Let's say you're interested in movies and New York City. Then you could do worse than check out the Celluloid Skyline exhibit being displayed in Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central from May 25 through June 22. The exhibit is based on the book of the same name by James Sanders, an exploration of how New York is portrayed in film. The exhibit includes "scenic backing" paintings made for movie sets in the 40s & 50s, film footage of films set in NYC, production stills and location shots, and other artifacts of NYC's intersection with film. Sanders was kind enough to send me a photo of one of the scenic backing paintings:
I left the tool chest in the foreground for scale...the paintings are three stories tall! I'm always down for a trip up to Grand Central so I'll definitely be checking this out.
In 1967, psychologist Stanley Milgram began a series of investigations about the small world phenomenon. Milgram and his collaborators had people attempt to get a letter to a final recipient by sending it to a friend who was, in turn, likely to be friends with the final recipent. Each person in the chain proceeded likewise until the letter was delivered to the final recipient. Milgram found that the separation between two randomly selected Americans in this way is about 6 "hops". His experiment recently got me thinking of a related question:
Pick a group of people who live in NYC whose members collectively know everyone else who lives in NYC. What's the smallest number of people you'd need for that group?
For the purposes of answering the question without resorting to loopholes, let's assume that brand new arrivals (in town less than 3 months) don't count and that "know" means that each person considers the other an acquaintance...that is, something more than just someone they recognize or see daily. Any guesses as to the smallest group size? Better yet, is there any research out there that specifically addresses this question? Or is it impossible...are there people living in the city (shut-ins, hermits) who don't know anyone else? I'll share my best guess in the comments.
Right now, "Unknown Precipitation" is falling from the sky in NYC:
They must have some idea what this stuff is. Maple syrup? Soylent green? Pepsi Cola?
Update: Alright, this calls for some intrepid investigative reporting. I just stuck my hand out the window of my apartment and can tell you that the mystery liquid is not hydrochloric acid. I repeat, not hydrochloric acid...I still have the full use of my hand.
Update: Feeling emboldened that my hand didn't melt off, I stuck it out the window again and let some of this unknown liquid pool in my palm. The liquid is clear and flavorless, which rules out whiskey, transmission fluid, honey, and pig's blood. It's too soon to tell for sure, but I'm guessing the precipitation is some form of water.
Please consider this letter notice of your termination, effective immediately. Despite clear expectations and requirements -- January temperatures not to exceed 40° F, consistent snow and blustery conditions, minimum of one blizzard with white-out per annum, &c. &c. -- you have failed to date to meet expectations and deliver even rudimentary winter weather. A forecast high of 72° today in New York City is clear proof of your failure to do your job.
A replacement will be appointed immediately. Perhaps we will try a young go-getter for this role, someone who is willing to take on the many weather challenges of this magnificent season rather than rest on his "Great Winter of '02-'03" laurels.
Yours truly,
Mother Nature
[Guest post by Meg Hourihan.]
At one of the few chain restaurants in Chinatown today, I witnessed a Spanish-speaking cashier taking an order from a Cantonese-speaking customer off of an English-only menu. It took awhile, but the woman seemed satisfied as she left with her food.
From the perspective of the outside observer, New York's Little Italy seems like little more than a chunk of Disney World plopped down in the midst of lower Manhattan. On the ground, the reality is not much better, particularly if you're out to find a good meal. Unlike neighboring Chinatown, Little Italy's food reputation is not the best. Since we started working in our new office in Chinatown, a number of forays have been made into Little Italy in order to procure take-out to bring back to the office, particularly pizza-by-the-slice. The results have been disappointing; several slices of blah pizza and a deep-fried risotto ball with prosciutto, mozzarella, and peas (sounds fantastic, right?) that was way not fantastic.
Is there anywhere in this whole small country we can get good Italian food to go or pizza-by-the-slice? As it is, Little Italy is reflecting poorly on the mother country and its excellent cuisine, and it would be nice, if possible, to salvage some of that reputation.
You know that "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" song? They should add another verse, something like:
Take your glove to the ballgame
and if you don't, you're an idiot
We went to the Yankees/Red Sox game at Yankee Stadium with David and Adriana last night and in the bottom of the third inning, Yankees second baseman Miguel Cairo hit a line drive just wide of the foul pole in left field. As I watched the ball coming towards us, I thought a million things -- it's foul, it's gonna drop into the seats way in front of us, never gonna get here, what's the count now, is it time for cheese fries yet...almost everything except for "holy shit, it's coming right at me" -- and then stuck my bare hand straight up in the air, leaned slightly to my left, and dropped the ball.
Dropped isn't the right word, really. Deflected the ball off my bare hand is more accurate. It bounced into the seats behind me and then rolled down under Adriana's seat. After a brief scramble, some meatheads who were ambling by on their way to beer, pretzels, or the can stuck their paws in and made off with the ball. A Yankees fan who observed the whole thing got up in Meg's face, framed by her faded Red Sox hat, and yelled, "ha ha, Boston fans can't catch!" His truth stung almost as much as my rapidly swelling hand. David scored the play as an error, Box 324, Seat 3.
But the most entertaining play of the night by a fan who was not me award goes to the fellow in the yellow shirt who, emboldened by too much Miller Lite, dashed out onto the field, arms raised triumphantly, soaking in the cheers of the adoring crowd. Out came security from all corners of the field and the crowd redirected its enthusiasm from the hunted to the hunters, cheering for blood. "Hit em!" the guy behind me was screaming, "HIT EM!!"
Security eventually converged on the would-be outfielder and he adopted the surrendering posture of a man who knows he's had his fun, palms in the air, head down, not running anymore, almost sinking to his knees. And -- BAMMM! -- this security guard, a former linebacker by the looks of him, comes flying in from the blind side and wallops the guy, knocking him to the ground in a full-on lay-out tackle. The crowd roared at the guard's tackle and cheered lustily as the gladiator was removed from the coliseum.
Apple opened a new retail store last night on 5th Avenue here in New York City. Since 5pm yesterday evening, they've had a camera trained on the store to capture the first 24 hours of the festivities and are displaying the results in a time-lapse movie on the store's site. During the 5am segment of the movie, an enterprising Apple acolyte showed up and proposed to his girlfriend by holding up signs in front of the camera:
Does anyone know who this person is? Please email me if you do...I want to know how this turned out!
As it happens, this was the second marriage proposal at the opening...the eighth person in line proposed to his girlfriend right before the store opened and she said yes. Geek love!
Update: Uschi apparently said yes! (I say apparently because this blogspot site has the story and I'm assuming it was copied without attribution from a news site or newspaper but I can't find the actual source.) (thx, robert)
Update: My pal David thinks the acceptance is a hoax...that blogspot site is filled with other fake news stories. I was fished in!!
Spotted this on my walk to the office this morning:
If you can't tell, it's a bus covered with laundry. This had to be an advertisement for something (MTA employees aren't that eccentric) and after a little poking around online, I found out it's part of All's "Spot the Bus" sweepstakes:
From May 15th to 26th, two all small & mighty buses covered in clothes will cruise the streets of New York City. When you see one, send a text message of the time and location to 96787. You'll be entered in the Spot the Bus Sweepstakes.
If you'd like to take part without actually spotting the bus or even living in NYC (and have a chance at winning $5000), I took the above photo at 10:41am near 14th Street and 10th Ave in Manhattan. Good luck!
Among the many things New York is famous for is the tiny apartments of its inhabitants. Our first apartment here was about 400 square feet and somehow the people who lived downstairs from us in an apartment with the same footprint fit two people and two pitbull-type dogs into that space. In a recently released book, Apartment Therapy's Maxwell Gillingham-Ryan reveals that he and his wife live in a 250 square foot apartment in the West Village.
Having such small apartments, city residents want to make the most of the space that they have. In designing a loft apartment for his son, architect Kyu Sung Woo came up with an interesting solution to the space problem...he fit two stories into a one-story apartment. The result is The Interlocking Puzzle Loft, a surprisingly spacious two-bedroom palace crammed into 700 square feet.
As shown and described in this article from Dwell, the key element in the loft is the half-height bedroom above the kitchen and the bedroom's walkway positioned above the short downstairs hall closet and back kitchen counter, which allows the apartment's inhabitants to stand up in the bedroom. Pretty genius idea.
A quick note about the Van Gogh show at the Met that's closing at the end of the month: if you're in NYC, go see it. Admittedly, I'm a fan of Van Gogh, but I thought this was one of the best museum exhibitions I've ever seen. The exhibition features drawings (as well as a few paintings) from his short 10-year career as an artist, and you can really see how much he progressed during that time and how much his drawings and paintings were related. I can't wait to go back over to the MoMA and look at Starry Night and The Postman and view them not as paintings, but more as drawings done with paint.
One of my favorite things to do in new cities is to observe how the traffic works. Traffic in each place has a different feel to it that depends on the culture, physical space, population density, legal situation, and modes of transportation available (and unavailable).
Everyone drives in LA and Minneapolis, even if you're only going a few blocks. In San francisco, pedestrians rule the streets...if a pedestrian steps out into the crosswalk, traffic immediately stops and will stay stopped as long as people are crossing, even if that means the cars are going nowhere, which is great if you're walking and maddening if you're driving. In many cities, both in the US and Europe, people will not cross in a crosswalk against the light and will never jaywalk. In many European cities, city streets are narrow and filled with pedestrians, slowing car traffic[1]. US cities are starting to build bike lanes on their streets, following the example of some European cities.
In NYC, cars and pedestrians take turns, depending on who has the right-of-way and the opportunity, with the latter often trumping the former. Cabs comprise much of the traffic and lanes are often a suggestion rather than a rule, more than in other US cities. With few designated bike lanes, cycling can be dangerous in the fast, heavy traffic of Manhattan. So too can cyclers be dangerous; bike messengers will speed right through busy crosswalks with nothing but a whistle to warn you.
In Bangkok, traffic is aggressive, hostile even. If a driver needs a space, he just moves over, no matter if another car is there or not. Being a pedestrian is a dangerous proposition here; traffic will often not stop if you step out into a crosswalk and it's impossible to cross in some places without the aid of a stoplight or overpass (both of which are rare). More than any other place I've been, I didn't like how the traffic worked in Bangkok, either on foot or in a car.
Traffic in Saigon reminds me a bit of that in Beijing when I visited there in 1996. Lots of communication goes on in traffic here and it makes it flow fairly well. Cars honk to let people know they're coming over, to warn people they shouldn't pull in, motorbikes honk when they need to cross traffic, and cars & motorbikes honk at pedestrians when it's unsafe for them to cross. Traffic moves slow to accommodate cars, the legions of motorbikes (the primary mode of transportation here), and pedestrians all at the same time.[2] Crossing the street involves stepping out, walking slowly, and letting the traffic flow around you. Drivers merging into traffic often don't even look before pulling out; they know the traffic will flow around them. The system requires a lot of trust, but the slow speed and amount of communication make it manageable.[3]
[1] This is the principle behind traffic calming.
[2] That traffic calming business again.
[3] Not that it's not scary as hell too. American pedestrians are taught to fear cars (don't play in the street, look both ways before crossing the street, watch out for drunk drivers) and trusting them to avoid you while you're basically the frog in Frogger...well, it takes a little getting used to.
Went to dinner at Xiao Nan Guo last night, a Shanghaiese restaurant in Central (level 3 in the Man Yee building). Meg had a little trouble with her entree (a hairy crab), but Grandma's BBQ pork belly (or something like that...I should have written it down) that I ordered was pretty good.
We also had an order of "chef's special steamed pork dumplings", which we guessed (correctly!) were soup dumplings. They looked quite similar to ones we've had in NYC (@ New Green Bo, Grand Sichuan International, and Joe's Shanghai), but the broth inside was a lot lighter and the dumplings were more delicate (meaning that they tended to break before we could get them into our spoons and slurp the yummy juice). Very tasty...I could get used to the lighter soup, but I still prefer the NYC ones. I think we're off to find some dim sum today, so we'll see if we can drum up more soup dumplings.
(Also, after lunch yesterday, we picked up some pastries on the way back to the hotel from the MTR. I had some maple syrup bread and Meg had a milk French toast bun. I've found the bread here in Hong Kong to be great, something I didn't expect before we got here.)
M: Do you wanna go get some tea or something?
Me: You guys could go over to Tea and Sympathy.
C: I don't like that place. They're not so sympathetic.
Me: Tea and Apathy?
C: No, more like Tea and Antipathy.
If you happen to be in NYC on November 3rd, stop by Eyebeam in the evening and check out a panel that I'm on about criticism called "Everybody's A Critic, Or Are They?" Here's a description:
With 9 million blogs, umpteen online message boards, thousands of shows on hundreds of cable channels, and an increased number of magazines on the newsstand, the number of outlets for expressing criticism has never been higher and the barriers to would-be critics have never been lower. Is this devaluing evaluation or does the shotgun approach result in better criticism? YOU be the Judge!
Joining me on the panel are Emily Gordon, Village Voice film critic Michael Atkinson, and Columbia professor & author Duncan Watts. The wonderful Steven Heller will moderate and no doubt bring the conversation to a higher level. Details:
November 3, 2005
7:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Eyebeam (map)
540 W. 21st St.
New York, NY 10011
The Metropolitan Museum of Art recently purchased a painting called Madonna and Child by Duccio di Buoninsegna. The Met paid $50 million for the early Renaissance piece, more than they've paid for any single acquisition to date. The New Yorker has the story of how they came to own the last Duccio in private hands. In the article, Calvin Tomkins explains the reason for the painting's importance:
Small as it is, the painting has a powerful presence. It captures the eye from a distance, and commands, up close, something like complete attention. Holding the Christ child in her left arm, the Virgin looks beyond him with melancholy tenderness, while the child reaches out a tiny hand to brush aside her veil. Centuries of Byzantine rigidity and impersonal, hieratic forms are also brushed aside in this intimate gesture. We are at the beginning of what we think of as Western art; elements of the Byzantine style still linger--in the gold background, the Virgin's boneless and elongated fingers, and the child's unchildlike features--but the colors of their clothing are so miraculously preserved, and the sense of human interaction is so convincing, that the two figures seem to exist in a real space, and in real time. Candle burn marks on the frame, which is original, testify to the picture's use as a private devotional image. It is dated circa 1300.
I had the good fortune to stumble across the Duccio at the Met a few weeks ago (I was there for the Diane Arbus exhibition and passed it by accident on the way to another part of the musuem). What struck me at the time was a certain oddity of the piece...almost like it wasn't what they'd said it was but magical all the same. I know Jack about art[1], but after reading more about Madonna and Child, it probably seemed odd to me because it's a transitional piece, not quite Renaissance but not quite Byzantine either. The piece is a thin slice of a phase transition that had barely begun, a moment frozen from when the artists of the day were collectively working out how a Renaissance painting would eventually differ from earlier European styles and represent the wider cultural changes then occurring. Marco Grassi writes in The New Criteron:
More importantly, the artist places the Virgin at a slight angle to the viewer, behind a fictive parapet. She gazes away from the Child into the distance while He playfully grasps at Her veil. One must realize that every aspect of this composition represents a departure from pre-existing convention. With these subtle changes, Duccio consciously developed an image of sublime tenderness and poignant humanity, almost a visual echo of the spiritual renewal that St. Francis of Assisi had wrought only a few decades earlier.
More more on Duccio, check out his biography on Wikipedia and some collections of his work (1, 2, 3), including other Duccio representations of the Virgin and Child),
[1] I wish I'd taken an art history class in college, but my 18-yo self wasn't that interested.
While walking through Chelsea Market to get some lunch, I ran across a band comprised of more than a dozen 10-12 year olds with trumpets, clarinets, flutes, guitars, and percussion instruments. They were playing Superfreak by Rick James when I walked in and segued from that right into Hava Nigila. Awesome.
This is the best thing I've seen on the web in the last few weeks. An artist from the UK named Banksy went into four of NYC's most prominent museums -- the Met, the Museum of Natural History, the Brooklyn Museum, and the MoMA -- and installed four of his own pieces of art:
Dressed as a British pensioner, over the last few days Banksy entered each of the galleries and attached one of his own works, complete with authorative name plaque and explanation.
He says - "This historic occasion has less to do with finally being embraced by the fine art establishment and is more about the judicious use of a fake beard and some high strength glue." Banksy continues -"They're good enough to be in there, so I don't see why I should wait"
Staff at the New York Met discovered and removed their new aquisition early Sunday morning while Banksy's discount soup can print took pride of place in the MoMA for over three days before being torn down.
As of now, the other two pieces currently remain firmly in place.
Be sure to click through to see the photos. As far as I'm concerned, this is probably more interesting than most of whatever else is happening in the art world right now and instead of tearing it down, the MoMA should move it into their contemporary art collection. Thanks to cityrag for the link.
Some friends and I checked out the Ashes and Snow a couple of weeks ago here in NYC. The exhibition features the photography and films of Gregory Colbert, who documents "the wonderous interactions between human beings and animals". Colbert spent ten years traveling the world collecting the moments for this show, which will be displayed around the world in a "nomadic museum". The museum, constructed out of shipping containers, is currently placed on Pier 54 on the west side of Manhattan, just below 14th Street, but will continue to travel around the world after it leaves NYC on June 6.
As much as I liked the photography, the building designed by Shigeru Ban was the star of the exhibit for me. The simple wooden path surrounded by rocks, over which the photographs were displayed and beautifully lit, the industrial feel of the shipping container walls, and the way the sunlight reflected off the Hudson River and danced through the cracks in the walls and across the ceiling...all the elements came together to create a wonderful environment for viewing Colbert's work.
I dragged my ass out of bed at 6:45 this morning so that I could be in Central Park when they unfurled The Gates, the 16-day public art project by Christo and Jeanne-Claude. I was not disappointed. The whole art question notwithstanding, The Gates are an amazing and moving spectacle, and it was great seeing so many people in the park this morning, sharing the experience. Here are some photos I took:
There's so much in the news these days about our differences, conflict, and fear...The Gates are a perfect antidote for all that and for New Yorkers, a chance to come together and celebrate the city without terrorism or a power loss being involved. If you're in New York anytime before February 27th, I urge you to head to Central Park to check it out.
New Yorkers, there's still lots of time to take advantage of Restaurant Week:
Enjoy special three-course, prix fixe menus at the city's best restaurants. The restaurants listed below offer $20.12 lunches and/or $35.00 dinners during Restaurant Week. Duration: Jan. 24 - 28 and Jan. 31 - Feb. 4, 2005; Excludes Saturday, Jan. 29 and Sunday, Jan. 30
I can personally vouch for lunch at 11 Madison Park (three full courses with five possible choices for each course and they gave me so much dessert) and have also dined favorably in the past at Artisanal, Blue Smoke, Craft, and Gramercy Tavern. The "lunch only" places are probably the best deals...$20.12 for so much good food, it feels like you're stealing from them.
In NYC, when you don't have a car and you need to move stuff that won't fit in a taxi and isn't enough that you need an entire huge moving van, you call a "man with a van".** I recently used the services of a guy named Paul, recommended by a friend of a friend. After packing the back of his truck with my things, we set off for our destination, chatting along the way. He asked me how I'd found him and we eventually got to talking about craigslist.
Paul told me that these days, he got most of his jobs from CL and only one or two a week from personal referrals. I found that surprising and when I pressed him further, he told me that because of CL, he's been able to do pursue moving (which he really likes doing) as a full-time career. I can't remember the exact quote, but Paul said something to the effect that he can't believe he's getting away with starting a full-time business on CL without it costing him a single dime.
I'd never really thought about it before, but in some ways, CL helps lots of people build businesses cheaper and more effectively than more "robust", complex, and expensive enterprise software solutions. Movers are just one example. CL can help you find employees for your business. If you've got a van, you can pick up free furniture and electronics around the city, fix or refurbish, and sell it. You can start a business doing computer troubleshooting, piano lessons, buying and fixing up old motorcycles, or escort and sensual massage services. And if you need something done for your business but don't have the money to pay for it, you can always barter goods or services in exchange. These are just the obvious examples. Does anyone know of anyone using craigslist in more creative ways to make a living or other examples of people succeeding in business using CL?
** Don't know how this evolved, but folks in the "man with a van" profession like to rhyme the names of their businesses. My guy was "Call Paul to Haul", but you will also probably find "Chuck/Buck with a Truck", "Cory with a Lorry", "Schmuck with a Truck", "Call Jack to Pack", and so on. (Oh, I'd recommend using Paul if you need a man with a van...check here for his info.)
The NY Times recently asked a few New Yorkers which era they would nominate as New York's golden age. Like Greg, I thought Bill T. Jones' answer was the most penetrating:
Right after 9/11.
New York had a true reappraisal of itself at a tragic and introspective moment. New York had the attention of the whole world; it was a frightening moment. But the world was ready to follow, to assist.
It lasted a few months. We were vulnerable and open to the rest of the world, and we were ready for a change. There was a chance to ask questions, and it was a time when we were forced to do so.
But it didn't happen. There wasn't a true conversation about what America means to the rest of the world or about why New York was chosen. It was an opportunity. And then the politicians took it.
That last sentence is a doozy, isn't it? It saddens me to think that in times when we need to have open and honest communication to heal wounds and investigate opportunities, we instead let ourselves get caught up with the marketing of powerful men.
Read on the subway this morning:
A leaf, one of the last, parts from a maple branch:
it is spinning in the transparent air of October, falls
on a heap of others, stops, fades. No one
admired its entrancing struggle with the wind,
followed its flight, no one will distinguish it now
as it lies among the other leaves, no one saw what I did. I am
the only one.
I might need more poetry in my life.
After the Met yesterday, I sat on the stairs to watch these two street performers who were really quite good. At the end of the show, one of them did a flip over four people. I made this composite of the photos I took of his jump:
(click for a larger version)
I posted about how I made this image in the cool technique group on Flickr.
As part of a lazy Sunday here in NYC, I ducked into the Met for a couple of hours and wandered around. I've seen the whole muesum at least twice, but I never get tired of it. The Gilbert Stuart exhibition is worth checking out (the room with several of his Washington portraits is fantastic), but NYC photography fans will want to check out Few Are Chosen, an exhibition of street photography. Featured are the photographs of Walker Evans (he took photos of NYC subway riders with a hidden camera), Helen Levitt's photos of NYC street scenes, gritty photos of NYC by an artist whose name I forget, as well as a selection of Henri Cartier-Bresson's work. The collection is fairly small but well worth checking out if you're into that sort of thing.
Since two Fridays ago, I have been unable to sleep past 7:30 in the morning, no matter what time I go to sleep or what time I am required to get up. In the months prior to that, I can count on one hand the number of times I awoke before my alarm at 7:45. I have no idea what's causing this.
Finally got the chance to check out Daisy May's BBQ with a friend last night. We wandered over to the restaurant, but I would recommend getting delivery instead (there are no tables, just a small counter), which according to to CitySearch, is free anywhere in the city. I had a beef brisket sandwich with pickles and onions (yummy!) while Nichol had a whole, like, 2 quarts of creamed spinach which she completely finished so it must have been good.
While I was waiting outside Daisy May's for my companion to arrive, a horse-drawn carriage sped by on 11th Ave. His horse at a full trot, the driver loudly sang the chorus to "Zombie" by the Cranberries:
In your head, in your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie,
Hey, hey, hey. What's in your head,
In your head,
Zombie, zombie, zombie?
Hey, hey, hey, hey, oh, dou, dou, dou, dou, dou...
It's been in my head (in my head, zombie...) ever since.
Earlier in the evening, I saw the largest blue screen of death ever near Times Square. I tried not to take it as a sign of something.
Pretty much every day for the last year and a half or so, I stop at the same deli to purchase some orange juice on the way to work. When I first started going, there were two Asian women who operated the cash registers and seeing them churn through customers was like watching a fine ballet or elite athletes at the top of their game. They knew the price of every item in the store, had your change to you almost before you'd paid them, and had everything in a bag in the blink of an eye, all while constantly chattering back and forth in their native tongue and bantering with customers, everything on autopilot. They moved so fast that they could have been picking pockets as well and no one would have noticed.
One morning about nine months ago, I came in to find that one of the two women was gone and had been replaced by another woman who, it seemed, had never worked in such a fast-paced environment. She was sooo slow. Her more experienced counterpart served 4-5 customers in the time it took her to serve one...it was almost painful to observe, like watching me playing Kasporov in chess. I felt bad for her and figured she wouldn't last more than a few days, but the next couple of months saw steady improvement as she learned the job and got used to the routine. However, she was still not as fast as the other woman by at least a factor of two.
All that has changed in the last month. I don't know what happened, but the new woman is now working as fast and efficiently as her partner. And what's more, she has learned my individual habits (no bag or napkin unless I get something to eat and no straw unless it's a carton), something which the other two women had never done despite my daily visit. It's been fun watching her develop into a kick-ass employee and now when I go in, I try to pay at her register if I can.
While handing my cup of soup over the counter, the African-American woman who ladled it out for me asked in such a way that the "s" was almost silent, "crackers?" I nearly shot back, "what'd you call me?" as a joke but instead bit my tongue, smiled, and thanked her. Lucky for me the bite didn't hurt due to the massive amounts of novcaine coursing through my mouth from a morning jaunt to the dentist...although that and the accompanying dull aching pain may have contributed to almost putting my foot in my mouth in the first place.
Some people spend their money on cars, houses, tobacco, music, alcohol, shoes, clothes, electronic gadgets, or collectables. After taking care of my rent and savings account, I spend my money on very few things, one of which is food. Specifically, eating for experience. I developed this habit while living in San Francisco -- one of the best cities in the world for food -- and have continued it here in NYC, also, as it happens, one of the best cities in the world for food.
Eating for experience doesn't necessarily require vast sums of money. I probably spend less on average per month than the typical twenty-something does on booze or clothes. I haven't eaten at all of these cheap places in NYC, but I've been to more than a few of them and have had some very good experiences. Many professional food critics will tell you that their favorite spots to eat, places they wouldn't dare to review or write about, aren't particularly expensive. The soup dumplings at New Green Bo are 8 for ~$3 and I'd choose them over a $35 filet mignon most days of the week.
But every once in awhile, when you need to celebrate an occasion and have your tiny mind blown in the process, you get yourself a reservation at the type of place that requires reservations and perhaps a jacket and tie. For my birthday (as well as another special occasion I am quasi-legally bound not to reveal), Meg took me to Daniel, one of only five NY Times four-star restaurants in New York.
The vocabulary of a physics major can't do justice to the meal we had at Daniel, so I'm not even going to try. The dining room, the service, the food...all great/excellent/fantastic or whatever superlative you want to supply. Two things stood out:
- The -- and I'm quoting from the menu here -- Duo of Cedar River Farm Beef: Braised Short Ribs in Red Wine with Scallion-Mashed Potatoes, Seared Dry-Aged Rib Eye with Watercress, Porcini, and Young Carrots. The short ribs were excellent and I don't remember what I thought of any of the accompaniments, but the rib eye was a revelation. It literally floored me. Ok, not literally, but I would have been knocked to the actual floor if that kind of thing was acceptable behavior at Daniel. The first bite startled me it was so good. Beef, even really good beef, tastes like beef, but this was on some other level of flavor...it tasted like magic. The remaining few bites were as perplexing as the first as I struggled to comprehend how ordinary meat could taste like that. Best dish I've ever had in my life, ever. Ever!
- When the maitre 'd comes up to your table in the middle of the meal and inquires if you're there for a special occasion "or something", he's basically asking, "what the hell are you young people doing here?" in the really polite way of someone who has a lot of practice asking indirect questions. Because if there was a sore thumb sticking out in the restaurant that night, it was us. Young, not particularly fashionable (me only...Meg looked quite fine in her new dress), not rich, not there for the scene or to be seen, and genuinely interested in the meal rather than just eating on an expense account. I told him it was my birthday. Still trying to figure out precisely why we were there without asking outright, he tried the obvious follow-up question: "are you a chef?" I replied that I wasn't but that Meg worked in the kitchen of a restaurant.
From there, it was easy. When Meg starts talking about something she's enthusiastic about, the other participants in the conversation can't help but be engaged. Soon they were talking about garde manger, covers, and who knows what else. A tour of the kitchen was offered and accepted. After we paid our check, he showed us all around the huge kitchen, if that's even what you can call three stories of food prep area. Really nice guy and generous with his time...he spent 20 minutes showing us around when I'm sure, as the maitre d' of the whole fricking place, that he had a much better class of flesh to press about the dining room. He even gave Meg a card for the women in charge of staffing and suggested she come in to do a stage in the kitchen.
Right before we left (5+ hours after we'd arrived at the restaurant), we got to watch Daniel Boulud direct plate traffic and then chatted with him for a few moments. I tried to relate to him my religious experience with the rib eye, but I'm sure I didn't do it justice. What a wonderful experience all the way around.
Related:
- A visit to the French Laundry
- Rosecrans enjoys a night at Chez Daniel
When there's a 40-foot tall robot in Times Square, even the most jaded New Yorkers gawk up at it like tourists. It was next to the Good Morning America studios; I think it's a promotion for the movie Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.
Even after almost two years of living in NYC, returning here after being out of town still makes me feel the wonder and novelty of a tourist. The lights of the Empire State and Chyrsler Buildings from across the river. Crossing Manhattan past the residences on the long blocks and downtown past the bodegas and restaurants lining the avenues. The three 80s-style heavy metal chicks filming a commercial. Hipsters with bags laden with hummus hailing cabs in Chelsea. And an impromptu puppy gathering on the front steps of my building; more soft fur than any one town deserves for itself.
The almost-poem included with September's rent notice from the landlord:
September is here
Fall is near
Now is the time-to cheer !!!
Any leaks/repairs call us.
I didn't know whether to tear up at its simple beauty or wonder how much of my rent was going toward rent statement verse writing.
Went and took photos of the main protest march today. More tomorrow maybe. (Not more photos, more words.)
Two years ago, Calvin Trillin wrote an article for the New Yorker about Shopsin's, an eccentric eatery in the West Village with about 9 billion menu items:
What does happen occasionally is that Kenny gets an idea for a dish and writes on the specials board -- yes, there is a specials board -- something like Indomalekian Sunrise Stew. (Kenny and his oldest son, Charlie, invented the country of Indomalekia along with its culinary traditions.) A couple of weeks later, someone finally orders Indomalekian Sunrise Stew and Kenny can't remember what he had in mind when he thought it up. Fortunately, the customer doesn't know, either, so Kenny just invents it again on the spot.
Shopsin's has moved to another Village location since the article came out, but they've still got that big old menu. If you dare, feast your eyes on a tour de force of outsider information design, all 11 pages of the Shopsin's General Store menu (PDF, 188K).
You want chicken fried eggs with a side of pancakes? Page 6. On page 1, there's gotta be 100 soups alone, including Pistachio Red Chicken Curry. I lost count after 40 different kinds of pancakes on page 10. In amongst the kate, gregg, tamara, and sneaky pete sandwiches on page 2, you'll find the northern sandwich: peanut butter & bacon on white toast. There appears to be nothing that's not on the menu, although I looked pretty hard for foie gras and couldn't find it. If they did have it, you could probably get it chicken fried with whipped cream on top.
On page 8, page 11, and the front of their Web site, you'll find the restaurant rules:
- No cell phone use
- One meal per person minimum (everyone's got to eat)
- No smoking
- Limit four people per group
On that last point, the menu has something additional to add (page 4):
Party of Five
you could put a chair at the end
or push the tables together
but dont bother
This banged-up little restaurant
where you would expect no rules at all
has a firm policy against seating
parties of five
And you know you are a party of five
It doesn't matter if one of you
offers to leave or if
you say you could split into
a party of three and a party of two
or if the five of you come back tomorrow
in Richard Nixon masks and try to pretend
that you don't know each other
It won't work: You're a party of five
even if you're a beloved regular
Even if the place is empty
Even if you bring logic to bear
Even if you're a tackle for the Chicago Bears
it won't work
You're a party of five
You will always be a party of five
Ahundred blocks from here
a hundred years from now
you will still be a party of five
and you will never savor the soup
or compare the coffee
or hear the wisdom of the cook
and the wit of the waitress or
get to hum the old -time tunes
among which you will find
no quintets
-- Robert Hershon
Love it, love it, love it, and I have to get my ass over there one of these days.
How can someone smell so much like garlic at 8:30 in the morning? Are there garlic breakfast foods that I don't know about?
Walked past another NYPD flash mob in Times Square. Deterring terrorists these days involves standing around drinking coffee. How about a little gunfire and random beatings? Now *that's* intimidation.
Standing on his tippy toes had two benefits for the young man on Broadway: 1) he could see whichever famous person was doing Good Morning America this morning; and 2) passersby could see more clearly the red stripes on the soles of his Prada shoes, identifying him as a person of impeccable taste.
Meg and I went to Craft earlier this week. The restaurant's schtick is to present fresh food as simply as possible. The heirloom tomatoes were sliced, salted, peppered, and placed on a white dish with a wee bit of basil. The wild salmon came with a few onions, making it the most accented dish of the evening. The striped bass was served braised in its own juices with a couple of carrots. Plain sautéed hen-of-the-woods mushrooms. The lamb shank was served alone in its own juices, still in the container it was cooked in. Green beans, unbuttered. Mashed potatoes, lightly buttered. Cinnamon and chocolate donuts on a simple white plate. A single slice of brioche pain perdu with small pitchers of caramel and chocolate to flavor it. I enjoyed the no-nonsense presentation, but the tastes were a little too spare for my, um, taste. Verdict: The food was great, the novelty of the preparation was fun, but I don't think I'd go again.
The next day, we checked out Danny Meyer's new Shake Shack in Madison Square Park, located at the opposite end of the NYC food spectrum from Craft. We each had a Shack Burger with fries and shared a chocolate shake. The food came in a box and the burgers in little bags, reminding me of In-N-Out Burger. The fries were way too crispy, but the burger was one of the best I've had in NYC. (Good burgers are one of the few things I miss from California. Not that good hamburgers can't be found in NYC, but it's just not a hamburger town.) I'm looking forward to trying the Chicago-style hot dog (Nathan's aside, give me a Vienna Beef dog any day of the week over a NYC dog) and the frozen custard on my next visit.
Salon recently ran an article on the relatively new school of thought about traffic management called second generation traffic calming. It involves improving traffic flow by incorporating, under certain circumstances, automobile traffic back into the flow of other human activities:
Rejecting the idea of separating people from vehicular traffic, it's a concept that privileges multiplicity over homogeneity, disorder over order, and intrigue over certainty. In practice, it's about dismantling barriers: between the road and the sidewalk, between cars, pedestrians and cyclists and, most controversially, between moving vehicles and children at play.
The idea, borrowed in part from behavioral psychology and evolutionary biology disciplines, is that traffic will become safer and move more smoothly if drivers are forced to pay more attention to their driving and be on autopilot less:
Reversing decades of conventional wisdom on traffic engineering, Hamilton-Baillie argues that the key to improving both safety and vehicular capacity is to remove traffic lights and other controls, such as stop signs and the white and yellow lines dividing streets into lanes. Without any clear right-of-way, he says, motorists are forced to slow down to safer speeds, make eye contact with pedestrians, cyclists and other drivers, and decide among themselves when it is safe to proceed.
At the beginning of the article, the author observes traffic working like this in China:
It's rush hour, and I am standing at the corner of Zhuhui and Renmin Road, a four-lane intersection in Suzhou, China. Ignoring the red light, a couple of taxis and a dozen bicycles are headed straight for a huge mass of cyclists, cars, pedicabs and mopeds that are turning left in front of me. Cringing, I anticipate a collision. Like a flock of migrating birds, however, the mass changes formation. A space opens up, the taxis and bicycles move in, and hundreds of commuters continue down the street, unperturbed and fatality free.
In Suzhou, the traffic rules are simple. "There are no rules," as one local told me. A city of 2.2 million people, Suzhou has 500,000 cars and 900,000 bicycles, not to mention hundreds of pedicabs, mopeds and assorted, quainter forms of transportation. Drivers of all modes pay little attention to the few traffic signals and weave wildly from one side of the street to another. Defying survival instincts, pedestrians have to barge between oncoming cars to cross the roads.
But here's the catch: During the 10 days I spent in Suzhou last fall, I didn't see a single accident. Really, not a single one. Nor was there any of the road rage one might expect given the anarchy that passes for traffic policy. And despite the obvious advantages that accrue to cars because of their size, no single transportation mode dominates the streets.
When I was in Bejing a few years ago, I observed the same thing. Traffic was an amazing thing to watch there. One day as we toured a temple a few stories off the ground, my dad and I broke away from the rest of the group to watch traffic on the 5 or 6-way intersection below us for several minutes. It was a marvel of self-organizing behavior, with buses, pedicabs, pedestrians, cyclists, taxis, cars, and motorcycles forming temporary lanes of traffic that would weaken and yield to newly formed lanes of flow.
I've observed this phenomenon in NYC as well, especially in dense areas of Manhattan like Midtown. People are always in the street, crossing against the light or jaywalking across even busy avenues or through stopped traffic. Cyclists run red lights, charge through busy crosswalks, and barrel down one-way streets the wrong way. Everyone pays a lot of attention to what they're doing, regardless of what the signs say or where the crosswalk is marked. And for the most part, it seems to work. New York City has a relatively low pedestrian fatality rate, about half that of the city with the highest rate, a remarkable fact considering the pedestrian density involved and how fast traffic moves in Manhattan sometimes (I saw a cab zipping down 5th Avenue this afternoon doing at least 50 mph, slaloming through jaywalkers as he went).
We went and checked out the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party on Sunday. We sampled five or six of the 'cue vendors. The baby back ribs from pitmaster Mike Mills were my favorite, although the brisket and sausage from The Salt Lick was pretty fine too. The North Carolinian BBQ, flavored with a thin vinegar-based sauce, was not to my personal liking -- give me Memphis or Kansas City style any day -- but others enjoyed it.
On the way out, we sat for a second to listen to a panel on America's "barbeculture". Listening to folks argue about BBQ is right up there with listening to people argue about blogging, but panelist Lolis Eric Elie's use of the phrase "barbecue diaspora" made our short time in the audience worthwhile.
More on the BABBP: NYC Eats finds a hardcore BBQ fan and eGullet prepared an extensive report, going in-depth on Ed Mitchell.
I read somewhere last week a lament that no one had told the writer about the special magic of the black and white cookie. I, too, lament. Jonesing for a snack last week, I remembered this person's rave about the b&w and purchased one at the bodega on the way home. Whoa, what a dessert! The black and white cookie is, in fact, not a cookie but a flat, thinly frosted cake, like someone has sat on a cupcake. Cookie convenience, cupcake taste. I am hooked.
Being the last person in NYC to learn about this biracial delectable, I need some help in locating the best b&w in the city. New Yorkers, where do you get your black and white cookies?
I should start out by telling you that I live downstairs from
THE MOST ANNOYING PERSON IN THE WORLD!!!!!
Every weekday morning for the last couple of weeks, the woman upstairs, who just recently moved in, has been holding some sort of ballroom dancing function in her bedroom -- which just happens to be above mine -- at 7:15 am. The clomp, clomp, clomp of high heels on hardwood floors directly above your head for 20 fucking minutes is enough to wake the dead and even a heavy sleeper like me. And even when she isn't wearing hard-soled shoes, she's a heavy walker. It sounds as though a 6'8", 350 pound man is jumping rope up there.
To make matters worse, I think she's got a 2.4GHz cordless phone. 802.11b doesn't play well with 2.4GHz cordless phones. Every so often, and only when she's home, stomping around like an elephant, the wifi signal in the apartment goes to shit, usually right when I'm in the middle of something.
SO ANNOYING!!!!
On the way to work this morning, a man holding a folded subway map motioned to me and then his map. Happy to give directions when I can, I walked over to where he was standing. As I approached, he motioned to the map again and began, "excuse moi..."
Before I could even think about it, I replied, "oui, monsieur?"
That elicited a surprised look and a stream of French dialogue. I think I heard "parlez" and "francais" in there somewhere. "Non, non, non, monsieur. Un peu, un peu." My crude way of saying that I don't speak French very well.
Slightly disappointed in my unwitting deception, he cut to the chase. Rockefeller Center. Good, something easy. I pointed in the general direction, but he seemed skeptical, motioning to it on his map. Reaching back into my memories of high school French, I conjured up the approximate French version of "49th and 5th" and pointed once again in the right direction. Relived that I seemed to know where he wanted to go and that I was able to tell him so in (mangled) French, he gave me a nod, said "merci monsieur," and headed off.
"C'est rien. Au revoir monsieur," I replied after him.
He looked back at me, suspicious, as if to say, "are you sure you don't speak French?"
As I sat at my computer last night, a cry arose from outside the window. A woman, distressed about something. Figuring it was just a television, reveler from a nearby party, or someone facetiously wailing about trivial things to a friend on the phone, I ignored it and went back to my work. But they continued, the distressed cries. I began to catch snippets of her lamentations:
"Sebastian...why...don't leave me...accident...don't die...can't live without you..."
Concerned, I got up and went to the window in the living room. I could hear her more clearly here, talking to herself or maybe to God. Her dog Sebastian had had an accident of some sort. The woman was almost hysterical at this point, so it was hard to tell what had happened or if Sebastian was alive or dead.
Thinking that the dog had fallen out a window into the space between my building and the next (about an eight to ten foot distance), I opened the window and stuck my head out to investigate. No sign of Sebastian. I could hear the woman even more clearly than before, still repeating the same words over and over. I strained out the window, trying to locate her apartment; she needed some help from a calm party, someone who could call 911, 311, the emergency pet hospital, or whatever one does for critically injured pets. The sound bounces around so much between the buildings that she could have been anywhere, my building, the building across the way, even in the buildings behind ours.
I was about to put my shoes on to see if I could find the woman somewhere in our building when I heard dialing. She'd finally snapped herself out of her hysteria and was calling a friend. The conversation calmed her; after a couple sentences, her distressed voice lowered and I couldn't hear her anymore. A few minutes passed, my heartrate slowed, and I heard a buzzer (on the floor below, I think) and then running up the stairs. As the woman answered the door and let the person in (her friend? a paramedic?), I heard very little, just a "hi, where is he?"
A lot of people in NYC live alone, and all they have to keep them company sometimes are their pets. Sounds silly to some, but a person can love a pet as much as they can a person, and their death is no less shocking and painful. I hope Sebastian is alright; it sounds like that woman really cared about him. Makes me sad thinking about it. Hope he's OK.
As I walked to the subway through the crowds in Grand Central Terminal last night, a police officer yelled out to a young man accompanied by his mother, "hey, you gotta take that cap off in here!" The youngster, startled, tugged on the bill of his Red Sox hat, looked at the now-grinning cop, and smiled broadly, realizing he'd been had. "That's worth a summons around here, ya know," the cop continued, chuckling along with boy, his mother, me, and a few other folks within earshot. In stark contrast, that same morning at the Times Square subway station, commuters gave a wide berth and apprehensive looks to a hulking police officer holding the leash of the biggest German Shepherd I've ever seen.
On my way to lunch the other day, I noticed a new exhibit at the Annex of the NY Transit Museum in Grand Central: New York: The Ride, Subway Cartoon and Cover Art from The New Yorker. That's two of my favorite NY things together, so I swung by for a look today. It's a tiny exhibit and takes only 5-10 minutes of your time, but if you're in the vicinity, it's worth the effort. Here's my favorite piece, Hell: The Fifth Avenue Entrance by Mick Stevens:
Here's the description of the exhibit:
Throughout the years, cartoons and cover art from The New Yorker have brilliantly captured this city, its hopes and aspirations, its people and their foibles, and their daily routines. Subway humor has been a staple of The New Yorker since the magazine's 1925 inaugural issue.
While offering an entertaining survey of subway satire from the 1920s to the present, the exhibition also explores changing perceptions of the subway over the course of nine decades. Original artwork, reproductions of The New Yorker covers and cartoons, and original magazines, whose subject matter is the subway system and the people who ride it, are on view.
The exhibit continues through July 18.
Yesterday was a wonderful day to be in New York City. After a warm, sunny walk through Central Park (you can rent small remote control sailboats at the Conservatory Water!), we went over to the Whitney to take in the 2004 Biennial. While I didn't like many of the individual pieces, the show as a whole was worth seeing, if only to check the pulse of the contemporary art world.
I'd love to point you at some of the pieces I enjoyed, but of course the Biennial Web site is in Flash, rendering individual artist biographies and artworks unlinkable. I know artists have a fear of functionality, but you'd think they could make an exception in this case. Anyway, I dug up a link to one of my favorite pieces from the show, Hamburger Hill by Barnaby Furnas. The bullets tear his Civil War-inspired paintings apart in straight lines -- looks just a bit cubist to me -- flattening several minutes of action into one still frame. Wonderfully active, vibrant, and visceral.
Sunday dawned windy and cold, a good day to spend a couple of hours at the Natural History Museum. As I walked through the Hall of Advanced Mammals, navigating through crowds of presumably more advanced mammals, two women leading a gaggle of uninterested children passed by me. One of the women started chastising the children in that ridiculous singsong voice that parents use with kids to induce guilt (which seldom works):
"Kids, you're not paying attention. Why aren't you paying attention?"
[absolutely no response from the kids]
"See, the mommies are looking, but the kids aren't looking. Come on, you're missing the dinosaurs."
Today was the first real spring-like day in New York this year, so Meg and I celebrated by exploring the High Line. I took some photos (click on the photo below for more):
The High Line is an elevated railway that has fallen into disuse and disrepair, currently running from 33rd Street to the Meatpacking District on the west side of Manhattan. Before setting off, we checked on the Web for directions on how to get up there and found that some friends of ours, Jason, Alison, and Jake, had documented their High Line excursions, complete with directions. If you're interested in trying it yourself sometime, I would note that the south entrance/exit to the High Line appears to be closed (new fence, locks, barbed wire), so prepare for a round trip back up to 33rd Street.
I went and checked out the NYC photoblogger event at the Apple Store in Soho last night. A huge crowd assembled to watch presentations by seven NYC photobloggers. Among the highlights:
- Khoi's presentation of Infrangible. A man after my own heart, he still hand-codes his site for each entry, nesting tables within tables and thumbing his nose at structured data. Databases are for suckers! He also does not resize large photos (like this one) to fit on the screen all at once, the idea being that the photo won't have the same impact at 400x600 that it does at 740 x 1113.
- Mike's photos of abandoned subway stations. I loved hearing Mike's story: he's got a cheapo camera and is a self-professed bad photographer, but he loves to shoot, is striving to improve, and, judging from the audience's delighted reaction to some of his photos, his approach to photography is definitely interesting.
- The topic of retouching photos in Photoshop came up several times. Most of the presenters adjust their photos in Photoshop for brightness, contrast, color correction, etc. Purists would argue that this is cheating. I liken the Photoshop retouching stage of the digital photography process to the darkroom stage in analog photography. Ansel Adams performed extensive manipulations of his photographs in the darkroom and few consider Adams a cheater. Khoi had an interesting comment along those lines, saying that the photo out of the camera has to have "it" regardless of any correction done after the fact in Photoshop. In my experience, good photos can be made great in Photoshop, but no amount of manipulation can turn a poor photo into a good one.
- Adam and Scott's description of the simplicity of fotolog.net. You upload photos, your friends upload photos, and the interface allows you to quickly jump from the photos of one friend to the next, keeping up with their visual lives. No need to call it social software or justify how useful the social network is. fotolog.net is elegant in its simplicity and it works. End of story.
- A tantalizingly short look at Eliot's photo management system.
- And across it all, the *barest* of impressions that photologging is an art form unto itself, that it's not just photography + blogging. I'm not sure yet what makes it a unique thing, but the combination of the relative inexpensiveness of producing digital images in mass quantities (with a digital camera, it costs as much to take and store 1000 photos as it does to take 1 photo) and cheap, easy methods of publishing them to the Web has a lot to do with it.
Most of the crowd stayed the whole two hours...which is amazing. After it was over, some of us moved along to a nearby bar to socialize which, according to Jake's introduction to the event, was the real reason for the whole thing in the first place. I only stayed for a bit before hunger and tiredness got the best of me, but it was nice to briefly meet and chat with some of the presenters before racing off to dinner.
Rosecrans illustrates the importance of location for some NYC dwellers (you know who you are) by the number of steps he has to take to reach various destinations, entertainments, services, and delectables from his desk:
Kitchen: 6
Toilet: 11
Bar: 61
Niman Ranch cheeseburger: 110
Coffee shop: 141
Cheese shop: 153
Nearest subway platform: 305
Manhattan (Union Square): 433
Gym: 561
Drycleaner (good): 961
For some New Yorkers, many of the things on his list are even closer than that: 8 steps to the phone and 9 to the door after the delivery guy rings the buzzer. With cabs and Towncars, both the well-heeled and those not so fond of hoofing it are able to reach any destination in the five boroughs and beyond in less than 100 steps. In these cases, it's not so much about steps as dollars.
As I walked past Bryant Park yesterday at lunch, I wondered how Anna Wintour, editor in chief of Vogue, gets from her office in 4 Times Square to Bryant Park for the Fashion Week festivities. It's only a block, less than a 2 minute walk, but she also has the option of taking one of the sleek black cars parked at the rear of the building on 43rd Street. Factoring in the stop lights, one-way streets, and Midtown traffic, the drive must take 5-10 minutes. My best guess is that Anna is not a steps kinda gal and opts for the Towncar.
On my way back to the office after lunch, I heard a whistle from far down the street. A second later, I heard another. Whistle after whistle sounded, each closer than the next. It was only when I saw a man in uniform checking the parking meters down the block that I also noticed several whistling men heading for their not-so-legally parked delivery trucks.
Listening to NPR this morning as I struggled to regain enough of my consciousness to stumble into the shower, I heard Colson Whitehead read a selection from his new book, The Colossus of New York. In it, he described weary evening commuters vying for seats on the subway like pigeons scrapping for seed. That characterization strikes me as inaccurate. Commuters dash down stairs to catch an arm in the door before it closes and pack into already crowded cars rather than be left on the platform, but even in the busiest stations at the peak of rush hour, people don't squabble for seats like pigeons for food.
If you want to see pigeon-like behavior, watch instead the tide of evening commuters racing to spin through the turnstiles at Times Square/42nd Street, swerving around confused tourists, colliding, dancing from turnstile to turnstile, searching for the fastest way past the fumbling metrotards and exiting passengers shooting out of the station into the chaos.
Joe DeSalazar is an account exec at a NYC advertising agency, but all he really wants to do is cook. Keenly interested in food but frustrated by a lack of focus on food & drink at wine tastings and the expense of tasting menus at fine restaurants, Joe created a bimonthly event called foodie. foodie is Joe & 3-4 chefs cooking, 6 courses of food paired with 6 courses of wine, and around 50 people eating, drinking, chatting, and generally having a good time.
The latest installment of foodie was held last night near Washington Square Park. The inspiration for the meal was Joe's recent trip to Italy. The menu featured dishes with parmigiano reggiano, bologna (you know, from Bologna), balsamic vinaigrette, and basil. The most ambitious item of the night was the timpani, a dish inspired by Joe's favorite food movie, Big Night. The chef came around with the timpani before he cut it up...it was huge, about the size of library-scale Webster's Dictionary. My favorite dish was the tortellini with pork in a chicken broth.
If you'd like more information about foodie, you can email joe at foodieny [at] hotmail.com (web site coming soon, I've heard). Gothamist wrote about the previous foodie in September.
The NYC marathon is today. Practice is over, the carbs have been loaded, and it looks like an uncommonly nice November day is on tap for the runners: Yahoo! Weather says, "Mainly cloudy. A few peeks of sunshine possible. High 71F. Winds light and variable."
Though most of the news reports during and after the race will focus on the winners of the race, for many of the spectators, both here in NYC and watching on TV, it's all about tracking your marathoning wife, son, next-door neighbor, or coworker.
Here at kottke.org, I'm tracking my favorite weblog census taker & blogger, Maciej Ceglowski. To benchmark Maciej along his journey, I'm pitting him against runner #30972, one Sean "Puffy" "Puff Daddy" "P. Diddy" Combs, producer, lover, runner. Good luck to both runners, but we're hoping Maciej wins one for all the webloggers out there!
Race updates:
2:54 pm - Sad news, my friends. P. Diddy beat Maciej by about 28 minutes, 3:58:22 to 4:26:31. But really, both men are winners for finishing before I have even put on a shirt today (the pants made an appearance a couple of hours ago). Meg and I are looking forward to dinner with Maciej and his girlfriend tonight where I'm sure we'll get a full account of the exciting duel. We aren't sure whether P. Diddy will be able to make it out with us tonight, but we made a reservation for 5 just in case.
1:55 pm - The race is well and truly joined. Maciej crossed the 20 mile mark @ 3:16:34, putting him just 13 minutes off of Diddy's pace at that point. He's slated to finish 17 minutes after Diddy, but with Diddy fading so fast, it's anyone's race at this point.
1:40 pm - P. Diddy just crossed the 20 mile mark @ 3:03:17 with a projected finish of just over 4 hours. I don't know if Maciej is still on his former pace, but Diddy has fallen off dramatically.
1:36 pm - Let's check the inbox to see if there's any news about Maciej. Ok, we've got Viagra, Xanax, Russian wives, online casino, and increase your size. Nope, nothing about Maciej. And no Diddy at the 20 mile mark yet...I think he's in trouble.
1:21 pm - Diddy was just on the TV again. Security is a problem. He's being mobbed on the course and when he stops. He just shoved some kid out of the way.
1:12 pm - Diddy's in trouble...his legs are cramping up and he's been stopping to massage them.
1:09 pm - Alright, I'm getting fed up with NBC's lack of Maciej coverage and the 3 in-race updates on the web site just aren't enough. So, I'm enlisting your help. If by some chance you're reading this site, watching the race right now in person or on TV, and you happen to see Maciej (#18307, blue shirt, blue shorts, pasty-white complexion, possibly carrying Krispy Kreme donuts), let me know where and when you saw him.
12:42 pm - They're interviewing Diddy on the TV right now. Hopefully this will expend precious energy and give Maciej, who still has not been interviewed, a bit of an edge.
12:39 pm - Maciej has closed the gap on Diddy. He's at 2:06:05 at the halfway point, 9:37 minutes/mile with a projected finish at 4:12:10, only 22 minutes behind Diddy (as opposed to 34 minutes at the 10K mark). The TV is speculating that Diddy will continue to fade and finish at around the 4:15 mark. Come on, Maciej!
12:16 pm - P. Diddy is working hard at taking away from James Brown the title of The Hardest Working Man in Showbiz. Piddy's time at the halfway point is 1:55:27. He's running 8:48 minute miles with a projected finish of 3:50:54. I've got to hand it to P. Diddy...he's kicking ass.
12:04 pm - It's just after noon and I'm sitting here on the couch in my boxer shorts watching the marathon on TV and waiting for some cinnamon rolls to come out of the oven. How lazy do I feel right now?
11:32 am - If you'd like to track Diddy vs. Maciej yourself, here's the page to do it.
11:27 am - Here's what the race tracker looks like after 10K for our runners:
11:15 am - We have a fix on Maciej! He passed the 10K marker with a time of 01:00:58. He's doing 9:50 minute miles with a projected finish of 4:17:38. That puts him more than 30 minutes behind Diddy at the finish. Come on M. Ceggy, you can do it!
11:07 am - Oh no! P. Diddy has reached the 10K mark with no sign of Maciej. Diddy's time is 00:52:43 with 8:30 minute miles and a projected finish of 3:42:46.
10:55 am - TV says that Diddy is running 9 minute miles, projected to finish in 3:50. Whither Maciej?
10:46 am - The Marathon Tracker on the official site is only giving results at 10K, the halfway point, at the 20 mile mark, and at the end of the race. So unless NBC changes their unfair broadcast policy, we'll continue to receive P. Diddy updates throughout the race on TV, but will only have 3 updates on Maciej.
10:25 am - P. Diddy is through 1 mile. No TV update on Maciej yet.
10:08 am - And they're off!
10:06 am - Someone's singing the national anthem. It looks as though NBC has decided not to give equal interview airtime to Maciej. Disappointing.
10:04 am - NBC just interviewed P. Diddy on TV, minutes before the race is to start. I have high hopes for Maciej after seeing the huge diamond earring that will be weighing Diddy down during the race.
I was just at the Barnes and Noble on 48th & 5th. Jimmy Fallon and his sister were there signing copies of their new book, I Hate This Place: The Pessimist's Guide to Life. As I browsed through a couple of magazines, I noticed three girls standing in the bargain books aisle. Well, everyone in the store noticed them standing there because one of them was crying and shrieking uncontrollably and her two friends were taking turns calming her down or revving her up.
"Oh my God! I can't believe Jimmy Fallon kissed me!!"
"I know!!!"
[They all scream.]
"I'm never going to wash this cheek again."
[Sobbing intensifies. The girl is alternating between trying to regain her composure and going completely bats with the crying. She's having a hard time standing.]
This goes on for a minute or two. Then a woman, dressed to the nines and obviously a lifelong New York resident, annoyed that these silly girls are between her and whatever purchases she wants to make, pushes by them while loudly announcing to the rest of the store, "my God, I don't understand what the big deal is, seeing some guy and then crying like a baby, yelling, and blocking the aisle. I hate this fucking store."
Here's a fun tip for visitors to (or even residents of) NYC. If you're in Grand Central, make your way down to the lower level where all the food is and find the Oyster Bar. In front of the entrance is an archway about 12-16 feet across. If you and a companion stand facing opposite walls of the arch just inside the archway and whisper to each other, you will be able carry on a hushed conversation despite the 15-foot gap between you. The closer you get to the wall the better...about 6-12 inches away is pretty good. This works on the same principle as the "whisper dishes" you see at science museums.
The power went out around 4:10pm or so as I sat in front of my computer. I don't know the exact time because most of the clocks in the office are electric. Wandered around the 15th floor for a bit, looking out the window at people in the building across the street looking over at our building and down to the street. Reports via cell phone that the power is out in Brooklyn as well.
I grabbed provisions from the dark fridge (a bottle of water) and set off from 45th Street across town and down 30 blocks to 14th Street and into the Village...after 15 flights of stairs. When I emerged from the building, people were everywhere. It's midtown, so people are usually everywhere, but this was that times ten. I waded through the crowd down 5th Avenue to 34th Street.
Nobody knows what's going on. A red emergency vehicle is parked, the driver has the passenger side door open with the radio blasting the news out to a crowd of people. Everyone stands listening, heads cocked to one side, looking at the ground, straining for details. I join them for a couple of minutes. The radio says that the power is out. Duh.
I pass a woman saying to another woman that Madison Square Garden is on fire. Two minutes later, I walk past a very intact and very much not burning Madison Square Garden. The crowd is so dense that we're all shuffling along, no one getting anywhere fast. Someone bumps into the person in front of me. "Hey, watch where the hell you're going." People are little scared and seem on edge. I don't hear the word terrorism, but the air is thick with the thought.
I reach 18th Street. Some shops are open, most are not. The ice cream shop is doing good business. The owner of a bodega has barricaded the door with shelves of food and stands watch with him employees.
A block from home, I see a couple sitting outside at a restaurant, sipping Coronas, watching the world go by.
And now, I leave for the airport. I have no idea if we'll get there in time.
"Next!" said the coffee & donut man (who I'll refer to as "Ralph") from his tiny silver shop-on-wheels, one of many that dot Manhattan on weekday mornings. I stepped up to the window, ordered a glazed donut (75 cents), and when he handed it to me, handed a dollar bill back through the window. Ralph motioned to the pile of change scattered on the counter and hurried on to the next customer, yelling "Next!" over my shoulder. I put the bill down and grabbed a quarter from the pile.
Maybe this situation is typical of Manhattan coffee & donut carts (although two carts near where I work don't do this), but this was the first business establishment I've ever been to that lets its customers make their own change. Intrigued, I walked a few steps away and turned around to watch the interaction between this business and its customers. For five minutes, everyone either threw down exact change or made their own change without any notice from Ralph; he was just too busy pouring coffee or retrieving crullers to pay any attention to the money situation.
If you were the CEO of a big business -- say, a movie studio, music company, or multinational bank -- you'd have been tearing your hair out at this scene. He lets his customers make their own change?!?!! How does he know they're making the correct change? Or putting down any change at all? Or even stealing the change? Where's the technology that prevents the change from being stolen while he's not looking? Surely there's a machine that could be invented to keep track of it. Bad, bad, bad! Unclean, unclean! Does not compute...
Hold on there, Mr. CEO, don't go all HAL 9000 on us. Ralph probably does lose a little bit of change each day to theft & bad math, but more than makes up for it in other ways. The throughput of that tiny stand is amazing. For comparison's sake, I staked out two nearby donut & coffee stands and their time spent per customer was almost double that of Ralph's stand. So, Ralph's doing roughly twice the business with the same resources. Let's see Citibank do that.
It's also apparent that Ralph trusts his customers, and that they both appreciate and return that sense of trust (I know I do). Trust is one of the most difficult "assets" for companies to acquire, but also one of the most valuable. Many companies take shortcuts in getting their customers to trust them, paying lip service to Trust™ in press releases and marketing brochures. Which works, temporarily and superficially, but when you get down to it, you can't market trust...it needs to be earned. People trust you when you trust them.
When an environment of trust is created, good things start happening. Ralph can serve twice as many customers. People get their coffee in half the time. Due to this time savings, people become regulars. Regulars provide Ralph's business with stability, a good reputation, and with customers who have an interest in making correct change (to keep the line moving and keep Ralph in business). Lots of customers who make correct change increase Ralph's profit margin. Etc. Etc.
And what did Ralph have to pay for all this? A bit of change here and there.
What Independence Day is all about:
- Watching a 145-pound Japanese man eat 44 1/2 hot dogs in 12 minutes in the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest.
- Making an appointment with the chiropractor because The Cyclone is a seriously dangerous relic that needs to be razed before it kills someone (me!). It's been three days and my neck still hurts from the whiplash I got from the first drop. Rollercoasters should seem unsafe but actually be safe.
- Going to the super-crowded beach at Coney Island to dip our tootsies in the water with half of New York City. As Steven observed in Prospect Park, the scene was the kind of multiculturalism you often find in NYC. Well, almost. Economic stratification is still alive and well in America's melting pot...the racial demographic resembled the subway much more than Central Park West. Jonah summed it up well when he quipped, "it's so crowded here, why don't these people just go to the Hamptons or Nantucket?"
- Fireworks. The display in NYC was fantastic...we saw several types of fireworks we'd never seen before.
- Watching Zoolander.
- Visiting the Met. Except for a brief visit to see the da Vinci exhibit this spring, I had never been there. An excellent museum on many levels...we'll definitely be going more often from now on.
1. Get the hell out of my way, I'm coming through.
2. Do not stop at the top of the stairs to put your MetroCard back into your purse/wallet. You are between me and my train.
3. Act more like a particle and less like a wave. When you're weaving all over the platform like a drunken sinusoidal, energetic particles like myself -- who, in keeping with Newton's first law of motion, like to remain in a uniform state of motion until acted upon by an outside force -- cannot easily get past you.
4. Slower traffic keep to the right.
5. Yield to persons crossing the platform from the express train to the local train (or vice versa). They need the right-of-way more than you do for that 15 seconds of your existance on this earth.
6. Have your MetroCard out of its holster before you get to the turnstile. Before.
7. If you are waiting for your train, suppress the urge to wander the crowded platform aimlessly. Pick a spot and stay exactly there. If you need to move, do so with purpose and well-defined direction.
8. I'm embarrassed that I even need to mention this one because it's so bloody obvious, but get out of the way and let everyone off the train before you attempt to board. (Calling Malcolm Gladwell...why haven't you written a NYer article that explains the particularly brain dead human behavior of people crowding into subway cars and elevators before people have exited them?)
9. Get the hell out of my way, I'm coming through.
Meg and I went to see La Traviata last night at the Metropolitan Opera House. It was a lot of fun. The music, singing, sets, and costumes were amazing...and people actually yell "Bravo!" while cheering.
The Opera House itself, however, leaves a lot to be desired. It was built in the 60s as part of Lincoln Center, a center for the arts that pillaged other parts of the city of their arts venues and plopped them all in a massive complex on the Upper West Side. What were architects and interior designers thinking back in the 60s? Everything is fine when the house lights are down and the stage is alive with color and song, but as soon as the lights go on, I feel as though I'm sitting in the opera house equivalent of a 60s suburban living room. No sense of grandeur, no awe, just a design that didn't age
