Finally Got a Haircut and Reached the Epitome of Attractiveness (For Me)!

“Just a trim…nothing fancy.”

For the sake of my niece and my wife, the age of Mohawks is over.

“How do you comb it? Just forward like that?”

This is my gay hairdresser speaking.

“Yeah, I guess.  I don’t want to spend too much time on it in the morning.”

This is me realizing that perhaps I should be a bit more metrosexual.

“…but look. If you comb it back, like this…”

He sprays down my hair and slicks it back.

“…you will look almost sexy.”

I laugh.

“No just simple is fine.”

Then as I’m sitting in the chair, my thoughts stray.

“Did he say, ‘almost sexy’? Really? That’s the best I can possibly do? The best haircut he can suggest is one that makes me almost sexy? Is actually sexy really the best I can be in this world?

As if he can read my mind he keeps playing with my hair.

“Yes, you look almost sexy now.”

>sigh<

Halloween pictures: mission accomplished

There’s the “official” pictures that were downloaded onto the computer just before it went into the shop. Until we get it back, here’s the pictures that we took on Halloween proper.

This year’s costume wasn’t quite as esoteric as last year’s Suede and Stella, but it still took people took varying amounts of clues to figure it out.

Anyone that figured it out just from the cane got five points.

(I was going to paint the cane, but figured that doing it in PhotoShop and gluing flames on would look better.)

If I caught anyone eying me as if they were trying to place me, I’d bring out the Vicodin bottle and pop a pill.

If they got it at that point, they’d get four points.

(Thanks to Lil Sis for the prop.)

If they still looked perplexed, I’d take out the dry erase marker and write a symptom on my white board (aka Peeps).

Two points for guessing it at this stage.

(Notice what she’s holding.)

Last clue was she and I playing catch with the BOUO.

(Bonus points if you called it the “Ball of Unknown Origin”.)

One point if you guessed “House” at that point, two points if you guessed “Drug Addict Doctor” (which someone actually did), because really if you know who House is you should have gotten it several clues ago.

Pictures as soon as I can!

How long would it take you to notice a garbage strike in YOUR town?

In a recent visit to Toronto, nearly everyone we met was apologizing for the garbage strike.

The first thing that struck me was that it is just a slight exaggeration to say nearly everyone was apologizing. Waiters, street vendors, even random people Phil chatted up on the street all seemed embarrassed by the state of their streets. New Yorkers would never go out of their way to apologize for anything a city worker would subject a tourist to.

The second thing that struck me is that I had no idea what the hell everyone was talking about. We finally had someone point out to us the “unsightly” state of this garbage can that obviously “needed to be taken care of”.

This is the sight that made most Torontinians horribly embarrassed by the filth in their streets. When we got back I snapped a photo of our street corner on an average day:

No wonder we missed it! Some days I’d be grateful if NYC looked like Toronto in the middle of a garbage strike!

My personal stance against flyering in my neighborhood:

Since moving to the new apartment, any business that leaves a menu or a flyer in my front door is blacklisted.

Eventually I’d like to organize the neighborhood or start a website for a more effective boycott, but until that time my personal boycott will have to do.

As of yesterday, these are the companies that made my blacklist:
MET Supermarket
Pad Thai Restaurant
Amadeus Pizza
Dispatch Moving and Storage
24-Hour Locksmith

As of today they’ve been frequent offenders…but the only offenders.  There’s plenty of businesses in NYC that I choose not to frequent those that litter on my front stoop.

That was until…today.

This morning I found this on my doorstep:

Okay, New York businesses whose name begins with the letters A through Z, you’ve just been put on my boycott list.

Conversations in the Elevator: An Update of an Old Buddhist Tale

There once was a very wealthy man who had everything he could possibly want…but he was discontent.  He wanted to know what was the point of it all.  He was told to seek out the Buddha.  At this time Buddha had gone through his “questioning and fasting” phase and was now in the “fat and wise” stage.  Besides being fat and wise, he also was living on top of a nearly unreachable mountain.  The rich man hired a team and set out for the mountaintop.  Five months of journeying and a considerable percentage of his wealth later, the rich man finally arrived at the Buddha’s abode.  He told the Buddha that he was happy in all things, but he wanted to know what the Buddha knew.

“What’s the meaning of it all?” 

Buddha nodded in thought and sat for an hour…and another…by the time that three hours had passed he was nearly at his wits end. 

Out of patience he pleaded, “Well?!?”

The Buddha looked at the man, smiles, and says, “You are the Buddha.” 

The rich man was disgusted.  He spat upon the ground. 

To himself he thought, “Months of travel and the better part of my fortune gone, and that’s all he has to say?!?”

To the Buddha he said, “You are a pig!”

The Buddha nodded. 

The rich man stood perplexed, “What?”

“That’s the answer.”

“What’s the answer?”

“Buddha sees Buddha; pig sees pig.”

In a similar vein, this morning I got on the elevator with a woman who works in my office and a random delivery man.

The man said, “You shucked?”

In this story, I’m the one that is perplexed.

He repeated, “You shucked?  Something shucked you in morning?”

I shrugged, helpless to understand his question.

“Your hair…it’s shucked.”

He made a “scared” face and I realized that he’s referring to my Mohawk.

“No.  I did this on purpose.”

He got off laughing and it dawned on me.

“Shocked,” I said to the other passenger.

“What?”

“He was saying ’shocked’!”

“Yeah.  What a douche-bag.”

“Really?  I thought he was being friendly.”

She said nothing out loud in response, but her face clearly said, “You’re a douche-bag, too!” 

Moral of the story:

Friend sees friend; douche-bag sees douche-bag.

I found my first dead body yesterday.

My upstairs neighbor was an old, solitary man who died peacefully in his sleep.  The problem was that since he was so solitary, nobody knew for a few days.  I happened to be the one to find him and call 911. I assumed it was pretty routine, but when I told the story to the police, they told me that I would also have to tell my story to a detective as well.  The homicide squad showed up and I told them the story, but after telling my story to the 911 operator, the policeman, and the detective I also had to tell the story to the EMT.  I was a little surprised that I had to tell the story to the EMT, but he seemed to think it was important.

“You the landlord?” he asked.

“No.  I work here.”

He wrote that down; he had started taking notes as soon as he saw the state of the apartment.

“You’re the super, then?”

I explained that I worked for a university that leased some of the apartments in that building.

“So you only lease to students?”

“Right.”

scribble, scribble, scribble.

“So how did he (referring to the deceased) get into the building if he wasn’t a student?”

“We only lease half the building.  The other half is rented by professionals and the like.”

This seemed to satisfy him.  He started measuring he body.

“So how’d they get in this building?”

“I assume they contacted the management company.”

No…he wasn’t measuring the body; he was measuring the bed.

“Do you have their contact info?”

“The building manager’s on his way.  Are you…are you measuring the apartment?”

He scribbled down the dimensions of the apartment.

“Do you know how much he was paying for this place?”

I shrugged and then turned to go upstairs.

He called after me, “What’s the building manager’s name?”

I know that it’s hard to find a good apartment in this town, but I seriously…can you wait until the body is out the door before making an offer?

Good News! One of Mrs. T-Z’s students is sick!

…with Swine Flu!  I’m really excited about this.  Here’s why:

09/11/2001 – 8:46 AM – I’m five blocks away from the Twin Towers.  I spend the next six hours hiding under my bed until the police come to evacuate my building because, in the policeman’s words, “your block is on fire”.  He tells me to pack an overnight bag, but I don’t see home for several weeks.

08/14/2003 – 4:15 PM – I’m living in Jersey and working in Spanish Harlem when the lights go out and the alarms go on.  Our building is evacuated as a precaution, but I can’t get home since the city was blacked out.  I walk from Spanish Harlem to the Bronx to spend the night on my friend’s floor.

12/20/2005 – 7:45 AM – Wake up in Brooklyn with plans of going into Manhattan to see the original cast of Spamalot while they’re still together.  I really considered walking to Broadway to see the cast since the subway was on strike.  I decided against it and stayed holed up in my apartment.

08/08/2007 – 6:22 AM - We are on our way home from our honeymoon and out of town when a tornado struck very near our Brooklyn apartment.  We were sleeping safe and sound in Lancaster, PA and were completely unharmed and in fact knew nothing of it.  We completely missed it. 

I will not let that happen again.  I have been a part of every major historical event in this city since I moved here, and I don’t intend to miss this one.  Mrs. T-Z is home sick, but I’m making her go in tomorrow, hug each student, throw away their tissues by hand, and kiss each on on the top of their heads!

I will be a part of this.

Strange Sightings in New York City: Mascot Marathon

A couple of months ago Peeps, Barfa, and I went to union square only to find a handful of people in animal costumes warming up for a race.

They were friendly folks.  Anyone was welcome to join; they even had masks for walk-ups that were interested in joining in. 

They were so friendly in fact they invited us to go to their monthly costumed dance parties.  I was beginning to think that it wasn’t so much performance art as recruiting for a furry cult.

Yeah, this girl is definitely a Future Furry of America.

When you have eliminated the impossible…

…whatever remains…however improbable, must be the truth, but try telling this to my wife.  Consider the following facts:

My wedding ring is fairly unique.  I wanted a piece of Tanzanite to match my wife’s engagement ring.  We had to find a jeweler that knew how to bezel-set stones because that was the only way to set such a soft stone on a mens’ ring. 

Based on this evidence, what do you make of the following story?

The other day I’m sitting on the subway, and I notice that the man across from me has a similar wedding ring as I.  It’s uncannily similar…white gold with a purple stone.  I consider striking up a conversation on our coincidental choice of jewelry, but as I prepare to cross to him the train pulls into a station.  It’s loud and people are moving , so I wait to approach him.  As the train doors open he looks up at me, looks back down to his book, and then looks up at me again suddenly.  He then looks out the window, grabs his backpack, and bolts out of the doors that are already closing.

Now consider my hypothesis against my wife’s. 

My wife thinks that the man who happens to have the same stone as I noticed me staring at him and took umbrage and stared back.  He might have wanted to comment that I was staring, but then noticed that the train was at his stop and bolted out the door before he missed his stop. 

My theory is that the man across from me didn’t just have a similar ring; it was actually the same ring!  The man was likely an older version of me from the future who traveled back in time and was given strict instructions not to interact with past versions of himself.  When he made eye-contact with me, he didn’t recognize me at first because of my new Mohawk.  On second glance he realized that I was the younger version of himself and ran before the space-time continuum was forever and irreparably damaged. 

Which of those is more likely?  Two people with the same wedding ring?  I think not…

Altercations in the Street, Part II (Big Sis, don’t be afraid.)

If you need a review, here is Part One.

This hasn’t stopped me from asserting my right to cross the street. If you plow around a corner close enough that I can touch you, I’ll give you a little tap just to let you know how close you came. Most cars can’t be bothered to stop, so I never know if they got the message. Today car number two stopped to confront me. To cross the street I had to pass two older women who had the right to cross, but they were waiting for cars to stop for them even though they had the right of way. This gave me added gusto to cross since someone had to assert our right to cross the street. The next car to come careening around the corner barely slowing down to do so came within inches of me, I tapped on the drivers’ window with my newspaper. The driver stopped, reversed, and got out of the car and demanded an explanation for me hitting her car. It’s also a good exercize for me in keeping my cool as I find the question infuriating since the amount of potential damage done by my newspaper against her car is insignificant when compared to the amount of damage that her several ton car would have done to my frail frame.

“What the hell was that?!?”

“Oh, I’m sorry miss. I thought maybe you didn’t realize that you almost hit me.”

“You don’t go around hitting other people’s property.”

To my surprise, as I was about to brace myself for the debate, the two old ladies were there to back me up. They had surrounded her from behind so the lady had to listen to reason.

Lady: Actually the young man did have the right of way.

Driver: He was on the sidewalk!

Me: If I was on the sidewalk, how could I have possibly hit your car?

Driver: What?

Lady: You just said he hit your car, but if he was on the sidewalk he must have incredibly long arms.

Driver: Oh, fuck you!

Thinking that chapter was over I set off again on the morning’s errands, but one of the women rushed to catch up to me.

“I used to be like you.” she said with a smile.

“What?”

“When I first moved to New York I used to walk around like I had rights…and angry when people feel like they can go around acting however they want with complete disregard for others.”

I put my hand on her shoulder and smiled, “So I’ll mellow out eventually?”

“You will…eventually.”

I’m really not sure if I want to mellow out, but it was such a nice interaction with a fellow New Yorker I couldn’t help but to let her peace infect me. She went back to her friend and with that epilogue complete I continued on, not realizing that another altercation was waiting for me…literally…just around the corner.

This time it was in the form of three large men….not as large as my friend who knocked me to the ground a couple weeks back, but they probably weighed in at over 200 each and they were wearing Giants jerseys which somehow made them more intimdating. The biggest one meets my gaze and breaks off from the group.

He looks back at his buddies as he makes a beeline for me, “Look, all you gotta do is this.”

He raises his arms as he’s obviously coming after me and I brace myself for the assualt. To my surprise, he wraps his arms around me and gives me the firmest, warmest bearhug I’ve ever received…no…not even a barehug…a very sincere hug and I instinctively hug him back. He pats my back, releases me, and rejoins his friends.

“Thanks” I say, and he nods back in return.

As they walk off, I hear him say to his friends “See? It’s as easy as that!”

Some days I really do heart NY.