June 30, 2004
Go read "The Best Job in Town," in this week's New Yorker. I would link it, but alas the article is not online. It's all about American outsourcing, really informative, but not a lot of boring numbers and stats. You can also listen to this discussion with the author.
The Dizee Rascal/The Streets show the other night rocked. Oi! Celebrity sightings: Sophia Coppola, David Cross and Moby. Non celebrities, loose women and drunks filled the rest of Irving Plaza.
The Times identifies Snoop Dog as, "the rapper, actor and linguistic innovator, who added the suffix 'izzle' to the American lexicon..."
Off to VA for the long weekend. Happy 4th of July!
June 25, 2004
Wait, I forgot...While I was in Chicago, Jim went to see Bradford's new play The Morning Show and somehow ended up on stage. He really could not look more uncomfortable. But he did get an "I Survived the Blackout 2003" t shirt as his reward.
Time to waste? Here you go.
Make a living participating in focus groups. I myself have participated in multiple movie-reviewing focus groups, product-naming focus groups, and various market research groups.
Another admission - I have actually assembled some of these groups myself, to find out what people are thinking about say, the army, or accidentally poisoning themselves at home. I did not do this out of my innate curiosity.... Yes, it was a job. I have also worked as a "secret shopper" and I have been that person that calls you in the middle of dinner and asks you to take a "quick survey" which is actually 20 minutes worth of open-ended questions about toothpaste and bagels and random products.
For some reason the only survey I can remember clearly at the moment, is when Au Bon Pain was considering opening up in NYC and I had to call random city dwellers to ask them how they felt about pastries and croissants. My conclusion: most normal people have no strong feelings on the topic.
DMX arrested on carjacking charges at airport, while posing as an FBI agent. His lawyer explains it was a crack induced "misunderstanding."
Iggy Pop, The Strokes, The New York Dolls on August 14th on Randall's Island. Yay!
Powdered alcohol. You can snort your next shot of tequila. Amazing.
June 24, 2004
Camera still broken. But check it out: a link to pictures from Saturday night's karaoke blowout. Page three even has the shots of Ian and Liz that seemed to cause my camera to explode. Thanks Abby!
Went to see Super Size Me while in Boston on the weekend. Muy interesante. Have now actually thanked my parents for not letting me eat fast food growing up. Of course, compared to listening to years of constant and steady whining that everyone else's parents let them eat McDonalds, they didn't fall over themselves in appreciation for my accolades. I would have to catagorize their reaction as a somewhat subdued "we told you so".
June 21, 2004
Saturday was a fun, fun night. There was cake and drinking and singing. It was also one of the saddest nights on record recently. My beloved Canon Elph that has given me nothing but love and good times, died a very quick unglamorous death. At a karaoke party no less. While I was trying to capture Liz and Ian duetting on The Cure's Just Like Heaven! (Note to self: Just Like Heaven really raises the roof with an audience. Will add to personal karaoke list.)
Anyhow, it is my regretful duty to show you these two last shots:
And then nada...Somehow I got the camera to at least download the photos I got off before the demise.
June 18, 2004
Monte's Surprise! I know you want some. Pictures here.
June 16, 2004
When did Exene become Christene Edge?
Funny British people at the beach.
All you clean and sober druggies, pull out your wallets: the original Big Book is up for auction.
Good lord, I couldn't help but link this.
To view the Farenheit 9/11 trailer go here. Right wing groups have been attempting to intimidate film distributors and keep the movie out of theaters. Moveon.org is asking people to try to catch the film opening weekend if possible. So grab some popcorn and go watch Bush destroy the world.
June 8, 2004
Can I just say that all this Ronald Reagan crap is pissing me off? I am home watching Cops right now because Reagan is on every channel. I heard the post office will be closed on Friday as well. Huh?
Reagan was no friend of mine. So I could give a shit.
"Bush
should have died, not Reagan."
Words of wisdom from Morrissey
June 7, 2004
My first long walk in forever today. I got a spiffy new pedometer last week (free 'natch) but sadly found out that my walk home is only five miles instead of the six I previously thought. Alas, this means more time at the gym.
I've been at the Book Expo in Chicago for the past week. Chicago was cool and all but I found myself missing the stench of urine in the streets that makes NYC feel so much like home. I got to hang out with Tracy-kins who met me for dinner and brought me to a neighborhood in Chicago that has no name. Or at least she cannot name it and the random strangers we asked did not know either.
I got an advance copy of Malcolm Gladwell's new book Blink, autographed by the man himself. Another one of my intellectual crushes. And the book rocks. It won't be in book stores until January 2005, so go read the Tipping Point in the meantime if you haven't.
More small world stories: I was standing at our distributors booth and saw that they were displaying Ben's new book. I also arranged for them to give me the book after the show, but forgot to pick it up. I think Ben should send me one.
Oh, and then I stopped over at the Soft Skull table and picked up George Tabb's new book Playing Right Field: A Jew Grows in Greenwich. Apropos of nothing, I yelled out "I know George!" at which point all the booth workers pounced on me to tell me that he will be doing some sort of signing/show that involves the book and the club Continental and I don't know what else 'cos I wasn't entirely listening. But there you go.
I got home and members of PCP Roadblock were in my house. Shout out to the RVA! They were cracking me up with stories about the weekend and about driving around some random punk band of youngins on tour. Jim and the guys had joined Lisa & Jennie last Friday at Siberia to see The Sleazies. I missed out on my various worlds crashing together. Darn.
Which leads me to my other small-world story. Man, I enjoy telling these stories so much more than people like listening to them. Ok, many months ago someone, lets call her Jen, tricked me into signing up for My Space. Immediately, after not filling out my profile, I realized I just don't have the time in my life, or the mental space for Friendster-2 when I can't even stand using Friendster-1 anymore. And thus, I never went back.
Then one day I got an email from Sarah B., telling me that her email was down and that I had to email her through My Space. So I log in and look around and realize that all these people I know are in this database and they all have mini-blogs in there! Very stalk-worthy. So I waste like 3 hours running through friends, acquaintances, enemies and strangers' random musings until I run smack into Tony Bitch up in there. With a link to his band The Dirty Fingers. I went to his site and found a link for The Sleazies (that is the aforementioned band that played in NYC last Friday night, that I missed and yes, I know this story is too confusing) and I got all excited 'cos I recognized an old friend, Darga, in The Sleazies.
Obviously my life is none too exciting, ok? I am overly enthusiastic about the mundane. I am shocked every time I find out my friends know my friends or someone I know is doing something fun. I need a hobby.
So back to the activities that I missed: Lisa took this photo of Jim and Mike kissing that I pulled off her site.
My husband kisses boys.
Oh, and also on Lisa's site - the demise of Sweetwater. God, you go away for a week and look what happens. Sweetwater RIP.
Wait do you know that The Streets and Dizzee Rascal are at Irving Plaza on June 29th and 30th? That Courtney Love is doing Summer Stage on June 28th? Who's down? Email me.
I almost forgot, Don Wood has a site. It's pretty sparse, but go show him some love anyway.
What's good from Fresh Direct? The Parbaked Rosemary Ciabatta Mini Loaf. I seriously do not remember ordering it, as I can hardly pronounce it (FYI: its a bread substance) but, yum... good. Georgetti calls it Yuppie Direct. I can't imagine why.
Please, watch what you eat.
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