3.14.02 – this is where i work

3.13.02 – after these messages, we’ll be right back

computer problems + tech means that slithy tove may be a bit neglected for a few more days till i get Buffalo Gal open and have time to do battle with Earthlink.

3.11.02 – buffalo gal, won’t you come out tonight?

the past few days have been filled with laughter and old friends and good food, and i feel very fortunate indeed.

met sumit for dinner; we went to an indian restaurant near his office where he’s something of a regular. apparently he usually goes there after working late and brings work with him, so when he showed up at 8 o’clock on a saturday night with a girl, there was a flurry of excitement, a quiet table for two set up before we could get our coats off, free deserts and much conversing in hindi. later my stage-manager-turned-law-student friend emily called in search of a study break. we ended up drinking pints of bass in some bar in the village, yelling at one another about theatre and men and politics, and a good time was had by all.

yesterday i met amanda at penn station and we hung out; the aim was to shop but we mostly ended up chattering and walking in the wrong directions. she brought me home to randolph, nj, for a home-cooked meal with her family and a chance to finally meet winston (pronounced “WEEN-stun”, with the first syllable very high pitched, the second very low) the chocolate lab who reportedly spends 98% of his energy growing and losing fur on everyone and thing. winston didn’t seem quite as hairy as one might have expected, but he had beautiful, chocolate brown eyes and a big doggy smile.

tonight i am packing; i fly back to buffalo early tomorrow morning and plunge straight in to tech for Buffalo Gal.

i seem to be having a semicolon phase in my writing these days. i don’t know what that means.

3.10.02 – on the bathroom wall in amanda’s parents’ house:

“The plumber dug around in the pipes and saw something glitter in the muck and it turned out to be the soul of the previous tenent. He gave it to me and i wondered how we might return it and he shrugged and said he found stuff like that all the time. You’d be amazed at what people will leave behind, he said.”

3.9.02 – on the 7 train

“Hang on to your dreams. Hang on to the handrails, too. -a public safety message from new york city subway”

3.8.02 – want fries with that?

the burger king on 42nd street advertises “free internet access with any food purchase!” does burger king as an ISP seem questionable to anyone else?

3.7.02 – it was a rhetorical question

an actor that nanci & i know came into town for an audition; in exchange for a deluxe portion of floor space in our queens apartment she insisted on buying us dinner. nanci protested politely, but hey, free food is an integral part of living on an intern’s salary so i went along without putting up much of a fight. we went to this place in the village called Stingy Lulu’s, which advertises “fabulous food, generous portions, stingy prices and O.K. service.” the service was better than O.K., but still disappointing since deb had promised that all the wait staff would be drag queens. it turns out that they only do that on weekends. most of the other patrons were in drag, however. the business card for the place said:

Cool DJ’s and disco balls

handsome guys pretty girls

ugly drag queens and stiff drinks

the bartender made wicked cosmopolitans, and i had salad with warm brie on it. what more could a girl want?

3.6.02 – life is weird, can i be your stylist?

life is weird. but generally in a good way. found the world’s greatest cafe in the village last night, i would go back there all the time just to sit on the cushioned window seat, drinking tea and reading something fashionable if only i could remember exactly where it is. jon & his roommate, garrett, were in nyc yesterday; they are actually the ones responsible for discovering said cafe. i think they originally wanted to go there because it was called the Esperanza Cafe and esperanza is just inherently funny. over funky over-priced teas garrett & i nearly bored jon to death comparing notes on our respective bengal cats (oh, does your cat chirp too? yeah! he makes these clicking sounds, like this! *cat noises* isn’t it scary how smart they are? mine always reminds me of a velociraptor when he’s hunting for his toy mice – you can actually see him thinking! mine can turn on the tv! oh, mine watches tv too! on and on, ad nausea). two contenders for Freak of the Week: the first was a guy who wandered through the Esperanza café a couple of times. he was talking loudly on his cell phone, pausing frequently to make sure that everyone around him was noticing him and his conversation – which wouldn’t have been weird except that the cell phone was actually a plastic toy phone with a coiled cord running inside his jacket, so that it looked like the phone was plugged into him. the Scary Freak of the Week would probably have to be the guy we encountered on the subway train later that night who was holding a 9mm in his lap, and actually loaded the clip into the gun while we were sitting across from him on the train (we got off at the next stop).

matt & i saw proof tonight on broadway – it was quite good. exactly the sort metaphysical math and science concepts meets humanity stuff that i really dig. jennifer jason leigh was starring in it; i thought she was an interesting actress to watch in terms of her physical characterization, but she has a voice that is clearly trained for the camera, not the stage. trying to project to the back of the house left her sounding nasal and strained, so that at intermission i heard people asking what sort of accent or impediment she was trying to affect. afterwards matt and i sat in a very 80’s hotel bar and over coffee and cheesecake i learned what an investment banker actually does, and he let me dissect the production we’d just seen. the cocktail waitresses fit right in to the 80’s scene we’d just walked in to; they had to wear these awful little black mini dresses with big poofy sleeves and a low-cut front. matt said, “i bet they get laid a lot.”

3.4.02 – monsters, inc.

there’s a radiator right next to the futon that is my bed right now. warm temperatures meant that the radiator was relatively inactive for the first week i was living here, so i kinda forgot about it. one night i had these terrible dreams in which something in my room was making this horrible, heavy breathing sound. clamp your teeth together, pull your lips back, and draw your breath in in several sharp bursts, and then let it rumble out in a sort of throaty growl, alternating with a snake-like hiss. that’s what it sounded like. i woke up from the dream, but the heavy breathing kept going on, right behind my head. i slowly realized that the sound was coming from the radiator, but in my sleepy state, having that sound in my room was still threatening. “no wonder kids are scared of the monster under the bed,” i thought to myself. “the monster is right here in the room with me, only he lives under the radiator, not the bed.” even still, getting up to go to the bathroom i half expected something to reach out and grab my ankle from under the futon, and i had to shove the closet door closed as i passed by. when mari stayed over here this weekend she confirmed that the radiator was indeed scary. i’m typing this in the living room now, but i can hear the radiator panting away back there. eek!

3.3.02 – 1:05am: yawn

had 3 days off from work in honor of the grammy’s (betty was nominated for a grammy so she had to go out to CA for the ceremony; unfortunately harry connick jr. stole it out from under her, but at least we got a break from rehearsal anyway), so i’ve been busy being a good tourist: went to museums, saw a show, took the ferry to ellis island, drank cosmopolitans in SoHo, misread the subway map and took a detour to brooklyn, ate crepes from a street vendor in central park and went window shopping on 5th avenue. now i am sleepy, so further details of my adventures will have to wait till tomorrow. or the next day.