the day after yesterday | johnozed

Another weird weather day. Up earlier than usual and out later than that, I was intending to do some busking. It was quite cool out and there were plenty of dark clouds threatening rain. I ran some errands including a stop at Solid Threads, a T-Shirt shop in Hoboken. Rand and Lisa got me a Jersey Fresh T-Shirt for my birthday and it seemed to be a size too small. I had a gift receipt which allowed for a hassle free transaction. There were other shirts I could have chosen from but I stuck with the original Jersey fresh plan.

From there I walked up First Street and walked over to the river. No buskers around, all quiet on the waterfront. I sat and read the Village Voice since I had nothing else to read. There was an interesting article about Fracking and how big business is doing whatever it wants, including fucking up the environment with polluted water and land. And then there is the nasty problem of natural gas being released through water lines, so if you turn on your faucet and no water comes out but gas does a simple spark can blow your house as well as your neighborhood to bits.

Why they don’t research solar power or wind power is beyond me. An inexhaustible supply is there ready to be used. It’s clean and would provide a lot of jobs, but instead we just concentrate on getting more oil from the ground and polluting the air with emissions. This is where a mash up of The Road Warrior and Koyaanisqatsi would make a lot of sense. Living on the top floor of a five story building I can tell you, there is a lot of wind out there. And some of you reading this can probably say there is a lot of wind here.

Back indoors I was surprised to see a friend from Murdoch daze on Facebook. Ulysses Sankitts, my old friend who saved my ass a few times has made it online. I will never forget the first time I met Ulysses, I started working for Murdoch Magazines a day before him. A friend from Maxwells was getting married that weekend and I was asked to DJ. Alas I had no equipment and the wedding day was just a few days away. I didn’t know what to do but I did know Ulysses and his brother Tony were also DJ’s.

So I asked this relative stranger if I could borrow his equipment, I would even give him my fee in exchange for the use of his turntables and PA. To my delight (and surprise) he said yes. That Sunday Ulysses and Tony arrived and delivered their gear and even set it up since I didn’t not know how to do that. It must have been 1987 since I remember playing Prince’s ‘It’ a few times at the reception. Twenty five years ago and here we are friends again thanks to Facebook.

We always were friends though, it’s not like I never saw him again. We became good friends, I crashed at his house out in Queens, partied with him at several clubs and he made a few appearances at parties that I had thrown, including the infamous basement party that must have had fifty people there, with party crashers. He seemed to get a kick out of my friends as did his brother Tony. Anyway he seemed just as happy to find me on Facebook as I was to find him. That Queens posse of Excer, Ray, Pedro and Ulysses is still around. Tony unfortunately passed away early in the century.

It wasn’t all grey…

Runaway Boys

Well timing is everything and time is relative. I was just sitting by the river, reading a book and enjoying a cigar. The weather was pleasant after a few hours of dark clouds and rain. Bill was supposed to sing at Randall’s Island for an event this morning but it was cancelled on account of rain. The rest of my reading a book and sitting by the river enjoying a cigar was also cancelled by the rain. I sat there and the wind started and I turned around to look westward. There it was- a major storm approaching my way.

I packed up my things and headed home. Lots of people had the same idea, though they were running. I just walked fast and plotted my course with the least amount of trees on the path I was taking. It was getting windy and the trees were swaying. There were some buskers (Pat and Benny) who were probably cocktailing and oblivious to the oncoming storm. I told them about it and they turned around and started packing up their gear. The storm mainly passed, only some rain nothing torrential coming down. But it certainly looked quite ominous, enough to hurry home.

It was certainly bad out by Breezy Point in Queens where a tornado touched down. There is video out there on the interwebs should you care to look for it. I don’t think anyone was hurt which is good. Last night Bill and I watched the news where it was reported that a grandfather was watching his grandson practice football and was struck by lightning out of a clear blue sky. I guess that you never can tell, blue skies, cloudy skies- when you’re number is up, that’s it-time to go. A bunch of kids saw the old man get zapped.

Bill came home a bit damp on the clothes and more damp in the spirit. He was in no mood for anything and went back to bed. After that I headed out to read by the river. Which was the beginning of this here blog entry. I meant to post the other day that Bill and I watched the Black Swan last weekend. It was quite good and very intense. We were both impressed with the whole thing. I myself re-watched the last episodes of True Blood which ended the season last Sunday. The last two episodes of the season were the best of the season.

Now Bill and I are watching The Apartment which Bill had never seen before. Jack Lemmon’s character CC Baxter lives on west 67th Street off the park his rent was $85.00 a month. He was making $95.00 a week which was quite a princely sum back then. Bill is amazed at the pacing and plotting of the movie. It really is a great movie, one of Billy Wilder’s best. Bill is totally engrossed in the movie and I am enjoying watching Bill see it for the first time. It’s like a window into the past watching The Apartment.

13 Dirty Water