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Monday,
September 1 and Labor Day. Bryan takes his parents
uptown; they spend the next five hours shopping at Macy’s and other stores,
while he goes to work at HSBC.
Yes, they took this picture from the top of the Empire
State Building.
In
the evening, we walk to the West Village and John’s
Pizzeria. Yes, and in the very same
booth where Doug Hadden and I overheard Woody Allen and Marshall
Brickman work out the premise for Annie Hall. We have
a pitcher of Red Hook, and two small pizzas — a plain, and a mushroom and
onion. The total is $50, with $10 tip.
| Celebrity sightings: On the walk back to Veniero’s for pastry, we pass a Third Watch television shoot. Bryan stopped at Phoenix, and saw Kelly Osbourne and her posse. |
Tuesday, September 2 and we drive with his family to New Jersey, and visit crafts and golf stores on Route 22. Lunch with my mother and father at noon.
We
have tickets to see the Milwaukee Braves vs. the Mets at Shea Stadium,
but I also have my first class of the fall semester – Trade & General
Book Publishing – so they must go alone. Luckily for them, the
rain stops enough to see the game (Mets won 3–1), and I truly enjoy my
first class.
When I return from class, I stop for two bottles of wine; one is a 2000 Beaulieu Vineyards Coastal Merlot for $10 which is just scrumptious, and the other is a 2002 Ruffino Lumina pinot grigio, which Bryan declares merely drinkable. He then grills some cheeseburgers, which we have with white corn from Dreyer’s Farm.
Wednesday,
September 3 and they go to J&R
Music World and Century
21 in the morning. More poignantly, they enter Saint
Paul’s Chapel, the church that stood while the World Trade Center
collapsed behind it.
My friend, the Rev. Lyndon Harris was working there at the time. This is a picture of him, along with the former Archbishop of Cantebury, Dr. George Carey, and the current Presiding Bishop of the United States, Frank T. Griswold.
I
meet them at the Federal
Hall National Memorial (George Washington inaugurated as President
on April 30, 1789), pass the NY Stock Exchange (covered with the
flag in my picture), and Fraunces
Tavern (George Washington delivered his farewell address to his Revolutionary
War officers there in 1783).
| We
are supposed to be having a large group for dinner at Carmine’s,
but no one can make it, so it’s East
Post instead. This is real
Italian food.
I have an appetizer of bresaola, and Bryan the tricolor salad; entrées are the lasagna for Pam, green fetuccine Bolognese for me, and the fusilli with eggplant and mozzarella for Bryan and Lee. Yum, yum. Along with two pair of martinis and a glass of sangria, the total is $93, tip brings it to $116. |
Thursday,
September 4 and we take the subway to Bowling Green, and
walk
to Castle Clinton
— not really a castle,
but a fort in the
Battery — where we take the the ferry.
This whole area has changed over the last 300 years, as landfill has increased the acreage of lower Manhattan. But this building, in particular, has had its share of alterations, including once housing the New York Aquarium!
Our
destination is Ellis
Island, and our lady of the harbor — the Statue of Liberty.
It would have been nice to have blazingly beautiful weather, but that was
not to be.
Do you notice anything special about the picture below? Exactly. When they were here two years ago, this picture would have featured the World Trade Center behind Bryan, Pam and Lee.
By noon, we are ready to eat. Instead of heading back to the apartment, we take the subway to midtown; our next stop is our normal lunch diner. Hey, we have to show them all the hot spots!
It’s
almost the end of their trip, so it’s Mexican for dinner at El
Cantinero; we had eaten there the last
time they were in town.
There is a back patio which used to allow smoking, but that’s stopped. The other difference is a “patio menu” — when I asked the difference, the waiter replied, “less things.” OK. The food there is decent but nothing to write home about, although the margaritas put us all in a good mood.
Well, except for Lee who doesn’t drink, but he’s always in a good mood! We stop at Tower Records on the way back for Billie Holliday cds for Pam, and prison music for Lee.
Friday,
September 5 and Lee and I are the first ones up, which suits Pam
and Bryan just fine. Lee wants another bag to carry things home,
so we go down to Orchard
Street. One has to bargain down there, and Lee proves himself
a true New Yorker when he gets the bag down from $20 to $15, and without
the tax. Bravo!
After a quick change at home, we’re out by noon and on the way to Times Square via subway. There are many stops to be made, including the NY Yankees store, Sanrio, and the new Quiksilver Boardriders Club store.
Then
it’s a long walk up Sixth Avenue to Central
Park, which is celebrating its 150th
anniversary. We eat sandwiches at the chess stand, before seeing
the Alice in Wonderland statue.
At The Dairy (the visitor center and gift shop for the Central Park Conservancy), Bryan buys a limited edition shirt designed by Robert Rauschenberg featuring pictures of activities in the park; it is truly fabulous and the $35 goes to benefit the conservancy.
Our
next stop is the Metropolitan
Museum of Art. First, the American Decorative Arts wing,
with its fabulous Frank Lloyd Wright living room and Louis Comfort Tiffany
windows. Roy Lichtenstein on the Roof is, well, On
the Roof, a sculpture
by Roy
Lichtenstein. We also visit the Temple of Dendor as well as cruising
through some other parts before leaving.
We pass Strawberry Fields
(two acres of the park dedicated as an international garden of peace) and
the Dakota, remembering John Lennon, before hopping the subway at 72nd
Street to 14th Street
for more bargain shopping and a walk home. We’re at the apartment
for an hour or so before splitting into pairs for dinner.
| Pam
and Bryan go for a mother and son dinner at Pangea,
while Lee and I head off to St. Mark’s Place for more hats and dinner.
I’m open to anything, and it seems like fish is Lee’s answer to “where”
— that being Barracuda,
where Bryan and I had had some unusual experiences.
But tonight the dinner is fine, with a very good glass of Merlot for me, along with Kiwi mussels baked with tequila and cream. Our entrées are shrimp surrounding garlic mashed potatoes for Lee, and the same crabmeat jambalaya that I’ve had each time before. We join Bryan and his mother, who are finishing drinks and then we all return back to the apartment. |
Saturday, September 6 and I’m up before 5 am. But why? Lee has woken me up, right in the middle of a dream about him, very confusing. But I can’t fall back asleep and when they leave at 6 am, I do four loads of laundry and make the bed with clean sheets.
Bryan
has bought the new remix of Walking on Thin Ice, the song that turned
Yoko
Ono into our first mother of punky dance.
Leave the apartment at 4:30 pm and take 5 pm bus to Cranford. I’m only home for a few minutes before we go to Elio’s for dinner, joining friends of my parents. Little necks and mussels posillipo preceded a dish of asparagus, artichoke, shitake mushrooms, shallots and white wine, which cover thinly pounded veal to produce Vitello Elio. I also have a nice Martell Cordon Bleu.
Sunday, September 7 and one advantage of being at my parents is breakfast at IHOP. After a meatball sandwich, mom and I go to Marshall’s where I get two Polo button-downs, and a bunch of 2(x)ist and Hilfiger underwear.
I’m on the 4 pm bus back to the city, and in the apartment by 5:30 pm. Bryan and I go for drinks at Dick’s and dinner at Mary Ann’s. This evening, since we have the new cable box, I watch “Finding Debra Winger.”
Monday,
September 8 and it is my first class of Professional Book &
Information Publishing with Bob Bolick, who looks like a cross between
Steve Martin and John Cleese. There are only five students, and it
doesn’t look like an easy course, but it should be intriguing. Bryan
is sleeping when I return so dinner is essentially a slice
of pizza from
Due Amici.
Fr. Craig Wylie’s daughter Miranda-Claire is stage managing for Dose, a musical playing September 3 - 20 at the Red Room over the KGB Bar. “Get your fix with oversized and delusional Lilly Evans Hampton as she pursues Big Love in the Big City with her dubious troupe — butt-boy Bink, junkie Jamie, and artiste Angola in this darkly comic musical romp.”
Tuesday, September
9 and I go off to class before Bryan even gets home; perhaps it’s
the full moon, but I’m very charged up. Trade & General Book
Publishing (Y59.3330) is taught by super-agent Loretta Barrett,
president of Loretta Barrett Books, Inc., a literary agency she founded
in 1990. Ms. Barrett is a true iconoclast and may actually get me
interested in publishing again!
| From her biography: Former
Editor-in-Chief of Anchor Books and Vice President and Executive Editor
at Doubleday & Co., where she published Betty Ford, artist Judy
Chicago, and Betty White. She represents a wide variety
of clients, including Ray Kurzweil, Letitia Baldrige, and Michael Anderson
(of the NY Times).
Barrett serves on the national boards of Reading Is Fundamental, the Nathaniel Wharton Fund, and The Grandparenting Foundation, and is a member of the University of Pennsylvania’s Trustees Council of Penn Women. [She is also an admitted Roman Catholic.] |
Wednesday, September
10 and lunch at the diner. The West Wing is a repeat
from last season, and having our cable recorder, I can stop and go out
to dinner with Bryan at Mie.
As usual, great fish.
| The season premier of
Star
Trek: Enterprise is very good. Bryan tells me later that
they’ve acquired new writers and it shows. OUT magazine has
an article on John Fleck. I know him as one of the NEA four,
but didn’t know he also played Silik on Enterprise!
He is also a major character in the new HBO series, Carnivale.
Now, I hope that you will remember this for the rest of the season, but one of the best websites for detailed plot and character information, as well as gossip and personal opinion, about Star Trek: Enterprise, as well as The West Wing and more, is Television Without Pity. To give you an idea of how comprehensive it is, the description of this episode runs to 14 webpags. Yes. |
Thursday,
September 11 and the morning is filled with memorials to the attack
on America two years ago. I walk uptown to have lunch at the diner,
and then walk all the way back. I finally return to the gym at 3
pm. I meet Bryan at 6 pm and we go to Wendy’s
for take-out. Later, we have drinks at Dick’s while we
watch the “Tribute in Light” from the WTC
site.
Friday, September
12 and mother is coming into the city to purchase theater tickets.
I walk uptown and meet her at Port Authority, and walk over to the diner,
where we meet Bryan. I walk to my appointment with Dr. Jose Cortes.
My bloodwork comes back fairly good, with t-cells of
264, the highest
they’ve been in years. Must be the walking.
| In the August issue of Q, Johnny Cash is quoted about his lack of record sales before his resurrection by Rick Rubin in 1994, “If you were in my shoes and believed what I believe, you’d have been a fool to choose a decade or two’s worth of record sales over eternal salvation.” Today, he passes into glory. |
Saturday,
September 13 and I go to the copy center to pick up course packs
and a slice of pizza. I stop at Duane Reade for my new prescription
(Viread) and go to the gym. We get Chinese delivery from Mee
Noodle Shop.
Around 8 pm, I’m in the mood for a cocktail but don’t want to go to Dick’s. We take a walk, winding up on First Avenue and drinks at Paquito, in their new restaurant section. But the drinks aren’t very strong and we head over to Mary Ann’s for real ones, in addition to a couple of shots of cachaca.
Sunday, September 14 and how did I come to have Seth Green in my home in Cranford? In the dream, I leave Pangea, where a woman has asked to speak with me, and returned home by the request of my mother. She needs me to go pick up lottery tickets! But outside our old bedrooms, Seth Green is having a party with friends. I explain to Mario that mom has rented a room to him, and the actor and his party eventually get in limousines and I take a trip downtown with them. For some reason, I’m wearing a suit and tie, which gives me gravitas I suppose.
Our plans were to go food shopping, but we substitute pizza at Muzzarella’s and then a couple of cosmopolitans, one at Nowhere and one at Dick’s. We’re home a little after 10 pm and asleep before midnight.
Monday, September 15 and I go to the gym at 2:30 pm. I do other things but my memory is not very good. I take the bus to class for my Master of Science in Publishing. The offices of McGraw-Hill Educational are at 2 Penn Plaza and are quite nice. The class is rather interesting also, although I’m not sure to what practical application I can apply it.
When I return home, Bryan suggests going for a drink, which we do. We grill the steaks, which I have spent hours marinating. I’ve been meaning to watch “Carnivale” which I do.
Tuesday,
September 16 and it’s the middle of the month, and you
need a break from the heavy stuff. Let model Chad Nittler
share “his tips for better abs” in the current issue of OUT
magazine. I don’t know about you, but this is one goal that just
isn’t going to happen in this lifetime!
The watch he’s wearing is from Harry Winston and costs almost $14,000. On the other hand, the wool trousers by Calvin Klein are only $175 (I know you were wondering about the pants), and he’s holding a very cool, limited edition Michael Jordan MP3 player by Philips that’s $230. Still, I wonder if the watch keeps accurate time, harrumph.
Wednesday, September 17 and a perfectly lovely day, 75 degrees with no humidity, so I walk to Best Buy to see if they have received a stock of phones. Lucky for me, they have the exact model I was looking for.
I watch a new episode of Star Trek: Enterprise and get ready, the Televison Without Pity recap runs to 13 pages this time! Next is the repeat of last year’s The West Wing season finale. I also vaguely watch a repeat of Law & Order while Bryan grills pork loins, which turn out much better than expected.
Thursday, September 18 and I visit my parents; we have meatball sandwiches at home. My father and I stop at Total Wines and get a bottle of the 2000 Beaulieu Vineyards Merlot that I like so much; interestingly, it’s only $7.07 here (yes, an odd price). I’ve been paying a penny less than ten bucks.
For dinner, mom makes ravioli and we watch two Dean Martin tapes; they’re finally coming out with compilations of his fine television variety show.
Friday, September
19 and I go to the post office, as Bryan gets a McCoy pot from
eBay. I spend an hour at the gym, and have lunch with Bryan at the
diner, before taking the bus to New Jersey. I stop at OfficeMax
to purchase a Carina Altra laptop
desk stand.
| When Bryan arrives in
New Jersey, we go to dinner at the Spanish Tavern
(on US Highway 22 East, in Mountainside) anyway.
We have a considerable amount of food and drink, including two Cuervo Gold margaritas, two Ketel One vodkas, and a $21 bottle of Rioja Vega. Appetizers were almejas (mussels in green sauce) and escargots ($9 each). I had the surf and turf ($26 — lobster tails are lobster tails, but the filet mignon is perfectly tender) and Bryan had the paella Valenciana ($21). With dessert and espresso, the total was $130 before tip. |
Saturday,
September 20 and we’re up early to go to Lambertville.
Originally settled
in 1732
by Emanuel Coryell, the Lenni-Lenape
tribes roamed there until George
Washington marched. Our main destination is David
Rago to check out his Craftsman Arts and Crafts auction.
We also have a chance to go to the Golden Nugget Antique Flea Market which is always closed when we’re there. Bryan collects old Christmas ornaments and buys a full box for ten bucks. One ball alone is worth that, so a very good deal.
We cross the river to New
Hope and return to my parents, after lunch at T.G.I.
Fridays in Flemington. Not my favorite place but the first
one we see with a bathroom!
| We
have the car, still, and I say that if I find a parking space anywhere
in the city, then that’s where we’ll eat. And that turns out to be
Second Avenue near 25th
Street and a Spanish restaurant, Olé.
Yes, we’re at another one! The food isn’t bad, and there is silly
entertainment by a Charo clone. The drinks are weak; at least the
Sangria is full of fruit.
Appetizers (both $9) included the almejas rellenas (basically clams casino with a not very good stuffing) and ensalada de primavera with roated pignole nuts, serrano ham and shaved parmesan. Bryan had the filetes de cerdo castellanas ($17 — pork tenderloin stuffed with Spanish manchego cheese and pimentos in port wine reduction) while I had the pollo a la Catalana ($16 — thinly pounded chicken breast rolled with olive oil, garlic and Spanish onions over an eggplant puree). OK, those weren't too bad. The total was just under a hundred dollars before tip. |
Sunday, September 21 and a beautiful evening for a long walk through Union Square, where I saw one of the waiters at Rocco’s having an outdoor dinner.
I continued up past Splash and the new Limelight, which on Sunday nights turns into Avalon. Yes, the long reach of Pat Lyons has now extended to the city, although his name isn’t attached to it. But his brother John Lyons is definitely attached. I almost go in to inquire after him.
I go off to Pangea; I have a mojito with my cold ginger and carrot soup, and then a glass of Vega with my peppercorn steak salad. By that time, Arnoldo is sitting with me, which leads to another glass of wine and then two glasses of Knob Creek bourbon. I read the Gospels until falling asleep at 1 am.
Monday, September 22 and lunch at the diner. Then I walk down Fifth Avenue to the NYU bursar’s office for a refund check. I didn’t realize that I would also have to go to Wall Street to have it cashed. Since I was there, I went over to Ground Zero. Wait. What are these limosines pulling up? None other than the head of state of the Central African Republics.
I do the reading for class before taking the subway to New York University. We have a guest speaker, Jack Farrell, who is the Vice President and Publisher of Educational Products, Medical Publishing Division at McGraw-Hill.
Tuesday, September 23 and the weather is terrible. Class is rather tough; we’re actually taken to task for not writing well! But it is a Master of Science in Publishing. Bryan is making pork loins in the broiler, along with pasta.
We grab a martini at 11
pm, and we’re in bed watching Jay Leno, and his guests Lisa
Kudrow and Graham Norton. Poor Graham; he is so used to being
the center of attention, and trying so hard to fit into the American interview
format. I squirm for him.
| For dinner, Bryan had
purchased a $30 bottle of 1999 Pomerol, Clos de Salles from
Is-wine
on East Fifth Street. The description from the store is:
“Mostly Merlot, Pomerol wines are among the best in the world. This one is dense and rounded, full of dark fruit flavors. The wine marries well with caramalized vegetables, roasts and mild cheeses.” |
Wednesday, September 24 and it’s a day of walking. It begins by walking all the way to see Bryan and have lunch at the diner. Then I’m off to an NYU lunch seminar with an executive from the custom publishing division of Time Warner. It’s rather fascinating actually.
Bryan gets home around 6 pm and we go out to Dick’s for drinks (cosmos for him and wine for me). I spend the next three hours in the bedroom watching new episodes of Enterprise (here is the Television Without Pity recap), The West Wing (twp recap; also, the best lines are by John Goodman) and Law & Order. This is going to be the first season without creator, and full-time anal compulsive, Aaron Sorkin. I shut off the television at 11 pm and fall asleep.
Thursday,
September 25 and Bryan is going to City Hall to inquire about upcoming
jury duty; we have sandwiches at the same bagel place that I ate at when
I was on jury.
In the evening, we stop at a very nice restaurant (Shore, 41 Murray Street) for shellfish and martinis. Mine is made with a French vodka, Ciroc, distilled from grapes. Citysearch calls it, “A polished Tribeca take on the great Northeastern seafood shack.”
Our destination is 49 Murray Street where we are to attend a screening, but wind up going out with Heather and her boyfriend Dave (who is straight-edge) at Brady’s Tavern, just a block from Ground Zero.
Friday, September
26 and Bryan is up and out before I’m even awake. I spend
the morning getting ready for my meeting with Dean David Finney, head of
SCPS. This is just a fifteen minute chance to meet with the dean,
although I do pitch myself as an asset to the school.
| After, I took the train to Cranford. My plan was to go to the Garlic Rose, a new restaurant in Cranford that was featured on the Food Channel this week. But dad didn’t want to go there, so it was the normal dinner at Elio’s. I had the appetizer of seared shrimp in cream sauce with artichokes, followed the Vitello Elio, veal with artichokes and asparagus in white wine sauce. We also managed to had a couple of glasses of Chianti, Sambuca with espresso and finally a Strega. |
Saturday, September 27 and awake at 9 am; I have to take my mom to Kohl’s to get yarn for the bedspread she’s knitting for me. We have lunch at the Cranford Diner. Back in the city, Bryan and I leave for Michelle’s for her Rosh Hashanah dinner; on the way we pick up two bottles of 2000 Beaulieu Vineyards Merlot.
Art’s parents are at dinner; I hadn’t met them before and they’re really nice. His father Harry is of Greek descent, and his mom is Italian, just like my mom. Still, we’re home at 11 pm.
Sunday,
September 28 and Andy
Roddick is so cute, I could take up watching tennis. I’ve
had so much food recently that I only have a bowl of oatmeal before going
to the gym at 4 pm.
Dinner is at Pangea;
he has a caipirinha and I have a mojito. Entrées
are
penne with chicken and mushrooms for him, and the bistro chicken
with steamed vegetables for me. I don’t usually have that, but the
scent of another diner’s was wafting through the restaurant. We also
have a glass of wine, and cocktails after.
| Back home, I send an email
to the Bishop
of Dallas, Jim Stanton, with the subject line, “from the former editor
of the episcopal clerical directory.” It reads:
The constant use of the term "homosexuality" by you has begun to disgust me more than it has you. Please stop. Stop it now. You cheapen yourself by spending all of your time thinking about sex. Please step down from your episcopate now. I have remained as silent as I have been able over the last few years. It is over. And so are you. |
Monday, September 29 and Planet Out reports British religious support for a move against homophobia. My horoscope reads:
It might be flattering when you're the subject of gossip. On the down side, you're too well known to make a false step. Use this moment in the spotlight to advance your most important project.
I go to the gym and then for a couple of slices of pizza at Anna Maria’s. I walk to class at Penn Plaza with stops at Circuit City and Best Buy. Class is interesting again; the weather is nice so I walk back home.
Tuesday, September
30 and T.V.O.D. lives in more ways than one. TVOD.net
is a club in Manchester, England. Check out these Mancunians!
| At Norman’s, purchased the latest from Steve Reich (which is a CD and a DVD), the Nick Cave live DVD, God is in the House, and the new Wire album. I wish I were more impressed with Wire; twenty years ago, there was a mix of bombast and thought. Now, there was just noise. |
Lunch for the first time this semester at the dining hall, and go to the gym. I also have a paper to write for the evening’s class. There’s something about this class that revs up one’s motor. After, I make ravioli and open the Villa Antinori wine. Hey, that’s what it was. Sorry it wasn’t fancier!
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Some restaurant links connect to new york citysearch, the Menu Pages, or amazon's new restaurant site. Remember, I spend hours researching interesting websites; the hyperlinks open in new windows, and are rarely connected to advertiser-supported sites. Try them and encourage their existence.
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Jethro Tull rock again on DVD
By Brett Sporich at Reuters
Chrysalis/Capitol Records has spruced up a 1994 VHS release of the 1970s rock band Jethro Tull for a new DVD.
The DVD “Jethro Tull: The 25th Anniversary” contains bonus material such as a full performance of “Teacher” from a 1970 French TV gig, and a live performance of “The Witches Promise” is revealed in a hidden Easter egg.
The first part of the DVD covers the celebration of Jethro Tull’s 25th anniversary party, including interviews with former members and current collaborators interwoven among live performance clips of “Nothing Is Easy” at the Isle of Wight Festival during the 1970s and a performance of “Thick as a Brick” at New York’s Madison Square Garden in 1978.
The latest “Tull” DVD, the third in a series, includes never-before-seen complete live performances of “Teacher”, “The Witches Promise”, “The Story of the Hare Who Lost His Spectacles”, “Aqualung”, “Kissing Willie”, “Rocks on the Road” and “Living in the Past”.