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

When we dropped off the Subaru off at the airport parking lot, I heard the one valet mutter to the other valet, “Stick shift.”  The vehicle remained in the drop off area the whole time we waited for our ride to the airport. I watched it, motionless in the same exact spot, from my seat in the shuttle as we drove away. This reminded me of that one time at the Tabor Tavern on Route 10. They have valet parking. As I got out of the car, I said to the valet kid, “Do you know how to drive a stick?” He smoothly replied, “I don’t, but the other guy does.” I nodded. Three hours later, I came out of the restaurant and handed the valet my ticket. “Oh yes,” he says. “Your car is right here.” With a flourish, he points to the Subaru. It's about 8 feet from where I’d pulled it in. He hands me the keys and lets me take it from there. 

We were walking up Allen Street in the LES, Wanda, Derek, Tom and I. Suddenly (cue symphonic audio clip) I spied Bon Bon , the Swedish candy store. The thing with Bon Bon is that I don't actually know where it is. I just go in every time I walk by. It is difficult to resist the allure of salted licorice. Seriously. So we enter the establishment. There's one definite thing I like about Bon Bon compared to its arch rival candy shop Sockerbit in the Village: Actual Swedes work at Bon Bon.  Meanwhile, Sockerbit is staffed by what appears to be an endless stream of college kids from like Cleveland. It's cognitive dissonance to the max and kind of a let down. I like to order my Swedish candy in Swedish. It's weird to know more about the candy on offer than the cashier. Like how to pronounce it. Anyway, when we go in, fantastic news. A Swede is behind the counter at Bon Bon. He's like 23 with all the vestments of a hipster. He immediately starts messing...

Tom mistakenly tossed his running backpack on top of a hive of yellow jackets. Read all about how that transpired here:  https://waitingtogetthere.blogspot.com/2019/09/toms-bee-tribulations-in-hudson-ny-part.html   Photocredit:  http://www.ipmnoco.com/single-post/2017/10/05/It-is-yellow-jacket-swarming-season It was determined that all six of us were vital for Mission Backpack Extraction. We got in the cars along with four (4) cans of Raid. This squadron of Raid was assembled and at the ready under the sink at Helen and Matt's. If there were a shooting range for Raid spraying, Matt would be out there on weekends. He's seen some trouble in his time. Luckily, Helen and Matt also had a really rangy pool skimmer on hand. We did not, therefore, require the pole, hook and duct tape called for by the original plan. The pool skimmer fit in the car, but just barely: Pool skimmer in the car. Tom exited the vehicle and shrugged into a hoodie. then he put o...

We're visiting Helen and Matt upstate this weekend. Tom's training for the NY Marathon and his plan calls for a long run. So he sets out for a 20 miler. About 5 miles in, he decides to take a loop through a nature preserve. He removes his little running backpack and hides it in a bush. When he comes back: Yes. Tom snuggled his backpack on top of a hive of bees. His credit card and his cash and his water bottle are in the backpack. Luckily he still has his phone. He calls me. I say I'll drive over with another credit card, cash and water. As I'm offering to do this, it all starts to feel a little perilous. Tom just got a new car and I've never driven it before. This car's filthy with new fangled gadgets. It's got one of those keys that's not really a key. It's a doohickey you put in your pocket and you press a button to start the engine. Plus it's got a crazy automatic gear shifter featuring multiple mystery buttons. And besides that, i...

Mom: "This baseball might be worth something. It's autographed." Upon closer examination.... Mom: "Oh.  Your father signed it."

It’s always a dilemma of epic proportions: whether to go to Free Day at a museum or to pay to get in some other day.  On the one hand, *Free Day,* emphasis on the Free.  On the other hand, when you go to Free Day, you’re packed in the museum with the kind of people who go to non-profit institutions on the day they don’t have to pay. We went to see the Leonard Cohen exhibit at the Jewish Museum on Free Day. It was the only day we could go. I don't know where the summer went, but Leonard will be headed out next week or something so the clock was ticking to get our asses up there. Leonard Cohen at the Jewish Museum, UES The exhibit was more like a video installation than an exhibit in the way you'd probably picture an exhibit. The rooms were dark. Beanbags and benches took up most of the floor space. And the place was jammed. Like Free Day jammed. Like the standing room only in the back spilled out into the hallway. In the middle of one of the video...

The house we rented for the week was right on a lake. This was the view sitting on the deck drinking coffee in the morning. My father has a new hobby - picking locks. While the rest of us all lounged around on the deck, pop spread out his lock picking tools on the kitchen table. He went down in the garage and rummaged up an assortment of Masterlocks. He picked them. On Wednesday we opened up birthday presents. Pretty much everybody except me and Mary had birthday presents. Tom received a gift from my dad - a lock picking kit of his very own. Tom is a quick study. He opened up the practice lock that came with the kit in record time and then moved on to the Masterlocks from the garage.  Now he's graduated to door locks. I have mixed feelings about this. Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Ella and Jack played a little game they called "William Tell." With an avocado and a rubber-band shooter. My brother decided that eye protection was a must-have so so...

Let’s say you lay out a jigsaw puzzle in a vacation rental. You wonder how hard it is to get a family to go into full OCD puzzle mode for 24 solid hours until the last piece is snuggled into place. You decide to study my family unit. I’d say your odds are good, but the goods are odd. No one ever accused any of my immediate relations of being within shouting distance of normal. Thank God, that would be boring. My father, for example, spent the entire first day of our vacation in an outfit comprised entirely of green spandex. Green socks, green bike shorts, green bike shirt, green hat. All green, but varying in their shade of fluorescence. He had an outfit change for dinner and emerged in full-on red, white and blue. No one commented on any of these style choices, however. Pop's fashion sensibilities haven't altered much in the past forty years. At this point, we'd all get worried if he showed up anywhere in a navy blue polo and khakis.  Pop was odd man out, howeve...

My parents are cleaning out closets with a ferocity that would dwarf  Peter Dinklage . Mostly that means they are easily distracted by items someone socked away sixty years ago.  I am closely monitoring their endeavors.   My mom had pretty good handwriting for a ten year old. She lacked in the politeness category, however. The infamous "Nubian Princesses." I have known these statues existed my whole life but have never actually seen them before. Their provenance is a complete mystery. I am closely monitoring the composting, or lack thereof, of these allegedly "compostable scouring pads." Check out the evidence I dug up below. I buried them outside months ago. I will continue to shovel these up periodically to assess, but I have my strong doubts. Probably not actually compostable "Walnut Shell" scouring pads I buried months ago. I am actively contemplating a situation that emerged when I purchased two luggage racks on Amazo...

This post is my version of 5-Bullet Friday , but without nearly as much reflection and also with an ulterior motive. If you buy anything on this list, kindly report back. I'm on an investigative mission. I have had an Amazon reseller account for going on a decade and have yet to earn a single solitary shekel from Bezos. The process is rigged, I tell you. Like if someone clicks through on a blog link, but buys the item in a different size or color or model, all bets are off and no soup for you, blogger person. In the good news department, I personally have other methods to earn my soup. However, and this is important: Tom and I are engaged in a fierce battle to see who can earn more money on the internet. Tom used to win every year back when YouTube was fair, but in 2019 I might be ahead. I've raked in almost $16 so far and it's only July. My biggest money maker continues to be the Cher post . It's the gift that keeps on giving in the RPM department. Anyway, onwa...

Tom and I boarded the airplane and sat down in our seats.  We were bound for Oregon to spend 4th of July with Helen and Matt at Darcey and Kent's house in Eugene. I fastened the seatbelt and stowed my crap under the seat. At some point, it became evident that the young woman seated on my right was singing softly. Some kind of Christian uptempo number. Then she started talking to herself, mostly narrating the entire process of downloading the United App, remembering her frequent flyer number and signing up for inflight wifi.  The quiet talking and occasional musical interlude continued the entire flight. Later on, when we mentioned this to Kent, he said, “She’s probably from Eugene.” Speaking of the travel portion of our vacation, I’d be remiss if I failed to mention how I had been pulled aside by a TSA agent at the security checkpoint. It was because of a ziplock full of lentils. The agent hoisted the lentils into the light and peered at them intently. Then he turned ...

My trip to DC went flawlessly and say this in breathless awe. All my trains were on time. No problem with the hotel reservation or the taxis or the shipments of stuff I needed for the conference I was going to. The bonus logistical round began on Wednesday morning. I decided not to head directly to the office. I decided instead to walk to Tribeca and go the Fountain Pen Hospital. This plan to go to the Fountain Pen Hospital was super vital in a non-life threatening way. Here's the crux of the main challenge: The store is not open on the weekends. It is not open evenings.  It is open 7:30-5:30 pm Monday through Friday. Basically, if you don’t work in a five block radius, you have to make a special trip there. And because I’m not a retiree, this required deft time management. The whole idea of going to the Fountain Pen Hospital began when I heard Neil Gamin on the Tim Ferris podcast talking about his fascination with fountain pens. He mentioned this store, which has been...

When I learned about this work thing I needed to attend in Boston, I immediately snapped into action. The work thing required me to be in Massachusetts for a grand total of 18 hours: 4 hours of meetings, a dinner, a good nights sleep, and then home on the train the next morning. Boston -  Destination for the Work Thing I booked a hotel within walking distance of the train station.  Then I decided I wanted to actually walk the walking distance.  Then I made the daring call to *not* take my rolley-bag. I would eschew the rolley-bag. Because simply, who could disagree that rolley-bags on sidewalks suck if you’re going more than like 10 feet? I decided I would take my work backpack and my handbag, which is a tote-style affair. That’s it. And exactly then ... the whole endeavor became a full-on OCD challenge: How do I pack for one night’s stay in Boston with everything I need for work still in my work backpack, but then also manage to stuff in there all I need ...

After a really lovely brunch at Nix with Kate and Renya, I attempted to walk home. All was going well until I hit 5th Avenue. And when I say "hit 5th Avenue" I mean I hit it like a solid wall of humanity completely decked out all manner of gorgeous saris and scarves and golden tassels. Turned out to be the Hare Krishna parade. I had previously not realized how many followers of Hare Krishna there are in the New York City metro area. There did not appear to be any way to cross the avenue. Rolling ever so slowly down the street were these towering red and gold floats with people sitting on them cross legged possibly smoking hookahs. Or maybe it was incense. And all around the floats, flowing over every square inch of the asphalt and sidewalk, a jangle of men, women, children, strollers, kids all marching. Entire family trees turned out for the festivities. So I joined the parade. It might not be the best plan. It might be more a click-your-heels-twice-and-pra...

Tom and I zipped down the sidewalk in Chelsea. Coming the other way was a troupe of guys. As we crossed paths, the one guy said to another guy, “We’re going to that drag show tonight.” Tom turned to me and said, “what is a tri show?” I said, “He said, ‘A drag show.’ Not a tri show.” “Oh,” said Tom. “I was thinking that I knew bi, but tri sounded new.” I laughed. Because it was funny. Tri’s. That is not what the T stands for in LGBTQ.  But my moments of feeling all in-the-know were short lived. We went to the Whitney Biennial, which is a whole other story, but the important part is that I had bought a $7 matcha latte right before we went in that I was not. going. to. throw. out.  So Tom and I took a detour through the book shop in the lobby. There was a display of flags for sale. I see the Leather Flag, Demisexual flag, Aromatic flag, Non-binary Flag. Wait, the Aromatic flag? Is this people who smell good or people who only are attracted to peo...

Thursday night, we headed out to Bushwick to see a show. It feels like another world out there. A long way from the office in New Jersey where I'd been just hours before. And I mean that mostly in a non-geographic context. (Bushwick is in Brooklyn, btw. Apparently this is not a well-known travel destination outside of a five-borough radius.) Admittedly, I was feeling a little jangly when we first showed up and the venue seemed more like a club for people who don nude high heels to lengthen their leg line and then blow out their eardrums amidst unrelenting house music. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I'd left my earplugs in my other handbag.  And I don't own a pair of nude high heels. I feel like they were a thing like three years ago. Has the trend become a classic? I'm not the type who would know. But the second we got through the bar and into the theater space, I knew it was all going to work out just fine.  We were greeted by a very b...

Friday night we walked over to the Rubin Museum to drink with the Buddhists but also because they had a Game of Thrones tour of the galleries. A few of the Buddhists came on the tour with us. The tour guide shuffled us all up to one of the mandalas on the fifth floor and started pointing at it while talking about Game of Thrones. She had an iPad full of photos from the show to corroborate her Tibetan art-related theories. Some of them were a stretch. One of the Buddhists leaned over and whispered, “Too many Game of Thrones references! Maybe a few would be ok, but this is over the top.”  I whispered back, ‘this is a Game of Thrones tour.”  “Oh," he said,” I didn’t know that.”  Afterwards, we decided to check out the new Georgian restaurant on 14th street. The Georgian alphabet is printed, kind of big, on one of the walls in the restaurant. These letters look really spry to me, who cannot read them. They bounce across my eyeballs. I wonder who it w...

I have aspirations to be one of those crafty bloggers who wakes up every morning with a plan to genetically engineer gingham into seasonally appropriate wallpaper or maybe learn how to use shrinky-dinks to create an on-trend evening bag. I like the idea of crafty blogs because they seem so innocent. Cute photos of dogs with tails entwined into heart shapes will drive this impression. But these sparkly creative types are not cherubs. They are a gang of internet masterminds.  You don’t get results by merely posting adorable photos of rhubarb growing in your garden. You have to be ready to wage war for search engine advantage. The back-end of any blog about creative green living is a dystopian desert world of pipes and steel. Where their black fuel is clicks on retargeted ads. Meanwhile, I do not harbor any illusions relative to my lack of effort in the SEO department. That doesn't stop me from documenting my crafting prowess. Personally, I felt quite artful and shrewd ...

I picked out a pair of shimmery golden pants to wear to Michelle and David's big birthday party in Providence, RI. You might question my fashion choice — you might wonder, “weren’t you worried about having shinier pants than the birthday girl?”  Had you actually asked, I would have chuckled very breezily. No way. Zero concerns. When you know someone for almost thirty years, you gain a very solid understanding of what she’s likely to break out for her birthday party. My hope was to fit in with the general theme.  Good news! Tom said my golden pants performed very well. Michelle has other friends with similar perceptiveness. There was a lot of shimmer in that ballroom for a Saturday night in March. Michelle herself wore an amazing blue sequined jumpsuit. Super sparkly. This morning at brunch, I said to Michelle that the color was understated. She said, “Yes, because sequins can be understated.”  Speaking of pants, when Tom and I were walking over to the b...

Last week, I was in Stockholm for a grand total of 3.5 days for my class reunion. Sara had suggested I stay my first night at the Radisson Blu, which she said was right where I'd get off the ArlandaExpress terminal in the central Stockholm train station (T-Centralen) and therefore super convenient.  But when I got off the ArlandaExpress train, which was high speed, quiet and clean -- everything New York trains can't seem to manage in their wildest dreams -- when I got off the train and looked at Google Maps, the Radisson Blu seemed kind of distant. Seemed like I need to walk down the main drag and then go around the bottom of the station or something. I set off.  And fifteen minutes later, had walked in a giant circle ending up about 20 feet from where I was before, right out front the Radisson Blu. I'm going to blame it on jet lag. The Radisson Blu was basically in T-Centralen.   I went up to my room, dropped off my suitcase and headed back down to T-Ce...