Jersey du Jour: "Dapartures"

Jersey is definitely an interesting place to live. So I'll post a few things every now and again that sometimes make one go, "Only in Jersey!"

An interesting experience taking a cab recently late in the night. A young guy is in the back seat with me (a common practice of Jersey City drivers late night is to pick up more than one passenger and charge each of them. This tends to take unusually keen geographical skill, and I am luckily one of the last ones out, so I get to chat with the driver at the end.)...so, the young guy sitting in back with me asks if I "party" and sniffs. He gives me his number and asks me to call him if I ever need anything. "I got weed, too." This kid gets out and makes the driver promise to come back for him.

As we drive away, the driver asks, "He's trying to sell you drugs, yes? He's a drug dealer." Yes. Jersey du nuit...

The pic above is of the place I catch my bus at Port Authority. I love this typo.

Hot or Not? (for Nerds!)

Rube Goldberg

What say you about this inventor of the convoluted machine that performs a simple task?
One example is his self-operating napkin. There's also a good example from the Animaniacs: Wakko devises a doozy so he can order a pizza over the phone.

Hot or Not?
And you bitches know I'm not asking about his looks!
(Geez, the name "Rube" alone gives me an answer! But I'm not a woman of average proclivities...)

A Good Port

There was something like magic happening last night in downtown Manhattan. For the first time in I don't know how long, I felt completely in my skin and that my ship had sailed into the right port--had brought me to a new home after a spell of harsh seas and broken masts. A friendly port peopled by freaks as in love with quirky voices and weird instrumentation as I, people who huddled together to escape the rain and the cold, cozying up to a four-piece jazz band as if they were circling a campfire for warmth.

I had landed at my new favorite bar in Manhattan, The Ear Inn, the oldest working bar in NYC. It's part of the James Brown House (read the history). There resides the ghost of a sailor named Mickey, waiting for his ship to come in. In the 30s it was a speakeasy. And today they have homestyle food cheap, a reading series, and jazz that welcomes the likes of me (and the New Orleans diaspora) every Sunday night.

And there, I heard this AMAZING woman perform. Her name is Rachelle Garniez. Holy crap. She plays accordion too. I've always wondered where the female voices that had tons of character were these days--female singers who could do justice to a Tom Waits song. Rachelle is it. I think I am esthetically in love with this lady. She does these vaudeville shows too.

Her next show is coming up at Joe's Pub on Dec. 22. You should come with me!! (I'm talking to you, Erin Melina!)

PS: Jeremy Irons was there, totally digging on the music, especially our friend on the clarinet.

Potter's Field -- Right Here in NYC

Wow, I just learned that Washington Square Park and Bryant Park were both once potter's fields, burial grounds for those who couldn't afford proper burial, or the anonymous dead. (OK, I did learn this from Wikipedia, but that's usually relatively reliable, I think...)

So next time you NYU students drop acid and hang out in the park near campus, or you corporate types go ice skating next to the library, remember this: you're hanging out with dead people. Nameless dead people.

How Poltergeist. I wonder if bodies will ever erupt from the rink and break through the ice? Yeah, that will probably happen during the "rapture," when God's faithful servants get taken away in UFOs, leaving the rest of us sinners behind--we'll be Left Behind! Does that mean we will then rid ourselves of proselytizing and hateful hypocrisy? Which leads me to wonder: would that be God doing them or us the favor?

"Iron Man" Lives Again

Evidence that I spend WAY too much time at my job and with people from work (though I have to admit, so many of them are grade-A high quality--I cannot escape the fact that I heart them):

I did karaoke last night with work folk and defended my heavy metal chops on the microphone. I even have proof. My big boss took this highly unflattering picture of me with his cell phone. I believe I was singing Black Sabbath's "Iron Man" at the time. (You know, "Iron Man" is actually a really shitty song for karaoke--it's mostly guitar solos, but it is totally easy to sing. Besides, it always causes me to think about the awesome cover The Cardigans do of it. Plusses and minuses...life's a series of 'em.)


Earlier in the night, I threw the gauntlet down with an eerily accurate rendition of "Rock You Like a Hurricane." ( I sang really "lou-T," like a balding German rocker.) Then my coworker punk rock Patty and I sang "Cum on Feel the Noize," in honor of Quiet Riot's late lead singer, Kevin Dubrow. (He was so young--only in his 50s. That's becoming younger and younger to me every day.)

I'll be 36 on December 9, a day of birth I share with some real gems: John Cassavettes, John Malkovich and Donnie Osmond, to name a few.

PS: another sign that I work too much--I just got home from work at midnight on a Friday. Awesome! But I can't lie: I've been leaving on time with great regularity lately. So hey, consider me blessed: I have a job and I like the people I work with and I am off on time more frequently than not. And they don't mind if I throw cursing tantrums where I nearly blow the joint up with my massive F-bombs.