I'm going to be in Chicago visiting Big Yellow Hair and her dog Seat Belt starting tomorrow night, through Memorial Day. So if you're looking for exciting blog posts, you're not going to get them until after I'm back. If that.
Go have your own fun holidays.
Oooh! NY readers, or readers visiting the NY area - go to the Brooklyn Bridge extravaganza this weekend and report back to me. It's 100 years old!
TENNIS WITH DOG!
So I found this neat site where you can enter all your family tree stuff without having to sell your firstborn for the access (*cough* Ancestry.com *cough*). My family has a bunch of information about our relatives that used to live in bits and pieces all over the place. Now, thanks to this great resource, it's all in one spot: my family tree. And baby, it is BIG and LONG (that's what she said).
We go back to 1738 at least, and that's only the part I can fill in. I have dudes stretching back to the 1600s but getting from them to the last link on my tree is the tricky part. Copious note taking by my mom's side of the family throughout the years had given me the basic outline for that side of the family. Now coupled with the detailed and readily available information from the folks over at FamilySearch.org, I have names, dates, parents, siblings, addresses and even occupations in some cases.
I see you've clicked FamilySearch. Yes, yes it is manned by the Mormons. They might be slightly weird and too blonde for us northeasterners, but I'll be damned if they don't keep good records.
For example, I have a great-great grandmother who was apparently French, or descended from the French. Huguenots, to be specific. That's the family lore but we haven't been able to substantiate it quite yet. Anyway, closest I got was today when I dug up the correct spelling of her name, and records of her sisters, brothers and mere. Guess what? The family owned a restaurant for which she was the chef, and two of her brothers were bartenders (or barkeeps, as they used to say).
I'm sure you're thinking big whoop, but this is huge news for me. I feel all Catherine Willows today, and I'm proud of it.
------
In other news, visit AMNY today and read all about how blogger buddy Clinton is saving money by reverting to the cuisine of his college days. Imagine my surprise this morning when I walked past the AMNY basket at the Union Square stop, only to find Clinton's mug staring back up at me. "I know him!" I said out loud, to nobody. Very exciting stuff. Except, I wonder if his participation in this article is inherently traitorous to Chris...
Sorry Joan Acocella. You didn't answer the question. You talked about just about everything about New Yorkers *but* their rudeness. If this were 10th grade composition, you would have "See me" scrawled in red across the top of your paper.
So let me attempt an answer to this perennial question.
1) Because there are too many of us in a very small space.
There are a lot of us who live in the five boroughs. Add to that the throng of daily commuters. Now add all the toolbags who are moving here every day to either be a hedge-funder, a Scary Sadshaw or a Hipster. Let's turn it up a notch with a bunch of domestic tourists. Up some more with international tourists whose countries have a currency that is currently valued higher than the dollar. That's an assload of people in a very finite space. You think we're not crawling all over each other every second of the day? You do the math.
2) Because "I'm walking here!"
How would you like it if I invaded your living room every night and stood in front of the TV while you tried to watch 'My Name is Earl' from your barcalounger? Then don't gawk up at the tall buildings from the MIDDLE OF THE SIDEWALK. Really, it's just common courtesy, or were you raised by wolves? Step aside and look all you want - just don't do it in my path.
3) Because you're an idiot.
Here's where I agree with Acocella: New York is not considered the center of the universe for no good reason. People who come here generally have a little more going on in the IQ area, with a side order of ambition. We live in a fast-paced, global world. We read the paper and books (you remember books, right?). We like to discuss politics and world events. We have opinions about subjects other than what happened on 'The Hills' last night. So when you approach us on 42nd and Broadway asking where Times Square is, what else can we do but give you directions to Coney Island?
4) Because it's all in your head.
New York City has a long history of being a difficult place to live. Just rent 'Gangs of New York' or read Pete Hamill's 'Forever'. The muck and the puss and the stench and the goo one had to wade through just to get from point A to point B, never mind dodging people throwing the contents of their shitbuckets out the window. Unless you were an Astor, rolling around New York wasn't a pleasurable experience. Then came the Industrial Revolution and the place cleaned up a bit, with indoor plumbing and paved roads being two of the biggest contributors of a cleaner, nicer New York. The post-war years were a kind of Utopia (think Breakfast at Tiffany's), but unfortunately John Lindsay's disasterous tenure as mayor was fast on that era's heels and in no time the city was bankrupt, dirty and dangerous. Apparently everyone's impressions/memories of New York stop right here. Yes, people were pissy - wouldn't you be if your idea of a good week was no attempted muggings? Now we have Mayor Bloomie and things are nice, for better or for worse, and so are we. For the most part.
5) Because we just saw another Chase Bank being constructed in the place of our old favorite watering hole.
Enough said.
6) Because you do not stand clear of the closing doors.
Dudes, we know it's so cool that you're taking the subway for the VERY FIRST TIME, but your enthusiasm is getting in the way of our business. Get your ass in the car quickly, then sit down or hold onto something. We think it's totally gay when you shout out "Ooh!" while flopping onto some poor quotidian commuter because you got caught off guard by the jolt when the subway started moving. It's a subway. It jolts. I mean, what do you think this is, the Washington DC Metro?
7) Because NY is a culture where it's "all about me".
Some ass walking down the street on his cell phone elbow you in the septum? His didn't mean any malice in his bonking of your schnoz, it's just that you got in the way of his very important life. You should know better than to get in the way of his very important life. He is very important. Can't you gather that by the way he is talking about important things on the phone to another very important person?
8) Because we're too busy to be nice.
We're busy - we don't have time to help you. Except when we do. Per Acocella's column, there are times when New Yorkers are illogically nice, and it usually has to do with the giving of directions. I myself, possibly the most silently rude New Yorker there is (you should hear my inner monologue sometime) has on more than one occasion offered my assistance to an arguing couple holding a map. Once in French, even. Then there was that time I called 911 some dickhead smacking his wife around. I can be nice, but my niceness generally has a direct correlation with how far outside the NY metro area I happen to be.
In a nutshell, nice, nasty, bitchy or benevolent, all you need to know about the cross section of humanity that is New York you can find on Overheard in New York (this item is a particularly perfect example of the nice/rude dichotomy). Anyone planning a trip should bone up and buck up. It's going to be a bumpy ride.
As a woman born in the era of feminism, I shouldn't laugh at this. But I do.
I'm not going to go into the gory details about my vacation, but suffice to say Savannah and Charleston are two lovely little cities in the South. I highly recommend visiting them both -- they're cute, the food's good, they're a helluvah lot cheaper than NYC or Europe, and they're close to each other. Fly down on the cheap, rent a car, drive around. Do yourself a favor though: don't go to Hilton Head. Like Palm Springs, that other town that makes my socialist-leaning skin crawl, Hilton Head's full of entitled rich white people. Plus it's boring, not that pretty and you can't access the coast. HH fucking blows, if you want to get right down to it.
Because all car rental places are whores in that they charge an extra $10 a day for a second driver, I did all the driving. Which was fine, no matter what my driving on vacation experiences have been in the past. Well, except for the deluge we encountered on Tuesday that made me pull the car over and start crying. I'm convinced the driving was fine because I (a) wasn't alone, (b) wasn't perpetually sitting in the middle of soul-deadening traffic, and (c) wasn't monkeying with Google map printouts -- because zing! we got a Garmin for the car!
Garmine, as I named her, was an enormous help. Not sure how to get out of the airport? Garmine knows. Wherethefuckisthefuckingrestaurantwe'relate! Garmine knows. How do I get out to Tybee Island without going through downtown Savannah? Just ask Garmine.
Not that she's not without her faults. Garmin maps have to be updated from time to time and if they're not, which is usually par for the course at a car rental place managed by the apathetic, Garmine might take you a little out of your way or insist that you keep making right hand turns when your hotel is clearly to the left.
She's a little annoying too at times. Her volume level is either whisper or shouting. If you drift a little too far over a lane she might get testy and remind you to "keep right". Sometimes she does a fake-out - making you go one way then have to Uey it back in the correct direction. And she doesn't like when you vary from the planned route to stop into a CVS for sunscreen, practically shouting "RECALCULATING! RECALCULATING!" at you until you want to smack her off your dashboard.
But for all her flaws, she was the sweetest, most helpful and welcome addition to our trip. From here on in, I'm hiring Garmine to accompany me on my travels.
Keep right.
Well, I'm done betting on horses for the Triple Crown. I put four on Eight Belles to win (since there were no Philly horses I bet on the filly - get it? I'm so funny.) and although she comes in second, she ends up getting euthanized minutes after finishing the race.
Smarty Jones: my favorite horse in the world (more than Seabiscuit, even) wins Kentucky and Preakness, but blows Belmont.
Barbaro: we all know what happened here.
Do we see a pattern?
So that's it for me - no more betting. I obviously have some kind of bad juju going on when I put money on a horse.
JeffCap, who kindly ran the 12 blocks to the OTB to make my bet on Saturday, said it best: "Never ask me to place another bet for you again."
Hello, this is Sally Tomato. I'm currently on vacation from April 26th to May 2nd. If you need to reach me, too bad. Don't even begin to think I might be checking my messages - only workaholics or fools do that. I'll be in Charleston, Hilton Head and Savannah in the warm weather while you folks in New York sustain yet another week of rainy mid-50's. Ha. While you spend your days staring absently at your monitor out of sheer boredom, I'll be drinking and eating my way through the south.
If there's a work emergency and you need to contact someone in my stead, tough shit. You'll deal. It's only a week. We're not saving lives here, people.
Update to this post below!
This article was forwarded to me by Big Yellow Hair. Seems like a couple kids in suburban Chicago got suspended for a senior prank so innocuous it could've been an episode of 'Happy Days': 10 kids dressed in banana costumes are given chase by a gorilla. That's it. No screaming, no real disruptions, just bananas being chased by a gorilla through campus. For this they get suspended.
Honestly, can we as a nation lighten up please? What about this prank screams terrorism? It's the end of April for chrissakes. They're good kids who are already accepted to college and are blowing off a little steam and for this they get a 5-day suspension? We pay no attention to an epidemic of bullying sweeping across the nation, but bananas - whoa. Not acceptable.
Anyway, BYH and I think this is one of the funniest concepts in a long time. She, as bigwig of Major Improv Theatre, is going to reward the kids with tickets to a show and anointing them honorary members. I personally think this pathetic story is too retarded to be buried deep in the Sun Times - this deserves national coverage, baby.
Meantime, I'm going to see about renting a banana costume of my own as tribute/performance art. Just go about my life as usual, but in a banana costume. Walk into work as a banana with a briefcase. Get a lunchtime pedicure. Hail a taxi. Go to happy hour and drink banana daiquiris. The possibilities are endless.
UPDATE: BYH got in touch with the boys after all. Initially just left a message, but today one of the kids called back, saying his name was [redacted]. "[Redacted]? I'm sorry don't know a [Redacted]," she said, absentmindedly. "What can I say?" the kid continued. "I'm the gorilla."
They're going to the show on Tuesday night. Dressed in their costumes.
Dammit, I love this story.
I'm off on vacation (domestic) next week. Domestic, because the dollar is for shit. If it weren't, my hand would be forced to visit my favorite place in the world - Paris - followed by a wee excursion to the south - Provence.
I would feel sorry for myself, but Bunny just checked in and had this to say about her annual France class trip:
"Forgot to tell you about the trip. It was fucking freezing the whole time. And fucking wet the whole time. We are standing at the top of the world at Eze and you can't see 5 feet in front of you. I told my families, 'If you could see out you would have a spectacular view of the Mediterranean.' And on the way up to the top, we saw some firemen giving CPR to a dead guy. Yeah, that won't haunt 5th graders for the rest of their lives!"
So I'm very content with kickin' it southern fried grits style in the land of Waffle House.
Starbucks: I don't have it out for the company, really, I just choose not to patronize them as often as some people. Not a big fan of corporate behemoths in general; plus, I think their drip coffee is too bitter (I do loves me the Gingerbread Latte, though, and the new Honey Latte is quite delightful). Apart from my still not being able to order in the right order, I haven't had much to say about Starbucks. Until just recently.
Old news: in the past month Starbucks has started offering a new roast at a lower price point that's supposed to be less bitey. The company simultaneously took the opportunity to change the logo to their old logo before some PAC got upset about paper coffee cups featuring a mermaid flashing her virginia. Now instead of the chest-up shot of the mermaid we're getting full frontal. But that's not what's bothering me. What's bothering me is that it's brown.
"Sally get over yourself," you're thinking. I would but it's not just the logo, it's the entire rebranding effort which features the most boring color in the spectrum. The color of M&M most likely to be thrown on the ground. Not only are their cups brown, their store signs are brown. To wit: BROWN Starbucks sign somewhere on Eighth Avenue in the 50s. And we all know that when one goes they all go, which is to say sooner or later all the Starbucks in New York City and across America will soon be the color of feces.
Would someone tell me WTF is wrong with Schultz? Why why why would you go messing with your brand to such a degree? Changing the kelly green Starbucks has been associated with for the past 15/20 years to brown is akin to changing the Golden Arches to hot pink. Like changing the NBC Peacock to a pigeon. Like changing Charmin's Mr. Whipple to George Whipple. I mean, I'm no Jack Welch, but fucking with your brand at this late date - when there is in essence nothing wrong with it - well, that's just whack.
So, lots to do tonight, lots to do. Couple concerts, theatre, stuff. One thing in particular on Gothamist's event list piqued my interest, however I won't be attending because I have to start packing for my vacation next week and I need to finish this very wonderful book. But I would so love it if someone would go in my stead and represent:
First Lady Laura Bush and Jenna Bush on Literacy and Learning tonight at the 92nd Street Y
Now, I'm all for reading. I love to read - christ, my apartment could double for a Barnes & Noble - and I think it's very important to evangelize to our kids the importance/value/fun of reading. But somehow the gravity of the pro-read message turns comical in the hands of Georgina W (come on - she looks and acts just like him). And paying for a ticket? *snort* You'd have to pay me to sit through that shit.
So will someone from my reading audience go tonight and heckle the ever living shit out of these two? Here's the line I desperately want to shout out:
"Did your dad read this book? Can he?"
Ba-da-bum. Thank you, I'll be here all week. Try the veal.
