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Friday, April 30, 2004 ( 9:30 AM ) teahouse If You've Got the Crime, We've Got the Time I hate hidden characters in movies and shows. They always make me feel so manipulated by the producers. Like Charlie's Angels. I used to watch the original show, from the 70s. Why don't we ever see Charlie? What's wrong with him? Is he ugly? Does he have bad acne, or a crossed eye? Especially with those gorgeous women working for him, you'd think he'd prefer to be more than just a disembodied voice on a speaker. And what about Mrs. Columbo? Why is she never revealed, and are we sure that Detective Columbo wasn't just some crazy doddering old man in a trench coat fantasizing that he had a wife at home waiting for him? And remember the Bloodhound Gang on PBS? Why didn't we ever see Mr. Bloodhound? I think there was one episode in which you saw his shadow, but that was it. We couldn't even hear his voice. Who would let a bunch of pre-pubescent kids run around unsupervised like that? Who cares if they solve mysteries and help people? It all seems very suspicious to me. Seems like Child Services would have shut down his ass pretty early on. # 0 comments Wednesday, April 28, 2004 ( 9:24 AM ) teahouse Tighten Those Muscles Yesterday I was walking down Fifth Avenue, when I saw someone I knew jogging up the street. It was my doctor. My ob/gyn. It was weird to see her in a different context. Usually when I see her, she's in a white coat and I'm lying on the examination table, my legs in the stirrups, and we're talking about Pap smears. But yesterday she was wearing an old, ratty jogging suit, and looked like any other runner. She didn't seem to be in great shape, she was huffing and puffing. I thought about shouting out to her, "Hey, Dr. S! How ya doing?" But then I thought better of it. After all, would she really recognize me? She probably recognizes her patients based on other parts of their bodies besides their faces. # 0 comments Tuesday, April 27, 2004 ( 8:35 AM ) teahouse Music Nerds You know how some people have secret relationships they keep from their friends? Well, one of my friends has a secret orchestra. She plays in this group but she never talks about it and she never invites us to their concerts. I'll say, "So when's you're next concert? Can I come see you?" and she'll say, "Nahh..the group sucks, and I don't like the conductor much, and the music is bad..maybe next time!" She says it unconvincingly, though. I think she really likes it but she doesn't want to share it with me. She's been putting me off like this for a year. It's like that secret relationship that's just about sex with the tattooed, Harley-riding construction worker from Jersey City that you don't want your banker friends to know about. So you meet furtively in alleys for quickies, and then in public date other guys you can take on double dates with your snooty Manhattan friends who are none the wiser. It's like she just fulfills a need to be in an orchestra, but she doesn't want to share that need with the rest of us, who are members of her "mainstream" orchestra and don't know about her other, "secret" orchestra. It's kind of scintillating, actually. We wonder whether the other orchestra knows tricks we don't know, or is really good in bed. So we're going to do an intervention. But I vote for just secretly following her to her next tryst - I mean, rehearsal. Then we can nab her in the act. # 0 comments Monday, April 26, 2004 ( 8:35 AM ) teahouse Ooohh, Denzel... This weekend I was in a fancy wine store downtown, doing some wine tasting. The wine store employee's name was Tawana. She looked like Halle Berry, but with dredlocks and multiple piercings. She opened one bottle and poured some for me. She said, "You HAVE to try this one. It's sooo divine. Her voice lowered to a sultry whisper. "It's like, well, it's like Denzel Washington in a bottle." She was right. It was delicious. So I bought a bottle. The funny thing about that was that it was a bottle of white wine. # 0 comments Wednesday, April 21, 2004 ( 8:39 AM ) teahouse The Hostess with the Leastest I have friends coming into town to visit me for a few days. Because work has been so crazy, I'm now scrambling around trying to clean my apartment and prepare for their arrival. I just realized that I'm a terrible hostess. I'm messy and unorganized. I'm not one of those hostesses who have fresh flowers on the table to greet their guests. I think I can dig up a dying cactus somewhere. My towels never match. My bathroom is dirty. I can't find my iron, and I can't remember the last time I used a hair dryer. I won't be waking up at 6 a.m. to brew coffee so they are awakened by the pleasing aroma, like in those Folger's commercials. I have no food in my refrigerator. If they stay with me for too long, they'll starve to death. We New Yorkers get lazy with our guests. We don't plan things because we figure they'll just amuse themselves in the City while we work. I'm sure my friends will be fine. If they're really bored and kind find a single thing to do in this city, they can stop by my office and watch me work for 18 hours straight. It'll be more exciting than the Zoo. Watching lawyers in their natural habitat. # 0 comments Tuesday, April 20, 2004 ( 12:53 AM ) teahouse Getting Old I swear, the older I get, the more I enjoy music by Bruce Springsteen. I was in a dive bar this weekend near the Lincoln Tunnel exit, drinking a cold beer and listening to Thunder Road on the jukebox. What a great song. Suddenly, inexplicably, I found myself slapping the backs of the flannel-shirted men at the bar, sobbing, "I love you, man!" I swear, I'm really a 50-something-year-old guy From New Jersey..trapped in the body of a 5'3" Asian girl. # 0 comments Monday, April 19, 2004 ( 8:56 AM ) teahouse Segway Woe I actually saw a guy on one of those Segway Transporter things the other day. I always thought those were a huge gimmick, expensive and not affordable to the common man. But I actually saw one. This guy was riding one down 3rd Avenue. He was zooming pretty quickly, obviously in a hurry to get to work. And he was easily overtaken by 3 kids on skateboards AND a pregnant woman pushing a stroller. # 0 comments Friday, April 16, 2004 ( 8:07 AM ) teahouse Testing.... Something funky is going on. My posts are disappearing. Stand by while we resolve technical difficulties... # 0 comments Thursday, April 15, 2004 ( 8:48 AM ) teahouse Worker Bee I'm already totally swamped at work. They've got me running around on all of this work that they saved up for my arrival. I feel like the Queen of Sheba. Trumpet fanfare, anyone? In spite of the craziness, I'm hoping to be able to take a few hours in the next couple of days to go to the International Orchid Show at Rockefeller Center. It's important to make time for these things. I already used the emergency drinking water in my "go-bag" to water one of my office plants. You can tell I have my priorities straight. I might die of dehydration, but my orchids will still be looking damn fine. # 0 comments Wednesday, April 14, 2004 ( 8:37 AM ) teahouse Welcome to Your Life; There's No Turning Back Well, my vacation is over. I started work at my new firm. Along with the requisite forms for my health insurance and 401k, I was given a zippered duffel bag with the firm logo on the front. I thought, "Oh goody! Free stuff!" I opened it to find a gas mask, a flashlight, a bottle of purified drinking water and a card with printed emergency phone numbers and evacuation procedures in case of a terrorist attack. Yes, welcome to the life of a Manhattan high-rise office worker. Perhaps they should have included cyanide pills for a quick and painless exit. # 0 comments Monday, April 12, 2004 ( 8:59 AM ) teahouse Easter Monday I spent Easter with my best friend's family in the suburbs. The oldest person there was her 90-year-old grandmother. The youngest was her 3-month-old niece. I was the second youngest person there. We dyed Easter eggs. We got the super-duper kit with the glittery designs! I wish I'd taken pictures. The baby was too young to do the easter egg hunt. So everyone hid eggs for the second youngest (me) and I walked around with a wicker basket and find them. I laughed when I found the eggs and cried when I didn't. I had to be rocked and comforted. They gave me milk and cookies, whispered to each other that I must have had too much excitement for one afternoon. I sat and watched Teletubbies, and then I took a nap. I wore a new pastel dress and an Easter bonnet. I got rowdy during the church service and had to be taken into the cry room. I got excited and smeared deviled eggs all over my face. Then I had to sit in the corner for 5 minutes. Today is Easter Monday, a holiday that apparently is not observed in the U.S. That's too bad, egg rolling contests sound like they might be fun. # 0 comments Friday, April 09, 2004 ( 8:25 AM ) teahouse Good Friday to You Hope everyone has a good day off for rest and reflection. It's beautiful and sunny. In the meantime, I have some pictures up from my China trip! You can see them here. I'll keep adding to them. In the meantime, enjoy the day and have a Joyeux Paques! # 0 comments Wednesday, April 07, 2004 ( 8:02 AM ) teahouse Strong Disciplinarian One of my pet fish is misbehaving. He's been very territorial in the aquarium, terrorizing the other fish and chasing them around. Additionally, he hogs the food, so that while the other fish are skinny and scrawny, he has gotten fatter and fatter. So yesterday I grounded him, and sent him to his room without any supper. Well, not really. I caught him with a net and partitioned him off. I fed the other fish, to try to fatten them up. Now he's in solitary confinement. At first he was very angry at me, but now he's calmed down and resigned himself to his fate. If he's good, I'll let him out later, and give everyone bloodworms as a treat. I run a tight ship around here. No misbehaving! # 0 comments Tuesday, April 06, 2004 ( 5:52 AM ) teahouse Insomnia I love watching PBS in the middle of the night. There are so many interesting shows. There's the old man with the fishing hat and tie-dyed shirt who teaches adult literacy. "In the word time, you see the 'e' at the end. But you don't pronounce it. The 'e' is silent." There's the woman with the 60's bouffant who teaches handwriting. She writes the cursive letters on the chalkboard, accompanying her handstrokes with her soothing voice, "Undercurve, slant. Undercurve, slant." There are nonstop ads for the new PBS reality show: Colonial House. It appears that Frontier House and Manor House were so successful that they've spun it off. What's next? Teepee House? Igloo House? Chateau House? I'm looking forward to Wigwam House. # 0 comments Monday, April 05, 2004 ( 7:59 AM ) teahouse Supreme Ironic Blend In Starbucks in Beijing, , you can't buy a soy latte. In fact, there are no soy products on the menu at all. # 0 comments Friday, April 02, 2004 ( 8:42 AM ) teahouse Rear Window My friend A is doing her residency in internal medicine. She told me a funny story yesterday. Last week her hospital sent her to a federal penitentiary, to give physicals to two male prisoners. The physicals included rectal exams. This week, she was supposed to go back to the prison to see more patients. But she got sick at the last minute and had to stay home. So instead, her boss (the attending physician) went over to the prison and filled in for her. He called her after returning from the prison, totally irate. "Apparently word got around in the prison that there was an attractive young female doctor giving rectal exams," he lamented. "So when I got there, there was a line out the door. Since you weren't there, I ended up having to give rectal exams to about 100 male prisoners." !!!! # 0 comments Thursday, April 01, 2004 ( 1:52 PM ) teahouse Adding it All Up Round trip air fare to the Far East: $800 Money shelled out for cheap trinkets and fake designer clothes from street markets: $200 Admission to the Great Wall, Forbidden City and the Summer Palace: $10 Actual cost of a fancy Peking duck dinner in Peking: $15 Ticket to watch Chinese acrobats contorting their bodies and tumbling through hoops: $20 Having time off in between jobs, sitting around in pajamas all day, watching bad daytime tv, scratching my belly and enjoying blessed UNEMPLOYMENT: Priceless! # 0 comments |
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