Tuesday, January 30, 2007

In the Subway

1. Late at night, smelled cigarette smoke. Saw that a guy to my left was openly indulging.

Began giving him dirty looks; looks that condemned him for forcing me to breathe his poison. Long minutes later,as we were about to pull out of Columbus Circle, I noticed he had in his hand a loooooong, pointy metal thing with a handle. Kinda ice picky-looking, maybe; kinda deadly-looking, for sure. The doors were about to close but I managed to get off the train.

Ratted the guy out to some train worker but as the train had pulled out and she didn't know which one it had been, the worker was at a loss as to how to inform the appropriate authorities that a guy with a deadly weapon was in the system.

Remember, if you see something, say something. (Might not help in terms of security but it'll help kill time for both you and our highly-trained transit workers.)


2. Daytime. On the Manhattan-bound D, there was an Orthodox Jewish kid with wiiiiiiide-brimmed black hat that made him look like a schoolkid on "Little House on the Prairie". (He wasn't wearing "peyos", the side curls often favored by Hebraic devout, so he really could be an Ingalls classmate.) I wanted to ask the kid what it was like not being able to wear buttons and if he liked riding in horse-drawn carriages, so he'd thing I'd mistaken him for Amish.

He was such a wholesome-looking, freckle-cheeked, potentially normal boy. I believe he should be made fun of early and often.

Until he stops that.

What could possibly be religious about wearing long, black coats and slightly-off man-hats? More to the point, what could these garments have to do with a religion from the middle east?

And what does a bunch of guys who "believe" the same thing, wearing the same outfits to reflect that shared "belief, have in common with a gang of '50s high school students with greased back hair and satin jackets bearing the name, "The Conquistadors"?

Everything.

They're all in costumes. Gang uniforms. A method of group identification.

The enemy of subtlety. Of individuality.

Ask me tomorrow and I may feel differently. But today I think that kid should wear "regular" clothes and be exposed to everything and go to shul on Yom Kippur and identify with our people as an individual, not a member of a hive.

Just like me and all the rest of us.


3. Daytime. Idiot on an elevated platform thinks he's underground; tosses minor trash toward the tracks without realizing or perhaps even caring that it will continue past the tracks toward the people in the street below.


4. Early morning. Two guys, one very large, seem nice enough but are very loud. Still, they're laughing and, as I said, they seem nice enough.

They're looking at pictures on someone else's phone. A friend's, perhaps? They mock him.

Hey -- now, they're playing recordings on the phone at a disturbingly high volume, fast forwarding/rewinding them audibly. It's really annoying and they're still laughing and talking really loud.

Without warning, they explode. Something they saw or heard on the phone has ignited them. The large guy hurls the phone to the floor of the train where it smashes, on impact, into several unusable pieces. Apparently, they had seen a picture of the phone's owner, naked, on the phone.

Some nerve this guy had putting a naked picture of himself on the phone. The loud boys naturally shifted to the higher level of ridicule mandated by this offense. I now had the feeling they had stolen the phone. But the photographic evidence of the owner's deeply-felt personal pride pretty much meant they had to destroy the device rather than realize any value from it.

I mean, a man lives by a certain code of behavior, doesn't he?

The guys leave the train.

The pieces of phone continue to ride.

__________________________________
30 January, 2007 @ 20:07:30 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Monday, January 29, 2007

Recurring Motifs

Gawker linked to this blog again the other day. So far, about 2600 people have viewed the post.

The post included a plug for the Sunday afternoon reprise of my '04 one-man show. One person attended the show.

It was a woman I'd met two years ago at a party for the opening of the play "Belfast Blues". She's been on my e-mail list since then and finally decided to come to something.

Attractive woman. I did the (a?) show for her, although it may have ended up being as much about show biz history and other things that interest me as it was about burning bridges. (More, probably.)

She liked it a lot. Said if I did it again, she would bring twenty people. (Of course, she couldn't even get the people she'd been hanging with earlier in the day to come, but I think she was on the level.) Responded with overt, clearly articulated appreciation and encouragement of my enthusiasm for her.

Good chance, I suspect, that I'll never see or hear from her again.


In any event, I have about 12 bucks to get through the week -- and some of those may be difficult to access. (Don't ask.)

Still, I'm in a good mood.

Since I got back to the States, I've performed at the Public Theater (Joe's Pub), sold a headline to The Onion (cnn.com linked to it), helped a successful friend rewrite his act, consulted on the development of a feature film, spent substantial time with my father, sisters, nieces and nephews, traveled south and west, been linked to by Gawker . . .

I feel kinda productive.


Fuzzy, though.

While my sister and nephew were here, I was on the go, running around town with them. (Yesterday, my nephew skated at Rockefeller Center. I've never even done that.) They had a hotel room that must rent for thousands of dollars on New Years Eve, as it faces 1 Times Square, where they drop the ball that heralds the coming of the new year. (I've always kinda thought that it brings in the year and that if the ball somehow got stuck, the new year wouldn't come.)

I stayed there with them on Saturday night, in a big, comfortable Marriott bed, but despite this, I didn't really rest until last night when -- no responsibilities on the horizon -- I descended into a slumber that, depending upon how you calculate, lasted from like 12 to 15 hours.

And now I'm free and fuzzy; nothin' to do and no money to do it with.

Livin' the life I love.

__________________________________
29 January, 2007 @ 19:30 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Saturday, January 27, 2007

Greetings From Alt.Coffee!

I'm writing from a different place today. (Geographically, at least.)

Rather than a soulless, corporate, chain cafe, I'm in alt.coffee, which, as its name implies, is an "alternative" coffee house on Avenue A, just across from Tompkins Square Park in the East Village. (Well, the name doesn't imply it's on Avenue A, but, um . . . you can infer it.)

Anyway . . .

Yesterday, I led my sister and nephew to both the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Television and Radio. I think he liked the TV place better but I didn't -- I liked 'em both.

I liked standing amidst the physical expressions of ancient peoples and I liked watching a "Jackie Gleason Show" featuring the musical coupling of Reginald Van Gleason III and Groucho Marx (in full regalia, including painted mustache), from 1967.

Come to think of it, I guess the the two museum experiences sort of offered me the same thing.

The Gleason episode was chosen because of a Gleason tear I was on at the friend's house I've been hiding out in. Specifically, we (I) wanted to know what Gleason's variety shows were like in this late period and, in particular, how they were structured. It seems (I'll have to do more research) they were more or less straight vaudeville shows (as my friend suspected) but with Jackie's comic uniqueness integrated via patter and song.

As for the Danny Thomas immersion that was also part of my week's hide-bernation . . .

I didn't get to see much of his stuff during the short time I was at MTR, but I did get to see the previously elusive opening credits of "Make Room for Grandaddy", the 70s sequel to his long-running sitcom of the '50s and '60s.

But there's so much more to see, I guess I gotta do some hiding out at the museum.

As for this place, they're so alternative that they have a no cell phones sign on the door. Presumably, this is because the use of cell phones would disturb the peacefulness otherwise afforded the thoughtful (and alternative) clientele.

However, the screechiness each time the door opens or the obnoxiously loud music that's periodically played -- I guess only philistines and door-oilers could have their peacefulness disturbed by them.

Oy. six screeches in the last seconds. Tomorrow, I'm going to Starbucks.

Now, it's off to Freddy's to make peace with the cunts. (See Autumn in New York.)

Bye for now.

__________________________________
28 January, 2007 @ 03:44 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer



(special note -- i'm reprising my edinburgh fringe show from 2004, 'bridge-burner", for one performance, tomorrow (sunday) afternoon in new york. showtime is 4:45 pm, 1/28. location is jimmy's no. 43, downstairs at 43 e. 7 st, west of second av. in the east village.

hope you can make it,
andrew)

review of show
sound of young america endorsement

Friday, January 26, 2007

Blowing Hot and Cold

In early January, the temperature was about 70 degrees. Right now, it's 11 degrees -- 21 below freezing -- and with the wind chill, it's said to feel as if it were -5.

The winds are gusting at between 16 and 20 miles per hour.

Yet I was just on the subway and, as far as I can tell, they've decided there's no need to turn on the heat on the trains.

This refusal to warm the bones of rail travelers is something I first noticed last winter. A transit worker told me they didn't wanna make the trains too comfortable for bums and stuff.

So on account of this, everybody should suffer?

Man, people are dumb.

At a branch of my gym frequented by Russians, most of the men throw water onto the sauna mechanism to make the room hotter. This is how it's done in Russia (and elsewhere), where a traditional unit heats a bunch of rocks and water thrown onto them releases the "dry" heat.

But my gym doesn't use these traditional units. They use electric units, which are not designed to have water thrown on them. As far as I can tell, throwing water on these units is like throwing it into a toaster -- you're basically just dousing hot, electrical coils.

And boy, it smells like all kinds of acrid, toxic crap is released into the air when the coils are doused, turning an activity that members engage in to improve their health into something that diminishes it. Yet pointing this out to said dousers virtually always draws the response, "Everybody else does it."

So, the Russians refuse to accept that things are different here and the other gym members refuse to believe that Russians, though experts in sweat, may not always be right. And people throw bags and bottles of water onto the bare heating coils, even when there is an area on the sauna's mechanism for rocks.

Yup, even when given the option of doing things traditionally, these idiots throw liquid on everything in sight, figuring the more hot things they get wet, the sweatier they'll become. And nothing is more important to a sauna-using man than sweat.

He'll use every trick -- cold tissues on the thermostat, blocking out air with towels under the door, whatever -- to make the room as hot as he can, so he can sweat the toxins out of his body, even if it means -- as it seems to with the hot coil-dousing -- that he'll be breathing in new and potentially more dangerous toxins in order to do it.

Of course, that's just the "Brooklyn Belt" branch. At the Irving Place branch of the New York Sports Club, members will take the heat however it comes, as long as they can rub each others schlongs in the process.

It was a regular whack-fest when I was there recently. And the festive ones didn't seem concerned with their aim, even though I asked my bone-rubbing neighbors to be careful, lest I be doused with reproduction fluid. They smiled indulgently but continued, "willy" nilly.

Prudently, I shifted to the steam room and when I emerged, I saw through the sauna door that the jerk-geometrics of the room had increased, er, geometrically. It was like looking at a large, semi-abstract flesh sculpture.

I didn't rat 'em out, but within a few days, both the sauna and steam rooms were conveniently "out of order".

My sister and nephew are here from Virginia. I don't think I'll be getting him a guest pass to the gym.

Actually, he wants to go ice skating in Rockefeller Center. But it's freezing out (which I guess is good for skating, but . . . ) Couldn't he have fun just watching New York television?

It's not like we haven't done stuff already. We went out to dinner last night with my uncle and aunt. They recently found this blog (actually, I inadvertently led them to it via the sig on my e-mails, but who expects someone to click on that?), so it was important for me to somehow convey to them that things are not going as badly as this piece of silly web entertainment led them to believe.

I don't think I was too successful.

__________________________________
26 January, 2007 @ 14:03 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer



(special note -- i'm reprising my edinburgh fringe show from 2004, 'bridge-burner", for one performance, sunday afternoon in new york. showtime is 4:45 pm, 1/28. location is jimmy's no. 43, downstairs at 43 e. 7 st, west of second av. in the east village.

hope you can make it,
andrew)

review of show
sound of young america endorsement

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Did I tell you I shaved off my beard?

When I was starting out in comedy as a teenager (yes, two of these reminiscences in one week), my mother made me leave the house by 10 PM, so she'd know I'd made it into Manhattan safely (from Brooklyn) by the time she went to bed. Unfortunately, my spots were generally close to 4 AM, so I had a lot of time to kill before a show.

I didn't have any money (sound familiar?), so I couldn't really go anywhere. I had to simply hang out at the club where I was (maybe) performing until it was time to go on or go home. There were other comics around, so it generally wasn't boring, but I remember one guy started calling me the "King of Ubiquity", which really stung, and I couldn't adequately explain why it wasn't my fault.

It was hardest if, for some reason, I had to go into the city during the day because, often, it didn't make sense to go home and then leave again by 10. On those days, I would basically hang out at the club, talking to the bartender and whoever else was around, from some point in the afternoon until early the next morning.

What I learned from this was how to wait; how to endure lengthy periods of time when nothing was happening.

I got good at it. And I'm good at it still.

Which is a problem because I've got things to do but I've put my learned skillfulness at waiting to the worst possible use -- if anything is wrong with a set of circumstances or if I'm simply afraid to do what needs to be done I'll wait -- as long as it takes to get it done properly.

Without fear.

Without compromise.

So, there are always things I'm waiting to attempt but the circumstances aren't right.


I guess . . .

. . . Somehow.


But I did manage to shave off my beard

Because I didn't want to look like ragged shit when I went to visit my father.

I'd wanted to do it for a while but it took the fear of a negative reaction from my father to combat the waiting I learned to do to meet the needs of my mother.


Hmm.

__________________________________
25 January, 2007 @ 19:05 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer



(special note -- i'm reprising my edinburgh fringe show from 2004, 'bridge-burner", for one performance, sunday afternoon in new york. showtime is 4:45 pm, 1/28. location is jimmy's no. 43, downstairs at 43 e. 7 st, west of second av. in the east village.

hope you can make it,
andrew)

review of show
sound of young america endorsement

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Logic, Coffee, Practice, Performance

Damn!

The few tables at the (NY) Soho Starbucks that usually are in range of a usable, free (borrowed) wi-fi signal are proving unequal to the task of staying connected.

Oh, well. I'll write this in Notepad and post it later.


A couple of tables away from me, a brilliant and lovely girl, probably not long out of college, was arguing on the phone with her mother. The mother wanted her to move in with her boyfriend and she was arguing against it, saying of all her friends, only one couple was shackin' up. The intensity of the argument was hilarious because it reflected such an unironic reversal of "traditional" generational values -- the annoying and meddlesome mother, so typically clueless that she didn't know cell phones didn't charge long distance fees, insisted the daughter should be livin' in sin, while the daughter, rebelliously, refused.

BTW, I know this girl is brilliant because she's a tutor who uses the Spring/Crosby Starbucks as her office/classroom. (I've left and come back and found she'd apparently been here the entire day.) I regularly hear her teaching logic to a variety of illogical charges. Her explanations are clear, the students' heads filled with varying amounts of mud.

She has a difficult roommate who is trying to kick her out but she's consulted a lawyer or something and found that she can really screw the roommate if she wants, which she's not gonna do unless it's necessary. Still, she wants to torture her torturer by making her think she'll seek legal recourse.

I know all this simply from overhearing her conversations. I feel that I know her but I don't even know her name. (Ah, life . . . )


Yesterday, I hid out in my friend's house yet again. We mostly watched the work of the late comedian, Danny Thomas, who's been largely forgotten (except for his charitable work) since his sitcom's last (re)runs on TVLand/Nick at night.

It's a pity, because much of his work is extraordinary. In fact, one of the things my friend showed me was a an episode of Thomas' mid-seventies sitcom, "The Practice" (not to be confused with the lawyer show of recent vintage), which was a 30-minute monologue featuring Thomas (playing a curmudgeonly doctor) alone in an apartment with a lifelong friend who has just died. Michael J. Fox did a similar episode of "Family Ties" years later, which received a great deal of attention, but nobody ever speaks of this beautiful effort by the then 64 year-old Thomas. ("The Practice" was created by the man who would write and direct "Arthur", Steve Gordon.)

Also, little-noticed is the fact that I'll be doing a reprise of my 2004 Edinburgh show, "Bridge-Burner", this coming Sunday at 4:30 PM. Time Out didn't see fit to list it (I was late with the submission), so we'll see if this blog can induce anyone to some out and see it.

I'm doing it again so that I don't forget it. (Reason enough, don't you think?)

If you'd like to come, the location is Jimmy's No. 43, downstairs at 43 E. 7 St, west of 2nd Av. in the East Village of Olde New York. (By the way, for those of you not hip enough to realize this, I just threw away a significant percentage of potential interest from NY hipsters by using the term "Olde New York". I am, as the title says, a Bridge-Burner.)


Hey -- while I was writing this, a (seemingly) gay guy asked me if he could sit at my table and, since I thought the wi-fi had reconnected, I explained to him that I couldn't move the table so he could sit in the other chair because it would jeopardize my wi-fi access. I said, however, that if he took a chair from elsewhere and placed it on the outside of the table, that would be just fine.

He smiled and thanked me and got a chair, which he moved to the inaccessible side of the table, altering the table's position slightly, potentially ensuring I would find no 'net connection here.

I could ask the tutor to teach this guy logic if knew her name.


Yay! I have an internet connection! (Maybe the guy nudged me into "the spot".)

__________________________________
24 January, 2007 @ 16:44 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Those Who Do Not Study History Are Doomed to Repeat It

During my early days in comedy -- but after the point at which it was a novelty, so there were now stresses and personality conflicts and other things that got in the way of the fun -- I used to go over to a friend's place in the afternoon and we would smoke pot and watch tapes of old TV shows and weave webs of dreams. As time went by -- I'm sure the pot helped with this -- I increasingly opted to hang out at my friend's late into the night, rather than heading over to the comedy clubs were I would otherwise (maybe) perform.

I was hiding out in a place (not just physical) that felt safe, but I was pushing my real ambitions aside, decreasing the chance that I would be who I wanted to be and do what I wanted to do in the way that I wanted to be (him) and do (them).

Well, time went by and I moved into my own pursuits and eventually, as happens with people, my friend and I drifted apart -- maybe not in terms of our essential relationship, but we just didn't see each other. We were involved in different pursuits.

But lately, after -- literally -- years, I've been hanging out with my friend again, watching DVDs of old TV shows and avoiding his exhaled THC.

It's been fun.

For one thing, he feeds me. (He's a terrific cook.) For another, I get to watch great performers and analyze and theorize, which is something I like to do.

But (as I explained in I Am, They Said) I've been out of step with the New York comedy scene lately, so I decided on Friday that I would head over to a show where some comedy people would be hanging out and just hang; be me; establish myself as a nice guy in the minds of people who don't know me. First, however, I'd be heading to my friend's for some video and fine dining.

I told him I could only stay 'til about 8:30, but when the time came to leave, I wanted to stay where it was safe; I didn't want to go to a place where something was at stake.

So, I stayed with my friend and watched more TV.

__________________________________
23 January, 2007 @ 18:22 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Monday, January 22, 2007

Mile High

Dallas-Ft. Worth Airport is a major "hub", so, naturally, I've changed planes there many times. And passing through its terminals, I'm not usually reminded of the incident. But for some reason, on the way to and from Tucson, I thought about it. I even told the story to the woman I was flirting with on the plane back. (Maybe I was trying to give her some ideas.)

Y'see, I have often, in many places and situations -- found myself the naif; the inexperienced one. Such a place and situation was an airplane, some years back, heading from Los Angeles to Dallas, where I would change for a plane to New York.

Next to me on this plane was a good-looking, mildly rednecky guy who was trying to get into acting and stunt work, if I remember correctly. But his more immediate concern was to -- on this flight, either join or reaffirm his membership in the "Mile High Club".

If you don't know (and at the time, I think I didn't, membership in the Mile High Club is achieved by having sex in a plane while in flight, usually in the lavatory. (But don't try to smoke in there!) And this guy seemed to think he might accomplish this feat with the cute flight attendant with whom he and I were frequently chatting.

Only thing is, she was more interested in me than he.

And I probably looked pretty uncool and otherwise aesthetically challenged as I generally did (and do?). But I guess there was something there that spoke to her, aside from my mouth. Because -- no -- she didn't sponsor me for membership in the club.

But she did invite me to come live with her in the suburbs of Dallas, rather than continuing my trip to New York.

I regretted saying no from the moment she vanished from site in the Dallas terminal. But I didn't drive and I didn't have money and I didn't understand how a person could make such an offer so quickly and I only mentioned the first two problems and she basically said she'd take care of me and I imagined she'd get fed up with me and . . .

I don't know.

But when you think of all the stupid, pointless, unrewarding, and even destructive adventures I've plunged into, it seems a poor moment for rationality to have kicked in.

Maybe taking her up on her offer would have changed my life.

But then again, maybe if I'd gone with her, I'd be dead.

That's how I make myself feel better about missed opportunities -- by reminding myself that had I done anything differently, I could have set in motion a chain of events culminating in my premature death.

Of course, some contemplative souls will tell you there are many kinds of death.

I wonder if she remembers me.

__________________________________
22 January, 2007 @ 17:45 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Hasenfeffer Incorporated

I'm back in the Bensonhurst Burger King but it's a weekend lunchtime, so its filled with life -- mothers, kids, etc. You can barely smell the incontinence-covering cleaning fluid they use. (This is a good thing.)

Yesterday, I had another lost phone scare but it turned out (as I hoped and suspected) that I'd merely left it at my friend's house. So, I happily went to the gym where I locked the key to my lock in my locker and had to have the cleaning guy snap it off so I could have access to my clothes and the now-useless keys within. (Yes, I had to buy a new lock but at least I didn't have to walk naked through the sub-freezing streets of New York.)

I think, typically, a schlemiel is described as "the guy who spills the soup" and a shlimazel as the guy who gets soup the spilled on him. So, what does that make me?

I locked myself out of the locker, so it would seem I'm a soup-spiller. But I have a friends who would tell you I've, metaphorically, spilled soup on them.

Locking yourself out of your locker is, in effect spilling the soup on yourself. (Someone I know recently said self-spilling was the trademark of a shlimazel but I'm pretty sure they are wrong.) So, am I schlemiel, shlimazel, or something else?

Shmegeggie?

Nebbish?

Putz?

We report. You decide.


By the way, I've purchased bags of Quinlan's pretzels (see I Didn't Fall Off No Turnip Truck) for 25 cents each over the last two days, in the glorious borough of Brooklyn.

Hah!


__________________________________
21 January, 2007 @ 18:52 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Friday, January 19, 2007

I Didn't Fall Off No Turnip Truck

I'm in a Burger King on 86th St. in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. An old, elevated rail line (the West End line, now part of the D/6th Ave. subway line) rumbles north and south route out front.

It's a nice-looking, modern BK with a combined post-war American culture/Hollywood motif. In my experience, bums like this particular location, as do cops and the economically/socially constrained. (There was a gravelly-voiced guy – would probably sound like a mobster to non-New Yorkers – perhaps intellectually challenged, almost talking to himself before. Technically, it probably fell under the heading of "thinking" aloud. Constantly.)

The smell here is not of charbroiling, but of some kind of cleaning compound. It smells like whatever is typically used to mask the smell of sickness and loss of control in the apartment of an elderly, incontinent woman.

In this warm, inviting environment, I breakfasted on a sausage biscuit and Fanta orange soda as the morning snow melted outside.

It's a happy morning.

But last night was another story entirely.

I went into a little store in NoHo and picked up what was basically a 50 cent bag of Quinlan pretzels. But in Manhattan, with high rents, etc., the snack companies offer stores their items without a price marked on them, so the stores can charge what they need to without being contradicted by the bag. Usually, this means 75 cents for a "50 cent bag" but these guys had the nerve to ask a dollar fifty for a 50 cent bag of pretzels!

Now, Quinlan is not a premium brand but I may have swallowed hard and paid if they'd asked for a dollar. But a dollar fifty. I'd never seen anything like it..

I demurred.

And the counter guy mocked me, saying something like, ''A dollar fifty – that's a lot of money."

I said it might not be a lot of money but it's a lot of money for that.

Which is when I made my mistake.

I said his price was out of line even with typical Manhattan overpricedness but all he took from that was a license to see me as an outerborough rube and he began indicating directions -- "Queens." (Points in one direction.) "Brooklyn." (Points in the other direction.) Meaning "Sure. In the out of the way hamlets you're used to this may be high but my sophisticated, high class, clientele expects to pay a premium that befits their lifestyle, you penny ante, peasant."

I pointed as well, indicating the price for non-premium pretzels would be 75 cents, tops, one block in either direction. Then, pointing directly at the guy, I said (this is an almost exact quote), "You are a crook or an idiot."

I don't think he got the "or an idiot" part, which is too bad, because what I meant was that he might have been making a mistake. Rather than overcharging with intent, he may have been citing the wrong price .

But he gave no indication this was the case.

So. I walked one block to Bully's Deli and bought a premium brand of pretzels, "Snyder's of Hanover", for 50 cents. (They also had an enormous bag of Rold Gold for under a dollar!)

A dollar fifty, indeed.

__________________________________
19 January, 2007 @ 21:53 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Don't know what it is about those Jack Fetterman parties . . .

They're not wild.

I left and stopped at a couple of places with a friend -- don't think we did much if any drinking at these post-party places.

We did stop in a Chinese place that was closing but agreed to make us end of the night egg rolls.

Then my friend got in a cab and I woke up again on a train in the Bronx.

Again, it was a train I don't usually take. And it was hours later. And I don't remember getting to the subway station. (In fact, I don't even know what subway station I went to.)

Since I'm waiting for another debit card to replace the one I discovered was missing while on the F train Tuesday, I PayPaled money to a friend yesterday and he gave me the cash, so I can cover expenses during the wait. Well, when I woke up in the Bronx, my pocket -- where I had placed the cash -- was empty.

I wanted to cry the other night when my pocket was missing the debit card but I had more of an accepting, fatalistic reaction this time. I simply started to think of who I could beg for cash.

Stuck my hand in my jacket pocket and the money was there. Not all of it. It was missing two dollars which had apparently gone to the single use MetroCard I found in my pocket and another $1.80 or so, which a receipt in my pocket said had been spent on a deli item at Key Food.

I vaguely remembered going or wanting to go to Key Food. But why? They had plenty of food at the party and I'd just had an egg roll.

And at which train station did I get a D? The stations closest to Key Food don't include the D line.

And there is some indication I was online at 12:48 AM. But that doesn't seem possible. Did I use my laptop somewhere?

Where?

I don't have a hangover.


Note to relatives: Do not read this post.

__________________________________
18 January, 2007 @ 19:48 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

BACK ON THE COMPUTER WITH THE KEYBOARD PROBLEMS

NOW EVERYTHING IS BEING CAPITALIZED!!!

ALSO PUNCTUATION TROUBLES

ANYWAY THIS IS SOMETHING I WANTED TO TALK ABOUT A COUPLE OF WEEKS AGO AND THIS SNIPPET OF A MESSAGE I SENT SOMEONE ABOUT MY NEW YEAR ACTIVITIES REMINDED ME:

"yesterday, I did something I'd long wanted to do -- I went to see the "polar bears" take their New Year's dip in Coney Island. Walked the boardwalk and rediscovered the remnants of vacation bungalows toward the far western end (I'd seen them years ago but thought they were long gone.) Had a hamburger rather than a hotdog at Nathan's 'cause I hadn't had a Nathan's burger in a long time and that's what my father used to get when I was a kid.

Today, New Year -- new disturbing realities"


THE POLAR BEARS ARE A GROUP OF GUYS WHO TAKE WINTER SWIMS IN THE ATLANTIC OCEAN

BEEN DOING IT FOR LIKE A HUNDRED YEARS AND SOME OF THE MEMBERS LOOK IT TYPICALLY THE GUYS ARE GRAY AND FAT IF OFTEN MUSCULAR

THEIR MOST FAMOUS DIP IS ON NEW YEARS DAY AND ITS ALWAYS ON THE NEWS AND IT ALWAYS SEEMED LIKE SOMETHING TO SEE AT LEAST ONCE

SO I WENT THIS YEAR AND WAS SURPRISED TO DISCOVER IT WASNT JUST OLD GUYS IT WAS MEN AND WOMAN AND GIRLS AND BOYS EVEN A FATHER WITH HIS TINY SON

HIPSTER CHICKS AND HIPPIE CHICKS PEOPLE IN COSTUMES GUYS FROM IRELAND WITH AN IRISH FLAG A COUPLE IN A SORT OF TUXEDO AND A GOWN WITH A BOTTLE OF NON_ALCOHOLIC CHAMPAGNE

A KID WHO SAID "I CANT FEEL MYSELF" WHEN HE CAME OUT OF THE WATER

A TWENTYSOMETHING GUY WHO SAID TO HIS FRIENDS SOMETHING LIKE "IS THIS THE MOST RETARDED THING WE"VE EVER DONE?"

AN OLDER GUY WHO CLAIMED THE WATER WAS "WARM"

THERE MUST HAVE BEEN TWO HUNDRED PEOPLE THERE IN THE WATER AND ON THE BEACH MAYBE A LOT MORE

PEOPLE WERE SO HAPPY

THEN A GUY DOVE IN AND NOBODY KNOWS WHAT HE HIT BUT HE HAD TO BE TAKEN AWAY IN AN AMBULANCE AND HE DIED

BUT MOST EVERYONE WAS DONE BY THEN SO I DON"T THINK IT WAS A PRIMARY OR DAMPENING MEMORY FOR THE REVELERS WHO REALLY SEEMED TO THINK THIS WAS THE BEST POSSIBLE WAY TO START THE NEW YEAR

A REAL BEACH DAY IN THE HEART OF WINTER AMAZING

PEOPLE ON THE BOARDWALK AT RUBYS BAR

SOME PEOPLE WERE PROBABLY STILL DRUNK FROM THE NIGHT BEFORE

FARTHER DOWN THE BOARDWALK AS I SAID IN THE SNIPPET I FOUND CRUMBLING REMNANTS OF CONEY ISLAND VACATION BUNGALOWS FROM MANY DECADES EARLIER THE AREA USED TO BE FILLED WITH THEM AND THESE ARE PROBABLY THE LAST OF THEM TO BE FOUND IN ANY CONDITION

SAW THE SAME ONES I THINK YEARS AGO WITH DIRTY VENTRILOQUIST OTTO PETERSON AND MY FRIEND SETH SCHULTZ A FUNNY COMEDIAN FILMMAKER AND CLUB OWNER WHO SHOT HIMSELF LAST YEAR WE LOVED THESE REMNANTS OF THE OLD WORLD AND OLD WAYS SO IT MADE ME FEEL GOOD TO SEE THESE CRUMBLING HUTS AGAIN

THEY"RE SORTA HARD TO SPOT AND IVE BEEN AROUND THERE IN THE INTERIM AND NOT SEEN THEM

MAYBE SPOTTING THEM AGAIN MADE ME FEEL CONNECTED TO SETH SO SAW THEM AT A GOOD TIME

FUNNY THING RUBYS BAR WHICH WAS OWNED BY A GUY WHO STARTED HIS BUSINESSES WITH MONEY HE MADE SEARCHING THE SAND FOR VALUABLES WILL PROB BE GONE NEXT YEAR ALONG WITH EVERYTHING ELSE THAT HAS MEANT CONEY FOR DECADES A MALL DEVELOPER IS GOING TO SUPPOSEDLY PUT IN YEAR ROUND AMUSEMENTS

MANY BELIEVE THEY"LL PROB BE SOULLESS BUT THIS IS WHAT THE CITY WANTS IRONIC THING IS THOSE CRUMBLING BUNGALOWS FROM THE BEGINNING OF TIME WILL PROBABLY STILL BE DOWN AT THE FAR END OF THE BOARDWALK AFTER TODAYS AMUSEMENTS HAVE BEEN DEMOLISHED AND REPLACED BY WHATEVER"S TO COME

NATHAN"S WHERE I HAD A HAMBURGER WITH GRILLED ONIONS AND MUSTARD LIKE MY FATHER ATE WHEN I WAS A KID (AND I DID TOO) IS ACTUALLY FAMOUS FOR THEIR FRANKFURTERS SOME PEOPLE THINK THEYRE THE BEST IN THE WORLD THEY SEEMED TO HAVE CLASSED UP A BIT THEY EVEN HAD TABLES AGAIN AND THE BATHROOMS WERE PRETTY NICE

AND THEY SERVE FROGS LEGS EVEN IF YOU NEVER GET EM ISNT IT GOOD THAT THEYRE THERE?


I"M BACK IN NEW YORK

I LOST MY DEBIT CARD FOR THE SECOND TIME IN A MONTH SOMEWHERE BETWEEN DALLAS AND THE F TRAIN

FUNNY THING IS I LOST IT AFTER LEAVING MY FRIEND JACK"S DECEMBER WEIRD MUSIC PARTY AND I GOT IT REPLACED BEFORE I LEFT FOR TUCSON AND I LOST IT UPON RETURNING FROM TUCSON AND JACK"S NEXT PARTY IS TONIGHT (RELIGIONS HAVE BEEN BASED ON LESSER PATTERNS)

I SHAVED OFF MY BEARD AND THE REST OF MY HAIR BEFORE LEAVING FOR TUCSON BACK IN THE BRIEF BUT HAPPY TIME WHEN I HAD A DEBIT CARD

NOW YOU KNOW EVERYTHING

IN CAPS!!!

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Blow the Man Down

When my father gave me three dinner choices last night, two were restaurants and one was having his girlfriend make fish. Even though I would have preferred a Mexican restaurant (it feels weird leaving Arizona without having eaten Mexican), I chose the fish, a choice my father clearly found less than satisfying. But who knows what he would have eaten at a Mexican place.

After dinner, we went to an enjoyable little Johnny Cash and Elvis show on the east side of town, where my father wasted no time in ordering an ice cream sundae, to be delivered to him during intermission. He assured me (with some humor) that everything was fine because he was only ordering a junior sundae. (In protest, I attempted to demonstrate restraint by not ordering ice cream, which, of course, I wanted.

When I was a kid, my father used to challenge me to knock him down in the swimming pool. He would be immovable -- a rock. I could never knock him down. (Of course this probably says as much about my weakness as it does about his strength.)

Relatively recently, we were in a pool and he said to me, "I bet you could knock me down now."

He wasn't so weak -- it wasn't like he was a frail, old man or anything. Maybe, I could have knocked him down.

But, the thing is, I never wanted to knock him down.

__________________________________
16 January, 2007 @ 05:16 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Monday, January 15, 2007

Reminded of Los Angeles

Today was the day that Tucson reminded me very much of Los Angeles. Specifically (on opposite ends of the scale), the somewhat rundown, heavily Mexican South Tucson and the house in the hills overlooking the city where, tonight, I attended a "house concert". (Not a performance of "house music" but a musical performance in a house.)

It was ostensibly a "folk" concert but the enjoyable, though not extraordinary, "John Smith" (really) seemed more a standard contemporary singer/songwriter than emblematic of anything noticeably folk.

Interestingly, I felt like this guy singing in someone's living room needed to deliver more than if he were performing in a club. Even though the show was basically free (they asked for a five dollar donation), included a top-flight meal and offered a window into the lifestyle of well-heeled hill dwellers, it somehow seemed that an extraordinary environment called for an extraordinary show.

Which we didn't get.

But what we did get -- or rather I did -- was a chance to further witness my father's extraordinary diet. (Although, terrifyingly, it may be his ordinary one.)

This is what my father ate today: Matzoh brei (like French toast made with matzoh) and some baked goods offered as dessert at the concert. He completely eschewed the delicious soups that were available, claiming he doesn't eat food he has to balance on his lap. (There were seats available at tables.) If I hadn't said I didn't want any (which was a lie), he would have eaten ice cream when we were out in the afternoon. I'm told he had a little soup before we went to the show, but still, is this any way for septuagenarian with a couple of arterial stents to eat?

I've sometimes said that my father's internal scale, in weighing cake against life, will determine cake has greater weight and value. We went to a movie yesterday, "Stranger than Fiction", wherein Dustin Hoffman poses a similar choice to Will Ferrell -- life vs. pancakes. "Who on Earth would choose pancakes over life?" asks Ferrell (not an exact quote). Well, Will -- meet my Dad.

I'd like to talk to my father about this and other things but it's hard. It'd probably be better for him if I could but, then again, he helped create the impediments to communication that exist between us and (I get no pleasure from this) I guess you do reap what you sow (sometimes, anyway).

The "folk" singer's songs were often emotional and often about father and son and I looked over to my father periodically, as I often do (it tends to make him uncomfortable), to see if I could figure out what he was thinking or feeling. (At a certain point, I think he looked over at me -- I wonder what that was about.)

We left and both noticed the vivid array of stars above us. Now, he's watching his new Hi-Def TV and I'm talking to you instead of him.

The other day we say "Dreamgirls" and I was teary-eyed the entire film, partly because I kept thinking about how the Supreme the Jennifer Hudson character was based on died tragically young and broke some years after being kicked out of the group. (*Spoiler*) The movie's "fat girl" doesn't share her inspiration's fate and as we were leaving the theater, my father was enthusing about the film while my awareness of the reality behind it still had me at the edge of tears.

I was about to tell him that the real-life story didn't end so happily but I didn't want to spoil things for him.

__________________________________
15 January, 2007 @ 06:49 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Saturday, January 13, 2007

IAQ -- (In)Frequently Asked Questions

Re Tucson, Arizona:

Q. Did you ever find a plunger?
A. Yes I did. (And nobody was any the wiser.)


Re Downtown Tucson:

Q. How can your father have eaten something called a Chocolate Xtreme blizzard at a place where they only serve vanilla ice cream?
A. Vanilla ice cream but chocolate syrup. (In a vanilla world, I guess that qualifies as "Xtreme".)


*************************



Funny about seeing things and people through the prisms of our own experiences and pre-dispositions.

I just got back from this great salad/soup/muffins/pizza/chili/pasta/ice cream/more buffet restaurant called Sweet Tomatoes. (In L.A., the same chain is called Souplantation and it's my favorite place there.) I got up to get something and when I returned to the table, my father was kissing (on the cheek) and otherwise enthusiastically greeting this old lady and old man.

"What," I thought to myself, "does my (young and vital) father have in common with these old people?"

Well, they're his friends, I guess. His (more or less contemporaries .

But I don't see him that way -- I wonder if other people do?

Can I know? (Does it matter?)


*************************



Haven't told you yet about how, all around this area, there are those classic, fork-shaped saguaro cacti, the kind you see in old, black and white westerns -- the definitive cactus, I think (iconically speaking).

Oh, yeah -- and lots of western scrub brush.

And water tanks on the side of the road that say, "Water. Use it Wisely." (I guess its a precious commodity out here in the desert.

Just trying to make you feel like you're here with me.

__________________________________
13 January, 2007 @ 22:38 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Downtown Tucson

Went to dinner at a traditional, old-style Italian restaurant, that's been here since the 1930s, called Caruso's. (Some would term it a good "red sauce" joint.)


Not sure it's been in the same spot or building all that time, but it's been there a long time. Hanging above the street in front of the entrance is a beautiful, partially lit neon sign, featuring a cartoon of a stereotypical fat, Italian chef and (among other things) proudly announcing the menu includes "PIZZA-PIE". (Not just the word "pie", but hyphenated!. Beautiful.)


No tall buildings that I could notice in downtown Tucson (or anywhere else for that matter), although the dorm my cousin was in was an astonishing several stories tall. (It was surrounded, however, by much shorter dormitories.) I guess the hot weather here in the desert is responsible for the architectural clinging to the ground that seems to define this place. Driving by on the highway, structures seem like eruptions from the dirt; kinda like sophisticated mud huts. The chain store-laden strip malls that so much define America are much in evidence here, but they've been implemented with a southwestern motif that, for the time being -- for me -- gives them additional aesthetic points.


Downtown features more standard streets and has a trolley running through it that somehow seemed to pass only when I was looking the other way. The streets were still partially done up for Christmas, which made me feel I'd gotten to experience Christmas in yet another city. (I saw one house -- not downtown -- with lights that read "Noel", under which there were various incandescent seasonal icons plus a illuminatable cactus -- a "Western" Christmas tree?).


After dinner, we went to Dairy Queen (which still often only has vanilla ice cream -- my family, as chocolate-loving New Yorkers, were always appalled by the preposterous limitation), where I got to be upset as I watched my father down an artery-clogging "Chocolate Xtreme" Blizzard. Maybe I should have set an example for him by not getting anything myself, although I don't see why I should have to do that (except of course, for the fact that I want him to live).


In Dairy Queen, I asked my cousin if she had been the conduit through which my aunt had discovered my blog. (I recently got a panicked call from her after she encountered my life as described herein.) Turns out she actually helped me by saying the blog read like my act (implying -- hee-hee -- that this was just a show.)


No neat endings today. Gotta go to the gym.


Next time,
Andrew


__________________________________
13 January, 2007 @ 17:25 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Friday, January 12, 2007

Arizona Late Afternoon

Just got out of "Dreamgirls" and as we were driving home, there were mountains, not too far in the distance, that looked almost pure white in the late afternoon sun, with dark patches caused by shadows from clouds in an otherwise blue sky.

The mountains seemed kinda like very large piles of white sand or, at one point, lunar eruptions; jutting pieces of the lunar surface, here on Earth.

Now (or shortly) to dinner with my cousin Sarah, who's in her first year at the University here.

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Tucson, Arizona

I'm in my father's house, having just (mostly) weathered a crisis-in waiting.

Sure, I knocked over a beverage glass as I got up to leave the restaurant last night, ice and liquid crashing to the floor and spreading in multiple directions. Yes, I spilled orange juice on myself and the table while lifting a glass at brunch. Of course, my father thinks I'm a physical incompetent, but this is nothing new.

Still, it's my first full day here and I don't want to rile my father to an explosive level too soon, so, it was unsettling to me when he arrived home earlier than expected, just as I was searching for an implement to unstuff the toilet. (It's gotta be the toilet -- I didn't do anything wrong).

Since I didn't want any visual clues to lead him to investigate the area, I had to stick my hand in the bowl and remove the excess tissue there just after I'd taken a shower. Then I had to sop up the liquid that had fallen from the tissue.

Finally, I had to lower the lid on the overfull bowl and hope this wouldn't be a sign of something amiss. Fortunately, he was in a hurry, so we left before anything could catch his attention.

Now I'm back and he's off to an appointment with his skin doctor. (Tucson, he tells me [proudly?], is the skin cancer capital of the US.)

A little while ago, I saw a family picture I didn't think I'd seen before and thought I looked terrible in it, so I took it off the wall to examine it (meaning me) more closely. When I tried to put it back, the hanging apparatus came out of the wall and just vanished.

I looked all around and got down on my knees several times to examine the floor -- even rubbing my hand across its shoe-trodden yuchiness -- but could find nothing. So, my explosion-prone father would be coming home to find his klutz of a sonny-boy had both screwed up his wall and stopped up his toilet less than 24 hours after arrival. (Not good for a 75-year old guy who who'd just had a cheesey omelet and fried potatoes for breakfast. I was already starting to think, "I've killed my father.")

Fortunately, he was not due back for a couple of hours, so I went to the (other) bathroom, where I noticed I'd used too much paper as I was about to flush and again had to dip my hands into a watery waste receptacle, this time to make sure I didn't impede the plumbing of the entire house. (Two flushes. Success! Phew.)

At some point, I refortified myself with "Special K wirh Red Berries" (eaten right out of the box, it now occurs to me, with my toilet-clearing hand), but whether it was Kellogg's flakes (not to mention berries) that helped me or not, the fact remains that I finally thought to look behind the picture below the one I'd undone and there I found it -- the "hanging thing" which had eluded me. (And when I went to get it, I feared for a moment that I would end up knocking this picture down as well.)

Somewhat relieved, my eyes focused better as I rescanned the floor and there it was, no, there it wasn't, wait -- there it is -- The Nail. (You know -- for putting the hanging apparatus on).

I placed the nail in a hole in (more or less) the right position on the wall. There was another hole above it, which may have been the proper hole, but it looked like it could no longer accommodate the apparatus. (Oops.)

Then I put the hanging thing on the nail, and the picture on the hanging thing and - voila! -- my father's pictorial tableaux was (apparently) whole again.

Fortunately, the deteriorated upper hole was hidden by the picture frame. (Hopefully, my father has aged into sufficient forgetfulness to not immediately notice the thing is -- maybe -- lower than it used to be.)

Ahh. My first morning in the old west.

Now, it's one o'clock -- the prime of the day -- and I'm ready to really explore this corner of cowboy country.

Somewhere, I gotta find a plunger to unstuff the toilet.

__________________________________
11 January, 2007 @ 21:25 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Mr. Horace Greeley Was No Fool

Well, I'm a-headin' west, where a man can go as far as his wits and
his shootin' iron will take him. In other words, I'll be visiting my
father in Tucson, Arizona, where gray-haired Jews who don't like the
humidity of Florida spend the winter. That means I'll be able to blog
regularly again -- for a short while, anyway. My computer's still down
and, just like yesterday, I'm writing this on my phone. However, I'm
using mobile Gmail rather than the phone's text message function, so
at least I can compose and send in one clump rather than in multiple
minuscule increments. I've only a cheap, phone keypad, though, so it's
still a pain in the ass. In fact, I gotta go 'cause the predictive
text on this phone is going crazy. It seems to be wanting to write its
own blog post, which could be more interesting than mine but this is
MY blog, so the mechanism and I are acting at cross-purposes. When
next you hear from me, I'll be in the land of ten-gallon hats and
dance hall girls (unless I'm killed in a plane crash or something).
Until that happy time when we're all eatin' beans together at the
cyber-chuckwagon again -- so long, pardners. (By the way, I hadda do
this in TWO clumps.) Andrew

9176740792@vmobl.com

In one of those keen ironies that seem to define our lives, this blog was linked to last Thursday by Gawker, a major blog which covers New York media and the city in general. The Jan. 3rd Xmas post has received close to 1900 hits since that time and presumably at least a few have been checking back to see what's new and they've found NOTHING. Because the morning after the Gawker link, my laptop refused to respond properly to keyboard input. So just when people may wanna read this thing, I can't WRITE it. I'm sending this in segments as text messages to my e-mail address and will cut and paste - one of the few things my laptop will still do - into the blog. Incidentally, within a day of my computer breaking down, I lost my phone. This is being sent from a new one. If anyone really needed me over the weekend, they would very likely have been shit out of luck. It took 8 texts to do this as my new $14.95 Virgin Mobile phone will only do SHORT messages. I'll write again when I can. Love, Andrew P.S. - My storage wasn't sold. More next time.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

This is the Best January 3rd Christmas Ever

A few years ago, my Uncle Eugene said to me something like, "Isn't the city beautiful, all dressed up for Christmas?" And I thought, "No. Not only haven't I noticed much dressing, I've noticed the opposite -- an absence of dress."

Then I realized -- I'd been a downtown boy while my uncle lived on the fancy schmancy Upper East Side and worked in midtown, which was all dressed up for tourists and shoppers. And these were places I virtually never went.

Since then, I've tried to make a point of visiting Christmasy New York at least once during the holiday season -- usually later rather than sooner as I've never internalized the fact that it's best to do things at the earliest possibility, as waiting could mean you'll never get the chance.

A good example of later meaning never came back when I was living in a studio apartment in Hollywood, that is, I was living in an office at Paramount Studios. (Secretly.)

In my hallway was the casting office for the early '90s series, "The Bradys" -- a more serious version of "The Brady Bunch", featuring the original cast. I really wanted to see the Bradys in their "world" and I asked the casting director if there would be a chance to do so. She told me of several occasions that would be good and I chose a day when they would be shooting a party sequence in the Brady home, which seemed a perfect opportunity to share their lives as I wanted to do. It would also be the last such opportunity before the series wrapped.

Well, when the time came to visit with Carol, Mike and kin in their "home", I received a call from The (L.A) Comedy Store asking if I wanted to do three days in San Diego, at the La Jolla Store. Because I needed the money and I needed the goodwill of the Store, I headed down to do the gig and I never got to visit the Bunch. In fact, Robert Reed died shortly thereafter.

Lesson (un)learned. Do things at the first opportunity.

But here it is, January 3rd and I'm only now making my uptown Christmas pilgrimage.

I just finished a walk up Park Avenue, one of the richest areas in town, and many of the buildings were dressed in simple wreaths; reflective of their sophisticated and understated caste. But some had nicely lit trees and the like and I opened the door to one place's lobby to get a better look.

The doorman was on the phone but he asked if he could help me and I said I was just getting some last looks at Christmas. I left but decided to take one last look -- knowing the doorman would find the loitering suspicious, but deciding to indulge myself anyway.

True to my expectation, the doorman eyed me suspiciously. But beyond that, he opened the buildings door and said, There's a big tree in Rockefeller Center that's still up. You should go see it." Meaning, that's the Christmas for gawkers like you. Our Christmas is members only.

As he reentered the building, I spoke to him in the native New York dialect, saying, "Thanks for the attitude, prick." I then said, ultra-sarcastically, "You're an elegant man."

I'm not sure he heard any of the second part as the swanky structure's heavy door was closed by then, and it's too bad 'cause that's the part I wanted him to hear. Despite the fact that he's just a regular union worker who happens to toil for the rich, he somehow identifies with them as if osmosis has placed him on a higher socio-economic plane. He is, in short, a snob. (And probably a worse one than many of the people he works for.)

It must be some version of Stockholm Syndrome or something; you know, where hostages begin to identify with the people who kidnapped them. Anyway, the exchange ruined my mood a bit but I also felt good that I had stood up for myself.

And I made a point of looking into two or three other buildings to see if the reaction would be the same.

It wasn't.

One Puerto Rican (I'm guessing) doorman was particularly nice. (Of course, I recalibrated my approach, too. I can learn, sometimes. A little. . . . Temporarily.)

Okay. Enough Starbucks electricity-taking. Gotta continue my walking tour of a real, old-fashioned January 3rd Christmas.

__________________________________
3 January, 2007 @ 20:00 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Happy New Year!!!

I HAD NO PLACE TO GO ON NEW YEAR'S EVE!!!

Okay, I did have someplace to go -- a good party, actually, with a Weimar cabaret theme -- but it came in after my last e-mail check, so I lived my New Year's Eve as if I didn't have anywhere to go.

And it was . . . nice.

I went downtown to Trinity Church, where bells were ringing in the New Year for the first time in over a hundred years.

According to the publicity, the Trinity bells provided 19th century New Yorkers with the same kind of New Year's tradition modern denizens (and visitors) now enjoy in Times Square. And it was, apparently, the Times' move to the square in 1904 that sounded the (seeming) death knell for the downtown tradition.

But the bells are back.

And even before they tolled for me (and thee), the sound of nearby fireworks beckoned from (kinda) the south. So, after exchanging Happy New Years with some well-dressed older folks across from the church, I hustled toward the the fireworks, past the big, beautiful Chrrstmas tree in front of the New York Stock Exchange (in front of which a pretty, dark haired girl was kissing the ground as an expression of her love for New York City), past a New Year's bash with a James Bond (2)007 theme (at least on its sign).

The sounds of the fireworks were coming from two different directions, so -- naturally -- I headed in a third, toward where I thought they should be. But, as minutes passed and I realized I might miss them entirely, I turned toward the sounds and soon bright, colorless flashes began appearing above and around the varied structures of lower Manhattan. Eventually, I glimpsed colorful splurtches of fireworks from somewhere across the water -- maybe Staten Island. And when they ended, I turned right toward the Staten Island Ferry, by which where there were more ridiculous-looking, Happy New Year hats (which I love) per capita (which literally means "per head", doesn't it?) than I'd seen anywhere else in my (admittedly limited) evening's wanderings.

A guy in front of McDonalds asked me for money and when I indicated he was barking down the wrong purse, he offered to buy me a coffee (I turned him down, with thanks), a gesture of sweetness that reminded me of another time, some years back, when I was broke and heading for a nearby comedy club to glom train fare from a friend or distant associate. A bum on the southwest corner of 23rd and 8th hit me up for some funds and I frankly told him that I was so broke I was about to hit up people I knew so I could get home. He opened a hand filled with coins and whatnot and pulled from it a subway token, which he gave me so I could travel home.

It's a beautiful world.


THEY'RE AUCTIONING OFF MY STORAGE TOMORROW IF I DON'T PAY THEM $350 BEFORE THE AUCTION BEGINS!!!

Stay tuned.

__________________________________
2 January, 2007 @ 14:23 GMT
http://blogs.chortle.co.uk/andrewjlederer