February 05, 2008

Sick

I am a sweaty, disgusting mess. I have some sort of stomach bug, which hit at exactly the wrong time. I knew something was wrong when I wasn't starving by noon today, after eating through my entire lunch at 11:30 (as usual), but hoped that if I ignored it, it would go away. Not so. I am marveling at the restorative effects of Ginger Ale, though. Not that the mass market version actually does anything. Why am I blogging about this? Because I am sick and not thinking properly.

Posted by csageday at 12:03 AM | Comments (0)

August 15, 2007

A Little Behind in My Discovery of Crafting Techniques

I have discovered the world of iron-on transfers. Photoshop and fashion have been joined for me, and it doesn't look like a 70s or personalized mall T-shirt (well, it only marginally resembles those things). In another 10 years, I'll discover silkscreen and I'll catch up with the late 90s. I would post a photo of what I did, but it's a surprise (and not really a fully formed item yet, anyway).

Posted by csageday at 12:12 AM | Comments (0)

July 09, 2007

Spoiled Rotten

A week and a half ago, after visiting PrintIcon to get prices on letterpress printing, I headed downtown for a quiet dinner at 1492 (a Spanish tapas place) with Derek and Jo (maid of honor, visiting from Chicago) and possibly another friend, Rishi. I took my time at PrintIcon, asking questions while Jo stood by and tried to help me negotiate with the very opinionated salesperson. Then, our cab took forever to get to 1492 because I couldn't remember where it was and we ended up on the wrong side of Delancy.

Finally, we walked up to the restaurant, found D waiting outside, and headed in to find a table. I immediately noticed Rishi sitting at a table near the front, waved hello, and started walking his way. I think it took a second or two for me to register that a) everyone in the restaurant was singing happy birthday and b) I recognized not only the people sitting next to Rishi as other good friends, but I noticed that the rest of the people sitting next to them, and so on down a very long table, were also friends and were there to surprise me for my 30th birthday. As this registered and I lost my voice for a moment, my family emerged from the back. It was such a lovely, wonderful surprise, and totally unexpected. D, of course, arranged it all despite the wedding madness (and as payback for his 30th surprise), and I'm still amazed he pulled it off. I was obsessed with surprised parties as a kid, and getting one as an adult feels quite special.

To cap things off and take my mind off my cracking knees, dubious blood pressure, and various other signs that I'm no longer in my twenties, I was carted off to Babbo this evening for a decadent feast with D and the family. The beef cheek ravioli and squab were fabulous. We also had a nice chianti -- dry and tannic. And someday, I might fast for a week and then try their tasting menu. I think it may shorten my life considerably, though -- after just the normal dinner (shared antipasti and primi, and a pasta dish as a secondi), D and I both feel completely stuffed.

Posted by csageday at 12:47 AM | Comments (0)

May 30, 2007

This weekend....

...one of my oldest friends, Liz, is getting married. To celebrate, Mom dug up some photos from Miss Carrol's -- the nursery school where we met (see class photo on top) -- and various Halloween exploits (notice the scary hair? That was a daily tragedy, not one limited to Halloween, although I usually forewent the added color), and we produced the following...

Congrats to Liz and Colleen -- two people who actually read this blog (and, gasp, comment!) from time to time, and so deserve a special tribute!

Posted by csageday at 04:23 PM | Comments (0)

May 06, 2007

The News

On the Friday before Easter, Derek and I went to Veselka (site of our first date eleven years ago). We had our usual soup and pierogis and were getting ready to leave when D pulled a ring out of his pocket and proposed. I said yes. There are plenty of stories that lead up to that moment, but they don't really matter -- we're just happy to be making things official, and we're feeling very lucky to be together.

Posted by csageday at 11:50 PM | Comments (5)

December 30, 2006

Saturday Music Roundup

Our new favorite band is the peppy, poppy, very fun Los Abandoned. Their lyrics are a mix of Spanish and English, and song themes are wacky and fun, inciting us to (after some alcohol) jump around playing air guitar in the apartment. Sample lyrics: "en Van Nuys there's porno starts, and swap meets...Van Nuys es very nice, but it's not paradise..." and "¿donde esta mi pantalón" (can someone who speaks Spanish explain why that's singular?). There are songs about stalking, songs almost entirely in Spanish with a "be-atch" thrown in for fun, and songs mostly in English. Titles include "office xmas party", "nada mío es fake" and "panic-oh." It's very happy music. The lyrics are great, too. There are some videos on the site if you're interested.

Another favorite album for us this year has been Nic Armstrong's Greatest White Liar. Love that stuff. Also loving The Flaming Lips, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, The New Pornographers, and Franz Ferdinand

Posted by csageday at 09:16 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2006

Audiologists & Car Salesmen

I have enough hearing loss to justify wearing a hearing aid (or two, actually), but I've valiantly (or frustratingly) avoided doing so for approximately twenty years because I hate the things. They're ugly, cost a lot, and are easy to lose. Wearing one makes you feel like you're walking around with cotton in your ear, into which someone has wedged a mini radio that goes "whoooossshsshhhh" all day and occasionally amplifies the speech of your loved ones.

If you mumble or if you've ever tried to tell me something from behind my back, you have some experience with my charming hearing loss. In fact, if you mumble, you probably hate me because I laughed that time you told me your cat died, or whatever. I'm not that good at compensating for not hearing whispered things. I do a lot of nodding and intent staring. Sometimes I manage to piece together meaning 30 seconds later, and jump inappropriately into the conversation. This makes me unpopular.

Once in a blue moon, I'll end up in a situation where I really can't hear a thing, and then I'll think, Damn, I need to go to an audiologist and just get a backup hearing aid. This happened in the nineties, when I was called to jury duty in Newark and had no idea what the hell was going on in the courtroom. I think it was even a murder trial, so I was freaking out a bit. The lawyers mumbled (who knew lawyers could mumble?) and the acoustics were terrible -- the words just evaporated into the air. Thankfully, I was picked off by one of the lawyers, but that experience, along with a few other equally traumatizing ones, finally sent me in the direction of an audiologist two years ago.

Audiologist's offices seem like doctor's offices. They are tucked away in office buildings with other medical offices, there's a receptionist's desk, and you fill out an insurance form. Once inside, there are framed diplomas and white walls and such. There is a booth for the hearing test (an agonizing place, since I'm competitive and it kills me that I can't ace the test), and there's medical gear lying around. You have a test and a consultation, and then you expect to be told something about the hearing aids available.

This is where it all goes horribly wrong. Your audiologist will tell you that you want and need Brand X, for such and such technical details. You nod. What you don't know, and what won't dawn on you until you leave or go to another audiologist, is that audiologists are like car salesman. They've sold their souls to one major company, and they'll sell that company over any other to patients. Their "diagnosis" leads nicely into a sales pitch. During the pitch, you start to notice that the diplomas on the wall aren't really medical.

My father (also near-deaf and a valiant crusader against hearing aids, until recently) gave me a lecture about this a while back, which I semi-ignored. I figured that I just had to find the right one, who would show me all sorts of hearing aids and discuss their merits in a non-biased way.

The first audiologist I saw seemed pleasant, and recommended a type of hearing aid that seemed perfect, although horribly expensive. I was very happy with it, since it doesn't have the cotton-ear effect, but I couldn't get much information about other/cheaper brands.

Today, I went to another guy in the hope of the non-biased experience and something cheaper. No go. The guy even looked like a used car salesman -- kind of round, and pushy about the sale. His shirt made me dizzy. And he offered only one recommended product (a different one). At the end of the appointment, in a very un-doctorly way, he asked me, "Just for my own reference, I've given you the full refund option (read: No money down!!), now WHY are you leaving this office today without purchasing a hearing aid?" ARGH. At least he enunciated well and spoke at a comfortable volume, so I didn't miss a minute of the sales pitch. I think I need to start an advocacy group. Or maybe learn sign language and force all of my friends and family to do the same?

Update: Thanks to Rose for the links. Also, I forgot to mention my biggest gripe about this whole thing: Insurance plans don't cover hearing aids! And they're not cheap. Hence the whole sales-oriented doctor thing.

Posted by csageday at 10:28 PM | Comments (4)

July 08, 2006

My Frigging 29th Birthday

I don't want to be 29. It's so old-sounding. 23-28 did not bother me, but this is unacceptable. It's too close to 30. I haven't done anything that I wanted to do when I was 23. Have not become fluent in Spanish, have not lived or really traveled abroad, have not gone to graduate school, have not chosen a career path. Can't even make meringues. Can't even spell meringues. I was somewhat looking forward to my birthday yesterday, but at some point I realized how old I'd be and this morning is just awful. How could this have happened? It's odd -- during the past few years, when someone asks my age, I've had to think about it. I've even done the "So, let's see, I was born in '77, and it's 2006, so...." thing. I've clearly been in denial about my advancing age, because so much should have gotten done by now that hasn't. And don't go saying that I've done all of this great stuff because it'll just make me feel worse. Now I'm going to go eat some expensive brunch with an alcoholic drink (because at least I'm over 21 -- how come that part took FOREVER?) to make myself feel better.

Posted by csageday at 01:36 PM | Comments (3)

June 09, 2006

Gymnastics Again

I still can't believe what I did the night before last, although I do have a constant entire-body soreness that is reminding me every time I sit, stand, or attempt to climb or descend stairs. I took a gymnastics class at Chelsea Piers (yes, this was inspired by Stick It).

Quite a lot has changed about in my physique in 15 years. And this class -- this was no class for adults wanting a nice and easy intro to the sport. Here's the description. Note the non-intimidating references to "all levels," "basic," and "beginner" -- it's all complete bullshit. I mean, there were beginners there, and they got special attention, but the class reminded me a great deal of a regular practice from my serious gymnastics days. The coaches were similar, too (they do not tolerate laziness! 10 push-ups, now!). In a way, this is good, because it's the real thing -- you absolutely get your money's worth. Still, I had fantasies about waltzing into a gym after 15 years with a big nostalgic grin on my face, ready to exchange reminiscences with coaches or dazzle a class of adults struggling to do a cartwheel. Instead, no one really cared -- we just went ahead with exercises. It occurred to me during the class that there must be thousands of ex-gymnasts missing the sport (a search for gymnastics videos on YouTube confirmed this later).

We started out with running around the floor, which was followed by a standard combination of warm-up and strength and flexibility exercises. What amazed me was how fast it accelerated, and how much the class could do. The warm-up morphed into handstands, then half-turn handstands, then handstands on alternating hands, etc. The pace was great, and I was slightly amazed and glad that these (younger-than-me, cocky-but-good-at-their-jobs) coaches were actually letting us do all this stuff. I mean, what if someone broke an ankle? But then again, we're adults, so we should know what our limits are, maybe? I couldn't believe I didn't have to sign a waiver and be interviewed at the door -- I half expected the office staff to review my state of health and refuse me entrance to the gym altogether.

I started to feel the extent to which I have let things slide about a minute into the opening run/warm-up. By the time we were done with handstands, my wrists felt as if they'd been run through a meat grinder. I wondered if the intense joint pain was anything like arthritis, or if perhaps I had arthritis. I wondered if I would be able to do anything else after the handstand activity that involved inverting my body completely. I was dreading the cartwheels. But the funny thing is, as each new form of pain announced itself throughout the two hour class (which felt like a six hour one), I was able to work through it by simply continuing to do whatever the coaches told me to.

The handstands were followed by handstand-rolls, then cartwheels, then one-handed cartwheels, then no-handed cartwheels (couldn't quite manage that -- I'd start out, then frantically throw out a hand as my head rushed toward the carpet), and then combinations.

One side effect of being an adult while tumbling is nausea. This makes sense. Normally, when flipped upside down and sideways and around quickly, one's stomach tends to react negatively, no? I didn't really expect this. What I expected instead was to rupture some tendon or groin muscle while doing a round-off or back-handspring, but, miraculously, that didn't happen. Instead, I felt that my wrists and ankles couldn't quite handle the impact, and my stomach couldn't handle something that had seemed so natural years ago. I was grateful that I hadn't snacked ahead of the class, and I had to limit water intake just to make it through to the end.

The simple floor exercises were followed by tumbling sequences with big squishy mats, then front flips (trampoline optional) into the "pit" (big injury-preventing hole in the floor filled with foam pieces). Then came the serious stuff -- the tumbling without life-saving mats. A few of my classmates (I should mention that a good deal of the class was made up of men, which I did not expect, but maybe it's easier to do all this stuff without boobs) went ahead with round-off backhandsprings. Gamely, I went along and tried to do one. Bad idea. The first thing I discovered, which I oddly did not discover in other activities, was that one cannot wear glasses during tumbling, as they will end up 15 feet away. The second thing is that I can't quite manage a back-handspring myself at my current age of 28. My arms can't do to do what they're supposed to, and my legs can't either, for that matter. In my mind, I've got it down perfectly, but on the floor I did the round-off fine, launched myself backwards, landed on my hands, and then promptly fell into a heap on the floor after them. The coach looked mildly concerned and said, "Better have a spot next time." When I got back to the line, a classmate (who I couldn't identify after that, because I did the rest of the class blind), said "I LOVE you! You have absolutely no fear!" which made me feel good, though the right assessment would be that I'm just really, really stupid and completely out of touch with my physical capabilities.

A good half hour was spent on tumbling. I kept doing round-off back-handsprings (with a spot), and taking breaks in between to regain some semblance of a normal heartbeat and level of nausea. My face was probably purple (this is what happens when I work out strenuously -- highly embarrassing), so I'm glad there were no mirrors. I desperately wanted to put my head on the cold concrete walls, but I thought that would have looked strange. Basically, I was in way over my limit, but I'm competitive and stupid and I really wanted to stick it out.

I was truly grateful when it was over. I haven't been able to walk any faster than a 90-year old since. I have gained some insight into the lives of people with impaired mobility (people move so fast! Toilet seats are WAY too low! There are at least 80 stairs in my commute!). I have avoided all kinds of bending-over in the past 48 hours, and I have to pause between steps. It's beyond pathetic. I feel great about having done it, though, even though my body is pretty messed up.

This person can do the round-off back-handspring with a tuck at the end and she's been out of the gym for 10 years -- it completely puts me to shame, but maybe if I can work up the courage to go back for another class I can work up to that (or maybe not).

Posted by csageday at 12:57 AM | Comments (6)

May 25, 2006

All Apple, All the Time

I have not yet been to the fancy new 24/7 (24/7!) Apple store on Fifth, but I just read David Pogue's NYT review of the MacBooks. I obviously haven't been keeping up with my Mac porn lately (although I went online to see the rest of these ads)-- I didn't know these all came with built in cameras!? And sleek keyboard and mouse designs and a hundred other little innovations (no start up time -- a magnet instead of a latch, which is magical all on its own since I'm still scared of holding magnets near computers). It may finally be time to upgrade my G4 -- especially since iPhoto for me is slower than the elevators at the Port Authority.

Posted by csageday at 07:07 PM | Comments (0)

May 11, 2006

Sneeze, Cough, <Blows Nose>

Well, <sneeze> the bee poll<sneeze>en doesn't really seem to have done <sniffle> much. Snot pours out of my nose <sneeze> at odd times of the day, and I ride the <blows nose> train with pockets full of tissues. I'm too lazy/busy to go to the doctor, and I've eaten all the regular pills in the house to no avail. I've even gotten a bloody nose, and I've slept practically upright to allow airflow to my lungs. I keep hoping it'll be over soon, or my tolerance will suddenly start to build. After all this punishment, it should, right? This stoic suffering should get me something, shouldn't it?

I learned a disturbing fact about the trees in the city recently. The city plants "male" trees instead of "female" ones because they have shallower root systems and therefore wreak less havoc on sidewalks (can't confirm or deny this). The only drawback is that they spew out more pollen, and I suffer. Honestly, I didn't know that there were male and female trees. This seems somewhat sexist. Maybe I can start a movement to give female trees equal representation?

I _think_ the allergies are marginally better than last year, which isn't saying much. Oh, and I haven't really been taking regular doses of bee pollen. I ate a bunch of it like candy while watching TV one night and got terrific stomach cramps later, so I kept my distance for a while. So much for lofty experiments with alternative therapy.

Posted by csageday at 08:58 AM | Comments (4)

May 03, 2006

Did you notice all the 8-12 year-olds on the subway last Thursday?

I took my 10-year-old nephew to Take our Daughters and Sons to Work Day last Thursday and had a great time. We only worked together for a half an hour--the rest of the day was filled with activities for the kids--but it was nice to spend time with him and get the perspective of a 10-year-old. It was also nice to be the indulgent aunt who took him to Lincoln Center and the Time Warner Center and Bouchon Bakery afterwards. He wants to be either a professional hockey player or a car designer.

Posted by csageday at 12:12 AM | Comments (0)

April 23, 2006

Gadget Mom

My parents love all things electronic. They're both tinkerers, and I grew up surrounded by the latest Apple or IBM version of the home PC, along with countless other generations of personal technology products. When my parents were young and broke, they scraped together enough money to buy one of the first reasonably-sized calculators. They had a microwave long before anyone else. I learned my multiplication tables by using a program Mom wrote in BASIC. In the mid nineties, they both had watches that could send and receive email. When Mom and Dad went on a trip recently, they took two humungous bags filled not just with clothes and books, but with various electronics they couldn't possible part with for a week: satellite radios, a mini-camcorder, a laptop, palm pilots, cell phones, digital cameras, and a portable printer.

Given these tendencies, I was not all that suprised when Mom said she was bringing a laptop and printer on our trip upstate this weekend. We were heading to a meeting and I knew she needed to print some reports. I was a little bit apprehensive when she said that she planned to use the printer without an outlet. I kept suggesting that she could borrow someone else's printer upstate or find an outlet somewhere to use. I didn't fully understand what she was planning until she pulled out the printer IN THE CAR, while I was driving, and contrived a rather elaborate mobile home office on the seat next to me. She had to hold the adapter in the cigarette lighter while printing from the laptop and feeding paper in. In order to prevent the paper from getting stuck on its way out of the printer (which printed rather well, considering the fact that we were going 70 miles an hour in a rainstorm), she had to carefully route printed sheets away from the edge of the car seat and to a pile of paper on the dashboard. Now, laptop use in the car is widespread these days, but printing from the laptop? This is somewhat of a feat. I think she may have put off the printing of these reports simply so she'd have an excuse to use her laptop, portable printer, and new little laptop mini-mouse in the car. Just, you know, to prove it could be done and possibly to justify the ownership of a portable printer in the first place. Impressive, no? I'm wondering if somehow they'll contrive to get a refrigerator and microwave in the car for the next trip. At least that way we could avoid the awful rest stop food.

Update: Mom has informed me that Dad has already installed a refrigerator in his car, so all we're missing is the microwave. Mom has a bit of an obsession with RVs, too, so this might be the next addition to the collection.

Posted by csageday at 12:58 PM | Comments (2)

April 13, 2006

The Zoo

Derek is at war with the ants in our apartment. Slice open a mango, and they'll appear within the hour30 seconds to haul away any minute scrap you've left behind.

For some reason, they congregate near our hall table. It must be their entry point to the apartment. We've checked for food, we've set out new traps, and Derek has bleached every inch in the vicinity (he estimated killing 40 ants in the process), but they still gather there on the windowsill. I left a glass half-full of Emergen-C on a desk in the adjacent room overnight, and by the next morning there was an army of marching ants going to and from the glass. Down the wall, across the floor, and up to the desk -- a considerable distance for an ant.

Our mouse seems to have abandoned us (though a neighbor's cat visited us through the window the other day, which may explain this), and I still haven't seen a roach the size of my first one (I've seen small ones, but nothing that would make an audible, hideous crunch quite like the first one -- it was big). Maybe the ants have taken over to the point of forcing other animals out? They do have an advanced social structure and military mentality. I wouldn't put it past them.

Posted by csageday at 12:55 AM | Comments (0)

Nothing to blog about, so I'll just ramble...

I have been, inexplicably, in a rather good mood today. Aside from my customary morning crabbiness (crabbiness is an understatement; Derek is a saint), I have felt strangely conversational. I joined in pre-meeting office banter. I made a friend on the bus on the way home from the Coop. I found the sticker-price-making machine at the Coop "fun." Something must be wrong with me.

I'm thinking this abnormal behavior can be attributed to spring and the extra sun I've been getting. On Sunday and again yesterday evening I took long walks in the park/woods near my family's house in New Jersey with the family dog. (Derek and I also had a pleasant time pretending to be aristocratic suburbanites (my parents are out of town) -- Derek played the piano in the (large, spacious) living room, and I read an ancient book about the Havameyers and sipped sherry. Rather ridiculous, but quite satisfying.)

If the quiet and outdoor activity are responsible for today's mood, this bodes well for the summer, since I just joined the Adirondack Mountain Club. My brother and I went to an Adirondack fair in New Jersey last Sunday in search of information about building boathouses upstate (a family project for this summer), and I was lured into membership by the friendly ADK volunteers. They mentioned "instructional weekends" where you learn about kayaking or trail maintenance or overnight hiking. There's a New York City chapter which organizes local activities. They also have a "rustic camp" on the same lake that Sebago does (Lake Sebago). I'm a bit intimidated because my camping and serious hiking experience dates back to eighth grade, but I'm hoping this will help me get up to speed again.

In other news, I'm flattered that Francis posted the birthday card we made for him (a la Six Things).

Posted by csageday at 12:53 AM | Comments (0)

April 03, 2006

Magnolias, Not Dogwoods

Apparently I learned nothing from the Macy's Flower Show last year or from decades of living in The Garden State, because I can't tell dogwoods from magnolias. Rose kindly informed me that the collection of photos I had so carefully named "Dogwood Bloom #1", etc. were not, in fact, dogwoods at all. They're magnolias. Magnolias? I guess we had a magnolia tree in the backyard, not a dogwood? Damn. And that was one of the few blooms I thought I could identify! Now I only know daffodils (although I was a bit shakey on that until recently), rhododendrons (I even know how to spell that), forsythia, and roses. That's it. This is pathetic. It's going to take a while for the magnolia knowledge to stick, too, since I've been calling those trees dogwoods for at least 15 years. The rest of the blooms I see fall into the "flower" category. This is another area of grown-up knowledge I somehow haven't quite acquired, along with filing my taxes and starching the linen (oh, and making meringues -- they didn't come out so well).

Posted by csageday at 02:03 PM | Comments (3)

March 26, 2006

Allergy Season

It's here. I'm just starting to feel the fuzziness in my head. I've been sneezing and blowing my nose, too, and this is a bad sign. Each year my allergies seem to be worse. And each year I suffer stoicly through them, putting off medication in the hope that it'll all be over soon. It lasts for ages, though -- longer each year -- and I blame this entirely on the poor air quality in the city. For all the advantages of living here, the air is a definite drawback and in the spring I always fanticize about living in a farm somewhere, far away from the clouds of bus-generated, lung-stressing diesel fumes.

About four years ago I finally sent myself to New York Magazine's allergy-doctor-of-the-moment. He did a bunch of tests and confirmed that I'm allergic to grass and tree pollen. He also sent me home with lots of free medication (which is why, I suspect, he was so popular with magazine readers). The Allegra and Flonase worked, and I had a bearable spring that year.

The following year, I planned ahead and got my Allegra prescription, only to find our that my health plan decided that it didn't need to cover Allegra. Clarinex only, which doesn't work for me. Ever since, I've been a snotty mess all spring. My nose is like a faucet, and I'm incapable of staying outside (even at the cherry blossom festival, which I was determined to enjoy).

This allergy season, out of sheer desperation, I'm taking a different tack. I'm ignoring the medical establishment altogether and buying things from women in shawls and headscarves in tiny off-the-beaten track stalls. My mother would be mortified.

Derek's mom, however, is a seasoned alternative medicine expert. She has gladly given me advice on herbal remedies, since the rest of the family tends to shy away from her regular admonitions to take bovine eye supplements, echinacea, etc. With her help, I've been steered toward buying various bags of dried brown things. Also dried yellow things. We're in Delaware for the weekend, and we went to one of those indoor weekend markets yesterday that carries everything from Amish sausage to garage sale rejects. I bravely ventured into a stand with herbal remedies of various sorts picked up some astrogolus for less than $2. It's the real thing -- little slices of the root. I also picked up a jar of bee pollen, which I've become addicted to. It's chewy and a little sticky. Once you've started down this path, there are endless opportunities to get caugt up in exotic cure-alls -- it's a bit daunting. After I'd picked up the bee pollen, I inexplicably found myself buying flax meal and some other odd-looking herb. It's a slippery slope.

Derek's mom has lent me an old book called "Folk Medicine" to help me along my alternative medicine route. It describes "Vermont healing practices" and focuses largely on honey, vinegar, and frequent urinalysis (with your trusy "Squibb's Nitrazine Paper"). These three things, used in combination, can ostendibly cure everything from bedwetting to high blood pressure. There is also the odd mention of turpentine and castor oil. The book, thankfully, doesn't require urinalysis or castor oil for allergy treatment, but strongly recommends replacing daily coffee with Brigham tea to address severe allergies. I'm also supposed to contact my local Vermont honey beekeeper and get a year's worth of honeycomb cappings to chew on. This seems less likely, but the book is so pursuasive that I'm convinced the tea will solve everything.

Actually, every recommendation in every herbal remedy book seems to be guaranteed to fix my allergy problem (and several others), so how can I possibly fail? I plan to eat a teaspoon of bee pollen a day, along with a cup of astragolus-infused Brigham tea. I'm not entirely sure the astragolus will help the allergies -- it's supposed to strengthen the immune system, which may mean that I'll react even more strongly to allergens, but I could swear I read somewhere that it can help. Honestly, isn't it obvious that I'm a little desperate here? I'll try anything.

Posted by csageday at 05:04 PM | Comments (1)

March 19, 2006

Colorful Quarters

I got these two quarters as change from a coffee stand on 4th Avenue. Has anyone ever seen these types of state quarters before? They look like they've been stamped with paint. I'm not sure if this is some sort of official project or a local artist's idea.

Posted by csageday at 07:32 PM | Comments (2)

March 05, 2006

Dad's 70th

Mom threw a fabulous family-and-friends fete for Dad's 70th last Sunday. The usual pre-party panic somehow paid off and the house was transformed into a perfect upscale brunch locale. A few photos, taken by Dad's various children and grandchilren, are on Dad's Flickr site. I had the bright idea that I was going to write a lengthy satirical poem about his many careers, marriages, and hobbies (he's a colorful character), but I couldn't seem to get anything to rhyme. I started out with "Dad turned 70 today, though he hardly looks that way," (and he really doesn't -- he isn't even gray -- shoot, that rhymes! I didn't think of that before, damn). Since he's still not walking we kept the party small -- two more affairs are set to be scheduled in the summer -- maybe I'll get something better together by then.

Posted by csageday at 05:30 PM | Comments (0)

March 02, 2006

You know things have gotten bad if....

1. I've started talking in my sleep. Last night I mumbled a bit and then said "You stole my artwork." to Derek. I don't use the word "artwork" all that much. I have no idea what that was about.

2. I'm watching reality shows. I sat in a heap of captivated self-loathing while watching the final episode of The Bachelor: Paris. Why??? Why did I watch the endless hopeful monologues of overly made-up women in evening dress stores? Why did I watch the rejected bride-to-be sob in the back of a limo? The show is such a pathetic waste of time. These poor, demented women sign up in a kind of human husband lotto, where they have a miniscule chance of living happily ever after (or until they break up two weeks after the show) with a man they haven't met. The whole show is kind of revolting, which, of course, is why people watch it. What sucks is that these man-chasing competitive women actually seem to fall in love with the guy toward the end and start spewing out cliches about opening their hearts and letting him in and feeling a real connection, but of course they're just going to have their warped little hearts broken. But they have to KNOW that, right? What I don't get is, when the woman was sobbing in the limo, why wasn't she cursing the show and all of its heartless producers? And the voyeurish viewers for supporting the whole painful venture? I'd be sitting there going, "God, I'm such an IDIOT -- why did I sign up for this stupid shit? And that asshole! And you, the stupid camera man -- I'm bawling and you're not even offering a god damned tissue? What kind of a show is this?" Must be in the contract.

Still, that said, Derek and I both like Beauty and the Geek. Not all reality shows are exploitative horrible things. It still has all of the un-realistic showboating and drama, but as it progresses it becomes a much more positive show. It's great to see the participants struggle with everyday things (the geeks with any sort of social human contact, the beauties with, say, reading a map). It also offers an interesting commentary on the different social strata that people inhabit. Needless to say, D and I both fall in the geek category, though neither of us have the physical or fashion-sense impairments that distinguish some of the geeks (well, at least I don't have the fashion-sense impairment), so we usually side with them. And I have a huge soft spot for chess-playing, painfully self-conscious, pocket-protector-wearing men. They’re so cute!

Posted by csageday at 10:07 PM | Comments (2)

February 28, 2006

Derek: Charlie Brown or Fashionista?

And now, as part of a new Blue Sage feature, I present you with an example of Derek's impeccable fashion sense.

(I don't think he has a modeling career ahead of him.)

I get a kick out of this sweater every time he wears it. It's cute on him, but I end up calling him Charlie Brown all day.

Posted by csageday at 10:13 PM | Comments (2)

February 07, 2006

The Suit

I wore a suit jacket for the third time in my life today. The first time was for a rather embarrassing interview with Goldman Sachs, in which I revealed an utter lack of knowledge of financial markets (the career center people told me to apply for the job in my senior year, I don’t know why). The second day was yesterday. I felt I needed to give my attire a slight professional boost for the conference I just attended, since I’m in a different role at work now and wouldn’t it be nice if people took me seriously? It’s pretty cool. I’m not sure it matters tremendously, but I’m very happy with the gray jacket I got and I’m psyched that I don’t look like an insurance salesperson in it. I spent three weeknights last week desperately searching for jackets and finally found two at, of all places, Macy’s. I know you know how I feel about Macy’s, but it was a last resort. And there was some kind of sale so I saved scads of money. I also, gulp, opened a Macy’s account to get an extra discount. I feel like I’ve gone over to the dark side, both from the jacket-wearing point of view and the Macy’s credit-card point of view. I’m doing things that people do when they’re pushing thirty. Just wait, soon I’ll be driving the kids around in a minivan.

Posted by csageday at 03:57 PM | Comments (0)

January 08, 2006

Football Season

Half the country is currently obsessed with watching men in tights and shoulderpads run five feet and then get jumped on by 10 other men in tights and shoulderpads. On TV. Why?? It seems like the most silly and frustrating thing to watch. Every once in a while the ball gets thrown, but half the time it's not even caught. It's painfull, too. I just watched a play where a bunch of players got up and walked away but one guy looked dead. He was just lying there on the field, completely immobile, but no one looked concerned because, in football, this is normal. I've heard horror stories about players writhing in agony because of a broken limb. To support all of this carnage, entire teams of medical staff stand on the sidelines, ready to provide hospital-grade treatment. I've always found it odd to see a player standing on the sidelines hooked up to an IV (this is not unusual). Doesn't that seem a little strange? Like maybe he should be in the hospital, and not getting ready to go back into a game that resembles human bumper cars?

Did I mention that these games also take place in the middle of winter, when it's freezing cold? And thousands of fans volunteer to sit in the cold for hours to watch them?

And the coaching staff acts like the executive staff of a major bank. It's all corporate on on the sidelines. Manager types run around with headsets and clipboards and have entourages of support staff. During non-game-days, they work in office complexes and communicate with email and use complicated software. Some of them wear suits. Given the outfits of the players and the pointlessness of the game, I think they're all taking themselves way too seriously.

There's lots of technology, too -- football seems to be way ahead of baseball in this regard. Referees get to watch replays on little TVs and I think some of the football players have wired helmets. Even the TV networks broadcasting the games are more advanced -- they broadcast in high definition (my brother Nick and Derek were glued to Nick's new HD TV screen yesterday) and have yellow lines superimposed on the field to indicate something or other about the next "down". It all seems slightly distasteful, like they're trying to compensate for the silliness of the game with expensive widgets and fancy TV graphics.

Derek and my brother and father are all normal enough, but come football season they get mesmerized by the sport. Now that the Giants are in the playoffs, they're unavailable for four hours at a time while the games are on. If anything interesting happens and they're all watching the game together in New Jersey, there's this erruption of stomping and clapping and yelling -- and since they're all over six feet tall and rather wound up, the noise can be a little scary. I've done my part in trying to get enthusiastic about football, but I can rarely get engaged enough to figure out which team is the Giants (I sit there in front of the TV, dozing off, and get scared out of my mind when some football-obsessed family member starts making noise about some great play). So I'm going to take my new camera to the park today and leave Derek to his Giants game and hope they lose (sorry, guys) so I can see more of him in the coming weeks.

Posted by csageday at 02:22 PM | Comments (0)

December 29, 2005

The Ingenious Relocation of the Traditional, Time-Tested Day Family Christmas Celebration

It has been a unique Christmas. A week-and-a-half ago, I got a call from Mom saying that Dad had slipped on some ice in the driveway and had broken his leg. He was doing okay, but was going to have to have surgery and would probably have a long recovery to deal with. The following Monday, I started a new job. Tuesday, the transit workers decided to strike (*&^*&$%^%!!!). Wednesday, we learned that Dad was probably going to have to spend Christmas in the hospital. Oh, and I should mention that my Christmas shopping was no where near done two weeks ago, and was impossible to do given the intervening circumstances. It was a stressful couple of weeks, to say the least, and I can't say I entirely held things together.

First, an update on Dad. He is valiantly soldiering on with a variety of metal rods and other pieces of metal sticking out of his shin, after having undergone the first of two surgical procedures. Although the pain has been difficult to manage at times (it was a bad break), he's in good spirits and probably grateful for being excused from his usual last-minute shopping spree. He remembers slipping on some black ice while carrying shopping bags to the house, being briefly suspended in midair, and then crashing down on his shin. Somehow, he got himself into the house and called 911, only to wait forever because they had the wrong address. Since then, he has been enjoying a steady stream of Diet Coke, painkillers, and Christmas candy while things stabilize in the hospital. He has a room full of gadgets (he is, at heart, a gadget man, given to early adoption of gizmos and electronic appliances of every sort), including two laptops, to keep him busy. We're hoping to have him home after the weekend.

Now, I have to explain the Traditional Day Family Christmas Celebration, so you can understand how Dad's hospital visit might make us all a little batty. It's a little silly, yes, but there is NO deviating from the Celebration, because it is Essential, and has been in place for Decades, regardless of family members with broken bones in hospitals. There is a very precise and time-tested holiday schedule in our house. The challenge was not how to alter the usual extravaganza, but how exactly to bring the Day Family Celebration to Dad, given some annoying little hospital Rules and Regulations (and pesky hospital staff).

First, there is the Gathering of Dad's Numerous Children and Grandchildren. Dad has accumulated several children and scads of grandkids through the course of two marriages, and we usually gather a bunch of them for a pre-Christmas gift-exchange event. I assumed this might be slightly altered or cancelled given the hospital circumstance, but no. There are traditions to uphold, you see, hospital rules be damned. And Mom almost reproduced our usual party without a hitch. Through the help of a "patient representative," a "family room" was booked for 15 people so we could have the party down the hall from Dad's room.

The snag came at the entrance desk. We were definitively barred entrance when we arrived with our holiday party entourage and numerous shopping bags of food. We were told by a completely humor-less woman that the room was "restricted" and "not just anyone can go wandering upstairs, you know." We mentioned that we WERE the 15 people it was reserved for, but this made little headway. I have never encountered such a standoff-ish, haughty bunch of hospital volunteers. After explaining that we weren't welcome, they asked that we move our stuff out of the way and leave! I wonder if the hospital staff realizes that they were in mortal danger of being strangled at that point.

After much cursing and an epic battle of hospital software and frantic phone calls, the entrance workers suddenly changed their minds. A full blown battle of the Day Family against the hospital staff was averted (although Mom gave them a nasty speech in return for their efforts), and we proceeded upstairs. Mom assembled a rather large and well-appointed Christmas party for 15 people in the hospital, with a three-course meal, spiked egg nog, AND chocolate fondue. Are you impressed yet?

The next significant Day Family tradition is the Christmas Eve reading of the archival (and falling-apart) copy of "'Twas the Night Before Christmas." The time and place of said reading is habitually dictated by my brother Nick, and CANNOT be missed, regardless of how much wrapping you still have to do or how tired you are. The mood must be festive, the dog must be present, and Mom will read and comment on how her favorite line is the one about how "new fallen snow gave a luster of midday to objects below." We will roll our eyes. Dad was excused from this particular tradition so he could sleep (more often than not, he is asleep during the reading anyway). And besides, the hospital wouldn't let us call at one in the morning.

Next up, family members wake, procure coffee, and ready themselves for present opening. No one is allowed to enter the living room at this point (unless the living room lies between one's bedroom and the coffee, in which case exceptions may be made, but only if one agrees NOT to look directly at the stockings). When the family is ready, we proceed down the stairs in order of age (with the dog being encouraged to lead the way but usually failing to understand his role). Nick enters first, followed by me, then Derek, then Mom and finally, Dad. Since Dad is last, the order wasn't terribly disrupted, but Dad may be required to do an honorary walk (or crutch-assisted hop) into the living room when he returns. To accommodate his present location, we decided that he would open stocking presents last.

Once in the living room, we must stand clear of the stockings (no touching!) while the stuffed stockings are preserved on camera for archival purposes. Finally, we each settle into a chair and begin tearing through the stockings and "under-the-stocking presents." Once complete, the usual process involves taking showers and gathering in the dining room for "crackers" (those party things you pull apart), champagne, and eggs benedict with extra hollandaise sauce.

Much thought and preparation went into the dilemma of how exactly to handle this part of the hallowed Celebration. Could we make eggs benedict ahead and bring it to the hospital? Unacceptable. It would turn to cold mush on the way, and hospitals, we have been informed, do not have microwaves. Should we eat it without Dad? Equally unacceptable, and possibly a little cruel, given the hospital food alternative. And really, the point of the Christmas Brunch is that it's over-the-top and completely unnecessary and gluttonous. Nick was responsible for the ingenious solution. He found an appliance practically made for making eggs benedict in hospitals. It's a toaster with an egg-poaching attachment. Not an egg frying attachment, but an eggs-benedict style poaching one. The only thing it doesn't do is make hollandaise. He bought one, tested it out at home, and then bought another. I'm sure the hospital has a whole slew of rules prohibiting this type of homemade-meal cooking (Dad was NOT happy about the open flame involved in the chocolate fondue), but somehow this didn't factor into our preparation. The Sage side of the family is not so good at playing by the rules. I'm sure Mom would say something like. "Hospital rules be damned! We must have our hollandaise!" at this point.

On Christmas morning, after stockings and showers, we packed the car up with all of the remaining presents, pitchers of coffee and hollandaise, eggs benedict ingredients, and orange juice. We must have looked like complete nutjobs walking into the hospital with 10 shopping bags and a suitcase on wheels. A little ridiculous, yes, but as I mentioned before, the Day Family Celebration must go on. Again, the hospital entrance workers gave us the obligatory we're-in-charge-not-you-even-though-it's-Christmas trouble, letting us know first that four people couldn't possibly go up at once ("This is a hospital, you know."). Again, we persisted and they computed and we eventually made our way upstairs.

There was hardly anyone in the orthopedic wing -- somehow everyone manages to get better on Christmas Eve -- and Dad didn't have a roommate, so we decorated his bed and leisurely set about opening Dad's stocking. I can't say it was quite like the usual fireside event, but it was fine. We set up our eggs-benedict-making apparatus in the "family room", and while it must have taken an hour to get the appropriate amount of eggs poached and english muffins toasted, we got the job done. Dad was suitably impressed. I'm sure the nursing staff (which is made up of much more friendly people than the entrance staff) thought we were all nuts. Our party crackers came with little paper crowns, so we were all walking around with orange and yellow burger-king-like crowns on our heads.

Anyway, mission accomplished. The Day Family Celebration is complete, and we're all recovering well from pre-Celebration stress. I just got word that the second surgical procedure was successful and Dad might be home Sunday. We may have to enforce some sort of safety procedures for the family to ensure that the following Christmas does not involved hospital entrance workers.

Update: I got a fabulous Canon Rebel XT for Christmas from my family and Derek (thank you!!) and took some pictures at the hospital, so I'll have those up soon. Also, Derek and I drove down to Delaware for the Costas Family Christmas Extravaganza after we left the hospital, which is equally gluttonous and festive. We made out exceptionally well on the gift front -- blog readers may be interested to know that Derek's brother Wes gave us a gift certificate to Al Di La! I'll have photos from Delaware up soon as well (including many of the most adorable one-year-old on the planet, D's nephew Xander).

Posted by csageday at 12:30 PM | Comments (5)

December 27, 2005

Ahhhhh, Sleeeeeep

Finally. Vacation. The obsessing over gifts and schedules and work and sleep is over, at least for a few days while I recover at my family's house in New Jersey.

I have many holiday havoc tales to tell, which I'll post here just as soon as I'm done eating the rest of the fudge...

Posted by csageday at 02:50 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2005

My First Roach

I've lived in the city for 10 years -- six years full time -- and miraculously I've avoided crossing paths with a cockroach in any of my apartments. I've had mice, big ants, little ants, thousand-legged insects that crawl across the walls, a dying cricket, and waterbugs, but not a single roach (that I saw, anyway).

So much for my luck with roaches. It's true (ugh, ew, gross) that they climb up the pipes. I went into the bathroom a minute ago to find one trying to crawl out of the sink. Damn they're ugly. They just have no redeeming characteristics. No fur, no color, no shame.

I watched it for a minute to make sure it wasn't going anywhere and tried to decide what to do. Roaches have hard shells, and I really didn't feel like killing it in the sink (too many opportunities for roach pieces flying into my tootbrush/face), or flushing it down the drain (it would just come back). Also, the thought of the crunch it would make just made my stomach turn.

So I got some cardboard and a cup and decided the move it to the floor or some other place, so I could kill it as far away from my own body and any of my stuff as possible. While I was performing the delicate slide-and-capture maneuver, though, the roach grabbed onto the side of the cup so I couldn't make a seal (you were expecting that, yes?). I had to chop off a leg or two, making the whole experience that much more ... revolting.

I finally got it into the kitchen -- that seemed like the place to go, with the good lighting and the garbage can and heavy stainless steel pots and pans ... just in case. I put it on the counter, thought a minute, then moved it to the floor. I'm not sure why I was so disgusted by the prospect of killing it. It's disgusting all on its own, so the added crunch and possible flying roach-guts add another dimension to the ugliness. I felt similarly toward the giant waterbug that lay dying right outside my door in a different apartment. It's kind of like killing a rat or a turtle. It's just too big to deal with. I don't feel this way about mice at all. The roach just seems invasive and unnatural -- like an alien species attacking the house. I want to kill it, but I'm afraid it'll turn into something even angrier and scarier and will infect the planet with a horrible fast-spreading roach disease. (I just watched parts of a show called "Surface" about a gigantic monster that lives in the sea and eats people -- maybe that's why my imagination ran wild.)

Anyway, I got the roach onto the floor and then realized I wasn't wearing shoes, so I couldn't step on it. I considered using a mug, but settled on finding a suitable pair of shoes instead -- ones with smooth bottoms so I could be absolutely certain the thing would be dead and not scuttling through some grove on the bottom of my shoe. Once properly outfitted, I confronted the roach again. It was playing dead, remaining feet pointing up in the air, curled slightly inward. I removed the cup and raised my foot. I grimaced. I couldn't handle it. The prospect of the CRUNCH was too much to bear. And what if it was so resiliant I didn't kill it the first time around? I put the cup back down.

When did I become such a sissy? How pathetic.

While putting the cup back down, the stupid insect came back to life and grabbed onto the rim again, making a last stand of sorts. God I hate roaches. I shook the cup around until it let go, lifted up my foot, cringed, and slammed my foot down on top of it. A couple of times. Just to be sure. It crunched and I lost my appetite, but it's done.

Now, when the exterminator comes at 8 AM on a Saturday morning and knocks until we wake up, I won't be pissed off. Or I'll try not to be. I don't think I can go through all that again. I admit, I was impressed the roach made it all the way up to the third floor -- and I told it so, but we've got enough on our hands with the mice and ants, thank you.

Posted by csageday at 11:21 PM | Comments (4)

August 09, 2005

Underground Radio

Every once in a while, when we're driving down from the Adirondacks on a Sunday night, we catch the Underground Garage radio show on Q104.3. The DJ, "Little Steven," educates the masses about garage rock and plays a wide variety of stuff -- clips from films, songs from lesser-known bands, and obscure hits from major bands like The Who, The Stones, The Beatles, etc. Yesterday's show had a movie theme and included trivia about A Hard Day's Night (one of my favorites) and Bonnie and Clyde, with some other random tracks thrown in. It's always an eclectic mix, and after the repetitive playlists on [pick any music radio station], it's a welcome change to have a DJ that doesn't sound like a sales rep. (FYI: The website is a bit like the show -- it's all over the place but it has great old audio/video clips buried in there somewhere.)

The format for the show is a kind of rambling, non-standard, play-whatever-the-hell-I-feel-like mix you sometimes hear on low-budget or college stations at 3AM. This only works if the DJ is interesting, so it works for Little Steven. (We once heard a similar kind of show on a classical station -- we listened to the same classical piece played in digital format, then in analog, then in digital format again. Between each one, there was a droning commentary about the subtle differences between them. Ugh.) I'm guessing plenty of podcasters out there are reintroducing this particular format with less success.

By the way, can I take this moment to mourn the loss of the old 101.1 CBS FM? I know it switched off a while ago but I was forced to listen to CBS radio station jingles at 7AM for many years. My elementary school bus driver didn't really like kids and had that station on every morning, without fail, at a volume you couldn't really ignore no matter where you sat. I can still hear the jingle in my head: "101, CBS FM/ 101, CMS FM/ We play your favorite oldies/ CBS effffeeemmm Newwwww Yoooooooork. [cue "My Boyfriend's Back"]" That tune is permanently branded on my brain. Jingles aside, it was a nice mix of old stuff, with some Beatles thrown in, and I miss it.

Posted by csageday at 12:09 AM | Comments (1)

August 08, 2005

Lovin the Leeches

Very briefly, while reading a fascinating New Yorker article about leeches and their growing use in medicine, I considered marching into the leech-infested muck at the lake upstate to catch some. Leeches give you a natural local anesthetic, thin your blood, and suck it out -- it's great for headaches, black eyes, reattached fingers and toes, osteoporosis . . . and people paid big bucks for treatment a century ago. The article was so thorough and interesting that I thought, for a split second, "It's a bargain getting them for free! I should run right into the swamp! These things are amazing!" Then I remembered what they look like. Plus, I feel fine.

I wish I could link to the article, but it's long gone (it was the July 25th issue). Suffice it to say that leeches do have proven health benefits, are sophisticated little animals, and can live up to a year without a feeding. They're also disgusting, they're attracted to shadows, and they just love the bottom of our red kayak.

Posted by csageday at 11:13 PM | Comments (1)

July 15, 2005

London

Some belated links on the attacks in London: Angry Marxist Hippy has some good quotes. In an NYT Op-Ed piece, Thomas Friedman reminds us that "To this day - to this day - no major Muslim cleric or religious body has ever issued a fatwa condemning Osama bin Laden." Some clerics in Spain issued a fatwa after the bombings there, but the fact that this is a major exception underscores the previous point. The BBC also addresses the abundance of madrassas (Islamic schools) in Pakistan that teach the Koran and little else and seem to support an extremist view -- one of the bombers supposedly attended one.

Posted by csageday at 12:11 AM | Comments (0)

July 13, 2005

Derek, Handyman Extraordinaire

The expert Russian furniture movers said it could not be done. They tried to move the desk in to the tiny little second bedroom without success. Enter Derek. Derek suggested last night that, if we do various things to the door and the desk with tools, we might fit the desk into the little room. I was very skeptical. I stuck to my more straightforward unpacking tasks and said things like, "If you break this desk, you have to find another one EXACTLY like it or [vague threat with raised eyebrows and threatening look]." The desk is the size of Montana and the doorway to the little room is tough to maneuver around, so I really didn't think there was much of a chance. Besides, by last night I was finally coming around the idea of the desk-as-cookbook-shelf-near-the-kitchen.

Turns out there are obvious things you can do when faced with this problem, like, say, taking a door off its hinges to gain an extra inch or so of room. These are the sorts of things you learn about when you have a house, I think, or move 10 times in the space of a decade. I knew about this, but the thought never really crossed my mind in connection with the desk problem.

Secondly, furniture is sometimes constructed with moving in mind. My desk is one of those old hulking library desks made of oak, so I really didn't think it would have any handy Ikea-like components, but it did. There are quaint looking (and rusted) screws holding the top of the desk to the bottom. I had seen the metal anchors holding the screws in place, but again -- I thought, "cool, old metal things" and didn't realize that they actually had a purpose.

So D hammered and unscrewed things and we barely managed to squeeze the thing through the door, and now I'm sitting in my own little office, working on the Mac on the desk. End of inspirational moving story.

On to other things of interest. With a working computer and internet connection, I finally managed to post the July 4th photos from up north. Since my photos of people are notoriously bad, I stuck to pictures of things that don't move or have a camera face.

We spent last weekend in Cape Cod -- should have a few photos of inanimate objects from that trip up soon as well, in addition to an account of our side-trip to Stew Leonard's, the Disneyworld of grocery stores.

Possible things to do this week: The Brooklyn Philharmonic will be at the Prospect Park Bandshell this Saturday, and Calexico is playing at Castle Clinton in Battery Park this Thursday.

Posted by csageday at 12:29 AM | Comments (0)

June 09, 2005

Spring Fashion

Why is it that each year, when it finally gets hot out, everyone breaks out these great outfits and I can't even find my sandals? Seriously, the first warm day (which always takes me by complete surprise because I never check the weather), all these women show up wearing these uber-hip top-skirt combinations with summer sandals and I'm wearing a wool turtleneck sweater, corduroys, and boring shoes? When do these people find time to find these clothes? And where the hell are the great clothes, anyway? I try to go shopping and it's usually a complete disaster. I only ever find good clothes if I come across something when I'm not shopping. Yesterday, for instance, I was on my way to my Coop shift -- slated to make it there just on time -- when I walked by a shoe store that is usually crappy but suddenly has 20 pairs of shoes I HAVE to check out. And they're all on sale and ridiculously cheap. So now I have two new pairs of summer shoes (and I was late for my shift) but no frilly, gathered v-neck tops or cool-looking skirts. I give up. I was not meant to be fashionable.

Posted by csageday at 11:02 PM | Comments (0)

June 07, 2005

Dumpster Diving

Every ten years or so, my parents decide that their house in New Jersey is too full of STUFF and they decide to throw everything out. It's a psychological thing we all do -- except usually it's annual and it's called spring cleaning. With Mom and Dad, it takes the form of a dumpster in the driveway. Pretty much anything in the cellar or attic that isn't a family heirloom is game.

The problem is, I can't stand to see good stuff go to waste, so I freak out every time. I know that someone, somewhere needs music box cartridges from the fifties or a book on roses from the nineties. Since I've been getting more environmentally conscious these days, I also know that perfectly good metal filing cabinets should be given away and not tossed, computers and air conditioners have harmful chemicals and should be discarded safely, and books that can't be sold should be recycled. So I threw my usual fit, then took a day off to wade through wet garbage and rescue things. I understand that sometimes you just have to get rid of stuff and figuring out how to do that is hard, but it just kills me to see good stuff in a dumpster. And this time, I have the INTERNET. (Derek checked eBay and found someone in need of those exact music box cartriges, so there.)

I think this way of dealing with stuff is a generational thing. Baby boomers were the first generation to experience this unique consumer culture -- it's affordable to buy the latest and greatest and there isn't much value placed on anything five years old unless you're an eBay collector. It's easy to accumulate lots and lots of stuff. With Derek's family I've seen exactly how much stuff a family can buy over a thirty-year period -- they still have it all.

All the pointlessly huge McMansions and Targets suggest that generation X hasn't improved much, though. There's a trend toward conservation and organic foods, but people don't seem to realize that conservation means living with less -- owning a smaller home, driving a more fuel-efficient car, and creating less waste. Dad has one of the first hybrid cars, so we're not quite as bad as your average SUV-owner, but we've got plenty of the same bad habits everyone else has (not carpooling enough, using too much water, buying mass-produced junk we don't need, etc.). The damage caused by all of this consumerism and the outsized oil comsumption is irreversible, but environmental issues are low on the political priority list. I just don't get it.

Anyway, back to the dumpster. Driving home I tried to think of a rational plan to deal with all my stuff AND all the stuff in the dumpster, but when I pulled up the driveway and saw the thing, I had to call D and freak out over the phone a bit (Hewey consoled me). I tried to be a good environmentalist after that and called a bunch of municipal offices to find out about recycling, but have you ever tried to talk to New Jersey municipal people? It's kind of like talking to the garbage/mafia man. There was a lot of "Sure, we can take care of that for you -- just throw it in the dumpster (wink wink)." Recycling lumber and consumer electronics? Unheard of. ("That's what the dumpster's for!")

My triage efforts so far have included two trips to the recycling center, the rescue of a suitcase full of fabric, a 1922 Encyclopedia, LPs, speakers, books, a jewelry box, a lamp, clothes, a drill, two typewriters, a slide projector, frames, a small TV, a wrought iron table, baseball bats, clothes, a camping lantern, and luggage (here's a pile). And that's just from my Dad's collection. There was probably more buried in the corner, and I'm sure more went in after I left, but at least I made a dent. Unfortunately I didn't find a computer recycler for the computer stuff -- there are periodic collections but I don't know if there's a permanent drop-off anywhere. I'm heading out later this week for Mom's contribution and a collection of board games my brother is getting rid of.

The plan is to pack it all in the minivan and have a huge (and very cheap) stoop sale on Sunday in Brooklyn. (If you like old junk, please stop by -- hopefully we'll be out there by 11. We're at 11th St. btw 8th Ave and PPW.) Anything that might be a collector's item will be sold on eBay. Anything left over will go on the sidewalk (sidewalk items almost always get picked up in Brooklyn) or to Goodwill.

Posted by csageday at 12:19 AM | Comments (0)

June 03, 2005

Apple

I recently found myself at an Apple store with my entire family celebrating the Tiger release (Apple's new operating system). My family is not an Apple family. We were pioneers in the eighties (or at least my parents were) and had an Apple IIE at one point (on which I played numerous games of MathBlaster and tried unsuccessfully to let Mavis Beacon Teach Typing), but we switched to Windows after that.

I scoffed at Apple users in high school and college, jabbering on about the superiority of the DOS interface (I didn't really know what I was talking about). I wrote papers on ThinkPads and 486s. Then, toward the end of college I took an HTML class taught on the Mac. I had to ask the person next to me how the thing worked. I was compeltely Mac-illiterate.

Slowly, as I learned to use BBEdit and Fetch and then got a job in a Mac-friendly office, I converted and became an Apple-loving freak. I bought a G4 desktop -- and a cool-looking Apple monitor -- and then a used G3 laptop. I made a pilgrimage to the Apple store when it opened in Soho and stared in awe at the new machines. I own a t-shirt with a sequined apple on it (the old rainbow one, for the retro appeal).

Why the conversion? The interface is full of great graphics-based shortcuts. You can drag-and-drop anything, and although I have had some very bad run-ins with slow and demented Macs that have died unexpectedly, OSX is pretty stable. Apple's software -- iPhoto, iTunes, especially the new Tiger Dashboard -- is always intuitive and well designed. Good design saves time and reduces clutter. Windows is a poor copy of the Apple interface.

I extolled the virtues of the Apply platform to my family but got a lukewarm response. I'm not great at logical debate (Me: Macs are soooo coool! Parent: They're way too expensive. And what about all the PC software we own? Me: Whatever -- it's like, just, really cool!)

Then, out of the blue, Mom decides that Dad -- the gadget man -- needs an iPod. Then Apple releases the very cute and affordable miniMac. Mom gets a MiniMac. And an iPod. Then my brother decides he needs a iPod Mini. (iPods are ubiquitous these days. Even Lego People have them.) So within the space of a couple of months the family is interested enough in Apple to attend the Tiger release and be dutifully impressed by all the hype and features. I HOPE this is indicative of a larger PC-to-Apple trend, but I'm trying not to jinx it.

Posted by csageday at 01:18 AM | Comments (1)

June 01, 2005

10th Reunion

My dreaded 10th high school reunion invitation arrived in the mail a few months ago and I'm slated to drive up to it tomorrow. I had a minor breakdown shortly after getting the letter about it, possibly due to the fact that this year's reunion photo might include CHILDREN.

I feel like I'm the only member of my class without an advanced degree of some sort, or a least a spouse. The most I can claim is a fireplace and washer/dryer in my Brooklyn apartment (and I might not even have that soon). When you've gone to an elite (oppressive, high-pressure, competitive, screwed-up, insane, kick-you-out-for-doing-things-normal-adolescents-do) boarding school, reunions take on an entirely different dimension.

The prestige of the school makes you feel like you should at least be a foreign ambassador or running a brilliant startup by now. My latest theory is that alumni spend the first 10 years either trying to achieve this or figuring out that the expectation is (gasp) unrealistic. The latter group has a major breakdown somewhere between years six and nine and is only just coming to terms with being normal around the 10th. This is, of course, drastically oversimplifying things -- most alumni do really interesting things. I'm just trying to make myself feel better about my extended post-college procrastination.

You can't physically visit the place without feeling a combination of awe and repressed-memory recovery. It's a gorgeous campus. The teachers were phenomenal. On the flip side, the school politics are and were completely screwed up. The attitude of the administration toward disciplinary action is still infuriating. A special brand of conformity is king. The pretentiousness of it all makes you queasy, but the reputation for academic prestige is fully deserved. The whole experience of going there was pretty intense.

The 50-year reunion types get nostalgic and passionate about the school, but members of my class (save for the successful people) are a little more cautious. I decided to go, then decided not to, and eventually justified going by promising myself that if it's really uncomfortable I'll just go hiking somewhere else in New Hampshire. I know I'm not the only one with qualms, either. We'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll bring a flask of brandy for the hard parts. It is, after all, the location of my very first drinking adventure.

Posted by csageday at 11:59 AM | Comments (0)

May 12, 2005

People Who Run

I know a couple of People Who Run. Rob runs obscene distances every week. This in addition to holding down a job. He has placed well in the Chicago Marathon twice and recently took a shot at Boston. This is a recent running chart:

Yes, a hundred miles per week. Over-achiever. Ambitious.

Rose is a new runner working up to the NYC marathon this fall and making great progress. Via her blog, Miles of Yarn, I found this description of a marathon and was sort of horrified and intrigued. Marathonning is most definitely scary. Rose is brave.

Derek runs the loop in the park WITHOUT STOPPING every couple of weeks, which I find extremely impressive because of the big, long hill in the middle of it. D has a heart-monitor doohicky and does special stretching things afterwards.

I, on the other hand, am not a Person Who Runs. It is a painful activity, and aside from that ostensible but not-really-measurable cardio gain and those fabled endorphins, I don't really have a compelling reason to punish myself in this way. I did the Prospect Park loop once without stopping but I did it at more of a shuffle than a run. When I'm out there, I enjoy the park and finishing the loop -- even if I walk half way -- is always gratifying. I just can't get myself out there more than a couple of times a year.

Still, since I joined a gym a month ago I have been trying out the treadmill. Running with TV is a unique experience. I didn't watch much TV as a child, so when you put me in front of a TV my mouth will drop open slightly, my eyes will glaze over, and I'll be uninterruptible unless physically proded. I never learned to tune it out -- I am completely engrossed by the magic glowing box with the little people in it. TV shows, no matter how bad they are, can draw me in and make me completely lose track of time. So combining the dreary treadmill running with the TV is brilliant. I am hypnotized just enough to forget the annoying physical reality of running and can make it through a mile without stopping. Here's my mileage (if you can call it that):

Oh, and the little comments Rob has? Mine would go something like this:
4/15 15 minutes impossibly hard torturous horrible
4/20 22 minutes god when will it stop?!?
5/8 20 minutes tv good. don't know what watched.
5/10 no idea on time. tv. might have drooled. running sucks.

Here's the kicker. Right after the day I managed to run one-AND-A-HALF miles on the TV-aided treadmill I got an email about the 5k Corporate Challenge at work. The email mentioned the option to walk the whole way. I thought... 1.5 miles, 3 miles, walking, evening, Central Park -- well, that sounds nice. I figured someone I'd know would sign up, so I added my name to the list.

The registration process gave me a hint of things to come -- I signed up quickly and only realized when I got to the confirmation page that I had spelled my name wrong. Yes, my name. And yes, there was a "Review your information" page that I clicked through. I spelled both my first and last name wrong. Cubdt Dat instead of Cindy Day. There must have been something horribly wrong with me that day. I had to email a guy at JP Morgan or whatever to get it fixed. Humiliating.

Then, today, I got an email that mentioned "practice runs" and "headbands" and cc'd a lot of people I didn't know. Images of Richard Simmons danced through my head. Then Jane Fonda in spandex. What have I gotten myself into??

Posted by csageday at 11:52 PM | Comments (5)

May 09, 2005

Clog: The Sequel

We thought our plumbing adventures were over after sucking up two decades' worth of sink drainage, but no such luck. When we got home after work the next day I found two things: 1) there were some suspicious-looking, recently-regurgitated pipe artifacts in our sink and 2) we had a message on our answering machine from our downstairs neighbors saying there was a leak in their ceiling. (Oops.)

One more thing: The message from our neighbors was left right around the time the brokers were showing the apartment.

Derek went downstairs to apologize and investigate and found out that the leak (surprise, surprise) was right around where our bathroom sink would be. I reluctantly looked under the sink, and found pretty much everything soaked.

So... Did the plunging CAUSE the leak?? Did all of that seemingly productive work completely mess up the pipes? And how?? And more importantly -- what the heck did the real estate people do? Were they inspecting something? Why did the sink leak through the floor when they did something if it didn't when I was plunging for, like, half an hour? How could something this simple be so complicated?

We haven't heard a word from our brokers. Well, actually, we did hear some positive things about a possible sale to people who would be interested in renting to us -- yes! -- at which point Derek really didn't feel it was appropriate to say something like... "you didn't use our sink, did you? Because there's this awful leak..."

Our very nice landlord has promised to send a professional. Until then I'm stuck brushing my teeth using the triangular contraption in Derek's bathroom. And no more plunging.

Posted by csageday at 10:07 PM | Comments (1)

May 04, 2005

Clog

Now I know why plumbers make so much money.

If you are easily disgusted by plumbing adventures, skip this post. Really. I don't want to be responsible for any loyal blog readers puking at work.

Ever since we moved in here I've had a temperamental sink. It doesn't like to drain. I always feel bad, because it clearly has digestive issues and there's something plumberish I should be doing to help. Still, I know that if I wait long enough the water will make it down the drain. Tonight, though, it just quit. The sink had had enough. It was crying out for help.

Under the sink, also from when we moved in, there's some scary-looking toxic Draino-type liquid. I've thought about using it a few times but I know it's bad for pipes and horribly bad for the environment, so I avoid it. While browsing through the books at Whole Foods, I came across an eco-friendly home cleaning book and looked up plumbing for kicks. The book recommended using a plunger for clogs. I read the section twice, looking for a solution for a SINK clog, but couldn't find anything. Then I realized that the advice was for any clog -- sink, kitchen sink, toilet, tub. I couldn't exactly bring myself to imagine using the plunger that I pretend doesn't exist in the same sink I use to brush my teeth. So I never tried the cure-all plunger solution. Until tonight. I was desperate.

My newly-finished knitting project needed to be soaked and blocked (stretched into shape), but the sink was dirty. I started to clean it, but found that without any drainage the cleaning wasn't really happening. Derek's sink is this weird flat-bottomed triangular thing with the hot and cold fixtures reversed (even if you KNOW they're reversed it still messes with your head). Out of the question. Tub, no. Kitchen sink, no. I had to do something. So I got the plunger, which is actually kind of new and not disgusting after all, put it in the sink and plunged.

If you ever do this, try to remember that there's a safety drainage thing somewhere else in the sink. If you try to force water through the drain and it won't go -- it WILL come flying out of the safety drain.

Thinking, like an idiot, that one good plunge would undo a year of cloggage, I plunged with confidence. The force of it drove the water straight out of the safety drain and UPWARD, nearly missing my face, and all over the vanity.

The plunging was kind of satisfying, though, because I heard a really disgusting sound and something gray appeared in the sink. Encouraging, no? So I tried it again, and again, and again. I created a little roof over the safety drain with a sponge to avoid the fountain effect and watched as all sorts of stuff came out and into the sink.

The sound and the chunky water was eerily similar to vomiting. I even felt a little queasy. And I have a pretty strong stomach for this stuff. The nauseating thing was that the stuff in the sink was clearly NOT MINE. All I put in the sink is toothpaste and water. There was silver gray stuff at first -- possibly paint from my artist landlord? Slivers of it. LOTS AND LOTS of it. Sometimes it was a little yellow or brown. Then I found a PEBBLE -- but not just any old pebble -- a pebble with bright pink paint on it. Eventually, yellow sand came up. Then cat hair, caulking, possibly kitty litter, human hair, some kind of string, and rust-colored stuff that is hopefully not -- but most likely is -- the inside of the pipe.

At some point I decided I'd had enough plumbing and having that much STUFF out of the pipe meant it would probably drain well enough. Ten minutes of this was heroic enough. There's no reason to endure more than necessary, right? So I grimaced and got the gunk out of the sink. I turned on the water. The sink filled up. No drainage. AT ALL. Despite all of the effort and the stoic endurance of REALLY DISGUSTING stuff, the sink was not cooperating. I realized in complete horror that I had probably just been cleaning the passage between the safety drain and the regular one the whole time. Which, tragically, turned out to be true.

I called in reinforcements. I held the safety drain closed, and Derek plunged mightily. BLACK stuff came up. Derek looked very disturbed. We tried again. It looked like someone might have dumped an entire fish tank in there -- the gunk looked like multi-colored pet store pebbles. During an intermission, I started pulling on some hair poking out and it KEPT GOING. All told, the knotted hair excavated was one-and-a-half-feet long. (Are you still reading??)

The two-pronged attack plan worked. The sink now drains. There's more plunging to do but we're not sure we can take any more of this. We just ate dinner. We both feel sick. And I really won't ever feel quite the same way about that sink again. Which makes me glad that we're going to take a look at a rental tomorrow. Ignorance is bliss, when it comes to your sink's past.

Posted by csageday at 11:44 PM | Comments (5)

April 20, 2005

Catholic Idol

All of the little rituals that surround the papal conclave are pretty entertaining. I tried to ignore the hullaballoo, but then I got sucked in. It's kind of like American Idol -- it's shallow and petty and pointless, but it's completely addictive. It's all in the details:

• The secrecy of the conclave and its rituals -- like stringing counted ballots together just-so, recounting them, then burning two at a time -- provide suspence and drama. And useless trivia!
• There's an ominous photo of a cardinal shutting the big chapel door (cue voice-over from pope wannabe).
• Papal robes are made by special papal tailors in three different sizes (and the press is invited to take pictures).
• The Sistene Chapel is swept for "bugs" every so often to prevent sinful eavesdropping.
• People spend hours speculating about the big event -- Will there be white smoke or black smoke? Who will the next pope be? Will the cardinals argue in secret? Should we start an office pool?

For a few short days, the Catholic Church managed to be current in a media-friendly way. The papers and TV were flooded with pope-abilia. It got out of hand, but you've got to acknowledge this centuries-old establishment for the public relations savvy it has built up. Crowds love a nail-biting spectacle. Too bad the Catholic Church itself, with its new ultra-consevative pope, is completely out of touch with the social needs of those crowds. To drag out the American Idol analogy, FOX doesn't give a damn about their audience either as long as they tune in, right?

Posted by csageday at 01:18 AM | Comments (1)

April 08, 2005

Google Maps Rocks

The satellite image feature on Google Maps is my new favorite toy. You can type in an address and get a satellite picture of any location. The interface is fantastic -- Google did a really complex thing in a simple, elegant way, as usual. You can click and drag the map in any direction, switch from "map" to "satellite" at any time, and zoom in and out. I found the house I grew up in and navigated around town for a while (here's Thomas Edison's house). I spent countless hours of my childhood carpooling around but seeing everything from above finally helped me figure out where things actually are. The photos are detailed enough to show each parking lot space in shopping centers. Once you start finding places you can't stop. I went upstate next, then Derek found his various childhood houses, then I browsed around New York for a while, eventually branching out to Niagara Falls, Europe, and beyond. Here's the Grand Canyon.

The natural landscapes are stunning. I couldn't believe for a while that I was looking at the real thing -- in its actual scale. You can follow highways to different towns and gain a completely different perspective on a very familiar stretch of road. Changes in population density are easy to see. Topography can be guessed at if you zoom out a bit. When it finally dawned on me to head over to Europe and Asia and check out the rest of the world I found a huge stretch of desert covering the equator and gorgeous colors up in northern Canada. You can't zoom in much outside of the U.S., but the Pyrenees and Himalayas are clearly visible. Go south and you'll find bright white ice and what seem to be currents in the vast stretches of water. Here are a bunch of screenshots. This is my favorite, though:

Posted by csageday at 12:43 AM | Comments (0)

April 05, 2005

April Fool's Recap

In case you missed it, the blogosphere was full of April Fool's stunts -- it's the perfect medium for it. Gizmodo got a spate of fake iPod products, Go Fug Yourself launched Go Hug Yourself, toothing duped the media, and Rose mentioned that Francis had a hand in BoringBoring, which completely nails BoingBoing down to the ads (check out the "zz" favicon).

Posted by csageday at 12:49 AM | Comments (0)

March 19, 2005

Home Theater Survey

Derek answered a bunch of questions posed by an "international research group" that cold-called us Friday night. All of the questions were about multimedia systems and gadgets and computers with DVD drives. It was Derek's ideal survey. He reads Home Theater Magazine on the train, could easily write the articles in the same magazine, and lusts after projectors and high definition TVs and various other gadgets I don't understand. Given his job, he could outfit us with all sorts of stuff, but when asked about the size of his TV, he answered: "A 20-inch, I'm sorry to say." Poor Derek. Even more shame ensued when he was asked if he owned a home theater system. "Well I have the sound system but I can't say I have the screen." His chance to shine came and went because a) I don't like big TVs and b) he understands that and gave his 27-inch TV away to make me happy. That seems worthy of a 10-year investment in real estate together, doesn't it?

Posted by csageday at 10:15 PM | Comments (0)

March 15, 2005

Plenty?

D handed me a magazine called Plenty while we were passing the time in the Houston airport last week. At first glance, I thought it was a teen magazine and gave D a look. The title was an almost offensive shade of green, and a scantily clad model was karate chopping a comic-book-style superhero. They both have speech bubbles but I couldn't make heads or tails of it. I stared at the tagline: "Smart living for a complex world" and still couldn't figure it out.

Turns out that Plenty is a well-written, interesting magazine aimed at 20- and 30-somethings concerned about environmental issues. The mag was practically written for me. There were articles about solar and hydro power, ecotourism (with 10 write-ups of exotic spots), "green gear," and eco-friendly fashion. The articles are all well-researched, fun, and easy to read. There were short pieces on estrogen in the waterways, hybrids, florescent lightbulbs, and global warming. If someone does something about the design team (or is it the marketing team? The title and tagline are confusing, too), Plenty could certainly find an audience with the hordes of young Whole Foods customers.

Okay: Just checked the site again and they've released another issue with another odd cover (but great content). I don't get it -- this isn't Maxim. At least the neon green is gone.

What does "Plenty" refer to, anyway?

Posted by csageday at 12:16 AM | Comments (2)

February 17, 2005

Pet Roomba

We got a new pet for Christmas: Roomba. Not a live pet, but a vacuum cleaner. It's all we can handle in the way of pets with our current schedule and level of maturity. It's a cute vacuum cleaner though, and very well trained. Roomba's many talents include:

• charging into the bedroom and UNDER THE BED (unthinkable) to suck up the mountains of dust bunnies that live there
• headbanging (that little gray thing has a sensor; when R bumps into a wall, chair leg, your leg, he just bounces back and turns this way and that until he finds his way out)
• dutifully returning to his "home" (charging base) when he needs recharging (he does this with triumphant beeping)
• tactfully blinking when he needs to be cleaned
• cheerfully beeping when asked to go to work
• woefully beeping after having eaten rug fringe or his own charging wire (sounds like a choked up "sorry, so sorry")
• entertaining Cindy and Derek while endlessly Roomba-ing all over the apartment

Note to interested buyers: Roomba doesn't suck up everything the first time around -- the suction isn't fantastic -- but he's persistent. If you leave the thing going for a while and just forget it's there it picks up a lot of dust, especially in odd places. It's a good item for a smallish NYC apartment. If you have a real pet, go for the Dyson (cue imitation of the Dyson commercial).

Posted by csageday at 11:26 PM | Comments (0)

February 15, 2005

Baby Xander

Xander, Derek's family's youngest comedian, doesn't have a blog yet but he's got a website. I couldn't resist adding captions to the latest batch of photos -- he's such a character.

Posted by csageday at 06:02 PM | Comments (0)

February 10, 2005

Earthquake Changed Time, Coastlines

From Yahoo: The tsunami earthquake changed the shape of the earth, altering the spin and shortening the day a tiny bit -- does anyone else think this is extraordinary? "Scientists at NASA...said the Dec. 26 quake...disrupted the planet's rotation and shaved 2.68 microseconds, or millionths of a second, from the length of a day." Read the rest here.

Posted by csageday at 07:28 PM | Comments (1)

For Seinfeld Fans

You can read scripts of Seinfeld episodes on this site. If you've seen enough episodes you can easy imagine George's yelling, Jerry's expressions, Elaine's smirk, Kramer's body language, etc. It's like Cliffs Notes, or TV for work. It also gives you a different perspecive -- you see why certain things are funny, how the scenes are set up, etc.

Posted by csageday at 07:26 PM | Comments (0)

February 02, 2005

Tetris

I pride myself on my game of Tetris. I gave many, many hours to it in high school and college. Embarrassing confession: Since Tetris games can last a while, I developed elaborate fantasies of attending Tetris tournaments, where crowds of Tetris experts would sit in a dark auditorium, watching some sort of projection of my game. People would talk about my shape-changing dexterity and elaborate stacking techniques. Analysts would discuss the complex statistical formulae used effortlessly by Tetris prodigies like me.

So when a bar with vintage arcade games opened up in Williamsburg, I was psyched. All of that time invested in Tetris should be enough to get me a free beer and my name up on the high score blackboard, right? I should have known better. The Atari version of Tetris, which is what arcade-style games use, is very different from the PC-based software I played on. It has weird levels and it stops the game and sends you to another level when you've gotten to 15 rows. The version I played just goes on forever, getting faster and faster. The Atari version also doesn't respond well to fast commands in succession, so my fancy changing stuff doesn't work and I lose pretty quickly. Nevermind that the Atari version is the original version and I was playing some knock off. It was depressing.

So my question is, is there anything useful gained from honing video game skills? Even if you become an expert in one game, another version will appear eventually and you'll have to learn it all over again. Does it help your fine motor skills or satisfy some need to keep your mind occupied with a completely mindless task? Is it any better than learning all the plot lines and characters in daily soaps? Is there any benefit to all the dedication and blisters?

Okay, one benefit. You can impress drunk people into thinking you're cool. It's how D and I met. We're both quiet, even when we're drunk (sometimes), but we played Space Invaders together in the basement of a bar for a while. It was sort of retro and fun and it kept us together long enough to figure out what to do next. So video games are like a dating service for really lame, antisocial people. How sad.

Posted by csageday at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)

January 31, 2005

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)