All Is Love

Last year I went to see an original new musical at The NY Musical Theatre Festival. The Great American Trailer Park Musical was its name and, although there were some really fine actors involved with really fine singing voices, the material pretty much (sorry to say) bit the bunny. There were 15 shows put on under the Festival banner and a fine idea it is because it provides a venue for experimentation with new material and utilizes top notch talent that only NYC can provide, especially singers and dancers.

This year there are 34 entries in the Festival and last night I went to see All Is Love, a new dance musical and, again, the talent was right up there. The plot was a total cliché, being three bright young girl-things arriving in the big city, dazzled and thrilled, assimilating into the mainstream and eventually descending into the passion of the seamy side of life (eek) and being dragged into rape, physical abuse and sexual betrayal, not necessarily in that order. There is no spoken dialogue but it sure didn’t require a course in American Sign Language to get the gist. It was about an hour long and I really liked the music (on tape) and you sure can’t fault the dancing talent, both men and women. There ain’t nothin’ like NY theater dancing anywhere else in the world and even off-off-Broadway can field the best. But, admittedly, All Is Love is a work in progress and maybe they will eventually have a real show to give to the world.

Wedding Blitz

So here they are; signed, sealed, delivered…it was a grand affair. They are in Bora Bora as we speak; not too shabby a honeymoon destination. It was funny, here was this really nice, mini-extravaganza of a wedding, the two stars shining with inner and outer luminescence; an event totally focused on them with literally hundreds of eyes (if you count the dogs and chickens) glued to their every move and somehow they got through it with a high degree of polished aplomb. Who’d a thunk it?

Because of a logistical arrangement with the mother of the groom (my sis) I was one of the very few who actually saw them the following day and, oddly enough, they seemed like the same old couple that I knew before they got hitched. Unglamorous, unfettered by fancy accoutrements, sensibly dressed and calm as garden veggies. Their day in the firmament didn’t seem to have gone to their wedded heads in the least.

Anyway, bravo to thems that worked so hard to get it together for that one glorious day, perfect weather included, and bravo to the two of thems for carrying it off with no apparent stress and/or agita. If they suffered, it didn’t show. Congratulations dear nephew and welcome-to-our-hearts your spousal selection!

Oh, before I forget, yes the bride looked gorgeous in her white wedding dress but that bridesmaid (sister of the bride), in her incredible fall-color-coded gown, was cherce!

Whatever Happened to Bowling?

How the mighty have fallen. 100 years ago I bowled in a league in the East Village but had to give it up when my job carried me out to Long Island. We bowled at this really funky old alley on University Place called the Bowlmor Lanes. It was on two floors and must have been built in the 1940’s and was probably creaky even then. But it was funky and it was ours. Anyway, I have joined a league again and we bowl at the new fancy-schmancy sports complex at Chelsea Piers on the west side of Manhattan. If you drive along the West Side Highway you can’t miss it.

The lanes are top-of-the-line electronically-enhanced alleys with people (mostly young women) with walkie talkies keeping tabs on their maintenance. The small Pepsi costs $2.49 at the snack bar…other foodstuffs are priced accordingly. In other words, outrageous. The bowling itself is expensive too but I guess I shouldn’t be shocked by the change in prices on anything these days. There is also a certain “attitude” amid the young ladies who man the various concessions. Tipwise, it’s a demeanor to be regretted.

I tried to remember the last time I bowled and it has to be at least 13 or 14 years ago. In my old league days my average hovered in the high 160’s which was not too bad considering the condition of the facility. The equipment (balls and shoes) at the Piers are technically far superior to what we had in those days and the pins themselves seem to fly much more extravagantly than I remembered. Nonetheless I’m a tad ashamed to lay my scores on you but here you go: 116, 124 and 130. I would have done a lot better on the third game, since I was getting the hang of it again, but I sort of ran out of steam. Believe it or not, bowling does require a modicum of stamina.

We are called the Strike Squad Supreme which is just silly. I tried to surreptitiously change the “Squad” to “Squat” but they caught me and accused me of not having the proper team spirit. Can you imagine? Oh, well, onward and upward! If not the hero incarnate, I plan to be at least a credit to my team.

Wedding Bliss

I’m off to San Francisco tomorrow to attend my nephew’s wedding. They are actually getting married on the front lawn of Blackberry Farm in Bolinas, a small hamlet on the coast about 40 miles north of SF. The reception will be on the back lawn. There is a collection of exotic chickens roaming around. And a couple of horses. It’s rural and idyllic. That old she-witch, Lady Fog, is possible but hopefully an absentee guest, de lawd be praised.

This is my nephew and his fiancé. Aren't they cute? They are both now in their 30’s and have been friends and enemies and companions and maybe bank robbers since high school. Hopefully the glue of this history will take them well into their 40’s. If either of them objects to this blog or this photo I will remove it forthwith. In the meantime, depending on how busy they are (and I imagine they are pretty busy) and visiting this blog is certainly way low in their priorities, please feel free to convey good wishes before any veto is lodged.

This wedding is a big deal in my family; especially for my sister (mother of the groom, otherwise known as MOTG) who is, as we speak, basically flipping out with excitement, but (of course) in a constructive way. She is in charge of the floral décor and, it seems, the porta-potties. Insert joke here about aromatic juxtaposition(s).

I’ll see if I can get an appropriate photo on here, fit for human consumption, in the near future. No chickens, but no promises either.

Nine Eleven

On March 11, 2002, these two brilliant shafts of light, representing the fallen twin towers, lit up the sky. For one month this is the view I saw every evening on my way home from work on the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. Each 9/11 anniversary afterwards, including tonight, these shafts of light are resurrected. On a clear night they can be seen from 25 miles away. Whatever solid edifice is eventually constructed at ground zero, no matter how soaring, this memorial in lights will always be, to me, the most eloquent.

The Evil Side of Wicker

This photo is posted here in honor of nothing in particular. I just think it's so weird and it tickles my fancy. What if Frank L. Baum had decided on a tin man, a cowardly lion and a wicker basket? It probably would have changed the history of the world.

Bob Mathias, Hometown Hero

I went to high school with this man. Bob Mathias died last Saturday, Sept. 2nd. An amazing athlete, he won the decathlon in the Olympics twice; first in London at the age of 17 and then Finland four years later. He starred in the movie about his own life. He was a Congressman for four terms. All-American boy; All-American man…except he was a Republican (gasp).

But I fudge the truth here a little bit. He was a tad ahead of me in school and was, I think, playing football in the Rose Bowl as a senior at Stanford during my freshman year of high school. His brother Jim was two years ahead of me and his sister Pat was in my class. According to Bob’s obituary they both seem to be alive and kicking in the backyard of my youth.

This is my brush with greatness: I think I was in my sophomore year when Jim brought a couple of his brother’s Olympic medals to school for show-and-tell. The medals were subsequently stolen from his gym locker. What scandalous behavior for a small town! School and police officials at first pleaded with the thief to return them, to no avail, and then they did a weird thing. They put an empty box in a deserted room and they made every boy in school go in one door and out the other, presumably giving the repentant thief a chance to return the medals without fear of arrest or incarceration. As far as I know it didn’t work. The box was sure empty when I went through. To this day I don’t understand the psychology behind this procedure but, well, who am I to delve into the devious mind of authority?

I think the riddle of the missing medals remains a mystery to this day. Unless they got thrown in a ditch maybe they will turn up in some basement, attic or rural cabinet of curiosities one day. That would be good.

Mima Knits

I have this friend who lives in Quincy, Mass. Call him Ismael (yes, without the ‘h’). He is sort of a Puerto Rican Renaissance man (that is not an oxymoron) in that he has quite a large range of interests and actually indulges in creating examples of some of them. We call him Mima because none of us, including young members of his own family, can even come close to pronouncing Ismael with the accent it requires (too many zzz’s). He’s basically a techie type of guy with, it seems, an amazing amount of patience (please don’t quote his partner on this subject; quote me) and he always seems to choose projects that are complicated and beyond the ken of “normal” artisans. Mima knits and I think it’s more than a hobby for him since he brings his skills in math and science into the creation of some pretty fine garments. Obviously the boy learned to count at an early age.

But enough about Mima; this is my blog, after all. The point is that after a decade of cow eyed looks and deliberately shivering in the cold in his presence, he knitted a sweater for me. It only took years of outrageous hints on my part and two or three months of his spare time but, hey, who’s to say I’m not totally worth it? He took measurements and made a paper pattern, kindly acknowledging that I do have a middle-aged spread midriff-wise. I chose the color (well, actually I just said, “ya know, one of those cool new-blues”) with two letterman-sweater type stripes on one sleeve. This is a throwback to my unlamented high school days where “lettering” in sports (I played basketball) was academically as important as an A in algebra. I never got an A in algebra but I did get an A in b-ball and, therefore, a college scholarship.

This is my new sweater.














Pretty nifty, huh? It is an exact fit, it complements my pitiless blue eyes and I really love it. I haven’t actually worn it out in public yet but will be proud to do so when winter starts blowing up our noses.

Naturalist Killed by...Ego?

My first stab at a title for this blog was “Stingray Kills Egomaniac” but I was pretty appalled by my own hard-heartedness and decided to buff the corners with slightly more compassion. It is always sad to hear about an early death and Steve Irwin was only 44.

I’m just so puzzled how this death occurred. Did he try to give the stingray a bear hug or what? The “stinger” is not on the end of the tail as you might expect, but at the base of it, so you really have to work at getting hurt, much less getting it stuck in a vital organ. These are very shy and non-aggressive animals and the only time I’ve ever heard of any injury caused by a stingray was because somebody stepped on one. I’ve seen all kinds of rays and skates on the hoof many times and they are amazing and beautifully graceful creatures; but I’ve never tried to grab or even touch one. In fact I make it a habit to keep my hands to myself while snorkeling or Scuba diving. The one time I veered from that policy, and lived to regret it I might add, I was showing off and grabbed a living abalone with my bare hand only to slice a finger badly on its shell. Although I wasn’t hurt much and the scar is miniscule, trust me, it’s not good to bleed profusely while swimming in the ocean, any ocean. No explanation necessary.

Mr. Irwin’s death reminds me of that other publicity-hound, Timothy Treadwell, who devoted more than a decade to studying and “making friends” with grizzly bears in Alaska before one of them finally ate him in October of ‘03. He was only 46. He, however, had the gall to put his girlfriend in jeopardy too and she also bought the farm in the jaws of hell, age 34.

Shall we discuss Siegfried & Roy? Let’s not.

Flirting with animals is a dangerous business, even if they are only domesticated ones like pit bulls and remakes of Lassie.

Hooked on Bagels

There was a survey taken recently, and published hither and thither, about the very best bagels in and around New York City. I was pleased to see that my favorite bagel source in Brooklyn was right up there in the top five (I think it came in second actually…a robbery worth reporting to the deli-police). It’s also a damn good delicatessen in and of itself but it is their bagels that give it it’s lustre. I’m lusting after one as we speak and may have to give in and hike over there right now.

What makes a good bagel, and why are the ones in NYC so much better than elsewhere? It’s not proven but conventional wisdom has it that it’s our water. Not that it’s any more pure or better than anywhere else, I guess it’s based on the make-up of it. Certain amounts of minerals and chemicals, etc. gives our water a really good taste so it’s logical our bagels would reflect that since what bagels are, basically, is boiled dough. Rings of hand-rolled dough dropped in boiling water. That’s how you cook them but a basic bread-recipe and the addition of a variety of seeds and stuff as toppings is what gives them their individual kick.

When I have guests and/or company I usually try to stock in a small supply, or else we all traipse up to Terrace Bagels for take-out or, even, eat-in. Many of my friends/family have made a stop there on their way out of town, to take home a baker’s dozen. It’s the thing to do and a nice homey memory of Brooklyn.

My favorite bagel is sesame seed. I like many of the other varieties also, but tend to avoid the sweet ones. A toasted sesame seed bagel, sometimes still cook-pot warm , topped with cream cheese (plain is good; but scallion is great) and it’s a nosh fit for a king. It’s all individual taste, of course, and sometimes individual pretension. It’s like pizza; the fancier it gets the more unbagel-like it becomes.