“What Lawyers Can Learn from Sisyphus” – interesting article on how to persist in the face of difficulty. Then again, it’s not often that I see a reference to Sisyphus.
There’s something poignant about reading this NY Times article on Neil Simon, as he’s in his 80’s and as his “Brighton Beach Memoirs” and “Broadway Bound” are being revived.
The age of the internet isn’t making it easy when we post pictures of ourselves and our kids, and this article about the topic makes me wonder about posting any pictures on-line, when or if they get appropriated without our permission (or reminds me that we should read the fine print better).
This looks like a yummy recipe for Apple Cider Doughnuts; just ignore the calories. I’m not a cook or a fryer even, but this is tempting.
A little behind on this, but it’s the 10th anniversary of Alton Brown’s “Good Eats” on Food Network; interesting item about it on NPR radio.
Well, the video below was a thing for a Belgian reality tv show, in a train station in Belgium. This was quite entertaining! I’m imagining if this could happen at Grand Central.
How hysterical. Plus, the Belgians have as much weird taste in tv as anyone else. Ahhh.
Hat tip from www.refdesk.com: thought of the day – “Everything terrible is something that needs our love.” – Rainer Maria Rilke
Reading this NY Times article about how Mandarin is the trend in Chinatown hasn’t exactly convinced me of giving up on one day improving my Cantonese or trying to stop getting Cantonese and Toisanese confused; it’s not like Mandarin’s going to help me communicate with my relatives. Plus… this isn’t surprising news to me; guess the NY Times wanted to put their imprimatur on this trend in Chinese dialects in NYC.
The NY Times on the Cookie Diet… my response is a resounding sarcastic “Yeah, right” to the concept of a cookie diet (I like cake, but it’s not like I’m going to lose weight eating cake). And, I liked how the article closes with these lines:
“For weight loss to stick, you have to be able to settle into an eating pattern that you can adhere to over time,” said Suzanne Havala Hobbs, a clinical associate professor at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. “That eating pattern needs to provide you with all the nutrients you need while holding calories in balance with the number you expend.
“Diets with a gimmick,” she added, “aren’t harmful for a short period of time. But they’re not likely to cause a meaningful change in behavior that will enable you to keep your weight at an optimal level.”
Her advice? “Keep a food diary, cut your portion sizes, cut out the junk and enlist support from family and friends. Start walking — daily. You’ll be better off.”
As a follow up to weird NYC animal stories – like the dog on the ledge in the Upper West Side, there’s the story of the cat stuck in a car engine (Channel 7 has the AP version, but when they were showing the video on tv, my jaw dropped by how weird the story was; there’s also the Daily News postings here and here). I was pretty stunned by how dramatic the pictures were, but good that the kitty was ok (that is one big and furry cat, by the way).
There’s hope yet that we can save the earth with better thinking about our garbage – recycle and make less waste and so on. A huge “maybe” of course.
Didn’t make it to Homecoming this year, but – despite the loss – I think hope still springs eternal for Alma Mater.
Some NYC items:
Living in Hudson Heights (which seems to be somewhere south of Inwood and north or west of Washington Heights).
“When Love is a Schlep” – when singles in the city have to resort to relying on mass transit and the far distances of the outer boroughs (well, true, it isn’t that easy).
Sports radio fans: Mike and the Mad Dog were actually back together (scroll down to Mike and the Mad Dog reunion to listen to it on wfan.com), on Friday, 10/16/09, at the Yankee Stadium playoff opener – however brief a reunion). Well, guess only the Yankees can do that: creating reunions for people’s enjoyment.
I’m behind on “Law & Order” (insert teeth gnashing) – but here’s two of the three on the Law side to give us a peak on what goes on in the behind-the-scenes (Linus Roache in his real accent):
Oh, I just adore the current NYS Lotto “Sweet Millions” ad campaign. The commercials (see below) are so adorable, and the posters of the furry animals are soooo swweeeet!
Jaw-dropping: ex-lawyer reads a book a day for a year. As Peter Applebome noted, “by necessity,” Nina Sankovitch reads books of 250 to 300 pages or less. But, still – jaw-dropping.
I’m amazed that the media reports this as if this were such a surprise; MTA needs to do a better job of giving notice of service detours – simply posting the posters (at non-obvious locations) and posting on mta.info or text messages (which not everyone – not tourists, certainly, or others have access at all times) are not sufficient. The local television stations should try to be more helpful in getting the notice out.
So, wait – ex-journalists are becoming lawyers? What are ex-lawyers doing? … Hmm, well, no one says that the current economy is making it easy for anyone.
Atlantic Antic on Atlantic Avenue, on Sunday, in Brooklyn. Not sure if I’ll make it, if I’m too lazy to get out of my end of Brooklyn.
Getting into watching “Community” – it still a show that needs work – the need to balance humor and heart is still hard to achieve – but I think I like it. It kind of feels like a non-musical “Glee,” only the women characters don’t feel stupid. In fact, none of the characters (except maybe Chevy Chase – but even that’s not clear) don’t feel stupid; they’re just trying to deal with community college and finding a future. I also like the diversity – everyone’s a little stupid, but not stupid, and get some joy out of something, even Abed, the eccentric Pakistani-American kid, and maybe not so much the Asian American instructor who teaches Spanish (actor Ken Jeong). Still wish the series didn’t conflict with “Fringe” though.
“Fringe” – one of those odd, yet fascinating episodes because it’s all about the characters (and less of EvilCharlie):
Walter realizes it’s time to live in a real apartment;
military veterans who become ticking time bombs and not even know it;
crazy colonel thinks he’s right that there’s a Big Threat Out There (and even if he is, he can’t even be specific enough to convince Broyles of anything);
Broyle’s is a tough but kind man, telling Peter and Olivia to look out for each other as they head to Iraq to speak with informants;
Olivia’s still trying to recover from the car crash and the horrifying trip to the Alternate Universe (aka “over there” or “other side”) – at a bowling alley;
Peter can speak Arabic because he was apparently involved in some kind of unspecified shenanigans in Iraq;
and Astrid… doesn’t want Walter to use fruit in the experiments. Umm, wasn’t Astrid supposed to be an FBI agent herself? Huh?
Been watching chunks of Ken Burns’ National Parks documentary. Especially enjoyed the parts about Teddy Roosevelt’s style of big government power – the style of a NY progressive Republican – to preserve nature and history. Ken Burns was using film-making to make some kind of political statement indeed.
Am I glad that I don’t live in NJ – I’d hate to watch that gubernatorial debate and actually have to decide to vote in that election. Ironically, the commercial for the third party candidate, Christopher Daggett, was funny for making fun (in a funny way, not necessarily the mudslinging way that is traditional for NJ) of both Jon Corzine (for being a former financier) and Chris Christie (umm, for being a large loud man). Being in the NYC tv market, we get way more NJ political ads than I’d want to stomach, but I doubt it’s easy for the NJ Voter to deal with.
This video below that Eyewitness News had has to be one of the stranger Only In New York type stories – someone’s cuddly furry dog is on the ledge. Fortunately, the dog finally went back inside, but very odd scene.
Sesame Street’s parody of “Mad Men” – to teach kids to understand emotions:
Vermeer at the Met:
Oh, and Justice Sotomayor throwing the first pitch at last Saturday’s Yankee game.
As a follow up to Primary Day, I voted on Runoff Day. As reported, Bill DeBlasio is the Democratic candidate for public advocate and John Liu is the Democratic candidate for comptroller. More importantly, for NYC history, Liu is on the path to becoming the first Asian American in citywide political position.