Top headlines in New York today

"At Least One Killed by Crane Collapse in Manhattan"

"The Girls Are Back in Town" (re: Sex & the City)

Ah, New York. So dysfunctional.

Do I feel stimulated? Oh Yeah.

Today I am officially the last person on earth to receive their economic stimulus check from the government (some orphans in Peru got theirs before I did, or so I hear). And in honor of this day, I give you howispentmystimulus.com, which was started by some guy in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and is a hilarious and true account of how Americans are spending their money.

One of my favorites features a table full of whiskey bottles and the following entry from Andrew in St. Louis:

"After the economic stimulus package was signed into law, I pledged to spend my stimulus money on one of the few well made American products left - Kentucky whiskey."

But my all time favorite was one from Sybann in Raleigh, who sent in a picture of a super, turbo-charged vacuum and this description:

“This is the George W. Bush Memorial Dyson. I wanted to buy something that will suck as hard and for as long as this administration.”

As for how I will spend my stimulus? Hellooooo, Spain!


Who's with me?

The Garden of Wedding Dresses

So on Sunday I went wedding dress shopping.

I wasn't buying; one of my reporters who is getting married in August was, so don't panic that you've missed some major announcement in my life. You most definitely have not.

We went to this appointment only place called The Bridal Garden, wherein rich people have donated their old dresses and they are resold. The profit (it's a non-profit bridal dress shop) goes to support New York City school children. Or at least that is what is claimed.

I thought the address sounded familiar (and the doorman looked familiar, actually). But it wasn't until I got off the elevator and saw the paint job in the hallway that I realized that a few floors down was where my friend Steven has his offices. That was a little disconcerting.

But not nearly as disconcerting as the mad house INSIDE the Bridal Garden. They had way overbooked the day and let someone in who did not have an appointment. So my friend had to start changing behind a screen in the main room that did not really cover her. Also the window were behind her and there were no blinds on the. Granted, we were on the ninth floor, but still, there were lots of buildings around us with nine floors as well. I'll cut to the chase and tell you that my friend tried on seven or eight dresses, but didn't find anything she really liked. More disappointing to her was the complete lack of attention paid to her by the staff. She was looking forward to some advice from someone who knows what they're doing, as opposed to me going, "The waist on that dress looks a little funny."

While all of this was going on, the drama playing out beside me was as follows:

Bride-to-be #1: Looked like a little doll. She had a dress that looked like she should be on top of a cake. However, she had come with her fiance, who the shop made wait outside in the hallway. Every time she wanted his opinion, they would have to go get him. She wound up buying the dress.

Bride-to-be #2: Came out with them most stunning dresses I had ever seen. The first one she tried on, I fell in love with and after she put it back on the rack, I seriously considered buying it, even though I have no wedding planned in the near future and no hope of one. Each subsequent dress (except for one - a halter top that fit weird) was more amazing than the last. She had her mother with her, who was very southern and I had a weird flashback to the process when a high school friend got married. She did not buy a dress.

Bride-to-be #3: Getting married in six weeks. Bought the most hideous dress I could imagine. It looked like someone's grandmother's "good" tablecloth, but sparkle-y. She was loud (didn't have an appointment), tried on 30 dresses (NO LIE), called everyone she knew to tell them about the dress. Took pictures with her camera phone and sent it to everyone. Discussed ad nauseam how, "I think I love this dress!" Told us several times in a normal speaking voice - because she had lowered her voice from loud to normal as if imparting a secret - "and it only costs $600!" She was there with her mother, who looked exhausted and disinterested. Became a really bad stereotype when she started saying something about her rabbi. I lied to her and told her it was a great dress. But it wasn't a great dress. It was hideous.

We're doing this again in June. I hope she finds a dress soon. I don't know how many of these other brides I can put up with.

Spring, my a**

We're mid way through May and the heat is still on at my apartment complex.

How is that even right? When is the warm weather ever going to get here?!

Again with the friggin' movies

So AGAIN this Sunday what do I encounter as I try to navigate my way around Grand Central? A movie crew. This time they were blocking my exit and taking up the street corner where I was supposed to be meeting my ride.

I wrongly assumed it was the same movie as the weekend before. (Damn, I thought, this movie must be almost entire set at Grand Central for these guys to be here again. Either that, or they are WAY behind their shooting schedule.)

Instead:
On Sunday, May 11, filming of the remake of The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3 will result in street closures in and around Grand Central Terminal throughout the day, particularly along East 42nd St between Madison Ave and Lexington Ave.

This movie stars Denzel Washington and John Travolta and is set for a 2009 release date.

Sadly no photos on the Internet for this one.

This time I saw no one's back. But I was extremely annoyed by the stupid flacks who kept trying to "move us along" the sidewalk. They kept telling people to move along. I did not move along as I was waiting for my ride. And actually no one said anything to me, which I guess was weird and too bad. I was all prepared to do battle and tell the chickie with headsets who thought she owned the streets and sidewalks of all of New York that the only way I would move is if she had one of the nice gentlemen in blue with the guns come over and ask me to move.

Oh well. There went my chance of being arrested on the set of a Denzel Washington movie.

Gas Gone Wild

When I went to work yesterday, regular unleaded gas was priced at $3.81 a gallon.

When I came home from work, it was $3.89.

WTF?!

More on me

So the Sunday interview lasted all of 40 minutes. I wasn't sure how I did at first, but later in the day as I reflected back it felt like they were trying to impress me.

Today I got an e-mail asking if I could come back on Monday at noon for a tryout. Now I have to re-teach myself QuarkXPress in a week. How do I get myself into these situations? Well, at least I don't have any major projects going on at work.

More on Clive Owen

I didn't take these pictures and this wasn't even the scene I saw (back of scene I saw). They were in a totally different part of Grand Central when I happened upon them.

But as we covered already I didn't even know what was going on, so I definitely didn't take any pictures. I just stole these off someone else's blog; someone who DID stop and take photos. Smart girl.

Update: Blog2

Because you've been following this blogging saga with baited breath...

We bloggers received this in an e-mail today. (As if someone is reading this blog. Ah the power of Bucky! Or more likely, the same thought occurred to everyone simultaneously.)

Meantime, though, I should have mentioned before, even as I did sing your praises, that we got A LOT of submissions for this job. (Thanks, Craigslist!) Though there are a lot of YOU -- more than we planned! -- we changed our plans BECAUSE we liked you each so much, and MANY people, though we appreciated every submission, did not make the cut. Just wanted to give you some warm fuzzies to last you this week.

Movie Obstacle Course

In addition to the Five Boro Bike Tour, which tied up traffic like crazy today (so I couldn't drive into the city for my interview), they were inexplicably shooting a movie at Grand Central.

So half the place was corralled off and every time I tried to get where I needed to go, some young woman with a headset would come up to me and say, "Uh, excuse me ma'am. We're shooting a movie. Can you go another way?"

I was all like, "No I can't go another way. That's the only way to get from here to the 7 train!" Apparently I was the only person trying to get anywhere in Grand Central. Everyone else was just standing there transfixed, staring at the back of some guy in a suit. I don't know who it was. It didn't seem to matter to those gawking if the person was famous. They were just awed by the big, bright lights I think.

Anyway, I finally did make it to the 7 train.


(Oh and by today, I meant Sunday. It's after midnight as I'm writing this post, so it will pop up under Monday. Don't be confused. No one is filming in Grand Central on a Monday...at least not while the trains are running.)

Happy Birthday, Pete Seeger

Today is Pete Seeger's 89th birthday. How did he spend the day? How do you expect? Protesting the war in Iraq, as he does almost every Saturday I drive to work. Today he was wearing a yellow slicker because of the rain and looking like that guy on the box of fish sticks. I should have taken his photo while I was stopped at the stoplight at the corner of Routes 9 and 9D. But of course that didn't occur to me until I had driven away.

So instead I present to you this photo from an event held here Wednesday night:



I'm telling you, Pete Seeger plays every event in this town. I could hold a barbecue and say, "Pete, do you want to come play at my barbecue for peace?" And he'd be there.

Today is also my grandfather's birthday. But he didn't make it to 89. He died of Alzheimer's when I was in college.

I suppose in hindsight, that wasn't the best way to end a post.

Update on that other blog

It appears that BreakupGirl.net just let anyone who sent them sample blogs become a blogger because now they've decided to use a "team" of us, which is fine because it means less work. But when they said team, I thought they meant three or four. There are 10 of us (thus the conclusion that anyone who has ever visited the site is now a blogger). And it is a crazy group. We had to introduce ourselves via e-mail to one another. At first everyone seemed to be New York-based, which was nice. I thought I could potentially develop some friends from the group. Most of the seemed to be in media or the arts. But the second half was from more varied locations and backgrounds - a sixteen-year-old from Buffalo, a woman that works for a Jewish cultural group in D.C., a gay female "sex worker" from San Fransisco (I don't if that's good ole fashion streetwalker or porn star or other.)

Only one of us (not me) has started blogging though, because the two people who run the blog are in transition and haven't really instructed us what to do. One is moving to Israel for six months. And I think the other one is just moving...I can't really remember what he was doing.

They want to break us up by beats - someone doing celebrity gossip, someone doing books, movies, news items, etc. I don't know if there are enough beats to go around for 10 people, though. I mean, it's not like there's cops and courts or environment or IBM to be covered. Should be interesting how it plays out.

Sunday

I have a job interview. On Sunday. Is that weird? I'm not the only one who finds that weird right?

The Sunday part, that is. Not that I'd be able to land a job interview.

Always with the noise

As you know from my previous post I was dead tired upon my return. So, of course, yesterday morning at 7:30 my upstairs neighbor's alarm went off...for four hours. He's done this before and I've talked to him about it, but I guess he doesn't care enough to remember to turn the thing off when he's spending the night elsewhere. It takes about four hours for it to finally release nobody is coming to turn it off and then it shuts itself off. In the meantime, I had to relocate to the futon because it is so loud in my bedroom, sleep - even when one is bone tired -is impossible.

Then THIS morning, I got woken up at 8:30 a.m. because they've finally started deconstruction of my balcony (next comes reconstruction). They were supposed to have done this two weeks ago, but are behind schedule. I thought for sure they would finish it while I was gone and I'd miss it. But I have no such luck. So now, for the rest of the week balcony construction. Great. It shakes the whole apartment, that work. Not to mention it's weird to have men hanging right outside the sliding glass door. I'm so glad I finally got curtains.

It is never quiet in New York. Not even here in the 'burbs.