Work

Scrubs is, of course, one of the funniest shows of all time, so I was laughing hysterically to clips on YouTube (yeah, my TV is not connected) and saw one in which Turk is wearing a PETA "Powered by Tofu" shirt! If you are anal enough to want to see it for yourself, click here and skip to 6:22.

Here's a list of professions you might want to consider. For how many of these people do you know what they do? To make the list, it had to be one I didn't know!

Apiarist, beadle, boatswain, bowyer, busker, cooper, cordwainer, costermonger, currier, fletcher, farrier, hostler, wainwright.

Remember, "boatswain" is pronounced and sometimes spelled "bosun," and "hostler" is pronounced and sometimes spelled "ostler." Actually, I should have known "farrier" because it was mentioned on Darcy's Wild Life. (Yeah, another good reason to keep my TV disconnected.) Here's some I can think of that I do know, but just as interesting:

Haberdasher, chandler, thaumaturgist, barista, vintner, dramaturg, flautist, sommelier.

So, which ones did you know? And, did I miss any cool occupation-names?

CHOC-O-LATE

This weekend I went to another Fringe Festival performance called "We Love You, Johnny Hero," but this musical was actually good. True to Fringe, it was like seeing a college show -- amateurish with some weak singers -- and the story got pretty heavy handed with the conservatives-are-bad stuff with the song, "The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the brave get butchered." But in spite of an ending that didn't quite make sense, it was pretty clever, with funny songs like "Sometimes you have to chloroform the ones you love," and "This is so f---ing cool!"

I also discovered a new Max Brenner restaurant (apparently an Israeli company!) just off Union Square devoted to chocolate! I mean, chocolate fountains pouring into chocolate mixers, fancy chocolates of all kinds, pipes through the dining area labelled "100% chocolate," even chocolate pizza! It was like heaven, only more brown and delicious. The menu itself was conventional -- and sadly, vegan-unfriendly. But it was a wonderland of a store! I love New York! (Here are pictures with my sucky new expensive camera, but for better and more pictures look here.)






The next day I helped my roommate buy supplies for her turtle -- or, well, we didn't end up buying anything, but it took a lot of time. Went to Buddha Boddai in Chinatown and was pretty disappointed by the food. But afterwards I crossed the last thing off my summer to-do list and went to a new place in Brooklyn, the waterfront, for a view of Manhattan. Actually, the weather was rainy and it was a terrible day for it, but technically I have finished my list. Now time for a new one.

Speaking of which, I bought 白果 ("whitefruit" in Chinese), which are these nuts the size of grapes that come in pistacchio-like shells so that I can make soup with them like my roommate does, where they taste similar to lotus seeds. I looked them up, apparently they're ginkgo nuts. Now I just have to learn how to cook them. I find excitement where I can.

I also explored 37th Ave here in Elmhurst, which I didn't even know was there, but is full of restaurants, and discovered there's a Taco Bell near me. Apparently, life is just a neverending ball of joy.

Malaysian Idol

If cute things make you want to puke, then I'm really warning you, don't click here!

In economic news, the economic is doing great, but salaries are falling compared to inflation. In fact, salaries are at their lowest point, as a percentage of the economy, since record-keeping began in the 1940s! That's right, people are producing more, profits are through the roof, but they're not going to employees. In 2004, the top 1% of earners received 11.2% of all wage income, up from 8.7% ten years earlier. Yay, Bush! (From NY Times)

Google wonders

There are a lot of you who apparently don't know the powers that Google has to offer. You surely know how to search, but you can do a lot more with that search box. For example, it's a calculator: try typing in 4*3.6+2, and violà! It also converts: try typing in "3 square km in acres" or "$16 in shekels". Type in a phone number, it will give you the name and address of the person with that number. Want to track a package? Doesn't matter if it's USPS, UPS, FedEx, just type the tracking number in! Want to know what "quaff" means? Type "define:quaff" (though m-w.com or dictionary.com is better). Looking for movie times or reviews? Just type in "movie:snakes on a plane", or by zip code "movie:21044". Want a weather forcast? Type "weather:90210" There's lots more stuff like that.

Just as cool, you can get most of this information on your cell phone wherever you are by texting to GOOGL (46645).

Then there are Google applications. If you don't already have a gmail account, you have to get one, it is far better than all the others in so many ways, it's really incredible. You don't know what you're missing. Another must-have is Google desktop, for searching your own computer files. Not only does the Windows search suck pickles, but this will even find files that got deleted or lost, or older version of files you still have, which has saved my life on more than one occasion. Picassa is the best thing ever for dealing with photos. You probably know about Google maps, and blogger. Google spreadsheets, Google calendar, Google translate, are all cute. Perhaps the most ambitious, and a bit scary, is their Web accelerator. It makes the web faster because it preloads all the links that you just might possibly click on, so they're all ready to go. However, to do this, Google basically makes a copy of the entire Worldwide Web on its own servers and everything you do is off the Google copy. That means they know every site you visit, every password you type in, and so on, just like your ISP does currently but they'll have everyone on there. Just imagine, if they were evil, what power they might have. And they plan never to delete anything, so some email you sent years ago, some web page you just put up for a few minutes to play around, it will stay there forever, for some future evil government to mine...

Anyway, these things are just the tip of the Google iceberg. Not everything is equally good, I've just mentioned a few that I find nice to know about.

Nothing to tell

Just to make clear, I haven't been posting lately because there's nothing to tell, working all day. Well, yesterday I walked arount the Columbus Circle area, which is beautiful, taking lots of pictures to post here, but my camera quality sucks and what a waste of money. Dammit. Now I'm waiting to do the lottery for front row tickets to Wicked, but it's pouring, so it better be worth it.

No, I didn't get the tickets.

Action Alert: Call Ben & Jerry's

Take a quick second and call Ben & Jerry's at 802-846-1500 (9 to 5 EST) and ask them to keep their promise to buy cage-free eggs. They've been lying to the Humane Society of the US that they were going to stop buying from these factory farms that cram 7 birds to a cage too small to even stretch a limb, with feces falling on birds from cages overhead. It's so easy, just call them up, right now, and just a one sentence message. Their decision affects tens of thousands of animals. (More info)

I mean it, it's just a phone call, do it already!

Politeness, the brothel, and a turtle

Tsoching is in Yellowstone Park right now! Isn't that cool? In Wyoming, a state with less people than Washington DC, and yet it gets just as many Senators as California. (And DC gets none.) Call that democracy?

I've also noticed something about my new roommate, Li. She is extremely polite. I mean, the kind of polite you hear about Japanese people. I remember when I was cleaning the bathroom, and she asked me:

Li: Do you want to clean the bathroom now?
Me: Yeah, just a little. The mirror and stuff.
Li: I never use that.
Me: Really? I use it whenever I get out of the shower.
Li: So you want to use clean the bathroom now?
Me: I just feel an urge to get this done.
Li: (leaves, comes back a minute later) Still cleaning?
Me: Yeah. I like to have a clean bathroom.
Li: We don't usually clean all that.
Me: Yeah, I'm just doing a little.
Li: So, you want to clean the bathroom now?
Me: (thinking, why does she keep asking me that? then suddenly, a light bulb goes on. I stop and turn to her.) Did you want to use the bathroom?
Li: Well, I was thinking of taking a shower, but --
Me: I'm sorry! You should have told me, of course I can do this later! (I scurry away.)

This happened again Friday, when I asked if it was okay if someone stayed over for the weekend. I kept saying, "Really, don't feel you have to be polite, if you don't want to it's no big deal, just tell me." But she just answered with things like, "Aren't you worried about having someone in your room?" I repeatedly tried to get an answer from her: "It sounds like you're hesitant. So, you'd prefer not?" More vague comments. Probably from her Chinese sensibility -- for whom saying "no" is just too impolite -- her answers felt to her like she was hitting me upside the head with a baseball bat while screaming "No! No! No, motherf---er!" But I, the stupid American, kept asking, struggling for a response. Finally, I said, "It's clear from your hesitation that you don't want me to. Right?" Pinned against a wall, not knowing what else she could possibly say, there was only silence. She was probably thinking something like, "To say so out loud would dishonor my ancestors and my family will turn away in shame, crying out to the gods, why, why gods, why didn't you send us a boy?"

Of course, as an American, if she asked me I'd just say, "I rather not, sorry." Which in politeness terms would probably be the chinese equivalent of pulling down my pants and saying, "Want some of this, puta?" Ah, cultural differences.

People in Taiwan are not Chinese.

Today, super-yummy food at Red Bamboo, and a walk around the Village, Washington Square Park was beautiful. Sweet. Went with Li. While talking to her, I suddenly realized that she knows Carol. And Li loves to gossip. So, it could become sticky... Li already has some ideas of me based upon gossip about me, but she won't tell me what it is she's heard.

Thursday the weather was great, so I worked in Bryant Park, which is great. Moreover, they had a stage set up where opera singers were performing -- which was actually kind of annoying, it's not exactly background music for working, but also a little cool. In the evening, they set up for a performance of the New York Pops Orchestra, but I instead chose to see a friend Marissa's comedy troupe, The Brothel, whose performances I had missed so many times, that I was determined to make the trek. It was, as people in Hollywood might say according to Kevin Smith, interesting. It must take a lot of cojones to get up in front of a crowd of strangers and friends and tell jokes that, um, aren't so funny. As you can probably tell from this blog, I can't exactly do any better. Some of the guest stand-ups weren't bad, though.

Friday I worked in Flushing, where at a Chinese market, I saw turtles in a crate, for sale by the pound, one trying hopelessly to get out, but a worker took a clam and hit it on the head so it would pull back into its shell. I said to him in Chinese, "不要殘酷" -- "Don't be cruel" -- but he seemed not to hear me. Sent a note to the ASPCA, but obviously I'm not hopeful.

Ok, we're caught up on this week's highlights. I'll be better in the future.

Soup!

I look at the war in Lebanon and think, Israel lost. They destroyed a few rockets, but otherwise got nothing for it. They are saying that the Lebanese army is coming into the south, but honestly what difference will that make? The army will sit there and do nothing as Hezbollah controls the place and acts freely. What a disaster.

Yesterday I had young jackfruit in coconut chili sauce from the nearby Indonesian restaurant. I've only had jackfruit in its sweet, fruit-like deserty state, but apparent when it's young and not yet sweet, it works as a vegetable, a kind of meaty thing, something in the vague vecinity of potato. Then I cooked some sweet mung bean and oat soup -- it's so good! Steamed some lotus buns. A yummy day.

Balls!

I went to Curly's, a new vegetarian diner, which didn't look so diner but the food was actually pretty good. Then I went to a random Fringe Festival show called Minimum Wage. It was not good and I left halfway, but waiting in line to go in seemed interesting (see the video, which when I upload it becomes all blurry for some reason, but in the original the girl is so pretty!).

I was also thinking about how there seems to be a whole set of pretty fundamental things that no one ever taught me, and that it's not clear how to learn. For example, I have never used bleach before. I don't know what it does exactly (whiten?) or when to use it. So it was a new step for me to try it in the laundry this week. I don't know if it had an effect. Where do most people pick this info up? From parents I guess, because I don't see anywhere else that imparts this extremely common knowledge. Or let me give another example: flirting. I have no idea how to flirt. I have some sense, from experience, of how women flirt, but most of that wouldn't work for men. Where do people learn this -- not from parents I think! Is it just genetically hard-wired into them, that it comes naturally, or did I miss some formative period when I was supposed to be talking about this with peers? Anyway, there are a lot of other examples, but these are kinds of things I wish I could just sign up for a course on and get up to speed, but alas, such things don't seem to exist.

The Daily Show showed Condi Rice saying, "The Chinese have a character for crisis. It’s weiji--danger and opportunity. I think they have it right. Every crisis has within it danger, but every crisis also has within it opportunity." Jon quipped, "At least that's what she thought it meant when she got it tattooed." The picture shows Condi with a tattoo that says 猪 -- the character for "pig"!

I've embedded my first video in the blog. See Tuesday's post.

And if you want to waste time, this flash video is kind of cute.

Swiss Re

I'm not sure why everyone is so up in arms over Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic statements. He was extremely drunk and out-of-control, and he apologized and said these were things he didn't mean. Many of us have said things when very angry that we don't believe just to upset another person. I can easily see that happening when so extremely intoxicated and being arrested. What's the issue?

A sugar plum tastes like a plum. Nada especial.

One thing I am looking forward to seeing in the UK is the Swiss Re building ("The Gherkin"). I don't know why it isn't more famous, it's so beautiful. If I were building at ground zero, this is the kind of thing I might put instead of that stupid boring Freedom Tower — something that will stand above the city, draw the eye, and soar. Why couldn't we get the Fordham Spire, a cool spiral design to be built in Chicago that will be the taller than any building in the world today? We're New York City, dammit.

Be honest now, because it probably says a lot about your psychology: When you saw the Swiss Re building, did you think of a: a) Easter egg, b) rocket ship, c) phallus, or d) Noam's blog sucks which is why I don't leave comments?

Noodles

I'm not as sure about Lebanon any more. I'd just said I was turning against the war, but now I've been thinking that the war was inevitable. Hezbollah has been building bunkers and stockpiling tens of thousands of missiles, all with Israel's name on it. Hezbollah is, after all, committed to the destruction of the "Zionist Entity", and they did attack Israel without provocation. If the destruction is going to happen sooner or later, better than it happen sooner and be dealt with than fester and get worse. The sooner Hezbollah is weakened, the better for Israel and Lebanon both.

I was walking down my new street, which is only one block over but I'd still never come out here. There are a bunch of asian restaurants not far from me -- not the yucky American-style chinese takeout along Roosevelt, but the everything-written-in-chinese type. Went to a hand-pulled noodle place and got some cheap dumpling while watching the guy first prepare the dough and then stretch noodles by hand (see the two videos respectively)

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I've heard of sugar plums in 'Twas The Night Before Christmas, but never had any idea what they were. Well, I found them hanging out in Chinatown, and here's one of the visions dancing in your heads. Haven't tried it yet, stay posted.

Went to a bar in the Meatpacking district, which I hadn't been to in forever, and it's so cool there. I should go more often.

Turning on Lebanon

I've been away moving to my new apartment. The room is very big now, and my roommate is not gross, so it's a win, but moving was hellish. And it's not really done, there's still a lot of chaos in my room, and the stuff left by the old inhabitant will linger for two more weeks, but at least I have some floorspace, and a bed, and really everything I need. Welcome home.

The other day a friend was telling me how she stopped seeing a guy because he wasn't paying for her meals. Can you imagine if a guy left a girl because she wasn't paying for his meals? What is this sexist nonsense? I don't actually mind paying, I just mind being expected to pay because I'm male. It's like being expected to do the cleaning because you're female. I do it, of course, because it's necessary in this society, but I imagine it's like in the South, where whites were called "Mister" and blacks were called "boy" -- black people knew they had to accept this if they wanted to get whatever they wanted in life, but they surely weren't happy about it.

My grandfather died. I guess he deserved it. I guess we all do.

I've turned against Israel's war in Lebanon. The suffering caused is just too great, it's not worth it. Still, what drives me crazy is the Muslim world's criticism of Israel while holding up pictures of Nasrallah and calling on him to strike Tel Aviv. So, they're only against the deaths of civilians when those civilians are Muslim? Israel is at least taking great pains to avoid killing civillians, while Hezbollah continues to target them. The racist hypocricy astounds me.

Far more people are dying in Iraq, whey are they not protesting the Baathists and Sadrists?

I feel like Muslim culture today is built on hatred and prejudice. I hope that a Muslim can explain this all to me.