Posts Tagged ‘Julio + Stine = Alexander’

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I Haven’t Time to Be a Millionaire

Monday, January 17th, 2011

A day off which happened to coincide with many others (but not all) having off for Martin Luther King’s birthday, or the recognition of it as a Federal holiday. And it was a good day. I went to bed earlier than usual last night after watching the Golden Globes with Bill on TV.

We both enjoyed the telecast, thought Ricky Gervais was pretty funny with his accurate putdowns on Hollywood and the star system. I watched the second episode of Shameless last night after Bill had gone to bed. But there was so much going on in the episode I couldn’t keep up and went to bed halfway through, around 12:30.

I slept fairly well, Bill get up this morning around 5:00. He was off to Philadelphia on his day off to meet some people in a casting agency and was on a Greyhound bus around 6:30. I was up and about at my usual time, 8-ish and set about starting my day. Shower, coffee before heading out to the grocery store.

I walked by Mr. L’s barber shop on my way to the supermarket. Tony my barber was cutting someone’s hair so I would have to wait until later to get my hair cut. Came home and had a nice breakfast and started my laundry.

Plenty of clothes to wash so I was busy. After the washing was done I headed out once again and walked to the barber shop where Tony was available. He was sitting watching an old movie on Turner Classic Movies with another bloke who turned out to be Joe Pantoliano.

I didn’t let on that I knew who he was and let him watch the movie undisturbed while Tony set about cutting my hair. Soon other customers came in and Joe Pantoliano made his way out without anyone paying him much notice. He was bundled up somewhat and also wearing sunglasses.

Another customer and I started talking about the current situation. He used to work at JP Morgan Chase and now he’s an engineer for the MTA. I explained that I was an office manager for an investment bank which went belly up and now I sell cigars and expensive pens.

I think he was looking for sympathy to which I replied that he was making more money than I am, mentioning that I took a 20 thousand dollar pay cut where he is still making a lot more money than I am. He does have a Master’s degree which he pointed out. He was trying to blame the economic climate on government being out of control, and I agreed that it was out of control and has been for the past 10 years.

He wasn’t expecting to hear that, nor was my mentioning that invading Iraq which cost billions of dollars helped put us where we are now. And also the deregulation of the banks which the right wing (who I did not mention by name) had been working on since the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. I ended it with that and came home looking rather snappy with my hair nicely trimmed.

Hadn’t gotten a haircut since November I think and it was getting to be unmanageable. Came home and ran into Stine who told me she was making her excellent meat sauce and would make me a package when she was done.

When she was done and Julio came home, she invited me to have dinner with them. Alexander was wonderful as usual, sometimes putting on a show for me, fake laughter and all that. He does love being the center of attention and does not hesitate to scream my name to get my attention.

A wonderful spaghetti dinner with Stine, Julio and Alexander, some wine and some grapes for dessert. Alexander was getting sleepy when I made my way back upstairs, soon after Bill had come home. Now it’s now and here I am, a container of meat sauce in the fridge and me trying not to think about going to work tomorrow.

Bill and I are watching Shameless and William H Macy reminds me of someone.



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I Can’t Stop Loving You

Saturday, December 11th, 2010

Wow, it’s been a long day. I am just so tired, wasn’t even sure if I should or could write and right now I am still not sure. Started out alright enough, I was able to see Alexander and Stine before they flew ff to Denmark.

Alexander doesn’t see me that often these days and it took a while for him to warm up to me. He was playing shy, hiding under the table. Sure enough though, he warmed up and ran around the apartment showing me his latest artworks and toys much to the dismay of Julio and Stine.

Julio is flying to Denmark on the 23rd. Alexander was more interested in making scratching sounds on the 3D poster of the Beatles in Yellow Submarine than the actual poster itself. Ah to be 2 and a half years old and easily amazed.

I was downstairs for about a half hour before I headed back upstairs to gather my things so I could head off to work my 10 hour shift. An easy ride into the city, caught the 11:15 bus since the 11:30 bus has been so unreliable lately.

I was in early enough, strolled up the avenue, buying organic chocolate chip cookies at the Farmer’s Market. I noticed that my pants were feeling a bit larger than usual, or rather the belt I was wearing did not fit right. I had enough time so I went to Daffy’s and bought a 38 inch belt. I put it on when I got to the store it felt just right.

Apparently, I’ve taken 2 inches off my waist, which I suppose is a good thing. Imagine if I applied myself!

It was the Bradley and myself for most of the day. For some odd reason Calvin scheduled Sean to come in at 4. It’s only the holiday season, and it’s been getting quite busy, so why have an extra body working? Jeezy Creezy, Calvin can be quite stupid sometimes. Sobriety should be a prerequisite when doing the work schedule.

It was a relief when Sean came in though and I was able to have something resembling a break. The backroom was filled with cigar smokers, not leaving me much of a chance to sit down and enjoy a cigar myself.

We closed the backroom at around 7:00 as scheduled and finally I was able to sit, if only for a few minutes and have a couple of puffs on a choice cigar. The Bradley was quite agreeable to work with so that was nice.

He left after 8:00 since he opened the store, leaving Sean and myself to watch a handful of people come in over the course of 90 minutes. Some good people and a pain in the ass who was upset that his credit card wasn’t being approved fast enough.

An entire 40 seconds had passed before his approval came through. It wasn’t anyone in particular’s fault, the credit card networks were more than likely overloaded.

With Sean’s help I did almost $4,000 earning a nice piece of that 1/3 of 1% commission. I usually buy Sean a hamburger as a way of saying thanks for his help. No one else does anything like that, which is why Sean will ring things up on my register.

The store closed, Sean and I leaving at the same time, he headed to the subway and I headed down the avenue to the bus terminal. After wresting with the wires on my earphones I plugged in and listened to Cosmic Thing and Dry County by the B-52′s. Midway through Deadbeat Club I was in the bus terminal headed to gate 323.

There were several long lines and I asked the people at the end of one line if they were waiting for the Hoboken bus and they said they were so I dutifully stood behind them. The bus arrived and the line crawled. I was within a foot from the door when the bus pulled out, filled to capacity.

There was a woman walking parallel to me and I knew she was trying to cut in front of me. We found ourselves staring right at each others faces. Neither one of us was willing to look away when she asked how I was doing. I said I was OK, that I was hoping to get on the bus after working a 10 hour shift on my feet.

She said I was lucky to have feet and I agreed with her, saying yes that it would be worse if I had tentacles. She tried the old, ‘other people have it worse than me’ routine, a routine I am quite familiar with and often perform it for other people.

She starts saying that when she was hurt (?) she realized that somethings that we get annoyed with are really nothing to worry about, that other people don’t have these things, also saying ‘you have food at your house, don’t you?’

I hope she wasn’t trying to invite herself over.

Not posting tomorrow unless something happens. And hopefully it won’t.

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For Today I Am A Boy

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010

So tired. I’m pretty sure I am more tired today than I was after bicycling yesterday. Today’s fatigue is mainly from chasing Alexander around. Yes, he’s now in his 2′s. Stine once again planned an excellent party at Van Saun Park in Paramus NJ.

She had a party there last year and today was even better. Lots of food was prepared. All of it good. Stine is an excellent cook. The day started early, Julio and I with Alexander riding up to Van Saun Park to set up everything, move picnic tables and unpack various coolers.

I volunteered to help since I knew Julio would need my help and any opportunity to spend time with Alexander is always a good thing. After we unpacked everything Alexander took off to a play area, designed for 4 to 6 years, but Alexander doesn’t like to play in areas designed for his age group.

That left me chasing after him to the best of my ability. It was like that most of the day. Julio was busy grilling, Stine busy setting up the tables and making sure everyone had food to eat and beverages to drink.

It was up to me to play my part as the ‘manny’. And it was mostly a pleasurable experience. He held my hand when needed, and paid attention to me when he had to. The weather report mentioned scattered showers so I wore jeans and work boots since in case it rained, I wouldn’t want to get too muddy.

No one likes a muddy manny.

But despite the gray storm clouds in the distance it didn’t rain. It was quite muggy though. The food was excellent, the standard picnic fare, hot dogs, hamburgers, cole slaw, potato salad, salad salad. And a few birthday cakes which were quite good.

Stine definitely made a lot of food and of course I stood to benefit from the overabundance, which I did since my refrigerator now has a lot of food in it. I ate a lot today so I’m not hungry now, but it certainly won’t last past tomorrow. I’m looking at breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I will be sated.

I helped them lug all the food and presents upstairs. Though the day was pleasant enough, I did find Alexander filling the role of the terrible 2′s. At one point he had one of his cousins toys, some cart that gets pushed around and Alexander pushed it around and around.

I didn’t want to stray too far from the group so I tried to get Alexander to circle back but he was most resistant to the idea, enough so that he was screaming ‘Ni ni ni’ pronounced ‘nigh’ it’s Danish for ‘No’. I did get my way and we headed back and I situated him amongst his family.

About 5 minutes later I was looking around and noticed Alexander missing. I mentioned to Stine, ‘where’s the baby?’ and she looked around frantically as did I. We spotted him about 50 feet away pushing that cart and headed to a play area on his own.

I ran over there and got him, gathered him up under one arm and carrying the cart in the other. He was screaming ‘Ni Ni Ni’ and wheat I believe was ‘Let Me Go!’ really putting up a fight. He looked at me as if I betrayed him badly.

Basically he was overtired, over stimulated and still trying to figure out his boundaries. I felt bad but as I had hoped, he forgot all about it 20 minutes later.

That’s it for me, I wanted to write before Lost comes on tonight and I do not expect to answer the phone or do much else but watch the show for the next 3.5 hours. Under the Wire.
5.23.10 Alexander Van Saun Park 003
5.23.10 Alexander Van Saun Park 016

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For the Turnstiles

Saturday, May 22nd, 2010

Well Bill just came home. I’ve been home for a while. Went bicycling this afternoon. First time in a few weeks. Rode up to North Bergen, a little north of the Galaxy apartment complex.

I rode along the Hudson Waterway. The neglected side, the New Jersey side, not the Manhattan side. It’s changed since last summer when I last rode up there.

Buildings sprouted up, fences erected. Still could use a lot of work. It’s not a continuous walkway. There are parts where you have to ride on a sidewalk next to River Road. The cars go very fast on River Road, almost but not quite highway speeds.

I believe the law states that the people should have access to the river. The developers and I suppose the residents of these new buildings would rather the people did not have access to the river, so parts of the walkway are incomplete. Suddenly ending.

No signs saying the walkway is ending. It just goes from pavement to rocks. That’s fine if you have a mountain bike, it’s fine if you have a hybrid, but I have a street bike with thin tires so it doesn’t make for an easy ride.

I made the most of it of course, carrying my bike on my shoulder when needed. I went as far as I thought I could without having to deal with cars zooming past and then turned around and headed back south.

On a break I sat on a bench and looked at the river. Another cyclist clad in a Campbells Soup cycling attire stopped by and was taking pictures of Manhattan. I saw he was trying to take a photo of himself with the city in the background, so I asked him if he would like me to take his picture.

He was grateful and I took his picture. We chatted, his name was Chris and he was from Belgium. He was staying at a hotel in Jersey City and I remarked I was on my way to Exchange Place. He didn’t know about the waterfront walkway and had ridden up through the streets.

Luckily Weehawken and Hoboken was better suited for bicycles and I showed him the way back, past where I am usually strumming my guitar by Pier A. There was some event going on Pier A and it was crazy crowded. I was glad I wasn’t there.

We walked our bikes through the train station and I got Chris headed in the direction of his hotel. He went his way, I went mine and sat for a little while in the Exchange Place area just chilling and watching the river flow.

After a little while of that and talking with my sister on the phone I headed back up towards Hoboken. While riding through Newport I passed Juan Melli who I know through Facebook and we chatted for a little while.

I congratulated him on his new job in Hoboken City Hall, telling him that I too have a job, being the director of a new Manhattan Project, being a nuclear physicist and all that entails. Juan was headed to Liberty State Park and headed off in that direction and I headed north to Hoboken.

Pier A was still hopping as I sat an a bench nearby. Some guy asked if he could take my photo with a professional camera and I said sure. I asked him what it was for and he said it was for his own use so I guess I might be a pinup in Nuclear Physicist Fancy one of these months.

Came home, helped Julio bring in some stuff for Alexander’s birthday party tomorrow in Van Saun Park. I also saw my friend Lois. We had a much needed talk and things were ironed out quite nicely.

That’s about it. Right now watching a recap episode of Lost before the big 3.5 hour finale tomorrow night.

I will start work in one of these buildings on June 1

I will start work in one of these buildings on June 1


Or maybe one of these buildings

Or maybe one of these buildings


5.21.10 Chelsea Galleries 003
5.21.10 Chelsea Galleries 004
5.21.10 Chelsea Galleries 005
Self portrait

Self portrait


Clarice Starling

Clarice Starling


Hoboken from Jersey City

Hoboken from Jersey City

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Your Blue Room

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Well here we are again. May 12. Not my favorite day. A gloomy day and the battleship gray sky adds to it. I’m in a better mood than I was yesterday though. No hangover you see.

Also just saw Julio, Stine & Alexander for a few minutes. Stine texted me about some meatballs she just made and I stopped by to get them. Alexander is definitely going for the laughs, imitating his father’s eye movements.

He noticed my laughing a few weeks ago and knows he’ll get me laughing again. And he did. He also calls my name to get my attention. And he did.

He got a toddler scooter for his birthday and was showing me how he skates on it. He also got a tricycle which was out in the hallway. Both were presents from his grandparents. I came upstairs and ate everything.

Been quite cool lately, I think the highest the temperature has been for the past few days is 50 degrees. I did take the guitar out yesterday and played by the river for about an hour but that didn’t last long. Too cold and damp.

Today I mainly stayed inside and did laundry. I also watched Where The Wild Things are which left me merely whelmed. I mean, the puppets or rather muppets were good, but they probably should have gone with the voices of unknown actors.

Hearing James Gandolfini, Catherine O’Hara and Lauren Ambrose et al made me think of Gandolfini, O’Hara and Ambrose et al.

I returned it to the bibliothèque and got in return, Gomorrah, the Italian film about the mob. It’s supposed to be very good and I am happy to disprove the fact that Americans are watching less and less foreign films these days.

I’m not going to watch it tonight though. Wednesday nights, I’ve been watching Modern Family and Cougartown. Last night I watched Lost which was good. The story of Jacob and his twin brother, who’s name we were never told.

Allison Janey played their mother, or rather the woman who raised them. It was a fast hour which left some questions. Only two episodes left, next Tuesday and then the three and a half hour finale on May 23rd. I was invited to Rand and Lisa’s to watch the finale which I may do.

Tomorrow I am going to the Barclay Rex store in the midtown Manhattan. Barclay Rex is a high end cigar store and I used to go there when I was working for Wanker Banker. Nice place to get away from the inhuman cauldron sisters, Maggie Angelakos and Helen Alexandre.

I was there around the holidays and inquired about employment. One of the sales people suggested I send my resume to the manager Megan, so I did. The manager got in touch with me via email, saying that she was busy but will get back to me soon enough.

Last week, her assistant Clara sent me an email, wanting to meet with me but making sure that I knew that it wasn’t an interview. So tomorrow I’m meeting Clara to discuss why I would want to work in a high end cigar shop. I have a few ideas on what to tell her, being fairly knowledgeable about cigars and whatnot.

So that’s what’s happening tomorrow. It’s a lead and the first thing I’ve had since that other interview a few weeks ago. I thought that went well but haven’t heard from them since so I guess that’s not happening.

Working in a cigar shop sounds good to me though. I am sure I will tell you all about it tomorrow, after it happens. There’s always the Susquehanna Investment Group I suppose.


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Battleship Gray Skies

Battleship Gray Skies

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Rip It Up

Saturday, April 24th, 2010

Yet another day where I find myself not wanting to write, but compelled to do so. I have a few threads that I could possibly make something out of. It could be a stretch, it could be patchwork. It could be a rhyme and it could be without reason.

Last night had dinner with Julio & Stine for Alexander’s birthday. Some kind of bratwurst, potatoes salad, chicken salad, homemade rye bread and salad with some wine and home made birthday cake.

We sang Happy Birthday to Alexander who shouted ‘No! No!’ throughout. I brought my guitar and strummed a bit, but Alexander didn’t care, not when there were crayons and Thomas the Tank Engine and friends to draw all of his attention. Julio and Stine appreciated it though.

I thought the wine buzz would be enough to make for a restful sleep but that was not to be. I didn’t take a melatonin before sleep and therefore didn’t sleep all that well.

For some reason I decided not to go into the kitchen and take one, so stubborn I was with myself. Lot’s of tossing and turning and in the midst of that I jacked up my knee a bit. Just made for some difficulty when I walked.

The whole ‘something’s not right with that knee’ feeling.

I did go out and play guitar today, played some Specials songs, naturally. Do Nothing and Gangsters. As expected no one paid much attention, but some drunkards settled in at the next bench. They really enjoyed my playing and would applaud after each song.

Then they would bicker and one would walk away. Then he would come back and sit. Eventually the two of them walked away for a while then came back and sat further away. When I was done playing I walked past them and they both commented that I was a good guitar player.

Then they bickered again.

I went to the supermarket, I was out of Stevia which I got as well as some Ramen noodles for the homeless shelter that was doing a collection outside the supermarket. Bought them some lentils too.

Came home to wake Bill up so he could get ready to drive down to Atlantic City again and found him awake and getting his act together.

Played some more guitar and watched Bewitched which is really a terrible show, or rather was a terrible show. Canned laughter! I’ll have a double, better make that a triple! Haw haw! Everybody drink and drive!

I couldn’t help but remember something from National Lampoon, a comic where Samantha and her mother are having sex with demons. Edna Kravitz, the nosy neighbor has her eyes burned out while spying on Samantha and her coven.

The comic ended with Samantha and Endora being burned at the stake, Endora spewing forth profanity at everyone involved.

Now that was funny.

No plans to do anything tonight. I did think about seeing A Hard Day’s Night at the Loews in Journal Square with Chaz and Andy but opting to stay home once again. Perhaps a walk later on.

Anything but writing.
Please.

one half of my audience

one half of my audience


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