Why weekends suck and are amazing

Friday: Came home right after work, went into a tv coma.

Saturday: Participated in harrowing, headache inducing, kind of strangely comfortable road trip to Philly with my sister driving and 4 women going through menopause complaining about the air conditioner in the back. (Among many, many other things.)

Sunday: Went to the New York Television Festival at New World Stages, which sadly, used to be the $2 movie theater. (HS memories!) The panel discussions ranged from very helpful, inspiring and informative to downright patronizing and glib. (welcome to the world of TV development!) After that, I decided to walk from 50th between 8th and 9th all the way home. I made it almost 2 miles when I realized that I was sweating worse than everyone in this movie so I hopped on the bus.

Before that though, I took a little shortcut (not really) through the tunnel at the Bethesda Fountain and was literally stopped in my tracks by Thoth. I'd heard of him and have probably seen him around, but because of my increasingly unhealthy contempt for tourists who I try to avoid like the plague, I haven't been to that part of the park in ages. It was like everyone disappeared. No real description can accurately describe the effect of his voice, his movement in the space, that lacked a real audience, thanks to the massive crowd of tourists surrounding these two guys who were doing stand up or break dancing, or something. Some people walked by, snickering at his costume, his unexplainable performance. Some, like me, stayed to watch, mesmerized and when he finished we weren't sure whether to applaud or just walk away in quiet reverence. I did both and then continued on my trek through the park where I proceeded to dodge camera wielding tourists who took up the entire width of a city street, oblivious to the thousands of people around them who just wanted to go home.

Bliss.

Revisiting a sad and infuriating statistic

Hannah Upp. If you watch television, own a computer and especially if you live in NYC, there is no escaping this woman's name, face, story. She's missing! She's a school teacher! OMG, she lives in Harlem! The media who claim to be so compassionate about stories of missing people did all but print a story about her body being found somewhere. Notices went up on all the social networking sites, email vigils were forwarded to people's inboxes and then days later, Upp is spotted and then positively identified by her parents in the Apple store on fifth avenue.

Now, stories are surfacing that maybe she wanted to disappear from the face of the Earth, overlooking the small fact that her friends and family would be worried sick looking for her. I don't want to sound angry but bias is bias and when it's so blatant and no one takes accountability for it, it's hard to sympathize for one young woman going through a personal crisis, when there are families of hundreds of women of color who will never see their daughters again. I sincerely hope that Upp is okay and that she deals with whatever she is going through. Just like I sincerely wish the media would fairly cover all missing person's cases with the same fervor and round the clock coverage of a pretty white girl with a flower in her hair.

Passionate and informative video on the subject via Brave New Films after the jump:



Links via ABC news
Wikipedia

I'm still going to see it

Approaching my twilight years, I am not as much of a Sex and the City fanatic as I used to be. Like so many other New Yorkers, I have always been strangely entranced, delighted and absolutely pissed that Sex & The City exists. No one runs through midtown in four inch heels. Sorry, it just doesn't happen. Just like NO ONE can live on 73rd and 3rd and be perpetually broke as Carrie always was. Rent stabilized Brownstones in Manhattan? They don't exist. Neither do obscenely handsome, intelligent straight guys, or fabulous fleet week parties in some random location in Times Square. What I really feel sorry for are the all the out- of -towners who watch the show and then come to NYC and discover that (gasp) people of color actually live in New York. But I digress.

If you were caught up in the SATC haze as I was, you'll know that the show is a very hard habit to kick, especially now that it's in syndication. If you are not familiar with the haze, it's that 2-3 year period after the final episode aired on HBO where you actually felt sorry for yourself because you were torn between watching something really good, informative or entertaining or pressing play on your remote and watching another season of SATC on demand for literally the 400th time while simultaneously contemplating shelling out $200 for the DVD set. Ask anyone that knows me. It was bad. But again, I digress.

Thank the stars for this TONY article on why the show has been a huge reason for NYC's general downfall into suckage and oblivion. God knows I loves me some NY1 but when that stupid Carmel car commercial comes on, I want to gouge my eyes out with the nearest blunt object. Unlike most local NYC commercials that are so bad they're good, this one is god awfully horrendous and I really wish NY1 would renege on their pact with the devil and stop airing it. That being said, I will still pay 12 bucks and leave the theater two hours later feeling simultaneously dead & fabulous inside.

Link Via Time Out New York

Damn America?

I find myself in a sort of conundrum today...
The thing is, by posting this link to what I consider one of the most reprehensible and vile things about New York, I feel as if I'm only giving in to Internet hype instead of merely backing away. On the other hand, by ignoring the problem, I am potentially giving up on what should be a city-wide boycott of The Post, which is pretty much, unreadable. (My one loyal subscriber, if you're still out there, get to work!) Since I don't read the paper, I wonder if this "writer" reported Russell Crowe's phone throwing antics with the same self-entitled zeal. Or on Lilo Brancato for that matter, who is waiting to stand trial for murder. I'm not excusing stupid acts of violence by rappers but last time I checked a newspaper is supposed to report, not condemn. Not call a human being a "thing". Thanks to Gawker for noting this sad and ridiculous woman who calls herself a reporter. I have no idea why I chose the title for this post, it was the first thing that popped into my head. This was the second thing, quoted from some guy in a documentary some friends of mine are making: "America needs a nation-wide ass whuppin'." Amen.

Good Morning New York

50 shots fired. Let's really think about that for a minute. 50 SHOTS. I'm stunned right now. Our flawless justice system prevails again.


link via Gothamist

Yay

Congratulations to David Paterson on being sworn in as my state's new, first ever Black governor. Everyone seems to like him so that's encouraging.

Cloverfield makes a good point about gentrification.

Cloverfield was sort of good in a very "well it didn't suck" kind of way. Even though I was close to getting very nauseous, (it could have been the raisinet laced popcorn though) the shaky camera work meshed well with the special effects without ever being too obvious or cheesy. What bothered me about the film were a number of things regarding what would really happen in NYC in the event (even though there was a scene reminiscent of 9/11) a gigantic slimy monster thingy attacked the city.

For instance, what was with the automatic decision to run over the Brooklyn bridge to safety? Any New Yorker would know that, just like during 9/11, all was calm and peaceful uptown. Assuming that I didn't know the army was going to (spoiler alert) blow up Manhattan, my ass would have been on the first available train, bus, bike, Segway, or I would of hoofed it straight to Harlem and the Bronx. I mean really. And what was up with the subway scene? I would have loved to be a fly on the wall in that production meeting. Not only did the Spring St. Station look like someone just basically said "F**K it" and guessed what a NYC subway should look like, but getting from the village to 59th st in what seemed like less than an hr? Once that scene happened it kind of distracted me from the rest of the movie. And funny how no one was concerned about the third rail. Did we not see Beat Street? Forgive me for being such a NY snob but it drives me nuts when movies get it all wrong. Like when they stick the Empire state building, or the Chrysler building right in the middle of an intersection instead of in the avenue where they really belong, just so they can blow them up.

Which brings me to my clever title about the rampant and depressing surge of gentrification that is taking over the best parts of NYC. If those kids were real New Yorkers, they probably would have been in the Cloverfield sequel. But like all other twenty- something up and coming young professionals, the whole party scene reeked of the scourge of fair weather New Yorkers who come to party, live in cramped, over priced apartments, (that are overpriced because they will pay for it) pretend to be a part of the city when they won't go past 86th street and then leave, to spend their disposable incomes in the suburbs.

Which leads me to another point, as I increasingly stray from the original point about this movie which, the more I think of it was just aiight. Why do I always feel like I just asked something extremely personal when I inquire about whether someone is a Native New Yorker or not? If one says that they are from new York, it implies that they are born there, no? I've had more than a few uncomfortable conversations with people (mostly women) who seem almost ashamed to admit that they are not Native New Yorkers, who quickly inform me that they have lived in NY for at least five years and then are real quick to rattle off a bunch of trendy wine bars in Brooklyn that I must go to. What gives? I call it city envy.

Even though it's painfully obvious nowadays, (hint: despite a certain myth about New Yorkers being rude, it's actually the other way around!) I don't particularly care who is from New York and who isn't. What I do care about is the soul slowly being sucked out of the city I grew up in because the rich and affected want to use it as their playground and then bail when it becomes too real. It saddens me, makes me contemplate running to the suburbs my damn self. OK, I take that back. No WAY am I moving to Queens! (haha) But I am losing faith. Especially after watching Cloverfield. Now, the more that I think about it, it kind of sucked, just a little. Oh well.

link via Stuff White People Like (hilarious)
image via IWatchStuff