , Daniel Kitson's latest one-man show, don't get me wrong, his attire was perfectly serviceable. He looked comfortable. He's just so uncomfortable. I like Daniel Kitson. I want him to be happy. If this Mouse show were a painting, I'd say it would be this painting by Paul Klee : I'm imagining Paul Klee had just broken out a fresh canvas and dabbed some red on his brush, maybe to mix it on his palette, but no. There came a gigantic red drip, right in the middle of the composition.  Klee steps back from his easel and stares and stares and stares. Against impossible odds, he makes a painting that looks like it was supposed to have a giant red hypnotic dot in the middle of it. And so I imagine Kitson with this mouse thread of a story. He's a little spectrum...

I just had to shut off the juice on my new e-stim machine or TENS unit or whatever you call it. Naked electricity pours through four wires and gets a vice grip on your muscles. From there anything can happen, but mostly wild and unexpected flapping of the arms. I could easily be an extra in Beetle Juice. Daylight come and I wanna go home. This Healthmate of mine is the gypsy child of the chiropractor's big mama e-stim machine. She's a beast, that one. The nurse person starts her up and you can feel tectonic plates shift. It's like fifteen amazing minutes in El Dorado. Your knotted up back muscles emerge wobbling like a lump of freshly plated tartare. I had to have one. I was a jot leery of the vast array of mighty cheap e-stim options on Amazon. My mom said they also sell e-stims in the grocery store for $29.95. She advised, "I would not buy any e-stim you can purchase in the grocery store for $29.95." So I leveled up and got the most expen...

Counting the bass amps on and about the premises.  Are there enough amps for band night? Can you plug a guitar into a bass amp?  Dealing with the glögg situation Swedish Club Jul Fest rules Exchanging tickets for a show on 1/21/17 when I will be marching in DC Go to Box Office and stare them down Pondering the recent Daniel Kitson performance at St. Anne's Theater Lots going on there Ruminating on something Greg said and ultimately disagreeing Peeing on the toilet seat does not make you chaotic neutral. (that's a dungeons and dragons reference, in case you aren't cool like that)

Stylebook App I got this app called Stylebook . I think most people use this app to design little outfits. I do not. I use it to amortize my clothing. I make a note every time I wear something, and then the app takes the cost of the garment and divides it by the times worn. Do you know what the per-wear cost is of what you've got on? I do. These pants are down to $1.66 per wear because, as my friend Lynn said recently, "Every time I see you, you're wearing those pants." This shirt is $9.16 These boots are $16.33 I'm not keeping track of the sweater because Tracie gave it to me. If someone said they were going to charge me 30 beans for closet access per day, I'd freak out. But here we are.  Another thing I'm keeping a close eye on is how long your average item lasts. I was thinking the other day that a sweater was looking a mite tatty. I checked how many times I've worn it. SIX TIMES. That's a bloody unacceptable tragedy. My onli...

At brunch, I was telling Caroline about NaBloPoMo-- this scribble-a-blog-post-a-day business. She said she wouldn't have anything to write about, because she lives in Solna. Solna is a suburb of Stockholm. In Solna, every day is the same; you go to work, you come home and then maybe you have 18 drinks, it being Sweden and all. Tom said that I definitely would have something to write about today and it was only 11:30AM. He said if he were me, he would write about how I gave the finger to some dude driving a white Pontiac. He said if not the white Pontiac affair, I could write about walking right past a guy jackhammering and failing to notice.  But WTF there were no goddamn cones or anything. I will not write about either of these incidents. If I were going to pick something to write about, I might write about a 100% cotton blacksmith tshirt I took a close look at later on in the afternoon: "it cannot be inherited nor can it ever be purchased i have earned...

We were at the Morgan Library for Free Night with Greg. Here's a few snaps of one of the fireplaces. If it's not baby-on-baby fight club, what is it?  You see the one baby popping the other baby a fast clip to the chin? There's hair pulling and a really clutch eye poke. Also I think I spy some abs. One of the babies has a six pack. You don't really see the babies going at it unless you get within 20 feet of the fireplace. Babies Gone Wild at the Morgan Library It could be described as a major dust up.  Day 18 NABLOPOMO

When you arrive at the restaurant and the hostess asks "is this a special occasion?" You know you might have made a mistake. The place is not a sandwich shop. You reflect, "Maybe I should have worn something that is not a hoodie and jeans." Day 17 NABLOPOMO

Tom said, "Look what we got in the mail-- the real estate property tax reassessment." I said, "What is it?" Tom said, "It's the letter where they tell us the property value they're going to base our taxes on." ....But that's not important right now? I never thought I'd actually have an actual Airplane moment in real life.

Cleaning out sixty-five years. Grammy moved into her home in 1960(?) Mary and I spent five hours helping Grammy sort through the stuff in her bedroom she wants to take to Assisted Living and the stuff that has to go. It was a five-hour lightning round beneath a cloud of dust bunnies. Our system was efficient. I would hold up a thing in question and offer some color commentary. Grammy would shift around in the desk chair we'd rolled in for executive decision-making. She would declare "Keep It" or "Donate It." Mary handled all backend management. As the MC of the operation, I noticed the Gramster getting a little misty eyed about parting with certain signature possessions. For example, the curtains and matching bedspread she sewed herself for one of the bedrooms a good thirty years ago. Maybe forty. They coordinated with an orange shag rug.  You could call it a white lie, or maybe you could call it me trying to make a hard situation easier on a...

I like lip balm. Usually I have a vast array of tubes strategically positioned at home and in the office, handbag, backpack, pockets and tucked into the blankets of our bed. It's a lovely surprise when a Blistex rolls over your forehead in the middle of the night or you wake up in the morning with a tube stuck to your calf. So handy. Who cares if it leaves a mark. This Silk and Shine is silky, I'll grant you. It's not overly shiny and it's not my highest pick for moisturizing properties. You need to reapply way too often. Silk and Shine by Blistex.     EOS is a decent balm, but kind of a scam. The product does not go to the bottom of the egg. It's a plop of balm perched atop a sort of plastic grate. When you're midway through the plop, the egg gets unwieldy. It's like scratching your face with a ball.  EOS Lip Egg. The best flavor is the pink one. But I'd go with the vanilla tube if given a choice. I'm sure everybody ha...

I was a Moth Story Slam judge a couple weeks ago , and now I believe I'm well qualified to weigh in on one-man-shows. I wouldn't consider that a stretch at all. And as it happens, we went to a one-show on Friday night. I'm not going to name this particular one man, because as they inform judges at the Moth-- it takes some brass to clammer up on that stage, so don't give anyone a score less than 7. This one-man was very forthcoming. He told us that he'd rented out the theater himself, paid for it on his credit card. He paid seven grand for a 15 night rental. The theater has 20 seats. Most of the audience got in with free tickets. Maybe 4 people paid $5. I don't need a formula in Excel to do the sad sad math. Tom and I discussed the following: Why did the one-man not proclaim a one-drink minimum? If you give away free tickets, generally there's a catch. No one would be surprised. At least a drink minimum would offer one miniscule chance in hell of ce...

Walking uptown, I came upon thousands of people shrieking "Build a Fence around Pence," and "Reject the President Elect" and hoisting placards talking about Love and Hate. I slipped between them, hopefully exhibiting my solidarity to the cause. But I wasn't staying. In the thick of the honking horns and chanting, I pushed into MoMA and went upstairs to bask before hallowed masterpieces. I turned up the music on my phone and just kind of stared. Ruth Asawa, Poppy 1965 Klimt - Hope Day 12

Photo credit: Wikipedia Tom and I confidently stride into the Malaysian joint on West 8th Street in the Village. We know it's good, because in there, we're a definite minority. I pick up the menu and one of my fresh new chopsticks goes flying off the table. The waiter is attentive. He immediately swoops over with a new set. We order a mango salad. We eat the mango salad with our chopsticks. We order some dinner. The waiter bustles over with two forks. I look around. No one else in the entire place has been given a fork. Tom and I evaluate the possibilities: We were profiled, totally a priori . We look like people who can't work a chopstick. I did, in fact, perpetrate a chopstick mishap when I knocked the one chopstick off the table. It was deduced therefore that we cannot be trusted. When we ate the mango salad, our chopstick skills were observed and judged horrific. It would simply be too painful to let us continue. Or maybe the waiter is a consider...

Saw the Pet Shop Boys in Morristown, out  in Suburbia . (ha ha ha, that's super funny if you were a teenager in 1986.) We packed into the theater along with every other flavor of white people. All around us and up in the mezzanine, they bounced and shimmied and flapped a shoulder and knocked into an occasional +1 with crossed arms. Some were very tall and towered up in the front row. Luckily I had the foresight to wear some mighty big shoes.  Under the multi-colored lights, we looked green, red, yellow and occasionally blue. Our skin tone is an excellent canvas for LED pyrotechnics. Day 10

Audrey mentioned she collects old photographs. Old photographs of her family and also old photographs of random people with a descendant who had a yard sale and sold granny's black and whites.  I'm hip to this. The Momster picked up a thing for  cabinet cards  a few years back. Nothing like rifling through a pile of snaps laid out on the family coffee table and not recognizing anyone. Because, as it turns out upon inquiry, no one has any clue who the people in the pictures actually are. They were purchased at the flea market in the old Nichol's building. Mom comments on the expressions of soldiers in photos taken just before marching off to war, on hats and other fashion. It's kind of maudlin and voyeuristic and at the same time it's an honor to the dead.  A cabinet card from 1896. Dressed in their best, a family nervously fidgets for the camera. photo credit: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Walther_edwin_anna.jpeg Audrey brought up h...

photo credit: Playbill Casey, who has seen more Broadway shows than you can count on all your short hairs, says not to worry. We tip back a drink at the Iron Bar and the time is 6:56.  "The Encounter" starts in exactly 4 minutes.  There's a conversation with the waitress to get an extra glass of wine taken off the bill. We saunter into the theater at something like 7:01. The lights go down and the show starts.  It was clockwork under Casey's expert hand, but I don't think I'd try it unsupervised. Day 8

You're sitting at a table in a restaurant. You're having dinner with people you haven't seen for awhile. You're looking forward to catching up. The waiter comes by. Flat water is fine, you tell him. "And oh by the way, could you please turn the music up?" Said no one. Ever. Day 7

photo credit: https://www.fastcompany.com Over the summer, Darcey, Tom and I drove upstate to Helen and Matt's place. The three of us listened to a podcast about lying . There's a quick test to tell if you are a good liar or a bad liar:   With your finger, you draw an imaginary capital Q on your forehead. Spoiler Alert! If you're a good liar, you'll draw the Q so that people facing you can read it. You'll place the slash on the Q to the left.  Spoiler Alert! Darcey, Tom and I took the test. We are not good liars. I'd like to say I waffled a bit on where to put the slash because I saw a glimmer of universal higher understanding. But really, it was only because I had a fit of dyslexia. Fast forward to a month ago when Matt emailed that he was planning a surprise birthday party for Helen.  I immediately began wringing my hands and sweating. After all, we had just taken a test that conclusively showed we are not good at this "Tell He...

At the Bell House for Moth Story Slam We were the best Moth judges ever, by the way-- Ellen, Audrey and myself. The theme of the evening was "Persuasion." The place was packed; in Brooklyn everybody has a story, even if they really don't. If you're a wanna-be Slam storyteller contestant, you stick your name in an NPR tote bag. If your name gets picked, you stand up on stage and tell a five minute story. That is judged. By me, Audrey and Ellen. Our first test as a judging team proved stressful. We had about 6 minutes to come up with a name for our team befitting the "persuasion" theme. It being autumn and jacket and boot season and all, I fixated on suede. Like Pure Suede. Or Purr Suede for a cat-themed approach. photo credit:  http://qz.com/818849/daniel-gebhart-de-koekkoek-philippe-halsman-and-jumpology-what-cats-do-when-were-not-watching-in-photos/ Somehow I got from there onto the magic of pleather. Luckily, my team persevered without ...

We got tickets to one of those emerging theater shows that could easily spiral into a hot mess. The risk adds allure. So does the single digit ticket price. Tom looks around and says, "If it weren't for that guy behind us, I'd say we are the oldest people here." He chews on this observation for awhile. "Usually, when it comes to the theater, we're middle of the road, age-wise. Some old people, some whippersnappers. Not tonight." I decide to take a wide-angle selfie to document, for the record, that we are not the oldest ones in attendance: Old guy photobombs fake selfie. The old guy's fast, I'll give him that, the altacocker. But. Nobody in the audience cracks up when an actor mentioned " Bats Benatar " and the band kicks into a monster-mash banjo version of "We Belong to the Night." Furthermore, an actress dressed up as your grandma sitting on a chair perched on a table talking to a puppet says, "The child...

My grandpa, his brother and his brother-in-law had a business in the 1930s or 40s. They were "Manufacturing Furriers." I know this because a business card turned up: I do not know what a "Manufacturing Furrier" is or does exactly, but considering the number of fur coats and fur hats and fur muffs and fur scarves I've inherited and don't quite know what to do with, I'm going to state for the record that there was definitely fur involved. Yesterday, I walked by the corner of 7th and 23rd Street, the site of their former establishment: The former location of the  "Manufacturing Furrier" establishment at 235 7th Avenue in Chelsea Today, 235 7th Avenue is a Chelsea Papaya that is open 24 hours. Still not gentrified, this corner, although the jig is almost up. There's a Whole Foods and a Starbucks just up the block. Next thing you know, the Chelsea Papaya will be a Rag and Bone. Or a Manufacturing Furrier. The Manufactur...

photo credit: NY Post I got a seat on a crowded A-train. A guy sporting a very pricey suit was not so lucky. He parked his strap-hanging self right in front of me. I noticed the details on this suit-- the meticulous thread around the button-holes, the cut, the fabric.  His shirt was fancy.  His tie was gorgeous.  And his fly was half mast. So much effort so completely demolished. Day 2

I called my mom. Ring. Ring. Ring. Call Connecting. "Two at the door!" Mom bellowed in my ear. Pop was in charge of candy distribution. Mom peered out the window and monitored trick or treat goings on. "Your father just asked a kid if he was dressed as Ernest Shackleton ," she reported. Pop gave out mini-snickers bars. This raised my eyebrows. In the past, he's been more concerned about dental hygiene. He's treated the neighborhood to spider rings, pencils, erasers, and rubber lizards. Pop got on the phone. "I made a faux pas," he said. "Do tell." "A really little kid rang the bell. Her bag of candy was bigger than she was. I told her, 'Wow, there must be 50 cavities in that sack.' Her dad was standing behind her. He laughed and he had like three teeth." Meanwhile, back at our place, Tom was at the ready: A sad sad bag of candy This photo of a giant unopened bag of candy was taken at 8pm. Not one...