peter pan BONANZA

I will no longer take the bus.

This past weekend I planned a getaway to Martha's Vineyard that I expected to be perfectly relaxing. The bus from NYC to Woods Hole (where the ferry to the Vineyard departs) was scheduled to leave from Port Authority at 7:30 am. I rushed my little ass to get there with maybe a minute to spare. But alas, when I arrived at the mile-long line there was no sign of movement, nor would there be for another 30 mins. Instead, a cheery morning-shift Port Authority employee bellowed at my fellow travellers and I to move up, because we were most likely waiting in the wrong line. We weren't. So we all formed a gelatinous mob instead of a line, and began an undercurrent of displeased muttering that would continue for most of the day.

The bus finally got underway, and we continued on to Providence with only a few stops (including Fall River and the Lizzie Borden condo complex!) to detain us. Providence and its brown cinder-block bus station with perpetually understocked Dunkin Donuts came and went. I skipped the bathroom there, not wanting to wait in line. Fortunately, our next stop was a well-stocked Tadeschis at the Bourne bridge rotary. Unfortunately, they had only a Sanican to piss in, but I'm no princess.

Relieved, I was ready to make our transfer for the final leg of the journey. The first bus pulled away, and our diligent little cluster of 15 patiently waited for our white horse to arrive in the form of a Peter-Pan/Bonanza combo. This last section of road was only 20 miles, but the sun-bleached parking lot of Tadeschi's overlooking a run-down motel, crowded rotary and overpriced lobster hut was a far cry from sun-bleached parking lots of Woods Hole...where at least we could overlook the water. My travelling companion, Lily, wanted to eat, but her willpower kept her from going into Tadeschi's lest she miss the savior bus.

After 15 mins, I plopped down on the concrete to read my Vogue. After 30, Lily relented and bought an apple and some string cheese. After 45, I followed suit with some string cheese of my own. After an hour, we had missed the ferry we were planning to take. The woman standing next to me placed an irate phone call to Peter Pan Headquarters. Finally, a bus appeared on the horizon. We breathed a collective sigh of relief, but the driver's shaking head should have been an indication that we wouldn't be getting off that square of cement so soon.

His brakes practically screeching, the driver leapt from the door.

"I have one seat left! Anyone elderly or ailing?!" He croaked.

"Ha, ha," we all mumbled and started to gather our things.

"Oh, please," the irate woman intoned.

"Lady, if you think I just sat in an hour of traffic to come here and make jokes with you people, you are sorely mistaken," the driver articulated. "I have one seat. Who's getting on?"

"This is bullshit--" Irate began.

"Look I don't have to take any harassment from you!" Asserted the driver. "Is anyone getting on this bus?!"

None of us made much fuss when Irate stepped forward. We were either in shock, or happy to see her and her bitchiness ascend the steps, or a little of both.

"But we paid for tickets to Woods Hole!" A final protest from the male half of a New-Yorky couple.

"We don't guarantee transfers. Says right on the ticket. Another bus'll be here in a half hour or so. Can't guarantee he'll have seats either." With that the driver returned to his shock absorbent seat, bid us good-riddance, and drove away. We were left staring at one another, open-mouthed and feeling the bittersweet sting of mutual aggravation.

Then began a Survivor-esque formation of alliances, foes and general tribal behavior. Lily took a Chieftess role and started to look into taxi options. Taxis were expensive, and only took 4. There were a very limited number available. None of us believed the next bus would have enough seats. I knew we'd better make alliances now or risk spending the night at Tadeschi's, peeing in a Sanican and becoming fat on Cheetos. I began forming an alliance with the New Yorky couple and planned to split a cab once we had found one. A group of surly stubborn passengers sat around a picnic table and did nothing. A girl in overly-pointy shoes became a lawless savage, calling a cab without checking with anyone, and then grabbing anyone she could to join her plan with no regard to how many might fit.

The Tadeschi's workers "helped" us by suggesting we take the one dollar van that came every hour on the hour. Turns out it didn't go to Woods Hole. Lily finally found us a cab, just as New York Couple switched their allegiance and agreed to join Pointy-shoes. No cabs had even arrived yet, and we'd already missed the subsequent 2nd and 3rd ferry options. Things looked bleak. Suddenly, two older women who had stayed on the periphery of the tribe bid us all farewell and started loading their bags in to a minivan. One of them had a friend in Falmouth who had come to rescue them.

I pounced on the opportunity. "Are there any more seats?" I gasped.

"I could squeeze in two," the kindly and slightly crusty driver offered.

Without thinking, Lily and I abandoned our fellow passengers and jumped into the van. In the wild, one must fend for herself. Our alliances melted away as quickly as they had formed.

"Do you think it was wrong of us to leave without saying anything?" Lily asked.

"No way," I said. "They would have done the same."

They could take us only as far as Falmouth, but it turned out there was a ferry from there too. We figured anything was better than the parking lot at Tadeschi's. Along the way, the driver regaled us with tales of hitchhikers and women with broke-down cars who had met their maker on the Cape, being naive enough to believe strangers really would offer a helping hand. He also said he didn't trust hitchhikers one bit, and never picked them up. It was comforting to know he had such high moral standards. Seeing as we were finally on our way to paradise, both Lily and I smiled and nodded with our mouths shut.

As the icing on the road-weary cake, we arrived at the waterfront in Falmouth just in time to see the Island Queen literally uncouple from the dock and push off. The next ferry wasn't for an hour and half, but with the island in sight the time melted away. Lily and I split a lobster roll at a combo Italian/seafood joint up the road, and then enjoyed the sweetest sun-soaked ferry ride of our lives, followed by a wonderful sojourn on the Vineyard.

Mr. Peter Pan and Barry G. Bonanza will be hearing from my lawyer. Or at least my angry typing finger.

Socially awkward

Why are people so fickle about social networking sites? Now I have to get a dern facebook account, just so I can look at photos that are only posted on facebook. And so I can relate to people who only talk about facebook now. I've already fired friendster, myspace is becoming obsolete, I signed up for LinkedIn and dodgeball and have long forgotten them, flixster is breaking down my door and meetup.com won't friggin leave me alone. I'm sure there's a whole host of other sites I don't even know about that are chock full of profiles and personal manifestos just waiting for me to link to them.

What's coming next? Vinnie, any thoughts? It better be worth switching to cause I'm kinda sick of filling out my favortie artists, books and movies.

The Great Yogurt War part II: Yolato

I should mention that I have been on a ceaseless quest to find good frozen confections in NYC. Tasti-D doesn't count. It turns into water and chemicals when it melts. Coldstone definitely doesn't count. It's far too rich; like eating a stick of butter with a heath bar mixed in. Blech. Plus they claim to have pioneered smooshing in toppings, when clearly it was Steve Herrell who did that. Or maybe the McFlurry (does that exist?).

Prior to trying Pinkberry I half fell in love with a new discovery that I believe exists only in NYC. It's called Yolato (yogurt+gelato, duh) and it's super-duper yummy. I say "half" fell in love because I only like two flavors: blackberry and hazelnut. Many of the others that I've been willing to try are actually quite disgusting (they have a "corn" flavor, but I didn't try it). Here's what Yolato definitely has over Pinkberry:

No lines. Slightly cheaper. More flavors. Better flavors (the good ones anyway). Better name. Less market saturation, meaning more franchising and investment opportunities! Influenced by the Italians.

But still, can't New York have just one stand out Ice-Creamery that comes close to matching the likes of Herrells, J.P. Licks (both in Boston), Barts (Northampton) or Mad Marthas (Martha's Vineyard)? Maybe the sunglass-wearing I-banker from Worcester doesn't appreciate Massachusetts, but nowhere I know of can compare when it comes to ice cream. Hands down.

The Great Yogurt War: Pinkberry In-query

I tried PinkBerry yesterday. Maybe you haven't heard of this phenomenon. According to the website, "Pinkberry is SWIRLY GOODNESS. It's honest food, without preservatives, additives or excess sugar. It is DESSERT REINVENTED." Also, it's very expensive.

People go batshit crazy over this stuff. They line up around the block for it. They take out mortgages. Kill their own mothers. Start blogs.

I decided to see what the fuss is all about, because I walked by a Pinkberry when there was [gasp] almost no line outside. It only comes in 2 flavors: plain and green tea. If you ask what the flavor of plain is they will tell you "it tastes just like plain yogurt."

Didn't sound that appealing to me, but it turns out it tastes pretty darn good. I ordered the toppings you see above, raspberry and coconut. The yogurt had a unique, pleasing flavor that you wont find at other yogurtariums. The raspberries were fresh. I am pretty sure that sweetened coconut adds quite a few calories, but there's no mention of this nutritional info on the website. Anyway, thumbs up for flavor.

But thumbs down for charging 3 bucks for plain, and a dollar for each added topping. And for a name that seems more appropriate on a cute anime character than a yogurt chain. And for the ridiculous "queue." Also for giving me horrible stomach cramps afterwards.

OVERHEARD

Overheard yesterday on the street:

"I'm from Masachusetts. Trust me. I know how shitty it is."

I just want to set the record straight, guy in suit, sneakers and sunglasses at 7pm. YOU, sir, are the shitty one. The great state of Massachusetts may be missing a few things (White Castle, diversity), and may have some embarassing legacies (Catholics, Mitt Romney) but I believe it to be one of the finest states in the Union. If not the finest.

You needn't shun your home state just because you now live in the Big Apple. It's not like New York is perfect. It has guys like you. Guys who go around loudly proclaimly how feces-filled the home of Sam Adams, e. e. cummings, Dr. Suess and Ben Affleck is. Guys who talk too loud in public. Guys who wear suits.

OK, the Bay State has guys in suits too. Lots of them. Probly lots of loud talkers too. And guys who wear sunglasses at twilight. But I gotta ask....can New York claim to be home to any poets whose names can't be capitalized? BOOM.

What I do at My Job

Because I am an editor, you might think I would 'edit'. However, a large portion of my job involves digitzing and rendering; two activities with no creative value whatsoever. Any video that's going to be cut on a computer needs to be "digitized," meaning converted from a magnetic tape into a bunch of 1s and 0s so i can mess with it. Often, an assistant editor does this tedious work at night, or some time the editor isn't working, but becuase of various restrictions (money/time/number of computers available) I have taken on a lot of it myself for this particular show.

Any time I apply effects to a piece of video (dissolves, glows, resizes, you name it), they have to be "rendered," meaning written to the computer as a new file, one that marries the effect to the video clip. If you are editing a show "offline," which is generally the way it's done, the whole process is sped up because you digitize the clips at a much lower resolution (less pixels), and the computer has less trouble reading and writing these simpler files. We don't edit offline.

Both of these things take too long. Digitizing must be done in real time, and rendering depends on the speed of your computer.

This computer is slow.

The upshot of all this is that I spend an inoordinate amount of time sitting at my computer with no actual "work" to do per se, but without the freedom to leave. Digitzing must be monitored, the tapes taken in and out of the machine (yes, I know a robot could do this). Rendering doesn't take long enough to warrent leaving the room, but takes too long for someone like me (read: impatient) to sit patiently and watch.

So instead I do other things. Read blogs, play solitaire, write blogs (just started) and continually check my finances. Sometimes I read a book or a magazine. Ocassionally i'll get a phone call out of the way. Often I snack. I can visit co-workers for brief periods. Or go back and forth to the bathroom. Or annoy my boss.

It makes me wonder...how much of work is actually work? Do other people spend this much time wasting time? Why can't I come up with a better diversion, one that somehow contributes to the world at large?

Ooop, the render's done....

BEWARE-SPRAY

Saw Hairspray last night b/c I wanted to see a movie. I can't say I was expecting genius. Can't even say I was expecting great. Or good. Or decent. What I got was a a strong desire to see the stage show, and a very dissapointing movie.

If you can get past John Travolta hunching around in the awful lumpy female fatsuit, pursing his lips while delivering all his lines with some sort of mutated Minnesota accent, you have to put up with lackluster editing, jokes that fall flat, and an inelegant treatment of racial issues. I KNOW that the time period and subject matter call for a lot of jokes about integration, but pair it with a trimphant Queen Latifah marching through a fakey set with an unimpressive number of others holding cliched picket signs and throw in a cross-dissolve every other second and you get schlock, not biting commentary.

I can't claim to be a devotee of all things Hairspray, so I won't talk about John Waters' original intentions for the first film, but I do know enough to say it was supposed to be campy, like everything he makes. The tone of this version was completely mismatched with lines like "I wish every day was Negro day!" It was too earnest, too typical, too Disnified. There were some funny standouts, namely all of Allison Janney's lines, but overall, I wasn't laughing.

The music was great though, and like I said, whet my appetite for the stage show, which I feel I could could grant more leeway to tone-wise. Live theater is already suffused with a certain degree of camp, and from what I was told the play is funnier. Given the varied arsenal of movie tricks availble, the film fell totally flat. I've been given shit for this before, but I really think Chicago is a perfect movie adaptation. It wasn't the play on film, it was a film with the same plot and songs as the play. You felt Fosse in it, but Rob Marshall did away with the all-black sparseness of the costumes and set and added what only film can add....namely, close-ups, great editing and some depth.

Call me a hater, but I'm just callin' em like I see 'em. I did no research and am aware that Hairspray is mainly a popcorn flick for kids anyway.

I am now official

I now exist in the blogosphere. I have a diversion when I'm bored and need attention. I can join all my friends and pseudofriends who have virtual selves that are much cooler than their real selves.

And now, when I go on a trip or do something real neat, I can make everyone and their mother (including mine) read about it. Hey, they do it to me.

YAY. validation.