Keepers

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Most Facebook like me know about its On This Day feature. On This Day displays anything you’ve posted  post on your own page from previous years.  As an avid, I almost typed rabid – pretty close, Facebook user of eight years it is now rare to come across any given day that does not have at least four entries.

For the most part it’s a lovely trip down memory lane. All the jokes, the quips and memes, blog posts that I’ve chosen to share bringing memories. The only  major downside is a bittersweet revisit when I come across where I’ve posted on someone who has left this realm – a loved one, a friend or a favored celebrity. One can choose to delete the any upsetting posts to avoid such in the future revisits, but I do not delete mine. I feel if I deemed it important enough to post in the first place, then I should live with it. After all I’ve have learned the hard way everything heals with time. And speaking of avored celebrity  RIP Chuck Berry – who left us yesterday after 90 years and is now playing with his Ding-a-Ling for all eternity.

The other occasional downside is when I share something from another website —

photo of Facebook post Christopher Walken dancing

I click looking forward to revisiting the fun of it only to see–

screen capture of unavaiable video apology on youtube

— it gone. It’s not my content so I have no control over it when this happens. For the most part when someone else decides to delete the content or the site altogether – it’s gone. I have had posts where my only descriptor was “HAH!” and I’ll never know what was so funny on that date – now those I will delete as it serves no purpose to connect to a dead link. However, this is YouTube where there is almost always duplicates of everything – especially things that amuse and delight. In this case it is a compilation of scenes from movies in which Christopher Walken is dancing. It underlies with C+C Music Factory’s “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)” and I adore it. So I knew, KNEW there was no way there were not other posts of this out there, so – to the Google! My trust in this clip amusing others, as it does me, was valid. At least this is one dead post I can edit and keep the fun going.

And now for your and especially my own entertainment:

Christopher Walken Dance Now

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Let’s see how others are getting through their Sunday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 19

Old Feel In New Places

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When I was looking for a new place, I had my priorities and I met all of them. With my needs met, it was only after I settled in there was one thing I did not consider. My local bar.

Because sometimes I don’t want to sit and have a drink or two alone in my place. Sometimes I want to pop over to the bar, have a few brews, watch a game and shoot breeze. But I don’t want to go all the way downtown or across town to do so. A friend introduced me to her good friend’s bar and it was a good fit then. It wasn’t walking distance local, I definitely needed car service to get home, but I made friends and acquaintances there and always felt welcomed there. Since I moved I’ve missed that. I am much further away now, so getting there and back home is not as easy. While I still so  pop over there now and again – I know it will not be as often.Thus, I started considering half-heartedly looking for a watering hole closer to where I live now.

A couple of months ago I noticed this bar where I transferred from the subway to the bus on daily commute, Bar 180. Usually I only notice it from across the street as I am waiting for said bus, but I knew it was there.  Earlier last month I made myself pass directly in front of it one evening, taking a peek inside the window. Dark, but inviting, a touch modern with it white marble main bar top. It was early in the week, but there were enough customers to not look empty. It looked promising, but I was tired that night and really just wanted to go home. I considered the options. If I like the place it was closer to home travel wise and I would have a choice of bus or cab depending on when I left, which I did not have before. It really could not have been more convenient short of it actually being within walking distance of my place. So I told myself I really should stop in and check it out one evening. Last night as I was walking to my bus bright green balloons caught my attention. It was St. Patrick’s Day – of course! What better day to check out a bar?

I arrived at a good time, it was not yet crowded I was easily able to get a stool at the end of the bar. The first tender was a cutie, his professional greeting smile in place as I ordered a Guinness to start; it was St. Paddy’s Day after all. I started removing my coat, revealing the kelly green and orange colors of the day while I checked the place out. Main bar along one wall, a mix of bar height and standard tables and seating throughout to the glass paned walls facing the streets. Dark and medium woods, contrasted with metal trims and mirrors gave the place a nice cosy, but not cramped feel even as the place filled-up. A bright white full size bicycle was perched high up on one wall, in a corner, was an attention getter. My two favorite things so far 1- the ladies room was on the main floor, no wobbling down stairs to a basement bathroom, especially when wearing heels – yes! 2- the custom chandelier above the main bar. A steam-punkish vibe, made up of at least twenty individual plumbing pipes hanging from the ceiling in various odd angles terminating in Edison bulbs. The bronze-burnished pipes, with the sepia bulbs contrasted beautifully with the ceiling.

A listing of what was on tap, plus their standards appeared. They had a really nice selection of IPAs and a couple of ciders, plus their happy hour and St. Patrick’s Day special. The crew flowed in and out around the bar; a good camaraderie as they joked and teased each other as well as a few of the customers.  I don’t know who did their playlist, but the music was on point. Several of us, including the bartenders,  could not help but call out, raise our hands and glasses and bop our heads as various personal favorites came across the speakers. As I enjoyed my next Guinness, a small plastic bag appeared near my elbow. I smiled as I opened it, immediately donning the right green beads with the requisite shamrock bearing the Guinness logo – a fitting promotional swag for the holiday. A little tote bag just as mysteriously appeared, okay not so mysteriously as the promoter was standing there when it appeared by my hand, but hey.

The best part of the evening happened when a pretty blond asked if the stool next to me was empty and took a seat once I indicated it was. She clearly knew the bartenders and jumped right in as I teased one of the guys. One placed this pistachio ice cream green concoction before her and I was intrigued and asked for the same. It was a take on the classic vodka grasshopper, but with a little twist and tweak, it was so delish. As they had not come with a name for it, I promptly dubbed it the Irish Hopper  in honor of the day.

irish-hopper

Irish Hopper

Charming and engaging she and I joked and chatted, learning we were both Virgos and adored Broadway  musicals. As I am still relatively new to the area, she told me about the good, okay and bad eateries. We spoke of our day jobs, and as it turned out, her side job was as a server at Bar 180, but it was her night off. She was there because her husband, the resident beer guy was working. That’s how she knew everyone there so well. It mattered not for all had did their respective jobs well and I was successfully charmed by Bar 180. I will never be any bar’s “Norm!”, but I do believe I have found a new local bar and that’s a good thing.

Edited to add: Lights!@For those who wanted to see them…

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Let’s see how others are slicing up their Saturday.

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 18

Erin Go Knock Knock

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What’s black, green, orange and purple and impatient?

That would be me.

It’s Saint Patrick’s Day, I’m wearing my traditional kelly green, over orange tee shirt. Normally, I would wear this with a white suit to represent the colors green/white/orange of the flag of Ireland. However, though spring is mere days away by the calendar, the weather remains absolutely winter sucky. The streets are still slushy from Stella. The wearing of any kind of white was not happening, so I’m wearing black instead. And of course, for those who don’t already know, my hair is purple.  Yes, I’m being really subtle

As for the impatient – no it’s not to rush out of here and get my green beer going (ugh!).  My office floor is in the midst of a major floor renovation. The section where I sit was the first to be taken apart and worked on. As the partition wall is partially glass, it has a rather distracting bug under a magnifying glass feel. All day there has been a constant stream of colleagues from other areas on the floor, who have come walking around to get a good look at the finished product. I get it I do, as this will be their future as well, but it’s a cubicle – not a reinvention of the wheel.

As I said it was rather distracting, but this is me, always finding  a way to put my tongue firmly in cheek and snark things out.  The constriction guys left a portable line barrier off to the side in a room. They clearly forgot it was in the room as all other supplies have been moved to the next section.  So I decided to put it to good use.

click for full picture…

Yes, in a direct tribute to Les Nessman, the sign actually requests visitors to my cubicle to “Please Knock”. You’re as young as I am points to the first person who knows exactly where I got that from.

In the interim – unlike Erin – I’m not going braugh-less, but I am getting my Guinness on.

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!!!

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10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 17

And I Think I’m Going Out Of My Head

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My afternoon session over, I’m part joking around with a student and part mentally prepping for the next day’s training when my train of thought crashed spectacularly. It must have shown on my face.

Student: You okay?

Me: Yes. No. Tomorrow.

Student: Tomorrow?

Me: Yes, Tomorrow…

And this is what it sounds like when my brain fries

…and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty…wait no, that Shakespeare, that’s not tomorrow… creeps in this petty pace from day to day… NO!..Tomorrow never dies……what about tomorrow?… To the last syllable of recorded time… what the ever loving fuck?! I’m having a damn Shakespearean earworm!! …pace from day to day…day by day, oh dear Lord three things I pray…wait. What? No! My mind is shot…arrows… suffer the slings and arrows…GOD DAMN IT WILLIE SHAKES!…arrows…shot through the heart and you’re to blame…NO!…I will burn the heart…I have been reliably informed that I don’t have one… Oh Sherlock…Moriarty…Mycroft Masada Holmes…dammit no… Mycroft and Sherlock…broken heart…playing Operation…operations?…YES! Office of Operations! That’s who is coming in for training tomorrow!…

The mystery of tomorrow solved, I sigh in relief returning to what I was doing.

It was the very amused expression on my student’s face that informed me that entire stream of unconsciousness had in fact occurred aloud.

><

For the record I referenced:
Shakespeare's "Macbeth” and “Hamlet“,
James Bond’s “Tomorrow Never Dies“,
“Day By Day” from the musical “Godspell”,
Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love A Bad Name“,
From BBC’s “Sherlock”, the pool scene
A friend and fellow blogger whose name (Mycroft Masada Holmes) coincides with a character from the show and finally,
An operating scene from BBC’s “Sherlock”

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At the halfway mark! Let’s see how others are slicing up their day:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 16

π In The Sky

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So today  is March 14th; or as beloved by most math and food geeks National Pi/π/Pie Day. What is that? some may ask –

Pi Day - fruit pie with some of the mathematical numbers of π as its crust - Google.

Pi Day – fruit pie with some of the mathematical numbers of π as its crust – Google.

*clears throat and dons  instructor’s cap*
March 14 is Pi Day. It is a day to celebrate the mathematical constant pi (π) and to eat lots of pie. Celebrated in countries that follow the month/day (m/dd) date format, because the digits in the date, March 14 or 3/14, are the first three digits of π (3.14), Pi Day was founded by Physicist Larry Shaw in 1988.
*class dismissed – tosses instructor’s cap*

With my usual burst of planning ahead, I had the brilliant idea last night to go to the supermarket and get what I need to make a pie to bring to work in honor of  the day. This would be fine on a normal day, however, yesterday was anything but normal.

I had completely forgotten that the City was preparing for Winter Storm Stella. Predicted to possibly dump upwards of two feet of snow in the Northeast within a less than twenty-four hour timespan, it was going to be a big one, and we humans (mis?)behaved accordingly. Why is it whenever the word snowstorm appears in the forecast, people in the City raid their local market as though it is the end of the world? I understand those who live in further reaches where getting to the local store involves just shy of a snow mobile and when honestly could be days before you can did yourselves out to restock. I’m questioning the City dwellers like myself where most businesses are back in business, if they even close at all, within 24 to 48 max of a storm’s start.

People stock up stormy weather essentials. This almost always includes what my fellow blogger Arjeah humorously calls a French Toast Alert. The trifecta of bread, milk, eggs that is almost always the first things to fly off the shelves.

Empty shelves from the bread section of a supermarket - Flickr.

Empty shelves from the bread section of a supermarket – Flickr.

As I joked later, add cheese to the list and one could have French Toast in the morning, grilled cheese in the afternoon and, depending on what’s already in the fridge, make a frittata later. All of which is a semi moot point to my being at the market at the moment – after all I wanted were ingredients to make a pie, right? Right.

I walked into the supermarket and saw the lines at check-out stretching nearly the length of the store. That should have been a deterrent right there, but I am stubborn. It took a full half hour to navigate through the store to learn other than butter and milk, the two things I did not need to make a pie, everything else was g-o-n-e. No sweet potatoes, no apples, no cherries – fresh or *shudders* canned – could be found to save my life. I repeated this at two other supermarkets to no avail. I mean seriously people! Did half of the City decide to make pie on their expected snow day too? Alas, no pie to be made last night.

So here I sit, on National Pi/π/Pie Day – currently still without pie – but the day is yet young, I’ve time to remedy this.

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10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 14

Is It Only Pretty In Pink?

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WARNING: ADULT CONTENT AHEAD

A friend posted the following on her Facebook…

I was at work at the time and could not view it. I forgot about it and did not see the video until a day or so later.

At first, I just rolled my eyes, but then I just saw red.

A different friend had the same initial reaction I had in thinking how men around the world are a huge reason for a lot of the fucked up shit we females go through when it comes to feminine beauty, even down to our vaginas. Over the years, I have come across articles and advertisements with commentary on what should be the labia color, labia size, whether to be or not to be hirsute, a vaginal canal’s width and depth, the proper moisture discharge and content, and of course, the natural scent of a woman. I suppose that, with so many cultures using complexion lighteners to attain the presumed ideal (read pink) beauty, I honestly cannot say that I am truly surprised by this. However, I am appalled and frankly disgusted at the depth of how deep this desire, this need to achieve this presumed ideal for even our most intimate of places can go.

Stop the madness.

This brought up some far-from-scientific but highly interesting conversation twixt various friends of all genders over the next few days. In one such conversation, I groused on how most CIS men seem to behave as though any vagina that does not look like a Georgia O’Keeffe painting is unworthy. Of course, one of my idiot male friends then sarcastically asked which artist I felt best represented mine. Me, being me, immediately replied, “Rorschach.” When asked to elaborate, I said, “Each person sees something different in my lips.”

And calling spades what they are, the women who are doing this are likely doing so to obtain some ideal for beings who should have no say -in this very specific- so of our bodies whatsoever. Not that they should have it in any other body parts, but really absolutely none right there  – and yes, I mean men. Because as misandry filled as this is to say – no woman is likely going through labia bleaching, labiaplasty, vajazzling, and/or any other nonsense some women do to alter themselves from what nature intended for another woman. It’s bad enough we have legal legislation, by mostly men, trying to rule on what comes out of our bodies.

Now we have to put up with social legislation on how it should look before going in?!

Stop the madness.

I mean, seriously, we women go through enough shit on the daily with regards to our bodies on the parts that everyone can see. Are you effing kidding me that it has come literally down to that level? That some women have been made to feel so insecure about the appearance of their labia that they would subject themselves to that?

Stop the madness!

Because it seems to me if you’ve been invited to see this woman that up close and personal that you can make comparisons, you should be praising your local deity for the honors and shut the fuck up! Preferably by putting your lips on mine since you’re down there, I’m just saying…

And speaking of IJS – Stop the madness.

How I See It

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Writers see the world differently. Every voice we hear, every face we see, every hand we touch, could become story fabric - Buffy Andrews

Ah Buffy, I do not know you, but oh how writely (<- not a mistake), you’ve nailed this. This reminded me of a conversation I once had with a friend on how a Facebook post I once wrote came to be in the manner it did. It came down as such.

When I see/hear any thing, it’s all a matter of part of me registers it first. Casual me sees things at one level, writer me see things at a different level and poet me let things resonate on another. Then there are the times when it all converges effortlessly as one.

Looking at the last of autumn leaves on my street is rendered as follows–

The casual me says:

The trees on the block were so pretty last week, now all the leaves are almost gone, it makes me sad. 

The writer me tomes:

A week ago, this tree-lined block was in full bloom of autumn colors. Now only few leaves are left on graying branches to testify to that erstwhile splendor. It’s near maudlin in my heart to compare.

The poet me pens:

Leaving memories 
Reflected in these gray tears
Golds and rubies fall

(PS: Yeah, I know not the best haiku, but hey, not all my two-second poems are going to be gems – shoot me)

And when they all came together in the Facebook status post in question:

There’s a tree-lined block I walk through almost daily. A week ago this block was awash in the vibrant hues of fall. Today gnarled gray fingers claw at pink cloud-dotted cerulean skies, desperate to hold on to their remaining gold and ruby jewels in the ever shortening daylight of mid-autumn. I watch one such topaz jewel lazily drift to its final resting place upon the concrete. It felt as if watching a tear fall.

The same eyes saw the same street, the same leaf, at the same moment, yet each part views it, and thus tells it, differently. Still, not matter how it’s seen/heard/felt…

Warning: I'm a writer. Anything you do or say may be used in a story.

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10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 13

 

Just Another

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Some slices of life will be of the mundane, this is one:

So it’s just another Sunday afternoon. In these final days before spring, Old Man Winter reminds us he’s still in charge. It’s cold outside, so I am inside. I spent part of the weekend bingeing on TV shows; a true Netflix and chill. Some parts were spent setting up potential subject draft for future essays. Other parts giving time to muse and dropping random lines of poems and prose in draft for potential future poems.  I even donated a couple of hours to laundry sorting and house cleaning – as I said, the mundane.

Still, I am hardly bemoaning of these more quiet and frankly necessary times.  Yes, these more mundane times help me to appreciate the times that are anything but. Mostly, they are needed and appreciated to help recharge the old noggin and give this body some rest beyond the basic, and there is never mundane anything about that.

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10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 12

Cold As

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Hung out last night for dinner and drinks with friends. On my way home this happened:

Male Friend I ran into on train: Have you been drinking?
Me: Yup.
MF: You’re drunk?
Me: Nope. Inebriated.
MF: What’s the difference?
Me: A) I can still pronounce it easily. B) I can still spell it slowly. C) You’re attractive, but not nearly enough for me to have illicit thoughts. D) I actually thought the words “illicit thoughts”.
MF: Damn. Even inebriated you’re cold.
Me: Yup.

For the record, even when sober, I spell inebriated slowly.

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Let’s see how other’s are slicing it up this Saturday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 11