Big Business is a Two Way Street

Blargh. East Harlem has a Costco now. Sigh.

Meghan and I had brunch at Orbit up on 116 and First Ave. yesterday. I rode the bus up from my apartment, and there were these two older white ladies who looked very out of place on the uptown M15 above 96 Street. One of the women got up and asked the bus driver which was the right stop for the Costco. Ah. That explained it.

When I got off the bus and crossed over, there were tons of white people with baskets and huge shopping bags wandering 116th Street, looking confused and out of place. This, it seems, is the future of the neighborhood. At least during the day. On weekends.

The huge shopping center, which may or may not include a Home Depot and a Target to match the Costco in the near future (it's always in deliberation), looks totally out of place. Here, take a look at these photos:

Looking left, it's New York City.


Looking right... Aaaah! FML!


If the Target and Home Depot do come, I can't say I won't go to them. They're right up the street, after all, and I do miss megastores sometimes. But on the other hand, it's too close for comfort. If I'm feeling like this, there's no telling what the lifelong residents are feeling. Is it still Spanish Harlem, or will it be the SpaHa white developers have long been wanting?

Sigh.

Lost in a Forest Filled With Desert Water... What?

I'm slowly discovering who I am as a person, and, maybe more importantly, as a writer. And it's very confusing. I've always imagined my life going a certain (read: Southern) way—good at high school, successful in college, move to New York, get nice apartment, have great friends, get job in magazines, get married, have kids. All but two of the things on my lifelong to-do list can be checked off... and I'm only 23. Now what?

Yes, I realize the list isn't profound or broken down in any way, but... I'm struggling. I'm struggling with what I want and how I want to be fulfilled. What I want to spend my time on and what I don't. Sometimes in my social life or in my work life, I feel like things are going perfectly. Others, I wonder why I'm wasting my time. I'm only 23, and I'm poor as fuck, so shouldn't I at least be creating or exploring or energizing myself? I know I can't do these things all the time, and that there will be ups and downs, but, creatively speaking, am I not spending enough time on myself? Developing into who I want to be? Figuring it out?

I feel stuck lately. Things have been so great for so long, but my mind is starting to wander to things I have no experience, no time, no ability to do. Who the hell am I? Is this path that I'm on where I'm supposed to be going? Does it matter?

I don't know, obviously. And that's all I do know. I have ideas of going back to Mississippi to gather information and characters and history. Maybe I'm destined to be a great Southern writer? And I have ideas of traveling to Europe and getting into trouble. Maybe I'm destined to be a great random stories or travel writer? Or a memoirist? Or maybe I'm supposed to capture New York?

I'm rambling, but I'm allowed to do that. Basically I'm confused because I'm stuck. I've, sadly, accomplished many of my life goals, and I'm too young to say that. Or maybe I don't have enough goals. Or maybe I'm just confused with what life is supposed to be as an adult. Whatever it is, I'm not happy with it, and I want to know the answer.

Sigh. I am human after all. Now how does that work?

Radio Gaga Reprise: Two of a Kind

Meghan and I recently discovered that we drunkenly took photos of ourselves in the same mirror in the same bathroom in the same apartment on the same night right after each other without knowing it. I literally don't remember doing this. Radio Gaga, two become one. The results below. (Also, don't forget about the HLLWN 09 video, if you haven't seen it yet!)

MyNY: Two Months of Holiday Joy

One of my favorite things about New York is the really, really long holiday season. I know holiday decorations go up early all around the country, but it feels like so much more here. Stores decorate with lights and greenery, Coke cans go holiday, Starbucks cups turn red and Dunkin Donut cups have snowmen on them, ice skating begins, the big tree at Rockefeller goes up (even though it isn't revealed until the first week of December). Meghan and I were walking around Columbus Circle on Friday and the place has already gone coo-coo for Christmas time. The trees were lit, huge tree decorations hung from the ceiling inside of the Shops at Columbus Circle, and there was actual holiday music playing outside. Someone walking by exclaimed that Halloween was barely over, but in reality, Thanksgiving is a little more than one week away. Ah, the holidays. Loves it.

Time Flying

New York is weird with time. It moves by so quickly. Suddenly it's nearly winter again, the Starbucks cups are red, the Dunkin Donuts cups have snowmen on them, it's windy and cold and people pull out their shin-length puffy coats (even in 50 degree weather). Suddenly you've lived here for almost 18 months. Suddenly a decade has gone by.

Saturday is my mom's birthday. My dad's was a few weeks ago, November 3rd, and I forgot to call him for the first time ever. He doesn't care. My parents have never cared about stuff like that. In fact, my dad is going on a rock climbing trip for my mom's birthday and she doesn't mind at all. But still. Time goes by so quickly.

I blame it on the traveling. We spend so many minutes of our day walking to, waiting for, and riding on the train. Those minutes add up—30 minutes here, 20 minutes there, 15, 10, 45, and suddenly you've spent two hours of your day in transit. And suddenly a week has gone by.

Just look at this blog. I update pretty regularly, but I was busy at work this week and suddenly it's been four days since my last post. And suddenly two seasons have gone by.

This time last year, I was impatient for snow. This year I can't believe it's already time to snow again. But I guess that's part of living here. Every time you feel like you know everything, something pops up that you had no clue about. And just when you think you've settled in, something shakes you up and makes you rethink things. Even though time is passing normally, the more time I spend here, the less time I feel like I've been here. I hope this never ends—I want it to forever be simultaneously old and new.

Hate the Box, Love the Content

Ah, television. The big black box and I have long had a strange relationship. As a wee lad, aka pre-fourth grade, we had cable at my house. I grew up on Nickelodeon, Snick, the pre-ABC Family Channel and the actual-ABC TGIF. But toward the end of third grade, my family moved into a new house a little more outside of town, an abyss where cable wasn't installed and DirectTV, in its infancy, couldn't reach us because our "trees were too tall." (I never understood that.) As such, I didn't have cable again until I was in college. I didn't spend my adolescent years in front of the MTV box, I never watched an episode of TRL, and my family and I gathered around nightly to watch network TV that we could pick up with a giant antenna in our attic.

A little collage of some of my favorite TV, past and present.

In college, I had cable all four years, and though roommates and I watched it (Project Runway, Top Model marathons, etc.), I mostly paid for it because it came with the Internet. I've never been a channel flipper (we only had five channels, so one go-around was good enough and there was always a single obvious choice) and sitting in front of the box surfing for any mindless old thing never appealed to me. It still doesn't. In college, I taped shows I was interested in (cough Star Trek Voyager every weekday on Spike from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. except on Friday when it was only on from 3 to 4 cough) and watched those, then watched TV when specific shows came on. And then came full episodes ABC.com. Hello, lovelies.

Because the things about TV and me is that I love television programming, but I hate television itself. The writing on TV is like nothing else, and I'd almost always rather watch a few episodes on DVD (another TV godsend) than a movie. My attention span is short, so episodes are good for me, but I'm also a freak for completing a project in order, encouraging me to watch seasons as wholes. I am basically made for TV programming as a stand-alone option.

Right now on Hulu, I'm subscribed to 14 shows: 30 Rock, Brothers and Sisters, Modern Family, Family Guy, The Cleavland Show, The Office, Parks and Recreation, Cougar Town, Dollhouse, Flash Forward, Grey's Anatomy, Ugly Betty, V, and SNL. Add in Mad Men and I actually follow every episode of 15 current shows. And that doesn't include off-season shows like Weeds, United States of Tara, Nurse Jackie and so on. I own the entire series of Alias, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Will & Grace, then assorted other seasons of other shows.

The point of this post is a realization that I've come to today: I. Love. Television. (Programming.) I've always known, and I'm sure friends will give me a "duh" face, but I've never realized that I was such a TV person. Or that I loved TV writing so much. (Something you might notice is missing: reality TV/game shows. I like my shit written.)

So I'm going to do what any ambitious young person does and try to write some. I'm in a big creation phase right now and I keep making work for myself, but I'm trying to see what flows. And right now, this feels like it flows more than anything I've written, ever. I'm not quite sure what to think about it.

It was actually a feature in this week's New York magazine, Will Somebody Please Save NBC?, that inspired me. (Shocking that I'm inspired by New York mag, I know.) I saw it when I flipped through the issue on the train this afternoon and then read the entire story online, which I never do. Check it out. Or watch some TV. Programming! Not the box.

MyNY: Sunset from the High Line

I know I post a lot of photos of sunsets, but there's something about them in New York. The backdrop is better, the skyline shines, the colors seem richer. Meghan and I walked the High Line, a new elevated outdoor park on the lower west side of Manhattan, the other day, and the sunset was amazing.

Around 5 p.m.

Around 5:15 p.m.

Just another day in New York...

Was There, Like, Some Kind of Game or Something?

I got out of the Fulton Street stop on my way to the office earlier and ran into a huge pile of Yankee fans. An enormous pile. A pile of epic proportions. It was awful.


It was so crowded, in fact, that I went down into a different subway station and walked underground to avoid the crowd. Thank god for the unlimited MetroCard.

Of course I snapped a photo of the least trashy person there. This girl seems sweet.

As Meghan pointed out earlier, Yankee fans seem to be the New York equivalent of LSU fans—loud, trashy, carbon copies of each other. Gross.


Shockingly enough, the PATH station to Jersey was the most crowded area as I made my way to the office. I'm so glad these fools don't usually live here. Welcome to utter normality.

Okay, let's be honest, this is kind of cute. Now move!

The Unknown Effects of Glitter Bras and Mustaches

Halloween was brilliant. In one day we built costumes, rode trains, wandered the city, danced at several parties and in several bars, and pretty much traveled the globe. After much time pilfering through the hours of footage and some standard YouTube uploading drama, I'm happy to give you the HLLWN09 video.

The Good Life... The Green Life?

Ugh, I just got another Ikea email, now with "new lower prices!" Stop taunting me, affordable yet expensive and close yet inconvenient furniture! I do not want to look at the sleek lines of that beautiful "Expedit" bookcase that's only $69 and that I do not need or have space for but that I really really want! Stop looking at me like that! You too, Ikea 365+ 7-piece cookware set, so shiny and silver!

I need some green, but maybe not this kind...

I'm having trouble with my money right now. Not financial trouble, but mental trouble. I actually have a little bit of extra money because I got paid three times in October instead of just two (don't you love when that happens?), but I'm trying not to go insane and buy lots of stuff and be dirt poor again. Money padding is nice. But...

...But I just want so much stuff! I want some new $100 shoes! I want one of those Flip video cameras that are small but that shoot video in HD! I want a new computer! I want Final Cut Pro! I want a new jacket and some new clothes and some good food and lots and lots of stuff! Is it so bad to want stuff!? But I can't afford it. I can't afford ANYTHING!

Sigh. I'm antsy. I know my life is good and my job is good and I'm in New York and I'm lucky and all that, but sometimes I feel like I would sell myself for a little extra cash. If someone could just give me $10,000 to do a mini life-upgrade, I would be very happy.

So if you know someone...