Category: Brooklyn

Rain, rain, and more rain in the NYC metro area. It’s practically flooding in Jersey. Yech.

Interesting little quiz on Slate.com: “Red or Blue—Which Are You?”, wherein you fill out the on-line Scantron sheet (so reminiscent of my public school days, when we were inundated with Scantron sheets) and see what state (of mind, anyway) you are – red or blue. I answered the questions; turns out I knew some answers such the my state of mind is more “in the middle” (although I’d like to think that I leaned toward blue, being in a blue city in a bluish state; but I’m a proven moderate after all).

Apparently, Rolling Stone magazine has an interview with Garry Trudeau, the Doonesbury comic strip man, about what he recalls of his overlapping with George W. Bush in Yale, and Associated Press gets to reveal the interesting soundbites of said interview. Personally, I’ve heard some of Trudeau’s lines before (either on the interview he had with Ted Koppel way back when or in some article I read elsewhere). I’d be more interested if Trudeau had some recollection on John Kerry (who, I think, had some overlap with Trudeau and Bush at Yale; Yale must have been an interesting place in the 1960’s…)

I really don’t know whether to be relieved that ex-football coach Mike Ditka is deciding not to run for the GOP for the U.S. Senate seat of Illinois. And, why oh why are so many ex-athletes Republican anyway? Sports Illustrated had this odd photo spread (for the “Where are they now?” issue of profiling ex-athletes); the only politician (former or active)/ex-athlete who was a Democrat in the picture was Bill Bradley.

Check out “Beyond ‘Buffy’: State of sci-fi on TV” on MSNBC. Interesting article. It’s not like I have actual cable access to make my own accurate assessment on the state of tv sci-fi. But, if I’d have to put in some commentary, it’d be like this: local syndication has given me seasons 1-5 of “Stargate SG1” so many times (well, season 5 or 6, I forget which, is being shown like the third time this year on Channel 9…) and so what little of “SG1” I have seen has ways of irritating me for some unexplained reason (the writing isn’t tight enough for me or I’d wish they would develop the characters’ storylines just a tad more or else the parasite-power-mad alien premise just freaks me out too much or what; I just can’t figure it out). On the plus side, “SG1” has a talented cast; I’ve stopped seeing actor Richard Dean Anderson as his previous signature character of MacGyver (of course, that show has been gone so long so it’s only understandable that I would not ID him as MacGyver anymore; cannot say the same about Tom Selleck – will always see him as Magnum PI, which either says he’s not that good of an actor or else too good as Magnum – although he did a good job on “Friends”)…. Plus, I miss “Angel” and “Buffy”; their (inconsistently shown) reruns don’t quite satisfy. “Star Trek: Enterprise” needs improvement so badly (and I’ve probably said that so many times). What little of “Smallville” I’ve managed to catch this year only serves to annoy me (I am not a Superman person; can we please have Batman back? For real now, not some tease). “Charmed” is starting to really tick me off for skimping on its drama (and going too heavy on its campiness and having too many dumb holes in its plots; I’m too old for this show, obviously)…. Ok, I could go on, but it won’t be pretty, so I’ll just stop now.

I guess I got loaded on MSNBC links in this post. I guess I got bored with my usual websurfing sites; maybe I should look for new stuff to view.

Major League Baseball All-Star Game on right now. What the heck was going on with that top of the first inning? Pitcher Roger Clemens giving up all these runs; his nemesis Mike Piazza catching him, but definitely not making Clemens feeling very comfortable. Crazy stuff that the NY baseball fans/NY media will feed on…

What’s with that annoying “Jeopardy” winner, Ken Jennings? Will he ever finish his never-ending run on the show? How I miss the days back when champions were not allowed to stay on longer than a week.

The passing of Isabel Sanford, best known to tv fans for her role as Louise “Weezie” Jefferson. Salute to a tv icon (I don’t have TV land or other rerun channel, but I spent way too much of the 1980’s watching stuff like the “Jeffersons,” a true sitcom classic. Like, remember the weird Halloween episode where Weezie, George, and the rest of their gang had to stop a murderer? Ah, there goes that theme song: the Jeffersons, livin’ way up in the sky…movin’ on up…).

When is a Chinese wedding not a Chinese wedding? When it’s at Rudolph Valentino’s house at Caffe on the Green in Bayside. Excellent food and fantastic service; I’d go back again — check out the photos. Except for the alleged January bias incident between a group of Chinese women and a group of Family members earlier this year, if you get what I mean. More detail at this website.

On Law & Order SVU episode “Angels”, someone must have been a friend of someone else or won a contest, because in the morgue shot, the coroner introduces the cast to their “forensic odontologist” (a.k.a. the guy that does your post mortem dental work), Dr. Nova Cain. That was really bad, folks.

It was a dark and stormy night…. except for the realization that the Borough of Kings has finally arrived — 24 hour Duane Reed in Downtown Brooklyn! It’s just as expensive as in the city ($1.19 + tax and deposit for a 16 oz. bottle of Coke), but there it is in all of its neon and fluorescent glory on the corner of Fulton and Smith, which is around the block from my house. Actually, there appears to be at least 3 – 24 hour locations in Brooklyn; CVS in the Kings Highway region is also 24 hours. Now at least if I’m in need, I have somewhere to crawl in the middle of the night.

Ah, back to work? Geez. I don’t even want to think about what’s on my desk for tomorrow.

Yesterday, I saw “King Arthur.” Not spectacular, as the professional critics already observed, but I enjoyed it. My apologies to the male audience of the blog, who may very well think the world of the actress Kiera Knightley, but I couldn’t stop myself from admiring the men of this movie, a handsome bunch if I may say so. 😉 Otherwise, it was one of those movies where the military/male-bonding was pretty predictable (but always moving) stuff. “Lord of the Rings” more or less changed the way anyone thinks of the Big Battle Scene, but “King Arthur” was ok. Go for the matinee or else the DVD with the missing scenes which may have made this one a bit better.

Inspiring story on NY1, where they profile a president of a NYC Harlem hospital; a person of color in the medical profession who is committed to providing quality medical care to the community. Despite discrimination and personal sacrifices, Dr. Samuel Daniel sounded optimistic and dedicated about transforming the practice of medicine and a community.

Interesting article in the NY Times about the Republican Party’s social conservatives feeling slighted about seeing so many social liberal Republicans getting air time at the upcoming convention. One wonders: what does it mean to be “Republican”? Do we naturally equate “Republican” with “conservative”? It’s not like it’s the “Conservative” party (with a capital “C” like in Canada and Britain); surely one could be Republican without being conservative (sort of like it’s ok to be Democrat and not be liberal?). A quote from the article: “Steve Schmidt, a spokesman for the Bush campaign, said: ‘The Republican Party is a national party, and the convention lineup will reflect the broad national appeal of the Republican Party. When the speaker lineup is complete, it will reflect that.’” – it makes me wonder what it means to be a “national” party – does it mean being tolerant and expansive or being more focused (being “conservative”)?

Yesterday, the newsmedia highlighted the 200th anniversary of the Alexander Hamilton-Aaron Burr duel, which occurred out in Weehawken. I may highlight some of the NY Times articles once I get a chance to fully review them, but I think they’ve all been interesting stuff. Little known fact: I may know much more than I should about the Hamilton-Burr duel since I did research on it in college. (considering my Alma Mater, perhaps it was unavoidable that I got into it). I also liked this query about whether Hamilton could have been a precursor to modern Republicans. I’d posit no, since he was strong on making a strong executive (regardless of party designation? – not sure on that actually) and less on states’ power (he was not quite the “federalist” of today’s stripe); and his background is probably less-than-palatable for the social conservatives’ taste. But, Hamilton liked living well and making money; was a social climber; and did lip service for family values. So, it’s debatable as to which modern party he would have been. He could easily be neither. (the same could be said about Thomas Jefferson, a Hamilton opponent who pretty much backed away from Burr, his vice president, after that duel debacle).

The lesson from the duel, I’d say, is one should be very careful about how one defines “manhood” and “honor.” Burr wanted to defend his honor and, rather than just sue Hamilton for slander and defamation and other lovely, non-lethal, litigation at common law, he went for other means. Hamilton, despite having lost a son to a duel the previous year of 1803, was not necessarily better at avoiding the costs of defending or responding to a challenge. So it goes in a day in American history in 1804. Drop by the Trinity Church cemetary in downtown Manhattan, and salute the Hamilton tombstone.

Spent part of last night and this morning on an update to my so-called website, which is still neither flashy nor sophisticated.

Since PBS’ Nova (in NYC anyway) is showing “Elegant Universe” again this week and next, I thought it was timely that Slate.com had this interesting assessment of the physicist Brian Greene. The writer Amanda Schaffer articulates what I thought was valid criticism of how Greene does his whole let’s-pretty-up-science thing (his intentions – to make science palatable for non-scientists – are good; but it’s understable that Greene’s critics want evidence to back up the theories).

I like reading for pleasure; I like that in NYC, you can step into a subway car and see everyone reading something (Bible; newspaper; every possible form of literature, good or bad). But, do people outside NYC do that? According to this NY Times’ op-ed, “The Closing of the American Book,” less Americans are reading for pleasure and the argument is that this affects American culture or hurts America as a culture with an open mind, and American brains will get lethargic. Hmm…

This NY Times travel article about the new Trans-Russia highway is interesting. Imagine driving the longest highway in the world, and then (a) realize that it’s not entirely paved yet; (b) there are no hotels or restaurants or other amenities (the author notes: “And don’t expect to find gas stations, restaurants and roadside motels in Siberia. Drivers pack food and gasoline, and keep their tire irons handy for unwanted night visitors.” talk about roughing it.); and ( c ) it takes 25 days to go cross country (when taking the Trans-Siberian railroad will get you a week).

So it goes.

For the record, I dislike instant messaging. Maybe I’m old school about this, but I don’t like the idea that someone can randomly interrupt what I’m doing while I’m in the middle of typing or doing something intricate on the screen with the mouse. Yes, even if it’s my girlfriend. That’s in addition to random bling noises happening, or even worse, something worse popping up on my screen.

That being said, I tried sending a TV show to P–. I have a TV tuner card installed into my home computer. It’s possible to set the TV tuner to act as the video input for the web cam feature of Yahoo messenger. The hardest part was trying to change the channel — it insisted on setting the channel to public access every time it was activated. I had to start up the TV program to get to the channel switcher, then go back to Yahoo and fiddle with the screen size until the soundtrack kicked in. P– was able to watch Emeril with me.

That with using the included Snapstream (aka “BeyondTV”) software, tv viewing anywhere over the Internet is a reality. The video quality is not so hot – upstream on DSL is not much better than using a modem — but it works.

“Why does Saturn have rings? – And how come Earth has none?” – Slate.com Explainer explains…

The passing of Jeff Smith, a.k.a. The Frugal Gourmet.

According to the NY Times, apparently, there is more green stuff (of the tree-like variety, rather than the toxic) in downtown Manhattan; more parks are good for you, you know. (of course, my understanding is that Bowling Green also has wireless internet connection, but it’s not like I’ve been able to try that there).

Finished Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone last night. Scholastic, the publisher, annoyingly made obvious edits to slightly Americanize what is supposed to be British, so far as I can tell… well, yeah, I read/watch too many British stuff such that I’d notice the changes, but still, I ask why tamper with that? It’s not like American kids can’t figure out the context of the British terminology or wouldn’t still enjoy the work. And, I cannot accept that J.K. Rowling really originally had her British characters calling their mothers “Mom” or soccer “soccer.” Otherwise, nice read. Went fast (of course, I’ve already saw the first movie, so maybe that’s why it went fast as a read). Let’s if I can get through all five books in the series by the end of the summer (not bloody likely, as there mucho other books to read, but we’ll see).

Enjoy the weekend.

Seen on the (same) subway: Hasid with superslick fedora; young woman wearing a Calvin Klein burka. It was black with the CK logo in a subtle midnight black. I had no idea.

Planning meeting today for the picnic. The concept of buying food for 200 is intimidating. Not because it’s 200 people – I’ve done that before. Doing it without a car is a problem.

Finally I can say it. My promotion at work finally came through, so I’m quite happy. I’m managing four people now, so that will be a bit of a challenge; we’ll take it one day at a time.

It doesn’t feel like a shortened work week, and I’m apparently not the only one who noticed that feeling at work.

Do we really need another Police Academy movie? Apparently, it’s coming anyway, in a theater near you…

The cast of “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” are making the rounds this week on the tv talk shows to promote their movie. I particularly enjoyed seeing Will Ferrell on Charlie Rose last night; when Ferrell reminisced about the local anchormen of his childhood of the 1970’s , the thought struck me: have local anchormen really changed all that much since then? Are they just great targets or what? See, in NYC, the local news stations are becoming really diverse; there are (reality check time) still vastly more female Asian-American television reporters/anchors than male Asian Americans (at last check, two, I believe), and I’m rather curious that each station has a female African-American anchorperson (usually carefully balanced by a white male anchor). There’s also sometimes even the reverse; i.e., the white female anchor with the male African-American anchor. So, Balance is a Big Deal (pardon my sounding quaint, but I like that the news channels are trying to be diverse). Some time ago, when Channel 4 had the instance of an all male set (meteorologist, two anchors, and the sports guy (usually guy, no matter the race)), it got in the newspapers as something not seen in some 20 years.

Yet, despite the passing of local favorite male anchors (by way of mortality or retirement), you have the following:

–> Channel 2 (WCBS) promoting Ernie Anastos (although, Channel 2 is also heavily promoting the new hire of Roz Abrams, the long popular female African-American anchor who’s of a certain age – so, at least congratulate Channel 2 for not going entirely young on its anchors, despite letting go of the old favorite sports anchor Warner Wolf);

–> Channel 7 (WABC) promoting Bill Ritter (“Say hi to Bill when you see him hard at work!” – what a lame commercial, frankly – so not 21st century; and for the curious, he’s the white male paired at the desk with Liz Cho, who is bi-racial);

–> Channel 4 (WNBC), with the celebrated veteran Chuck Scarborough (white male anchor paired with Sue Simmons, an African-American female veteran – the two have been together on the same channel and timeslot for less than two decades).

Anyway, if you listen hard, the sonorous, deep baritone voices of the men (to best convey trust and confidence and all that) aren’t that much different than what Will Ferrell is satirizing. Of course, there may be one or two anchormen who find ways to express their (more than likely; hopefully?) interesting personalities (Jim Watkins on Channel 11 has the requisite Sonorous Deep Baritone, but his sarcasm has its moments). On the other hand, while it’s amusing to make fun of the local anchors, they’re nice to look forward to watching. I mean, it’s no coincidence that last year, when the Daily News made a poll, NY’ers said that they loved Chuck and Sue the best (it doesn’t hurt that those two have been on so long that it’s like watching an old married couple and they’re amusing for their quirkiness (usually Sue) or otherwise (Chuck and that way serious voice of his)). (Pardon me; I’m still a sucker for the local news personalities and making good-natured yet sarcastic fun at them, so the clips of “Anchorman” are just so hilarious to me – rival anchormen having fights with each other straight out of “West Side Story”? Hehehe).

Ooh – the first day of the John-and-John show (a.k.a., the Kerry-Edwards campaign). Loved how this Slate.com entry on the first day makes it easy to satirize the Democratic candidates. I’m still trying to accept how this will work, of course, but at least things are really cooking now in the political landscape. Time magazine’s portrayal of the young Kerry life was deep and sad and interesting. Nice read.

Ok, so Friday is tomorrow. All right already…

Amazing Race 5 started today — the first leg was from Santa Monica to Punta del Este, Uruguay– and they are sure not giving a good impression of Americans overseas. Why do they think that saying “muy rapidimente — we’re in a race” is going to get them anywhere faster?

What makes it worse is that a number of teams make some really bogus mistakes, such as missing the clue box clearly stated across the street from the hotel. That forces the top two teams to turn back from the finish line to retrieve the missing clue.

I’m rooting for the Father/daughter team — He’s a Vietnam chopper pilot, she’s a U. Florida law student. If that guy can get 25 stitches and still not be eliminated, that guy’s tough as nails.

On a different note, the New York Asian American international film festival is next week. Tremendous selection this year, and my org is sponsoring a film session. Their website sucks for trying to figure out what conflicts with something else, especially since there are two venues.

I’m thinking about getting a new cell phone in August. My phone wasn’t working over the weekend because a screw in the antenna was loose and I had no way of fixing it until I got to work. I’m considering the Nokia 6820 because it has a decent keyboard and it’s tri band, so it will work in other countries.

For those in the NY area, save Saturday, August 15 for the 7th annual Asian American Alumni Picnic at Forest Park, Woodside, Queens.