Slow day at the Harbormaster's

What is it with me and ferries lately? Every time I step on a ferry, it starts to downpour. This was the queue for the ferry leaving Oak Bluffs on Martha's Vineyard the other day. Not having an umbrella, my sister and I took shelter underneath the eaves of the Harbormaster's office. I had to laugh when I saw that they were watching a movie while supposedly working. How many times I've done this, I couldn't even count. But not in full view of a nosy public, however.

Lobster hypnotism

Do they feel pain? Yes. Do they scream? Probably not.

I'm on the Cape, and for my birthday the other night we had lobsters. To make yourself feel less of a villain while murdering your entree, you can calm your crustaceans by propping them upside down and stroking their back shell (carapace) and tail in a soothing manner for a couple of minutes. It will hypnotize them enough so when you pick them up to throw them in the pot, they don't even move. Easier for you, and hopefully easier for them. This trick is an Old Salt "secret."

I love the high seas

HIGH SURF ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 8 AM EDT FRIDAY. BUILDING SEAS
SOUTH OF NEW ENGLAND WILL REACH 8 TO 10 FEET THIS EVENING AND THEN DIMINISH
BELOW 7 FEET BY FRIDAY MORNING.>

Another gnarly ferry ride tonight, which I loved. It was a blast. However, the poor crew kept busy with the mop and bucket as more puking ensued from other passengers. This ferry didn't even go to Newport because it was too risky to travel that far, so instead the captain re-routed us to Point Judith and they paid for our cab to Newport. And they comped us the ferry ride, too. Sweet!

Block Island holding pattern

So I'm taking a break from the hot and nasty NYC grid, where it smells like broiling dog pee and garbage. Yesterday I hopped on the Luxury Liner to the Hamptons for a job interview which I don't want to jinx so I will remain silent on that. This morning, after my friend let me drive his awesome antique Alpha Romeo convertible out to Montauk, I hopped on the Viking ferry to Block Island. The weather was squally and the marine forecast predicted four to seven foot seas, and they were right on, so the boat was pretty pitchy. Luggage was flying. Two little girls in front of me were screaming. The guy across the aisle from me barfed up his still-purple berry-and-granola yogurt. BLEEAAAAAAAAH! Then the woman in front of me got up and barely made it to the garbage can before she too hurled. Yuck. I played Mother Teresa and brought barf bags and paper towels from the galley to the people who were too petrified to move. I feel bad for people who get seasick. It must suck.

So here I am, on Block Island, which I can't really enjoy because I have a big heavy rolly suitcase in tow. And it's kind of rainy. So I'm waiting for the Newport ferry, conveniently spaced five hours afterward and in a totally different harbor from when and where the Montauk ferry arrives. Next stop New England. I'm in a cafe with WiFi, but I think it's time to move on to a bar for a burger and a beer. Only two and a half hours to go. Block Island is really cute. It's like a mini-me version of the Vineyard.

Lobster salad, at only 50 Euros a pound!

I'm in the Hamptons and walked by this store tonight. Loaves and Fishes is a ridiculously overpriced store that locals refer to as Loans and Finances, as well as Thieves and Robbers. How ironic, considering that the original loaves and fishes a la Jesus were complimentary. They're infamous for their lobster salad, which is $100 a pound.

Anyhow, this is the first time I have ever seen a We-Want-Your-Euros sign anywhere in the U.S. It kind of shocked me, actually.

Bush's "Wall Street Got Drunk" speech

Not understanding that in this day and age, everyone has video recording capability on their cellphones, Bush makes a jackass of himself (yet again) at a private fundraiser after he asks the TV cameras to be shut off.

This latest gem, uttered July 18th in Texas, is rich, coming from the man who spent our country into oblivion.

And if anyone can explain what the hell he means by "fancy financial instruments," well that'd be just dandy.

Leslie Feist on Sesame Street

Since my last two posts had the word "kill" in them, I thought I'd lighten it up. I love this video! So cuuuuuuuute.

HBO's "Generation Kill" is killer good television

Although I loved Apocalypse Now, Platoon, and Full Metal Jacket, I can't say that war flicks are my favorite genre. So when I first saw the ads for "Generation Kill" plastered on walls throughout Manhattan, I wasn't all pumped up about watching it.

Until I saw the first episode.

I have since watched it three times. It's that good. And so damn funny! The writing is phenomenal, and it's produced by "The Wire" creators David Simon and Ed Burns. "Generation Kill" follows the highly trained Marines of First Recon Battalion through the first 40 days of the Iraq War. One of the characters, a Rolling Stone reporter named Evan "Scribe" Wright, exists in real life and wrote the basis for the show when he actually did follow a recon Marine platoon around in 2003 and wrote a series of articles about it for the magazine. His piece, "The Killer Elite," is still available online at Rolling Stone's website here. And here's the official HBO website for the show.

The Hudson River kills

As hot and humid as it was on Saturday here in New York City (peaking at 101 degrees) while I was paddling on the Hudson River, I was still trepidatious about jumping in to cool off. At one point we were cooking, so my friend and I stopped paddling the OC-2 and went in. Gripping the aku and the boat, I lowered myself tentatively into the murky green liquid, reciting my mantra out loud, "Please don't give me cancer, please don't give me cancer." My friend laughed. I spared her my diatribe about how much poisonous shit is floating in there. Not to mention the jellyfish, which we also saw lurking on the surface, waiting to sting. Eeyoo.

Sure enough, during yesterday's New York City Triathlon, some guy from Buenos Aires died during the swim part in the Hudson River. What a bummer. He was only 32. I wonder. Heat stroke? Heart attack? Or poisoned to death by the contaminents? You couldn't pay me to take an extended swim in that water.

Robert Stolarik/ New York Times

The bridal fascinator: a new trend unbeknownst to me

Yesterday I accompanied a girlfriend to the bridal shop as requested so she could get my totally non-expert opinion about a "hairpiece" she was thinking of buying for her wedding day. I said, "Why? You don't seem like the type who would ever get extensions." She laughed her ass off and explained, "No it's a decoration, not hair extensions." I had to laugh too. She told me that bridal hairpieces -- also known as fascinators -- are a trend, propagated mostly by Asian women. Who knew?

I warned her that because I know nothing about bridal hairpieces (obviously), therefore mine was the last opinion she should be soliciting. I thought the hairpiece/avian friend roosting in the updo of Carrie Bradshaw in the Sex and the City movie was heinous, and I told my friend as much. That thing gave a whole to meaning to the throwing-of-the-birdseed ritual after the couple exits the church.



But my friend the bride-to-be thought that my ignorance of bridal fads would lend an air of neutrality to my opinion. So, Miss Switzerland here was ready for the Moment of Truth. We got to the boutique and she modeled the hair thing for me.

HER: Okay tell me the truth.

ME: Wow, it's really . . . something! That's a lot of feathers!

HER: Do you like it though?

ME: Um, well . . .

HER: What do you think?

ME: It's certainly statement-making. It's kind of big. Maybe you should try some other ones on. What about this smaller one?

HER: Do you not like it?

ME: Well, it's not important whether I like it or not. It's really about how much you like it. Do you like it?

HER: I love it.

ME: Then buy it.

And she did. In the end, who gives a shit what anyone thinks? If you want to wear white furry thigh-high platform-soled go-go boots down the aisle, then do it up. I'm all for people making themselves happy. And she was really happy she bought it.

What really blew my mind was the price. This thing, which consisted of a giant fake white flower, white feathers, and some sort of faux pearl-laden popsicle-stick-shaped doohickey, all hot-glued to a hair comb, cost her a hundred dollars! I realized that you could buy these items at Pearl Art and Craft or Michael's, and with a needle and thread and a hot glue gun, you could whip this puppy up for about fifteen or twenty bucks. Make a bunch, take your bridal hairpieces to boutiques, and make a fortune. I think I've discovered a new line of side income.

Daily Show clip "Satire on the Street"

One of the funniest Daily Show clips I've seen in a long time. Especially great? The guy who didn't even get the dog shit joke. Wow.

Even better than the New Yorker cover

Barack Obama Tiger Beat Cover Clinches Slumber Party Vote

"Barack is sooooo hot!" said 12-year-old Tiger Beat subscriber Beth Majors upon reading the issue, which included a "supercute" poster of Obama leaning against the Lincoln Memorial and an interview in which he revealed that his most inspirational hero is "you." "He so totally has my support. Obama in '08!"

Obama is expected to remain a solid favorite with the giggling-and-talking-until-4 a.m. voting bloc, as hunky war hero John McCain, his closest contender, is widely considered by the slumber party demographic to be a gross dork.

Courtesy of The Onion, of course.

JibJab: "Time for Some Campaignin' " video

Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!

Oh heck, while we're on the topic of Barry riding unicorns, check out this beauty by Lukas Ketner.

The New Yorker cover and the politics of satire

In the early 1700s, English Protestants were the primary land owners and they charged outrageously high prices to poverty-stricken Irish renters. In "A Modest Proposal," Jonathan Swift proposes that plump, healthy Irish infants be sold as food to give the Irish a new source of income and the English a new food product to bolster their economy and eliminate the number of Catholics in Ireland. This premise is genius -- if you understand the concept of satire.

Everyone is freaking over the July 21st New Yorker cover this week. I think this bastion of liberal highbrowness may have run this cover in response to the tremendous amount of attention that New York magazine garnered recently with the death of its founder, Clay Felker, whose impressive obit ran in the New York Times, and whose praises Tom Wolfe sung in the July 8th issue. Until I read Wolfe's tribute, I didn't know that the New Yorker and New York were big rivals back in the day. Perhaps the New Yorker editor felt they needed a punchy, attention-getting cover.

The cover, which is brilliant, backfired. I'm sure the sophisticated readers of the magazine get it. But the majority of the country? Hardly. Right wingers are probably tacking it to their fridges with their Confederate flag magnets.

The illustrator, Barry Blitt, responds to an email by the Huffington Post regarding the cover :

I think the idea that the Obamas are branded as unpatriotic [let alone as terrorists] in certain sectors is preposterous. It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is.

The New Yorker press release says it "satirizes the use of scare tactics and misinformation in the Presidential election to derail Barack Obama's campaign."

It seems as though we have lost touch with the very essence of irony and satire.

Tonight's subway horror story

Tonight I was waiting for the E train at the 5th Avenue and 53rd Street subway when I saw one of these, but the size of a poodle, crawling up the wall.



It was carrying its dinner in its MOUTH. Its dinner was one of these. Seriously.

Woof woof

Here's my friend's Danish-Swedish Farm Dog, Whiskey, with his Spalding Extra High Bounce ball. The neighbors must love when we play this game.

Falsetto singing and yodeling that actually sound good

How I loved being a little kid in the seventies. The over-the-top fun, grandeur and decadence (not to mention the size of the shirt collars) were unprecedented when it comes to pop culture. These videos are examples of the music you'd actually see on evening network TV.

The first video is the Dutch band Focus. But my true five year-old fandom was always centered on Tiny Tim.

Big hearts in Big Sur

(Robert Durell / Los Angeles Times)

I love Big Sur. Its vibe is so good, so pure and spiritual that it's hard not to feel a connection to the land there. The people are welcoming. Esalen, Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park, Nepenthe, these places are nothing short of magical. And that view from the cliffs as you wind along the PCH high above the ocean! It's other-wordly. When I lived in L.A. it was my special place to go, and although I haven't been back to Big Sur for seven years now, it saddens me terribly that it has burned.

I've been keeping up with the status of the wildfires through an impressive blog called SurFire2008.org and found the most beautiful thing amidst all the tragedy. On a page called Housing Offers is a plethora of good will. As of this writing, there are over 90 postings from people offering accomodations to evacuees, firefighters, and pets. Everything from "horse corral - shady" to offers to "crash on my pull-out sofa" to "two homes with lots of bedrooms" to a "nice ocean view for your peace of mind."

Humanity at its finest. May it rain for them soon.

Gucci loafers

I set up two of my friends on a blind date. My guy friend is a Wall Street type, my girl friend is an artist. He wined and dined her and sent her home in his car with the driver. Thanks to my matchmaking skills, they both had a good time and liked each other. My guy friend called to ask me if my girl friend liked him. I assured him that she did. He kept pressing for details. What did she say about me? Did she say anything? I told him what I could remember, which was all good. Then I remembered.

ME: Well, there was this one thing.

HIM: What? Tell me!

ME: It was about your shoes. She didn't really dig the shoes. She said they looked like Old Man Shoes.

Silence.

ME: You there?

HIM: Old Man Shoes?! She said that?

ME: Yup.

HIM: Those are GUCCI LOAFERS! Those are five hundred-dollar shoes! They're a classic! Everyone wears those!

ME: No they don't.

HIM: They're de rigueur in the hedge fund world! They're practically part of the uniform.

ME: Um, maybe next time you should wear your Reefs with the bottle opener on the sole. I can assure you, those will impress her way more.

HIM: Those are out in the Hamptons.

ME: Maybe you should entertain her out there instead.

HIM: I'm going to have a little talk with her about my shoes.

ME: Whatever, just wear the rubber slippers while you're doing it.

How I wish for Endless Summer

Ninety scorching humid degrees. Nothing a cold beer and a sandbar accessible only by boat during low tide can't handle.

The Cliff Walk: Newport, Rhode Island's Millionaires' Row

No rowdy behavior!

I escaped to New England for the past week and returned to the hot steamy grid yesterday. One of the highlights of visiting with my sister Susan and her family who live in Rhode Island was an excursion to the land of Vanderbilt mansions and America's Cup yachts -- Newport -- where she and I toured the 3 1/2 mile Cliff Walk, which I had never done before.

These mansions were built as "summer cottages" in the late 1800s to early 1900s, before income tax was instituted. Now, most of them have been donated the the local historical society as museums, although there is a smattering of still-private homes amongst the splendor.



One of the mansions has been turned into a hotel called The Chanler, and this was the Sunday brunch menu. The cheapest thing you can mow down with your Bloody Mary is the forty-four dollar shrimp pasta. Their website includes the menus, but doesn't include the prices. Go figure.



The Breakers, owned by the Vanderbilts, was the swankiest home I saw all day. It's one of the several Millionaires' Row cottages shown in the opening helicopter shot in the 1991 film Reversal of Fortune about Claus and Sunny von Bulow starring Jeremy Irons and Glenn Close. Great film, by the way, if you haven't seen it, and most of it was shot in Newport.



Six doggies (all Labs, how Waspy!) turned into . . .



. . . seven doggies! And still an all-Lab gene pool.



Boo! Cesar Milan would hate this sign too. There are no bad dogs!



Susan on the steps of her summer shack . . .



. . . and in her front yard.



Alva Vanderbilt had this Chinese Tea House built on the cliffs at Marble House and hosted rallies for women's right to vote. That's a pretty swanky setting for tea parties.



It was a humid 90-degree day - perfect weather for these local kids cooling off.

Teahupoo

Teahupoo (CHO-po) in Tahiti is the thickest wave in the world, surpassing Peahi (Jaws) on the scale of deathly. The reef is only six feet deep, but drops to 2,000 feet only a hundred yards out past the break. Combine that with waves rushing in at 60 miles an hour -- just the lip itself is ten feet thick. Sharp jaggeddy coral is right underneath the break. And ocean water is 64 pounds per cubic foot.

Although it is the heaviest wave, I never really grasped the magnitude of that title until I saw this series of helicopter shots at Tim McKenna's amazing website. Here's Laird looking (for the first time ever) really tiny in all that skull-crushing thickness.

McKenna's website also shows some sick shots taken inside the wave by two surfers talented enough to hold the waterproof housing behind them and shoot photos while pitted, so pitted. Yikes. And in case you're curious, the bottom illustration by an unknown artist shows why Teahupoo breaks with such force. The dropoff is what makes it so fiesty.

Fuzzy Vans "Slip-on Fleece"

I've been hanging out with my nephew doing refreshingly fun stuff like surfing, shooting off fireworks, and learning to ride his dirt bike. The kid rocks -- except for his incredibly smelly old skate sneakers. His parents and I were laughing at how gross they are so he relented and agreed to look at Zappos this morning with me hovering over his shoulder giving unsolicited auntie advice. I was like "Oooh, look at these!" and miraculously he thought they were as cool as I did, so he ordered them. These are a new sneaker by Vans called, appropriately enough, "Slip-on Fleece." They will set you back 94 bucks, which is nuts, but they look oh-so-comfy!

A badass bear-hugger

On the right is my ex-housemate whose newish pics I saw today. Remmie is part of the band for the chick in the middle, who is a singer and American Apparel model.

If you saw Remmie on the street, you might be tempted to judge, given his love of ink, piercings, and eye makeup. Yet he was one of the most mellow and easygoing housemates one could ever wish for. The kid picked up after himself, was courteous, responsibly held down a job while going to college, and was a total sweetheart, calling me "Auntie." I never saw him abuse drugs or booze, and being a vegetarian, he ate healthier than I. He didn't even leave dishes in the sink. When he threw himself a 21st birthday party, a ton of friends showed up at our house and celebrated through the wee hours. Remmie is a cool guy. But what I like most about him -- he isn't afraid to give real hugs. You know how a lot of people give those A-frame hugs, where they lean in shyly and only your shoulders touch and it's this quick little pat-pat on the back thing? I mean that's fine for formal situations or for people you can't stand who insist on hugging you. But some people even feel weird hugging their friends. Not this kid. He gives these giant, heartfelt bear hugs like it's the last time he is going to see you.

How can you not admire someone unafraid to give bear hugs? He actually inspired me to be a better hugger. Thanks, kid.

Apathetic assholes

On the news this morning were two disturbing surveillance videos. Last week, a woman in a Brooklyn hospital died on the floor of the waiting room, and she lie there for an hour before anyone walked over to check on her. Three other patients are shown in nearby chairs doing nothing. Appalling.



The second video shows a man in Hartford getting struck down by a hit-and-run driver on June 5. And all the witnesses did nothing. No one helped him and no one could be bothered to call 911, even though the incident occurred during the day in an area with plenty of businesses with phones. One witness was asked, "Did you call 911?" to which he responds sheepishly, "No, I didn't have my phone on me at the time."



What has happened to our society that people are such uncaring assholes?