The latest instalment

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Say cheese

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Originally uploaded by ongaarf

A guy at work took this photo at our day at the races yesterday. The whole Ford client team went to Aquedeuct, a horse racing track in Queens, as a bit of end of year fun and appreciation.

I thought it was a flattering shot. Gotta love black & white.

And yes, horse track in Queens was exactly like it sounds.

Going to the gym, Greenwich Village style

I have to stifle a giggle or a roll of the eyes when I'm at the Y because every second person is reading while they are working out.

I'm not talking about people flipping through trashy mags while they're on the stepper. I'm talking about people on leg press machines, people doing squats, people on cross-trainers making their way through the Sunday New York Times, or The Economist, or Time.

People will do their set of chest presses, their paper at their feet, then stop to read. Or they'll have the machine on some setting that's evidently too low and their adductors are on auto-pilot as they sit back and leisurely read.

I feel like yelling "Come on, people. Let's crack a sweat and get the heart pumping. You're here to work out, not read!"

What nerds.

Celebrity sighting # 22

Billy Connolly strolled on past me into our local bodega (milk bar) this morning, as I was on my way to work. Looked like he had not a care in the world. His beard is very white these days but he looked quite dashing.

Curacao

I do love the tropics. I love the way its so humid that your skin changes. It goes softly plump, like ripe fruit. I love that you know you will never need a jumper. I love that you can step out of a warm shower, or into the sea, and there's no temperature change.

Four days in Curacao was enough to unwind, feel a million miles from the noise and intensity of a city, and fall back in love with scuba diving. The country is tiny - you can drive from one end to the other in just over an hour - and the guest house we stayed at included a car rental, so we explored the whole place. Curacao is a mishmash of Dutch people, Venezuelans, Indonesians, Chinese, Indians, African West Indians, people from other Caribbean islands and the locals, who are a mishmash of the above. I don't think I've ever been anywhere that had signage in so many different languages, or where people were nearly every colour in the rainbow.

Curacao felt incredibly old in parts - crumbling buildings from the 1600s form the old town - and is evidently going through a lucrative period because there was construction everywhere. Not just big resorts, although they were increasingly creeping along the coastline, but also housing and office buildings. They have massive oil refineries quite near the capital, Willemstad, and tourism is growing.

Each day we did pretty much the same thing:

1. crawl out from under the mozzie net and chug down a bowl of cereal
2. leap in the car and nearly melt until the aircon kicked in
3. drive to a beach
4. do a shore dive
5. laze in the sun
6. eat goat stew and rice/ fried fish and rice / chips & mayo / drink fruit punch with unidentifiable fruit flavours
7. drive back home and crack a Polar Beer and play Scrabble
8. find somewhere for dinner and marvel at the lack of herbs used in Dutch cuisine
9. fall asleep by 10pm

Highlights:

• seeing a flock of beautiful bright pink flamingos
• hearing a Jamaican tell the girls behind a bar that they were too slow. Hilarious given Jamaicans aren't known for their sense of urgency.
• coming up with our own hand signals for effective communication underwater
• renting dive gear & tanks on the beach for about US$30 and just swimming out to the coral reef. saw scary moray eels and a spotted eagle ray!
• getting horribly sunburned and smearing aloe vera plant leaves all over myself and watching the sunburn disappear. what a miraculous plant. no peeling! no heat, no pain. i had no idea it was so effective. i am now an aloe believer.
• walking on a floating pedestrian bridge in the city that simply slides to one side when a ship needs to pass down the river.
• finding out that Curacao is of course the home of the bitter orange-flavoured blue curacao, and it is indeed their national liqueur and only one distillery is officially allowed to make it. Mr Cointreau first came up with it, after Valencia oranges originally planted by the Spanish on the island failed as a crop, went wild, and changed flavour, and suggested to him another opportunity to make something alcoholic. I sampled a Bon Bini ('welcome' in the local patois) cocktail that featured blue curacao, and it was actually delish. I shall no longer scoff. (thanks Fi for the reminder!)

While away 2 more minutes and take a look at our photos on Flickr.

The big city

This is a pile of trash on the street around the corner from my office. It was as tall as me.

These heaps are de rigeur in the evening: pretty much every restaurant, cafe, apartment building and office block has bags and bags of garbage dumped in the street. Even the recycling is bagged up.The green wheelie bins don't get a look in.

Incredibly gross. And you can imagine what this smells like in summer.

People go through the rubbish a lot here. Homeless people pick through the trash for food and cigarette butts, for cans to recycle, for cardboard and paper to make beds. There are trash collectors in all the Midtown and Downtown districts whose job it is to clean up after litterers and empty garbage bins. They have to reach into the bins, sort through stuff and take out the bulky items and put them in bags, instead of changing over the bin liners. Such a degrading job.

Now that its below 5c at night, the subway stations have become bedrooms, living rooms and toilets for thousands of folks, mostly men, who don't fit into the shelters. They toss sleeping bags down on cardboard and tie their battered luggage to a leg. They hunch over themselves on benches with hoods pulled over their faces. Sometimes they sleep on the sidewalk on top of the hot subway air vents, their heads inches away from hurtling traffic. I've seen people sprawled, passed out, straight on the cement, in the middle of a platform or on the street, their pants full of shit and their mouths gagging open, lips dry. Pedestrians step around them. 10 year old kids walk past without batting an eye. It's truly distressing.

There are a few homeless people I have come to recognise because they're in the same spot each day. There's a young woman who lives under a window of the NY public library on 5th Ave, who draws incessantly and today told me I had spiders and snakes crawling all over me. There's an old man with severely swollen feet in podiatry slippers who lives on the uptown platform of our subway, and another older guy who is usually strung out and strings out all his stuff too across the downtown concourse. There's a big young guy who opens the door for people at the local McDonald's for spare change, and lives a few doors down in a deserted storefront.

There are supposedly about 35,000 homeless people in NY who stay in shelters, and about 14,000 of them are children. On my walk to and from the subway - 1 block in both directions- I must pass at least 5 people either begging or sitting with all their worldy possessions clustered around them.

I don't think I'll ever get used to it.

If you want me to stay, I'll be around today...

I witnessed a little bit of music history last night as Sly & The Family Stone performed in NY for the first time in 20 years. You may have seen Sly's much anticipated performance at the 2006 Grammy's. Nobody had seen him for decades and he came out after a medley tribute and gave a shaky rendition of 'I Want To Take You Higher', before wandering off stage after a few minutes.

Last night I had the option of seeing an 8pm or 10pm show, and apart from being a school night, I wondered whether there would even be a 10pm show given the guy is ancient and drug addled.

So I got there at 8.15pm for the 8pm show and the crowd waited patiently til 8.50pm when Sly finally wandered out, sporting a black mohawk and wraparound sunglasses. His daughter, a few second cousins and two original band members were eventually introduced after some waffling.

The crowd got antsy as Sly mentioned he hadn't made it to rehearsals, or the sound check, and wasn't sure how to work 'this new toy' (his electric piano). He tapped out a few notes and consulted with his daughter and a guitarist, a manager came out on stage, and it was... messy. It seemed as if he had stage fright, and was out of it, and I watched nervously as his daughter was making 'come on dad, you can do it' faces'. The whole band held their breath in anticipation.

The crowd was cranky. Some people were yelling and booing, some were trying to shush the rabblerousers to coax Sly into singing something or playing anything. Eventually the band just started playing. And that set the tone for the 1 hour set.

Sly would join in for a bit and then leave the stage, he'd sing and then disappear, he'd turn away from the crowd and the keyboard and just nod at the drummer. There were signs everywhere saying no photos, no videos, and several announcements, but half way through Sly yelled 'you can take as many photos as you want. i already been to jail, I don't care'. And the dance floor lit up with the glow of camera phones, capturing the mayhem.

The poor bandmembers covered his vocals (you could tell they had a plan B) and just kept the show going, pumping through the hits one after the other, trying to make up for his erratic behaviour. At one stage Sky leaned into a microphone and said "I'm an old man, I have to go pee" and left for ten minutes. His daughter and one of the guitarists followed him off stage after excusing themselves. By this stage everyone in the audience was chatting to their neighbour about what the hell was going on.

It was kinda sad: when he hit it they sounded fantastic - all those nights in the red velvet rooms of Saratoga dancing to funk were not a waste - but he wasn't having much fun up there . I wasn't really expecting someone notoriously addicted to PCP and cocaine, and who missed his own shows in the height of his career, to be totally together. Glad I got to hear them anyway.

I wonder what the 10pm show was like. I'm sure some unflattering reviews will emerge in the press today.

Freerice.com

If you fancy yourself as a confident speller and a charitable person, then www.freerice.com is somewhere you'll want to spend 20 minutes.

Play the vocabulary game and for every word you define correctly, grains of rice are donated. If you get a word right you get a harder word. I got to level 44.

Tell me how you go :)

The big wind down

Well I recall that the Spring Carnival heralds the arrival of the Silly Season in Melbourne and then everything at work begins to wind down, except for things that have end of year deadlines and still have budget.

It seems the catalyst here was Halloween, and now with a short week for Thanksgiving (2 day hol + early closing), people's attention spans are shot. Add in Columbus Day and a holiday for the start of the hunting season in some states, and then parties for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I don't imagine this month will be the most productive.

The iPhone weather icon this morning showed a new graphic: sleety snow. It's already as cold as it ever gets in Melbourne during winter (today's high is 6c, with a low of 3c.) and it has started raining. Short heavy bursts or spitting. The streets are finally empty of tourists and the city smells crisp and fresh. It's now actually pleasant to stand on a subway vent and get a rush of warm air, and those over-sized hot pretzels are finally looking appealing.

On Thursday Jus and I head to Curacao for our last blast of sun and sea before we embrace the winter wonderland. We've decided to go to Vermont for Christmas to stay in an old inn, which a colleague suggested. It's supposed to be a snowbound, sleepy, hot choc and Falls Creek skiing kinda place. We'll hire a car or catch the train and make our way up there on Christmas Eve.

(Vermont is home to Ben & Jerry's Icecream, maple syrup, cider and cheese. You can see why east coasters thinks Californians are strange, with their sushi and juice bar and egg white omelette obsessions. Most states' specialities are a homage to fat & cholesterol.)

Jus is researching a ski trip for February in the Rockies (yep, we're milking this US experience to the fullest). There are great flight/accomm/lift ticket packages available if you book by the end of November. If you're interested get in touch.

And if you haven't set yourself up on Skype yet, now is the time. Jus and I love the sentimental, sunk-a-bottle-of-wine, late night, long distance call. It's free. And we have a web cam so you can see our smiling faces :)

The fastest 6 months of my life

Well, as of next week, I will have been in New York for 6 months. I am shocked because part of me feels like I'm still just getting started and part of me feels like I'm already very used to living here.

Tonight I re-read the blog from the start and had a laugh. The TV ads don't sound strange anymore, I recognize the brands in the supermarket and I know how to cross the road without bumping into 50 people. I know which part of the platform to stand in so I can exit my train at the right subway stairwell. I know which subway lines to catch to different neighbourhoods without consulting a map. I finally know how much to tip and when. I'm probably talking funny. It all happens so quickly.

Jus and I scoped out winter coats last weekend. We tried on puffy jackets, fur lined hoods, coats filled with down that come to your shins. The coats have warmth ratings like doonas. The store was jostling with people preparing for the winter. I've bought wellingtons and two other pairs of boots to insulate against the creeping cold. The stores are full of woollen tights, turtlenecks, fleece tops and pants, gloves, scarves, ear warmers, thermal t-shirts, beanies, heavy woollen dresses and cashmere everything. You can't help but feel a little dread.

Ange, Jon - your scarf and leather gloves have been getting a work out, respectively. I think of you every time I put them on.

Burger odyssey: update

Well let's cut to the chase. We've been having a burger a week. I haven't even bothered looking at a McDonald's because every restaurant - including Asian, $40 mains and Mexican restaurants - have some kind of burger on the menu. They are nigh on impossible to avoid. And let's face it there is atleast a day week when you feel like ripping into one. So we do. I am doing what every good American does and am living in denial and taking supplements instead to deal with my dietary deficiencies.

The weight is under control thanks to the YMCA and walking home from work, and Jus bought a fairly fancy bike and christened it by riding around the entirety of Manhattan island. So all that ice cream blubber slid off and I can fit in most of my pants again.

Note: my cousin Jade just gave birth a few weeks ago to Merric and is back into all her pre-pregnancy clothes already. I admire the discipline. Check out her baby boy. Divine!

Let me hear you say 'yeah - eh'

So, as we descend into a frigid winter all the awesome theatre and concerts are hotting up New York. Suddenly every actor and his dog is on Broadway: Claire Danes, Bill Pullman, Kevin Kline, Harvey Keitel, Bob Saget(!), Rosie Perez, Chazz Palminteri, Hank Azaria, George Wendt (Norm!), Rufus Sewell, David Morse. We haven't bought theatre tickets yet as the stage hands are on strike and most shows are dark, but once the strike ends I'll be sneaking out at lunchtime and getting tickets. May as well make the most of working in Times Sq and go for the discount tix.

Our credit card is singed as we are off to see Sly & the Family Stone, Jose Gonzalez, Caetano Veloso and Cornelius, but I missed out on tix to Stevie Wonder, which I can't believe I didn't notice the advertising for. The genius himself...one day.

Aretha Franklin and Don Mclean are doing the rounds, as well as blasts from the past like Suzanne Vega, Hall & Oates, Alanis Morissette and The Lemonheads, Ween, Bazza Manilow, Neil Young, Ozzy Osbourne, Patti Smith and uber groups like Sigur Ross, the Polyphonic Spree and Public Enemy. Wu Tang clan or R. Kelly, anyone? Ne-Yo? Queensryche? Xavier Rudd maybe? Eric Clapton?

Like our dear departed Big Kev, I'm very excited.

My new favourite websites: farecast.com & farecompare.com

The Farecast travel site lets you search for airfares across multiple sites and airlines and tells you whether fares are rising or falling and whether to buy now or wait. You can compare airfares over the next 30 days to work out when's the cheapest time to go.

So for example if I fancy a long weekend in Miami I can check and see that mid-December is the best time to go and I should fly from JFK or La Guardia as they're hundreds of dollars cheaper than Newark airport. Love it.

It has international fares too.

Farecompare gives you a 1 year price history of a fare so you can see when the numbers dip. It also specialises in discount first class seats that are comparable in price, or cheaper, than economy seats. Freaky, but apparently true. I can't wait to try it out.

Celebrity sighting #21

The heavily made up Ivanka Trump was dining next to our table at Kingswood, a restaurant in the Village. There was a murmur through the restaurant when she entered, all blonde mane, foundation and big designer handbag. She looked a bit like sour puss but maybe it was all the low key staring.

(And yes, Kingswood is owned by an Aussie.)

Celebrity sighting #15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

Well this weekend I stumbled across the cast of Scrubs, a TV show I was addicted to until my addiction was rudely cut short by not having a TV. This is the last season of Scrubs and the cast were in NY for one day to give a panel Q & A. I went along and saw Zach Braff, Sarah Chalke, Don Faison, Judy Reyes, Neil Flynn and the creator Bill Lawrence and Christa, who plays Jordan, in their funny glory.

It was a good way to kill a couple of hours on a cold Saturday afternoon. Bill Lawrence was insightful, saying how he had wanted to create a show that was a cross between the nostalgia of The Wonder Years, the silliness of The Simpsons and the drama of Mash. Given the 7 years I think he was successful. He also mentioned that out of all the guest stars they had on the show Tara Reid was the worst. The audience loved this speck of goss.

And what's been funny is that Jus and I have discovered that NBC and ABC have full episodes of current series available to watch for free with minimal ads, online. So if you want to get a fix of the latest seasons of Heroes, Grey's Anatomy, Scrubs, My Name is Earl, The Office, Brothers & Sisters, Desperate Houswives, you know where to go. We've also discovered Joost and Hulu, another way to watch TV on your PC. Their lineup includes the Adult Swim cartoons, The Simpsons, Family Guy, and a whole bunch of The Onion and Comedy Central programs as well as lots of old stuff, like Who's The Boss.

So Jus and I can dip into TV whenever we feel like it, without actually owning a TV or paying for cable, or sitting through 20 mins of ads each hour. hallelulah. This is kind of a god send as Sunday nights with single digit temperatures and a wind that would freeze the smile off Hannah Montana are a one way ticket to Cosyville. Does this mean the experiment failed?

And thanks to all of you who placated my laundry room fears, advising that it's perfectly acceptable to remove someone else's washing from the machine if their cycle is done. Monday seems to be washing night in our building: let the games begin.

Holiday to hunt

Surprise of the morning: our client company has this Friday off for the first day of the hunting season. What the? That's the most bogus holiday ever. A horse race, perfectably understandable, but hunting?

Calling all aspiring filmmakers and cinephiles

May 10 2008 will be Pangea Day, where a 4 hour program of films will be broadcast live simulataneously all over the globe, with the aim of promoting better understanding of our common humanity.

Watch the brief video below: I dare you not to be moved!




Send in a short film or keep a watch out for screening info.

Depressed in Detroit

I don't know if its the cold overcast weather, or the fact that there is nothing to eat in this whole airport terminal except disgusting Quiznos subs or stale Starbucks sandwiches with far too imaginative fillings, but I am not in a good mood.

This is where blogs can be dangerous as the temptation to vent superficial, self-absorbed rants is so strong.

I'll stop whingeing now and go and buy a Detroit Red Wings souvenir pencil.

Celebrity Sighting #14

Saw actress Catherine Keener at Madison Square Garden, watching the ice hockey.

More on that extrvaganza later...

Halloween Highlights & Celebrity Sighting #13

The parade went right by our apartment and some pals came by to watch it with us. We were not disappointed, rather I got over-excited and turned into Squeaky. Was it the costumes, the sheer number of participants or the 12-deep crowd on the sidewalk?

The highlight for me was when a float went by booming Michael Jackson's Thriller, followed by 100 people dressed up as zombies, staggering around the street. I said "If they break into the routine from the Thriller video clip I'll die." And you know what, they did. It was awesome. On every block they would line up and crank out the moves. The zombie arm sway, the quarterback shuffle, the wanking hand motion....if you need a reminder, check out Youtube clip from 8.28 mins.

Other people felt the need to dress up as:

• a giant asshole


• the senator who was caught soliciting gay sex in the men's toilets at the airport, complete with pants around the ankles, toilet cubicle and fake hand tapping


• Posh & Becks


• an iPhone


• Wii controllers


• huge penises (there were countless numbers of these. why?)


• Jedis, replete with glowing light sabers


• Scrabble pieces (I can't escape it)

There were all the usuals - ghosts, scarecrows, witches - and some families where the parents evidently had got the kids involved in something elaborate, that they had no choice about participating in. There were also a lot of people who looked like they had dusted off costumes from Gay & Lesbian Pride / Puerto Rico Day Parade / Mermaid Parade and just wanted to get their kit off in public.

Just to give you some context of the size of this thing, the parade started at 7pm and went until about 11pm, and it was thick with people and floats, stiltwalkers and marching bands.

Work was a sea of people dressed up from Kermit to satan worshippers to Lara Croft to House, and we had a party with dry ice wafting out of the punch bowl, as well as a lot of orange food. Its one of the biggest adult party weeks in the year.

And who was the celebrity in the parade? Ron Jeremy. Truly scary.