Sunday Afternoon Movie

It's raining in NYC today, so naturally we stayed in and watched a movie - Maxed Out.

It's a thought-provoking documentary that focuses primarily on the predatory lending practices of credit card companies and other financial institutions (including shady Providian, and the big banks like Citi, Chase, etc.)

The film at times seems a bit uneven in trying to tackle too much. For example, it touches on everything from controversial credit card marketing practices in wooing college students to tackling the U.S. budget deficit.

However, the poignant moments come when the film highlights individuals so caught up in debt that there is often no relief. And more often there are desperate and tragic results. Sadly, it also points out the increasingly widening gap between the have's and have-not's and the corresponding elimination of a middle-class. The bottom-line is to stay as fiscally prudent and knowledgable as possible so as not to fall into a debt trap that one cannot escape from.

Gathering in SoHo

Last night we headed to Kin Khao in SoHo (171 Spring Street) to celebrate my friend's birthday. It was a good sized group and we enjoyed each other's company as well as the tasty Thai food. I ordered the Pad See Yew with chicken and it was really good.

Afterwards, we did a brief stint at Blue Ribbon Bar in the West Village where I downed a pint of the Old Speckled Hen prior to heading to Daddy-O.

Aquafina = Purified Bullsh*t

The Times ran an article today about what we already know...

PepsiCo Inc. is the latest company to offer some clarity about the source of its top-selling bottled water as it announced on Friday it would change the label on Aquafina water bottles to spell out that the drink comes from the same source as tap water.

Dramatic Chipmunk

TV Disaster

Like watching an accident...

Latest iTunes Downloads

1. Grow Up Metric
2. Love You In The Fall Paul Westerberg
3. Smokers Outside The Hospital Door Editors
4. Goodbye The Postmarks
5. The Heinrich Manuever Interpol
6. Valerie Mark Ronson feat. Amy Winehouse
7. If You Fail We All Fail Fields
8. West Coast Coconut Records
9. Anniversary Suzanne Vega
10. Karaoke Plays Maximo Park

On Second Thought, Tap Water Is Just Fine

I read a thoughtful and eye-opening article about the bottled water industry in the latest issue of Fast Company.

Written by Charles Fishman, it essentially raises the following questions (taken from the article), once you understand the resources needed to deliver the water:
1)Does the value to me equal the 99 cents I'm about to spend?
2)Does the value equal the impact I'm about to leave behind?

Fishman points out some interesting facts, including:
-24% of the bottled water we buy is tap water repackaged by Coke and Pepsi
-More than half the people in Fiji don't have reliable drinking water
-We pitch 38 billion water bottles into landfills a year
-Tap water is impressively safe in the U.S.!
-Our consumption of bottled water is expected to surpass soda
-The environmental costs of producing bottled water: energy consumed through transportation/shipping, filtration processes, etc.

Princeton University professor Peter Singer puts it in perspective, saying:
"Where the drinking water is safe, bottled water is simply a superfluous luxury that we should do without....We're completely thoughtless about handing out $1 for this bottle of water, when there are virtually identical alternatives for free. It's a level of affluence that we just take for granted."

Whole Foods' CEO John Mackey believes purchasing bottled water is a choice (which it clearly is) for consumers to make. It's a choice that I'll have to think more about from now on.

Fuggehdaboutit

Last night we met up with a couple friends and made our way to Coney Island for the Cyclones game. We tried to get a hot dog at Nathan's beforehand but the lines were way too long. So, we walked around the boardwalk but it wasn't that enjoyable as it was more crowded (and dirtier) than we remember. Are we still trying to compare NYC to Cali? NYC will ALWAYS lose the cleanliness battle.

Thus, we went to KeySpan Park to take refuge. It's still a great park - good seats, affordable (compared to MLB), decent food options, and definitely fan/family friendly. Although it might be a little too family friendly as we had some annoying parents around us who pretty much let their kids do what they want. Hmm, that doesn't happen here, does it?

Nevertheless it was still fun to hang out, to see the Cyclones hand it to the Valley-Cats (score was 11-2), and, of course, there's the unintentionally funny local spot for Bay Ridge Toyota, which exclaims (to song), "We Deliver, We Deliver!"

Green Day

This morning we stopped by the green market at Grand Army Plaza. Besides picking up some fresh fruit and other treats, we got a couple free reusable grocery bags courtesy of One Bag At A Time and sponsorship by Sundance Channel's The Green.

Afterwards we spent some time at The Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

When we returned home I finally got around to watching my copy of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. Once again, he lucidly laid out his argument with a mix of charts, graphs and photos. One really gets to see the staggering damage global warming has done: melting glaciers, rising temperatures to unhealthy consequences, causing flooding in some areas and droughts in others, and in general, simply disrupting our fragile ecosystem.

Pleasant Weather, Finally

A brief respite from the heat and humidity is here with comfortable temps in the NYC area. Last night we met up with a good friend from college and his fiancee. We had some drinks and tapas at Sala One Nine in Union Square, where they have a "buy one round, second round is free" happy hour. Who knew?

Why Do I Live Here Again?

Because the stinky subways, humidity, long lines, mass of humanity, constant threat of terrorism, subway wackos, shady landlords, and ridiculous real estate prices aren't enough....

Ah yes, there's always our fair city's aging and dangerous infrastructure run by the dolts at ConEd. They've brought us such crimes as electrocuted dogs, manhole explosions, countless blackouts and now an exploding steam pipe that made Manhattan look like a disaster film tonight.

Interpol - Heinrich Maneuver

My current favorite song...

The 2 and 5-Year Plans

Things have subsided for now with crazy landlady so maybe we'll be in Park Slope for a couple years (while my wife attends grad school). If not, top prospects include: Washington Heights and Morningside Heights in Manhattan; Long Island City in Queens.

As for the longer term, who knows? Maybe we'll settle in Morristown, NJ.

Or maybe we'll embrace our West Coast bug and pick one of these two areas:

1)San Francisco, CA (Bay Area)

2)Seattle, WA

Guitar Hero

The Times did a piece on how Guitar Hero is the new karaoke...

Saturday in NYC

Yesterday, we made our way down to Windsor Terrace where we had breakfast at the Windsor Cafe.

Then we killed some time at the Barnes and Noble on 7th Avenue before watching the matinee of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I thought it was one of the better Potter films though in some ways old Harry is getting to be formulaic in that 24-Jack Bauer kind of way. For example, though Harry's proven himself time and time again, why does he continue to get picked on and why do people continue to doubt him? Nevertheless, it was good fun though I don't think really young kids should see it b/c it's pretty dark stuff.

Later we walked through Prospect Park and in the evening made our way to the West Village in Manhattan to celebrate a friend's birthday at Daddy-O, where they have some serious tater-tots.

Overheard in Park Slope

In Prospect Park around 2pm yesterday....

(white male to white female companion): "There's a difference between political correctness and being critically conscious of race."

The Final Countdown

I saw this on The Soup - hilarious!

SHOCKING NEWS: ADULTS ACTING LIKE ADULTS IN NYC

Was I the only one who found The New York Observer columnist Lizzy Ratner's piece "The New Victorians" pretty obnoxious? As in, it's obnoxious to put a label of New Victorians on this supposed segment of NYC society. Plus, what makes them indicative of Victorian ethos, anyway?

Imagine that - people in their 20's nesting, focusing on career, having pets, getting married, throwing dinner parties and actually caring about their future?

One of my favorite quotes is this one:
As one soon-to-be-married, female 26-year-old online editor who lives in Williamsburg put it: “It’s no longer cool to be a slacker and be living in your basement.”

Sorry, but when was living in a basement ever considered cool?

It reminds me of the old Chris Rock bit where he hates on people who congratulate themselves for doing what they are supposed to do:

"I take care of my kids." You're supposed to take care of your kids! OR "I ain't never been to jail." You're not supposed to go to jail!

It's the same thing with this bullshit article. "I'm in my mid-late 20's and I am starting to act like an adult." You're supposed to act like an adult!

What do you want, a trophy?

Subway Squeezer

Just when you think we've seen it all on the subway: the kids doing flips in the aisle, the woman cutting her nails, the preachers, the guy rapping/singing into a tape recorder, the belligerent teen girls picking a fight with a woman, the creepy guy touching himself, the silent Asian guy selling bootleg DVDs, etc.

Now there's the overweight, middle-aged "squeezer" - as in, he tried to squeeze his big butt into a tiny space between two subway passengers, one of them being my wife. The guy on the other end of the empty "space" incredulously asks "you're gonna squeeze yourself into that space?" As squeezer guy lowered his caboose, my wife got up to avoid being wedged in by him. Then the first guy says "look, you made that lady get up." So squeezer guy gets up and lets my wife sit down and proceeds to stand. Unbelievable.

Another Reason to Consider Getting Out of NYC

From Anthony DePalma's 7/11/07 NY Times Article: "Warming Report Warns of Increased Flooding"

One-hundred-year floods could come as often as once every 10 years by the end of this century, Long Island lobsters could disappear and New York apples could be just a memory if nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new report on the impact of global warming by the Union of Concerned Scientists.