I just would like to comment on the weather for a moment if I can. Apparently we are surrounded by some of the worst flooding in recorded history, but I can't figure out where it is! Trees have fallen over in Queens, Trenton NJ is under two feet of water, upstate NY has washouts of major highways, I-90 is shut down, but over in Williamsburg Brooklyn it is dry as a bone. Very odd. We are surround by the apocalypse according to the news, but have yet to notice. The weather HAS been calling for rain for the past week, and I have been dutifully lugging the umbrella I found on a subway cay around with me, but there's been nothing to protect myself from other than an oppressive humidity. I would knock on wood, but frankly I'm feeling a little left out and would like some of the drama that everyone else in the tri-state area is reveling in. (Except for the people in Trenton whose basements are soaked, that sounds like a bummer).
On this day in 2006, we saw the departure of Aleksadra, M's best friend from Poland. She stayed 10 days in our apartment and we actually all got along quite well. As I might have mentioned before, we really love having visitors here (for shorter than 10 days hopefully) and love showing them the occasionally bizarre face of life in NYC. This last visit was no exception, topped with a very fine, scantily clad Mermaid Day parade in the driving rain out at Coney Island. Aleksandra, like many Polish people, had some very interesting comments about life in America as she sees it. Mainly they pertained to the freedom with which we slouch about and behave strangely on the train. But actually she thought that Americans in general are inspirationally free-spririted, a trait that expresses itself in a multitude of ways from dressing as a naked Merman to bombing the snot out of anyone we want. The only negative thing that happened while Aleksandra was visiting was that she was shocked by the rats running around in the subway tracks. Unfortunately we told her the story of the massive rat that tried to eat its way through the kitchen door at our last place and she couldn't sleep afterwards. We told her that of course she was safe from rats at our new place and hoped she would never think to actually read this blog. People concerned with vermin rarely distinguish between rats and cheese-house building mice who occasionally climb up to my keyboard to write an email.
After saying good-bye to her at the Newark Express bus stop (which has been moved from inside the Port Authority terminal to outside, across the street. There is literally a man in a yellow vest sitting on a stool on the sidewalk) we returned home and relaxed and watched movies in newly appreciated silence. This silence will be broken soon as our French friend Benoit will be coming to visit in two days so we felt we had to appreciate it.
The two movies we watched were Monsters Inc. (Inspired to see again after watching "Cars" the other day) and the Paltrow-Affleck flick "Bounce". Actually Bounce was pretty good despite a title describing Affleck's financial situation these days. Go see Cars by the way. It's been the victim of Pixar backlash. That is, Pixar has been making such good movies that I think people ratchet up expectations at every release, if this had been their first one it would certainly score more than the paltry 78% it's getting on Rottentomatoes.com right now. So irked was I that I wrote my own review on IMDB.com which I present to you here:
This movie is so much better than the reviews are giving it, currently around 78%. That's a C+ where I come from and Cars is WELL above average. Lushly animated, rich vivid colors, amazing characterization, the story is high-end Disney, slightly sappy but always with enough spice to keep it from becoming too saccharin. It also busts out of the well worn 'redemption' formula in a few refreshing places. I'm sure Pixar and Disney will make a load of money on this movie, which is great, but they deserve amazing reviews too. This is what movie making should be today, visually stunning, heart-felt, and need I say, original. Heaven forbid that Disney look at the C+ and decide it's a safer bet to make Herbie the Love Bug XIV than it is to make a fresh amazing, original feature like Cars.
Unfortunately I named this review "Cars Is Awesome", which I regret now, not that it wasn't but I think it lost some of the gravitas that it might have had otherwise. Thinking back, I should have called it, "Cars is Awesome, Dude".
This short entry is dedicated to World Cup which I am gradually becoming infatuated with. I don't know anything about soccer but I am interested in the World soap opera that it has become. I like reading about the dynamics raised between rival nations, rival teams, rival players. So I am trying to figure out what all the fuss is about only just now and so far I'm glad I've come around.
In other news, slightly more newsworthy than "I've finally started paying attention to world's most popular attraction", Magda's friend Ola is coming this evening from Poland. I can't figure out if she's been here before or not, no one is talking. I guess we'll find out tonight. Either way, she's in for a treat setting her lookin balls on Williamsburg for the first time I can tell you. "I've never seen so many, so hip!" She'll say. I overheard two hipster girls, multle-piercings and tatoos, along with vintage purses, talking about this "hipster architect" they knew, I thought they were making fun of him, but then they said, "he's hot" So I guess the word hasn't become deragatory yet. It will. I will see to that.
Okay, Germany vs. Poland today at 3 (ET) in a rematch of the 1939 debacle. Poland looked a bit terrible against Ecuador, but then Ecuador didn't ever invade Poland, like, thirty times. Apparently Germany has done some modern day pilaging though and taken all the most talented Polish players, enticing them with a good deal of cash instead of threat of death.
This weekend has been a little sedate, only because the weather has been punishingly wet. To spice it up, let's pretend that the weekend started on Thursday, like I often do, behaving on Friday much like I do on Saturday, sipping lattes and staring blankly at those who'd have me accomplish something. With Thursday night came a lightning storm that rattled the city's collective teeth. We came out of the subway in search of half-priced sushi on 1st ave. and a crowd was gathered around a man selling umbrellas in the vestibule of the station. These characters sell either sunglasses or umbrellas, depending on the weather, and where they keep the former when selling the latter is a mystery. The crowd was a bad sign though, since usually these guys are pretty lonely. Sure enough, the sky was redistributing half of the Atlantic ocean onto the East Village. Undaunted, I put a plastic shopping bag on my head, M had a broken umbrella, and we ran into the solid wall of water towards the Sushi bar. Just before we reached the block that the restaurant is on though, a barrage of lightning strikes started crashing all around us. If you can tell how far away lightning is away from you by the time it takes to hear thunder, then we were actually straddling each bolt. Finally just as we were entered the place, a flash of white hot light blinded us, followed instantly by a deafening explosion. We stumbled through the door, senseless and soaking wet, in an entrance which would have surely elicited applause from the patrons if they weren't so sure we were two of the four horsemen. Quite dramatic really.
The previous weekend we'd spent a peaceful time in the small town of Katonah, NY, at the childhood home of our friend Nick. The town itself was charming and tiny, almost edible really. The area was lush with late spring foliage and Nick's house was a large slice of domestic Americana. He was having a BBQ for friends and coworkers while his parents were out of town, so it had a Risky Business vibe, minus the hookers. We played wiffle-ball in his enormous back yard, the size of a football field, bordered on one side by an ancient stone wall. The property was once a small part of the huge estate of John Jay, one of the authors of the federalist papers. Maybe he'd sat on that same rock wall and pondered the grand future of our country. The Natives that had been living previously on 'his' farm watching dejectedly from behind a tree. We spent the night at Nick's getting drunk, sitting on the patio next to the cooling grill. We could see fireflies in the blackness around us, practicing for mating season by briefly flashing their tail-lights at us. I was allured.
This morning (sunday)we went to a nice little grocery/cafe and Marlow and Sons which was established by hipsters some two years ago. It would be the ideal little place to have a coffee and a scone outside if not for the fact that the hipsters running it, much like the neighboring hipster at 'Diner' next door, are total jerks. I'd like to use stronger language to describe them, but I fear my infant niece may turn into a reading protege in the next few weeks and ask my brother what an asshole is.
oops.
Anyway, note to you hipsters out there: lighten up eh? I thought part of being counter-culture was to reject what our nation's current diplomacy. Apparently though, in Hipster Williamsburg, you're either with us or against us.