TK
My thoughts and ramblings on the March. It was one of the most amazing and powerful experiences of my life.

More Politics
My brother is going to be a deligate at the Democratic National Convention. That totally rocks.

Kickin' it tourist-style
Last night I went to Beauty and the Beast on Broadway with Tina. We had fabulous seats in the orchestra. All the real tourists (including the massive group of 8th graders with Southern accents) paid $99 for them, but we didn't pay a cent. Having magazine friends who get lots of good freebies rocks. Before the show, we ate dinner at the Olive Garden in Times Square. It seemed appropriate.

Anniversary Special
Today marks the anniversary of my arrival in New York City. I landed at LaGuardia with two bags and a backpack, no apartment, no job. I knew exactly two people. I guess you could say I've come a long way. I have an apartment filled with my belongings, a job (such as it is) and a solid circle of friends. My only question is where did the time go?

March to Washington
OK. I'm not marching to Washington, D.C. I'll be riding in a motor vehicle. I really don't have the time to walk that far. But I will be marching on Washington, if you will. I'm heading down to D.C. with a group of friends to take part in The March for Women's Lives. I've never taken part in a political demonstration before. I've never really felt compelled to. But this grabbed me. I'm going to get to stand up for women's rights, be part of something historic. I have no idea what it's going to be like, but I'm really excited.

And just to make Scott jealous
Apparently, they have Panera in New Jersey, and we're stopping on the drive down to D.C.

Pop Quiz
Q: How long does it take one girl to correct/completely redo an amazingly shoddy transcription of an hour and a half long round table with eight panelists and two moderators? Keep in mind that it must be done by hand because you have to reserve an entire conference room to use a TV/VCR and desktop computers aren't very portable.

A: 18 hours transcribing (including 6 hours of my weekend), 7 hours typing. That translates into 26 single-spaced pages.

I have lost my will to live.

On a cheerier note
The weather here is finally lovely. To celebrate, over the weekend I went to the Brooklyn Museum and Coney Island (mmm ... hot dogs and skee ball). One day I really do need to go back and ride the Cyclone. I do love me some roller coasters.

Things that made me happy
-sappy mass-market fiction set in Ireland
-direct deposti tax refunds
-chocolate-vanilla twist cones

Kids say the darnedest things
I went to my grandmother's Saturday for my cousin's first birthday party. Her older sister, who's three, had gone to an Easter egg hunt in the morning. When she came back and saw a picture from the Easter egg hunt the year before, she said, "Daddy, that's the real Easter bunny. This year it was just a man in a bunny suit."

Too much sharing
Some times people tell you way more than you want to know. One of my co-workers just got back from paternity leave and over lunch he told us about his wife's labor and what the after birth looked like and the baby's first poop (apparently there's a medical name for it). A woman from another department walked by, overheard the conversation and proceeded to tell us every last detail about the birth of both her children. Now I know that you bleed for six weeks straight after you give birth, and that you need to buy stool softeners, and that you can have small contractions while breatfeeding because the uterus is shrinking. I should not know this much about people who are only acquaintances (I've never met the wife).

Spring is in the air
After being 20 degrees on Monday, the weather today was beautiful. It was so nice that when I went out to get a sandwich for lunch I decided to stay outside and eat in Union Square. So did about half the people in the neighborhood. The park was hopping, but I was still able to find a nice spot o' bench. Then on the subway ride home I decided that an ice cream cone would be just right for my good mood and the lovely weather. I passed four or five people with ice cream on my way out of the subway, and there was a line at Tasty Delight (yum, strawberry cheesecake softserve). I'm glad I'm not the only New Yorker aching for some sunshine and a taste of summer.

On a completely unrelated note
Some one is filming a movie near my apartment. I didn't stumble across the film crew, but all of the trailers, etc., have taken over my stretch of York Ave.

More fun with food on the subway
Today on my way home, I saw a woman eating instant oatmeal straight out of the packet. You know how some people eat bags of peanuts or M&Ms buy pouring them directly into their mouths? That's what she was doing with the oatmeal. I can't imagine it would be pleasant to eat dry instant oatmeal. Wouldn't you get thirsty? And there was oatmeal dust flying all over. It smell like maple and brown sugar. She finished off two packets between 14th Street and 59th Street, just two stops apart. Baffling.

For those of you who watched Sex in the City.
Do you remember the episode about modelizers, men who are obsessed with models. Well, I met one the other day. I was at Bumble and bumble for another free cut. These things take a long time, so I was reading Elle. One of the educators, who looked and sounded more like a frat boy than a hair stylist, seemed to be reading over my shoulder. I was reading a story about the new Calvin Klein line, and there were four pictures of the same model on the page. Then I realized he wasn't reading, he was staring. He started talking with some of the other stylists about his favorite models, and who had owned what shows, and who was new this season and who he had pictures of himself with, did they want to see? I guess modelizers really do exist.

Great friends
drop what they're doing and come bring you cookies when you need to bitch about boys. Thanks.

Traffic Jam on 83rd
There was a traffic jam on my block today. Really. Although most of you haven't been to my apartment or seen how out of the way it is, so you wouldn't understand how unusual this was.

The source of the problem was a heating oil truck stopped near the corner at 83rd and York. (Lots of furnaces around here run on oil, and the trucks pump it into basements from valves in the sidewalk.) And being New York, there are always cars lining both sides of the street, so there wasn't much room to get by. A brave (or crazy) driver might have attempted it. Except the next vehicle back was a tour bus of some sort. And the cars kept going from there, with a few taxis and a delivery truck mixed in, all the way to the end of the block.

I laughed the rest of the way home. I'm sure the people in the cabs who were paying 10 cents a minute to sit in traffic weren't laughing with me.