Tag Archives: Urban Life

A Day in the Country

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I am a city girl.  FOB (father of blogger) doesn’t drive anymore (he is 90, so thank G-d), POB (partner of blogger) doesn’t drive, SOB (sister of blogger) won’t drive (because she doesn’t feel her skills are good enough) and HOSOB (husband of SOB) let his license lapse. Son of POB and blogger is 8 years-old and we don’t let him drive.  Just call us strict parents.

So, I am the one.  Why do they call it a “minivan”?  The back half of the car was still in New York State for a full two seconds after the front half was welcomed to Connecticut on I95.  There is nothing “mini” about it.  Try parking that behemoth on a city street.  The good news is that I buy all the insurance the rental place sells, so I can ram cars forward and back to enlarge an otherwise snug parking space for only a $12.95 per day premium.  You get what you pay for.  (I am REALLY just joking although clearly I have considered the pros and cons.)

So, POB, FOB, SOB, HOSOB, our son and I set out for this place in idyllic Connecticut (that is, unless you have to drive there, using back roads, but I digress) where HOSOB has 3 bird paintings on show.  Lovely paintings.

But before he spoke, there were other bird nerds describing chickadees and their mating habits and such other interesting matters.  It caused me to take to a stone wall outside and try to snooze while knowing that bugs were crawling on me.  It was out in the country after all.  I fail to see anything remotely civilized about nature.  Ok, that is oxymoronic, but really nature is sooooo . . . creepy-crawling; how does one nap during a bird-nerd convention? By listening to them.  (Ok, that was a trick question.)  It was such a small space that it would have been ruder than even I could muster to lie down inside the gallery and snooze while the nerders were nerding.  (Don’t think it wasn’t a reasoned decision not to embarrass HOSOB; I have napped in the Islamic wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (pre-9/11) because it is sooooo soothing there.)

Then it was HOSOB’s turn to talk about the birds in his paintings.  HOSOB is really smart and his mind moves in many directions at once, but not all roads should be taken (if you understand my drift).  Luckily, he looked at SOB who was making the universal choking motion, as code for “you’re killing me” and he looked at me and I gave the universal “keep the ball in play” signal and he wandered back on the reservation and ended his talk.  Phew.  Of course, my son, Junior Bird Nerd, wanted to comment on the migratory habits of the subject bird.  I have made peace with muzzling my child.

FOB, a lovely man, tries to help me drive and give me directions and short cuts and then says, after I have committed to an exit, “Beats the hell out of me what you do once you get off . . . .”  Pause.  Grip the wheel.  Make sure that I keep everyone safe (including those outside the car) while I re-join the highway traffic.  Did I mention what a lovely man my dad is?

Any way, I have to go to his house tomorrow and fix the fool proof method I set up by which he can access Free Cell and his email account. By fix, I mean, I have to undo the buttons he pushed indiscriminately to fix a perceived problem — the computer took an extra second to re-load.  Oh well.  Did I mention he is a lovely, lovely man?

At various points during the day, I pretended to commit hari-kari and sometimes held out the back of my sweater in a point to show SOB where the sword had gone.

We all survived the trip, saw HOSOB’s beautiful art and, all-in-all, not so epic as, let’s say . . . . the trip to an family unveiling (http://40andoverblog.com/?p=35)

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Elmo Goes To Work

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Ever wonder how Elmo gets to work?

Well, here he is on his way to Sesame Street.

Hey, Elmo, “can you tell me how you get — how you get — to Sesame Stree-ee-tt??”

Wait, Elmo, you’ve stopped on the corner of 50th Street and 7th Avenue.  I know for sure — for sure — that this is most definitely NOT Sesame Street.

Funny, his voice sounded awfully much like a lawyer I used to know. . . .

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Our day today

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POB (partner of blogger) had a great idea this morning — go to Governor’s Island for a picnic.  Governor’s Island is a decommissioned military base island in New York harbor (right next to Ellis Island and Liberty Island) that has been turned into a park and fairground.  It is an easy subway ride followed by a ferry ride.  Ok, “easy” refers only to the directness of the route.  When on the subway or in line for the ferry, a person is subject to the sea of surrounding humanity and their insipid conversations.  (For the record, our (i.e., this blogger community) conversations are never insipid — too revealing? Maybe. But insipid? Never.)

First, there was a more-unsteady-than-elderly lady for whom POB gave up her seat.  (I was already standing.) POB asked if she wanted a seat and the woman turned to her friend and said, in a cartoonishly nasal voice, “Oh, see!! A seat opened up!!”  Poof, like, magic.  Really?  No, because a well-mannered person got up (in contradistinction to the mopes and slouches around us).  Her friend started to talk about food processing in a loud, screeching voice.

What the woman said was important and true — that if you saw how fast food is made, you would never eat it again and that most processing is bad for humans in both nutrition and the environment — but did we need to hear it in outrageous volume with a holier-than-thou tone at 11am on a holiday weekend?  And, just across the aisle, a scary-looking, tattooed dad with a beer gut (who was playing with his child by pretending to strangle him — really) was giving the child huge helpings of Pepperidge Farm flavor-blasted gold fish (hmmm, salt, chemically reconstructed “cheese” and polysorbate 60, anyone?).  Our son loves them, too, and we know we are going to a special place in hell for parents who let their kids eat this junk.  None of the kale or broccoli or grass-fed beef that our son eats will save us from this punishment.

And why DO men need to sit so wide that they take up nearly two seats?  I note that the smaller the shoe size of the man, the wider he sits.  Is this some psychological melodrama playing out?

Fast-forward to the line waiting to get back on the ferry to Manhattan.  A group of women and one man was behind us.  The man, who was overweight, and a bitchy effete garden gnome, was commenting to women passersby, “hey, do you think you could have tighter clothing?” or “do you think you could be any fatter?”  All I wanted to say to him was, “come out of the closet and stop being bitter with baggage”.  But I didn’t.  I could take him down in a minute.  The women, however, would lay me out.  One of the women had a son who was going to grow up to be the bully of his neighborhood.  He dropped a juice carton on the street and someone picked it up and handed it to her and said, “I think your child dropped this.”  I thought it was an elegant way to force the woman to deal with the litter.  She got all huffy, with heavy hip and neck action, saying to her friends, “the baby drops this and he gives it to me?” Ok, who else?  She is his mother for G-d’s sakes.  And the baby?  BABY?  Try 6 years-old, going on 12.  And mean.

Too much humanity.  I wanted to take a private water taxi followed by a cab.  I couldn’t handle any more.  But we did continue on the public transportation route.  On the subway, three 20-somethings were talking and POB and I were transfixed by the car wrecks that were their conversations and their outfits.  One was falling out of her skimpy outfit and had used eyebrow pencil to highlight her auburn eyebrows into a Groucho Marx effect.  I think she thought I was admiring her instead of not being able to take my eyes off this mobile crashing unit, so when she got off, she shimmied at me and smiled.  I was sooooooo grossed out I could barely breathe.

I took to my bed for a nap.  Oh, I forgot, once you get to Governor’s Island, it is perfectly lovely.

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Who needs Kevin Bacon?

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DFOB (dear college friend of blogger) and I were talking not long ago and discovered that our family members know each other without relying on our 30-year connection.

Here is how it works:

SOB (sister of blogger) treated DFOB’s brother (BODFOB) when he was hospitalized a few years ago.  I went to visit with the parents at the hospital while DFOB was flying in from California and SOB walked into the room.  Crazy, huh?

It also turns out that DFOB’s cousin trained SOB early in her medical career.

BODFOB’s girlfriend is someone with whom SOB and I both went to high school; her mother was our English teacher (the latter is the reason that this sentence has a semi-colon and is grammatically correct even though it doesn’t flow so well).

But wait, there is more:  POB (partner of the blogger) worked with the girlfriend on her book years ago (POB is in the publishing industry).

So, who needs Kevin Bacon any more?  Ok, maybe if I want to be connected to Barbra Streisand or Alec Baldwin, I need Kevin Bacon.  But G-d help me if I care about making those connections.

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Really? Are ya kiddin’ me?

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New York City is my home town.

Native New Yorkers (and those nearly native because they’ve lived here so long) abide by some neighborly rules.  For example:

  • Help tourists with directions.
  • Ask a blind person if he or she would like assistance (but never ask if he or she “needs” assistance).
  • Look the other way when your neighbor is sneaking a cigarette around the corner.
  • Always go to the green grocer on your own block because that is the store that stays open and keeps the neighborhood buzzing and safe at late hours.

New York City is ruined by those who come here thinking that New York is so anonymous that they can give way to their worst or selfish impulses with impunity.

Yep, you guessed it.  I had a run-in or two today.

Some guy sees me waiting for a hypothetical cab that might be free at 6:20pm on a weekday in midtown [hint: chances are better that you won the mega-millions lottery].  I know he sees me.  We make eye contact.

What does he do?  He walks down the block to try beat me out of the still hypothetical, available cab.  Since he is being rude with me, he goes for double and cuts another woman.  The woman then walks further down the block to cut him.  As you can probably tell, in order to get to win this way, one has to be moving further in the exact opposite direction of one’s intended destination.  We are on Sixth Avenue (or the “Avenue of the Americas” to those who arrived in the Big Apple after 1970) which goes north.  These two people are walking further south to get a cab ahead of each other.

I have my righteous indignation going.  Not at the woman; she did not see me.  The guy is the target of my wrath.

Of course, I have to walk a block out of my way (the man and woman were leap-frogging each other for the still hypothetical, available cab).

I catch up to the guy and call him out on his behavior.

He responds in a are-you-for-real look, “it’s New York” with a twang in his accent and a “f”-you shrug.

He did whaaaaaaat? He told ME, ME, a New Yorker for 46 years, what IS and IS NOT New York?  Is he kidding me?

Ok, I lose it.

I say, “Don’t you tell me about the rules of this town. I was born here. Did you ever hear of manners?”  (Actually, the “did you” came out like “didja” and the “ever” came out like “eveh”.  When I am angry, I lose “oo”s and my “r”s.)

The guy shows me the universal hand signal for displeasure.

**************************************************************************************************************

So, next I go down to the hotter-than-hell subway station, where everyone is letting loose.

And it doesn’t stop even when we are packed on the subway like sardines.

A woman with FABULOUS hair is flipping it all over everyone and my scalp immediately starts to itch from the contact.  No, no lice, but, hey, you never know.

There is a woman who looks TWELVE MONTHS pregnant standing while young people are sitting.

There is the guy who sits “wide” and takes up one and one-half seats and is also hunched forward so that he takes up the standing space in front of him.

A woman is screaming that some man is sweating in her personal space.

I turn to the incredibly pregnant woman and ask in an ordinary subway voice (i.e., yelling) if she would like me to find a seat for her.  She says she is ok in a way that suggests “I can take care of myself and who are you?” but she decides I mean well and smiles.

Someone gets up to get off at the next stop and then people insist that the pregnant woman sit down.

It was just the neighborly thing to do.

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Same Time this Year — Urban Jungle

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Dejá vu all over again, as a famous ball player (not known for his grammar) once said.

Last year (http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1085), we had a run-in with urban wildlife in our home.  Since it is happening again this year, I believe it now qualifies as an annual event.

Over the weekend, we heard what we thought was chirping and we surmised it had to be coming from our stove’s exhaust vent (it vents outside).  Maybe there was a nest there.  We did not want to disturb the nest, but we did want the birds to know that there is only room for one family in our home, so we put the vent on, which would not hurt them, but make our vent less of a sanctuary.  Maybe they would move on, we thought.  I also called the Bird Nerd, husband of SOB (sister of blogger), who did not understand the urgency of our concern that others lived among us.  You might think he would remember the hysteria of last year.  But noooooooooooooo.  I digress.

The next day, POB (partner of blogger) had a brilliant, yet frightening, realization.  There had to be family of  mice behind our washer/dryer and the babies (as in many) are making that noise.  This all sounded plausible since there is an empty space behind those appliances that our contractors ASSURED us was closed and sealed, but there I go again, digressing.  Birds, I can deal with.  My son likes birds.  SOB married a bird nerd.  A MOUSE — worse, MICE — this I could not handle.

We left for a day out of the city, with the mouse family not far from my thoughts.  We arrived home late so we had a quick dinner at a local restaurant.  I go into the kitchen later for something and there is a teeny, tiny mouse.  I scream, POB screams because I am screaming and our son asks why we are screaming.  “Nothing, sweetie.  Nothing wrong.”  Ok, our son is a smart guy.  If NOTHING were wrong, why exactly would his two moms be shrieking??

As our luck would have it, our superintendent is in Europe for another two weeks (note to self: consider a career change), and the exterminators come at the beginning of each month.  So, if you are going to have problems, have them then.  This tough love approach is designed to compel those of us who live in the urban jungle to train our varmints better so as not to upset the schedule of the exterminators or the management company.

Monday morning, the handyman lays down the sticky traps.  These are inhumane and make me sick, but this is the urban jungle and this is my home.  I am frankly terrorized by the potential painful deaths of baby mice, but I keep repeating “the strong eat the weak” as if to make me feel more callous than I am.  Also, I am comforted by the knowledge from experience that mice are too smart to fall for that old peanut butter on the glue trick.

Except later that night, two baby mice do fall for the peanut butter on the glue trick.  (Another got away.) I hear about this when I come home to a dark home and find POB and our son in his room with the door closed, the air conditioning on.

POB very calmly (and without looking up from her magazine) tells me that the two baby mice are on the Glue of Death and that she is perfectly happy never to go to that part of the house again until the handyman comes the next morning to take the “glue-kill” away.

Ok ok ok ok ok ok ok.  Worse than having live mice is having dead mice.  I go down to the doorman who cannot leave the door because there are no maintenance people on duty after 6pm.  He gives me a broom and a dust pan.  He wishes me good luck.  His expression shows he knows that I am a freaked-out pampered urbanite who never thought she would be doing this — mixture of sympathy and smugness that is sooooooo unattractive in the younger generation.

Up I go in the elevator.  I come into the house.  I walk over the radiator.  I use the brush to sliiiiiiiiide the Glue of Death over to the dustpan.  The broom bristles get stuck in the glue.  The glue is eating the broom.  The glue is getting stronger, rendering my ammunition useless.  I step on the edge to hold back the Glue of Death and retrieve the broom, but the Glue of Death has taken my sneaker hostage.  I am desperate to shake off the Glue of Death as the dead and dying mice bob up and down like pawns in a cruel game.

POB gets paper towel and tosses it on the floor.  I think, this is not a game of rock, paper, scissors.  This is a death match with mice, the Glue of Death and me.  But I use the paper towel to extricate my sneaker.

I bring the whole mess down to the doorman and, with the privileges of age, ask him to make this go away.

I come back upstairs, pronounce myself a hero to my family but a serial killer to the mouse community.  I take to my bed without food or drink until POB generously braves the particularly treacherous epicenter of our urban jungle to get fruit and chocolate for us.  She screams, but happily it was only a water bug. (Oy, we are soooooo careful and clean, why is this happening to us?)

I am ready to move to a hermetically sealed compound.

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Just because he’s crazy, does that invalidate his compliment?

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Maybe at 46 years-old, I am scraping the barrel for any compliment that comes my way.  I need my blog community to rule on whether a compliment received this morning can be counted as such. 

(I wish WordPress had those voting buttons so you can click “yes” “no” or “maybe“.)

I have a lunch meeting later with a client, so I am wearing make-up, earrings and a necklace.  No, that is not all.  I am wearing clothes.  (Nice) t-shirt under a bespoke blazer (so it really fits well) and bespoke pants (which would fit better had I not gotten the peri-menopause tummy paunch).  Shoes and bag work with the ensemble.  A true outfit. 

Many of you may be shocked; as sometimes I wear nice clothes but ruin the look with a pair of clogs.  But, I digress (comme d’habitude).

A man, who was dressed well enough not to be homeless, entered the subway car with a cart.  I know what you are thinking.  But, really, the cart had perfectly reasonable looking things in it.  Not like he was carrying his worldly possessions or anything.  Look, he didn’t SMELL.  And some homeless people are down on their luck.  Not all of them are crazy.  And we should help them off the streets because it is as good a litmus test as any for how civilized is our society really.  But, I digress (comme d’habitude).

The train clears out at the next stop.  It is an express station — not because he smelled.  I sit down in a seat next to the doors.  Then I realize I could move down and he could sit in that seat and be closer to his stuff.  So I offer to move down. 

He thanked me but declined.  Then, he said that I looked beautiful and my outfit was just right.  I thanked him.

Then he started talking to himself and doing a little tap-dance, foot shuffle, whatever.  This continued until he got off the train.

Valid compliment or no?  That is the question.

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There is a new normal for everything these days

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I was sitting on the train and I heard this annoying clicking noise.  I thought someone was cracking chewing gum.  I looked to my immediate left and saw that the woman next to me was clipping her figure nails on top of her backpack so the clippings would fall into the front pocket.  Before I could think to shut my mouth, I gasped a disbelieving “noooooooo!!!”  She looked at me, put her clipper away and took out her file, all the while making sure that everything fell into the front pocket.

So if she cleans up after herself, does it make it ok?  Is this the new normal for behavior in the subway?

Hmmmmmmmm.

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Wednesday Date Night with Friends

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I arrive early.  A possible stolen moment of mindfulness and relaxation out of a harried day.  But this is New York City, where quiet was expunged from the lexicon long ago.  And I am a consummate New Yorker so I must email something to somebody.  And so I did, to POB (partner of blogger) and FOPOBAB (friends of POB and Blogger) who were joining us for dinner.  Witness my descent into madness.

—– Original Message —–
Sent: Wed Jul 28 18:00:35 2010 [I am 14 minutes 25 seconds early, standing outside a pulsating restaurant]

A hopping place we picked. Such an active bar scene that if you were here early I wouldn’t be able to tell. I am sweltering outside listening to Dancing Queen (they pipe out the music for the pleasure of the passersby). I am trying not to sing along.  I wish there were drag queens around to dance with. My inner 20-something

Sent: Wed Jul 28 18:03:45 2010 [3 minutes and 10 seconds later]

Cabs are so plentiful I want to hail ALL of them.

Sent: Wed Jul 28 18:08:58 2010 [5 minutes 13 seconds later]

Men’s fashion is getting pushed to the limit. It is only ok if [husband of FOPOBOB, who always looks fabulous] would wear it. That is my litmus test.

Can you tell I am overwhelmed by the bar scene raging inside. Ok, a couple with a two year old are considering coming into the restaurant. Mean, evil parents. Toooo much. I am going to try to take a picture surreptitiously. [Unfortunately, I was unable to get my blackberry camera in focus quickly enough]

Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2010 7:10 PM [one minute two seconds later]

I am going inside. I am brave.

No one would seat me even though we had a reservation.  We ALL had to be there.  I had visions of being in a suburban steak house located in a mall where they say, “Ma’am, if you have a seat after your party has arrived, we will call you.”  And then you wait to hear, “Blogger, party of four!! Blogger, party of four!!”  Ok, I CAAAAN’T GO THERE.

We all arrive and sit down and everybody is chatting and happy to see each other.  I turn to the wife of FOPOBAB and ask, steeling myself for the answer, “how is your sister?”  [note: her sister had cancer].  I knew it was gutsy. 

Although time seems to evaporate when we all get together, it has been quite a few months and ANYTHING can, and does, happen.  I see the look on her face. 

Pause.  Pause.  Momentary out-of-body-experience.  Back in my body and wishing it lacked a mouth.

“She died.” 

[Why do I forget that I have a big S on my forehead for SCHMUCK?]

“We’ve seen you since then but we were with the kids, and I couldn’t go there.”

“Some hors d’oeuvres?” I say.  NO, NOT REALLY.   She tells me a hilarious story that happened as her sister literally lay dying that involved a nun.  There is humor in these moments.  I remember with my mother.  And if you been there, you can very comfortably listen and laugh along.  Because those stories help those still alive cope.

Meanwhile, POB and husband of FOPOBAB are talking about something else.  There is a break in the conversations.  I decided to catch up the others on our conversation. 

I turned to POB and said, “So, I asked about [wife of FOPOBAB]’s sister and she is dead.  But still we both have our appetites.  And, as you know, I have schmuck written on my forehead.”

Silence.

I turn to my friend and say, “in the future, just text us “worry” or “cry” and you fill us in on the details later.  Ok?”

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Rosy Big Picture; Details, Not So Much

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Police officers on horses look so majestic.  (I got this picture from the Internet.)

Also, a little tie with New York’s past.  Also, it is urban legend that being a Mountie is a reward for extraordinary valor.  So, these officers on mount deserve to stand taller than the rest of us.

Yet . . . .

As I was walking to the subway on another hot day, a Mountie passed by and his horse was pooping as they walked along.  I didn’t have time to catch a picture of the Mountie, but here is the goodies left over:

The next day the scene looked slightly better, after some time and a little traffic could run over it.

I bet you are wondering what is on the sidewalk right next to the horse manure.  You are, aren’t you?  Yes, you are.  I know it:

FOOD VENDORS.

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