Never hurts to bling it out a bit while motoring around the Financial District.
Just watched Food, Inc. for my anthropology of food class. It was good, informative and full of self-righteous zeal, as I expected. 
If you are familiar with the Omnivore’s Dilemma this won’t be news. For class we are looking at food polemics such as this and seeing how far scare tactics and behavior modification suggestions really take you. As anthropologists we fear problem solving, but love assumption problematizing.
Also, on a semi-related note, the distributors of Food, Inc. wanted $500 to let us screen it to a college audience for no-fee entrance. I guess intellectual property rights > food supply horrors.
I took these pictures Thanksgiving morning arranging flowers with my sister with the Thanksgiving Day parade on in the background, sipping coffee, and most of all smelling the delicious scent of turkey day feasting all around my house. We were just about as cozied up as one can be when it is 70 degrees outside. 
Then everyone came over and we ate, ate, ate.
I am thankful that there are times in life when togetherness is the most important thing, never stress.
Finals suck. Family rules!
Dear everyone who comes into the restaurant I work in,
Let me lay this out for you.
No, we don’t make mojitos.
No, we don’t have flavored margaritas.
No, we don’t make lemon drops and the bartenders literally laugh at me when I ask them to make Cosmopolitans.
No, our children’s pizza doesn’t come with toppings (head cook Jorge: “What does this look like? Dominos?)
No, I can’t fix your wobbly table.
That’s as cold as the beer comes.
No, we don’t do free birthday desserts.
No, your table isn’t dirty, the varnish on the wood is old.
No, I can’t control which game is on which TV. Nor, in that case, am I the reason your team is doing badly.
Also, I don’t personally make your food.
When you pay half the bill in cash, and half on a credit card, you still have to leave a tip for the whole amount.
Yes, all of the waitresses are talking about you at the server stand.
Yes, the soup of the day is actually the soup of the “until we run out of it.”
Yes, it is personal when I automatically add gratuity.
Whew, just so we have that out of the way. One morning, two guys came in and sat down for Sunday brunch and football, and one said to the other, “These tables are sticky,” to which his friend replied, “Yeah, it’s a fucking bar, sit down.”
I think I may have actually applauded.
Basically, the whole issue of politeness required when people come in and make such requests could be greatly helped by a little badge or sign saying as much I could just point to. The scenario could go like this:
Customer: “Do you have whole wheat pasta available?”
Me: (Points to sign which reads: “No, this is a fucking bar.”) and repeats: “So, what can I get for you?”
The spring cavalcade happened to fall on the day after my last final, hence I was too busy day drinking to attend. However this one conveniently falls right in the middle of my finals, so I can procrastinate by going and spending money!
Happy Holidays, indeed.
1. Last night I woke with a start in the middle of the night (due to an over-zealous furnace) and in my time waiting to go back to sleep had a mind blowing revelation on a better way to live my life, consider my problems, and interact with the world around me. Unfortunately, I don’t remember what this realization was, only that it happened while I struggled to escape from the sweaty clutches of my down comforter and that it was a good one. Enlightenment eludes me again due to narcolepsy.
2. It is the middle of November already!?! Wasn’t Halloween, like, yesterday? Almost time to pack my bags and leave this town for abroad adventures next spring…
(Cue writhing panic, again).
I am currently listening to the Where the Wild Things Are soundtrack and I must say, developing a full fledged girl-crush on Karen O.
I love me some Yeah Yeah Yeahs, but this soundtrack takes the cake. It is folky (instead of yelly?) and happy and sad and thrilling and lonely, many levels of things I like, and want to listen to for longer than in her work with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Favorite so far (I am not even through it yet), by far Worried Shoes. And look at the chick, she is so cool! Her persona is every bit as cool and individual and “take me if you like, fuck you if you don’t” as her uniquely expressive voice.
I think I’m in like.
So stoked!
more about "MoMA | Tim Burton", posted with vodpod
I am loving the NYT coverage of the Berlin Wall memorial. Especially the fun interactive things…
Here is my own pic from adventuring there in January with Steffi B., one of my favorite Germans in the whole wide world.
This is a mural on part of the wall left standing. If it has a cold, icy bluish look, that’s because of all of the history of sadness and isolation it is supposed to commemorate. Or, because it was like 25 degrees out.
Why must you be so full of interesting and distracting things?
While catching up on my blog consumption (instead of writing my paper), via my wonderful friend Kevin Gotkin’s blog, I Have a Crush On Paris (which I read instead of writing my paper), I discovered my new favorite blog: Hour of Departure.
Apparently by two NYU photo majors, the photo based blog is beautiful, poignant and suggestive. I looked through the entire thing (instead of writing my paper).
Go there and see for yourself. I find a great time to do this is .2 pages through 5-7 page paper.
Thanks again internet/attention span!
