Category Archives: Whats for lunch?

Ring Them Bells

Well it’s quite balmy out. It’s in the 70 degree range. On Washington Street hundreds of costumed children and their costumed parents are hitting up all the store owners for candy. They don’t go ringing bells in Hoboken.

In Weehawken, for the longest time (during the 11 years I lived there) the kids wouldn’t come to 127-129 Jane Street since my late landlady had a mean reputation. When she passed away that was when they finally started ringing the bell, after the crossing guard told them that it was safe to ring those bells.

It was initially startling to have the bell ringing every couple of minutes. But I indulged them with candy.

I myself haven’t gotten dressed up for Halloween for years. I think the last time was when I had a Darth Vader helmet that I bought for $40.00 in the 1980’s.

I went to the costume party at McSwells where I thought I stood out since my costume was mainly store bought, and everyone else seemed to have costumes they had made themselves.

The only costume that stands out in my memory was Steve Fallon dressed up as Mr. Peanut from Planter’s peanuts. Obviously it was a great costume if I’m remembering it 25 years later.

Last night there was a Halloween Karaoke at McSwells attended by Rand & Lisa and Lois & Fred. Roda was there too, managing the place. I didn’t go, wound up staying home. Bill came home and we had a good talk, then his phone rang and he was in the other room talking acting stuff with a playwright he is working with.

I just turned down the volume on the TV and played music until the news came on. Then I watched a documentary about the Beatles’ Love show in Las Vegas. That was actually very good and made me want to go to Vegas and see the show. That’s not going to happen at this moment in time though.

Then I watched another documentary on Joe Strummer, The Future is Unwritten. I had seen it before and it’s quite good and very sad, since Joe Strummer is no longer with us. I watched the whole thing, going to bed a little after 2:00.

As usual Bill was up before I was. He had me up for a while with his snoring. If I’m asleep first it’s no problem. But if I’m trying to sleep that’s when it gets difficult. I guess after an hour of trying to fall asleep, I feel asleep.

Bill went out and got bagels and the paper for me which was nice. I got myself out of bed and showered and tried to think of something to do.

Got a text from Rand asking how the computer was holding up and since you’re reading this you can tell that it’s holding up just fine. I asked him how McSwells was and he texted back ‘Twas OK’. I actually entertained the idea of going up to McSwells last night wearing the Mexican Mil Mascaras wrestling mask, but obviously I didn’t go.

I did go to the library this afternoon though. Picked up the Hoax, starring Richard Gere, based on from what I gather Clifford Irving and his fabricated biography of Howard Hughes. Also Rock N’ Rolla by Guy Ritchie. I figured since Snatch was an alright movie, this might be a good movie to watch tonight. Bill loved Snatch, but then again he is a sucker for a brogue.

Other than that, I’m rebuilding my music library, somewhat illicitly. I’ve always liked Who’s That Lady by the Isley Brothers of Teaneck NJ, but never got around to getting it. I remembering hearing it back in the day when FM radio wasn’t segregated.

You’d hear the Isley’s, The Who, Jimi Hendrix and lot’s of others mixed in. Nowadays I guess you don’t. I really couldn’t say since I don’t listen to the radio anymore.

I did download an excellent Kate Bush song, called Aerial. It’s really an interesting song and has birds chirping in it. I read somewhere a few months ago that when the writer would play the song, birds would flock to his window.

Now it’s getting too dark out, but I would like to see it happen sometime, just to see if it’s true. If it doesn’t happen I’ll still have a good song in my library thanks to Kate Bush.

Sing Sing Sing

Wow. Just had an almost 3 hour nap. The thing is I did not sleep well at all last night and was dragging my ass most of the morning. So I closed my eyes for what I thought would be an hour, tops.

What I usually do when I nap is have the TV on in another room. In my mind it acts as a boat tethered to a dock. Well I am the boat and the TV is the dock. And the sound of the TV keeps me from drifting away.

But since there was no TV on, and no dock to speak of, I drifted far away from the shore. It felt good but still there was no need.

It used to be that at least once a year I would come home from work, and maybe go to sleep for 12 hours. I would have done that today but that meant I would be waking up at 3:00AM. Didn’t dream of anything in particular, not that I could remember anyway.

I had lunch with Rand at the Malibu diner. They sat us in the big back room, which neither Rand nor I liked very much. He had a veggie burger with very mediocre onion rings. I had a BLT with fries.

Where I used to removed the tomatoes from the sandwich today I ate the whole thing. I should have had it on toasted whole wheat bread but I didn’t which caused the sandwich to fall apart. Still I ate it all.

Lately I eat just about everything put in front of me. Not such a finicky eater like I used to be. Still, I’m not running out to buy turnips.

I am happy to be able to drop off my computer at Rand’s apartment tomorrow, so perhaps there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Then we will go for drinks at McSwells. I was supposed to see the Bongos with the funniest girl alive, Meghan Taylor, but she seems to have the flu.

At least that’s what she posted yesterday on Facebook and today she is incommunicado. She certainly seemed her usual self on Saturday when I walked around Hoboken with her and here freshly shorn daughter Ruby.

I guess even if I don’t see the Bongos, I will have a pint with Rand in the front room. The whole thing about seeing the Bongos revolved around being Meghan’s guest, her plus one on the guest list. And of course I do wish her well.

Last night I watched the latest installment of the Monty Python documentary. It was mainly about Graham Chapman. He was funny and also a pain in the ass to deal with, mainly because of his alcoholism.

It was interesting, that when Graham came out of the closet, John Cleese was surprised since he thought he knew Graham so well. That’s the thing about the closet.

No one knows of the double life that is being led out of fear or self-loathing.

When I was outed at HBJ, a good friend of mine from High School (Kevin Wagner) that I worked with was greatly disappointed that I never told him. Not so much that I was gay, but because of the secret.

Cleese likened it to Michael Palin saying that he was Chinese. It was just a surprising fact about Chapman that Cleese didn’t know.

Still groggy from the nappage so that’s it for today.