Friday, March 28, 2008

LIFE ROUNDUP

-I turned 23 on March 23 and because I was in Chicago and traveled back to New York at night, the time change means my birthday was only 23 hours. According to Wikipedia, "23 is considered either lucky, unlucky, sacred to the goddess Eris, sinister, sacred to the unholy gods of the Cthulhu Mythos, or strange." I'm going to go with lucky, just for my own sanity?

And I also think this will be a good year. I had a lovely birthday in Chicago. It was low-key, with friends, fun and alcohol. The whole weekend was just really fun. I arrived during a snow storm (the fact that I arrived at all was a birthday/Easter miracle). It was fun being back in Chicago, which I've decided, although slightly worse than New York in terms of weather, transportation and fun brings more happiness to its beholders.

-Not as fun as New York or Chicago? Albany. I was there for two days for work. Remember when I used to travel to fun places? Despite the city of Albany not contributing to this , it was actually a pretty fun trip. See press coverage here:http://wnyt.com/article/stories/S393071.shtml?cat=300 And I really like learning how state government works (in a non-prostitute way, I mean) .

-Today is the 10 year anniversary of my bat mitzvah.

-I was up early finishing work and since I'm calling into the Friday am meeting then taking the afternoon off and going to yoga so no need to shower yet really, I decided to be "productive." I just wrote my first Yelp review ever (since Marissa and Alana correctly noted that I essentially think in Yelp reviews, so I should just putting my thoughts of the internet for the benefit of others). I wrote about the S 4th Bar & Cafe, since I was so impressed by it last night. I went there to do work and drink tea and had free wireless until 11pm, and when I finished I hung out at the bar and drank wine with a woman who was celebrating because she had just told her husband, for the first time in 5 years of marriage, that he was repeatedly verbally abusing her.

-I also wrote a letter to the NYTimes Ethicist. The contents of my letter actually occurred.

I work at a large non-profit in New York City. The organization doesn't recycle, and there are no bins or system in place to make it easily accessible. When I mentioned this fact to two of the janitors, both said they are glad we don't recycle, since it would make their jobs harder. I had been considering asking senior management if recycling could be implemented, but now I'm hesitant. I want our organization to recycle, but I also don't want to make other people, particularly those who aren't paid much to begin with, responsible for more work because of it, What's a "good liberal" to do? D.S., Brooklyn, NY DO NOT PRINT MY NAME!


It's actually not a dilemma to me. I sent it in because I think Randy Cohen will publish it because it's totally up his alley, and I really want Gawker's Unethicist to make fun of it, which is why I am not dumb enough to bring my real name. But for the record, I care more about the people I work with then I do about the future of the earth so I will stay quiet. But you all can feel free to give your responses, and I will judge you accordingly.

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Wednesday, March 05, 2008

My day

By now you've probably seen the website Stuff White People Like, which is really stuff the liberal urban young people like. For a fun exercise, since I have an hour to kill before pilates, I will go through my day and will reference this informative blog as I lead you through my day. Feel free to follow along.

My alarm went off at 7:30am and then I pressed snooze until 8am, checked the election results on nytimes.com on my blackberry and was disappointed that Barack Obama didn't win (even though I was conflicted until recently) ate cereal and then I left my gentrified neighborhood in New York City to work at a non profit organization.

I wrote article about needle exchange and some government policy that would apparently increase homelessness, so I was raising awareness about what's best for poor people . I should note that in my department, I am the only white woman, something I am very excited about, because, duh, I love diversity and being the only white person around.

For lunch I went to S'Nice, a vegan coffee shop where the guy who delivers the food (I guess waiter, but not really since we order at the counter) called me by name which was superexciting, had a Quinoa salad and coffee and read the New Yorker and the Wall Street Journal. Not all of it, just an article about math in the New Yorker (that was really good, and totally made sense) and about Mark Zuckerberg in the WSJ. These might sound like publications for smart people, and let me tell you, I am smart. I was once a gifted child.

When I was at work but not actually working I read Caitlin's blog from Japan; discussed my new obsession this amazing American Life episode about a Hasid and a hipster (public radio). I'm sad that I spent so much of my life not listening to This American Life when David Sedaris was on, since I do love him. I answered an e-mail from someone traveling to South Africa, recommending a hostel. I also scoured the internet trying to figure out if Ellen Page (Juno) is gay. I think she is. I feel like she would totally go to the Metropolitan too, which would be the best thing ever if she was just randomly there on a Wednesday night.

After I realized I was scarily on track for work this week, I left at 5:45, grabbed a Luna bar, and got on the L, hoping to make a 6:30 yoga class a 10 blocks from me. But despite my powerwalking, I get there at 6:26pm, all proud of myself, but the room is packed to the max, because after all, there are a lot of other white people in my neighborhood.

They could have maybe squeezed me in, but the leader basically said it would make everyone else uncomfortable, so not wanting to be that person, I left, and the leader apologized about 8 times.

I then came home, blogged what you're reading and watched my DVR'd The Daily Show. Since I am all about self-improvement and following through on exercising, I'm going to go to Pilates at the location nearer to me very soon (It starts at 8:15, but I'm going to be early, since I learned my lesson), which is fine, except I didn't want to eat before since I know I'll be hungry after so I ate grapes and half a cookie, and maybe after pilates if I'm hungry, I'll buy sushi at the overpriced grocery co-op down the street. Or I'll just have a lean cuisine since I had sushi Monday.

K, this took me an hour to write. But I think it was worth it.

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Monday, March 03, 2008

Coffee shop blogging!!!

After running extraordinarily late this morning and realizing my boss wouldn't be in to object otherwise, I decided to work from home today. So I went to this nearby coffee shop that I'm really into until I have to go do interviews and such.

Of the three other people sitting on their laptops at the tables around me NO ONE else in the coffee shop has a word document or an excel sheet, or a powerpoint, or anything that looks like work. Girl to my left: facebook. Girl to my right: Yelp. Guy across from me: gmail (which could be work related). Who are all these people? What do they do with their lives? Granted I am on blogger now and earlier on facebook, but I also wrote an ENTIRE article. maybe they're all about to. Are they all DJs or bartenders or strippers other nighttime jobs and are just hanging out getting lifecrap done? I am confused. Ok, now I have to go home to do interviews and such and don't want to talk and thus interrupt all these people doing whatever it is they do all day.

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