Month: June 2002

Read this.

I saw Ben Folds last night at the Roseland Ballroom. What can I say? The show was amazing. He’s such a talented musician, and it’s really obvious that he loves what he does (especially now that he’s free from his recording contract). The show was being recorded for a live album, and the audience was fantastic. It’s going to be a great CD.

Now I have to get caught up with all of his albums that I don’t have (many of which have been sitting on my wish list for about two years).

After the concert, I went to a diner closeby where the waiters are aspiring Broadway singers. The food wasn’t so great, and neither was the singing (yes, the waiters sang karaoke to Sinatra, Elvis, The Beatles, and that song about the Son of a Preacher-Man), but it was fun nonetheless.

They’re always trying to influence you–even the photographers. Look at the picture of Bush on this MSNBC article. While the article talks about Bush’s approval rating slipping, the photograph has his head low in the frame to capture the word “Protect” (which is only the first half of a longer word) right above him. Clever, these photographers are. The thing is that the photograph is a from the Reuters file, that is, not related to the article. So someone at MSNBC picked out that picture and decided to use it for the article.

I’d rather see one of the photographs where he’s in midspeech, looking like a monkey. So take this as a warning: don’t let the photographers try to influence your thoughts with their “slightly subliminal” messages.

I saw La Bohème performed by the Metropolitan Opera for free in Central Park last night. When you see the performance for free, you don’t get special things like sets or staging or translations; you get the singers standing at microphones in front of the orchestra, but that’s not a complaint.

I never realized how much Puccini “preemptively borrowed” from Jonathan Larson’s Rent. Not only does the story match up almost precisely, but the character names also match up.

The weather was really nice even though I had feared it would be too hot. I had wanted to get there early to get a good seat, but we were almost late to the concert though, as we first took the Express subway instead of the Local. Even if we had taken the right train, it still would have been packed. Apparently there are a lot of people in New York, and they all seem to like free events in the park.

I’m thinking about seeing The Barber of Seville on Monday, and of course the Philharmonic in the Park series whenever that happens to be. If anyone else is interested, feel free to join me.

Why is favorability not a word*? It should mean The level or measurement of being favorable or something resembling that. Vulnerability is listed as a word, so why not favorability? It’s not listed in Merriam-Webster or dictionary.com.

* Technically, favorability is a word, now that I have used it three times within sentences (and since it probably has been used by others before), but it still does not appear in any dictionary.

You know how I always say that I want the autonomy that comes with running my own company (or similar activities), and that I would like to be the master of my own future, but I just couldn’t come up with one good Idea? Well, you may not know that I say those things, but I do once in a while. It seems I may have found that Idea I’ve been looking for, and I’ve been thinking about it for at least a week now. To the best of my knowledge, it’s something that doesn’t currently exist in the scale I’m thinking. Step One has been completed: the domain name has been purchased. Stay tuned…

A few weeks ago I changed one of my morning routines. I switched from my Norelco Electric Razor (similar to this one) to the Gilette Mach3. I like the way it feels, but even after several weeks, it still irritates my skin. I have to find some sort of after-shave lotion (or something) that will help. Also, maybe it’s time to put new blades on. Any suggestions?

Rain, rain, beautiful rain. It’s raining now, at a quarter after two in the morning, and it’s been doing the same all day. The television warned us of flash floods and the Whole Bit. There’s something about the sound of the rain hitting the cars, street, roof and rain-gutters that is relaxing and almost musical in that chaotic, polyrhythmic sort of way. It’s the sound of the car alarms and the ambulance sirens that I don’t enjoy as much.

My roommate lost her job today. I wasn’t convinced that she actually had a job. Instead there was the possibility she just might have made workplace stories up out of thin air, and was actually spending her time smoking pot and going to clubs in NYC. Our neighbor upstairs, J.C. (it must stand for Jesus Christ—what else could it be?), is a nocturnal DJ who spins in some club that my roommate goes to all the time. I pay my roommate my “half” of the rent each month, but I don’t think there’s actually a landlord here. Even if that’s the case, it really doesn’t matter. I’m still getting a decent apartment for the small price I am paying… and no lease.

I just got back from seeing the Indigo Girls with Rebecca and Denise. I learned a few things tonight:

• Listening to good music live brings out a lot of emotion within me.
• The last time I saw the band was during college. I heard a lot of Indigo Girls during college, actually. While I lived in my Ray Street dorm, I would often fall asleep listening to music, often the Indigo Girls, and in love. Throughout college, without a real basis, I became less confident in my musical abilities, and even though for years people would keep telling me I would be a great teacher, more and more doubts entered my mind. It’s possible that by the time I was student-teaching I no longer felt passionate about what I set out to do four and a half years prior. That same semester was very bad relationship-wise as well. Several months went by where A. and I just didn’t talk even though we saw each other and worked with each other every other day. I don’t remember why now. But I think it must have been around this time that I lost whatever passions I had.
• I need to get real music back into my life. I’m just not the same without it.
• Lastly, I learned that I should not be allowed to write online after midnight.

And one final word: Have a great time in Europe, Becca, and good luck—I hope things work out for you.

From our Obvious Parenting Advice department: Bedroom TVs Linked to Fatter Kids.