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July 05, 2005
The 5-In-One Uber Blog Post (Since I Won't Get It Together Enough to Post Again This Week)
Apparently we've moved into a building that's half old-school/Latino Brooklyn and half Hipsterville. Tweens speaking Spanish hang out on the stoop, and young creative types with retro designer shoes have parties on the roof. Latin music plays in the cars going up the street; techno plays LOUDly nextdoor around midnight. Quite an adjustment from BugabooVille a couple of avenues up. In some ways, it's a welcome change, as long as I can manage to get to sleep with all the boom boom booming going on.
The place is nice but we can't move around much with all the boxes piled up everywhere. Our ficus tree is in the kitchen (no room anywhere else), which means we're not cooking anytime soon. My desk doesn't fit in the room meant to be an office, so our living room has a wall-to-wall furniture problem. Water glasses aren't unpacked so we're drinking water from wine glasses. The bathroom can't fit two people in it at the same time. I can see us trying to squeeze in there one morning and having one of us (probably me) fall in the tub. Oh, and even if I did have an internet connection at home, I was so wiped out from helping the (low budget) movers carry stuff up and down stairs I probably couldn't have found the energy to blog about all this. Much less the computer. From Friday to Monday I was without an internet connection. I experienced gmail withdrawl, blogging universe withdrawl, and Flickr withdrawl. I also had a headache for five days straight, possibly from all the dust from packing. I'm still not completely back to normal.
We spent the long weekend upstate getting all the stress out of our systems and having our annual extended family joint birthday party (D's was Friday, mine's next Friday). We swam, we vegged, we kayaked, we played tennis, and we barbequed like good patriots (of the liberal, environmentalist, non-righteous-flag-waving sort).
Somehow I completely blocked out Live 8. Very retro eighties. I had no idea it was going on until I caught up on my news today. And then, since someone gave us a Live Aid DVD last Christmas, I was like -- huh? It's been done and it didn't really work!? Has everyone gone mad? I'm still not exactly sure how I ignored the media long enough to miss the coverage. Or maybe everyone else ignored it, too?
Hmmm. Here's a design for the new Nets stadium thing. Looks like some building blocks shoved in crumpled paper. Or a shape sorter accident. Actually, could be a pile of garbage. Hey, let's build something that looks like what's in the recycling container! I'm not an expert, and I like some of the stuff Gehry's done, so I'll stop there. Just for the record, though, the whole put-a-stadium-near-my-neighborhood project isn't something I support. Development isn't always bad, but stadiums are not community-friendly. They don't make for nice residential neighborhoods. And I never liked the Nets. Can't we just bring the Dodgers back if we're building a stadium?
Was thinking of going to the David Sedaris 826 thing at Cooper tonight but decided I had too much to do. I went to Downtown 4 Democracy's reading back before the election at the same venue -- The Great Hall at Cooper Union -- and it was an English major's dream. Salmon Rushnie, Jonathan Franzen, Michael Chabon, Jonathan Safran Foer, Dave Eggers, Lou Reed, and others. Of course, I'm blogging instead and procrastinating. How productive.
Entirely unrelated: I got D Freakonomics and some CDs for his birthday -- not exactly thrilled with the New Porographers CD (Mass Romantic) or the Decemberists (Picaresque). LOVED They Might Be Giants' No!, though. D and I giggled at it all the way down from Albany, while my mother and brother were probably rolling their eyes in the backseat.
This will probably be it in the way of blogging this week, since I'm cooping tomorrow and we're going away for another long weekend this weekend (I know, we're spoiled). Hence the very disorganized and rambling post. I'll post some Flickr photos when I get everything set up at home, but till then go look at the Everyone's page -- the weirdest stuff shows up there.
Posted by csageday at July 5, 2005 10:07 PM
Comments
here's everybody's favorite urban planning acronym: NIMBY. Not In My BackYard.
Posted by: r at July 5, 2005 11:04 PM
You weren't thrilled with Mass Romantic and Picaresque, or he wasn't? (Or both?) I think both of those CDs are fantastic, myself.
Posted by: Francis at July 13, 2005 02:47 PM
I wasn't, but I am extremely picky when it comes to music. I'm not an expert by any means -- I could be completely missing the point with both of the new albums, or maybe I wasn't in the mood (or maybe the crappy car stereo didn't do them justice). I just find that for some reason I love some albums -- like TV on the Radio's last one -- while other albums that are perfectly good (The White Stripes' White Blood Cells) just aren't as addictive for me.
Posted by: Cindy at July 13, 2005 03:12 PM