Haunted House

I was talking with one of my downstairs neighbors yesterday evening - it was one of those nice, cool days and the dogs were playing and we were having a cold drink - when out of the blue she tells me years ago, just before she moved in, there was an explosion in my apartment.

It was so big that it blew crap from the apartment out into the woods behind it, damaged all the other apartments in the building. Whoever was living in the apartment at the time was apparently on oxygen AND smoking and fell asleep with the cigarette still lit. The person, quite obviously, died in the apartment.

This is the first place I've lived in where I KNOW one of the previous occupants died. It's definitely not the oldest place I've lived in — my last apartment was on the national register of historic places (and it's the only time in my life I've seen, what I guess was, a ghost). I assume people have died in apartments before, but never so horrendously. Blown up? Who gets blown up in their own apartment?

So now I'm all paranoid my apartment will turn out to be haunted. At least that would explain why my door keeps getting unlocked and windows opened. I always thought it was an apartment complex employee checking on something. But they usually leave notes when they were here.

Anyone else have dead people in their apartments?

South Street Seaport

You know what I like about this place? It's chintzy. It's cheesy. It looks like it should be in Pensacola or somewhere else on the Gulf.

They have really bad musicians playing for tips and they serve beer and drinks in ridiculously large souvenir plastic contraptions out of little wooden shacks. You can buy all the overpriced T-shirts and knick knacks you could want. Even the "mall" part of it is woefully reminiscent of places where we vacationed in my childhood. In short it's not as sleek and shiny as the rest of Manhattan.

Right across the street, however, is a nice, upscale lifestyle-center-type shopping area with cobblestone streets, et al. Shouldn't that be enough to fill your credit cards with happiness?

Apparently not.

(AP) A new plan to redevelop Manhattan's South Street Seaport calls for a 42-story apartment and hotel tower and additional open space.

The developer, General Growth Properties, said Wednesday that its plan would evoke the Seaport's maritime heritage while providing needed amenities to continue to attract tourists and benefit the community.

The centerpiece of the new plan would be the 42-story hotel and residential tower at the foot of Pier 17. The plan also calls for replacing the three-level shopping mall that now covers most of the East River pier with a pedestrian walk, and two smaller hotels and a cluster of two-story retail buildings.

The plan must be reviewed by the city's Landmarks Preservation Commission.

I Saw Your Nanny (for real!)

Y'all! SERIOUSLY!!!! Only in New York would this site exist. Seriously. I warn you. It's like crack. You will NOT be able to stop reading it once you start. So don't click on the link unless you have plenty of time on your hands!

Sexism without sexism

There's an article in the New York Times today about the media's (allegedly) sexist approach to covering Hillary Clinton's campaign. It was pretty evident from the beginning I think. Though I also agree with the person in the article that says, she ran a fundamentally flawed campaign. I think her campaign was bad and people just don't like her - though that is true of every woman in a powerful position, like Nancy Pelosi in the House or Zoe Cruz at Morgan Stanley or even Anna Wintour at Vogue.

However, regardless of whether you agree or disagree that the media coverage was sexist, you have to agree that this statement is ridiculous:

Keith Olbermann, the host of “Countdown” on MSNBC, said that while there were “individual, sexist, mistakes,” there was no overall sexism.

What? You can't have it both ways, Keith. There can't be sexism and NOT sexism. Just because the act of denigrating women is so fundamentally ingrained in the human psyche that we don't realize we're being sexist, doesn't mean there isn't a persistent and deep-seeded problem.

If you were to ask my executive editor if he was sexist, if he treated his female employees as lesser beings, if he felt their place was in the home (or maybe in features) would he say yes? No, he would not. But if you asked his female employees the same question, do you know what their answer would be? An unequivocal YES. Yes from the fact that the number of women in the newsroom has dwindled dramatically since his arrival. Yes from the fact he treats us with disdain, if he treats us at all. Yes from the fact we are paid far less than our male counterparts. Yes from the comments on women's appearance in the newsroom.

People need to realize that sexism isn't dead. It's just resting its eyes.

East Sider

This ridiculous burger is called the East Sider and in addition to 7oz of beef also has ham AND bacon on it, as well as mushrooms, cheese, fried onions and is impossible to put into your mouth as served. This my brother discovered the hard way.

It is one of the many burgers served at Jackson Hole diner, which has eight locations around NYC, including one conveniently located near LaGuardia and thus is good for taking friends and family who arrive in on late night flights because you work till 10 p.m. and can't get off work early to go pick them up.

I've also eaten at one of their other locations on the east side (I did not at that time have the East Sider. I actually had a turkey burger.) It was an odd location, in the basement of a building on what looked like a residential stretch of street. Looking in, it seems all there is a counter, but around the corner there's a think hallway-like room that is crammed with tables. That locations seems to do a big business in to go orders. As opposed to the LaGuardia location, which does a lot of city bus traffic.

Anyway, on the afore mentioned visit with my brother I had the much more modest Western Burger...


...with cheese, BBQ sauce, bacon and fried onions, and which unfortunately came out raw in the center. They recooked it. But I wound up taking it home. Once nuked in my microwave, I felt pretty safe about eating it.

Brooklyn Bridge in summer

Beacon Art (Live)

A few weekends ago, Beacon, which has become a weekend destination for art lovers from the city, held a live art-making event called Electric Windows. Twenty-four street artist descended on the city in May to create live artwork outside for passer-bys to see. The work was then hung on the exterior - where the windows once were - of an old electric blanket factory at the foot of Mount Beacon.

I was, of course, working during the event and thus missed it. But the art is still up and I got by the other day to look at it.

A few closer-ups follow:

Mississippi Picnic in Central Park

Saturday was the 29th annual Mississippi Picnic in Central Park, which I've spent years reading about, but this was my first actual foray to the event.

The giant event brings ex-pats from Mississippi together in Central Park for a giant reunion of sorts that usually attended by the governor of Mississippi and other dignitaries. Live blues music serves as the entertainment - along with the watermelon seed spitting contest. No. I'm serious. And they serve up catfish from Yazoo City. (They require a "donation" of $10 for the food, which makes me laugh. I've notice in New York the idea of a required donation is rampant. My brother suggested it must be a way around the tax laws. I say if it's required then it's a fee or the ticket price - what it most certainly is not, is a donation.)

It was fairly disappointing. Though, I have to admit we were late getting there. It started at noon and was supposed to last till 6 p.m., but when we got there around 2 p.m., they were already out of catfish and people were drifting away. We did enjoy sitting outside in the Mississippi-eque heat of 98 degrees (though it WAS cooler in the shade) and drinking iced tea from McAlister's, though.

Ironically, Saturday was also the date of the LSU alumni associations Crawfish Boil. That event, however, cost $60 - though you did get all you can eat crawfish and Abita beer. Still, it was a little too rich for my blood. Maybe next year I'll be able to save up enough to go.

Bannerman Castle

In the middle of the Hudson River, somewhere between Cold Spring and Beacon, there is a castle on an island.

This may sound incredible, but it's true.

It's not a very old castle, as far as castles go. And this one was built to house munitions. Around 1920, what you might imagine happening where one stores munitions, happens. Explosion.

On this very same island, the owner of the arsenal had a home. It did not explode. But if you see the house now, you would think that something similar took place. They say, the Bannerman family used it until the 1940s, but to look at it, you'd think it'd been abandoned a LOT longer than that. I mean, there are castles in Scotland (the homeland of Mr. Bannerman) which are much older and in much better shape.

Anyway, I'm supposed to be writing a travel story about my recent tour there. Instead, I'm writing this blog entry about it.

For someone who claims to love writing, I sure hate doing it!