Overheard in the Elevator

Six men and I are riding up, they're getting out at 24. I get out at 19.
Man 1: There's a lot of Jed Bartlett stuff at the Smithsonian. A surprising amount, it takes up a whole wall.
Man 2: You don't say.
Man 1: Yep, best President we ever had, that Bartlett. Jed Bartlett and Bill Clinton.

Closing Time...

So while most WEDYHTDers know this, I'm leaving New York in a little under two months. So this morning I was brain-storming on things I wanted to do/make sure I did again before leaving. The things should be quintessentially New York. But I could only come up with five.

They are:
Go to Whitney Biennial
See Munch Exhibit at MoMA
Go to Bohemian Beer Garden
Go to Bulgarian Disco
Eat Grimaldi's

Any help/anybody want to come?

This Modern Life

There's this commercial for some kind of fiber supplement that captures my predicament precisely. In it, a woman wakes up to her alarm and starts eating a carrot, then we see her gnawing on broccoli while driving the kids to school and eating a bran muffin while working out. The tagline of the commercial is something like, "if you get all of your daily fiber from what you eat, how do you have time for anything else."
And isn't this the modern dilemma? At least I feel overwhelmed by it sometimes, the number of things we're "supposed" (and many that we want) to do-- eat enough fiber, get enough iron, eat plenty of vegetables, exercise, give money to charity, work late, spend time with friends, see family.... the list goes on and on and it seems practically impossible to do all of it. Like the fiber example-- a typical orange, considered a pretty high fiber food, has 3g of fiber. And we're shooting for at least 25 a day! Which means just staying on top of your FIBER intake could be a freaking full time job. Meanwhile, there are restaurants we have to try while we're supposed to cook at home. Take advantage of every opportunity WHILE building good credit? Gym memberships that eat into the disposable income we could we using to feed the homeless.... ergh! Does anyone else get frustrated by this or am I just abnormally guilt-ridden?

the tiger look

I just came from the salon where I spent over $100 for a cut and color. My glasses were off during the process and, since I am nearly blind without them, I couldn't really see what was going on. However, before starting to paint my head, I did tell the woman that I am not in to the streaky look and that I prefer an all-over medium blonde. At the end of what has turned out to be an ordeal, I put my glasses back on to find that my head is streaked in black and white. The woman is all excited about the "low lights" and I tell her it is "great."

What gives? I am not afraid to speak in a class of 100 law students or afraid of giving oral arguments in front of judges--yet, when I have the chance to speak up about my utter disgust with my hair color that reminds be of a bengal tiger, I just grin (grimace) and run away.

Now that I am at work, I have called the salon and will be getting it fixed tomorrow. It was much easier to call and complain knowing I was in the safety of my own office. Why am I afraid of the hairdresser? She's the one that screwed up! She should be afraid of me! (in 18 short months I could sue) . Is this a quirk I have of being intimidated by the salon people or is it evidence that I have some more growing up to do? I may never know, but until tomorrow, you can just call me Le Tigre.

When you sell your soul, apparently they come back to collect.

So as the community may or may not know, I work at a large law firm in New York. Coming from a background of a lot of lawyers, but no firm lawyers, I started here kind of expected it to be the seat of all evil... and found for the most part, it's just people, just working. Most people who work here aren't attorneys, they're just folks trying to support themselves and their families. The attornies aren't evil, most of them are actually quite nice and they're just working also. It just so happens that what they're working on at best doesn't interest me and at worst conflicts somewhat with my morals, instilled in me by aforementioned non-firm lawyers.
In September I worked on a project for a pharmaceutical company client, some research into cholesterol-lowering drugs, or statins, and what form they took. The goal of this research was to try to argue that the company wasn't avoiding allowing a generic to be made (and therfore losing a lot of profit) by switching it from a capsule to tablet, but making it more like the other similar drugs on the market. Whatever. I typed up a little email memo about my research and send it off to the attorney. I made jokes about how terrible it was to work for the people trying to keep drugs that people need prohibitively expensive, but jokes in similar ways to ones I make about children losing their arms mining the diamonds for our client in a kind of but-my-hands-are-tied way...
Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago when I get a phone call from my Dr., following up on some routine blood work/check-up. He wants me to come in, I have extremely high cholesterol. He's be testing my blood and liver and everything else since then and finally yesterday put me on a statin to bring down the cholesterol. I went to get the prescription filled for this drug that likely I'll have to take for the rest of my life to control my cholesterol... and it's a $50 copay. Because there is no generic. And, at some, level this is my own fault. Fuck.

What are the odds?

Every time I fly to Minnesota from, well, anywhere, I kind of expect to recognize someone on my flight. This feeling isn't as strong anymore as I know what seems like fewer and fewer people in my hometown. As further evidence, this past weekend on the way to our local Target, my mom asked if I expected to run into someone I knew at Target... um, who would that be?
However, the past two times I've flown (aside from Israel, which is an outlier) I've either seen or been SEATED NEXT TO someone I know. Once was just in the airport, the other was on a flight back to NY from Oakland in January. What are the odds? Well, I did a few calculations:
In 2005 100 Million people pass through the NY airports, JFK, Newark, Laguardia.
I have 122 Friendsters. Say I also know the parents and on average one sibling of a quarter of them... there's another 91.5 people. Then theres the people I would recognize, I know but don't "know" and so am not connected to via online social networking at all. Say, an equal number to friendsters and familes- another 213.5 people. And then the people who aren't on Friendster. Let's optimistically say I know 600 people. Or would recognize them. This means that everyone I know is .0006% of the people who pass through the NY airports, and that's assuming they ALL flew in and out of NY and I was at the airport (all 3) all day every day to see them. Kind of astonishing to recognize anyone at all, actually. Food for thought. Next topic will be: After beating incredible odds like these... why do I still try to avoid saying hello? Discuss.