Dear Diary:
My children are proud to be New Yorkers, and they love the excursions we take around the city. But I didn’t realize how much it had skewed their perspective until we took them camping in northern Wisconsin this summer.
One night in the country the skies were so clear that the constellations and the Milky Way were incredibly sharp and beautiful.
“Wow,” my 9-year-old son said, “it looks just like the planetarium!
I find this alarming: “It was the first time in Mr. Bush’s presidency that he delivered a prime-time speech devoted exclusively to the economy.” (NY Times). Really? That tells me a certain someone has spent a little too much of his presidency focusing on unnecessary foreign conflicts instead of troubles at home.
BTW, a nickel to anyone who can re-punctuate the sentence below in the correct way. You did realize it was a joke, right? (I've already heard from one reader who didn't get my humor.)
I just absolutely have to share these. Over at Jezebel they’ve discovered a trove of fabulous women’s self-help books from the 1970s, called the Woman Alive series. The books and the commentary from Jezebel are absolutely hilarious. (Read: giggling at my work computer again. Very suspicious.)
A Lovelier You
It’s okay to be gay or lesbian or bi, kids. Don’t be scared. 
• Jack Lemmon was adorable, and a fantastic actor, in 1960. (See “The Apartment.”)
• Capoeira came to Brazil via African slaves as martial art masquerading as dance, and looks really neat when performed. Lots of singing and drum beating.
Reviews came in last night, opening night, and are pretty much unanimous that the show is mediocre, at best. I agree with many of their observations (it is too Les Miz-esque, many of the lyrics are terrible, and the characters do tend toward the one-dimensional) but for all that, I enjoyed this show immensely—and, obviously, can’t stop thinking about it. I’m hoping to finagle tickets to see it again.
“Actually, this Carton—a sensational James Barbour—didn’t put a foot wrong all evening…. The show belonged to Barbour’s sonorous-voiced Carton, one of literature’s first anti-heroes. He sang and acted wonderfully, with a kind of hangdog panache that was both ironic and, on the right occasion, very moving.”—New York Post 
“The most noteworthy performances find themselves battling against the reductive conception of their roles. This Sydney Carton is more of an endearing sot than the wastrel 'incapable of all the higher and better flights of men' that Dickens so memorably described, but Mr. Barbour’s robust baritone and flashes of self-loathing go a long way toward masking this.”—New York Sun 
“Barbour has a silky, sulky reptilian charisma and a voice that, for all the monotony of the crooning style, has remarkable range and color.”—Newsday 
Omigod, I wear rimless glasses. Will people think I'm a Sarah Palin fan? That I love her so much I'm emulating her fashion?
It was a great show, especially in the pre-intermission portion, and allowed me to suspend my mistrust of traditional musicals as entertainment. As with the last Broadway musical I saw, "Company," one man stole the show (Raul Esparza, you were robbed at the Tony’s!). This time around it was James Barbour as the self-damning drunk, Sydney Carton. There’s nothing dreamy about him, but he pulled off a charismatic stagger and wistful negativity that was quite astonishing. And that voice! Fabulous. I’d almost say he will haunt my dreams as the fetching Lucie Manette haunted his, but that would be a tad melodramatic and my life is not that Dickensian (or is at least lacking in musical numbers).
Do: Take the Staten Island Ferry, which is free, so you can get a look at the Statue of Liberty. Do not: Stand on line and pay for the boat that goes out to Liberty Island so you can mill around with people from Kansas. (I’m saying “on line” because that’s what New Yorkers do.)
Do: Ride the subway—because it’s fun. Whee! Do: Take a taxi in Manhattan at least once. Makes you feel like you’re in a movie. 
Do: Get delicious halal street food. Do not: Get a dry-as-hell pretzel or hot dog from street vendors. Do: Appreciate the smell of roasted nuts from street carts but do not: Buy them. They smell better than they taste.
Do: Go to Rockefeller Plaza, but not for long, as this is also tourist central. Get there early in the morning to watch the “Today” show taping and housewives from Virginia holding up signs to get Al Roker’s attention. 
After crossing the bridge on the Q train this morning and gazing respectfully over lower Manhattan, my reverie was interrupted by two men getting into a physical fight. One, sitting by the door, accused the other, standing against the door, of “sitting” on him. A pushing and shouting match ensued, wherein they both acted like 5-year-olds, but 5-year-olds where you worry one of them might pull a knife or throw a strong punch. Neither of those things happened, but it prompted the whole train to go quiet to assess the situation before several women from around the car, including me, yelled at them to knock it off.
..., but I kid. I will save my comments until every last one of you has seen it. Get crackin'!
NY Times: California: Settlement in Fatal Landslide"Landslides similar or larger than the 1995 and 2005 events may occur next year or in coming decades, during or shortly after intense rain," said Larry D. Gurrola, geologist and graduate student at the University of California, Santa Barbara. "People tend to have short memories when it comes to geologic hazards such as landslides. If people continue to live in La Conchita, more lives will be lost in the future and this is unacceptable."Of course, no disrespect to the victims.
1995 landslide
2005 landslide
Really, really terrible op-ed by me published in the Pacific Coast Business Times regarding the mudslide. Sort of.
From Peppermint Creek © 2008. Chaotic Soul :: Converted by Randomness
