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

 I was chatting with Bruce the other day about this whole minimalism trend wherein people go around their abodes and throw things away. I am no minimalist. If there's a flat, unoccupied surface I aim to put something there. So I told Bruce I was a maximalist when it came to interior design. Bruce suggested I might be a maximalist in life.  OK, I'll own it. I enjoy: brocade as many kinds of tea as possible on hand at any given time gargoyle statuettes old birthday cards that are actually pretty funny a large assortment of tote bags CAPS LOCK We were at brunch this morning with Derek, Wanda, Matt and Helen at this adorably maximalist place called Ladurée  in Soho. Maximalist = pastries stacked on top of each other There is a white fur throw on the backs of the chairs these days. Definitely maximal. I mentioned to Derek that we were looking to pop into MacKenzie and Childs on the way home. Derek grimaced. He is not a maximalist. And this MacKenzie and Childs is about as max...

 You can just call me Laura Ingalls Wilder. Each evening we're here in the heezie, I venture into our gutted former kitchen: No kitchen left standing! The only thing left standing in there is a slop sink. I fill up two glass jugs of water and the Brita water pitcher: Hauling around jugs of water I haul these back to our makeshift "kitchen" in the living room. I told Tom the other day that our "kitchen" reminds me of the kitchen in an off-off broadway theater production. There's a shelf full of canned goods, a folding table with a microwave and a toaster, and a dinette set from 1978 that is the full-on epitome of a dinette set from 1978. It's great, frankly. Very well made. The other daily event is the washing of the dishes. We have a tub of water in our "kitchen": Prairie "Sink" in the "Kitchen" Throughout the day, we toss our dishes into the tub and then, after the contractors leave, we lug the whole combobulation over to t...

First, Bruce and I trudged across the park dodging little kids on sleds. I was glad I wore my hiking boots. The overland journey was mostly ice and required a real rugged approach to footwear. Nonetheless, I wore a dress and fur collar. Because I felt like it.  Sadly, at the Met, all the timed tickets to  "About Time"  were sold out. That's what I get for 100% not bothering to plan ahead. In retrospect, it probably was a little optimistic to assume we'd get in. The show closes tomorrow. Luckily, there's the whole rest of the Met. Bruce and I both agreed the Clyfford Still called "1950-W" was the stand out of our afternoon. We stared at it for awhile and played a version of Ten Thousand Dollar Pyramid. Bruce muttered 10-20 words that began with the letter P until I shouted "Patina" and we both agreed it was a good word to describe the painting: Clyfford Still at the Met Museum of Art I was very pleased with my keen eye after noticing that, in al...

 Found these tucked away in a drawer yesterday: Tickets to dance performances at the Joyce Theater that we never saw It would take seven to ten sad emojis to reflect the melancholy I felt when I ran across these little white envelopes and the unused tickets inside them. Shows canceled due to a raging pandemic. I remember walking over the Joyce Theater box office and buying these tickets last January. Online ticket purchasing is all well and convenient for those who don't live a block and half from the theater. But for me, there's something infinitely earthly and corporeal about marching into an honest to god box office.  In a physical box office, you get to talk to the earsplitting electric voice of a cashier behind a double plexiglass wall speaking into a shitty but super loud microphone. You get to review laminated seating charts and chat about relative pros and cons of various rows. You get to slide a credit card down a shoot and moments later, receive actual tickets. Not ...

  Slush puddles Tom and I arrived on the scene a couple hours ago. Notably, as soon as we drove into Chelsea, the streets suddenly were not plowed. The West Village? Plowed. Above 14th Street? Not plowed. It was definitely a thing. Here's another fun fact: All the merchants shovel off the sidewalks, but they don't shovel off the snow on the corners of the block. So you step off the sidewalk into a six inch ice dam of dirty water. It's like this every year, I'm not sure why I remain surprised. Later on, we went back out to pick up some take out. We navigated the same exact corners from earlier. Our socks cried out in fear and trepidation. They hadn't signed up for a polar bear plunge. I said to Tom we should be Shovel Vigilantes. We should just get a f*ing shovel and f*ing shovel out the damn corners already. We'll pass those two exact same bloody corners 95 times a day. Why does nobody do this? How long could it possibly take?