From Associated Press: “The federal government was shuttered Monday while the Mid-Atlantic region dug out from as much as three feet of snow that left tens of thousands without power and blocked trains, planes and cars, with another storm looming.”
And this is news?
Tags: government
It’s over and though with the longest stretch of the imagination, I could not be considered a football fan, it was a wonderful game.
On Sunday morning, I generally watch “Face the Nation” and “Meet the Press,” though the latter less so. I particularly enjoy “Face the Nation” because of Bob Schieffer commentary at the close. This week he was clearly enjoying himself “covering” the game and his commentary was remarkably on target. You might want to see for yourself at http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/07/ftn/main6183371.shtml?tag=contentMain;contentBody.
And with it all over, it’s back to the increasing drudgery of daily life.
Tags: super bowl
Tags: anita nowacka
Tags: anita nowacka
Tags: anita nowacka
Today I was informed that I was “ignorant” because I don’t believe that Bruce Springsteen is “the most important person in the history of rock and roll.”
While I find Bruce Springsteen certainly palatable, I pointed out that notwithstanding my New Yorker status, I’m a Macon, Georgia fan: Allman Brothers, Otis Redding, Leon Russell and several others.
There’s little else to say, I suppose…save if you listen to the old Allman’s Fillmore West concert or Leon Russell at Long Beach, well, I would venture that you’d be hearing something extraordinary.
Tags: allman brothers, springsteen
We attended a birthday party at a fine Italian restaurant last night. It was for a friend of my wife’s who was turning whatever age. In the interest of being uncharactistically positive, the food was wonderful and the cake, which was purchased at a bakery of great moment was, perhaps, the best I’ve ever tasted.
However, the attendees simply bored me. We’ve been to several parties during the past year at the home of this couple, virtually all the same: catered in an upscale manner and guests who had virtually nothing to discuss but football, the food, American Idol and their surroundings.
Now, there’s a part of me that says parties should be a respite from the woes of the day. However, that we a couple of wars, a dreadful economy and increasingly partisan political issues today, I naturally think there are other things to consider in conversation than the Super Bowl. But not this group. It was an evening of simple, innocuous chatter without engagement or interest.
Making matters worse, some woman saw fit to bring her infant child along; something I’ve railed about for years. It seem remarkably discourteous to wheel one of those high tech carriages into a restaurant and attend a gathering of adults with a sometime crying child. “Well, the baby was too young to have a sitter.” Oh, please, then don’t come.
Nearly three hours of my life was spent at this event and I’ve grown to an age where I truly think about this sort of time that I’ll never retrieve.
My wife, probably a definitive narcissist, suggested that I get a haircut yesterday. Small requests such as this are things with which I can comply with facility, to reiterate a philosophy of life, it’s not the lions and the tigers that kill you, it’s the gnats and the fleas.
By any stretch of the imagination, I am not a vain man. I generally abhor attending the barber shop, well, “salon;” usually one of those chains we all know. I jokingly point out to friends that Albert Anastasia, the head of Murder, Inc. was killed in a barber chair.
If getting a haircut took ten minutes or less, it’d be alright. However, one’s generally in the chair for twice that time, frequently having to listen to the chatter of the “stylist,” who certainly is trying to be congenial. For most, that’s fine, for me, get it over with so I can go about doing whatever I plan to do.
My Sunday began at 9:45, when I arrived at one of these barber shops, only to find a line of a half dozen persons in front. I drove to another nearby, arriving just at opening time, 10 AM only to find two “stylists” waiting for the manager to open the door.
Well, I thought, at least I’m first in line and when the door opened, I was taken immediately. “Just trim it a bit and thin it,” I told the “stylist.” “Well, should this be a five, or a seven…” she responded.
Politely, I told her that I didn’t care about anything except getting out of there quickly. She went about her business and chattered continually about her boyfriend and weekend.
While I thought my head would explode at any point, I, of course, got through it, proferred the payment and gratuity and thought, “Free for a nother couple of months.”
I wish I could find a “barber;” a fellow (or woman) who sits me down in the chair and does whatever he or she does; then pulls that hot shaving cream out and shaves the back of my neck with a straight razor.
It tires me so these days to continually hear euphemisms for professions, secretaries are “administrative assistants” or “executive assistants;” barbers are, as I said, “stylists,” reporters are “journalists,” and so forth.
Isn’t ever possible for folks to be what they are and who they are and simply content or even proud of it. Life’s confusing enough these days without these small roles we play for self-aggrandizement.
Tags: 50s, 60s, art, bad people, blues, dogs, economy, folk music, getting old, government, greenwich village, ingratitude, jazz, life, meaness, poetry, politics, recession, rude, rudeness, seniors, women
story in the LA Times today was depressing. For me, born and bred in New York City; raised not too far from McSorley’s, I attended this saloon when it was the real McSorley’s. Now I love women, but, as you’ll read down in this piece, prior to 1970, no women allowed. There was something comforting about that. I was in the newspaper business at the time and when we’d drop into the McSorley’s we knew what to expect: pickled eggs, a glass of beer, no women and clearly no trendiness. This was a place that women didn’t want to attend back then. And with the stroke of some judge’s pen, it all changed, just as the Village did as the place I was born became filled with Wall Street yuppies and 8th Street turned into “shoe hell,” rather and a street of shops belonging to artists and artisans; the Women’s House of Detention became a park…and MacDougal Street no longer the place where I read poetry at the Gaslight following Paul Stookey doing a stand up comedy act and Hugh Romney reading his work.
If you want to know what the Village truly was, I recommend Republic of Dreams by Ross Wetzsteon, a wonderful history of “The American Bohemia from 1910-1960.”
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History lines the walls. Houdini’s handcuffs. Dusty wishbones hung by World War I doughboys wishing to return home safely. A plate commemorating Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 transatlantic flight.
Then there are the frames, holding yellowed newspaper clippings. A New York Herald story reports Lincoln’s assassination. (Lincoln was a customer, you know.)
Words are wallpaper here, so it’s easy to see why McSorley’s has inspired writer after writer to sing of the Bowery bar. Joseph Mitchell made one of the earlier stamps in a 1913 New York Times article, and later in a book, “McSorley’s Wonderful Saloon.” You can find this article in Mitchell’s book, Up In The Old Hotel.
Then came poetry, notably ee cummings’ 1923 poem “i was sitting in mcsorley’s.”
A sample: “tinking luscious jigs dint of ripe silver with warm-lyish wetflat splurging smells waltz the glush of squirting taps plus slush of foam.”
”The poetry is God-awful. You’ve got to be loaded to understand it,” said Jim Wilk, 41, a regular who works construction in Manhattan.
Perhaps. After four hours of drinking, he said, “All that poem is about is the constant flow of drinks and the constant flow of conversation.”
Bartholomew added his alehouse ode in 2001: “The McSorley Poems: Voices from New York City’s Oldest Pub.” There’s a worn copy behind the bar, where the 64-year-old with thick forearms and a mustache the color of a gray, rainy New York sky works.
He attended the City College of New York’s creative writing program in the ’70s and earned his master of arts in 1975. While there, he tutored under literary heavyweights Kurt Vonnegut and Anthony Burgess.
”Everybody can take a shot at what you want to do,” he said.
So he wrote. McSorley’s provided the money for the bills, and the environment to create the words.
”Mine, it isn’t going to be so flowery,” he said of his poetry.
”It’s a little dark,” added Teresa Maher de la Haba, McSorley’s first-ever female bartender and daughter of the owner, Matthew Maher. But if the poetry dwells on the dark, that’s understandable. After all, she said, McSorley’s is a bar.
Saloon, really. Sawdust covers the wood floor to keep patrons from slipping on spilled ale. No radio disturbs, no television distracts (except when one of the local teams is in the championship) — just glowing embers in the potbelly stove in winter, drink, and conversation to pass the time.
McSorley’s follows the city’s breakneck pace: a two-drink menu — the “light” (a crisp pale ale) and the “dark” (a porter, hints of chocolate) — two seconds to order and half that to get served. Cash only.
McSorley’s has a couple of mottoes: “Be good or be gone,” and the more infamous one, “Good ale, raw onions and no ladies,” harking back to the days when women weren’t allowed. When a judge ruled in 1970 that McSorley’s must allow women in, it was front-page news.
That’s enough to get the prose flowing. Throw in some of the bar’s characters and you might get published.
Use the silver-haired wise-guy server named Dick Buggy, who used to be an undercover cop, and would go into Central Park dressed as a woman to get mugged. Seriously.
Find him cajoling the ladies with terrible one-liners: “Drink up; you’re easier when you’re drunk.”
For balance, toss in endearing regulars — the lifeblood of any bar — such as Jim Wilk and his brother-in-law (they married sisters) Dan McGuire, an accountant from Maryland.
On the day after Christmas for the last eight years, they sit at the same table and talk about the year while gulping down ale from open to close. They even answer the pay phone that rings over their heads.
”I’ve taken down reservations for people in London,” Wilk said.
”I’ve given more directions to this place than directions to my own home,” added McGuire.
Tags: greenwich village, mcsorley's
I refer you to My expensive 12-day vacation.
Tags: health care, healthcare
