Category: Manhattan

Summertime

My little web presence will be discontinued this fall, since Yahoo is ending geocities in October. Consider this your last opportunity to check it out! … certainly feel free in giving me ideas on options; I am in deliberation.

Watched “(500) Days of Summer” – sweet, sad, funny; I recommend it. Yeah there are odd plot holes and you want to wonder how silly the characters can be – but it’s a human story. I liked it.


Y.E. Yang beat Tiger Woods.

Just me getting on the soap box for a minute: Apparently, there are indeed rational ways to consider how we can reform health care in this country. You know, without screaming at foolhardy legislators (who are a lot braver than I realize; but the mediator in me would want to encourage people to… realize that screaming is counter-productive and not a problem-solving technique; can we hear each other out and read and learn, before we react like fools? This isn’t exactly an easy problem and I just don’t think status quo is supportable, if it’s the thing that will hurt us in the long run).

NY Times’ Paul Krugman raises the question of how do we deal with an “unreasoning, unappeasable opposition”? — I’d suppose that realizing that they’re there is one step; the next is how to persuade the confused middle (I’m thinking that there has to be a lot of them; how many of us can say we understand health care/ health insurance or have read the bills on the issue?).

NY Times’ Bob Herbert acknowledges the confusion (great, I’m not the only one noticing it).

Very interesting item: President Obama has nominated three Asian-Americans to be judges in California’s federal district courts. (hat tip to Angry Asian Man, blog of which I’ve been getting into reading of late). Hmm… by the way, there is at least one vacant seat in 2nd Circuit, with Justice Sotomayor now on the US S.Ct…

The thing that moved me about the passing of Eunice Kennedy Shriver is learning about the impact she made in the lives of those with disabilities, particularly with the Special Olympics, and getting us to be more aware – back when women were not necessarily expected to be the political ones, in the sense of running for office, and thus having other ways to be advocates for others. I thought there was something powerful in reading how one person with a disability left a note: “She taught us to stand tall.”

It finally feels like summer, or We Hit 90

We had 90 degrees today. Finally, the first time since April 2009. Weird summer, temperature-wise.

Summer television:

I managed to watch “Psych” – wherein Shawn and Gus are in Vancouver and go after a thief, amusingly played by Cary Elwes (who – while no longer in his Princess Bride prime, was game for silliness).

“Law and Order: Criminal Intent” has been a show I’ve managed to avoid for quite awhile now – Vincent D’Onofrio tired me out (plus I miss the lack of lawyers) and I was wary of seeing Jeff Goldblum on the series (I liked him back when he did “Raines” – and worried if he was just playing a saner version of Raines but transplanted in NYC). The season finale, wherein Goldblum’s Detective Nichols works with Detective Eames (played by Kathryn Erbe; the character’s showing more gumption when she’s not overshadowed by Det. Goren’s drama) try to stop a revoluntary terrorist (that’s the best I can describe it). It got silly, but at least it was watchable and entertaining. Summary here. NBC should’ve actually aired it, but so that goes.

Not that I understand NBC these days; I’m still unsure of their plan to have Jay Leno take over the primetime 10-11pm slot. Time’s James Poniewozik (who’s on vacation, and thus allowed “Robo-James” take over his blog) posts the question of why viewers and/or critics take umbrage of NBC’s low-brow decision-making. He makes the point that, yeah, NBC has a venerable history of scripted tv; but he questions the logic of being attached to a broadcast network when the attachment’s usually to a tv show itself.

Personally, my reaction to the broadcast networks stem from the years of not having cable (therefore relying on the networks to give me tv) and how they treat my favorite shows and/or how they promote themselves (branding’s the thing that brainwashes us all).

I resented CBS for how they canceled “Due South” way back when; and pretty much avoided it because they didn’t have shows I cared for (and seemed to target an older audience). I’ve come to respect it for being traditional and stable (which seems to be how they branded themselves for the longest time now; CBS manages to retain the sitcom in its traditional format – and less traditional format – like “How I Met Your Mother”) and having less idiotic reality shows (considering the power of “Survivor” and “Amazing Race” – okay, not “Big Brother,” which I still avoid like the plague that it is).

I’ve been attached to ABC for a multitude of reasons – their news, their cartoons (back in the day), and their weird tv shows (they took chances, because for a long time, they were in the basement).

FOX — well, it’s FOX.

And, NBC was supposed to be better than silly, but I questioned it – and nominated it for worst tv of 2008 – when they gave us “Knight Rider” (and didn’t even bother to do it right; I mean, come on – you can’t quite mess up campiness). If you don’t have the shows I want to watch, you’re not destination I’m going to watch. (Hence, I watch more PBS these days).

Wat Misaka was apparently the first non-Caucasian player in modern professional basketball. Cool.

FC told me about how he and P had a great time in Montreal; he referred me to a pretty cool video of the concert they had seen of Coldplay (not by FC):

Last but not least, as we all could use a little smile: awww… cute dog!

Weekend

Rain on Friday – this is getting a touch crazy, I think – this odd, wet and cool summer, as noticed by NY Times’ Sam Roberts.

I’m a little behind on this – but this a hilarious edition of “Pearls Before Swine” – the comic strip about Rat, Pig, Zebra, Goat, and the stoooopid crocodiles (intentionally misspelled in the style of the crocodiles’ dialect). Cartoonist Stephan Pastis makes his appearances in the (mis)adventures of the crew, and here, he walks in on their “Hands Across the Comics Page,” a desperate attempt to save the newspapers and comics pages – wherein Pig replies to Pastis’ contention that “papers aren’t going anywhere”: “Oh, good, ’cause if you’re wrong and the comics page goes away, you’re gonna have to be a lawyer again.”

This causes Pastis join in the holding hands and singing songs for the cause, ’cause he apparently doesn’t want to practice law again. Ha! The official Pearls Before Swine blog also appears to be funny too. Ah, ex-lawyers who go creative!

There’s also the running series in the Daily News about the comic/lawyer Alex Barnett, the latest being where Barnett talks about contract lawyer work still giving him stress even as he’s trying to move up in the career as a comic. I thought the juxtaposition of the photos of Barnett as a lawyer in front of 60 Centre v. him as a stand up comic was funny.

As noted previously, I’m not a big Paul Krugman reader. It’s not that I’m intimidated by his shiny pretty Nobel Prize in Economics; it’s that me and economics don’t quite get along. But, his latest columns are very clear in talking about health care/health insurance reform. A lot of these issues fly over my head, but Krugman makes some good points here on why free market isn’t the answer (link to the Krugman blog; I guess that’s why he’s a Noble Prize winner; he seems to know what he’s talking about anyway).

Plus, Krugman makes some good points that not enough of us understand health care/health insurance and how much the government is already involved in it. The topic isn’t easy, but are we willing and ready to get ourselves educated on it and make it better?


DiFara’s pizza is now $5 a slice; this better be the best pizza in Brooklyn, or else is it worth it? You could always do what Grimaldi does – sell by the pie, not by the slice. (Disclaimer: I still haven’t been to DiFara’s yet; it’d be cool to eat the pizza there).

Re: Obama’s hosting Henry Louis Gates and the policeman, Jim Crowley – “Sometimes a beer is just a beer” … Well, I thought this whole commentary on what beer will be drunk at the White House went too far, but Slate’s John Dickerson explained it better. Plus, I do think it’s a male thing, but anything that encourages dialog, I’ll applaud.

Plus, Gates – since he has a website and he is a writer – put in his own final comment, before he’ll get to work (and let Obama go back to the many other things on the plate).

Obama’s awarding Justice O’Connor the Medal of Freedom (and others, like Archbishop Tutu, the late Jack Kemp, the late Harvey Milk, and so on).

The passing of Corazon Aquino – see Time magazine and NY Times observances.