Right now, the "web…blah…log" is not being updated regularly, but feel free to peruse the archive, and check out our carefully selected highlights from Season One, Season Two, and Season Three.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

a christmas warning

So here we are.
I should be happy. It’s my silver blog-iversary! This is blog entry number 25. (And they said we wouldn’t last...)
But my brow is furrowed.
I am in the midst of a conundrum. A conundrum that is sweetened and buzzed by this mug of creamy Williams-Sonoma hot chocolate that I am nursing, but a conundrum nonetheless. 
The sun has set, the chill is deep, and Christmas Eve looms. So it begs the question: What shall I give to you, dear reader(s), on this, our first blog-iday together? I have no gift to bring, pa rum pa pum pum. And our relationship is still so new, not even four months old, and we all know how tricky that can be. A blog about my childhood is too personal, too soon. A blog about that sandwich I just ate is too superficial for the holidays. 
So perhaps it’s time I dust off something special from my personal archives.

Monday, December 20, 2010

silent night

So here we are.
It’s a silent night. Which is a good thing.
See, this is the first December in a very long time -- I daresay since preschool -- where I have not sung a single Christmas song in a concert or benefit or the like. So, in trying to fill that little auditory hole, I have accompanied this year’s card-writing and gift-wrapping and general all-around living with the many various holiday music channels available out there. 
This was a shift from the norm: limiting such music to my own traditional Christmas playlist that was built years ago on John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together and Vince Guaraldi’s A Charlie Brown Christmas, and has been augmented through the years with Phil Spector’s A Christmas Gift For You, The Butties’ 12 Greatest Carols, and various specialty singles: Dean, Wham!, Frank, Bing... they are comfort and joy year after year, my iPod’s seasonal street soundtrack, played when I am out and about.
But I wanted to shake things up during this different little Christmas.

Sunday, December 12, 2010

mister steve martin

So here we are, in my head, on December 5, 2010:
ME: I want to do this, but I don’t want to do this. I’m a little afeared.
MYSELF: I know.
ME: I’ve always wanted to meet Steve Martin.
MYSELF: You love Steve Martin.
ME: Everyone loves Steve Martin. This is more than that. This is... this is...
MYSELF: You can’t win this, you know. This word game. There’s no correct, non-creepy word for your feelings about Steve Martin.
ME: I’m not a stalker. I’m not crazy.
MYSELF: Then why are you wearing that hat?

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

magic

So here we are. 
What a magical time in which we live. We carry the world in our pockets and hold the computing power of a hundred Apollo spacecrafts in our hands. What used to take up entire rooms and floors of office buildings in Don Draper’s day are now parked on any given lap at Starbucks, with a latte on the side. (Back then, one would probably assume that “a latte” was the title of Dean Martin’s latest hit.)
It’s not like the way it used to be. No sir. Things are way better now. It’s magic, I tells ye. (I say that in my best 1890s prospector voice.)

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

lordy

So here we are.
I can’t remember exactly how old I was when I first saw black birthday balloons on someone’s mailbox during a Saturday headed-to-another-garage-sale drive, but I know I was young and/or naïve enough to wonder if that wasn’t gonna be the best funeral ever. 
And as the Reagan era marched along and the boomers-turned-yuppies waved their flags extra fast due to cocaine jitters and decided that blisters and foot odor were small prices to pay for style in the form of sockless loafers, more black balloons appeared on suburban mailboxes, accompanied by matching streamers, bunting, and yard signs, all screaming the same slogan:
“LORDY LORDY, SOMEONE’S 40!”
The proliferation of Over-the-Hill birthday decorations was my introduction to gallows humor. Oh, I get it, I thought, like an alien observing some new planet’s civilization, they’re laughing about the fact that the birthday boy’s/girl’s life is over! That’s funny and sad! Like a clown! Which is appropriate for a birthday!

Friday, November 26, 2010

wee smalls

So here we are.
Some people get up at 5 AM. Some people go to sleep at 5 AM. But I think there is one thing that both groups of people can agree upon: that after the clock gets dialed back to standard time, there is no darker, colder hour in New York City than 5 AM.
Except 4 AM.
Make no mistake: this city does indeed sleep. I think that Kander and Ebb meant that there’s always someone awake in New York, New York; it sleeps, just not all at the same time.

Monday, November 22, 2010

50% chance

So here we are.
50%. It can mean so many things. Half. Half full. Half empty. Hours to go before your phone’s battery dies. A coin’s flip. An F grade. A fighting chance for life. Enough grays to require the permanent hair dye. Splitting the check, the profits, the assets. Reduction. A huge supply of your daily requirement of fiber. 
I am growing concerned. Over the last few days, it has been forecasted that there is a 50% chance of rain on Thanksgiving. Now all of a sudden, 50% only means yes, definitely, count on it. 
I am still aware that a 50% chance of rain means that there is also a 50% chance that it will not rain. But it’s going to rain. I just know it. 

Friday, November 19, 2010

punch line television

So here we are.
Remember Hee-Haw
I remember watching this, or should I say, I remember being forced to watch this back in the era of single-television households, when I was a kid. Cheap, syndicated corn-fed laughs served up on giant hay bales by toothless hicks in overalls and busty farmer’s daughter-types spilling out of their gingham, floating on hooch fumes and sticky with sweet chicken-fried metaphors you could sop up with a biscuit.
And Benny Hill? That was another one I was forced to sit through. Cheap, syndicated tweed cap-topped laughs served up with a side of steak and kidney pie by bawdy old Brits in derbies and busty young birds spilling out of their nurse’s uniforms, awash in Guinness and double-entendres, and somehow always ending with a fast-forwarded chase featuring character actors in various states of undress that ultimately makes one wonder what took us so durned long to break from our motherland’s monarchy.

Monday, November 15, 2010

full

So here we are.
I sit here immobile, ever spreading, in front of a box of long-awaited nirvana. I am thoroughly stuffed, but I continue to cram ‘em down, one after the other, as life goes on outside my window. I am bleary-eyed and silent. It’s all so rich and delicious that my heart is about to explode.
I speak of course about the complete series of The Larry Sanders Show, finally out on DVD. Yes, we’d purchased the first season when it was released ages ago, as well as the “Not Just The Best Of” discs that came out a few years after that, and I’d even caught a few in a brief window on Hulu this past spring. But it wasn’t enough. They were appetizers, tiny snacks on the banquet table, mixed nuts with hardly any cashews or pecans. There was no possible way to be totally satiated until we had every single episode in front of us, densely packed, on a platter.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

brave or stupid

So here we are.
Recently, I had a tough call to make, and as I was deliberating, I came to the realization that I was teetering on the high wire between bravery and stupidity.
(I would say that there’s a fine line between bravery and stupidity, but once you sing a certain lyric that is captured on an album, you can never say it without someone giggling and pointing and telling you, “hey - you said that thing you sang!” So thus I have to be a little more creative in my phrasing... and I am aware that the high wire thing may not be the most accurate metaphor. Apologies to all circus employees.) 
Continuing... 

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

robots

So here we are.
The robots woke me up this morning. Of course, this being Election Day, it was to be expected. The robots have been busy this fall. They robo-call a lot. I hate them.
Remember when the thought of a robot calling you seemed like an incredibly exciting prospect? So futuristic! So cool! Cooler even, than my Speak-n-Spell! (It speaks! It spells!)
You know, “hate” is such a strong word. I don’t really hate the robots. It’s hard to truly hate something that has no capacity to comprehend or respond to the hate, making it a complete waste of perfectly good time and hate. Plus, there’s way too much hate floating out there right now and I’m not going to add to it with something as silly as robots and their super-dialing powers. 

Monday, October 25, 2010

the true meaning of halloween

So here we are. 
I know there’s no Superman. I know there’s no Santa Claus. And that’s fine.
But I really wish Linus was real sometimes.
Linus, you know, from Peanuts. Not to be a philosophical smart-ass sidekick, and not to hang around sucking his thumb, but to once in a while come in and say the thing that needs to be said and remind us all what the true meaning of something is. He was good at that, because he did it succinctly and without injecting personal spin on it. When he quoted that Bible passage in A Charlie Brown Christmas, he didn’t paraphrase or add a “Jesus is the Reason For the Season!” or anything like that. He calmly trotted in, did the job, made us think, and then that magnificent Vince Guaraldi music kicked in and we saw commercials for Dolly Madison cakes (now owned by Hostess) and Peter Paul Almond Joy and Mounds bars (now owned by Hershey). 

Monday, October 18, 2010

zombie reply (not "brains")

So here we are.
I read a comment tonight from a guy named Jared regarding my October 7 entry, “Zombies:”
“Yes, it’s true, zombies are certainly reliable folks.  Having made a life long study of zombies, I can say this with confidence.  However, can one really have respect for someone who is so insecure about themselves that they resort to the most brutal form of peer pressure imaginable?  What else can it be called, when a group of people lash out, en masse, against any person who doesn’t conform to their standards of drooling, rotting and brain eating.  The zombie’s conformist mentality is cruel as it is absolute.  If you thought high school was bad, imagine being swarmed, gnawed on and disemboweled, just because you didn’t limp or moan like everyone else, and just like high school; judgment is nearly inescapable.  My point is this; while zombies may be honest and straight forward, how can one maintain respect for a group that is completely intolerant of anyone outside their own peer group?  While I may personally admire their honesty, I cannot respect them on the whole, at least not until they can learn to accept others for who they are, and not just mindlessly attack them.”
Jared, I must thank you for your comment and respond.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

winners

So here we are.
There is nothing in the world like watching somebody win. I had dinner last night with a friend and his two friends, neither of whom I had met before. In the middle of dinner, one of the friends suddenly pushed his chair back and hollered in victory: he had just gotten a big theatre job. I had only met the guy an hour earlier, but I was so thrilled by his news and his win that I embraced him. 
We live in a country that loves to win. Even when we’re not winning, we pretend that we are. We chant “We’re Number One,” not always because some official ranking has placed us in the top slot, and also because no one wants to chant “We’re Number Six.” Even if it’s six out of a million, which is still undoubtedly impressive. In other words, silver medals are pretty, and hey, good for you, but... hmmm. 

Thursday, October 7, 2010

zombies

So here we are.
I’ve come to the realization that the only people you can respect anymore are zombies. I’m not saying I particularly like zombies, but I respect them.  Not that I’ve had a lot of experience encountering zombies, (or any, really) but even my limited exposure to zombies via films and television and pop culture in general has convinced me that zombies are our last pure souls on Earth.
I understand that using the words “zombies” and “pure souls” in the same sentence is a tad unorthodox, to say the least, but hear me out. It’s simple, really.
Zombies will always tell you exactly what they want. No false pretenses, no stammering, no awkward pauses. They just come right out and groan it:
They want brains.

Thursday, September 30, 2010

rain comin' on

So here we are.
It’s that time of day where light would normally be pouring in our windows, but the apartment is eerily dark. It’s one of those days where the sky is about to rip open with water pouring down in a seemingly endless supply. 
Tangent:  I can’t believe I am living in an age where the words “tornado” and “New York City” are being used with some degree of regularity in the last two weeks. 
Back to it.
I am fascinated by weather sometimes. Not that I have any sort of scientific bent. I am plain old stupid when it comes to science. Even watching Alton Brown explain the most basic scientific principles of baking makes my head hurt a little. Just get to the good eats, Alton. 
Tangent: I like Alton Brown. I really do. I actually secretly like that he tries to make learning fun by having people dress up as proteins and acids and bases. And I’m not totally stupid, just mostly stupid. I really do want to learn what he’s talking about, but I’m not sure if that part of my brain works anymore. Maybe my brain is too distracted by the yummy pretty tasty food for absorption to occur. I’d try to prove that theory, but again... stupid.
Back to it.

Friday, September 24, 2010

historical musing

So here we are.
Back in ancient times, people used to jot down ideas not on electronic computerized tablets, but rather on pulverized and processed wood pulp, or, as it was once more commonly called, paper. These written musings were known as analog texts, or “notes,” and can still be found today through careful excavation of late 20th century filing cabinets and shoe boxes dating all the way back to 1996. 
With the aid of a writing implement such as a pen, pencil, marker, or other such stylus containing transferable inks, dyes, or clays that would cling to the paper, a person could create a portable, albeit rudimentary means of communication. These “notes” served many purposes. They could remind one of an appointment, or groceries required. They could serve as a remembering tool for profound thoughts and ideas that would otherwise be forgotten.

Monday, September 20, 2010

price of age

So here we are.
We’re sitting on the sofa watching the first episode of the 39th season of The Price is Right. It’s like New Year’s Day for my husband. He’s so happy. 
Not as happy as when I found him the skinny Sony ECM-51 microphone just like the one Bob Barker and Gene Rayburn used. But pretty darned happy.

Friday, September 17, 2010

15 years

So here we are.
Today I celebrated 15 years of marriage to my dear sweet husband.
And it occurs to me that we could be celebrating 15 years and one-half hour were it not for a Hell’s Angels road rally that blocked traffic on First Avenue that morning, with our officiant stuck in traffic as it passed. 
How do I know there was a Hell’s Angels road rally up First Avenue? Because as I anxiously waited for the call to come up from the bridal suite to the 26th floor of the Beekman Tower Hotel and walk down the aisle, I stared out the window at the gray, rainy streets below. Chopper after chopper, hog after hog they came in an endless parade past the United Nations. Not something you see every Sunday while you’re wearing a wedding dress. Of course, in New York City, all bets are off. 

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

september song

So here we are.
Maybe I was Jewish in another life. 
I say this because whenever Rosh Hashanah rolls around, I am reminded of how many Septembers have marked new beginnings for me. Elementary, middle, and high school always started the day after Labor Day, never in August. It was such an exciting time, getting ready to go back to school to some hotly anticipated newness; that is, until I actually did go back and realized within minutes that nothing and no one had changed. Happy New Year to me. 
Even my beloved Northwestern, on the quarter system instead of semesters, began their school year deep in September. Those particular Septembers were special, what with my years at NU being so magically liberating, but I particularly recall the one in which I was the Burger King Employee of the Month. (Fascinating and Useless Fact: I was only a sitting Employee of the Month for one day, since I had to go back to school. They awarded it early.) Even the end of that particular adventure was in and of itself an exciting new beginning: the beginning of a life where I no longer had to work at Burger King. That is saying something.

Friday, September 10, 2010

web...blah...clown

So here we are. And hey, it’s my blog’s week-iversary!
I had a little thought: blogs are kind of like clowns.
Blogs and clowns are cheap, low-rent entertainment for the masses. Oh, sure, there are serious blogs, just as there are serious clowns. The New York Times even has blogs on their website, but some of them are actually more like columns that don’t get printed in the physical paper (kind of like clown college, if you will), and some of their blogs are just little snippets that they keep churning out throughout the day... like so many clowns coming out of a car.
Blogs, like clowns, want to be seen. They’re everywhere in this circus we call the World Wide Web. They honk and juggle and fall down, all to get your attention. Clowns get hit by pies. Blogs about pies get hits. 

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

beautiful day

So here we are. 
Not to be so clichéd that I have to resort to quoting a legendary tourism campaign, but I love New York. I adore it. I even heart it. Especially on a beautiful day. Oh, there is nothing like a truly beautiful day in New York City. There are beautiful days in other cities, it’s true, but the ones in NYC are special, due in part to their rarity and in other part to the fact that the not-so-beautiful days are so horrendous to slog through that the beautiful days are magnificently amplified by comparison.
You know the kind of day I’m talking about. Blue sky. 68-72 degrees. Sunshine. Humidity barely registering. The barometer’s high as an elephant’s eye. Just enough breeze to caress your hair. The buildings sparkle, the trees pop. Even the pigeons smile. When the weather gods pat my dear city on the head and kiss the summer stench away, it’s a glorious place to be. 

Monday, September 6, 2010

tired

So here we are. 
I have several levels of tired. (One might say that my tired is tiered. (Sorry. That was uncalled for.)) Some of them result in utter hilarity, especially when I try to speak and the words of a thousand monkeys at a thousand typewriters emanate forth in no particular order. 
But then there is the level of tired where I am too spent to even attempt speech. Last night was one of those nights. 

Sunday, September 5, 2010

a nice little story

So here we are. 
...or were, about a week ago.  It was a hot day, and now it was a hot night.  
I trudged to the subway, homeward bound, lugging my life in my shoulder bag. Not wanting to bob and weave through the throng of tourists on 42nd Street, I took 43rd, tumbleweeds by comparison. I was sticky and tired and just plain done.
And that’s when he stopped me.  He, him, the nondescript one, appearing seemingly out of nowhere but actually from behind a parked car. 

Friday, September 3, 2010

welcome to me



Rats. 
I want to find the perfect opener, to begin all of my postings. Like Army Archerd’s “GOOD MORNING” in his old Daily Variety column. I poached that when I did the Playbill.com guest blog - crediting the man, of course - and I enjoyed that bit of consistency and identification. Kind of like how Stan Lee must feel whenever he signs his autographs with “Excelsior!” It’s so damned perfect, and uniquely him. I’ve had that problem with autographs, too, for the few people who’ve wanted them. I never know what to sign in front of my name. Stan Lee never has to worry about whether signing it “best wishes” is too cliché or if “xoxo” is too cutesy. 
Yes. I know who Stan Lee is. And yes, I am a girl.