I got one of them jack posts, and I done rigged ’er up under the mudroom there. Gave it a couple-three twists till the joists creaked.
While I was down there under the mudroom, with my legs out on the snow and my head in the last of the autumn leaves that had taken shelter behind the recycling bins, sort of cantilevered sideways into the space so I could get purchase on the wrench, I couldn’t help but remember the frites at L’Express, down there on Park Avenue. You know, you could go in there 24 hours a day and get some pretty tasty fries and a glass or two of wine, maybe even order up some onion soup. That was a good place to go after drinking downtown. Not as expensive as you’d think. And then you’d just hop a cab late in the Manhattan night, and if you weren’t too drunk, the night might smell promising and spring might be in the air.
I inhaled deeply, lost in the memory — and realized that one of the local stray cats had marked the recycling bins as his territory not long before.
Door’s still stuck, but I figure I’ll give the post a screw every weekend till we can open it again.
•
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Back in Business
The boat was back this morning despite the remaining ice, and tonight the announcement was made that we'd be back aboard for tomorrow's commute.
Good.
•
Good.
•
Monday, February 26, 2007
A Crank is Born
One summer in college I delivered mail. It was a great job: I had a four-minute commute, lost 22 pounds, got a (relative) tan, made friends with some, umm, edgy fellers, and could walk off a hangover by lunchtime every day.
The one dark spot I can remember came near the end of the summer, when I found, with a few legs of my route left, that I had a flat tire. Cut off from HQ, with time running out, I carried extra weight extra distance on foot, dropping behind schedule with every step, and came to the final block of my route dripping sweat, with my shoulder aching and the last offer of lemonade far in the past.
Three houses from the end of the last leg, standing at the foot of his driveway, was Bitterman McGurk, the oldest, curmudgeonliest, Social-Security-check-awaitinest WWII vet in town, whose gift for sarcasm was undiminished by the years and whose afternoon had been spent standing at the end of his driveway getting himself enraged. By the time I got there he was so worked up that his pulse was up to forty and his BP was practically detectable. And his rhetorical question was layered with so much contemptuous nuance, so polished and rehearsed, that you could tell he had been working on it all afternoon – nay, probably far longer, with early drafts unleashed on mailmen before me – and that he almost didn’t want to let it go, he had come to love it so much. But he had a job to do, and as I approached with a sympathy-seeking roll of the eyes and a theatrical wiping of the brow, he let me have it.
“What happened? Did your pony die?”
This morning, I was that man. It snowed about five inches last night. At 5:15 I was up shoveling the driveway and scraping the car, which went well. At 6:25 I headed out.
I reached the foot of my driveway to find that the main street had not been plowed in hours. Turning toward the ferry, I discovered that this secondary street had not been plowed at all. An outrage! A travesty! We never got such bad service in the last place we lived! I demanded satisfaction!
Even as I fishtailed my way along, I saw a plow heave into sight behind me, but with blade raised at a jaunty angle, well above the snow! On to more important plowing tasks, I suppose!
I have all day to hone my sarcastic comment, so I’ll probably get some work in on that. There are two problems, though: 1) the roads will be plowed when I get home, which will take a little of the sheen off my angry wit and 2) if I stand at the foot of the driveway to deliver my final polished gem, I’m gonna get blasted with a 30-mph face-full of snow and mud.
Guess I’ll leave the fist-shaking ire to the pros.
•
The one dark spot I can remember came near the end of the summer, when I found, with a few legs of my route left, that I had a flat tire. Cut off from HQ, with time running out, I carried extra weight extra distance on foot, dropping behind schedule with every step, and came to the final block of my route dripping sweat, with my shoulder aching and the last offer of lemonade far in the past.
Three houses from the end of the last leg, standing at the foot of his driveway, was Bitterman McGurk, the oldest, curmudgeonliest, Social-Security-check-awaitinest WWII vet in town, whose gift for sarcasm was undiminished by the years and whose afternoon had been spent standing at the end of his driveway getting himself enraged. By the time I got there he was so worked up that his pulse was up to forty and his BP was practically detectable. And his rhetorical question was layered with so much contemptuous nuance, so polished and rehearsed, that you could tell he had been working on it all afternoon – nay, probably far longer, with early drafts unleashed on mailmen before me – and that he almost didn’t want to let it go, he had come to love it so much. But he had a job to do, and as I approached with a sympathy-seeking roll of the eyes and a theatrical wiping of the brow, he let me have it.
“What happened? Did your pony die?”
This morning, I was that man. It snowed about five inches last night. At 5:15 I was up shoveling the driveway and scraping the car, which went well. At 6:25 I headed out.
I reached the foot of my driveway to find that the main street had not been plowed in hours. Turning toward the ferry, I discovered that this secondary street had not been plowed at all. An outrage! A travesty! We never got such bad service in the last place we lived! I demanded satisfaction!
Even as I fishtailed my way along, I saw a plow heave into sight behind me, but with blade raised at a jaunty angle, well above the snow! On to more important plowing tasks, I suppose!
I have all day to hone my sarcastic comment, so I’ll probably get some work in on that. There are two problems, though: 1) the roads will be plowed when I get home, which will take a little of the sheen off my angry wit and 2) if I stand at the foot of the driveway to deliver my final polished gem, I’m gonna get blasted with a 30-mph face-full of snow and mud.
Guess I’ll leave the fist-shaking ire to the pros.
•
Tarzan Not Be Ignored
An extremely reliable source tells me that there’s going to be a total lunar eclipse in the northeast US and France (hello, French readers!) this coming Saturday. Or, for you superstitious types, this Saturday Numa the fearsome sky-lion will devour Goro, and only the mightiest of the mangani will be able to frighten him into spitting out his prey.
In either case, if your weather’s clear, you should get out and watch it.
•
In either case, if your weather’s clear, you should get out and watch it.
•
Friday, February 23, 2007
L’Heure Bleu at Spuytin Duyvil
The water of the river looks like the sky above the Palisades, only wrinkled. Venus hovers. The wires are doing their dips. The Henry Hudson Bridge passes over with an elegant arch and accessible architecture; its task of bridging the island to the mainland is so self-evident, unlike, say, the Throg’s Neck, which seems to sweep out over water and land indiscriminately, an aimless, wandering bridge. It lacked focus growing up and they always said it would never amount to much. Not the Henry Hudson. Stolid, steely, blue, a single arch with a flat, straight road above. “Where you goin’?” “Right over there.”
Under it, and we turn north.
In Of Human Bondage, the protagonist has a revelation near the end of the book, right before he becomes impossibly old and dull for his age, in which he realizes that to not be an artist is allowed. That his life will weave of itself an intricate tapestry, unique among all others — that the pursuit of art will not make a more beautiful life than will being a country doctor. It’s sort of a guidebook for entering middle age, but, from the vantage point of early middle age, it rings true. It was not long after reading it that I began to chronicle my daily subway commute. Often I described the train floor in some detail.
Despite the first paragraph of this post (and other recent content), Exurbitude is not intended to be a commuter’s diary. The motto is Observation and Exploration; it’s just that work is busy, time is short, and the commute is what’s left over. So this week I’m leaning more toward observation.
In the spirit of exploration, however, let me offer a couple of tidbits from beyond the rails. 1) This morning as we passed south of Peekskill, I saw a bald eagle squatting way out on the ice. I hope I never stop being amazed by them. 2) Chimpanzees have been observed using wooden spears to hunt. Oh. Good. 3) A beaver has taken up residence in the Bronx River — the first beaver seen in New York City sinceDisney took over Times Square the early 1800s.
•
Under it, and we turn north.
In Of Human Bondage, the protagonist has a revelation near the end of the book, right before he becomes impossibly old and dull for his age, in which he realizes that to not be an artist is allowed. That his life will weave of itself an intricate tapestry, unique among all others — that the pursuit of art will not make a more beautiful life than will being a country doctor. It’s sort of a guidebook for entering middle age, but, from the vantage point of early middle age, it rings true. It was not long after reading it that I began to chronicle my daily subway commute. Often I described the train floor in some detail.
Despite the first paragraph of this post (and other recent content), Exurbitude is not intended to be a commuter’s diary. The motto is Observation and Exploration; it’s just that work is busy, time is short, and the commute is what’s left over. So this week I’m leaning more toward observation.
In the spirit of exploration, however, let me offer a couple of tidbits from beyond the rails. 1) This morning as we passed south of Peekskill, I saw a bald eagle squatting way out on the ice. I hope I never stop being amazed by them. 2) Chimpanzees have been observed using wooden spears to hunt. Oh. Good. 3) A beaver has taken up residence in the Bronx River — the first beaver seen in New York City since
•
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Casey Jones You’d Better
If you miss the 7:29 train out of 125th Street, you might get on the next one, which is the 7:33 bound for Croton-Harmon.
I was standing right there and didn’t see the train. Maybe it was the Invisible Express? Wonder Woman was the engineer? I don’t know. (Oh wait, yes, now I know. My train came in but it was identified on the board as the previous train. So I patiently waited for it to go. Byebye. Byebye, earlier train.)
So anyway, you get on this later train, the 7:33 bound for Croton-Harmon. And the steward waits for you to get settled and then hands you the little plastic tray with the lemon-scented hot towel on it while the conductor smiles beneficently and says “put that away, you don’t need to show me your ticket. Just relax!” And you do, you relax and recline your seat back a little and put your feet on the little footrest, and the headrest speakers are just perfectly angled, so much so that you opt against the mournful Tom Waits you usually like and you choose something peppy from the Fabulous 70s channel on the satellite radio. The reading material is pretty good; Architectural Digest and InStyle, or The Economist, Harper’s, Dwell – you name it – and when they bring the whole portfolio, you can ask them to just choose something for you because after all it’s just too too headache-making to decide. Any of it beats the reading material on your usual train, which primarily consists of the Old Familiar Suggestion scrawled over Homeland Security posters.
This train has brushed-nickel accents, high ceilings, contoured seats, electronic readouts for the station stops and an EZ-Listening automated voice offering kindly recommendations to enhance your personal safety. It runs on electricity. It stops in all the pleasant little East Bank river towns familiar from your J. Crew catalogue, where the doors open on live bluegrass music playing in the spacious heated platform shelters and the people who get off the train stop a moment to select today’s bouquet from the flower seller near the complimentary taxi stand.
You wish this were your train every day. But you’re careful because you don’t want to take having a train for granted, and you don’t want to miss a minute of the pleasant journey you’re having to the halfway point – but you can’t shake the irritation you feel at missing the last bus across the river and having to spring for a cab.
So you ride along suppressing your annoyance, because, hey, you had to go north, and you figure your next train is lumbering along behind you someplace in the night, sucking trash in its wake, its full-throated diesel engine issuing a rancid underworld smoke, each stained and torn seat displaying a deep depression from the weight of the hundred thousand hardy souls who came before you. It bowls along with its stale air and its aroma of inevitability and decay, and you know that it’s coming for you, but it’s still back there on the track somewhere, and you can keep ahead for a little while longer on this well-lit, comfortable ride.
•
I was standing right there and didn’t see the train. Maybe it was the Invisible Express? Wonder Woman was the engineer? I don’t know. (Oh wait, yes, now I know. My train came in but it was identified on the board as the previous train. So I patiently waited for it to go. Byebye. Byebye, earlier train.)
So anyway, you get on this later train, the 7:33 bound for Croton-Harmon. And the steward waits for you to get settled and then hands you the little plastic tray with the lemon-scented hot towel on it while the conductor smiles beneficently and says “put that away, you don’t need to show me your ticket. Just relax!” And you do, you relax and recline your seat back a little and put your feet on the little footrest, and the headrest speakers are just perfectly angled, so much so that you opt against the mournful Tom Waits you usually like and you choose something peppy from the Fabulous 70s channel on the satellite radio. The reading material is pretty good; Architectural Digest and InStyle, or The Economist, Harper’s, Dwell – you name it – and when they bring the whole portfolio, you can ask them to just choose something for you because after all it’s just too too headache-making to decide. Any of it beats the reading material on your usual train, which primarily consists of the Old Familiar Suggestion scrawled over Homeland Security posters.
This train has brushed-nickel accents, high ceilings, contoured seats, electronic readouts for the station stops and an EZ-Listening automated voice offering kindly recommendations to enhance your personal safety. It runs on electricity. It stops in all the pleasant little East Bank river towns familiar from your J. Crew catalogue, where the doors open on live bluegrass music playing in the spacious heated platform shelters and the people who get off the train stop a moment to select today’s bouquet from the flower seller near the complimentary taxi stand.
You wish this were your train every day. But you’re careful because you don’t want to take having a train for granted, and you don’t want to miss a minute of the pleasant journey you’re having to the halfway point – but you can’t shake the irritation you feel at missing the last bus across the river and having to spring for a cab.
So you ride along suppressing your annoyance, because, hey, you had to go north, and you figure your next train is lumbering along behind you someplace in the night, sucking trash in its wake, its full-throated diesel engine issuing a rancid underworld smoke, each stained and torn seat displaying a deep depression from the weight of the hundred thousand hardy souls who came before you. It bowls along with its stale air and its aroma of inevitability and decay, and you know that it’s coming for you, but it’s still back there on the track somewhere, and you can keep ahead for a little while longer on this well-lit, comfortable ride.
•
Sunday, February 18, 2007
You Will Purchase My Painting, Thank You
The ultimate symbol of virility, potency and danger, the great white shark has evoked terror and envy in men for centuries. Sleek, powerful, deadly and strangely suave, this ancient predator speaks to all that is manly and elegant. The only thing that could possibly make the great white a more fitting emblem for you -- YOU, oh powerful advertising executive or hedge fund manager or mid-level state-employed labor lawyer -- is a testosterone-rich eight-point rack of wapiti antlers with a six-foot spread.
The meat-eating, red-blooded, hippie-dicing scourge of the deep has finally achieved a level of ornamentation commensurate with YOUR status and power. And it's time for you to take him home.
At a manageable 18x24 inches, but surrounded by aFABULOUS RESPLENDENT freaking AWESOME frame of the finest gold-painted resin cast in a breathtaking baroque undersea motif, your Antlered Shark will fit any room and any decor -- provided the room is made for dominating your inferiors, impressing your admirers, or frightening those who would foolishly oppose you.
$250. Comment if you're man* enough to be interested.
Your symbol awaits.
*Dear women: you too!
•
The meat-eating, red-blooded, hippie-dicing scourge of the deep has finally achieved a level of ornamentation commensurate with YOUR status and power. And it's time for you to take him home.
At a manageable 18x24 inches, but surrounded by a
$250. Comment if you're man* enough to be interested.
Your symbol awaits.
*Dear women: you too!
•
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