Tuesday, November 29, 2005
"But you live in New York!" only works to a point
Tomorrow evening we say goodbye to this luckless apt forever.
To its credit, I suppose there were a few bright spots. A rundown:
+ Pretty blue walls, self-painted
+ TV, microwave
+ Hardwoods w/ minimal buckling
+ Shower in the bathroom (vs. in the kitchen)
+ Proximity to bus line
And now, the flip:
- Damp walls = peeling paint (hardly pretty)
- Fuses blown daily
- Bathroom suited for a 1/2 person
- Living in fear of cancelled electricity
- Living in fear of returning home to changed locks
- Living in fear that growling-man would find a way in
- Dollbed
- Mid-sized cockroaches (~5 sightings)--thanks, at least in part, to certain tenants' uncontained food-garbage (classy)
- Hearing our cross-hall neighbor smooth-talk the ladies at 3 a.m.
- Long-ass trek to the train
- Long hairy bugs as yet unclassified by entomologists
Let's hear it for the cons!
Good riddance, 1A.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
Balance
I can't recall having enjoyed a long w/e more than I have this one. A hushed Thanksgiving dinner w/ Pea and two new friends at Old Devil Moon, complete w/ fried catfish and peanut butter pie (special request!); a brisk evening walk through the neighborhood, four eyes peeking out from beneath thick scarves and the puffiest of puffy coats; the discovery of the greatest sake bar of all time (ok, in my limited and wholly-American experience); a leisurely evening spent browsing Strand's miles; an afternoon tucked inside the Scandinavia House library, alternately (trying to remember how to) read Dagbladet and knitting my latest creation... I'm thankful. I'm further thankful to have figured my way out of said library upon discovering I'd been locked in.
The weekend also witnessed the continuation of a vaguely consistent running regimen. Yesterday's six-miler on the East River Trail was one of those oh-yeah-that's-right-this-is-why-I-do-this runs. Sun out, sky blue... It was the crispest day I've felt so far, w/ temps hovering in the mid-20s. Such numbers are bound to make a transplant like myself a little apprehensive at first, but upon considering my options--run-trip-run on a beat-to-hell treadmill, or layer up and hit the pavement--the latter edged out the former by a hair. So, way too much Coolmax and a nifty brain-saving fleece cap later, I was out the door. And it wasn't bad. At all. My lungs took a few minutes to adjust to the offensive new kid in town (he'll be here awhile, they've since been warned), but once they were on board, I was free to soak up the noontime goodness. I didn't have to share much, either, as I'm guessing a number of my cohorts chose to take up w/ the Fifth Avenue saling brigade. My fixtures were gone, too--the fishermen that pull mutant lifeforms from the East River, even the always-present groups of Chinese men and women that practice Tai Chi down by the South Street Seaport. Of course, count on those lumbering tour buses to keep things lively, but other than them/their overexcited occupants, all was pretty quiet. So on I ran, acutely aware of my breath coming out in short little puffs and the clarity of the imagery that accompanied me. The trio of bridges--Williamsburg, Manhattan, then Brooklyn--looked exceptionally sharp, high towers and cables cutting cleanly into the blue of the sky. Across the water, Brooklyn's lofts, sprawling and worn, could be seen, including that old 11th Street sublet of ours. Approaching the ex-Fulton Fish Market, newly elsewhere, I braced myself for the usual stomach-buckling smells, because well, a few weeks has done little to dispel them. Foulness behind me, I continued to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal before heading back.
This one's a route I know well--the consecutive playfields, the scary cement seal park, the placement of each and every water fountain--and it's a route I'll get to know better still in the months ahead. It's become my old standby, the NY version of Seattle's East 19th-Interlaken-Lakeview-Pike loop that once served the same purpose.
Friday, November 25, 2005
Work it
Oh geez--The Little Gym! I didn't realize it was still around. This was the place I turned cartwheels and performed complex tumbling routines as a toddler. Of course, I don't believe I was signed up for fitness' sake, but for the straightforward purpose of having a darn good time. For kids today, there's (sadly) more at stake.
Thursday, November 24, 2005
I'm having a moment
Ahem, just a quick Thanksgiving Day sentiment.
I love you all (especially those of you I, uh, know) and I'm incredibly thankful for the sparkle you've brought, and will continue to bring, to my life.
Now, off to an intimate T-Day dinner for two. Different than in past years, but I can't complain, surrounded as I am by Pea-love.
Cheers!
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
"Italo Calvino, in his long but too-short career, scattered treasures. He deserves readers who'll savor them in their original formats, as well as a treasury."
Moving Times essay on Calvino. (Thanks Ma.)
Success
Conor Risch--pal of mine, co-worker of S, and all-around good guy--has this up on Flak. Nice work, C.
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Reminder
I'd been in a bit of a writing funk--until last night. All it took to shake it was a dedicated session w/ the laptop, Internet disabled; some background noise (Yaffa came through yet again); and my muse, who for the time being shall remain unnamed. This is almost always the remedy, but as N and I were reflecting on the other night, its effectiveness seems to exist in the writer's short-term memory only. But the immediate gratification that comes w/ completing--or even just getting a good start on--a piece of writing is a regular part of the practice, and it's too bad the reoccurence doesn't register in my brain. Remember how last time?... Ah well, I'll just have to content myself w/ constant reminders.
Eh, but actually, this is only part of it. Maybe a pretty small part even. Because more than I forget, I fear: No matter how good I've felt in the past w/ regard to a particular piece of writing, there's always the chance that the next thing I produce will amount to a big stinking turd. Of course, the occasional turd is inevitable/manageable, but what if one turd leads directly to another leads to another leads to... until I'm left gaping at an entire litterbox full of them? Ew. And the longer that box goes w/o a cleaning, the less likely I am to, ur, clean it. The yuckiness may stop coming, but so may the pretty stuff. No more words = scary.
I can't complain though. No matter how funky my funks, I have yet to throw up my hands and re-take up knitting w/ the old ferocity. Although I am in the middle of another scarf. Last night's round went well and I now have a new short story on my hands. I'm still playing around w/ it, but I figure in the course of a week or so it'll be ready for send-off.
Another thing: I find the sense of lightness/relief that follows a solid, uninterrupted writing session to be very affirming--a message that, no, I'm not wasting my time. I'm not just pretending, turns out I'm not a hopeless fraud. I've got to think that if I wasn't *meant* to write, the feeling wouldn't be nearly as intense as it is. At least that's what I tell myself.
Monday, November 21, 2005
The universe works on a math equation
Mark Kozelek/Sun Kil Moon has a new album out, consisting entirely of Modest Mouse covers. Everything's soft and slowed-down--nice, being able to hear the words and all. Plus, M.K. rivals Matthew Caws (Nada Surf) in the category of sweetest singing voice ever.
I'm enjoying one cover in particular--"Neverending Math Equation." Sure, the original's amazing, but there's something about Kozelek's rendition. It's pretty; you should listen.
Sunday, November 20, 2005
$150 will only get a girl so far
So a few weeks ago I joined a gym. It's really close to our apt, and it's really, really cheap. As in, I paid $150 for a SIX MONTH MEMBERSHIP. Hard to beat--nay, impossible to beat.
Oh, but oh.
The place is broken. I went in today to find a third of the cardio equipment displaying out of order signs, at least four weight machines missing that crucial pin, and per usual (I hate that--"per"--yet I use it), my would-be favorite ab machine squealing w/ every raise. I chanced a round on one of the treadmills, but ten minutes in threw up my hands and hit the pavement. It was the lumpy, gaping belt that tripped me up, see. Thing is, none of this appears to faze members. I made a comment to the woman leg-pressing next to me today--"does anything work?"--only to be met w/ a blank stare. And while I sigh loudly and pout visibly (exaggeration) w/ each new discovery, others take it in stride, simply and w/o complaint moving on to the next properly operating apparatus--even if it's three machines in. I don't get it. I realize I'm getting a hell of a deal, but sheesh, is a little routine maintenance too much to ask for? Apparently.
Still, there's no way I'm forking over $100+/month for a NYSC card. I'm staying w/ broken.
I'm whining, but it doesn't bother me that much. It keeps me guessing, and my workouts, in the very least, guarantee surprise.
Saturday, November 19, 2005
Speaking of snow, I heard my first Xmas song of the season today in the grocery store: Brenda Lee's "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree." Go!
We got our first taste of theater the other night. Not exactly Broadway--Union Square--but it was still pretty fantastic. Months ago we bought tickets to Slava's Snowshow, a selection I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have made if we didn't pass the theater every evening on our way home from work/school. The hundreds of white paper shreds that, every night, litter the sidewalk in front of the entrance helped its cause. Obviously not your everday theater-going experience. So following some quick Thai at Republic, it was off to the show. We were curiously on time, and as we made our way to our second-row seats, I have to say I was a little surprised at the low-grade look of the place. Not that I should have been, as again this wasn't Broadway. Oh, and those paper shreds from outside blanketed the aisles and seats, too. Like all the kindergartens had collaborated on a massive art project--albeit not a very creative one.
Anyway, the show opened w/ a single clown-- writer/director Slava Polunin, a clown born, raised, and trained in the Soviet Union--shuffling across the stage, dressed in a baggy yellow suit and floppy red shoes, with wild side-tufted hair. He had a rope tied as a noose around his neck, carrying the length of it behind him. Rope kept coming and coming until another clown appeared at the end, which was fashioned as a noose around his own neck. In a show of pained reluctance, Slava let Clown 2 have the rope for himself, the latter truding offstage to presumably do the deed, only to return w/ a host of clones trailing him.
The show unfolded in moving vignettes against a minimal set, at times featuring Slava solo, but most often involving the clones--all dressed in long green coats and sporting pink hats w/ these crazy winglike flaps extending from each side. The problem of individuality in the context of a totalitarian regime--does one fight for it or just give it up?--was/is an obvious theme through much of the show. Still, some of the segments were pretty vague, although this sort of didn't matter, as the most fascinating element to me was the incredible expression the actors managed to produce. Sadness, elation, confusion--all were executed w/ such precision. (Uh, the idea, I guess, where clowning's concerned.)
And then, the storm. While we experienced a brief mid-show flurry, the real deal didn't strike until the very end, until the closing scene. As Slava rolled onstage in a giant hamster ball, down it came--and hard. Wind literally whipped through the room, blasting all that white paper in faces, down coats, up sleeves. There was no keeping one's eyes open, I tell ya. The chaos must have lasted a good couple of minutes before finally letting up. When it did, what awaited us but a dozen oversized plastic balls, like the kind in the toy store cages that Tara and I used to bat around Bartell's when we were too old--only these balls were much, much bigger. After taking bows, the clowns launched them into the audience, which reacted immediately. Kids shrieked in delight, adults were suddenly kids again. It was, if I may, totally surreal. The conversion was so immediate, it was illogical. Pea and I started leaping w/ the rest of 'em, reaching high for a hit, laughing insanely (ok, that was me) when our hand connected w/ a ball. This went on for, oh, fifteen minutes, and I think the only thing that stopped me from continuing the wackiness were two aching and out-of-shape arms. Phooey. Still--waaay too much fun while it lasted. Play is good. Also good: knowing you never really forget how.
We're still shaking Xerox paper out of our clothes, but hell, small price to pay, right? Right.
Who wants in? I'd so go back...
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
I wonder how much it would cost to?...
Earlier tonight Pea & I were unwinding at Odessa w/ an order of clam strips and whisky sours when Pea commented on what he called his ideal decor. Now, Odessa's either been around since the 70s (doubtful), or its interior was designed w/ an eye locked on the decade. Generic oil paintings, pinups in drugstore frames, and the strongest (ok, the only real) indicator--wall-to-wall would-be wood. Faux wood paneling--that simulated, way-shy-of-convincing wood grain--seals the look. And in Pea's words, the *ideal decor.* I know exactly what he means, and I feel the same. Not because I lose myself in routine sunsets or Bob Ross-wannabe trees, not because all that wood leaves me breathless, but because it's a look I equate w/ comfort. Beyond the obvious--the warmth of the color brown, the reference to the natural landscape--it's a look that reminds me of grilled cheese sandwiches and bedtime stories and rocking chairs and Johnny Mathis. This, regardless of the fact that I wasn't enclosed by wood panels in the old Everett house growing up. (Boring plaster, we had.) It's just a timing thing. Seventies home decor bled into that of the eighties, the latter being where I spent most of my childhood. And since I passed these years safe, snug, and well loved, the association makes some sense.
All that aside, I just kind of like it.
Goodnight cig
Uh, how many kiddos pore over the author bio? And at this age, aren't parents still doing the reading anyway?
Really though, I don't have a problem w/ this particular alteration. Not like it bears any impact on the story itself, like you're robbin' that Marb from the paw of the little mister himself. (In which case, I don't suppose we'd be dealing in children's books, mm?)
Monday, November 14, 2005
Kill me now
As Carolyn Lluberes, an assistant at Wilhelmina Models, left the Virgin store, she called Ms. Richie a survivor. "She sends the message that, 'Yes, I've fallen, but I can get up with dignity,' " she said. Staring at a Polaroid of herself and the first-time author, Ms. Lluberes grew misty. "I never get star-struck," she said, "but to see her is really inspiring."
Having recently befriended the best underpublished humor writer in town, I can't help but return to the same old gripe: Why-why-why must so much crap line the bookshelves when there are so many promising haven't-yets waving around polished manuscripts? I don't need an answer to that, by the way. Grrr.
Speaking of, there's a man growling just outside our window. Thankfully, walls.
Holy cow! (sorry)
Is there any question as to who stole this show? Nope.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
It's beginning to look a lot like
I absolutely cannot wait.
'til, um, next month??
Dear You-Know-Who-You-Are,
Thank you, my sweet, for a fantastic weekend. Lucky for me, your visit coincided w/ the usual post-marathon slump, a period characterized by mild depressive symptoms and far too much sleeping in. (The new job hasn't helped any.) But you, you breezed into town, cheeks flushed pink and ponytail swinging, scooping me out of my rut before I even knew what had hit me. Bam, my energy re-emerged in full-force and you had me traversing the island faster than any train conductor or cab driver. (Ahem, the phrase "rarin' to go" comes to mind.) Bonus: You're an improviser. What, the flea market is no longer? Balthazar too expensive? The yet-unlit Rockefeller tree too far to go? As long as we got our frozen hot chocolate, as long as you got your museum fix (and I'm holding at nothing short of *really impressed*), as long as we had our feet on the ground of this city, you were A-OK. So thanks, you, for a hell of a time.
hugs,
k10
At long last, a lease
I can't believe I didn't post this earlier: We found a place! And it's the real thing. R-E-A-L. No more of this sublet b.s., thank you very much. As of December 1, we'll reside in a fourth-floor walkup (yeah I know), location exactly two blocks west of our current hellhole.
In a way (exactly one), it's too bad the spree's terminating at four. A few additional lets and I perhaps could've gotten an essay collection out of the deal. I suppose I could always bend.
Friday, November 11, 2005
This one's for you, Jeffy
Yes siree we're posing w/ a giant bunny. (Doesn't get more innocent than this, J.)
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Camp
Last night Tim and I headed to Barnes to hear this talented gent read. The house was full and Mr. Collins didn't disappoint. You never really know what you're going to get at these things, you know? Great writing doesn't always equate w/ great reading/entertaining; sometimes a writer's words are better read by you--in your head. Not so w/ Collins. He had an easy candor w/ the crowd, addressing us as if we were dinner party guests, cracking jokes that were funny, supplying plenty of backstory to his poems, delivering in a near-monotone that surprisingly wasn't dramatic or obnoxious. Anyway...
He mostly stuck to his new collection, The Problem with Poetry, but he revisited some older work as well. One of my favorites from the new book is called Litany. Collins' reading of it was prefaced by an acknowledgement that what women really want is not flowers or chocolate or adoration or sex or love or attention--it's similes. Ask any old romantic poet, he insisted. What a woman really wants is to be that vase on the table or that bookshelf in the corner. Or in the very least, to be artfully compared to them. Why else would so many such poems exist? asked C. Good stuff.
He read another one, also from the new collection, called January in Paris. Stunning. It's based on an epigraph by the French poet Paul Valerie, which reads, "Poems are never completed. They are only abandoned." Collins mentioned how for months, he went around uttering these words--to colleagues, to students--only to reach the eventual conclusion that he didn't agree w/ them. Still, the sentiment served as the starting-off point for a poem in which Collins reflects on all the "abandoned poems" circulating the city--people not quite complete, perhaps missing a "verbal flourish" (exact words, I think). The poem concludes w/ the author himself having just completed one such poem--a lovely, emaciated woman he'd swept from a Parisian cafe to rumpled white bedsheets, a framed picture of a cow grazing in a field perched on the wall behind her. (I'm not entirely sure of my accuracy here; I took only mental notes last night.)
The way Collins moves readers from one setting to the next to the next in a single poem is impressive in that it's not jarring. It makes me think of a leaf being carried along by a breeze, a breeze just brisk enough to keep things moving smoothly. Not wild and erratic, not at all bumpy, but continuous and lilting. Pretty neat.
And the collection has a bear on the cover.
Oh, but my all-time favorite has got to be the poem pasted below, also read last night. (Sadly, I don't think my mom ever saw such a gift, as I believe I kept them all for myself. Especially the year that camp started stocking the sparkly variety. Ask KM--I'm a sucker for clear-w/-silver sparkles.)
the lanyard
The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room
bouncing from typewriter to piano
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
I found myself in the "L" section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word, Lanyard.
No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one more suddenly into the past.
A past where I sat at a workbench
at a camp by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid thin plastic strips into a lanyard.
A gift for my mother.
I had never seen anyone use a lanyard.
Or wear one, if that’s what you did with them.
But that did not keep me from crossing strand over strand
again and again until I had made a boxy, red and white lanyard for my mother.
She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips,
set cold facecloths on my forehead
then led me out into the airy light
and taught me to walk and swim and I in turn presented her with a lanyard.
"Here are thousands of meals" she said,
"and here is clothing and a good education."
"And here is your lanyard," I replied,
"which I made with a little help from a counselor."
"Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth and two clear eyes to read the world." she whispered.
"And here," I said, "is the lanyard I made at camp."
"And here," I wish to say to her now,
"is a smaller gift. Not the archaic truth,
that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took the two-toned lanyard from my hands,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless worthless thing I wove out of boredom
would be enough to make us even."
Monday, November 07, 2005
Buono notte
Starting yesterday morning and continuing well into the afternoon, 37,500 runners claimed the streets of Mahattan/Staten Island/Brooklyn/Queens and The Bronx. The temperature hovered in the upper 60s and the sun was shining high--according to many, *a perfect day for a marathon.* But nope--too warm, too humid, too bright. Of course, some weren't phased in the slightest, accustomed as they are to running in much, much warmer temps. This guy pulled off the tightest victory in NYC marathon history, inching ahead of the competition to win by less than a second. Needless to say, the finish line photographers got their fix.
While brows were sweating by the thousands, calves cramping and knees tightening all over the city, we were not in Philadelphia. Nor were we in New Hope, Penn., backup plan. We were at home, questioning why our plans rarely materialize these days. Deciding it probably has everything to do w/ work/school, we managed to convince ourselves up and out into the light of day. Where were we headed? To the zoo, of course. And as we couldn't in good conscience leave an overeager gorilla behind, Petey made our duo a trio. (Really.) It was of little consequence that we never reached our destination, either; he made a fine dinner companion and, we believe, enjoyed the *real Little Italy*--especially the bakery case--almost as much as he would have the main attraction.
So while it took us a good while to locate the Belmont neighborhood, it was well worth the walking. For even though it was Sunday evening and most markets/bakeries were closed, area charm was still very much intact. A generous and garlicky salmon fillet (him) and fresh, ropey mozzarella wedged between slices of sauteed eggplant (me) meant the food--ours, anyway--easily met expectations, too.
Entertaining. Much like the fifty lbs of feline we very nearly stumbled upon en route to the train earlier that day. The thing was exiting an apt complex w/ its master, sported what we swore was a man's necktie (later learned it was no more than a decorative take on a leash), and did not look at all happy to be led outside by Mommy--an equally decorated sort. I don't know that I've ever seen such a scowl, come to think.
Time for bed. Need to conserve energy for when friend E comes (back) to town in a couple. No doubt expenditure will shatter records (our own). Get here now!
Friday, November 04, 2005
Skippin' town
We may head to Philly for the w/e. Who's been? Anything we shouldn't miss?
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
Nolife
My coworker and now-friend KT let me in on a little something, thereby cheering me up so much it smarts. The little something involved the track records of past employees in my position. Turns out, I'm not such an eff-up after all, meaning I'm not the only one who's put in consecutive late nights + some w/e time. Not that I feel good about such a commitment--it's not even a career!--but it's nice to know that it's not exclusively an issue of me being slow to catch on. Phew--for now.
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
Suds
[Failed to find a proper home for this one, so here it'll rest. ]
Washing My Hands of You, NYC
If cleanliness is godliness, am I bound for hell?
I moved from Seattle, urban hub of the Evergreen State, to the East Village neighborhood of New York City roughly three months ago. And while I’ve always valued a thorough handwashing, never before has this timelessly celebrated act of hygiene been so meaningful, so dear to my heart.
Contrary to the matted hair and threadbare flannel of its early-90s grunge interlude, the Emerald City, on par with Dorothy Gale’s industrially unscathed promiseland, is nice and clean. Seattle sits due east of the Puget Sound, which, compared to the thirty-third most polluted river in the country—I mean, the Hudson—is pure as a mountain spring. The city sky, when blue, is blue, not the cruddy yellowed-blue seen in gaps between metal, glass, and whatever else New York's skyscrapers are made from.
It’s simple. Eight million people guarantee voracious industrial output, which in turn ensures that said people are kept good and dirty. Confronted with an hourly hit of Napoleonic germ armies, be it on the counter of her favorite bagel shop, the metal grip on the 6 train, or on the hand of the man who tries to sell her packs of double-A batteries every morning, the New Yorker faces formidable odds. Even if she is able to ward off the pesky critters with routine scrubbing, she'd best not get too comfortable, for the rare unsoiled New Yorker is never truly unsoiled; not for more than a few minutes at a time. Think of a really great backrub, a Herme truffle, an orgasm. Fleeting, ephemeral, triumphant: Those few minutes are a regular gift from God, the next contaminant just a heartbeat away.
It’s no wonder, then: The unsoiled New Yorker has become a sort of Hope Diamond. Having clean hands in New York is worth a lot, certainly more than having clean hands in Seattle, the latter home to people who polish off sleeves of Dick’s French fries, licking their fingers of excess salt, naive to terms like "meningitis," "hepatitis A," and "infectious diarrhea." They don’t apply, one gets the impression. There’s just no market, said resident X as, admiring his view of a snow-capped Mount Rainier, he sucked in a particularly fresh breath of air. Seattle air.
But what of the time-honored reputation of New York as high fashion’s main man, you ask? Irrelevant. All the Givenchy in the city, and there is lots, doesn’t change the fact that New York’s a dirty, dirty place. Here in Gotham, “clean” and “fashionable” are the most distant of distant relatives. Hell, if every pair of hands here got its own Ivory soap commercial, the number of animated bacteria that would get airtime… It’s serious.
Headed home from work today, I was ten minutes from my stop when I felt my lips grow chapped and irritated. Recalling the hour that had lapsed since my last sudsing, I hesitated, my right hand brushing the pot of soothing lip balm tucked inside my bag. I shouldn't, I won't, I thought. But my parched kisser wouldn't hear of it, and before I could gather my wits about me, an index fingerful of Blistex had found its target. After some transitory relief, I hated myself a little. Then I vowed: Never again, not here.
The website of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention has this to say: "By frequently washing your hands, you wash away germs that you have picked up from other people, or from contaminated surfaces, or from animals and animal waste." Such straightforward verbiage may speak to, say, a Seattleite, but for those who participate in the collective generation of 26,000 tons of waste per day, I propose an amendment:
"By frequently washing your hands, not only do you wash away germs that you have picked up from other people, or from contaminated surfaces, or from animals and animal waste, you experience spiritual rebirth. Romans 7.4, TLB: Then you came back to live again when Christ did and are a new person. And now you are 'married,' so to speak, to the one who rose from the dead, so that you can produce good fruit, that is, good deeds for God. Whatever your relationship to God or to Christ, through frequent handwashing, you will feel like a new person, and should you ever produce fruit, it will be better fruit than it otherwise would have been."
I should be writing a How to Pitch, but...
We were out w/ Tim when we saw this. Being unable to tell what it was (raw foodie-heaven), we managed to find it terribly amusing.
Because these days, all I'm good for is pictures
Funny, then, that they didn't have the one news I wanted. The guy across the street did, though.
Ushpizin
I'd like to see this.
[Note to self: New York Landmark Sunshine Cinema 11:30am, 1:40, 3:40, 5:40, 7:45, 10:00 
]