vitamins for drunks

"drinkwel is the first multivitamin specifically formulated for people that drink alcohol."

WTF??? I mean, it's basically just a regular multivitamin with some trendy additions like superfruits and antioxidants, but seriously?? And would people who drink to excess really invest in new-agey vitamins?

This whole neutraceuticals thing has really gotten out of hand. Just eat real food, people! And practice moderation! It's really that simple.

Happy Easter!

Just found this picture on Cute Overload and had to share it here:


"Peep show." Heehee...

aww

Cutest OverheardinNewYork post ever:

Girl: I'll have a dozen bagels.
Bagel guy: I can't pass up on this opportunity. I have to tell you that you're really cute.
Girl: [Blushes.]
Bagel guy: Do you know what the difference between cute and not cute is?
Girl: ... Nooo, what?
Bagel guy: Three bagels. [Hands girl 15 bagels.]

--Jumbo Bagels, 57th & 2nd

meh

I saw a homeless guy fall onto the train tracks this morning. Two guys immediately pulled him out, and there wasn't a train coming, luckily. The man was obviously mentally handicapped and seemed really out of it. He was yelling gibberish and lying there sort of slowly wiggling his arms and legs once the two guys pulled him back onto the platform. It was kind of a scary thing to see. You have to wonder what would have happened to the guy had he fallen in when it wasn't rush hour and full of people. I know people like to say that some homeless are that way by choice, or are just addicted to drugs (so it's their own fault [?]), but what about people like this one? He probably has no family or anyone to take care of him. And yes, there are services out there to help the homeless, but how is someone like this supposed to take advantage of them, much less even take the initiative to seek them out?

It's just really sad to see. I mean, what can you do for someone like that? Throwing change at him won't exactly help anything, even if your heart IS in the right place for doing so. I hope the police or paramedics or whoever that got there after I was gone got the guy to a shelter or something.

new computer!

So my computer decided to completely die on me a few days ago. In hysterics, I called my parents and my mother suggested that I come home and use our computer here, and we would either take mine to get fixed or get a new one. Considering that my computer was five years old, it was pointless to pump more money into getting it fixed (remember the internet connection [or should I say lack thereof] fiasco that cost me $250?). So today we traipsed on over to the Apple store and they bought me my graduation present early. I am now the proud owner of a Macbook Pro! Hooray! I am a Mac virgin no longer. It's so lovely and functional. So I took a bunch of creeeeepy photos of myself in the lovely glaring glow of the screen with its built-in camera. Enjoy the slide show!

wha-huh?

I just saw a commercial for a new show on Court TV called "Till Death Do Us Part." It's about marriages that end badly, like with one spouse murdering the other. And it's hosted by John Waters.

wtf?! Who comes up with this stuff?

Anyhoo, I saw The Thermals at Studio B in Brooklyn last night. I was introduced to them about a week ago, so I'd only listened to three or four songs before the show. They're pretty much your standard indie-punk, but are really catchy and fun. Plus they were so good live. People in the crowd were really into it, with singing along and stage diving even though it was a small indoor place and the audience was really only thick enough for diving in a radius of ten feet from the stage. The band was all smiles; they seemed really happy to be there, which makes concerts so much more enjoyable. Also the bassist was totally darling. She was wearing a white eyelet babydoll dress and her curly hair was all flopping in her eyes. So cute.

Here are their websites:
http://myspace.com/thethermals
http://www.subpop.com/artists/the_thermals

it's about damn time

Readers may have noticed an usually large gap in time between the last entry and this one. It's not because I'm not going to lots of galleries and events (au contraire! I've done more in two months of NYC life than I did all last semester in The 'Cuse.), it's not because I'm too busy, it's not even because I'm too lazy... It's because my wireless internet simply refused to work in my apartment (though my room mates have no trouble connecting and I have no trouble connecting everywhere else other than my own home). So I've gone without a regular internet diet for nearly two months now. Marta (the Hungarian room mate) allows me the use of her computer anytime I want, but I try not to take advantage of her kindness, so all computer activity has been reduced to the bare minimum. Today it occured to me that the semester is nearly half over and I'm nowhere near halfway done with the research and work required of the numerous papers that must be finished within mere months. So I sucked it up and called 1-800-geek-squad. It took five hours to figure out the problem and fix it. And that's at a rate of $98 an hour. So let me say this:

I highly, highly recommend 1-800-geek-squad. The guy was very professional, really nice, and extremely polite (he asked permission to use the bathroom like three times). I didn't feel at all skeeved out by letting this stranger into my home. He explained what he was doing periodically, so I know he wasn't just fooling around to charge me more. And then he only charged me for two and a half hours' worth of work. I was on the verge of having a nervous breakdown, because I was thinking I would have to pay $500 just to get my internet working. That amount of money could pay for half a new computer! But no, I only had to pay $250. Plus he fixed my spyware detector and ended up cleaning up the whole computer, so now it runs faster too. $250 is a whole lotta money for me, but compared to the potential $500, I feel like it was totally worth it. I feel so much less stressed out now that I have internet. I can finally really get serious with my schoolwork. There's also a 100% guarantee, so if the internet somehow craps out again, Geek Squad will come right back and re-do it for free.

On to the art! I've been attending so much stuff lately that I don't even remember it all. But here are some highlights:

Kai Kuhne show during fashion week. Hugely fat fur mini-dresses, a knit one-piece bodysuit with jodhpurs, and a fat feathered mini-dress that made the model look like a slutty Big Bird. Scary.

Many, many art galleries in SoHo and Chelsea, including free brunch at Max Protetch last weekend. I was actually less than impressed by the gallery space itself (or even the current artwork), but far be it for me to complain about free food and art. I also followed it up with a trip to the Chelsea Art Museum, whose "The Food Show: The Hungry Eye" and "Dangerous Beauty" were deliciously clever (a floor made of scales in front of a CGI video of a scary-skinny runway model strutting her stuff, par example; or the bulimic family of dollhouse toys all vomiting into little toilets with the baby barfing into a training potty). P.S. They carried zingmagazine in their gift shop!

The Fountain Art Fair. A two dollar donation got you free drinks, a decent DJ, and a one-inch button featuring an illustration of-what else?-Duchamp's groundbreaking piece, "The Fountain." I fell in love with these pictures that were harsh black outlines of a mushroom cloud over top of a delicate pencil drawing of a big old rose. The flowers were so subtle that you didn't even notice it's a rose until you took a really good look. But they were so skillfully drawn that at first I thought it was a very light black and white photo. And the nuclear bomb over a rose? I know it's a bit of a cliche, but the mushroom cloud was very graphic and cool looking and that image is totally appropriate for the current political climate.

The zingmagazine release party! So much fun! To read about all the specific preparations I took part in, you'll have to mosy on over to the anonymous intern blog, but the party itself was fantastic. Trendy people + musical chairs + pinatas filled with condoms featuring photos of art on their wrappers + more pinatas filled with artist-related candy (paintbrushes, crayons, and cigarettes-so cute, no?) = a rolicking good time. Hopefully photos of the event will be up on the website soon. I can't wait for the new issue to finally get to the U.S. (it's being printed in Singapore currently). I love my internship.

Assuming my computer feels like behaving itself from now on, many more entries are on their way!

P.S. Ireland in a week!!

interesting day

Today I went to a talk given by George Cham, the creator of the webcomic, "Piled Higher and Deeper." He was a grad student earning his PhD (like 10 years ago) in some form of engineering, but ended up drawing this comic about how much grad school sucked and now making the comic, and doing talks and such, is his full-time job. So basically this guy spent years being miserable in grad school, only to end up with a "job" completely unrelated to his field of study. Wow, am I ever happy to be in a one-year masters program on a subject that I completely adore. Although I have to say, he was pretty damn funny. Plus he was kinda cute and there was free food afterwards.

When I walked home from the bus stop later, I was listening to the Talking Heads song, "Don't Worry About the Government," and I definitely danced the entire four blocks to my house. It was great. I seriously couldn't help myself. It's SUCH a good song. I think it's going to have to be my new favorite by them.

I made a very fattening quiche (mmm, creme fraiche) for dinner tonight after eating a couple of those mini-quiches at the George Cham thing. Then on Project Runway, the contestants were in Paris. It was a French-filled evening. I miss France so much. I can't even begin to explain how jealous I am that my parents are there right now and I'm not, especially since they're currently in Veules-les-Roses (it's in Normandy), which is my favorite place to be in the entire world. Even more than New York City. It is the most charming, most French town you could possibly see. There are houses with thatched roofs and cows everywhere. And the ocean is spectacular. The water is pretty cold (though I always go swimming anyways-how could you not??), but low tide is incredible. The beach at high tide is all big rocks, which are not so comfortable to lie or walk on, but at low tide sand stretches for hundreds of feet. The beach is also encapsulated by these incredible white chalk cliffs, so you can hike along the edge of the cliff in one direction and come back along the beach during low tide.

Oh and one more thing before I quit procrastinating and do some real work: When I was walking my dog this afternoon, a middle-aged couple passed by me, and the man had a big red and green parrot perched on his shoulder-like a pirate! It was like, "Well, there's my dose of surrealism for the day."

oops

When I was writing in here yesterday, I totally forgot to include the fact that I watched a performance of "The Taming of the Shrew" in Thornden Park last night with Bec. I hadn't read the play, and I have to say, I don't like it very much. I actually prefer the movie version "10 Things I Hate About You." Katarina's speech at the end pisses me off. She turns herself into her husband's slave after he spent the entire play practically raping her. Yeah. Okay.

So last night when I was trying to fall asleep, it occured to me how weird Thornden Park is. There is a huge public pool and there has been football practice for really little kids there for the past few weeks. Then there's a playground and you also get the ice cream truck driving through the park all day long. So it seems like a family-type place. There is also the amphitheatre, where they have Shakespeare being performed. And there is a gorgeous rose garden with little paths going through it. So it has a cultured edge to it as well, I guess. And then you have seriously frightening instances of crime, like the murdered body being found there last year. I would never walk through that park after dark.

So you end up with family-friendliness, culture, and crime all in one place. How does that kind of dynamic even happen? Syracuse is a weird place. It's like a bad neighborhood every few square blocks, and then every other OTHER few square blocks is upscale, relatively crime-free neighborhoods.