Archive for December, 2008

« Older Entries

Love Reign O’er Me

Wednesday, December 31st, 2008

Last night I inadvertently watched a repeat of Keith Olbermann, or at least I think it was since it was playing in the next room as I was on Bill’s Mac. It certainly sounded like a repeat, lot’s of Saturday Night Live and David Letterman clips.

That followed into Rachel Maddow which I did sit down and watch up to a point. I remembered the Kennedy Center Honors were on and I did want to see what they were doing for the Who, who received some of the honors that were doled out.

I turned in just in time to see Joss Stone do an adequate job of My Generation, the same with Dave Grohl on Who Are You, when out walked Bettye LaVette who I had read about several times before but never went beyond that.

Well she came out and basically stole Love Reign O’er Me from Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey who just sat there gobsmacked as I was on a couch in Hoboken.

A moving enough performance that I called Rita who was a Who fan from back in the day when they were doing 7 shows a day at the Paramount with Murray the K. She too was blown away.

I also called up California to tell Annemarie to keep an eye out for it. I posted it on my Facebook page and quite a few people were turned onto it and seeing it for the first time.

After Bettye LaVette came poor old Rob Thomas who did an ok job of Baba O’Riley saved by the participation of a choir comprised of members of the NYPD and the FDNY which was oddly rousing to see these uniformed representatives shouting ‘They’re All WASTED!’

But Pete and Roger loved it and it seemed like a thank you from the New York City departments for that Concert for 9/11 all the way back in October 2001.

So here we are, at the end of a calendar, ready to start a new one within hours. I had originally planned on doing a recap of the year, as I do every year. I have been doing this since October 2005 mind you.

This and a certain other thing that I do every day are about the only constants in my life and both probably lead to blindness.

I tried going back to January of this past year but just found myself reliving the feelings (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) that I had while I was writing it plus who wants to read recaps of my sometimes maudlin writing? Not me, that’s for sure.

Tonight Bill is returning to Hoboken for the night. Ending the year and starting a new one together. It’s been a rough year for the both of us, him more so I might add. He lost his father in February so his loss is that much greater.
I lost mine already so it’s a proper win for him on the sad scale for the year. Like Oscar Wilde wrote: To lose one parent may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.

And that is the first time I have ever used a semicolon on this blog. It all stems back to what started this blog, or at least the concept of it. Bill and I attending An Evening of American Satire at the Society for Ethical Culture that October night in 2005.

It featured Art Buchwald, Barry Crimmins, Paul Krassner, Lewis Lapham (who said those magic words that motivated me to write every day) and Kurt Vonnegut who stated that semicolons should never be used under any circumstances and on that point I held up my end until tonight. Blame Oscar Wilde.

I also had the plan to go to work today, just to check in and see if there was anything I needed to put in order. But Janice Huff the weather forecaster said it should be a treacherous morning and since I didn’t really have to go in I decided not to, expecting to wake up to snow drifts and glaciers creeping down Washington Street.

It didn’t happen and whatever motivation I might have had slipped away while I slept away the morning. I did wake up and turned on the TV just so I wouldn’t drift too far away in slumber.

But I did anyway. The snow started around the time Janice Huff said it would end so I tidied up the apartment a bit and did some laundry.

Stopped by the liquor store and picked up some Guinness for Rand and Lisa’s New Years Eve get together. The Latino kid from the shoemaker was there too and I wished him a happy new year.

He remembered the last time I saw him, the day before Thanksgiving trying to pick up Bill’s shoes which weren’t ready a month after they were dropped off. He wished me a happy new year as well and mentioned that he read what I wrote online about the service that day.

And he agreed with the review, at least that’s what he told me as he walked back to the shoe makers store in a brand new Michael Vick football jersey.

So tonight, Bill and I plan to go to Arthur’s for a steak dinner, then maybe a walk around smoking cigars, coming home and then heading over to Rand and Lisa’s to ring in the New Year.

I hope you and yours have a very happy New Year and I wish you all only the very best wishes for the New Year.

Now strap yourself in, cause it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

Here is the Hoboken twilight sky on a New Years Eve.
123108-001

123108-004

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in So how's band camp? | 2 Comments »

Look Alive

Tuesday, December 30th, 2008

Just got off the phone with Bill. It’s 11:37AM. Bill’s at work, I am not. He was just going off about how lucky I am to be able to go to work when I feel like it this week. My eyes rolled as I heard him say that and I needed to tell him what was what.

Yesterday while at work I sent him an Outlook invitation that I had posted in November and as a note on the invitation I wrote, ‘SEE? I am supposed to be out until Friday’. He got the invite but didn’t read it.

So technically I am off of work this week, as planned, as approved over a month ago by the managing director, the president of the company and the chief financial officer. Those are the other three people in the company- Vivek, Greg Stevens and Tom Chin.

I also explained that yes I am off and yes I am stopping by the office to take care of whatever odds and sods there might be, and no- I don’t have to do it.

I do it because I don’t want a pile of crap to deal with on Monday January 5. Plus it looks good that I am showing up when I don’t have to. So a few hours yesterday, maybe an hour tomorrow, maybe an hour on Friday…I wouldn’t say that I have the week off, would you?

A week off would be nice, but what would be nicer is a week off with someone to spend a week off with. I don’t have that.

Sorry but I was crabby when I talked to Bill about having the day off.

I am amazed sometimes at how I can change my mind. This afternoon I was all set to head into the city, just to wander around. I was all set, had the Lennon bio in my bag, some water, my bus pass and the latest New Yorker and my camera.

As I walked up towards Washington Street I realized that there really isn’t any good reason to head into the city, especially since I’m planning on going into the office tomorrow and anything that I wanted to do today, could be done tomorrow.

So I walked down Washington Street, talked to my sister on the phone, letting her know that her brownies and cookies arrived finally.

There’s also a gingerbread man in one of the containers. The gingerbread man looks horrified, as if he knows how it will end for him. As soon as you open the container, there he is under the wax paper with a look of anguish.

I walked over to Barnes and Nobel and farted around in there, bought a new calendar and walked home listening to the Kinks.

I really hope next year will be an improvement but I also think that it’s going to be tougher than it’s been this past year. Prices gone up, products shrinking and now I have a few friends out of work.

It seems inevitable that I will join their ranks but according to Vivek that won’t be until March 2010, and that will be here before you or I know it. Anything is possible of course. Gotta save some money this year while I still can!

I think everyone should take a nap at some point in the day. We can call it, ‘Siesta!’

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in Cool Cold Reality | 2 Comments »

I’ll Be On My Way

Monday, December 29th, 2008

It’s Monday and it’s a weird Monday. Some people are back at work, some people have off from work, and then there’s me. I could have stayed home but no I went to work. At first when the alarm clock went off at 6:00 I got out of bed, made some coffee and poured some cereal then I asked myself, ‘What am I doing?’

I knew hardly anyone from my company would be in and decided to go back to bed for some more sleep. No need to deal with the rush hour rush this morning. I turned off the alarm on the cellphone as well as the alarm clock and slept another hour or two.

Felt good, like I needed to sleep more. A different world at 10:00 than at 8:00. Walked down 42nd street surrounded more by tourists than office workers.

Got to the office, saw an email from Steve who I used to work with. He got married in September and went off to the Greek isles for his honeymoon. When he came back he found out that he was unemployed.

He is still able to use the office for whatever tasks he might need for looking for a new job. His wife gave him a gift certificate for the Cigar Inn, a new cigar store with a nice plush lounge in the back.

Steve asked me if I wanted to join him and I said yes. After creating about one hundred new files for the year 2009 and doing whatever odds and sods needed to be done I walked over to 52nd Street and Second Avenue where I met Steve outside.

We chatted with the owners before walking into the humidor. Steve left everything up to me since it seems I am known for smoking cigars. I tried to keep things on the cheap end and selected two Padron cigars.

Steve brought a bottle of Glenfiddich which is allowed and we got two glasses from the proprietor and we sat on very comfortable furniture and drank and smoked and shot the shit.

He’s unemployed now and felt he could sit there all day. I still had to show my face at work after a few glasses of scotch.

Steve and I finished up after a little over an hour and made plans to do this again next week, this time I’ll get the cigars. He can still bring the scotch though.

Got back to the office, nicely buzzed. Vivek was in and looking boyish. He’s going to be a dad in nine months. He told me to keep it a secret, but Steve told me while smoking our cigars.

I was only stopping by to pick up my stuff before heading to the Path train. Vivek said if I was in the neighborhood later this week to let him know so that we too can have some cocktails.

After all that I was on the Path train heading home, reading the John Lennon biography, which is quite good so far. Low key evening on the cards for tonight.

I told Vivek that I’d probably be off for the rest of the week but I may stop by. I don’t plan to get up at 6:00 tomorrow morning, in fact I just turned off my cellphone alarm just to make sure.

Tags:, , ,
Posted in Mood Mambo | 1 Comment »

Black Superman

Sunday, December 28th, 2008

It’s a Sunday again. Back to work tomorrow, if only for a few hours. Today has been an odd day weather wise. Quite unseasonably warm. 66 degrees they said.

Last night was more low key than it’s been the past few days. Bill injured his wrist somehow and he thinks he has carpal tunnel syndrome. Or arthritis. I told him it’s probably from using his laptop and straining his wrist without any support.

I watched a very good movie today, The Visitor, directed by Tom McCarthy who also did another very good film, The Station Agent. This starred Richard Jenkins who played the late patriarch on Six Feet Under.

Tom McCarthy is an actor also, and played the reporter named Scott Templeton who was making up stories for his deadline on the last season of The Wire. Highly recommended.
And if you haven’t seen The Station Agent, you really should. That is also a very good film.

I stayed up late reading the John Lennon biography. It’s a library book and I only have 14 days to read it. It’s a fairly recent book so there will be no renewing when the due date arrives. Also have the Sarah Vowell book, The Wordy Shipmates but that’s just a slim volume.

It was around 1:45 when I went to bed. I remember staying up way later than that just a few years ago, being artificially stimulated and sleeping away much of the next day. I’m glad to say I don’t do that anymore.

I was up around 9:30 this morning and when I went out for my morning errands I was surprised at how warm it was.

Got an email from Meghan Taylor about removing the pictures I posted on Facebook. I suppose she doesn’t read the blog. I would remove the pictures if only she’d tell me what pictures to remove. Until then the pictures stay.

Got a text message from Rand. He was at the Crow’s Nest in Hasbrouck Heights. I had to laugh since I’d never been there. Drove past it eight million times, but never so much as graced the place with the sole of my shoe.

I’m sure it’s a decent place and I’m also sure that the chances of running into someone from my past would greatly increase. A few months ago I would have been interested, today- not so much.

Of course it would depend on who it would be and with my luck it would probably be someone who gave me hell for four years in high school who doesn’t live that far away from the Crow’s Nest.

I’m just taking it easy tonight, waiting for 60 Minutes to come on. The Sound of Music was just playing but Bill texted me to tell me the Jets game was ‘ova’, meaning either it’s egg-like or finished.

I changed the channel and didn’t see any big men in tight spandex running around a field and jumping on top of each other. Now why don’t I like football again?

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in the day after yesterday | 3 Comments »

Meeting Across the River

Saturday, December 27th, 2008

Saturday night. Things are getting back to what could only be described as relative normalcy. Last night was quiet. Juan was out gallivanting, Bill back in Stuyvesant Town.

I watched Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, which was actually the first Charlie Chaplin film I had seen from start to finish. Also the first Chaplin film that I had seen where he actually speaks.

I never knew that he spoke in his later films and often wondered how long he would have done silent roles. Apparently in 1940 he was speaking in films. According to Wikipedia it was Chaplin’s first talking picture.

It was a daring movie that he made, since the US was at ‘peace’ with Germany at the time and it certainly pissed Hitler off which was an added bonus. A year later we were at war with the Axis powers.

After that I basically started reading a book that I had gotten from the library, John Lennon- The Life by Philip Norman. Supposed to be the best biography of Lennon so far. It is pretty good.

Philip Norman wrote an excellent biography on the Beatles in the 1980’s called Shout! The Lennon book was written with Yoko Ono’s blessing and she asked her son Sean and Paul McCartney to cooperate with the author, which they did.

But as luck would have it, once Yoko and Paul read the galleys they both did some furious backpedaling and denounced the book.

So far the only dodgy thing was John accidentally touching his mother’s breast and wondering what else he could get away with.

That would raise some eyebrows, but Yoko did give access to Lennon’s diaries and journals and as great a songwriter and musician Lennon was, he was also a flawed individual and he would probably be the first to admit it.

It’s a weighty tome and carried some heft as I had it in my shoulder bag and wandered around Manhattan en route to the Guggenheim Museum where I was meeting Bill and Meghan Taylor Mastro with Lily and Ruby, as well as Pat Paterson and his wife, the one and only Ann Boyles Paterson.

I do prefer going to art galleries instead of museums but the Guggenheim was on the agenda so it was off to the Upper East Side. Bill got there a minute or two before me and as we were waiting for the others Juan called wondering what was going on.

It was around 3:00 and he had just woken up. Nice life, which Juan has. I would have invited him along but this was the first I had heard from him since yesterday. He was cool with it, he had to go back to Trenton anyhow.

The Glen Ridge contingent arrived and soon we were inside the Frank Lloyd Wright designed building. I’m always reminded of the roller skating joke from Hannah and Her Sisters regarding the rotunda of the Guggenheim.

After walking around being nonplussed at the exhibitions we were on the street again, $18.00 lighter in each of our wallets. We could have gone to the Bergen County History Museum and looked at the mastodon bones, that would have been cheaper.

I used to go there with Annemarie when I was growing up. It was cheap then, but could be about the same price as the Guggenheim nowadays.

We decided on a bus downtown so we would roll past the Rockefeller Christmas Tree. Unfortunately it was stop and go traffic for about 40 blocks which screwed up my spine somewhat.

Still the company made all the difference and we had shared some truffles and other chocolates and had many laughs as well as taking snapshots of each other. Bill and I got off at 14th street, the others continued onto the West Village to meet up with Jim Mastro.

After parting ways with Bill I stopped by Farfetched to try to persuade Harpy to come with me to see Ann and Meghan but he just wanted to go home after working retail in a shop that’s taken quite a beating this holiday season.

Nothing that Farfetched has done, just that no one is buying anything anywhere these days.

So now I’m home, just had a nice dinner, watched a decent documentary on Groucho Marx and here I am sitting at Bill’s Mac and writing this.

What have YOU been up to?

Bill outside the Guggenheim Museum

Bill outside the Guggenheim Museum

Me outside the Guggenheim Museum on cellphone with Juan

Me outside the Guggenheim Museum on cellphone with Juan

Ruby, Meghan and Lily outside the Guggenheim Museum

Ruby, Meghan and Lily outside the Guggenheim Museum

Pat Paterson, Ann Boyles and Meghan outside the Guggenheim Museum

Pat Paterson, Ann Boyles and Meghan outside the Guggenheim Museum

Lily

Lily

Inside the Guggenheim

Inside the Guggenheim

What happened to Pinocchio?

What happened to Pinocchio?

122708-nyc-boyles-and-co-026

Ann & Me

Ann & Me

Meghan with her camera phone

Meghan with her camera phone

some words, between children

some words, between children

Super Mastro girls outside the Guggenheim Museum

Super Mastro girls outside the Guggenheim Museum

Kisses outside the Guggenheim Museum

Kisses outside the Guggenheim Museum

Awesome foursome on the bus

Awesome foursome on the bus

Ruby's patented pose

Ruby's patented pose

Harpy outside of Farfetched

Harpy outside of Farfetched

Me and Harpy

Me and Harpy

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Wonderful World Beautiful People | 3 Comments »

Prodigal Son

Friday, December 26th, 2008

Well I just got back from an excursion to the wonderful wastelands of Secaucus. Juan drove me out to Syms where I wanted to check out their sales and man what a pitiful selection they had to offer. Definitely a better selection in midtown Manhattan.

The only things I liked were suits that I already owned and I was glad to see that they weren’t on sale. I bought a French cuff shirt instead, with a tab collar, which I could never find in NYC. Surprisingly it was made by Sean John.

P. Diddy himself. I can easily picture him drinking Cristal, puffin on a stogie and frantically sewing into the wee hours of the night. He’s that hands on. I don’t care for his music but his clothes I don’t mind.

And I don’t mean the t-shirts with his signature on them, or the jeans or the bandages. I do own two of his suits which I think are quite nice.

I almost bought a silk scarf to go with an overcoat that used to belong to my late cousin. It was specially made for him and even says so on the inside. And since we shared the same name, it’s perfect.

My brother Brian was hanging onto it for a few months since he got two other coats that fit him better than this overcoat. I can’t wait to wear it to work. I think it looks snazzy. I’ll try to post a pic of myself wearing it.

I did have a nice phone chat with my brother Frank. I mentioned that when we meet, the first five minutes are generally tense. Like a chemical reaction. When you mix baking soda with vinegar there a chemical reaction for a moment, lot’s of foaming going on and after that it generally calms down. That’s how it is with Frank and myself.

He complimented me on my guitar playing yesterday which was a first. I’ve been intimidated by him when I would play guitar in front of him. I told him that I often tried playing in front of him, maybe a Beatles song I practiced and when I payed it for him he would tell me it was wrong and nothing like the number I was trying to play. That happened a lot so I eventually stopped playing in front of him.

Now he said he enjoyed my playing and wouldn’t mind jamming sometime. Which is something I always wanted to do, but generally got shot down. But still I’m willing to give it a go.

Last night Bill was here for a few hours and Juan stopped by too. It was like old times and by old times I mean, September. That was when Bill was still staying here mostly and Juan hadn’t started school yet.

A lot of laughs, some jazz and some beers added to the festivities while we watched The Onion DVD which was a gift to Bill and myself from my niece Meghan and her husband Rob. It was a lot funnier than we expected. Many laughs out loud and a few, ‘Oh no’s!’

Bill had to go back to Stuyvesant Town so he left around midnight and he took most of the energy with him, leaving Juan and myself to watch Scrubs before Juan leaving at 12:30. After all the Guinness I had had sleeping was incredibly easy.

Bow Tie Juan at Syms

Bow Tie Juan at Syms

Woke up around 9:00 this morning, no hangover, and no sluggishness. Ran some errands, had breakfast and did laundry. Now Juan is off to the mall at Wood Bridge, Bill is in Stuyvesant Town and I’m here again.

It was great being with Bill the past couple of days. It was actually the first time in a long time that we were able to spend hours together. And now I miss him. He gave me a pair of really nice braces that weren’t easy to find and weren’t cheap either.

I gave him some cufflinks, some braces and a tie with buses on it. Those things weren’t easy to find either. He liked them. Juan may be back later.

Ann Boyles might be in Manhattan tomorrow, which would make it so much easier for Ann to meet Bill. She said she wanted to meet him and he said he wanted to meet her after hearing me talk about her. Of course it’s all up in the air, nothing really set in stone.

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in So how's band camp? | No Comments »

« Older Entries