January 31, 2005
The Blog Effect
It's been over a week now since I started this blog. It's completely addictive. If I don't have anything interesting to post, I shouldn't post anything, but I'm finding that really hard. I'm a publicity whore.
So here's a list about the glorious side effects of blogging:
- psoriasis (in winter, due to excessive use of the mouse and keyboard in a cold, dry apartment)
- excessive checking of one's own blog for comments
- lack of sleep, followed by insomnia
- euphoria, caused by posting of a comment
- you write more, but not necessarily better, prose
- you realize that half the things you post have been posted by 762 other blogs
Posted by csageday at 11:40 PM | Comments (1)
Paparazzi
Last week, a coworker came over with the company newsletter and showed me a picture from the holiday party: The two of us have goofy smiles and we're showing off plates piled high with food. The first thing I notice is that I have FIVE chins. The second thing is that the chins and the food and the poor lighting make me look like I might weigh 500 pounds and eat that much food normally. Then, I read the caption: "Cindy Day and [coworker] understand that there are no calories in holiday cuisine." Now, is that fair?
Posted by csageday at 09:51 PM | Comments (0)
January 30, 2005
Church of Craft
If, in art class in the fifth grade, you took a Valentine's Day project a little too far and made a card that could sell for $12 at Kate's Paperie, Church of Craft is for you.
For people with crafty tendencies and a habit of collecting bits of fabric or fancy paper for future use, Church of Craft is like a candy store. It's not so much a church as an organization that gives crafty types the materials and the space to entertain themselves. It's founded on the belief that making things and indulging your love of yarn or fabric or beading is spiritually healthy.
Church of Craft in New York consists of a loft-like space in downtown Brooklyn which is shared with a similarly crafty store: Yarnivore. The Yarnivore side has a counter and stacks of yarn and knitting books, and Rose, the owner, is always on hand to help with knitting projects. The other half of the store is packed with art supplies but was somewhat of a mystery to me until yesterday, when Church of Craft had an open house and party to raise funds.
When I walked through the door and into the Church of Craft space, I felt like I was back in art class. There was a table stacked with construction paper, glitter glue, scissors, origami paper, stamps and ink, and various other art store paraphernalia. True to their nature, several creative types were taking name tag-making to new heights, incorporating everything on the table.
A little left-brained disorganization made it hard to figure out what was going on, but there was wine and beer and baked goods for sale, a raffle for artsy prizes, and someone was conducting a session on making popup books. When I figured out how things worked I dug out some white ribbon and three different kinds of paper and put together a wedding card for a cousin.
Shelves line one wall and are stacked with bins full of fabric, quilting supplies, felt, paper, sewing supplies, and similar items, all available for use by members. A bookcase had stacks of old sewing patterns and magazines. A knitting machine and sewing machine can be used by those who know what to do with them, and for people like me who like all of these things but don't know where to start, there are classes.
The best part is that, with the exception of the classes, it's all free. Donations of time, supplies, or money are encouraged. You can come in, sit down, and make Valentine's cards all day if you want to and you might even find someone to chat with who's doing the same thing. If you have a sudden need to make a patchwork skirt, you can take the train to Jay Street and find everything you need to do so.
Posted by csageday at 06:44 PM | Comments (1)
January 29, 2005
Fire, Anime, Chocolate, and a Dead Camera
Saturday, since family-related events have been cancelled, there's a Church of Craft thing at Yarnivore, and Princess Mononoke at MOMA.
Princess Mononoke. 1997. Japan. Directed by Hayao Miyazaki. With the voices of Gillian Anderson, Billy Crudup, Claire Danes. Miyazaki's lush and fantastic animes use a subtle blend of hand-drawn cels and computer-generated images to create an extraordinarily vivid and imaginative universe populated by amazing landscapes, people, creatures, and, well, things.
Last week's New Yorker article about Miyazaki, Japanese animator extraordinaire, made us anxious to see some of his work. Renting Spirited Away would have been the logical place to start but going to the new MOMA theater is much more fun. Miyazaki seems to have a unique appreciation of the fantastical creatures and ideas that appeal to children. Unlike the Disney machine, he also shows scepticism about marketing to children, encouraging kids to watch movies, etc. So he's brilliant and original and he actually cares about his audience.
On Sunday, we're heading to this Hot Chocolate Festival with a portable ice rink -- I'm not even sure how that works. If the ancient digital Olympus that I've resurrected keeps working, I'll take pictures. They'll be fuzzy and low quality, but that's all I can offer. Here's what the Kodak looks like:
Diagnosis: Lens malfunction. So D took it all apart and got the lens to move in and out, but only sometimes, and I sincerely doubt we'll ever figure out how to put this back together again.
(Note: I split this entry up to move these photos to another page.)
Here's one of the reasons I never want to move out of our apartment:
Other reasons: Derek has his own space to make a mess in. There are two bathrooms. There are thirteen permanent bookshelves. There is a washer and a dryer, and a hallway. There's something about having a long hallway that makes me feel grown up. Even more than having green wine glasses.
In other news, I need to stop writing blogs at one in the morning so I can sleep and not act like a complete idiot.
Posted by csageday at 12:57 AM | Comments (0)
January 28, 2005
The Uncle Floyd Show
If you've never heard of The Uncle Floyd Show, you must, must buy this DVD (or borrow it from me). It's supposed to be a kids' show but it's more like an extremely low budget, barely scripted SNL with puppets and kids' drawings on the walls.
In one sketch, "Liberal vs. Conservative," the camera cuts between a bearded, professorial liberal making some valid point and Floyd in a checkered suit, yelling nonsense like "That's what you are! Bimbo Schmimbo!"
D used to watch this and got the DVD for Christmas, but the irony is that this show was filmed in West Orange, New Jersey, where I grew up. The studio was a couple of miles from my house, and I had never heard of it.
We just watched a clip and it's even funnier the second time around. Floyd does a great Don Goomba (Godfather spoof) and an even better Julia Childs. One sketch is in fake Polish. I don't get why this isn't a huge cult classic. It think it once was, but it's still funny today.
Posted by csageday at 12:20 AM | Comments (1)
Pay the Train Gods
First, there was a blizzard, which is a reasonable excuse for train delays, especially on the flood-friendly F. But that was just the beginning. For some reason the train gods are very, very mad. Maybe they read my blog about buses and are lashing out on behalf of the MTA.
Monday, I nearly kill myself on ice and slush on the stairs going down to the station. Then I notice the turnstiles are roped off. No F service. No explanation. Take the bus, signs say. But the bus is a lot smaller than a ten-car train so I end up working from home until three and eventually taking a slow R train.
Later I hear about the switch fire that will put the C train out of rotation for "3 to 5 years". MTA estimates are notoriously weird. I cut the MTA some slack and endure delays and very disturbing irregularities like G trains appearing in Manhattan and V trains appearing in Brooklyn.
Wednesday, the A train was creeping along, except this time a toddler gets on in full tantrum mode. This red-faced little kid has lungs of steel and will not quit. He screams, scrunches up his face and screams again, writhing in and out of his mother's arms. Every time you think he's done, you realize a second later that he was only gathering his breath for the next onslaught. I've been on trains with drunk people and stupid people, but this was worse because the whole thing went on for 15 minutes while the train was sitting at a station with the doors open. Not a single person wanted to give up his seat or switch cars for fear that the train would start moving again.
Next and final episode of train god revenge for an unknown but horrible crime. I do the right thing and take the B to the F today, but when I get to Broadway/Lafayette to switch, two more Bs go by and a hateful V sits in the station forever. Garbled announcements seem to suggest the F is out of service. It doesn't bother me too much those because there's this great musician playing upbeat classical music so the whole thing seems funny. I decide that he is a train god incarnate, and if I give him a dollar an F will take me home. Except someone says the V is going to Brooklyn and I forget and get on and then it stops for good one station away. I decide to take the F in the other direction back to B/L to get a B. This time, I give the musician ALL my change (only had 20s in cash). An F came. It took me home.
Posted by csageday at 12:15 AM | Comments (1)
January 27, 2005
This Guy Needs a Life, Job, Girlfriend...
From Boing Boing: Someone is already waiting in line for the next Star Wars movie (yes, it's five months away). At least he has a couch to sit on and something to read. Five months of sitting outside (in rain, sleet, hail, snow) for a two-hour movie. Oh, and he has a blog. Maybe that explains it.
Maybe Microsoft Tipped Them Off
People are getting arrested for the stupidest things today. Some 9-10-year-olds got charged with a felony for drawing stick figures, and some poor guy using the Lynx text browser got busted by a SWAT team because they thought he was a hacker.
Posted by csageday at 12:51 PM | Comments (0)
Grammar Lesson
Started reading Eats, Shoots & Leaves today. It's funny, especially for someone who grew up having her grammar corrected constantly, mid-sentence, by her mother. The book states the case of "sticklers" who fight tirelessly for the correct use of apostrophes, commas, and "full stops" (it's British). Despite the humor, the author has a point -- punctuation is important, but so is fast, short, online communication.
I was an English major. I have a pretty good idea of how punctuation is meant to be used (my mother would disagree). But since work is always fast-paced and my primary form of communication is electronic (emails, IM), I notice myself leaving punctuation and good grammar out for expediency. It's just faster to say "launch pls, thx... btw, did you do such-and-such" than "Thank you. Please launch this file. By the way, ..." Even in emails to supervisors or large groups, it doesn't bother me much if I use "informal" language (read: sloppily punctuated, not well-formed, possibly misspelled). I would be mortified if anything in print appeared in that form. But I justify it online by thinking "It's this new medium thing, new rules apply, people understand, they even respect it."
Maybe we need to classify the use of English into multiple categories? Formal, informal? IM vs. published?
The problem is, I'm forgetting how to use good grammar and punctuation, and so is everyone else. (Kindly disregard egregious errors of grammar and punctiation in this blog -- I'm clearly using the new, informal version of the English language here.)
Posted by csageday at 01:07 AM | Comments (0)
The Genesis of BS
Still trying to get a hold on what a blog can be, and what this one should be, especially after reading Dooce's difficult time with comments this morning. It's not the place for my usual crisis rants (too personal), but I don't want to bog it down with a theme. I'll keep posting whatever interests me (or makes me mad) on a given day. At the moment it's a blog about blogs. My audience is pretty slim (Derek is already bored with it so, um, that leaves ... me). Overachieving perfectionist that I am, I'm doing my homework first. Here's how the blogging experiment came to be...
MT and Politics
First, a coworker raved about MovableType and showed me his blog (which is far more sophisticated in its simplicity than this will ever be). I thought: I need to do that. I should really do that. Maybe if I install MT, I too will write things like "On Photography is a wonderful book, at once a treatise on this enigmatic art form and a call to action," but it didn't happen.
Then there was MoveOn, which isn't a blog so much as a kick in the ass for people who want to get involved in politics but are lazy. That led to Wonkette and Daily Kos, which I checked now and then up to The Disaster in November.
The Yarn Phase
Disillusioned, I had an obsessive knitting phase, which naturally led me to an obsessive knitting blog phase. It started with Yarnivore, a blog written by a friend of a friend who recently opened a yarn store in Brooklyn. Then I found some serious knitting bloggers, and like many knitblog-addicts, ended up reading Yarn Harlot every day. I visited the blue blog and Mason-Dixon Knitting but always felt like an outsider because I'm not quite that serious about knitting 24/7 (a good thing).
Foodies
Boing Boing and some New York-related blogs are on my daily list now, but pictures of food and restaurant reviews are luring me into another subset of the blogging universe -- the food bloggers. There have always been the Chowhound people. But blogging has produced phenomena like Obsession with Food and The Amateur Gourmet. New York foodies now have a place to vent and an audience. Like the knitters, the food bloggers share photos about every stage of a project and organize group efforts. Is My Blog Burning? is a monthly event where a recipe theme (beans, terrine) and a date is established, and cooks all over the world blog about what they made on the chosen day. It's like Iron Chef done slowly, online.
There's a point here somewhere...
So the political blogging phase begat the knitblog plase which begat the foodblog phase. The problem is, I still feel lost because there are thousands of bloggers online and it's hard to summarize what they do.
Blogging is a medium in transition, and it is used differently by different groups. There are loose rules of etiquette and form to follow -- you have a title and tagline and a collection of links, you write in the first person, and your readers add a wide range of comments (unless you're me). A blog cannot escape being a reflection of the author's personality and priorities. How bloggers choose topics to write about, day after day, reveals what they value in their daily lives. For instance, my preoccupation with what other people think of me is abundantly clear... why else would I devote a whole essay to my relationships with blogs and my struggle to make this one decent? If I distance myself enough from my role as an author, maybe I can escape the vulnerability that bloggers inherently have.
Non Sequitor
It's restaurant week and places are so crowded that diners are psyched to get a seat on a crate in an igloo outside.
Posted by csageday at 01:01 AM | Comments (1)
January 26, 2005
Grand Old Iraq
Thirty-six troops died in Iraq today, the cost of the Iraq war is now $300 billion, we're not leaving any time soon, innocent Iraqis die every day, and insurgent violence threatens a fair election at the polls this weeked (that's an understatement). And Bush says: "I anticipate a grand moment in Iraqi history."
Update
Daily Kos had a similar reaction to Iraq news today.
Posted by csageday at 01:16 PM | Comments (0)
January 25, 2005
Bollywood Basics
Here's a Bollywood FAQ that explains the various Indian traditions that pop up in Bollywood movies. In a nutshell: Wearing a bindi on your forehead actually doesn't mean anything (they're just pretty), vermilion in your part means you're married, and relatives will wag their thumbs at you if you try to kiss your husband in public. Even at your own wedding.
Plus, BollyWHAT??'s Top Ten (Bollywood) Films. I really, really need to rent all of these and devote a day to this stuff so that the next time Bollywood is in the news I won't feel like I'm missing out.
Posted by csageday at 08:13 PM | Comments (0)
Oscar Glitz and Deficits
Today: Oscar nominees, and an answer about what snow will do the The Gates.
From Yahoo:
As Congress started to digest a new Bush administration request of $80 billion to bankroll wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, its top budget analyst on Tuesday projected $855 billion in deficits for the next decade even without the costs of war and Bush's Social Security plan.
This seems unforgivable. Why does it seem like no one gives a damn? Is it blind American optimism, or just stubborn, faith-based, irrational American optimism? Do most people fail to see how a deficit that big might affect their daily lives? Or do they fail to realize that accommodating some political awareness into their daily lives might prevent such irresponsible policy from existing in the first place?
That's somewhat hypocritical. My attitude since the election has been one of numb resignation, not activism. I'm just not sure what to do when faced with crooked politicians and half-a-country's worth of misguided souls. Ideas are welcome.
Posted by csageday at 12:24 PM | Comments (0)
January 24, 2005
Buses Are Slow
Nearly every evening, on my way to the subway, I pass a bus stop and there always seems to be a bus just pulling up. The buses seem to be moving fast, and I suddenly realize that if I jump on I would be getting somewhere in less than thirty seconds. I could avoid the 17 flights of slushy stairs and endless train delays and take the bus instead. The price is the same, and as an added bonus there's a view and I'll probably get a seat. When it's freezing outside, seeing a well-lit, warm bus pass by with a bunch of calm, warm-looking people staring out the window looks really inviting.
Today I couldn't resist. I had no idea which bus to get on but I figured 1) they're on Broadway heading downtown 2) I need to go downtown, and 3) I can just get off it it starts going the wrong way. I saw something like "Broadway -- 1st Ave" flash across the front of a bus and ran up to it as it pulled into the stop. Since I rarely take busses I'm usually flustered when I get inside -- should I say hello? The driver's right there. What's the etiquette? Passengers seem to understand that I'm a neophyte because they all stare at me. As in other failed attempts to ride buses in the city I try to nonchalantly look at the bus map and then remember that bus maps are unintelligible (see "Ancient Hieroglyphic Map", right). Plus, you need to know what bus you're on to make any sense of them. I'm self-conscious to an unhealthy degree, so instead of asking for help my next step was to find a seat and look out the window. The snow banks on the side of the street made me think for a minute that the bus may not have been the best idea just after a blizzard.
After about 50 stops in 5 blocks, I notice that all my fellow passengers are over 60 and buses really aren't for people who are trying to get anywhere in a hurry (like, for instance, to meet someone for dinner downtown). Then, we hit Times Square. There are three constant traffic jams in the city that I regularly run into -- there's one at Times Square, one in front of Grand Central, and one near the Port Authority. You really want to avoid being in any sort of moving vehicle in any of these places. And you never, ever want to experience those areas in or near rush hour. I must have spent 15 minutes moving from 43rd stree to 42nd street. And despite the 50 stops we'd made previously, you are NOT allowed to GET OUT of a bus if you're not at a bus stop. So while two ambulances drove right up to the side of the bus, trying to signal it to move out of the way, sirens and alarms blaring, the bus just sat there, and its passengers just stared off into space.
I seriously considered escaping further bus-related trauma at 41st street, but the traffic seemed a little less dense up ahead, it was warm in the bus, and I'm lazy, so I stayed put. We made a left onto 42nd and headed, stopping all the way, toward Bryant park. I saw one man scale a snow bank to get on the bus and then only ride it for 2 blocks. It would have been so much faster to walk. I regard bus travel in the city as something that long-time New Yorkers (who I hold in great esteem) know how to do, but I'm mixing it up -- it's something long-time New Yorkers are forced to do because they can't handle the 17 flights of stairs in the subway. Either that or they feel an urge for a very slow, old-timer's tour or their neighborhood. I can't see any other point of riding a bus in midtown. The stress induced by starting and stopping, nearly killing pedestrians, getting nowhere, and having to operate a little push-strip thing to ask the driver to stop at the right moment is just too much.
I had hoped that my bus would head down Broadway, but I needed to get to 9th St. and 2nd Ave. so I didn't mind going east until we came within sight of the arch near Grand Central, site of the second honking-parking-lot-in-the-street. In one of my previous bus escapades I sat there for half an hour. After another harrowing 15 minutes of screeching starts and stops, we were moving again, but at 2nd Ave. everyone stood up at once and got off. Mystified, I asked the driver where they bus was going and found out that I was at the last stop (duh). Disillusioned again, I got off and ended up spending $8 to take a cab to Veselka. $8 more than I would have if I had taken the damn train.
Posted by csageday at 10:27 PM | Comments (1)
January 23, 2005
Sardines
I am the only person I know who loves canned sardines -- the ones that come in those little tins that appear in comic strips (usually in reference to rush hour on the subway). I know people who like the slightly larger, more respectably sized sardines served in restaurants, and I know my father probably has a soft spot for the canned version, but for the most part people I know would wrinkle their noses and make gagging noises if presented with a freshly opened tin of Portuguese sardines in olive oil, their heads neatly chopped off and their little spines intact inside. It's a strong smell. It's not a particularly pretty sight.
It has become one of my favorite foods. I carefully scoop them out onto toasted or crusty bread and eat them as is. It may be that I need some nutrient I'm not getting otherwise, but I enjoy them the same way I enjoy anchovies -- they're fantastic because they have such a strong, instense flavor. Eating them reminds me of Spain, where I tried all sorts of new foods and loved nearly everything -- blood sausage and chorizo were a highlight, and eating at a somewhat authentic Catalan restaurant is always thrilling because of the food-related nostalgia. Back to the sardines, though -- the appeal at home has something to do with the fact that they're implicitly forbidden. I have to plan sardine snacks discreetly, since stinking up the apartment by eating them here is likely to garner a loud, passionate protest from D.
I recently discovered, courtesy Lidia, that anchovies can be used to perk up the flavor of pasta sauces, even for people who despise anchovies (you can sauté them with garlic in olive oil until they disintegrate). I wonder if there's a similar use for sardines. They would make a great sandwich for work, but I'm not so evil-minded that I'd punish my cube-mates with the stench.
Update
Just did a bit of research and found that:
- Sardines are good for you (omega-3s, protein, iron, etc.)
- Napoleon is responsible for the packing-in-oil
- I'm not alone, sardines are apparently wildly popular
- U.S. sardines are actually herring
- Grilled fresh sardines are not to be missed
Posted by csageday at 11:45 PM | Comments (0)
Blogger Debut
What the hell is a blog? Judging from blogs I've read, the content of a blog can range from intensely personal disclosure (to an uncomfortable degree) and entirely impersonal, well-crafted journalism that reveals almost nothing about the author's personal experience. Common blog traits include humor (usually in the form of sarcasm), a theme (knitting, politics, dogs), and links to other sites. To contribute to this relatively nascent form of expression, I should probably adopt these loose rules. Maybe I can write sarcastically about themed-blogs and link to them and get away without introducing any new information or insight at all ... but that would be lame and has probably been done already.
Basically, I enjoy writing and don't do enough of it, and I've become addicted recently to reading blogs, so it was only a matter of time before I crowded the blogging universe with my own interpretation of the medium. So here it is.
If I borrow from daily experience, this blog will be about what I'm reading, New York (Brooklyn in particular), various gourmet-food addictions enabled by New York (Brooklyn in particular), passable knitting, sailing (possibly), and my consistently thwarted attempts to travel.
Enough about what the blog will be. Here's what happened today on 11th street.
It snowed all day yesterday and D and I watched inches of white stuff pile up on the fire escape while staying as close to the fire as possible. Today, we headed straight to Prospect Park (as soon as we could drag ourselves out of bed) and found hundreds of Slope kids sledding. Everywhere. There were toddlers on sleds being pulled by their parents every five feet. Sleds were even piled up in the entryway of Applewood when we went there for brunch later. The dogs all seemed a little manic -- endlessly digging in the snow, excavating frisbees from snow drifts, chasing their tails, and trying to gallop through two-foot deep snow drifts only to be submerged up to their necks after one leap. The mood was generally festive -- we rarely get this much snow. We headed to one known sledding hill and watched all sorts of kids sledding on all sorts of sleds and with varying levels of skill. Despite the chronic lack of storage space in NYC, there were wooden toboggans and classic wooden sleds (not sure what they're called). Various cross-country skiers appeared and we saw one couple with snowshoes. Where these people find room for this type of stuff -- which comes in handy two, maybe three days a year -- in their apartments is beyond me. I nearly threw out the single piece of flat plastic that functions as our sled while cleaning this summer.
Since my digital camera is kaput, I have resurrected the good film camera I have. I finished off a color roll in the apartment, taking pics of books and the kitchen counter for fun. The point was to get a new roll in there for photos of the snow -- snow on brownstone buildings in Brooklyn can produce a very Victorian-looking and photogenic landscape. I realized when we got outside that the sun wasn't quite where it needed to be though, and the wind had blown all the white peaks off the wrought-iron gates. In the park, I took pictures of the snow anyway (and as many of people and dogs as I could without getting dirty looks), but since I've forgotten all those annoying details about light and exposure and film types I will probably end up with a bunch of washed out, uninteresting shots.
This week, if work doesn't take up every minute of every day, I'll try to see As You Like It at BAM, visit Jacques Torres, and start in on a pair of mittens to match the hat I finished yesterday. Given, I should really redo the hat because it's way too big, but the stitches are tiny and so perfect that I can't bring myself to tear them out yet. Since I've finished Augusten Burrough's Running With Scissors, I'll move on to this week's New Yorker and Vegetarian Times. Because we watched Ingmar Bergman's Through a Glass Darkly on Friday and it struck a major chord with me, another Bergman film may been squeezed into one of our evenings. An ambitious plan, and who knows whether I'll be motivated to comment on these endeavors in this blog, or whether I'll remember I have a blog in the first place, but we'll see soon enough.
Posted by csageday at 07:45 PM | Comments (0)