Month: April 2006

An old friend from my college days is performing in a one man show called “Man of the Heart”, where he embodies the Bengali mystic Lalon Pkokir. My friend now is an assistant professor of theater at UC Berkeley. By all means check out his website and go to his performances this weekend and next: http://www.lalon.org/. I’m going this Friday.

The passing of urban community activist, Jane Jacobs, most famous for the book, “The Death and Life of Great American Cities.” NY Times has a lengthy and fascinating obituary of Jacobs. Jacobs is notable for articulating – if not changing – the way we think about urban development.
The passing of Newsday columnist Dennis Duggan: the NY Times obituary and, more importantly, the Newsday one. There’s the AP one that Newsday posted too.

Great read: “On Bullshit” by Harry G. Frankfurt. A Princeton professor of philosophy (emeritus), he explains insight on what is b.s., and what is the intention (if any) behind it. Very well written b.s., if I may say so, about b.s. Very slim read (bit over-priced for something so small; they ought to release like a collection of Prof. Frankfurt’s writings in one book – far more a bargain), and lots of stuff that flew over my head (Big Words and Philosophical Mumbo Jumbo; then again, I was a liberal arts undergrad, so not impossible to grasp anyway). May require another couple of re-reads (plus a dictionary) to truly appreciate. For some reason, I imagined the voice of Donald Sutherland as the narrator. Although, I doubt that Prof. Frankfurt actually sounds like Donald Sutherland. Or Keifer for that matter.

When you’re coasting until the next payday, you do what you can to budget your meal expenses, not just to stretch the paycheck, but so that you can afford to splurge a little for something better.

Half of the dinners in the past week were home cooked. Wednesday was free dinner at work provided by the student government. Friday was free dinner at NYU’s Asian Pacific American Studies Institute, which celebrated its 10th anniversary by bringing back many of its former faculty and resident artists, and recently moved to the newly formed Department of Social and Cultural Studies.

Tuesday’s splurge: prix fixe at the French Culinary Institute. $35 for 5 courses – a big steal, especially for French food. There are some flaws because they are students: the menu had way too many rice dishes (thai rice, rissoto, then chicken and rice – enough already), our server had to juggle 9 tables by herself and her classmate wasn’t doing buptkus. One of the student chefs blew the budget by putting on 2-5mm slices of truffles on the side of the dish instead of shaving them. The deserts all had custard in them as the theme. Mind you, the dishes were well-executed, but they didn’t get the harmony down pat.

Saturday’s budget eats: The Taste of Chinatown – $1 and $2 dishes of tasty Asian cuisine. The ultimate was the $2 Peking duck – the line went down the block for half an hour. Recommended.

Sunday’s splurge: dimsum in Flushing at Ocean Jewels Seafood Restaurant
133-30 39th Ave. This is how dim sum used to be. Good, attentive service, no plate more than $3, and very inventive and well-executed dishes. Recommended.