Hey look at me, titling consecutive blog entries with song lyrics. And hey, look at me, writing consecutive blog entries about Sameer.
He and I went to the Pearl Jam concert in the Garden on Tuesday night. Eddie Vedder has to be the most essentially cool person in the world. Could not take my eyes off of him, no matter what was going on in the concert. The band played for three and a half hours, and it was sensational. I was particularly psyched that they played "Leash" and "Given to Fly"; was kind of hoping to hear "World Wide Suicide" and "Jeremy" but didn't. The concert featured a healthy mix of old, new and everything in between. There are few experiences that approximate the energy of 20,000 people singing along in unison to a completely electrified band. It was so loud that I would not have been able to tell if I was singing along or not had my throat not been hurting from the effort.
Delight, delight, delight in our youth...
Friday, June 27, 2008
All summer long, we sang a song
Sameer Ashar and I have been friends since the 8th grade. At the end of the 8th grade, some high school kids came to our middle school to recruit folks for the debate team. Sameer and I attended that meeting, listened to their nerdy pitch, and decided we would be debate partners the next year. We spent the next four years of high school developing a debate partnership that turned us into a nationally competitive team (arguably a top 10 or 12 team in the country)(arguably...get it?), while cultivating a deep, deep friendship. Since high school it has seemed, with some exception, like we've never been farther than 20 minutes apart from each other: we went to colleges 20 minutes apart from each other, law schools 20 minutes apart from each other, we worked for a while in downtown Manhattan near each other, and now we live about ten blocks from each other in Brooklyn. He is terrible at returning phone calls, is almost guaranteed to be late to any appointment, is a frickin Yankees fan, and is one of the very best people I know in the world. And, finally, that boy is getting married.
Last Saturday I gathered with four other of Sameer's friends (Ajit, Deepu, Tito and George) to engage in that right of passage called "the bachelor party." We drove up to Cornwall-on-Hudson and kayaked on the Hudson River. It was a gloriously sunny day, and I could not have imagined doing anything better than kayaking on that expanse of river (and off through a marshy tributary). When we finished the kayak trip, I had to teach Tito how to use his keys to get into his car, and then we dined on pizza and ice cream at a local joint. We drove back to Brooklyn, dined at a trendy but middling Mexican restaurant in Red Hook called Alma, and then headed to a karaoke bar.
I've never done karaoke. Honest. It's not just that I've never sung karaoke; I've never actually been to a karaoke gathering of any sort. The bar that we went to (the Hope 'n Anchor in Red Hook) had the kind of karaoke where it is basically open mike at the bar. You would peruse a book that listed the 15,000 different songs that you could sing, and then submit a post-it with your song on it to the 7-foot trans woman who was hosting the karaoke. Really, she had to be 7 feet tall, and she wore a glorious blonde afro wig. Sameer led off for us with Pearl Jam's "Elderly Woman behind the counter..." and then it was game on. Deepu, Ajit and Tito sang a range of pop hits (Sweet Home Alabama, I'm Just a Gigolo, etc.). Sameer and Ajit performed a duet to The Killers' "All These things that I've Become" ("I've got soul, but I'm not a soldier..."). The pressure on me to sing was mounting.
I don't know what other karaoke scenes are like, but with the exception of our little crew, this seemed like a fairly serious karaoke scene. Every member of the bar's staff, including our 7-foot hostess, would take turns singing a song and they were all amazing. There was another woman in the bar who simply had a professional-sounding voice. When she belted out "Me and Bobby McGee," you almost believed that Janis Joplin had been resurrected. I was intimidated, yes.
But a couple of whiskeys in me, and singing became an inevitability. I searched for a short song, and came up with Sinatra's "Summer Wind." I started in a bit late on the song but ended admirably -- heck, a drunk couple even got up and danced while I sang. When it was over, sure, I felt like a man. A man, that is, that doesn't need to sing any more songs in a bar for quite some time.
Sameer's wedding is in L.A. in a little over a week, and I'm looking forward to partying with those crazy boys again.
Last Saturday I gathered with four other of Sameer's friends (Ajit, Deepu, Tito and George) to engage in that right of passage called "the bachelor party." We drove up to Cornwall-on-Hudson and kayaked on the Hudson River. It was a gloriously sunny day, and I could not have imagined doing anything better than kayaking on that expanse of river (and off through a marshy tributary). When we finished the kayak trip, I had to teach Tito how to use his keys to get into his car, and then we dined on pizza and ice cream at a local joint. We drove back to Brooklyn, dined at a trendy but middling Mexican restaurant in Red Hook called Alma, and then headed to a karaoke bar.
I've never done karaoke. Honest. It's not just that I've never sung karaoke; I've never actually been to a karaoke gathering of any sort. The bar that we went to (the Hope 'n Anchor in Red Hook) had the kind of karaoke where it is basically open mike at the bar. You would peruse a book that listed the 15,000 different songs that you could sing, and then submit a post-it with your song on it to the 7-foot trans woman who was hosting the karaoke. Really, she had to be 7 feet tall, and she wore a glorious blonde afro wig. Sameer led off for us with Pearl Jam's "Elderly Woman behind the counter..." and then it was game on. Deepu, Ajit and Tito sang a range of pop hits (Sweet Home Alabama, I'm Just a Gigolo, etc.). Sameer and Ajit performed a duet to The Killers' "All These things that I've Become" ("I've got soul, but I'm not a soldier..."). The pressure on me to sing was mounting.
I don't know what other karaoke scenes are like, but with the exception of our little crew, this seemed like a fairly serious karaoke scene. Every member of the bar's staff, including our 7-foot hostess, would take turns singing a song and they were all amazing. There was another woman in the bar who simply had a professional-sounding voice. When she belted out "Me and Bobby McGee," you almost believed that Janis Joplin had been resurrected. I was intimidated, yes.
But a couple of whiskeys in me, and singing became an inevitability. I searched for a short song, and came up with Sinatra's "Summer Wind." I started in a bit late on the song but ended admirably -- heck, a drunk couple even got up and danced while I sang. When it was over, sure, I felt like a man. A man, that is, that doesn't need to sing any more songs in a bar for quite some time.
Sameer's wedding is in L.A. in a little over a week, and I'm looking forward to partying with those crazy boys again.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Hey, drunk lady
One of my dogs is taking a crap.
The other one is barking hysterically at you.
And I'm not making any eye contact, while trying to walk away.
What is it about this set of circumstances that leads you to believe that I want to have a conversation with you about anything, no less your aunt's five dogs?
Thank you, however, for repeatedly telling me that my dogs are beautiful. Not everyone appreciates them, like you do, when one is squatting and the other is yapping his head off.
The other one is barking hysterically at you.
And I'm not making any eye contact, while trying to walk away.
What is it about this set of circumstances that leads you to believe that I want to have a conversation with you about anything, no less your aunt's five dogs?
Thank you, however, for repeatedly telling me that my dogs are beautiful. Not everyone appreciates them, like you do, when one is squatting and the other is yapping his head off.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Cruisin'
On Friday we headed up to Bloomfield so that Cathleen could run in a Run for the Cure 5K (re breast cancer) with some high school friends in Hartford on Saturday morning. Cathleen and the kids drove up to my office school and arrived at around 4:30. There was some trouble with the car, Cathleen informed me, that had developed in the latter part of her drive to the Bronx; there was a bad bumping noise coming from around the front passenger side tire.
Oh. That's right. A few days earlier, while driving home from summer league, I encountered a horrendous patch of newly-scratched up under-construction roadway on the BQE that had not been so scratched up the week before. The car had gone bang and bop, and then I seemed to be feeling every bump from every piece of gravel on the road. By the time I awoke the next morning, however, I had forgotten about it, and Cathleen had not noticed anything driving either to or from school in the ensuing days.
Now we were in the Bronx, with all of our stuff, shortly before dinner time. We took the car to the local Midas guy near my office, whom I've used before and trust. At 15 minutes before closing time, he put the car up on the rack and showed me where the right-front spring was shattered. Well, that would explain that. No spring in stock; he could get one and repair it Saturday. When I told him we were actually en route to CT for the weekend, he recommended we go to the Enterprise rental place half a block away. So we did.
I never know what to expect from the service sector in the Bronx. Rude? Shoddy? Perfectly fine? It can be a gamble of sorts. The Enterprise on East Fordham Road was interesting: there were six guys in suits walking around, only two of whom appeared to be actually servicing any rental customer at any given time. The other four would take turns asking you what you were there for, and if you had signed in yet. Everyone was nice and friendly and seemed to be accommodating, but it didn't look like anything was getting done. And the place was packed with customers. My wife and I, with our two young kids, and our two small dogs, spent an hour there. To all of my small creatures' credit, they all did quite well given the circumstances: the dogs were under control the entire time; Max was incredibly well-behaved, but for periodic whining about how bored he was because it was taking so long (neither of which I minded, because it gave me an opportunity to audibilize patient, yet needling responses, that the men in the office were working as fast as they could to get us a car); Eliza became antsy after a while, so Cathleen took her outside for a walk. It could have been a lot worse.
When it was time for me to pick out a car, I was led into an adjoining garage. I told the guy I just wanted the cheapest rental they had available. Well, he told me, the cheapest they normally have is a Ford Focus sedan, but he'd give me a PT Cruiser for the same rate.
The PT Cruiser has been around for, what, a decade or so? Let me tell you something about that car: I have never liked it. A car that looks like a miniature hearse? Who the hell came up with that design idea? I have been so convinced of the absurdity of the Cruiser's appearance that to this day I cannot believe that there is anyone who takes that car seriously. One year I played at the Poultrydays ultimate tourney in rural, western Ohio on a combo Haverford-Swarthmore graduates team. One of the Swat grads, whom I of course did not know, had rented a PT Cruiser as his car for the weekend. I eventually learned that he was very excited about this rental, and had paid a lot in order to get it. Indeed, while everyone else camped at the fields in tents that weekend, he slept in the Cruiser (like a cadaver?). Not even giving a moment's consideration that someone might actually think that the Hearsemobile was cool, I started making fun of it from the get-go, and quickly alienated this complete stranger. I have a talent for that kind of thing. All was made up when, early in our first game, I cut deep and laid out to catch a swilly, overthrown huck that the guy had put up (most interpersonal conflict, I have learned, can be resolved if you simply catch someone's crappy throws).
So, standing there in the Enterprise car rental facility at 6 pm, I grabbed the Cruiser. I am all about maximizing the irony in my life.
The PT Cruiser is pretty much as ridiculous on the inside as it is on the outside. We were in a 2008 model, and yet the dashboard display was in old-fashioned dial readout form. The only digital display was a function where you could observe what kind of gas mileage you were getting, a piece of information that you'd think Chrysler would not want to make readily available given that this car was topping off at 20 mpg on the highway. Although the car handled the road quite well, it had the turning radius of a large elephant.
Eliza spent much of the drive up to CT, and much of the ride home yesterday, asking about and discussing why we were in this car.
"Why are we in this car?"
"Our car is broken."
"Our car is broken?"
"Yes, a man is going to fix our car, and then we'll get it back."
"Man going to fix our car?"
"Yes."
Pause. "Why are we in this car?"
At first I thought it was just her two-year-old brain processing the entire experience, but then I realized this is Eliza, my brilliant daughter. She is not asking why are we in a car that is not our car; she understood that the PT Cruiser was an absurd vehicle. "Why, Daddy," she was basically asking, "are you driving me around in this asinine joke?" Geez, I do love that little girl.
The balance of the weekend was great: Cathleen had a great run on Saturday (did the 5K in about 30 minutes flat), the kids road on the local carousel, we took a long hike in the sweltering afternoon up a nearby mountain (at Max's insistence; he is really into hiking and did not waiver once in his enthusiasm for the experience), took a cool dip in the neighbor's pool, had a terrific dinner and then drove home at night. This morning I went out for a 4-mile run and nearly died in the heat, and then we went to Max's classmate's birthday party in Prospect Park, before coming home, installing the AC in the livingroom window (mercifully!), grilling and bedtime.
Oh. That's right. A few days earlier, while driving home from summer league, I encountered a horrendous patch of newly-scratched up under-construction roadway on the BQE that had not been so scratched up the week before. The car had gone bang and bop, and then I seemed to be feeling every bump from every piece of gravel on the road. By the time I awoke the next morning, however, I had forgotten about it, and Cathleen had not noticed anything driving either to or from school in the ensuing days.
Now we were in the Bronx, with all of our stuff, shortly before dinner time. We took the car to the local Midas guy near my office, whom I've used before and trust. At 15 minutes before closing time, he put the car up on the rack and showed me where the right-front spring was shattered. Well, that would explain that. No spring in stock; he could get one and repair it Saturday. When I told him we were actually en route to CT for the weekend, he recommended we go to the Enterprise rental place half a block away. So we did.
I never know what to expect from the service sector in the Bronx. Rude? Shoddy? Perfectly fine? It can be a gamble of sorts. The Enterprise on East Fordham Road was interesting: there were six guys in suits walking around, only two of whom appeared to be actually servicing any rental customer at any given time. The other four would take turns asking you what you were there for, and if you had signed in yet. Everyone was nice and friendly and seemed to be accommodating, but it didn't look like anything was getting done. And the place was packed with customers. My wife and I, with our two young kids, and our two small dogs, spent an hour there. To all of my small creatures' credit, they all did quite well given the circumstances: the dogs were under control the entire time; Max was incredibly well-behaved, but for periodic whining about how bored he was because it was taking so long (neither of which I minded, because it gave me an opportunity to audibilize patient, yet needling responses, that the men in the office were working as fast as they could to get us a car); Eliza became antsy after a while, so Cathleen took her outside for a walk. It could have been a lot worse.
When it was time for me to pick out a car, I was led into an adjoining garage. I told the guy I just wanted the cheapest rental they had available. Well, he told me, the cheapest they normally have is a Ford Focus sedan, but he'd give me a PT Cruiser for the same rate.
The PT Cruiser has been around for, what, a decade or so? Let me tell you something about that car: I have never liked it. A car that looks like a miniature hearse? Who the hell came up with that design idea? I have been so convinced of the absurdity of the Cruiser's appearance that to this day I cannot believe that there is anyone who takes that car seriously. One year I played at the Poultrydays ultimate tourney in rural, western Ohio on a combo Haverford-Swarthmore graduates team. One of the Swat grads, whom I of course did not know, had rented a PT Cruiser as his car for the weekend. I eventually learned that he was very excited about this rental, and had paid a lot in order to get it. Indeed, while everyone else camped at the fields in tents that weekend, he slept in the Cruiser (like a cadaver?). Not even giving a moment's consideration that someone might actually think that the Hearsemobile was cool, I started making fun of it from the get-go, and quickly alienated this complete stranger. I have a talent for that kind of thing. All was made up when, early in our first game, I cut deep and laid out to catch a swilly, overthrown huck that the guy had put up (most interpersonal conflict, I have learned, can be resolved if you simply catch someone's crappy throws).
So, standing there in the Enterprise car rental facility at 6 pm, I grabbed the Cruiser. I am all about maximizing the irony in my life.
The PT Cruiser is pretty much as ridiculous on the inside as it is on the outside. We were in a 2008 model, and yet the dashboard display was in old-fashioned dial readout form. The only digital display was a function where you could observe what kind of gas mileage you were getting, a piece of information that you'd think Chrysler would not want to make readily available given that this car was topping off at 20 mpg on the highway. Although the car handled the road quite well, it had the turning radius of a large elephant.
Eliza spent much of the drive up to CT, and much of the ride home yesterday, asking about and discussing why we were in this car.
"Why are we in this car?"
"Our car is broken."
"Our car is broken?"
"Yes, a man is going to fix our car, and then we'll get it back."
"Man going to fix our car?"
"Yes."
Pause. "Why are we in this car?"
At first I thought it was just her two-year-old brain processing the entire experience, but then I realized this is Eliza, my brilliant daughter. She is not asking why are we in a car that is not our car; she understood that the PT Cruiser was an absurd vehicle. "Why, Daddy," she was basically asking, "are you driving me around in this asinine joke?" Geez, I do love that little girl.
The balance of the weekend was great: Cathleen had a great run on Saturday (did the 5K in about 30 minutes flat), the kids road on the local carousel, we took a long hike in the sweltering afternoon up a nearby mountain (at Max's insistence; he is really into hiking and did not waiver once in his enthusiasm for the experience), took a cool dip in the neighbor's pool, had a terrific dinner and then drove home at night. This morning I went out for a 4-mile run and nearly died in the heat, and then we went to Max's classmate's birthday party in Prospect Park, before coming home, installing the AC in the livingroom window (mercifully!), grilling and bedtime.
Friday, June 6, 2008
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