Party Vikings-Tommy's True Tales

Windy

2012-01-13T19:27:00.002-05:00

The wind rushes into me with such force that it pulls at my clothes and makes my eyes water. I could be falling with the ground rushing up at me. I could be flying up to see what makes the sky blue. I could be racing toward the visible horizon in a machine I could never afford.

The wind is cold and bracing. My tired heart races, my skin ripples under the awesome force. I spread my arms and splay my fingers and feel it flow over me like a cold sand. The energy gathers in my lungs and the scream is drowned out by the roar of the wind filling my ears.

I could be falling. I could be flying. I could be belted into a very expensive sports car that is flipping end over end into a fiery oblivion. It finally doesn't matter. I'm flying though a wind that makes me feel more alive than I've ever felt. It could be the end or the beginning again.

Either way, I'm finally free.

I figured out how to beat the world, the crush, the people, the unrelenting pressure and I'm free of it. There is no gravity, no headache, no flutter in my gut.

There is only the wind flowing though my fingers, pulling at my clothes and making my eyes water.

It's okay to let go, it's okay to fly now.

Thanksgiving Aftermath: Day 2

2011-11-28T07:21:00.001-05:00

Day 2

After taking heavy fire from cookware with stubborn cooked on goop we made headway into the actual kitchen itself. Looking back I saw the causalities strewn about like ragdolls after the family dog got to them. There were bodies on the couches, the arm chairs and draped face down over the coffee table. The snores were so loud, like jungle drums of hidden hostile natives. I was alone now.

Most of the dishes had been done and we managed to get everything into the refrigerator. Some things, like the beverages (and the turkey tuna casserole Aunt Mary brought) had to go outside on the balcony. By four am that night we managed to find the fridge. By 5:30 it was mostly over. However, the refrigerator itself was near bursting pressure. It just wasn’t designed to hold all that food.

There was only one thing to do. I had to eat my way back to safe appliance conditions. It would be no easy task. I would have to sacrifice my cholesterol and my sparkling six-pack abs but, hey, that’s the kind of selfless guy I am.

Bring on the leftovers….

Thanksgiving: The Aftermath

2011-11-26T15:34:00.001-05:00

After dinner on Thanksgiving we were bogged down in heavy dishware. The warm thoughts were exchanged. The thanks were given. The cranberry sauce was passed. It was carnage. When it was over not one guest was spared. They were laying all over the room in various states of tryptophanity. Turning my attention to the mess I cried out for help sure that none would come. After the dinner feast I took it upon myself to assemble a team and clean up. No easy feat considering the body count. Food remnants were piling up, stomachs were expanding and near-empty wine glasses were lying on their sides exsanguinating like fallen Roman soldiers. I was on my own…

Looking toward where the kitchen should be and began to assess; dishes were piled on the counter like trunks of the mighty Redwoods. Bowls of potatoes and stuffing rolled like vast dunes of the Sahara. On the dinner table I saw all the pies and other confections spearing out into the distance like a sea of sugary sweetness. I felt small, very small. Somewhere among the debris there was a sink for washing everything and a refrigerator to put everything away.

I donned my rubber gloves, strapped on my welders goggles, belted on my back mounted soap dispenser and unsheathed my scrub brush. Arching my eyebrow, I said a small prayer and went in…

And then there was that one Thanksgiving...

2011-11-23T09:43:00.002-05:00

I started the car and everyone piled in behind me. All the small rabbits bear cubs, spiders, mice, rats, a vertically challenged giraffe and rather small elephant. It looked like I just robbed a concession stand at an arcade.

“Where we goin’?” asked the rabbit.

“Off to get the Thanksgiving turkey.” I replied.

There was a collective, “Oooooh” from the back seat. The crew never had a proper Thanksgiving dinner and since they’ve slowly been finding their way into my house ever since the marshmallow incident I figured the least I could do is be a good host. I mean, where else were they all going to go?

“Where do we get a turkey?” asked one particularly reserved spider. He was one of the only ones who chose not to wear a costume on Halloween insisting he was Holiday Appropriate just as he was.

“Well, we go to the butcher and get one there. They have them frozen and fresh killed.”

There was the silence of an inky black night coming from the back seat.

The giraffe craned his neck to reach the front. “What does it mean, “fresh killed”?”

This was going to be a problem.

“Well, um….it means…um....there’s a turkey and the farmer has an…” I had nothing. There was a small army of All God’s Creatures in my back seat expecting a feast of epic magnitude and having no understanding as to who the star of the show was. I had the stuffing, the beans, the peas, the carrots, the onion casserole, the potatoes and the yams and all I needed was that succulent juicy turkey to make the day complete.

“So,” said the spider, “we’re going to get a turkey to bring home to have dinner with us? Well that’s very nice of you.”

“Well, no not exactly. You see we go to the butcher and –“

“Who is Butch and is he coming to dinner, too?” asked the elephant.

That Thanksgiving there was a feast of stuffing, beans, peas, carrots, onion casserole, potatoes, yams, two pepperoni pizzas, one calzone, two dozen rice balls and a bill from Vinny’s Pets for a 20lb. bag of seed , chicken wire fencing and one turkey, Phillip, who was very happy to be seated at the table instead of on it.

A new movie review by Yours Truly...Marwencol

2011-11-06T20:16:00.001-05:00

Here's the link to Movie-Hoopla.com....

And here's the article....

Great (Documentary)You Should Catch: Marwencol

What it’s about: Marwencol is a documentary film about the unusual recovery of Mark Hogencamp, who was viciously beaten outside a bar in Kingston, New York. As a means of dealing with the trauma, Mr. Hogancamp created a detailed 1/6 scale World War II-era town called Marwencol in his yard which he populated with military-style dolls that represent himself and the people in his life. The town serves as an escape from the war for Mr. Hogancamp’s character, Mark and an escape from reality for Mr. Hogancamp who exorcises his demons by playing out various conflict scenarios with the dolls. His world is so precise, so thick with narrative and a strong back story that you’d think you were watching a film maker fleshing out his storyboards.

Sometime during the evolution of Marwencol, Mr. Hogencamp began photographing the scenes he created. While it is obvious the figures in the shots are dolls, the set up of each shot is so precise that it could be mistaken for a photograph of an historical reenactment.

Mr. Hogancamp’s personal story plays out much like a non-documentary. The reason for the attack that served as the progenitor of Marwencol isn’t revealed at the beginning. The story unfolds as the film progresses but in truth, I was so taken with the immaculate details of the dolls, the town and the story Mr. Hogancamp created that I almost forgot about the Why.

Who made it: Marwencol is the debut directorial effort of Jeff Malmberg.

Why you should see this: Mr. Hogancamp’s story is very compelling and told with tenderness and care. He isn’t necessarily acting out with his dolls as much as he is actually living in their world. The doll is his alter ego placed in an alternate reality that enables him to maintain his sanity.

If you have any interest in art, models and miniatures you will love this film. Mr.Hogancamp’s artistic talents are considerable. For art buffs, WWII buffs and documentary buffs Marwencol is a must. If you can appreciate the journey the mind can take toward healing, Marwencol is a must.

Technical Stuff: The film was shot over a four year period between 2006 and 21010 and released in limited theatrical run in 2010.

Pumpkin 3

2011-10-30T20:21:00.003-04:00

The little pumpkin sat on the porch alight with the face of Boris Karloff. He was very proud of his newfound ability to scare the bejezus out of all the little furry things in the house. He also made fast friends with the other pumpkins that were carved and lit like patio lanterns. He thought he was by far the scariest but that was only until his skin grew back. Then he’ll be harping on me to make him a Clooney at Oscar time.

Colorful costumes were everywhere. The rabbits, bears, bats, ghosts, mini elephants, penguins and spiders were decked out as everything from swashbucklers to Phantoms of the Opera. There were sashes, masks, vegetable weaponry and the occasional mini-phaser.

The marshmallows all dressed as Zorro. The wheel of cheese had a Jason mask and a cheese knife. The cats were in hiding because the marshmallows all tried to ride them like horses. They were yelling things in Spanish while brandishing little toothpick swords. They were having so much fun I hadn’t the heart to tell them they didn’t know Spanish. It was just a bunch of words they picked up being so close to the Goya section in the market. But they were also close to the Japanese section so what they were yelling was something that sounded like a bunch a chipmunk Antonio Banderas’ ordering sushi in a very romantic way.

There was popcorn and candy corn, bubble gum and apples. “It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” had been playing all day and now that night was creeping up, they switched to Zombies, vampires and space squid. Root beer was flowing, candles were burning and spirits were about. The house was bathed in an orange glow and somewhere an organ played while a wolf howled in the night. Children were coming and going with tricks and treats.

There was a chill in the air and the smell of wood smoke. As the evening went on they all huddled together to watch movies until the inevitable mass nap took hold.

Friends don't let friends watch scary movies alone...

Happy Halloween everyone from the inside of my head to yours...

Another movie review for your amusement...

2011-10-30T17:29:00.002-04:00

My last of the Halloween-style movie reviews can be found on MovieHoopla.com. here's the link...

http://movie-hoopla.com/cutest-halloween-movie-ever-trick-r-treat/

Movie Review by Yours Truly

2011-10-29T15:23:00.003-04:00

This one is up at http://movie-hoopla.com/movies-that-robbed-me-hours-of-my-life/

Movies that robbed me of hours of my life: 30 Days of Night.

Serafini here, continuing my study of Halloween-style films to get your fur all a rising. This episode’s experiment was 2007’s 30 Days of Night. I was looking forward to this for a few scares. I wish I could say it was great. Hell, I wish I could say it was good. Watching it felt more like 30 Days of My Life.

What’s It About?: Every year the town of Barrow, Alaska the northern most town in the United States experiences, um, 30 days of night. Many townspeople leave because they can’t handle it. Those that remain pride themselves on their thick skin. A Renfield-type character shows up as a harbinger of the carnage to come. Shortly thereafter, a horde of UV light-phobic vampires descend upon the snowy outpost town after coming to the conclusion that, once cut off from the world, Barrow would serve as a month-long buffet orgy of blood. And it took them centuries to realize this. Carnage ensues in a way that makes CGI geeks all weak in the knees.

The film breaks down into the age-old format of pitting a group of survivors we don’t care about against either one monster (Alien) or several (um, Aliens)and slamming popcorn while the factions duke it out.

The setting and even some of the initial story set up is reminiscent of Outpost 31 in John Carpenter’s masterwork, The Thing (yes, I said masterwork. Because it is.) Then it all falls apart.

Who’s In It?: The group we got stuck with is led by the Sheriff (Josh Hartnett) and is estranged wife (Melissa George) who take charge by constantly trying to figure out where to go and what to do. At first the group tries to figure out who the invaders are. The next question that comes up again and again is how to kill them since they seem to be invulnerable to everything (except cutting them in half with heavy equipment, running them over, crushing them, getting a clean head shot or decapitating them with an axe). Despite all that, they never seem to definitively settle on a method. The second great hole in the film comes when the Sheriff goes into action and proclaims to his band of bug-hunt fodder, “We have two things going for us here, we know the town and we have the cold. We live up here because no one else can.” These two strategic revelations never figure into the film again. The vampires seem to have no problems with navigation and most are dressed for spring casual, sundresses and all while our heroes are lumbering about in parkas.

Now let’s talk about the vampires. They look like rejects from a Euro electronic band with their leader, played by Danny Huston constantly spouting either A. the obvious or B. philosophical clichés as if to let the audience know the older guy in the business casual is the old and wizened leader. Though they understand English, their spoken language seems a jarring mix of Klingon and a fax machine. The subtitles are a great help since you don’t want to miss any of the self absorbed gems uttered by the leader.

Why It Sucked: I could go on all day about this but I will leave it at the climax without spoiling the action for you. I really wanted to see some kind of great finish here. The Sherriff and his band of dwindling survivors have endured the entire month of carnage. All they have to do is wait it out an hour or two and the sun comes up. The vampires up the ante by taking a particular course of action that could have been countered by countless measures. Instead, the Sherriff chooses the dumbest one he could come up with and uses it to a predictable and incomplete extent.

In Summary: If you don’t care much for a strong script and a tight plot and if you like your vampires toothy and numerous and you blood copiously flowing then this one is for you. There is nothing atmospheric or chilling here, it’s an out and out modern gore-fest. I’d go so far as to say you could watch it with the sound off and you’ll still love it.

What Can It be Compared To: It wants desperately to be The Thing or 28 Days Later. Not as gratuitous as Saw.

What’s a Polar Opposite?: Anything with a plot that makes sense within the world of the story.

Though this film did a good box office and the reviews were much better than mine, I’d still set the Lame-o-meter on High.

Pumpkin 2

2011-10-26T22:16:00.001-04:00

The little pumpkin and I were staring at each other. We were trying to settle on a face to carve for Halloween. I had all my monster stuff out and the squash had all these Hollywood gossip rags on the table.

“Make me pretty…or handsome. I want to look like George Clooney,” the little pumpkin said.

“Why would you want that? Wouldn’t you rather look frightening?” I asked.

“Like who?”

“I don’t know. Boris Karloff maybe or Martha Stewart?”

“Who’s they?”

“Well both are sort of Frankenstein-ish.”

“No, I want to be handsome.”

“But you’re a pumpkin.”

“So? Are you saying I can’t be handsome because I’m just a runt pumpkin?”

“No, not at all. I’m saying that on Halloween it’s more fun to be scary. You can be George Clooney for Thanksgiving. Or Oscar Night.”

“No.”

This was going nowhere fast. Halloween was approaching and the little pumpkin and I had been going on like this for days. I thought it would be better to catch him after a nap when he’d be more open to suggestion but nothing was working. I’d happily carve a Clooney into the pumpkin but really, George Clooney? When did kids get so grown up?

Just then the little rabbit with the vegetable sword hopped on the table.

“Hoi. “Cha doin’?”

And just like that a mad scientist bolt struck me.

“C’mere, lil’ bunny guy.” I held up a picture of the dapper Carry Grant-esque George Clooney. What do you think of this?”

The little bunny looked, sniffed, blinked and said, “So?”

I looked at the pumpkin who said nothing. I turned back to the bunny and said, “OK, what do you think of…THIS!” and I whipped out a picture of Frankenstein’s monster reaching out of the page.

It was several minutes before either the pumpkin or I were able to hear normal tones again. The shriek was so loud and so shrill that the Formica in the table peeled up. The little rabbit launched into the air like an old NASA space rocket. Little bits of fur and chewed carrot were all over the table. He was lying on his side panting and muttering something incoherent.

“What. The Hell. Made you . Do that?” he asked.

“I want to be Frankenstein!” the little pumpkin said. And thus, it was written…

Movie Hoopla!

2011-10-26T10:08:00.001-04:00

In my continued effort to scratch every creative itch that comes my way, I have taken gig writing about movies which can be found at www.movie-hoopla.com. It is a new venture started by a friend for people who love to discuss movies and get into the occasional virtual fist fight over whose opinion matters more.

So please stop by http://movie-hoopla.com/ , like us on Facebook (www.facebook.com/moviehoopla) follow on Twitter (http://twitter.com/#!/moviehoopla). It’s Free and it’s about stuff you love – movies! Participate! Leave a comment, start a ruckus, tell us about movies you love and as always if you like it, tell a friend and if you hate it, tell an enemy.

Pumpkin I

2011-10-22T19:23:00.000-04:00

I had just finished my turkey sammich when I noticed the little pumpkin lying in the gutter like a Bowery bum. Odd because all the other pumpkins were stacked on shelves on the sidewalk in front of the corner grocer like an All Saints Day line up.

Ignoring The Prime Directive, I bent to the little gourd, "Ahoy there, Lil' guy. Everything okay?"

"Actually, no. Would you mind backing your car over me once or twice. I'm quite done."

"What kind of talk is that?"

"I'm ugly and unwanted. Everybody says so. I'm too small and too pale and my stem is too short. All the other pumpkims are nice and round and bright orange. I'm ugly."

"No you're not!"

"Am too."

I picked the little squash and hefted it a few times. It was a little pale and uneven in color. It was a little oval and marked up but it was full of unique character. "You know, those other pumpkins may be rounder and orangerier but unlike you, nin of them are coming home with me."

The pumkin lit up like a little girl who just discovered she was going to Disneyland.

I tossed a few bucks to the grocer who said, "I have better pumpkins, pal.". I told him this little one was more perfect than he knew and tossed it into the car.

"Can I drive?"

"No."

"Can I honk the horn?"

"No."

"Can I call out point values for pedestrians?"

"Yes."

"Can we have a nap when we get home?"

"Only after you brush your teeth."

It smiled, happy to belong...

Ted

2011-10-20T15:35:00.002-04:00

My friend, Ted and I were having breakfast at my place a few weeks ago. Oatmeal. He took a heaping spoonful of buttery steel cut oats and shoveled them into his considerable maw. After a few chews his brows came together, his eyes widened, face reddened and he spit the oats out with enough force to startle the other Ted, my cat.

“Agh, my mouf is burning! What the hell is on this?” he asked.

“That? Oh, that’s tabasco, jalepeno and a little white vinegar,” I said.

“Why would you do that? Why would you make oatmeal with liquid fire?”

“Keeps the spoons happy."

"What?"

"Well, the spoons were upset with me because I kept giving them boring things to do like stirring tea. They said to make life a little more exciting for them or else they’d leave with the forks and then I’d have nothing to eat with except for the butter knives because they don’t like to travel.”

Ted never ate over my house again.

But my silverware is quite content and that’s what really counts.

Bunny

2011-10-19T13:50:00.002-04:00

I was sitting on the ledge eating a sammich when the little rabbit came up to me. He was wearing a thimble on his head as a helmet. He had on what looked to be a suit of chain mail made of Cheerios. He was carrying on one hand a shield that was actually an oreo cookie, doublestuff. In the other he was wielding a stalk of asparagus.

"Hoi," he said to me.

"Hello there, lil' bunny guy. What do you say?" I replied.

"Ahm, have you seen a small bear wearing an egg shell on his head? He'd also be carrying a cracker and a stick of celery. We're playing Knights of the Rectangular Table."

"I think you mean Round Table, lil' knight."

"I know but all we had was a very large people-sized thesaurus for a table."

"Oh. Well, no, I haven't seen your friend but I'll let him know you're looking. What gives with the asparagus?"

"Oh that. We're not allowed to play with pointy things. So we use stuff from the cupboard. It's silly, right? Who ever heard of sword fights with asparagus? Silliest thing I ever saw."

I was about to say something on the nature of things you don't often see but the little rabbit was already on his way down the trail sheathing his asparagus at his side and strapping the cookie to his back.

The Night of the Missed Opportunity

2011-09-14T15:37:00.000-04:00

If radiance came in a bottle and that bottle happened to spill onto the street and become a living person, that person would be the woman standing across the street. She was mesmerizing, she was beautiful and she was on line at the breakfast cart. The shiny metal booth that smells like bacon and coffee always had a long line because the smell of bacon is one of nature’s intoxicants. Everything is better with bacon: eggs, bread or an old shoe. I didn’t see her, at first, as I rushed passed the cart. I had no time to wait in a line so I raced to lamb-over-rice wagon. It too is a cruel thing of metal, smoke and seasoned meat that plays havoc with your olfactory sense until you are no longer thinking clearly. You set out for a salad and you end up blowing your cholesterol out of the water. The little man with the rubber gloves and the hair net finished piling the stringy meat over the seasoned rice in the Styrofoam container. He slathered the whole thing in white sauce, not the red hot sauce that burned though my gut like a welder with a torch, but that creamy, rich, gooey, thick, white sauce like a possessed street artist. This was all good things in a little foam box. I took my treat-in-a-box and sat on the ledge of a nearby office building where many people eat before returning to their cubicles. I dug in with a ferocity matched only by those predatory ancestors of ours who chased down their food and clubbed it with a stick. Only instead of a stick, I had a little plastic fork. As I brought the fully loaded fork to my mouth I looked up and it was then that I saw her.

Her hair flowed like rivers of golden sunshine. Her skin was as pale as milk. I was sure she smelled like strawberries and rain. Her body had those girl curves that worked best in sundresses and big hats. I had found the woman who would take my name, bear my children and rub my feet at night. As I shoveled piles of spicy meat and rice into my mouth like a train engineer would shovel coal into the furnace of a mighty locomotive, I imagined us lying on a blanket in a field somewhere far from the grime of the city. I was lying in her lap as she read Shakespeare with her classy British accent and fed me grapes.

She eased to the front of the line with the grace of a ballerina. I imagined her soft, sweet voice ordering her eggs and bacon. I bet she liked extra bacon. Gnawing on lamb grizzle then spitting it out, I watched as she handed over her money as if she were a painter adding the final brush strokes to her masterpiece. She took her bag while I continued to shovel, raising my blood pressure like the steam in the boiler of the train.

To my absolute delight, my future wife was crossing the street with her little bag and cup of tea. Yes, it had to be tea, for such a refined lady had to be a classy tea drinker. She was captivating, she was breathtaking and, as I coughed on a large piece of tomato, she was suddenly looking my way. I realized then that I may have a chance with this beautiful piece of walking art having my babies. Without a second to spare, I forced the rest of the plate into my mouth. A burst of flavor hit about the same time as that internal alarm went off signaling that my stomach’s reach had exceeded its grasp. Still I chewed and swallowed several times. I wasn’t going to let fate pass me by on account of a plate of sloppy food. I swallowed. I burped. I felt faint. I ate that whole thing.

She’s not just glancing, she’s actually staring…at me. Yes, she’s looking straight at me. What should I do? What should I say? Should I straighten my tie? No, too obvious. My mind revved like the engine of a Ferrari. I stood but I didn’t know what to do with my hands. I tried putting my fists on my hips like Superman - too pretentious. I folded them across my chest like Captain Kirk - too arrogant. I tried putting one foot up on the ledge Captain Morgan style and raising one brow as high as I could - too “Ahoy there, observe my genitals”. Instead, I stood there, hands in pockets, hips slightly cocked, one knee a little bent, like the guy who models underwear in all the catalogs. I was ready.

I had my opening line all ready to go but I can’t remember it now. She closed the distance until we were engaging that age-old ritual dance of give and take, where words are almost meaningless and it all comes down to subtle shifts of expression. Ah, cat and mouse.

My vision of strawberry summertime raindrops was upon me. She stopped in front of me, paused and lit a cigarette. My pulse raced, my lips pursed and with the thickest Brooklyn accent I’d ever heard she said “Ay yo, buddy, you got some white crap all over your mouth. If you’re gonna take it on the face you might wanna carry a Handi Wipe.” She laughed and slapped her knee, took a deep drag of the cigarette and continued on her way.

It was several minutes before I could move. I stood there in my lonely silence, sans napkin, damning myself for my love of white sauce and wishing I opted for the apple at the fruit guy on the opposite corner.

Hello Reflux, my old friend.

2011-04-21T06:45:00.001-04:00

It’s another three AM and I’m staring at the ceiling while the Acid Gnomes have their way with the lining of my esophagus. This happens every time I eat too much at dinner (like a Buick), eat too late (like any time after 4PM) or have erotic dreams about the wrinkled old Korean grocer who sells me my lettuce. Because I loves me my lettuce.

I went to my doctor to tell him it felt like I swallowed a scale model of the Death Star dripping in hot sauce. Doc asked me why I would do such a thing when everyone knows a creamy lemon sauce would have been the way to go. He also mentioned that said I was 19 lbs over weight. I knew he had to be hallucinating. I was thin, I was ripped and I was muscular. Yes somewhere under the gut that dripped like a glob of hot wax over my beltline was a set of muscles that would make a supermodel envious.

What did this have to do with the near constant sleepless nights of me sitting up in bed feeling like someone was boring a hole right through me a very blunt and very hot instrument?

“Reflux,” said he.

“Heartburn?”

“No, reflux. It’s different.”

But I’ve bad heartburn lots of times and this feels just like heart burn with a heart attack chaser.”

“Oh yeah? How many heart attacks have you had, Ace?” He had me there.

At plus-19 I was showing a BMI of obese (that’s medical talk for, “Do they make underpants that big?”) though if you saw me you’d say at worst, I could stand to lose a few but not obese. That’s what he put in the chart; Borderline Obese.

“You’re triglycerides and your pressure are too high unless you’re actually trying to pop like a balloon and scare all the kiddies at the party.” I had strict orders to lose the gut like a cheapskate friend, take the pills he prescribed and think more about celery than pizza. He closed the chart, gave me the dismissive handshake and left me alone in the room in my little gown, bulbous midsection and my wounded pride. He added, “Remember, nothing tastes as good as being thin feels”.

I needed a cheeseburger.

I began a steady regimen of sitting at the computer, sitting at the movies and sitting down as I worked in a gym. I’d be down to fighting shape in no time. That was two years ago. For two years I’ve been on pressure pills, water pills, triglyceride pills and a reflux pill. I’ve been up at least three nights a week with an exquisitely painful sensation in the middle of me that can best be described as someone trying to scoop me out with a giant melon baller. Over the holiday season, which in my house runs from August 30 through mid-January I not only ignored my doctor’s advice but I, shall we say added an extension to the rumpus room and gained another 9 lbs.

The final shoe dropped when one of my shoes dropped and I couldn’t bend down far enough to reach it. I looked like a hot air balloon trying to dock in high winds in a thimble. I joined a weight loss website during a moment where I was creating an unholy alliance between a knish, sauerkraut, mustard and about a half pound of baked ziti. The site tracks the calories I enter and plots my weight and goals. I logged in and hit the ground running. The additional 9 pounds melted off like butter off a hot biscuit. It was easy. I logged in everything I ate and shocked myself at how far over my daily calorie requirement I was used to going. Then I lost four more. I could almost see the tiniest hint of a future set of abs sprouting under there. All was going well. You’d think there was a “Until” moment like all was going well until I met…the salami and mozzarella sammich. There wasn’t a particular moment, more like a lost week or two where I stopped counting thinking I had it all memorized. I found a deli that made the best bacon and egg sammich in the city. I found out about Nutella tarts and the joy of little pigs in a blanket. I thought I slipped only once or twice, that I had it all under control.

As I write this it is 3 AM on the third sleepless night. The acid gnomes are trying to escape though the emergency hatch carved into my esophagus. I’m slouched over my computer and my navel now aims at the floor. My niece asked me recently if I could see my feet over my stomach. That will cost her a birthday gift.

I have not touched the scale for I know what it will tell me. He was right, my doc, nothing tasted quite as good as thinning out felt. And so we begin again. I have my measuring spoons in my work bag. The oat meal is on the stove. By summer, maybe not this one but surely the next I will stride shirtless, muscled and tan down the beach, at the library, perhaps the diner during the early-bird special and maybe into a church. For nothing feels as good as feeling the aghast expressions on the faces of old ladies as a well-oiled shirtless man struts his stuff in the most inappropriate of places.

Dispatch From The (Old) Kitchen, Vol. IV: Freestyle Construction

2011-02-27T14:23:00.000-05:00

There are certain things in life you expect to be consistent like say, that cup of coffee from the diner to be hot or in general, your wife to be cold and Grammy winners in pop music to be tone deaf abominations that basically suck.

On the nature of unchecked expectation with regard to home improvement, one should reasonably expect:

The location of studs to be 16 inches on center apart. Drive a screw into the wall and you expect the underlying stud to grip the screw like your granny’s mashed potatoes gripped your intestines. You should not expect the lights to go out in the kitchen nor should you expect your upstairs neighbor to knock on your door because his lights also went out at the same time your drill struck something made of metal just before everything went black.

Electrical boxes should be firmly mounted to studs so that when you plug and unplug your stuff the box doesn’t wiggle and wobble and grip the plug like a lover caught in the throes of ecstasy. You should not expect the electrical box to be stuffed into the hole at a 45 degree angle in the plaster and supported by A BOOK OF MATCHES.

During your investigation into The Construction Methods of Yesteryear you discover not just one stud but many many studs running at random intervals along the length of the wall, you may suspect but not necessarily expect a problem. Of course what you find is a series of studs roughly three or four feet in length each and floating beneath the surface of the plaster on bent wood screws. That they are in fact holding outlets and switches at varied heights like points on a graph explains why they jiggle and move and throw sparks like the climax of a Michael Bay movie every time you plug something in or turn on the light.

When the old cabinetry is removed and the walls exposed, you expect them to be intact and solid. You don’t expect to see crumbling materials and the wiring to snake in and out of holes bored into the walls so they can run in front of the studs. Tilt your head to the side and recall that old fuzzy picture of the Loch Ness Monster. Now imagine a Do-It-Yourselfer drilling into the cabinet only to run into live wiring. “Hey, that’s a mighty interesting haircut you got there, bub”…

No, what you expect when starting a project is that the idiots who were here before you were skilled enough to know that under the sheetrock or dehydrated oatmeal or whatever they used years ago there would be uniformly sized studs standing the correct distance apart. The outlets would be mounted to those studs at a specified height, wires coursing along the length of studs like nerves to give them life. You expect to simply take down old cabinets and put up new ones so that the task of remodeling your kitchen would only take a week or two instead of the life span of certain insects and maybe a President or two….

Imagine if you will a bunch of freewheeling beatnik construction guys on the job in 1957 caught between modern progressive jazz and Elvis. They’re on the job with black turtlenecks and bongos and maybe a leather jacket and a comb (Ayyyyyyyyyyyy!!). They’re swinging hammers and tossing studs around while discussing modern art and wondering why everything has to be so uniform, you know, so SQUARE, Daddyo? So they buck convention and tradition (and safety) and start putting up studs anywhere they want. Load bearing beams are holding up the broom closet above while the bathtub above is being supported by papier-mâché and decoupage. Wire sheathing wasn’t used to run wires from the electrical service box to the switched and outlets, they were used to decorate the stud walls. Boxes weren’t mounted firmly to studs so much as suggested gently to be adjacent to a stud so as not to crowd and unbalance the space between the studs.

While all this is going on, some doofus stood in a corner on a box reciting Kerouac and suggested that at lunch they all go “On The Road” in search of enlightenment but only for an hour because that’s all they have for break. Plaster board is layered over gypsum so that the walls are uneven and almost six inches thick of cement and or plaster. You can’t put a nail though it and even if you could, it wouldn’t hit anything because nothing is where it’s supposed to be. In the end you have a modern art project that was graded and long-forgotten by art students at NYU.

Cut to somewhere in the 80’s and the descendants of that crew are crooning Wham and New Wave to each other while ogling the Vanessa Williams Penthouse issue. The new floor is dropped over the old one. It doesn’t level but if you don’t spill anything on it, you’ll never know. An abomination of white veneered press wood cabinets is put up over mistakes made a generation before. This cabinet design will never go out of style and press wood is soooo durable, it will last centuries.

Cut to today; one lone hero with a tool belt, a drill, a drywall screw clenched between his teeth and a puzzled look on his face stares down a job that was to be simpler than the combined minds of the entire cast of Jersey Shore. This is how Clint Eastwood must have gotten started…

Dispatch from the kitchen remodel, vol. 3

2011-01-27T17:36:00.000-05:00

The kitchen:

The place where food is prepared by loving hands from a culinary artist.

The place where that first Cup O Joe gets your day started.

The place where you eat your sandwiches and just about any other meal you can get away with over the sink instead of the table.

The place where holiday warmth is made and memories are forged with cookies, pies and turkeys.

Where you let the dishes pile as high as the proposed space elevator even though the dishwasher sits by with the eagerness of a child at an amusement park.

Where you sneak in those extra forbidden calories at 2am over a plate of sliced turkey and a gob of mayonnaise big enough to stop the heart of an elephant.

The place that for the past nine years has been an eyesore of outdated and worn fixtures and broken tiles that make you ashamed to call yourself a co-op owner.

The place from where your spouse has glared at you holding a rolling pin with your name on it while you luxuriated on the couch with your ps3 controller killing zombies.

Where you stand proudly holding your tools ready to begin the daunting yet easy task of updating the heart of your home.

Where your plan of two days of easy demo has devolved into an epic of destruction worthy of a Cecil B DeMille picture or a Greek tragedy.

Where you won’t admit this is going to be tougher than you thought.

Where one by one you find more unexpected surprises of handiwork horror than Adam’s Apples at that cheap new strip club your buddies recommended.

Where you wonder, “Did people not know how to build in 1957?”

Where you lie in the corner in the fetal position with tears streaming down your face because you’re in way over your head and you haven’t the guts to tell anybpody.

Where a beam that may or may not be holding up the floor above hangs precariously by two nails because you pulled out the other two dozen before hearing that ominous creak and seeing the ceiling sag beneath the weight of the obese diabetic on the third floor.

The place they’ll find your body under the debris that used to be your building if you don’t figure out how to solve that pesky load bearing beam problem.

The place where you are suddenly struck with inspiration as if all your Italian Renaissance ancestors parted the skies and tapped you on the forehead.

The kitchen: the place where you will build your new sculpting studio, for you live in New York City where the cuisines of the world are no further than your iPhone and you can live like the girls on Sex In The City like you’ve secretly always wanted to.

The kitchen cum sculpting studio; where the ink on your freshly served divorce papers will sit atop the pedestal that will one day seat a beautiful model for you to sculpt out of fine Italian marble just as soon as you build a pedestal and find a beautiful woman desperate enough to pose naked for you.

The kitchen; the place you had better snap out of it and put that beam back before the neighbors upstairs realize everything in their apartment is pooling in the middle of their kitchen floor.

The kitchen, yes the kitchen where one day you’ll ~~wonder what possessed you to think you had a clue~~ look back on all this and laugh---from your farmhouse in another state.

Random Dispatch

2011-01-24T19:47:00.002-05:00

HOME DEPOT GUY: So yer doin' yer kitchen over?

ME: Roger that.

HDG: Big jaaab. How long should that take you?

ME: Oh, I'd say a week or two.

WEEKS AND WEEKS AND WEEKS LATER...

ETHEREAL VOICE FROM ABOVE: Would you like some salt to eat those words with?

Another project begins for want of a cup…

2011-01-18T22:31:00.002-05:00

I’m in my kitchen. I’ve got a cup of coffee in one hand and I’m looking for sugar. I’m holding a cupboard door in my other hand. This wouldn’t be noteworthy except for the simple fact that the cupboard door is no longer attached to the kitchen cabinet. I’m staring into the cabinet that no longer has a door and into the sugar bowl that is currently holding some saw dust and two of the four screws that hold the European hinge in place. The other two screws are dangling from the hinge that is still affixed to the door.

From here the sugar bowl looks like a tiny ski chalet with tiny skiers all over the little sugary slopes next to the lodge that looks like two giant screws (because they are). There are bits of powdered press wood all over the shelf. My blood pressure is now audible in my ears.

Luckily for both my cardio vascular integrity and the rest of the cabinets the arrival of the new kitchen stuff from Ikea was imminent. And luckily the guy doing the demo and installation was right now staring jaw agape into a sugar bowl full of screws and particle board dust. The old cabinets were white Formica over press-wood with flimsy plastic white handles that were probably considered cutting edge design about 25 years ago.

The floor, which started life as 28 one foot-square garishly white patterned tiles had over the years become something like 42,000 little tiny pieces of garishly white patterned one-inch square mosaic tiles because they were improperly set. Nothing like thinking someone is in the kitchen preparing a crunchy fresh salad only to discover that its just the tiles cracking under foot.

In addition to new cabinets, I’ll be installing the new wood floor and the new back splash and the new range and the finish carpentry and the new light fixture as well as assembling all the cabinets and drawers and shelves. The counter will be subcontracted out because hey, I don’t want to knock myself out with too much to do. Before any of this can be done…there is the demolition. The old kitchen will be reduced to something like 300 heavy garbage bags of detritus that I will have to hump haul down to a waiting hired garbage truck. Included will undoubtedly be my pride, one or two vertebrae and quite possibly my nuts. Despite my best effort to seal off the kitchen from the rest of civilization I will raise enough dust and soot to make what happened at Pompeii look like a sneeze.

Some hands-on types love the demolition part. They love the primal manly act of taking a hammer to something and reducing it to unrecognizable rubble. They grunt and they scream and they roar like some kind of dumb gorillas in the wild. They hi-five each other as if it took some great effort to smash drywall into powder. I have friends who only offer to help me with my projects if they can limit their efforts to the demo. The construction crew I worked for strangely had 100% attendance when there was a new demo project. It is a cloddish heavy handed job absent of finesse. They never consider the electricity or the plumbing until the lights go out and/or the water starts spraying in to the room like we were on a ship in a storm- at midnight.

I hate demo. I hate making a mess and noise and dust because the next step in the chain is cleaning it up. Fine dust resists the best efforts of vacuum, wet rag and mop and sticks around longer than your mother in law after an unexpected visit. I am your atypical OCD construction dude/entertainer. I like to keep it neat and quiet and organized so that ratio of work to clean up is kept in a nice balance.

So here I am, holding the door and a coffee considering the job at hand, saying my calming mantras and congratulating myself on starting the demo almost without a sound…

Do stay tuned….

Peace on Earth, good will toward men, for a limited time only.

2011-01-02T13:13:00.001-05:00

As the line in the song goes, “It’s the most wonderful time of the year”. December, Christmastime. Aside from the parties for hosting and marshmallows for roasting the major thing chimes my jingle bells is the abundance of empathy we have for others. It restores my faith in humans to see people actually considering others before themselves at this time. I’ve seen people on lines at delis buying coffee for other patrons. I’ve seen more seats being given up on the subway. I’ve even had one man put money in a parking meter for me before giving me the spot. It’s a wonderful time to be alive and part of the throng of a great metropolis like New York City. Good cheer abound.

Of course, not everyone is brimming with good will; the guy who has to stand all day in the cold hawking expensive Christmas trees is probably had his fill of cheer by around mid December. People who aren’t Christians may not have their cups runnething over with great tidings of joy, Jesus, St. Nick and greetings of “Merry Christmas”. Ask any Rockette, the unofficial Ambassadors of Good Cheer how cheerful they are when they have to do four-show days of The Christmas Spectacular a week after Christmas.

The depressive ones, like me who feel drained and lost during this time may not qualify for a cheer leader position on Santa’s team but I find my spirits buoyed by simple acts of kindness and patience that are absent from January through November. So as I stand on the Precipice of Tomorrow and gaze into the inviting maw of the New Year (and the new decade) I pose the seemingly simple question; why can’t human beings seem to keep this kindness moving beyond New Year’s Eve?

This sentimental kindness is as transient as the season itself. As the big day looms closer our good cheer amplifies to a critical mass measurable in mega tons. Then, as suddenly as it appears, the kindness we exhibit goes out with the tree, the lights and the unwanted fruitcake. The Norman Rockwell painting of our existence goes back to the 70’s cop movie we live in from day to day.

Why does it have to be Christmastime for me to be nice to you? Does this mean in August when the thick steamy tropical soup of summer grinds everything to a sweaty standstill that I should shove you off the coffee line at the cart and swipe your cup as you stumble away?

I’m trying to put my finger on that little atom of persistent kindness because I’d like to keep it all though the year. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could always be nice? You know, if Santa or Jesus or whomever you believe is keeping score really knows if you’ve been bad or good do you think you’re getting bonus points for behaving as you normally should only one month a year? I know, I know, we are creatures of last-minute good intentions like flossing 20 times, brushing up and down, side to side, and using mouth wash on the morning of our dental check up. Remember how that goes? The dentist knows if you’ve been bad or good to your teeth. You know what you get if you’ve been good? You get a lollipop. If you’ve been bad, you get the drill.

This year, along with my other 42 resolutions I’m going to try it. I’m going to try and, like the reformed Scrooge, keep Christmas all though the year. I think I can happily spend the winter days greeting passersby with a smile, offer please and thank you at every opportunity and, as circumstance merits, do as much selfless good for as many as I can. It sets my souls aglow just thinking about it. I’m a steamy bowl of chicken soup waiting to nourish the aching tummy of my city. Why not try it with me?

Addendum
The blizzard that buried New York City in the final days of December, 2010 didn’t come as a surprise, what did was the City’s Official response: “Plow? What plow? Just don’t drive and everything will be fine. For a few days the city was paralyzed by drifts of snow and an absence of The Sanitation Department. It was a Yuletide buzz kill. I thought for sure the tragic consequences of not getting emergency services to people in need would make certain there wasn’t a cup left of good cheer to feed a mouse despite New Year’s Eve breaking the horizon only a day or so away. However, as people are wont to do during a crisis some stand in the corner with their hands in their pockets, some contribute to the problem by selfishly parking cars on sidewalks or just leaving them in the street. Others however, rise to the occasion by fashioning gurneys out of sleds to carry injured and sick people to help, offer blankets to the cold and make sure those around them are okay. Emergency responders trudge through the snow fully loaded with gear to get to a suffering baby. That’s not leftover Christmas Cheer, that’s it’s older stronger cousin The Human Spirit.

Since my car was lost in a block of ice somewhere among the abandoned vehicles in the snow I had to take the express bus into work not three days after Christmas. I always like taking the bus into the city because the drivers are usually very friendly, quick with a hearty greeting and a smile. Tonight, after standing on a block of unplowed ice I hopped on board with a sunny wintery, “Hiyo!”. It was returned only with a stern expression of a driver who had been navigating treacherous roads longer than she wanted to. I took the seat in the front and she pulled the beast out real slow. She was cautious and silent, taking no chances, never driving recklessly and in no hurry. I appreciated that though I myself would have had that thing lit up like a bottle rocket on July 4.
Traffic was the thickest I had ever seen. It was like trying to move through caramel left out in the cold.

Just before getting to Canal Street is when it took place. Being in the front of the bus I saw the dance play out with predictable result. There was a tiny car that rudely wedged itself in front of us with barely room enough to react. Our driver, fearless and wary eased up as close as possible to the car just to let the driver know how close he was to needing new paint.

He stopped in the middle of the slow moving traffic and got out. The driver lets out a frustrated, “Not again” kind of sigh. Edited transcript follows:

Driver: B**ch, you need some manners!

Bus: MOVE THAT PIECE OF S**T!

Driver: You need some manners, b**ch!

Bus: MOVE THAT PIECE OF S**T!

Driver: Something unintelligible.

Bus: YOU NEED OT MOVE THAT PIECE OF S**T BEFORE IT BECOMES RUBBISH!

Driver: How’d you like me to come over there and slap the s**t outta you?

Bus: MOTHER F***ER YOU COME THE F**K OVER HERE AND SLAP ME, MOTHER F***ER!!!

Driver gets back in car and purposely drags his way up Church Street until he turns for the Holland Tunnel like a dog with the tail between the legs. There are several minutes of quiet on the bus as I‘m sure the other two passengers are wide eyed and stunned. Trace and I merely yawn, another New York City moment for the books.

After composing herself the driver looks over to us as if to make sure we weren’t in shock. I smiles and laughed a little. She ducked her head a bit so her dark features were partially in shadow. Then in a quiet sultry purr not unlike Eartha Kitt she says, “Well I guess he didn’t want to slap the s**t outta me, dumb ass Jersey mother f***er.”.

Good Cheer for good times. Welcome to the New Year.

SNOW!!!!!!

2010-12-31T19:01:00.004-05:00

For the first time on DVD and Blu-Ray AND in Gale Force 3-D: The New York City Blizzard of 2010. Order now and get all five gripping installments:

Snowpocalypse: Now
Snowpocalypse Day II: Redemption on Hoth
Snowpocalypse Day III: Dude,Where’s My car?
Snowpocalypse IV: The Search for (A Parking)Spot and
Snowpocalypse V: Snowpocalypse: Plow.

The handsome boxed set,shaped like a shovel includes a bonus disc : Disaster Response Fail; One Mayor’s Quest For A Fourth Term complete with hundreds of hours of footage of Mayor Mike with a stunned look on his face. Also included is commentary by America's Mayor; Rudolph, "I was there" Giulaini who blamed the storm on 9/11, and said that as the Commander in Chief of 9/11 that he would have single-handedly plowed every street with a cardboard coffee cup.

Act now and we'll add two bonus screen savers of the Mayor's residence and the Commissioner of Sanitation's house both completely free of snow and ice.

All yours for the low MTA Rate-Hike price of 69.95 *IF* you can get to the store to buy it. Note: the case is not an actual shovel. Please do not attempt to dig your car out out with the box as you will break it and not be able to get baclk to the store to exchange it...

Christmas Eve, 2010

2010-12-24T17:00:00.002-05:00

I miss you.

I miss the lights and the stage and the butterflies just before they call me to the stage. I miss the thrill of the audition and the bigger thrill of the call back almost more than I miss the actual job. I miss the laughter from the audience and the jolt in the pit of my gut when I realize my material is connecting with a room full of strangers. I miss writing to you about it. I miss wondering if anyone new came by and bookmarked me. I miss the wheels turning, the breeze of motion and the joy of knowing I'm doing everything in my power to justify my existence. I miss seeing though the mundane humdrum to the furthest reaches of the absurd.

I miss it all.

They say that when one door closes, another door opens. I wonder if when that one door closes you can turn around and open it again? I do have a pry bar in the trunk...

The vantage point from My Brooklyn hasn't changed much this year. Instead of trolling though the old haunts of memory I decided to avoid nostalgia. I didn't stroll though the streets of the old neighborhood with a coffee and an eye toward the past. I didn't go to the old places and see the old friends both living and dead. I didn't stop by my father's place and wonder if he was somewhere in the ether doing his thing. I decided I've done quite a bit of that and though it sends a warm wave though something in me, it doesn't do much for my career.

The tree is once again glowing that warm glow that drips over the soul like your grandmothers lentil soup. The seven fishes are in prep and Mel Torme is wishing me good tidings. There's no snow tonight, no ice but plenty of houses with lights and kids on sugar high. It's a warm night for family, friends and the occasional guest star to drop by with a bottle of liquid merry.

This Christmas Eve I spent the day thinking and planning and dreaming of the year ahead. I want that future again, the one I seemed to have given up a few years ago. I have a note book full of plans that are frankly giving me a rash because I have to get them out of my head an into the world. If you're still with me and you still like sandwiches then take a ride. This might not be THE year but tonight might be THE night.

And there are 365 nights ahead...

Merry Christmas to you. I hope to see you here, on stage and maybe if I'm really lucky, on a screen in the coming year.

True Blood For True Brooklynites

2010-08-18T11:17:00.006-04:00

A re-imagined scene from True Blood: Instead of the slow, drippy, humid south with their sultry, syrupy accents that drip like beads of sweat off the rippling musculature of Eric’s chest, imagine if you will the HBO chick-porn-lite series taking place in a more genteel locale. Bensonhurst, say…

EXT: NIGHT THE SIDE ALLEY OFF THE MAIN AVENUE. FRANKLIN is terrorizing TARA who is begging for death. He has her up against a wall with his hands at her throat. Her heart is thumping like a hammer in her chest. FRANKLIN is unsure about his decision to kill her. JASON appears behind them brandishing a shotgun.

JASON: OHHHHH, (pronounced like a long o sound) get the f**k outta here.

FRANKLIN: Ohhhhh, this is a private conversation. You get the f**k outta here.

JASON: No, you get the f**k outta here. I got a shotgun.

FRANKLIN: No, you get the f**k outta here.

JASON: No, you get the f**k outta here.

FRANKLIN: No, you get the f**k outta here.

JASON: No, yougetdaf*kouddaheeeere

FRANKLIN: No, yougetdaf**kouddaheeeere. Are you a f**king idiot or something? You gonna f**king shoot me or something? You want me to stick that up your f**ing ass? I’m a f**king vampire. I can live for f**king ever and turn into a f**king bat and fly around and scare the s**t outta girls and s**t. You could f**king shoot me with all two hundred f**king bullets in dat gun and nothing would ever ha –

JASON FIRES ONCE: BANG! FRANKLIN explodes in a messy splash of blood and liquefied entrails that bathe TARA and surroundings in newly truly dead Vampire.

JASON: And you turn into a hunk a s**t that’s what! You turn into a f**king hunk a s**t. You know why? Huh? HUH? Cos I got f**king wooden f**king bullets, that’s why. That’s right! Wooden. F**king. Bullets. I got f**king wood, ahhhhahahahahaha!!!! An now you got f**king wood! Yeah!

TARA, astonished at her good fortune runs to JASON and collapses in his arms.

JASON: Ohhhhh, get the f**k outta here, I got wooden f**king bullets. Ha. Yeah. Wood.

The Night of the Pulp

2010-02-03T16:28:00.003-05:00

After a long day of getting nothing done at my day job at a crowded gym, I figured on spending the last half hour alone in the car waiting for the rest of the carpool. I pulled out of the parking garage on 67th street, made a few city block lefts and ended up on the east side of 3rd avenue in a spot with a broken meter. I reclined the seat, switched on the jazz station and stretched out to Ella crooning me to a better place in the dark.

I watched the people scurrying home from work in the cold evening. After a day like the one I had, it was a gift to sit there insulated from the city and the noise alone and invisible. They passed by my window like wind –up toys. There was the wiry haired nervous twitchy guy, the gay couple holding hands, wiry haired nervous twitchy guy, the mother in a near run with her stroller, wiry haired nervous twitchy guy. Wait – why does this guy keep walking by staring into the car? I don’t mean the causal glance, I don’t mean the, “Hey, isn’t that…?” that will plague my life once I become a Big Time Hollywood Movie Star. No, I got the look from someone who thought I killed his cat, slept with his wife and erased all the Star Trek he had on his DVR.

I began feeling twitchy myself like a caged bird. I watched curiously as he casually walked by the car in not even remotely looking casual. He was looking directly at me as if he was trying to recognize me without being recognized himself. He had his hands in his pockets which I did not like. He’d walk past, turn around, walk the other way and make an effort to examine the parking meters before coming back again. I didn’t like it. He was too shifty looking to be up to any good. I reached for the comfort of the .38 in my side holster just in case, when I realized I just made that up. All I had was a couple of pens and a nail clipper. A sharp nail clipper. After a good ten minutes of this I felt the pressure go up.

Suddenly I saw the spectral image of my father sitting next to me. He comes in handy at times like this for dispensing advice like, “Maybe you should get out and ask him how many pieces he’d like his jaw broken into”, and, “You know there is a bat in the back.” I had forgotten about the bat. He was coming back around again so I reached for my phone as if it was ringing. I used it as a distraction so it wouldn’t be obvious I was staring also. Yep, he was totally staring back at me. I knew this because as soon as I got on my phone, he flipped his open as if he was waiting for a call.

So, our strange guy thought I was calling him. That meant he was deliberately looking at me for something but he didn’t know who I was. It could also mean he doesn’t think I slept with his wife or kicked his cat. Not sure about the DVR though. I put my phone away and watched him do the same. We stared at each other like two gun fighters of the Old West waiting for the draw. I’d finally had enough of this game. I made a move to get out and he quickly shuffled off and got back on his phone. He walked out in front of the minivan that was parked ahead of me and disappeared. I had visions of him loading a 12 gauge shotgun he had concealed under his long coat. I reached again for the .38 that I kept forgetting didn’t exist while I listened to my father’s ghost chastise me for not being armed on the streets of The City. I felt like a sitting duck. I got out, opened the trunk and reached for the bat. I wouldn’t go out without a fight.

He came out from behind the van and walked briskly toward my car. He was looking for me in the front and didn’t see me until he was almost on me. I had surprise on my side. I was staring right at him and twirled the bat like a baton in hopes he’d get the message (and not have a shotgun that would reduce the bat, and me, into toothpicks). It was then that he made a sharp turn and darted across the street and jumped into the passenger seat of a waiting car parked there. The car pulled out hastily and made a quick left on to 67th.

My intuition kicked in and prevented me from putting the bat back in the trunk and returning to my peaceful moment. I had a feeling in my gut I followed up on by crossing Third Avenue and hiding by some construction scaffolding. I waited with my hood up and my hands in my pockets. Now I looked like a twitchy shifty stiff in the cold while I waited to see if my thoughts panned out.

Third Avenue was northbound only so I only needed to pay attention to one direction. The sedan made a left onto 67th. That meant if I was right, they’d take another left on Lexington, a southbound-only to 65th, make another left and another on to third again. Sure enough, no more than 5 minutes had passed before I spotted the sedan slowly coming up the west side of Third Avenue from 65th street to my position in the shadows. They had circled around just as I predicted. I’d get the jump on them if they tried anything with my car. They instead, stopped in front of the Starbucks on the corner of third and 66th. The twitchy guy got out and went for coffee. Maybe they were planning to caffeine up before riddling my Honda with bullet holes like a Japanese Swiss cheese. I watched in silence as the sedan turned left on to 66th and disappeared across Lexington, a block away. We were alone now, the nervous guy and I. I watched him though the windows order a tall coffee and about six brownies. He was animated and sweating and jittery. The last thing this guy needs was coffee and sugar. Things fell into place now; he either thought I was his Street Pharmacist, or he was a highly caffeinated assassin looking for a sugar rush before fulfilling his latest contract. Either way, he has the wrong guy. At least that’s what the ghost of my father said standing next to me.

I followed him across Third Avenue to see where he’d go next. Now I was the stalker and he was the prey. Instead of sneaking over to my car, he headed into the building just on the corner. I was ready to let it go as just a strange New York City misunderstanding when I was struck with an urge. After the man went into the building, I counted to ten and followed him in just in time to see the elevator doors close on him. I approached the desk man who was wearing one of those disapproving frowns as if to intimidate strangers with an entitled look. He looked down his nose at me and asked, “Can I help you?”

“Yeah, do you know that man who just went up?”

“Yes I do, can I help you with something?”

“Does he live in this building?”

Clearly agitated, he asked firmly, “And who are you?”

“Easy pal, you only work here. At the end of the shift you go home somewhere else. Does he live here, or what?”

“I need to see some ID.”

I reached for my wallet, “My name is Anthony Serafini, I’m a private detective working a very private case for some very influential people who live at an address that makes this place look like the self-storage number downtown.” I had no idea where I was getting any of this from. I was sweating under my clothes because I was sure there was some law against impersonating private dicks. My instinct was to turn and run but something held me fast to the ground while I continued my ruse. “Do you know if that man has any involvement in the trafficking of narcotics or prostitutes?” That did it. The doorman went a little pale as if he suddenly realized he left the stove on in his apartment in Queens.

As I went to hand my wallet to the nervous doorman, I dropped it on the floor, “Oh, clumsy of me.” I went to pick it up as the door man flinched and said he wouldn’t be able to answer that or any other questions I had unless I came back with a policeman.

I folded my wallet back into my pocket. “That’s okay, pal. I get it. I’ll be back.” I said as I turned and walked out. He called after me, “Hey, um, are you gonna show me your id?” I told him I wouldn’t be able to answer any more of his questions.

NOTE: What, exactly, was I thinking? I have no id, no badge or other credentials. I have no .38. I’m only half of a private dick. My father must have been nuts to do this sort of thing all the time. I was shaking by the time I got back to the car. I laughed at the thought of the doorman getting all nervous. I could get used to this. As I got in, my father was sitting there in the passenger seat again. “Nice work, T. Sometimes you make me real proud.”

I sat back in the seat, listened to Ella and blushed at my father’s pride. And that, for some strange reason made all the difference…

...And Lastly At First...

2009-12-31T17:59:00.002-05:00

I’m sitting at the table staring out the window to the snow covered field in the park across the street. The sun is hidden behind a thousand miles of gray clouds. There are massive cargo ships and tankers sleeping in the harbor. There are some layered civilians walking dogs in the snow.

I’m strapped up to what looks like a jet pack to keep my hyper mobile collar bone from slipping and sending me to the floor screaming. There’s the bottle of gin on the table, a Christmas gift, slowly disappearing and a handful of pills that are softening the edges so I don’t have to see them. There are people in the room making light of the day.

It is another end and another beginning.

There’s another chance to start over. There’s another chance to either get it right or screw it up all over again. I tend to screw it up so I can start over again. I’m good at repeatedly polishing the starting line in hopes that I’ll finally blast from it at the sound of the starter’s pistol. I’ve seen success and it looks good on the people who have it. I wonder sometimes how the jacket would fit on me. It would have to slip over the rocket pack behind me. No matter, I’m just biding my time amassing pages and canvasses and ideas. When it comes, I’ll be ready and waiting with a smile and a simple cup of coffee in one of those Greek diner motifs.

We’re all in line for our just reward, aren’t we? And tonight, as if we all prayed and resolved en masse, then God would finally listen and we’d end war, live green and shed pounds. Then I’d be out of a day job, too.

And out there, beyond yonder window breaks a mass of souls and hearts all together rejoicing in the chance to start the whole dance over again. Discarding the old with its weighty chain and strapping on the new and sparkly with its hope and promise. Some feel lonely, some will count their blessings and some will sleep right through it. The ships in the harbor will sound their horns at midnight and a mighty crystal ball will drop over the heads of a million drunken revelers at midnight.

I’ll probably be standing on the balcony looking out at the water wondering if this year will be THE year. Only I know the answer to that, though. I have to make the effort. God told me that once on one of our walks.

It is another ending and another beginning.

Happy New Beginning to one and all. Maybe it will finally be my year. May it finally be your year, too...

Christmas Eve, 2009.

2009-12-24T19:13:00.000-05:00

I fell out of bed around the time when the sun lazily peeks over the horizon as if to avoid the oncoming day. I had a bunch of late holiday chores to accomplish before it was all over for the zillionth time including my yearly where-the-hell-did-the-time-go routine. I stood up, groaned, stretched and stumbled to the shower. I turned the water on and waited the minute or two for the room to steam up before stepping into the tub.

There was a moment between stepping into the tub and sticking to the ceiling that I should have realized the room didn’t steam up therefore there was no hot water. As I swallowed my frozen chestnuts I began boiling water for the time-honored tradition of the sponge bath sans a squad of sexy nurses.

It was Christmas Eve and I needed to get a few more things for dinner. I was also due for a good dose of cheer and good will toward men. I felt a little better this year than last but there is still something about this time of year that leaves me yearning for something I can’t define. I took my shopping list, my camera and my bent for lonesome nostalgia and headed out into my Brooklyn.

I stopped at Ravioli Fair for a ring of cheese and parsley sausage and stepped into my grandmother’s Ghost of Christmas Kitchen Past. There was everything from rice balls to stuffed artichokes and a million other delights that made Christmas special all those years ago. I went in for sausage and came out 75 bucks lighter and with three shopping bags of food. Did I mention Trace was spending the entire day doing the feast of seven fishes and was at this moment, cooking her brains out over the stove?

I visited Maggio’s, the old music school I spent my youth in. As soon as I stepped into the store a slice of the traditional six foot mixed hero was thrust into my hands on a plate with potato salad and macaroni salad. I spent an hour taking bites and talking about the good old days, the characters that come through and the way things have changed. They went from a local music store that equipped every kid in the neighborhood with a guitar and the desire to be the next Van Halen to moving the whole thing largely to the internet because in this new Bensonhurst, there are no aspiring rock stars that play anything other than Rock Band.

I watched Big Angelo polish off the roast beef with extra mayo, complain in Italian about his diabetes and chug two canolis. Joe was salivating while trying to maintain composure. He was holding off because there was the feast of a thousand fishes waiting at home. Pale Eddie was busy helping a customer select a harmonica while trying not to make it obvious that was struggling with a mouthful of food. The Old Man and I spoke about my father, his father and business. He said people wondered why he didn’t retire to Florida. He said, “What am I gonna do in Florida, pull my prick until I die?” He had a point. He wondered where my hair went and said my new look was debonair. It wasn’t by choice.

We hugged, exchanged well wishes and I waved goodbye. I took a deep breath of cold December air tasting on it a little bit of everything; pizza from Pizza Den, cookies from West End bakery and coffee from the diner on the corner.

I took the New Blue Monster, ie the new leased CRV, around to my father’s block. I know I shouldn’t dwell on the past, that the best is supposedly yet to come, but I felt like painting a picture of the old block in my mind. I turned the corner and with my mind, saw all the old neighbors and friends on the block. I remembered the old light displays in the windows and the snow men here and there. The girls would come by and call for my sister and I was content to stay in and watch the specials on TV while dreaming of living in the Christmas tree. Don’t tell me you’ve never done that.

I paused in front of my father’s house and thought about that time we built a snow fort in the front that took up the entire front yard. Then there was the time that he, Trace and I went outside during a snow storm at 1am and built a snowman and brought a snowball fight into the house.

I don’t have to tell you that I still miss him.

Tonight there’d be dinner and family and a glowing tree. Outside there’d be snow and ice and a cold crisp night. There would still be no hot water but that’s what the stove is for. I’ll stand out on the balcony and look up at the stars imagining there really is a man named Kringle who exists purely to bring joy to the world. That there is a flying sleigh and a place hidden way up north where all they do is make toys and dance and sing. That one day there will be on earth peace, and good will toward men.

You can call that sappy, and maybe it is. Probably because I showered with my chestnuts in my throat this morning and I’m still waiting to roast them on an open fire just to defrost them...

I hope you’re with someone you love, and more importantly, someone who loves you. Be of good cheer. Believe in magic. Look at the world with the wonder of a child, even if only for one night. And don’t forget to set out milk and cookies….

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you from me….

Zombies From Bensonhurst, Ep II.

2009-11-29T23:02:00.001-05:00

The actual assignment was to photograph the rotting old ships and barges in Coney Island Creek on behalf of one of my various art-loving benefactors. I was more interested in revisiting our recent zombie citing in the marshlands. The plan was to snap a few shots and then explore the rest of the inlet to find out if there were really undead congregating back there.

*Expense Account Item #1: New front bumper with paint on leased Honda Accord.* We discovered the actual No Trespassing signs after accidentally blasting though one of the flimsy concrete barriers blocking our way to the field.

We hacked through the weeds and came out on a rise overlooking the desolate lagoon. We were surprised to find the tide had gone completely out of the inlet leaving most of the old hulls completely exposed. We were looking at a vast empty basin of thick oily sludge the shape of a giant boot heel in the mud. There were bottles, big tires, engine blocks and other industrial waste embedded in the sludge. It was an archaeologist’s dream and an ecologist’s nightmare. I thought I’d walk around the rocks following the coast to the other side to get closer to the ships I was getting paid the photograph. I left Trace up on the ridge while I went down to the sand. I took a few steps, slipped on something and tumbled down over the rocks to the wet grungy sand below. My clothes had torn and I twisted an ankle on the stones and found myself stuck in the mud. I extracted myself with a sucking sound and rolled on my hands and knees to stand up. I was covered in a thick brown/gray oily sludge that clung to me like undercooked oatmeal. There was sand on my face, in my mouth and in my underwear. I looked up to the rock and found a bright brown pile with my footprint in it.

I heard Trace call from up the ridge, “Is that-“

“Crap!” I yelled. “40,000 acres of deserted wasteland and I have to step in a pile of dog crap!”

*Expense Account Item #2: One gallon industrial cleaner, one wire brush, one pair industrial rubber gloves, one respirator mask.*

“Um, that’s probably not from a dog.”

“Well, what the hell else would it be? Ewwww, you don’t mean…”

“Yep, Zombie doodies.”

“Will you stop with that already, it’s probably just a dog.”

“Or not.”

“Dude, this is no time for jokes. I probably have people crap, human excrement…on my freaking pants and I look like a breaded cutlet!”

“Zombie doodies.” She said.

I dragged Trace, who was in obvious nasal discomfort and limped slowly to the edge of the outlet. I was not at all in a good position to shoot the ships from this vantage point. I needed to get across the inlet where the ships were closer to the shore. I stared out at the wet expanse.
Trace saw the look on my face and beat me to the punch, “You can’t make it.”

“I can walk across.”

“No, you can’t.”

“Totally.”

“Dude, it’s further than it looks. You’ll sink into the mud and the tide, which is coming back in will basically drown you and the Zombies will eat your brain. Let me have the car keys just in case.”

“I can make it. It’s not that far.”

I took ten limping painful steps and promptly got stuck mid calf in the mud. I began flailing and waving my arms around for balance as I was cursing up a storm. Trace tip toed out on the mud flat, surprisingly buoyant, and grabbed my arm. She tried to steady me and pull me out but I fell on her and we struggled to stay upright. There I was grunting with exertion and Trace yelling at me, “Stop, stop! Let go, you’re going to make us both fall!!”

Suddenly, a couple of hipsters with cameras sprang from the weeds behind Trace and unleashed an unearthly howl as they charged us….

“ZOMBIE!!” the first one screamed. “HIGH SPEED BRAIN MUNCHING RABID ZOMBIE JUST LIKE IN THAT BLOG!!” “Look, its attacking that poor girl, GET IT WITH THE SALT SHOT GUN!”

Salt shot gun?

Trace fell away from me just a one of them pulled out a sawed-off and let off a shot, “PWAFF!”. I was felled by a searingly painful burst of salt pellets to the groin and fell over face first into the mud – again. Since when do hipsters love guns?

*Expense Account Item #3: One pair testicles with titanium cup.*

I awoke about an hour later strapped to the trunk lid of the Honda. My head was splitting and my crotch was throbbing but not in a good way.

“Where am I?” I asked.

“You’re about to go through a car wash because you’re not getting in the car like that. Those idiots read your stupid blog and came to see for themselves. They saw you falling over in the mud all tattered and covered in crap they thought you were a zombie attacking me. Just as they were about to ventilate your cranium I got the gun away from them and made them tie you to the car. I told them I was taking the zombie to, “The Institute” for study. They were all too happy to oblige, stupid hipsters. Now shut up and hold your breath, its bath time…”

As the car slowly entered the car wash and the hot sudsy water lapped at my feet, I thought perhaps it best if I gave up on the zombies. Then again, dancing with the undead sure beats working construction with Johnny Style….

Tales From My Brooklyn: The Search For Sausage

2009-11-26T17:56:00.000-05:00

I was stumped for sausage. I made a batch of cheese and parsley links last night for stuffing that turned out to be horribly bad. Instead of a fragrant spicy aroma, the room was plastered with the stench of scorching Velveeta. Nothing says you have no idea what you’re doing in the kitchen like a pot full of gurgling burning cheese. The meat didn’t cook, it drowned in cheese. It was a coronary night mare.
I killed Thanksgiving.

I had no choice but to start over. It was however, 11pm on Thanksgiving Eve…After a night of uneasy dreams of being strangled by links of cheese sausage while hanging over a vat of burning Velveeta I fell out of bed. Splashed water on my face and left, making sure I was wearing pants.

I fell out of bed and headed out the door. I returned to put on pants and resumed my mission. The streets were deserted. The stores were closed. Well, the food stores were closed, the hardware store was open.

*Because no one may need food on the biggest cooking day of the year, but they may in fact, need a ladder. *

I tried the various avenues and side streets. I tried my butcher (closed) and my supermarket (“You mean like, frozen sausage for pizza?”) and the Korean grocer which resulted in a back and forth mispronunciation-fest that ended in both of us looking puzzled at each other and saying, “Susshhhssshhaaghhhesss…?!”

Despondent, I drove the dirty streets of this dirty city thinking of all the children, old folks and puppies I’d be disappointing if I came up dry. Then I realized I didn’t have any children, old folks or puppies and it hit me like a bolt out of the blue; what do you think of when you think of puppies? Yes, ravioli! I knew where I needed to be. Ravioli Fair on 86th would have the best sausage and all the Italian goodies that used to populate my grandmother’s table.
It’s a Thanksgiving Miracle, they were open!

There were a couple of guys behind the counter surrounded by the best Italian delights a guy like me could hope for. They offered me a cup o joe and a few rings of fried calamari. I thanked them for being open and saving the day and one of them said in his thick accent from home, “Hey, I’ve been open Thanksgiving morning for 32 years, I ain’t gonna change that. And besides, what am I gonna do home anyways?”
The two customers next to me were eating some fresh homemade stuffing out of pint containers and cooing over the Neapolitan flair of it. The conversation was light and jovial. The atmosphere was festive and perfect. There was no rush or fuss. There was no emergency because they had simply the most beautiful sausages I ever saw. I bought three rings. One of the counter guys brought out a fresh pie of pizza rustica which I haven’t had since Nona’s passing, some20 years ago. I bought a hunk and took a bite as I sipped my coffee. This is what home is supposed to taste like.

This was my Brooklyn. A place where you could go into a store and talk to the counter guys like they’ve known you for years. Where they offer you a cup of coffee and a sample with a proud smile. I could hang out at places like this all the time. I sometimes wish I made it big only so I could pass my days with these characters that would populate the pages of my books should I ever get to writing them all down. So much of my Brooklyn is disappearing and being replaced by a mythical vision created by hipsters and transplants who “saw it in a movie” and decided to recast it in that image. It’s not real but where I’m from still exists if you know where to find it. Thankfully, as I sit with my family and eat myself into a coma as I hope you’re doing, I feel lucky to still call it my home.

Zombies From Bensonhurst, Ep I.

2009-11-09T14:28:00.003-05:00

Zombies. That’s all I need right now. I’m never prepared for an encounter with the living dead. Never have a supply of salt or a shot gun. I do have a selection of heavy tools like hammers and drivers in the trunk of the car. But the car was about a half mile away in the parking lot of Home Depot. So that meant Trace, Katie of the Rockettes, Johnny Style and I were on our own in the forgotten wilderness of Brooklyn. All I had was my camera, some gum and a can-do attitude….

I was dying to get some shots of post apocalyptic Coney Island Creek with it’s crumbling decay and carcasses of rotting ships. It was an urban ruin paradise. This area was given up on years ago as industry advanced. Now it is just a dead place behind a Home Depot with strange growth of weeds and trees and earth. Burned and rotting hulks of long forgotten vessels slowly sink into the mud beneath the sluggish brown-green water. There is nothing left of some but the ribs and some scattered decking. There are also remnants of piers and bits of beautifully rusted metal. Listing permanently in the toxic mud is a small rotting submarine, a local celebrity left to die an undignified death among the sludge. It was once destined to help raise the Andrea Doria but an impatient crane operator lowered her prematurely into the water at her launch. She rolled over and her investors disappeared quicker than doughnuts at a Weight Watcher’s Anonymous meeting. You could almost hear the entire place give off a long haunted painful groan.

I wanted my pals to see all this natural beauty before the developers came in and “Disneyfied” it. I unsheathed my camera and began shooting what composed itself in my lens while the others began wondering why they were there. I tend to get lost in my work and ignore everyone else until the feeling passes. Could take hours. Thankfully, The Party Vikings are aware of this and put up with it. I snapped about 40 quick pics when Katie of the Rock began complaining that she had to pee and was wondering if Home Depot had a bathroom. Johnny, also in a state of urinary distress was prepared to relieve himself in the creek. “What? Like its drinkable water…” said he. Crazy Tracy simply sighed and muttered, “Here we go again, I’m going back to the car for a nap.” “Oh, come on, you guys, this place is awesome.” I pleaded. “It’s broken and alone, strangely quiet and left behind.” I said. “Oooh, a total vacation spot, “Johnny said, “ Too bad I didn’t bring the spf 30 and some swim trunks.”

I snapped a few pics of the ships lying half submerged and half on the sand of the shore. Just as we were beginning to make the usual “this is where they dump the bodies” jokes we saw something that sent a chill up my spine: in the distance, off to the side on the shoreline there was a rustling in the reeds. I ignored it at first but then after composing a few more shots with the zoom there was a distinct shape emerging from the thicket. A man in a cammo hoodie and pants appeared and was fumbling around the shoreline. He was making these awkward strained movements, slow and jerky hunched over as if he were trying to lift a heavy sack of flour. He was also fumbling with a fishing pole making very ungraceful cast offs into the shallow mucky water.

“What could he possibly be fishing for out here?” asked Johhny.

“Brains?” Replied Trace. She had a flair for the morbid.

“Ok, now I really have to pee.” said Katie Rock.

Johhny began to worry. “Um, what would that guy be doing all the way out here? There’s no fishing here. There’s nothing alive here.” I reassured them that it was probably just a homeless guy fishing for his supper. We should be respectful and leave him be.

We made our way around the shore by cutting across the inlet keeping the homeless guy to our left. He was in plain sight now though we could only see him from the waist up. The hood was up over his face so we saw no detail, not even skin color. His clothes were somewhat tattered and dirty. He was still struggling with something heavy and awkward. The hump to his back was more pronounced and he moved as if he was in great pain. He still hadn’t noticed us though we made no attempt to hide.

I was anxious to take advantage of the light and low tide to get some great shots of the wood and the metal. We buried ourselves in another area over grown with weeds, trees and cement refuse to get closer to the dead submarine. I was in my glory shooting streaks of rust on concrete, aging blackened wood slowly bleaching in the sun and the murky green water lapping at the old hulls. While I was snapping blissfully away I felt the tug of a hand on my jacket.

“What”?

“Um…” it was Katie. I had assumed she peed herself by now so I just kept at my work.

Another tug, another, “Um….” T’was Trace. I kept shooting, lost in the orange oxide streaking and gleaming in the golden sunlight.

*NOTE: STAR WARS REFERENCE COMING

A final tug and Johnny, “Um…that’s no moon…” Finally in a huff I drop my camera and turn. I see the three of them all facing left and staring wide and glassy. I follow their gaze and finish the sentiment, “…that’s a space station…”

The strange homeless guy was now wringing out what appeared to be a bloody t-shirt. He was grunting softly and struggling to squeeze out the thick liquid that dripped like maple syrup in December.

“Maybe we should go see if there’s a bathroom in Home Depot after all.” I said. We moved together closed tight like a single blood cell silently navigating through an atherosclerotic artery. We were about two thirds of the way to the car moving very slowly to avoid detection. I wanted to get a picture of the man who was now hunched over in the dirt and rocking back and forth with the t-shirt. I raised my camera.

Trace: Is there something wrong with you?

Johhny: Um, serial killers don’t like their pictures taken (in a hushed hiss).

Katie Rock: Dude, seriously.

I presented the evidence: the erratic movements, the strange posture, the groaning, the blood and the inability to see his face- because there was no face. We weren’t dealing with a homeless man but in fact, a member of the undead, a phantasm, a Zombie. Just as I finished, the flesh-hungry undead man suddenly stopped rocking and looked up as if he sniffed something on the air. My heart beat faster. He slowly turned his head to us, his face totally concealed by the hood. He rose and squared himself to us. The front of the hoodie and his pants were stained a wet looking black.

We gasped...

Katie spoke first in a hoarse whisper, “Well, I no longer need the bathroom.”

Johnny replied, “It’s okay, you can run faster now.”

“Romero or 28 Days?” Trace asked as she was tearing the flesh off my arm with her white-knuckle-death grip. She was referring to the type of Zombie. Would this be the slow lumbering kind made famous in George Romero’s Living Dead series or would this be the more terrifying Speed Zombie popularized in recent films like 28 Days? I had no answer. We began to move en masse toward safety. The Zombie followed with his body, took a few uneasy steps toward us... and suddenly charged.

Screaming like a bunch of teenage girls on prom night, we bolted for the car.

It's like I told you at the beginning; I’m never prepared for an encounter with the living dead. Never have a supply of salt or a shot gun. I do have a selection of heavy tools like hammers and drivers in the trunk of the car. All I had was my camera, some gum and a can-do attitude….

To Be Concluded...

This is only a test

2009-11-04T21:11:00.002-05:00

Messing with templates here. Can't seem to get the date to post....Hey, Joey, any thoughts?

Night of the Party Moms, An Accomplice: NY Adventure (First in a series)

2009-08-25T23:24:00.002-04:00

Standing on my particular corner of the urban theatrical experience that is Accomplice: New York, I’m waiting on a large group of women to come my way, the third group of the day. The neighborhood is busy, tourists are everywhere. It’s summer, hot humid and sticky. There is no breeze on the sidewalk under the scaffolding so I also have a nice sheen of sweat all over. I’m wearing faded jeans, work boots, a black tank top, the orange mesh worker vest and the yellow hard hat. In my opinion, I do not look like a burly construction dude, I am an homage to 70’s gay culture oiled up and ready for delivery.

The group gets to the corner across the street. I get into character, prepare to ignore them and throw them off the trail. As they cross the street I size them up. It’s important to figure out the nature of the group. You’d think everyone who pays for the experience would be in a good mood and want to play along but that isn’t always the case. Some are tired or hungry. Sometimes the groups don’t all get on well with each other. In any event, I have to decide how to play with them so they all have a good time.

One quick look says it all; Party Moms. Damn, why did it have to be party moms? The Suburban Party Mom is a class unto itself. They are the women who are usually stranded at home with kids in the summer and are pulling their hair out looking for an escape. They are out for a good time and quick to have a drinky drink and start dancing on tables. This far into the tour they have either had a drink or twelve, have to pee or are getting hungry. This makes them very lose and uninhibited. The husbands are congregating in someone’s garage or bar or boat doing suburban man things and so the moms, all hot and sweaty and whooping it up, are unchained and heading my way.
They get to the site, check it out for clues and facts like good little amateur detectives. They look around, toy with the lock on the gate and knock on the plywood to make sure it’s a real site. Then one spots me. I talk on the phone to whoever is in my mind at the time. Right now it’s Johnny Style and we’re talking about hot rods. With the other ear I listen for their progress.
“Maybe it’s this guy, he’s the only one standing around”, says one. “And who does construction on a Saturday?” offers another. “And what construction worker has a purple phone?”

NB: I happen to like purple. So what if my iPhone case is purple? Some of the coolest muscle cars of the era were painted Plum Crazy Purple. Very manly. Look it up.

They continue, “And look at his boots; they’re in too good of a shape to be real”. And then it all goes to a weird place: “Go ask if it’s him”. “Mmmm, look at his muscles, ask him to take off his shirt”. “Hell, ask him to take off every thing!” And soon I am surrounded by sweaty over sexed middle aged women who are now pawing at me like I’m choice sirloin slathered in A-1. One woman on my right with dyed red hair and massive jugs is running her hand up and down my arm telling me, not asking me if I’m the guy they’re supposed to meet. Another on my left is snuggling up to me feeling my meager musculature and a third is getting it all on film. They have decided in their wanton lust that I am the guy. Even if I’m not, I am the guy. A confirmatory pinch of my nipple though the flimsy shirt further stimulates their interest.

It should be noted here that some may find this a tad over the top. Some have said it’s not appropriate for people to grope the talent. Not me, baby. You throw me into a gaggle of horny drunk party moms who paid for the meat and I am ready for action. Who am I to shatter their fourth wall illusions?

I go though my routine in character, a 15 minute private comedy/improv show for the receptive group who collectively hoots and whoops as I pick on them individually. We exchange the necessary information and I start to wrap it up. They don’t want to leave because they are having so much fun disproving my previous though about being a gay icon. If they have fun, I have fun. I’m making them happy, my bosses happy and my ego happy. Win/win all around. Alas, though I love to please, I must send them on their oversexed way. We part with blown kisses, the odd grope to my posterior and a few flirtatious suggestions from the Moms. I’m wondering if I can count this collective moment as one more notch on my belt.

I am a wild party.

Pancakes With The Girls

2009-06-29T16:45:00.000-04:00

There was that last nerve I heard wind so tight that it went form a low C to a high A in just a few minutes. The commuters, the traffic and the lack of an actual client base that made a 12 hour day worth getting out of bed hung on the back of my head like an anvil. I hate summer. I find myself, “Busy doing nothing” to the degree that I don’t get anything productive done. The old Huey Lewis line, “all I want is a couple days off” springs wryly to mind as I wake up to another 4:55AM start.

A day off is something that I didn’t see coming anytime soon. That’s what you get for having a dream that takes it’s sweet time to materialize; day job, writing time, acting job, painting time. A full chaotic life with time left only to worry that it’s all for nothing. I stared at the calendar looking for the most convenient time to stage my own death so I can catch a break. I was then reminded with a blast of heralding trumpets that the Goils, Tracy and Katie, The Brain and The Rockette respectively, The Entourage collectively were spending the weekend in new Orleans for a bachelorette party. I would be really and totally ALONE. I almost fainted from the sheer weight of the bliss I felt at that moment. They would be up to their necks in plastic novelty penis necklaces and penis straws and other tasteful theme-correct garb while I would be doing…absolutely nothing. I would rejoice in the splendor of silence and nowhere to be, nothing to do, no hanging out till all hours, no late night or early mornings. No nothing but me, my computer and silence. And my usual work schedule which I could handle because I knew I was going to be totally pro active and productive…

I unloaded The Goils early Friday morning and planned my day; a long run, breakfast at the diner then three hours of writing followed by an hour of painting and reading some instructional materials then a nap. Repeat again over dinner and get to bed early so I can voluntarily wake up early for a run. That was the plan for each day of my weekend alone, compensating for work hours and standing on my corner for Accomplice.

There was the sound of seconds ticking by so fast that the fabric of spacetime buckled and twisted with a sucking sound and a vacuum-like pull on my nethers.

Before I knew it, I was on my way to Laguardia to return the entourage to its rightful place getting tangled under my feet wondering what happened to the last 72 hours. I know I went to work and to the Accomplice acting job. I know I checked my email a few times and watched a crappy movie on TV. I looked at my note book and found a doodle of a butterfly and a sandwich on a bun, pickle on the side. I looked at my computer files and found I typed approximately 50 words. 50 random unassociated words like Convoluted and Magic. And I did the dishes several times. No 7000 words, no paintings, no meditative rest or instructional reading. No runs or healthy eating as evidenced by a pile of take out Chinese cartons on the counter. No productivity to report other than a great deal of practice working on my Zombie acting skills for my as-of-yet-un-penned epic, Zombies From Brooklyn.

Now I was circling the airport mimicking the motions of the planes over head with a puzzled look on my face waiting for two wired and hungry women who couldn’t wait to shatter my peace with a weekend’s worth of Tales From the Bayou. In the distance there was an object hanging in the sky with an eerie self-generated illumination. It looked haunting and creepy set against the hazy foggy black/gray sky. I took a breath of relief at the thought that we could possibly be undergoing an alien invasion which would solve all my problems. My heart sank as I realized the alien space craft ready to turn all our brains to a pulpy mush was in actuality, the Met Life blimp set out to do roughly the same thing only slower.

They got in the car alight with story. The talking and the pictures and the retelling didn’t stop until midway into the next day. They got together and made a thousand pancakes in the morning speaking as if they didn’t need to draw breath. Meals had passed, errands had been run and time ticked slowly by as I heard both versions of the same tales over and over again. While they were droning on and on about oysters, humidity and a sweat so thick you could ladle it like soup I once again looked at my calendar for the most convenient time to stage my own death.

All I want is a couple days off….

Accomplice: New York

2009-04-20T21:22:00.003-04:00

This past weekend I started the new acting gig. I can best describe the project as part street theatre and part game/scavenger hunt. My job is to spend the day at a particular location waiting for groups to come through looking for their “contact”. I have to fool them, ignore them and mess with them a little and exchange information to send them on to their next destination. It’s like I get to do a bit of my old routines, try new material and play a character I have a free hand in experimenting with as long as I keep tight to the format.

I see about eight groups a day on Saturdays and Sundays. What this amounts to is that I do about 16 fifteen minute acts a week. This is more than I’ve ever done on stage as a stand up and the kick is that I’m actually getting paid to do it. At the end, the cast regroups at the final destination, a bar in SoHo, where we can meet the groups that stuck around to get loaded.

I happen to favor film as a career choice but at this point, I'll take any role I think I can do, especially if they’re willing to toss me some green paper. So I stand on my corner watching the locals watch me and wonder what the hell I’m doing there and why I carry on every 45 minutes or so with a bunch of strangers. I was told by the actor I’m replacing that I’d get to know the locals and the patterns of life on the corner. People have already started to notice the new guy and I’m noticing the regulars, too. There are a bunch of old timer’s who hang around all day, the psychic who sits on her front stoop and the handsome couple who thought I was tossing rats into the street one time. Don’t ask. I got to watch the NYPD tow a car away and later, I got to watch the couple from New Jersey stand impotently in the space wondering what happened. I let them hang a moment before telling them that they were too close to the hydrant so they got pinched. The guy started to argue that he left plenty of room until I reminded him that I was not a guy with a tow truck. As I stood there waiting for the next group, I was bumped into by Moby who looks like a little hipster douchebag up close.

The show is actually a bit of fun when the groups want to be entertained and it’s a real drag when they don’t. I can’t imagine shelling out good money for something and being intent on not enjoying it but there’s always one in every bunch that stands there with a face like it’s a big inconvenience. So I ignore those guys and focus on the audience that wants to be there.

If anything, I hope to have a lot of material based on the kinds of people who pass through. There were two Canadians I singled out for the purpose of telling them that the only things most Americans know about Canada are Rush and hockey. They laughed when I told them I thought Canada was a satellite of the old Soviet Republic somewhere south of Spain. Then there were the two German girls, one from Frankfurt, to whom I thanked for her town’s major contribution: The Frankfurter. The other was from Hamburg. So I said to the group, “You know what I’m gonna say here, right?” The group uttered something about hamburgers and I said, “No!, That’s where the Beatles got their big start, you amateurs!”

And so begins the new chapter On The Road To Hollywood, Vikings. Here comes that wind gust!

www.accomplicetheshow.com

Tommy

All I Wanted Was An Olive...

2009-04-12T13:52:00.002-04:00

After spending my umpteenth Friday night on the couch feeling sorry for my stagnant acting career I decided to hit the street, looking for action. Actually, I was invited to this swanky Korean place in Mid-Town by some friends and since my gun molls were invited first, I really couldn’t say no.

We ended up in one of those places that you see on TV that epitomize a scene you need to be part of and make you feel bad because all you’ve got in your town is an Applebee’s. Think trendy-bar- lounge nouveau- ethereal music-colored-swirly-lights-and seating-as-art vs. comfort. I knew I was about to pay too much to walk out hungry.

NOTE: You know me by now, I like my food like I like my women; cheap and in abundance. I don’t like places that serve items in tiny melon-baller sized portions on plates that double as hub caps for tractor trailers. I like my meals in heaping succulent portions that spill over the edges of the bowl like Scarlett Johansson’s breasts spill out over her bra while she’s on her period. And that side salad better be big enough to feed a gaggle of hungry rabbits. Maybe I like lettuce a little more than the next guy, you got a problem with that?

We sat on stools that were too high for a table that was too low and too far away. Cozy. The cute Asian waitress, one of several came by with the leather bound menus and passed them out as if she was handing out special tickets on the inaugural flight of tourists to the moon. One gander at the selections and I felt a spike in my pressure, however I was among people who were not aware of my subtle intricacies and my penchant for colorful complaint so I sat and played it cool. The drink selection, like buffet night in a dance club in Chelsea was packed with enough fruit to send a diabetic over the edge and the dinner menu looked as if the selections were created by an avant-garde designer instead of stuff made by a cook. I could get an appetizer for $15, an entrée for $10 (you figure that one out) and a drink for $15. As I opened my mouth to offer my opinion of the whole thing, I was intercepted by Angry Tray and Special K, the Belching Rockette who gently and knowingly reminded me that there was a special running, a sort of dinner Happy Hour; an entrée and a drink for ten bucks. My pressure resumed it’s normal high and I sat back in my stool.

A different cute Asian waitress, the one I decided I’d be sleeping with later came and took our drink orders. I bristled at what I was hearing; apple pear this and cranberry pomegranate that, Bill From Ohio Who Loves The City ordered a red wine to go with his suit. He had just finished his shift at that swanky hotel that doesn’t have vibrating beds. When it came to my turn I ordered something that was not on the drink menu, a simple dirty Martini. I apologized in advance for ordering a drink that clashed with the color scheme and waited for her to tell me they didn’t serve a relic of a drink like that, and come to think of it, they didn’t see fit to serve a relic like me at all.

A short time later, I was forced to watch grown men sip pink cocktails from trendy glasses and grown women coo at how wonderful everything tasted. My drink arrived looking like me, a little muddy and rough around the edges and came served with an apology from my future sleeping companion, “Um, I’m sorry but we have no olives…” I sunk in my trendy stool. “No olives? You’re a bar and you have no olives?” She looked a little sad and said, “Um, no we, um, ran out and have to get some from, um…” “The deli on the corner?” I offered. “No, um, downstairs.” “Ah,” I said, “In the olive cellar, a wise place to keep them. Retards spoilage.” I emphasized the word retard. She assured me it would be a few moments, no longer. I notified her that I would not take a sip until my olives arrived.

Drinks drained, plates came, my companions got drunk and my drink sat there untouched. My pressure rose incrementally as I was the only one at the party not having any fun. I stopped the cute waitress and said in more of a statement, “I’m not getting my olives am I, darling?” She looked at me as if she was surprised I didn’t buy her line about looking for olives in the cellar. “Oh, um, I’ll go check on that” and off she went to the next twelve tables without stopping at the bar. I watched staff come and go through the back door, return with food and on one instance a very large wad of cash for the deposit. Note to self: they’re careless with money, I can take these little skinny Asian guys. Still, no olives.

NOTE: Time has a funny way of moving in certain situations. When you’re dreading that IRS audit it sneaks up on you faster than the scope during your colonoscopy but when you’re waiting to tie one on with an inadequate aperitif staring you in the face you can hear the seconds tick by in cinematic echoing slow motion.
I sat and waited I composed a short list in my mind of travesties similar to olive-less martinis: a porn star without breast implants, a Ferrari without a stick shift, a politician without a dishonest thought, me without a fit of unmitigated hostility at having to compose such a list, etc…

ITEM: The following may or may not have happened; I need to confer with my lawyers before divulging sensitive information…

I stood with my naked drink and approached the bar with a smile. The bartender, a little Asian guy who looked annoyed that I was about to interrupt him looked at me. I placed the drink on the bar and asked him what he saw. “uh…” “I’ll save you the strain, friend. What you see here is a trendy glass built to hold fruity drinks aimed at assuring fruity people that, like their favorite Sex and the City character, they are making the scene so they can laugh at how many of them are a Carrie when they really wanted to be a Samantha and I’m speaking of the men. What you see is an old kind of drink made for guys like James Bond; cool and sophisticated, and guys like me; not cool, not sophisticated and easily angered when the small things that are supposed to make me happy suddenly become monumental problems with no conceivable solution. You don’t stock olives, I get that because an olive isn’t trendy. It doesn’t come in colors, it’s not made by a designer, it isn’t good looking, it isn’t followed by paparazzi and isn’t friends with The Donald, The Paris or any other douche who feels the need to precede their name with “The” as if it were a title conferring genuine individuality….it is a simple and humble little fruit grown on a tree but it makes me very happy, makes this little old drink taste so much better and I really really want one. Now. I don’t want a replacement. I don’t want a drink that is pink, light blue or light green. I don’t want a drink that comes in a work of art, I don’t want a drink with a clever name, was featured on TV or Time Out magazine or one that you made for a celebrity. Right now, I’m the celebrity, I’m a very impatient and tempestuous little brat of a movie star and Daddy wants his olives so I don’t care if you have to go to the store on the corner, get them from the olive cellar or go the bar across the street to pluck them out of somebody’s drink and plop them in mine, I want a freaking olive.” By this time I was sweating and a mere few centimeters from his nose. He stared, eyes wide and said in one word, “I’llseewhatIcando…” and slid away.

I rejoined my group who asked what had transpired, “Nothing, I asked how much for the waitress”. Everybody ate and rounded out the corners with their drinks when I was greeted by the cute waitress who placed a tumbler on the table containing three very large olives on a tooth pick. I was grateful. She smiled. I installed them in my drink with minimal effort and began imbibing. It was a strong tight and salty concoction, one that I was craving and enjoying very much. I raised my glass to the bartender who nervously smiled back. I passed the drink around and found no surprise in the disapproval of all including Bill From Ohio Who Loves This City who coughed, “Who drinks that?” “Guys like James Bond and guys like me, just ask the bartender…” I replied with that slightly fuzzy smile. The gun molls both agreed it was a strong but good drink and Special K, feeling her first fruity concoction ordered a Mojito and offered to buy Yours Truly another. I took her up on it and was happy to see it arrive with olives already installed.

The evening passed without further incident. Your Humble Servant began enjoying the atmosphere, the conversation and thoughts of the little waitress holding a jar of olives and nothing else. Ah, the little things….

Scene...

2009-02-17T09:49:00.001-05:00

Somewhere in a better land there is a perfect scene playing out. There is music playing the outro to the whole movie. I see it clearly but that still doesn’t make it real. I can’t really tell but I hope it’s real…somewhere. I see a bunch of people on a beach because the beach is the end of the world to me, the place where we all yearn to be, by the ocean where all seems limitless and infinitely possible. It is where all the sunny beautiful things happen.

We all make it there alive, all of us, no one left behind, no one lost on the battlefield. Everybody gets the girl, eats the sammich, and scores the winning touchdown in the last seconds. It is a warm human night. The old cars pull up, rumbling muscle thunder under flat black painted hoods, the girls in bikinis dance, the muscle heads flex, the troubadours sing and bop.

Even the bad guys join us because it is so much groovier to sing and dance and eat and drink and smile. Everything is perfect after the long struggle. I see friends long gone, pain long abated. I see my father in his jean jacket next to his Mustang. He gives me a wave and a smile and he sings to the outro song off key. There’s a band playing. It could be any year, anywhere and all is finally well – for a little while. There’s a melody and a harmony and song. There is no more fight, no more struggle, no more long days. The moment is light and blissful.

As the outro song fades, the camera pulls up and back to show the beach alive with people, the water reflecting the orange setting sun, the sky all firey purple and the sun setting so slowly over it all. The cars rumble on the dunes with their lights on, the kids lying on the hoods staring dreamily at the oncoming night sky. All is really and truly well.

The scene plays over and over in my head and lifts me a little because I am somewhere in the crowd with a drink thrust in my hand and my beat up shoes in the other.

As the image fades we all dance and sing together. You win, you get the girl….you get the idea. Use any song you like for your outro to close your movie, it doesn’t make sense to tell you mine, that’s just for me.

Roll credits…

A Little Bit of Happiness

2008-12-24T16:21:00.001-05:00

This season has been particularly uncheerful for me. There are a variety of reasons, glum, adding up to me silently wishing it would all be over. There were parties we were invited to, didn't go. There's a stack of cards unattended to and shopping that never got done. I missed most of the specials on TV and even the annual barrage of yuletide tunes that I usually find so festive seemed more of an annoyance. I just don't care.

Now today, Christmas Eve has blasted through the door like a big fat entitled uninvited guest and I'm trying to hide in the closet. I certainly didn't think I'd find a hope of Christmas Eve salvation. I dropped Trace off at the fish store for dinner stuff and stood outside in the cold and the rain. The line was out the door. We were in Bensonhurst, where I am from. I only live a short distance away but I rarely get back here. None of my friends are still here, my father is gone and most of the places I spent my life in were long gone too. As I stood on the corner I remembered my Bensonhurst, a place so close to my heart that it beats with a Brooklyn accent. I love this place for it made me what I am mostly. As I looked up the avenue I saw the music store where I spent many many weekend days learning to play drums and guitar and worshipping the older kids who got to go to clubs and concerts. We'd sit in the store all day and I'd listen to the owner's son play guitar and tell tales of being in bands and going to shows. I learned so much of my humor, my love of music and my want to play anything that makes sound from those precious days. All the metal heads would stop by and some touring celebrities would come in for strings and things when they came through. I have many cherished memories dating back 27 years to that tiny building in that old Italian neighborhood.

I smiled to myself, hungry for something I couldn't find anywhere else and began walking toward the store. I stepped through the door and there were the owner, Big Mike and his son, Little Mike still stringing guitars, still arguing, still telling jokes and throwing things. The store hadn't changed much; there were guitars and drums and things all over the place. The employees were usually friends of the family in a constantly rotating cast. There was a six foot hero in plastic wrap on a row of amplifiers and a hungry looking group hovering. Mike looked up and recognized me with a huge smile. We hugged and laughed and told a few quick one liners and I felt tension melt, I felt home. There was always a stool by the counter for anyone to sit and hang out. I sat and made myself at comfy. Soon we were telling stories of old mobsters, actors, musicians and friends long dead. There was the ongoing argument started in 1984 about what an over rated guitarist jimmy page was. Stairway to Heaven was on and when the guitar solo came on, Fat Sal came sliding into the room and frantically picked up a guitar off the rack and played note for note in tune. He disappeared just as fast after the song ended. I looked around and felt so full of life and so full of memories that I just sat teary and for the first time in weeks I laughed hard.

Mike looked over and said, "Hey, Tommy, you remind me so much of your father, may he rest in peace. He was a good man." I asked, "Really?" "Oh yeah, you sound just like him, look just like him and that's good because you'll always keep him with you."

I really miss my father.

I went and saw The Old Man behind his desk, we smiles and shook hands warmly and spoke Italian, what little I still can. I really need to relearn.

For a brief time, I was home, in my old neighborhood. It was like the old days, my father would come bursting in the room any minute. We'd drink wine and tell more stories and laugh and cry and fight until it was time to go home.

You remember this song:

There are places I remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places had their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I've loved them all

But of all these friends and lovers
There is no one compares with you
And these memories lose their meaning
When I think of love as something new
Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more

Though I know I'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I'll often stop and think about them
In my life I love you more
In my life I love you more

Soon it was my time to head back out in the rain and the gloom but I was warmed now by tender reminiscence. Before I left, Mike bellowed to me from across the room, "Hey, Tommy, you can't leave without taking a piece of sandwich!" We unwrapped the giant hero and he tossed me a couple of pieces. Turkey, ham, roast beef, American cheese and a bit of antipasto spread for those wondering. "You should come by more" he growled in his thick Bensonhurst accent. I missed that, too. We hugged our Merry Christmases and I walked down the avenue eating my sammich. For the first time all season, I was happy.

So, to those I know and love both near and far, a Happy Christmas to you and those you keep close. May the season's warm embrace keep you comfy.

New York City: $103.50, Tom: $0.00

2008-12-07T14:15:00.001-05:00

You know those days when you are so hungry that you find yourself doubled over in a kind of nauseating pain. It's the kind of pain that defies logic because you feel like you want to vomit but your stomach is quite empty. That's what I was walking around with all morning yesterday. It made me irritable, impatient and prone to fits of uncomfortable singing…

I had a job downtown that would permit me just enough time to grab a roll-o-sushi at one of those Asian Everything markets near Union Square and eat it on the train back up to work. I was so hungry that this little rolled up bit of rice, avocado and imitation crabmeat looked like a Porterhouse steak. I couldn't wait to get this hot little number alone.

NOTE: As a cheap date, I am equal to none.

I happily skipped up Broadway toward Union Square like a ten year old who just got kissed by the cute girl who started growing breasts. As I passed Forbidden Planet, a popular comic store, my eye caught a few goodies in the window. This being the season, I figured I'd start on my list.

Q: Do I look like a thief to you? Do I look like the kind of guy who would pilfer Geek Porn? I was stopped by the hipster slacker security force-of-one who insisted I check my bag at the door. I like to be cooperative but when it comes to strangers handling my food, I get a bit touchy. I gave in because I wanted to see if they had that new Kirk action figure rumored to be in residence but I did so under protest. I made my list and proceeded to reclaim my lunch, hang on baby, papa's comin'.

Here's where it gets good. I should have grabbed the bag by the handles but in my haste I just palmed it from the bottom like I was holding a stack of books secretly greased with butter. As I made for the door the phone rang. With my free hand I answer and press my shoulder to the door - which doesn't move.

SLOW MOTION HOLLYWOOD EFFECT: The door doesn't move, I slam and collapse into it like a crumpling piece of paper, the phone snaps shut in my face and my precious lunch goes momentarily airborne and slams into the grimy wood floor.

MY GOD, THEY LOOK LIKE ANTS IN SNOW CAMMO FROM UP HERE! Um, no, that's lots of rice on the floor, Captain. And little bits of imitation crab. I glared at the slouchy bag check guy who turned so fast you'd think a parade of naked Rockettes kicked on by.

I was now furious. Blood-in-my-eye-want-a-human-sacrifice-they-cancelled-Star-Trek-again furious. Now, I can take a lot of things, suffer many indignities, deal with many a personal injustice but I can not take someone messing with my food. I drew my umbrella, ready for blood but since there were children around composed myself. I had no choice but to leave. So I did. And I left the mess for them. I continued up Broadway with my stomach in a knot. I was hungry and out $3.50. I hate that. Two things I hate most; wasting food and wasting money. And reality TV. The phone rings again, it's Trace. I'm straining to hear her through the stuttering signal. All I hear is bits of digital flotsam; "I'm….bip…leep…bop…hayep…you." I think she's at the subway – or ordering a subway, or ran into Hemmingway. I try to tell her lunch is waiting for her in Forbidden Planet's new cafeteria but she can't hear me either. In the middle of New York City in the United States of America in the year 2008, I am on a piece of crappy technology that can't keep it up long enough for me to get directions. I was so intensely concentrating on listening that I failed to notice that I was standing in the middle of 14^th street – against the light. I looked up to see the front end of a bus growing larger in my field of vision. Just as I was about to scream into the phone for help I heard the distinct chime that says, "Call dropped" . "Beedlyeoop."

THE SCENE: Me, hunched and wide eyed in the middle of the street clutching a dead phone, bus bearing down on me, furious, confused and hungry…..

Knowing I was about to die under the wheels of the MTA's finest, knowing ATT would have the last word in my private little war with cellular technology, I decided on one final act of rebellion; I grabbed the little black flip phone by both ends and just as I was about to rip and tear, I heard that voice once again over my shoulder, "You know if you do that you will have to replace it and you'll be out a cool hundred for this one and who knows how much for the next. Just be patient. And get out of the street." Yes, cooler heads. I loosened my grip on the phone I heard that other voice out of nowhere, dark and ominous: "DO IT, DO IT NOW!!!!" and I tore the little phone in half and screamed, "LOOK AT YOU NOW, BITCH!!!!! YOU LIKE THAT?? HUH? HUH? HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!!" And I dodged victoriously out of the way of traffic and to the station.

As my elevated pressure returned to more suitable atmospheric conditions I stopped laughing long enough to realize just how much 6 little pieces of rice and crab cost me…..

And what are you having for lunch?

Tommy.

The Night of It All Happened Before 9AM

2008-11-23T22:16:00.001-05:00

The alarm snapped to attention happy to be useful. The cheery sounds of the morning jock on the classical station mellifluously filled the silence with announcements I was too comatose to decipher. I reached for the off button and rolled out of bed onto the floor in a tangle of blankets and previously sleeping, currently alarmed feline. It was the usual beginning to another work day. 4:59, awake and standing at the window wondering where I had gone wrong on my quest for a job that didn't require waking up at any particular time.

In the shower there's nothing more exhilarating than water the temperature of November mornings at 5AM to give the testicles a little wake up jolt. Forgot to put the coffee up, forgot to eat and forgot to leave on time. Traffic, never seeming to be anything less than an orgy of metal and plastic, piled in front of us and made short work of being early. We decided to take the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel because it's quicker than sticking to the roads and proceeded to make yet another mistake. We raced into the tube and promptly came to a halt.

THOUGHT: You know that feeling you get when you swallow too much food and when you finally take a drink to wash it down it feels like a clenched fist shoving it's way though your esophagus?

We didn't find out until the other end of the tunnel that there were two closed lanes because of construction. Predictably, we arrived late to the first appointment. I got to Big Mike's ten minutes late to find he didn't get my text that I'd be ten minutes late. He's outside, warmed up and ready. He'd like to work out outside today.

TEMP: 30 degrees. Me: Jeans, t-shirt, forgot gloves, hat, scarf and armor plated underwear with special crotch-mounted heating unit.

We ran and pranced and lifted and grunted and sweated as much as two straight guys can in a courtyard in November at 7:30AM. We finished up at 8:15 which left me 15 minutes to get to my next charge who lives at least 25 minutes away in morning traffic. Looking forward to feeling my fingers and toes again I ran to the car, turned the key and heard that straining choking sound that reminds me of getting stuck somewhere in the cold with a dead battery. That's because I was stuck out in the cold with a dead battery. I reached in the glove box for my trusty AAA card to discover that we no longer employed the services of AAA because we leased a new car last year. What could happen?

TIP: Never let your AAA lapse because even though you leased a new car you still have the same old brain that occasionally does things like forgets to turn the headlights off when you disappear for an hour.

Cold, late and stranded, I did the only thing I could do: I stood in the street with one end of the jumper cables attached to the battery and the other end slung over my shoulder with my foot on the bumper, arms akimbo; the Universal Sign for Motorist In Distress. Fifteen minutes later not a single soul stopped to help. In the middle of Manhattan, not a single person bothered. So I asked a few people. Collected responses here for you review: Too busy, My boss just called me, I'm late, My battery is on the other side of the car, You look like a stalker, How do I know those are real jumper cables?

TONE SHIFT IN 3…2…1…

It was at this point, all became surreal. As I was standing there in the Universal Motorist In Distress position, I noticed a large crowd of gaping shocked onlookers looking upon me. Puzzled, I thought to check on my fly. As I began to slowly gander down to check I noticed they weren't looking at me but slightly over my left shoulder. I turned to look and found that a bald man wearing shredded jeans, a torn leather coat and a t shirt was staring at me a mere foot or two from my face. Did I mention he was covered in blood? I could see no open wounds like slash marks but he was definitely in some kind of scuffle. There was blood coming from cuts on his cheeks and nose. There was blood on his shirt and jacket. There was blood on his bald head. There was blood on his hands and wallet, which he was holding and riffling through as if he were looking for a condom. People approached and suggested he wait for the police or go to the hospital a block away. He was dazed but responsive as he shook his head "no" and staggered off down the street. Trace, in a bit of a shock said to me, "Holy Mazzola, did you see that guy?" "The guy a foot from my face covered in blood and tattered clothing? No, hadn't noticed." I replied. The crowd followed the unfortunate soul down the street leaving me to my frozen nuts and rigid cables.

Finally, to my great relief, one of the building staff where I was came out and said, "Hey, what happened?" I said that I must have left the lights on and the battery was dead. "No," he said, "I mean with that guy?" I blinked. "What guy?"

We were connecting the cables to his car when the block erupted into a cheesy 70's cop show. No less than three squad cars, sirens-a-blarin' came up the street the wrong way and fishtailed to a stop. The cops hit the street, ready for action. I told them the guy they were looking for was about three blocks away by now. The twitchy officer holding his holster was looking around for a suspect that was no longer. I yelled over, "The guy you're looking for is about three blocks away, you can't miss him." "What did he look like?" "Bald, white, leather jacket, denim jeans. Oh and he's probably the only guy walking down the street covered in blood." Just as quickly, they tore back up the street in reverse, fishtailed forward and sped off, late-coming ambulance right behind.

After a quick charge, the car started and we were almost on our way. The door man came out and asked, "Hey, man, what happened"? "Oh, I must have left the lights on and the battery died." "No, I mean with that guy?" I blinked. "What guy?"

The rest of the morning was full of traffic, missed appointments, double parking and a gas gauge teetering just below "E". On the FDR Drive, southbound toward Brooklyn and home, the car coughed and sputtered. We looked at each other, brows a-raised…

All this before the hour of 9AM……

The Night of the Rainy Afternoon

2008-11-19T15:34:00.001-05:00

The rain was falling cool and crisp and the people were running and fleeing it's baptismal embrace. I was loving the solitary communion with the City of my birth. I was standing in a doorway taking a drag on one of Johnny's older clove cigarettes letting the rain paste my balding scalp with cool drops like little kisses from the sky. I watched the urban socialites with the pulled back plastic faces twisted into permanent smile grimaces running for cabs all flustered and upset. I watched the suits darting between cars and cabs trying to shove their expanding bellies between the raindrops and I watched the delivery guys and construction workers just shrug it all off as another day in the trench. I loved this day and sent a thank you heaven-ward for such a blessing.

It was then that the entertainment got much better.

People shuffled by with their umbrellas like they were in their own personal cones of silence. They looked down trying to avoid contact with each other, trying not to get wet and looking like wet rodents, miserable and cold and lonely. It is the rare sight of a smiling face peering from under the silk and nylon and plastic to the street ahead or to the sky above. Rarer still is the happy soul found splishing though the puddles in a carefree fashion. Usually, they just drone on in miserable silence counting the seconds until they get to their destination so they can complain about the rain. Silly stuff is man made of.

As random luck would have it, I was present on this day when one person passed another person and the tops of the umbrellas collided. The water cascaded down onto the people underneath breaking the zombie drone and snapping them back to life with a snarl instead of being grateful for contact with another living being . It was a, "Hey you got your chocolate in my peanut butter" moment but without the joy that comes with discovering a new and tasty confection. They saw it as an infringement on their personal space. Action was demanded, retribution was at hand. Suddenly the two squared off, umbrellas were drawn tight like rapiers and they engaged, attacked, dodged, feinted, parried and all that other swashbuckler sword fighting stuff.. They chased each other around the street, swiping at one another and shouting things like, "Take that, you fool," and "So you theenk you can defeat me? Well taste my steel!"

As if by chaotic osmosis, others got caught up in the fray and soon the sound of umbrellas snapping shut was all around me. Wet pedestrians spilled out onto the street dueling like pirates in an Errol Flynn movie. In the stores, people were fighting with their umbrellas in the shortened position like little black nylon daggers. I saw the traditional table jump/swipe/cut the candles Hollywood-style in the little diner who's doorway I was occupying. Only the candles were rows of cakes and pies on the counter plus the occasional coffee cup that didn't slice neatly at the touch of an umbrella but rather, clattered across the counter into the lap of a priest who jumped up and shouted, "DAMN YOU!!! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!!" and joined in with not one but two umbrella daggers. Back in the street people were jumping onto the hoods of taxis, kicking over those metal pretzel carts, using old ladies as shields and hurling grapes and apples from the fruit stands. It was a pirate paradise, a swashbuckler's symphony, an umbrella maker's wet dream. Right in front of me two combatants were pounding their rather expensive looking designer umbrellas until they were nothing but tattered fabric and ugly bent metal. People were shouting, umbrellas were clanging together and people were rolling in the wet street. All the while I stood in my doorway puffing the clove and praying that the rain would never stop.

The Night Of The Day We Got Thrown Out Of Church

2008-11-03T22:03:00.001-05:00

PROLOGUE:

Are you one of those people who wishes they had a camera built into their head so you never miss those one-in-a-zillion shots? I happen to be one of those. I learned after missing sunsets, cloudbursts and one instance of two girls making out in Times Square to always have my camera handy. Now I am always ready for what Fate throws at me, photographically speaking. I mean, if Fate decided to send those two amorous girls my way I'd have to be well stocked of chocolate pudding and condoms but I have only so many pockets.

We were walking up Broadway in the Village the other day passing Grace Church, a beautiful turn-o-the-century gothic number that I would love to move into as a primary residence. The only problem with that is it's still a church. It's spooky, awesome, inspiring and grand all in one breath. As always, I snap a few shots so that when I'm rich and famous I can show the architect what kind of house I want built. Take a look for yourselves here http://www.gracechurchnyc.org/toura.htm As I was snapping away Trace noticed a sign that read:

BACH AT NOON

(which I initially took to mean they were at a late breakfast)

Daily Organ Meditations

Tuesday through Friday from 12:30 to 12:45 o'clock

Tuesday September 9 2008

through

Friday May 22 2009

featuring

The Organ Works of Johann Sebastian Bach

Grace Church is open for meditation beginning at

noon on the days of these offerings. The organ

programs are offered informally as part of this

opportunity for reflection at the middle of the day.

CURRENT TIME: 12:17. Groovy. After making sure there was no cover charge we stepped into the massive old structure and strode slowly down the center aisle. As you can see by the pictures, it is a huge space and it had that church smell to it which always reminds me of silence and meditation, and getting smacked by the nuns in Catholic school. We sat ourselves off to the left and begin to notice other people seated around us, all silent and contemplative. Some were even praying. Here were locals deep in communion as a well as a few tourists respectfully looking around.

Suddenly the massive room was filled with the thunder of pipes as Bach began to play. I mean, it wasn't actually Bach, I think he's dead. It seemed to be prerecorded and coming from everywhere. We were struck with how beautiful everything was; the sound, the smell, the stained glass windows and the vaults and arches and buttresses. Totally stunning. I need to get a few pictures because this is just too cool.

OBSTACLE: My little camera has a setting where you can assign sounds to the various functions. For instance, the snapping of the shutter can be made to sound like, well, the snapping of the shutter. There are also other sounds that I happen to favor that are a little unexpected. Because I like a little whimsy in my life, I have set every function to a sound; the power on, focus, shutter, download, setting adjustments, everything. My camera does not go "click, zzzzzt" like your camera, it goes, in particular order, "SPROING, SPLOOP, FIZZOOO, BLIP, BOIIIIIIIIOOOOIIIOOIIONG, POP, AHUGAHHHH, SPLIP, A SPACESHIP TAKING OFF SOUND, RIBBET-RIBBET, and MOOOO". All at high volume.

Trace saw that I produced the camera and she pointed to a few things, "Get that and that and that", said she. I'm snapping away while Bach is shaking the mortar to powder. I shot the stained glass and the organ pipes and even a few of Trace looking sufficiently humbled. I was crazily snapping shot after shot of the ancient structure and the music only fueled my frenzy. I was The Phantom of the Casio 8.1 Megapixel. People were looking but were unsure of what I was doing because I am a Stealth Machine. I shot under my arm, over my shoulder, from down low in my lap. I got the ceiling, the vaults, the cracked plaster and the wood work. I got the old corner stones that were dated from 1912 and the giant wooden pulpit. I turn for a moment and see Tray wide eyed and pinpoint pupiled and suddenly I'm pulled back to reality; the organ music had stopped some time ago and the only sound filling the massive silent space was, "SPROING, SPLOOP, FIZZOOO, BLIP, BOIIIIIIIIOOOOIIIOOIIONG, POP, AHUGAHHHH, SPLIP, A SPACESHIP TAKING OFF SOUND, RIBBET-RIBBET, and MOOOO". All at high volume.

It was then that I noticed the worshippers and tourists looking at us like a pack of brain-hungry Zombies alerted to our presence. It was silent. Dead silent. We looked at them. They looked at us. There was no motion, no sound, only the occasional groan of old settling building. My hand tensed, RIBBET-RIBBET. I turned to Trace who seethed between clenched teeth, "We. Must. Get. Out. Of here." and we slowly stood and made for the aisle and the massive front doors that led to freedom and safety. I attempted to shut the camera by blindly hitting any button until I found the off switch. "SPROING, SPLOOP, FIZZOOO, BLIP, BOIIIIIIIIOOOOIIIOOIIONG, POP, AHUGAHHHH, SPLIP, A SPACESHIP TAKING OFF SOUND, RIBBET-RIBBET, and MOOOO". All at high volume.

We barely escaped with our lives…

I Am A Sexy Chocolate

2008-10-26T16:08:00.001-04:00

We needed a new box of tea for the house so we went to a fancy specialty shop spelled shoppe that sells exotic tea and also happens to be an equally fancy chocolatier which is apparently French for place you get snooty versions of that candy bar you used to get at a corner candy store. Now, I see myself as a regular old school Brooklyn guy. I like my coffee in a paper cup for .75 cents from the diner and if I get an itch for chocolate, I reach for a Hershey's Kiss. I'm not a connoisseur of anything except Star Trek merchandise and excuses as to why I have no acting career so the whole multilevel appreciation of foods and wines is lost on me. I'll drink vinegar and love it if you tell me it's supposed to taste that way but there was something seductive about this place so we ventured in with the caveat that we would not be taken by hoity toity candies.

As soon as we crossed the threshold (which is French for ordinary-doorways-are-for-cheap-corner-candy-stores ) into chocolate heaven we were hit with the scent of chocolate tinged with exotic spice. It was intoxicating. There were literally miles of shelves and displays offering chocolate from different parts of the world from South America to the South Bronx. There were different flavors and tones and hues; chocolate with fruit, chocolate with spices, chocolate with nuts and chocolate with all kinds of combinations of all of these. I never knew you could do so much with a simple candy. Ah, and therein lies the rub, Rube, chocolate, as it turns out, is not so simple a thing. A lot goes into making a quality confection. So much so that it gets pricey. Ever think you'd see a chocolate bar go for $15 American dollars? Me neither but they had several varieties.

Off to one side there was a special counter like you see at the deli but instead of acres of processed meats that serve as the basis for many a great sammich there were chocolates in every configuration. There were drops and cubes and chunks and blobs and bloobs and circles and stars. There were different colors and decorations on each for the different flavors. I was amazed and slowly being lured in by the siren song of cocoa. Along the walls and on the shelves the bars and blocks and drops and powders were all packaged in designer wrappers. Some were stark art-house black and others were colored according to ingredients or country of origin. It was all so…….sexy. I was becoming a chocoholic right here in front of the Raspberry Almond Indian coco blend. I wanted to feel this sexy.

I was slack jawed, drooling and sticking to the front of the glass counter when head popped up from behind it. Attached to the head was a curvy exotic chubby girl whose nametag read Dorothea who asked if I would like a sample. Now, normally, I would turn that into some kind of innuendo thing by responding with something clever like, "Hey baby, as long as it ain't a sperm sample" but I was too busy trying to unstuck myself from the glass so my response sounded more like, "Eth pleath, I'd ike a thample, Dodothea."

The lights suddenly dimmed and time slowed and I could have sworn I heard hypnotic music from somewhere. Seven minutes later I was in the midst of a chocolate orgy and on one of everything. My chocolate goddess lustily handed morsel after morsel over the counter to my waiting mouth and I hungrily and greedily accepted it all with no pressure to buy. I was soon lying on the counter in a cold sweat with my waist expanding obscenely. I wondered how much I could take before I'd be vomiting exotic confections all over the designer counter. No matter, my mouth was hanging open and Dorothea was stuffing me like a Thanksgiving turkey, a sexy chocolate Thanksgiving turkey. I could taste the paprika and pepper on her finger tips and it made me swoon. She took one of the white peppercorn cayenne squares in her teeth, unbuttoned her blouse to the top of her breasts and leaned over to feed me just as a customer walked by aghast and covering the eyes of her impressionable child.

I was beginning to feel sexy.

I was close now, I could feel it. If she moved too quickly I'd blow my cookies right there. Through her subtle sexy accent she whispered, "Hold it right there, baby, hold it there for me and take it, yes…" and she slid me a square of cherry hazelnut from Morocco. That was all I could take, I pulsed and quivered and jumped off the counter to keep from actually throwing up all the chocolate that my little confection stuffed me with. I hit the ground doubled over wondering I'd be able to make it to the door when suddenly Trace appeared equally doubled over. It seems that on the other side of the store there was another counter and another sexy sample person named Xavier. He also had an accent and offered no pressure to buy. She too was seduced by the dark side of milk chocolate. She too wanted to be sexy.

We composed ourselves and emptied our pockets to pool our cash. We walked out with a bar of Belgian milk chocolate with grilled almonds and I came away with a bar of cherries and almonds in dark chocolate. We needed the credit card.

God, I am so….sexy.