Author: F C

First off, congrats are in order for AJ’s new baby boy, which arrived yesterday morning!

Monday, we went to Coney Island for a friend’s BBQ. The area is much better now that the Stillwell station is renovated. We passed by the famed Nathan’s site, missing the actual eating contest (49 dogs by the perennial winner Takeru “The Prince” Kobayashi, and 37 by Sonia Thomas, both Asian). We saw it on ESPN, where they displayed a bag containing the world record 53.5 hot dogs. How do they make room for so many?

We’re still cleaning up space in the apartment for stuff. I got 4 garbage bags of stuff reorganized into 3 neat boxes. At once there was a lot more room for the sofa. More space will open up when we are done with the laundry.

About 3 more hours before they will announce who will get the 2012 Olympics. Maybe it’s just boosterism, but I do think that New York has a shot, if Paris doesn’t win it outright in the first round. The move to a Mets Stadium greatly improved the NY plan and eliminated the bad aspects of the proposed Jets Stadium. P thinks it will just be craziness if they do end up picking here, but I’ve haven’t seen the event yet that was too big for New York.

Quick post on the run — going to Tanger Outlets today.

P and I went to visit my godmother on Saturday. She’s the mother of all chowhounds; she’s kind of getting on in years and can’t get around as well as she used to, but she still manages to make the rounds. Will have to find out how to get her out for dinner.

Friday night we took the recommendation of the Chowhound book to go to Zen, 31 St. Mark’s, for ramen. Very good pork stock — rich and full of pork bone flavor. Last night we went to Zaytoons on Smith St. Excellent middle eastern cuisine, semi-Turkish.

Watched Howl’s Moving Castle at BAM – long, but good. It’s a little wierd to figure out how the Japanese perceive European culture.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Thanks folks for the comments. I’ve been a bit busy as you will see below. Skype or me and I’ll walk you through this.

I had jury duty on Wednesday at Supreme Court, Civil Division. This is your garden variety potpouri type of general jurisdiction court. After about 4 hours of hemming and hawing, I got picked for an auto accident case. It won’t actually start until next Thursday, when hopefully the case will settle out after 6 years.

We also got our raise letters today, which were on the high side for not-for-profit work, but measly against the private sector. I thought it was good, some others were jumping for joy, and others were not happy.

I bought the Chowhound’s Guide to the New York Tristate Area. Incredibly awesome – the website distilled into a book. The indices in the back of the book are vital, because the categories in the main section are as arbitrary as New York Press’ Best of New York issue.

For those trying to figure out where to go to write, here is the link.

New: Upgraded the blogging software to 1.5. There are some new things behind the scenes, and some neato templates, which I’ve changed to here. I’ll be working on changing the picture to something more mine, and get the location thing working again. Please point out anything seriously wrong.

Old: Interesting new book I saw at the Union Square Barnes and Noble called Hong Kong Apothecary: A Visual History of Chinese Medicine Packaging. It’s the first comprehensive look at Chinese medicine production that I’ve seen in English, and it is incredibly facinating. The meanings of the fancy mysterious boxes are revealed.

Today, I went into the city to help plan the annual Asian picnic. I spent most of the time in the East Village going up Broadway to Union Square. Meantime, the Gay Pride parade is going on Fifth Avenue, as well as a Billy Graham christian crusade in Flushing. Barely a sign any of it is going on with probably upwards of 100,000 people involved between the two events. New York is the only place this kind of thing could happen.

Had dinner with my mom and P- tonight, and the topic of eminent domain came up. Of course the topic is dear to us because my apartment is directly affected. I kind of remember 10 years ago when the Chinese government swiped the land under Beijing McDonald’s to build a shopping mall, while America was awash with mergers and acquisitions. At the time, we never thought that what happened to McDonald’s could happen in a democratic society, and such robber barron “master of the universe” business deals could happen in a communist country.

What kind of week is it when the Chinese are involved in hostile takeovers, and the US validates government property grabs? Capitalist or Communist? Left or right?

Chinese Oil Giant in Takeover Bid for U.S. Corporation

It seems that China is undergoing the same sort of issues that the United States did as it moved out of its industrial revolution. I’m sure that there will soon be Chinese figures like Rockerfeller, Carnegie, and Morgan. In fact, the Chinese are being assisted by JP Morgan Chase, opposing another bid by Chevron, a descendant company of Rockerfeller’s Standard Oil. In another interestng tidbit, the takeover target, Unocal, financed the Brooklyn Dodgers’ move to California. What’s old is new again.

Got an autographed copy of “Arthur Schwartz’s New York City Food” at A Cook’s Companion on Atlantic Avenue. I haven’t read the entire book, but it seems to be pretty complete – he even has my godmother’s spaghetti and meatballs recipe on page 170.

Batman Begins is really a superior movie to all of the others. There was one continuity error (or difference) about who exactly is the killer of Bruce Wayne’s parents versus the previous movies or the comics, but this explaination is much, much deeper. Definately some inspired casting choices. Recommended.

On the other hand, saw the trailer for the Dukes of Hazard movie — besides the question of why?what about the casting: Jessica Simpson as Daisy Duke, Burt Reynolds as Boss Hogg, or Willie Nelson as Uncle Jessie? Obviously, their careers are headed for a dead end, good buddy.

To recap this past week –
Finally had Giordano’s pizza in Chicago — technically, it’s “stuffed pizza”, not deep dish pizza, neither of which is really pizza to a real New Yorker (to be called pizza here, you have to at least be able to handle the product with your bare hands — the best can be folded in half), but simply a pretty good casserole or pot pie. We got the “special” which is sausage, peppers, onions, cheese, in tomato sauce, topped with a crust and another layer of sauce and cheese. Afterwards, we jetted to Second City ETC., which had a Saturday Night Live-type comedy revue. The stagework was clever, like imitating an above head view of a bedroom scene by standing in front of a black wall with a sheet strung like a curtain. When they had to get out of bed, they would lie on the ground with their head facing the audience and sort of squirm back and forth until they got to the other bed, where they would stand up again and get “under” the covers.

Had the ultimate OJ dash to the airport. The flight is supposed to leave at 8 PM on Saturday. It’s like 5 PM and I want to make a quick trip to Chinatown for dinner. I’m waiting for the red train for like half an hour, then 3 trains change to express service and will pass the Chinatown stop. I don’t get to Chinatown until like quarter to 6, where I find a vietnamese noodle shop and go crazy with the pho noodle soup. My seating at the front of the empty restaurant successfully lures others lusting for that perfect combination of broth, meat, and noodles. I don’t get out until 6:30, where I dash back to the subway and get back to my hotel to pick up my luggage at 6:45. Another dash back to the blue line and back to O’Hare… it doesn’t get in until 7:40. The plane started boarding at 7:30. A Chinese airport worker quickly tells me I got to go to Terminal 3 – 2 terminals away from the train station. I’m booking like a madman, tossing my stuff through the X-ray machine at the checkpoint, and then running to wing K, and then 9 more gates… I make it on the plane at 7:55, just before they close the doors. Kids, don’t do this away from home.

This week I had to do written evaluations of those workers that report to me. It wasn’t that easy. Then there was some other things that involved politics that really disturbed me.

Thursday, after a dramatic downpour, I went to see the Little Grey Book Lecture on “How to Commit the Perfect Crime” in Williamsburg. This is a monthly series where the lecture leader, John Hodgman, hosts a multimedia presentation on a particular topic, to humorous effect. There were a variety of speakers, including an ex-shoplifter cum gazelle on the Lion King, an ex-cop who accidently trapped himself in his cop car, and a law professor who found the place to commit the perfect crime, the Idaho portion of Yellowstone National Park. If you don’t get the opportunity to go, you should at least listen to some of the podcast excerpts of prior shows – they are hysterical.

Today I met P- at Japas 38 for a singing dinner at that karaoke bar with a half dozen of her female friends. One sang Madonna songs with abandon (or is the idiom “without abandon”?). And she was really believable.

This weekend: Saturday, Batman Beyond, laundry. Dimsum with P-‘s dad on Sunday morning, then a visit to my dad with possibly a side stop to Ikea.