Cooler than You: Stupid Things I Say and Do

So today I went on the hunt for a dresser.  I braved IKEA again, on the quest for something cheap and functional.  Perhaps this is where I should say I do not enjoy the vortex of IKEA.  the first time I went into an IKEA I was hobbling along on crutches as I had broken my foot.  Perhaps it was the pain pills, perhaps it was the July heat, perhaps it was the massive crowds that day . . . But, ever since I have detested the place. I'm just not a fan of winding through the vortex of IKEA, with only one way out--through more crap.  To make it even better all the furniture blurs into itself after about five minutes, and winding through the maze of assemble-yourself furniture of pressed wood and veneer it feels like a vortex has sucked you in.   Mixed in are rooms assembled with signs attesting that "This is rooms costs 1000."  Components share and match, and mix, and . . . scores of folks run about designing their room to look like something from the stor...

Blogging in traffic. Sometimes life has a funny way of working out. Six weeks ago I came back up to NY with wild hopes of staying and refinding my lost dreams of self-respect, redemption, and career. I guess persistence, fear, and shame paid off as I've landed adjunct lines, health insurance, and an apartment share. I emailed every call for adjuncts, and I hit up schools not advertising. I prayed under a star lit sky, along the shores of the island I once called home. In all reality, I never stopped calling NY home. Memories of spending nights in the city haunted and drove me on my quest to find my solace in the city of dirt, grime, dreams by the dozens. The classes kind of fell into place, and after a week of scouring Craigslist for housing I found something great. Of course, I had the handful of crazies and jerks, but persistence paid off as I didn't feel at home in College Point, Queens city, and Kew Gardens. I had secretly had my sights on the sometimes grimy but deeply...

As I sit in LGA waiting for an overdue departure to RIC, thoughts of mine continue to stir and echo. Two years ago I left NY two months after the premiere of the -Sex and the City- movie. I've never been a huge -Sex and the City- fan, but I did go see it with a friend. I groaned a bit while watching, feel in love with some shoes on the silver screen, and grew appalled at some of the story. Yet, Carrie going back to Big makes sense as they orbited around everyone. None-the-less... I will never say -Sex and the City- gave me an epiphany, but last night while watching it on HBO I couldn't help but laugh, sigh, and ponder. NY was my home not long after I moved, and it wasn't until the prolonged debacle with Jackass that I got irritable with Long Island. In all reality, I should admit what I have yet to do. I've always loved NY, much of my identity comes from it, and I've always enjoyed the residential enclaves of Queens. For years I spent an obscene amount of time i...

In May 1994 my Dad gave this to my Mom for Mother's Day. Okay, in reality he rescued her from neglect.  She was about a year and a half to two years old when we got her, she had lived with a cat for a year, so she was . . . She acted like a cat most of her life, tried to climb trees after squirrels, and chased my dog Charlie.  She taught him to climb on the back of our couch, which is why until his death the sofa had a permanent dip in the back.  Charlie died about six years ago, and she loved to hang on his fur and be carried around the house.  Best trick Muffin had, I had taught her to find Charlie for me.  Charlie was a medium sized dog, so the six comparison was amusing to say the least.  He was loud, chased lunch-meat trucks, and belched and farted on command.  My high school friends and I can take credit for that trick.   Sorry, I don't have one of the two of them on my computer.  Honestly, I don't have it in me to dig up ri...

Last week while watching "Project Runway," my Mom made mention (for about the hundredth time) that she can't stand Anthony. For those not in the know, he's the black and dramatic gay guy who talks and talks and talks. She does this lovely this shake and shudder thing while stating that she can't stand him. Even better for the drama around here. While she was carrying on about Anthony I started having flashbacks to when my brother would kiss her. You should know that Bubs was six foot two or so--somewhere in there--lanky and tooth less. Heh. Whenever he kissed Mom she would shudder, shake, cringe, and bellow "I got kissed by a boy." There's just no way to aptly describe it. I started laughing, Mom started laughing, and we looked at each other and mentioned Bubs at the same time. Laughing some more, she said it was a shame he wasn't around to watch this show with us. She wanted know what he would say about Anthony; as she referenced that he was wor...

Yup, it's that time of year when the reformed fundamentalist in me is thrilled not for peeps and candy coated eggs but for baseball. Eight-o-five pm tonight brings the best stress relief yet. It's the Yanks v. the Red Soxs. Sorry, I did remember that it's Easter too!

I'm coming back from another conference--this time St. Louis, for which I'll detail later--and I am never not amazed. There's the usual internationally weary eyed traveler asleep on the floor, the young children acting as sound birth control for anyone within a hundred miles, there's the religious minded praying before flight (more touching since today is Easter), and then ... there are a group of Phi Sigs. Yes, folks, that's fellow Phi Sigma Sigmas from the sorority I pledged in college. I'm watching there lettered shirts fill up a row of seats, hearing their incessant laughter, perhaps I'm smelling the remnants of their weekend, and my ears bleed from the singing. Oh. Dear. God. I refrain from complete jackassery, and showing my age, by not standing up and shouting "I have seniority in the hallowed walls of Phi Sig, so shut your pieholes!". Instead, I suck on a Diet Pepsi in the Detroit Airport's C concourse.