Thank god, because walking 5 minutes sure would have been arduous. :P

My credit card number has been stolen TWICE since I've lived here in New York City.

Incident 1: Subway card reader.
Result: 4x $800 Western Union cash transactions from Missouri.
Incident 2: UPS delivery person.
Result: $650 in prescription drugs from Duane Reade (local pharmacy in NYC).

Between that and my recent move here, Citibank must think I'm trying to pull an Ocean's Eleven on them. I'm envisioning myself doing one of their commercials right now where I talk with a totally different identity - ooo, perhaps I'm an elderly Jewish woman spreeing in Bloomingdales on blouses (w/shoulder pads) and mismatched Burburry Capris.

Here's a new thing for me. 'Strike'

Back home, a strike was either a baseball term or what happened when my friend (we'll call him Philip for anonymity) tried to hit on a girl (we'll call her Hoffman) with little success. Well, with the pending strike on Friday here in NYC, I think the word has taken on an entirely new meaning. The staggering figure is that if there is a strike it will cause a $400 million dollar windfall... PER DAY.

Oh well, I'll just have to mingle and mix with all the foreign tourists. Hot damn, I love those people and their schwag.

Some of you larger city residents will understand the principles of HOV lanes. Well, actually I'm pretty sure everyone knows what they are (even you Brits using the M1 and M3 have these). Well, the most I've ever seen (with thine own eyes) are HOV-2. Two people per car. It's exciting enough when you get to drive in those lanes.

Well, with the pending strike NYC's contingency plan calls for a colossal HOV-4. Four people. Now, how could they possibly expect that. The heavens and all their righteous Henry Fords and Lee Iacoccas made cars with four/five even seven seats, and by god I intend on driving it by myself - solo - happily utilizing those other seats for such important items as my fanny pack (?), gallon of milk, and audience for my vociferous crooning of Tony Orlando's greatest hits.

My last (only) experience with a strike was in London and it was the Tube (subway) drivers and dispatchers. That was heinous. A complete shutdown of public transportation in the 11th largest city in the world.

Oh sh*#.

Oddly, I rant and rave yet 1) I do not have a car here in the city and 2) I live walking distance from work.

(sent via work)

I found myself asking, what could one possibly do in a 485 sq. ft apartment? The answer is: film a movie. Why not? More pix to come later - it's been an 18+ hour day for me and I'm knackered. Here're some pics. This was basically two scenes in a film for the NY Film Academy so I won't be showing up on a silver screen near you anytime soon... er... ever. Perhaps a bootleg DVD one day when I somehow gain popularity in the Laotian Film Circuit. :(







P.S. Sometimes I feel like my world is random to the 10th power.

What's up with girls in this city and only liking the crust? I mean come on people... you live in a city where good cheap pizza is more prevalent than grammatical mistakes in my posts and all you want is... the chewy breadness part? This 'eating' of the ' bready parts' happened to me two times this week, with three entirely different people. Coincidence? I think not. Eh, no fret - I like the cheesy bits anyway.

Just saw Syriana. I'll give it an B+ on production value. A C+ for generalized view of oil induced world conflicts. A B+ for acting. And finally, a D- for the miserable-ness of having to sit in the second row of the theatre. I swear... it seems like you have to get to the theatre at least 40 minutes before a movie starts for decent seats.

I somehow got lucky with this pictures. The flash on my little portable Canon Elph against the dark color of this Mercedes SUV managed to capture the size of the snowflakes I mentioned on Friday. The little bastards were wet little buggers...

Click on the picture for a couple more random notes.

The more time I spend in New York the more I realize that my worst fears of ridiculous CoL (costs of living) here are coming true to the umpteenth degree. I find that there are still plenty of venues for free entertainment such as the barbershop quartet harmonizing Christmas carols at my subway station or a drunk woman kicking her bagel directly onto the tracks of an oncoming subway or even the skilled freestyle breakdancing at the Union Square subway station... wait, notice something? Yeah, all this 'free' entertainment seems to be in subway stations. Oh well, at least my two bucks gets me something.

It's too bad that there were a bunch of punk tweens acting all gangsta' like on one of my subway rides today. They needed a good kick in the face and the bald burly beast of a man sitting next to my friend and I definitely looked like he was aiming to give them one. These punk-ass kids were threatning some old woman to stop staring at them. Little did they know that there was a surly Irish bred barefist boxing contender (I confidently assume) looking to plant a swede on their todd. Good thing we got off - I don't even want to know what it would have looked like if he punched one of those idiots. One of them deserved a good Mike Tyson left hook planted right on the kisser (thru their skateboards). An uppercut from this guy probably would've rendered them in the coma ward at Beth Israel hospital... But regardless, I can guarantee one thing, there probably would have been a standing ovation from the rest of the passengers on that car. Hell, I might've joined had one of the teens sitting next to us looked at me and actually apologized for his friends...

Anyway, I digress. What this post was going to be about was CoL. Let's review today shall we? The number on the left is what was shelled out today. The number on the right is an estimated cost what my friends and I would've paid back in my hometown of Knoxville, TN.

- Burrito at Chipotle. $9 | ~$7
- Cup of tea at Starbucks. $2 | yeah right...
- Fully catered Ginger & Orange sea salt hand scrub with lotion in a distilled water stone basin @ Sabon. $0 | haha...
- Four tickets to delayed viewing of Memoirs of a Geisha. $49 delayed, and in the last row - of the balcony, after waiting 30 mins in line | $28, no delay and good seats.
- Seeing woman kick bagel onto subway tracks. $0. | subways? drunk women kicking bagels?
- Two slices of pizza and sodas at Amore pizza shop. $8 | ~$10
- Four rounds of bowling at Bowlmor Lanes with shoes. $163. | ~$50
- Three pitchers of beer and nachos during bowling. $129. | ~$45

Well, at least I did find my hair's long lost cousin. The cost of that? $0. The value? Priceless...


Midweek Movie Review: Memoirs of a Geisha - severly dissapointing albeit the female actresses put on a visually stunning performance.