Talents of a New Yorker

I can't do a lot. But this I can do: after years of practice, at a pay-by-the-ounce salad bar, I can calculate by feel the weight of one pound in my hand give or take an ounce, or at most, two. I wonder if that'll get me on Letterman.

ways to ensure you will never, ever, ever recover from a breakup

1) live in the same building as your ex

2) live in the same building as your ex, a building which happens to have faulty elevators, and get stuck in the elevator with him. watch him try not to cry as your friends unacquainted with him wonder wtf is going on, and why you could cut the tension with a knife. cringe as you get off the elevator and one of them shouts, "What the hell was THAT all about?" still within earshot of heartbroken ex.

3) attend the same gym as your ex. he must use it for the pool, you must use it for the climbing wall, both of which are in short supply in new york. this means that every time you go in for a shot of endorphin in hopes of staving off your recurring low-grade depression and gnawing loneliness, you are sure to encounter him and neither one of you know how to act. go home defeated to subsequent email from the ex detailing every emotion he's been feeling about you for the last weeks and how seeig you, you devil, just makes it all come back again. feel chastised and vow to never leave the house again.

4) fearing that your ass -- now growing fatter thanks to reduced gym attendance -- will grow permanently attached to the piece of crap couch you retrieved out of the garbage years ago, and that your ambulatory stasis will only serve to intensify said recurring low-grade depression, finally leave the house, even though every time you leave the house it undoubtedly results in some highly emotional confrontation. go to the bar with friends. make sure one of the friends is someone the ex was suspicious of while you were dating. The bar is real far away from your house so you feel like you can relax sans accidental ex encounter. Then watch, GAPE MOUTHED, as ex walks through the door -- with a date! Proceed to supress gurgling stomach acid as ex and new date cross the bar, where he sits facing you, throwing sad/longing/angry/accusatory glances toward you and your friends, especially the "suspicious" one. Proceed to bathroom so you can witness flagrant PDAs and your ex rubbing some girl's thighs, even though only hours before you had received an email proclaiming for the 900th guilt-inducing time his undying love for you. Ponder how you will be alone forever, how you threw away the only person who ever wanted to marry you. Go home to receive an accusatory text message from ex about suspicious friend -- who, in all honesty, even if you wanted him, would never have you thanks to your inability to move on from previous relationship and its messy aftermath -- even though the EX was the one ON A DATE! Spend the next day volleying foul email back and forth with the ex discussing whose behavior and reaction was worse during and after the uncomfortable incident.

Bonus: read *very closely* the email he sends about how his new girlfriend is an accomplished Broadway actress and how she's "SO NICE to him." As if you weren't. As if you were a lousy girlfriend. Feel bad about virtually unemployed self, wonder why you couldn't love him more, if this is an inherent flaw in you and you will never love anyone appropriate -- only gays or emotionally unavailable and religiously incompatable men who live 2,000 miles away. Wonder if you're one of those people for whom it's just not destined. Digusted by your own self-pity, have a beer. I hear it reduces ass spread. Really.

5) Watch roommate and fabulous new boyfriend grope each other on couch each night, sneaking off to kitchen periodically to kiss audibly. Watch thoughtful holiday present exchange while contemplating one's own island-like status. Feel guilty for your selfishness and for raining on happy happy romance parade each night.

6) Watch everyone around you get engaged, get married, and pop out babies with merry abandon. Recontemplate your loathsome self pity and selfish inability to feel much joy for them, in turn making you feel even worse and like you must withdraw to spare all those happy people around you the black cloud that your presence constitutes on their otherwise perfect lives.

7) Repeat!

Oom pah pah Oom pah pah

In the space of the last 45 minutes, I have witnessed not one but TWO bands -- one full, one brass -- belting out holiday songs. The high school band playing in Rockefeller Center, which was performing some Tschaikovsky piece from the Nutcracker, should have come with a warning label and a gratis pair of wax earplugs. If the dancing had matched this music, the Nutcracker would have been performed by an army of drunken chimps in tutus. The professional band in matching Santa hats playing in the Time Life lobby was much more melodious. Lest you think me a grump, though -- the raggedy rhythms and ear-bending tones of the high school band brought the bigger smile to my face, especially the bass guitar player -- a gangly, buck-toothed, head-bobbing fellow of about 14, who couldn't have looked more excited to be playing "We Want to Wish You a Merry Christmas" for a crowd of tourists and hip-shakin' toddlers. Brought me back to my own days as an excited and proud performer in the good ol' Youth Symphony. Ahh, New York.

Corporate America, not always the DEVIL

After 5 years of working for a miserly major publishing company that shall go unnamed but that rhymes with HOW MOANS (and, yes, the employees there moaned. a lot. with good reason), I have to say that seeing the other side of the fence has been eye-opening. Not all corporate titans are completely evil, even when they're publicly traded! How Moans seemed to take joy in scrimping on or even taking away any little perk or convenience that may have served to make their employees happier, healthier, wealthier, or even just content. They seemed to take joy, in fact, in making employees' lives more DIFFICULT -- drawn out contract negotiations, forced slave marches to South Brunswick, etc.

Working for Time Inc. has been completely different. I know employees of the particular title I'm at have gripes about restructuring and salaries and the like, but one thing they will give it, is that there are PERKS. I don't know how much these perks cost the company, but I would venture to guess that these perks inspire loyalty in a way that How Moans just couldn't wrap its stupid, niggling head around.

For instance, Time Inc. publishes a whole bunch of magazines, like Real Simple, InStyle, Health, Entertainment Weekly, People, Time, Fortune, Money. They make all these magazines available FREE to their employees, and you can go down to big kiosks in the lobby and just take whichever ones you want if you don't have anything to read on the subway or the Stairmaster.

Here's another example. The other day I went down to the lobby ISO lunch, and there was a group of about 40 people singing Christmas carols -- yes, you people who think New York is craven, real ones, not just ones about Santa, ones about God, too -- in the lobby. All kinds of employees were milling around, singing along to the Christmas carols, and the whole lobby is crammed full of gorgeous garlands and silver balls and bells and Christmas trees and menorahs. It makes work seem like kind of a warm, happy place to be.

Meanwhile, across town at How Moans, the CEO and COOs of the company are probably dressed up like Scrooge and the Grinch, armed with bags of coal to pelt at employees who have gone out in search of a hot dog, since the company TOOK AWAY THE CORPORATE CAFETERIA even though there's nowhere to eat down there. Not that I'm bitter anymore, having just sated myself with a gourmet, *corporate-subsidized* lunch here in the grand old Time Life building.

How Moans, how I hate you. For Christmas, I hope you miss quarterly earnings projections, disappoint your precious, precious shareholders, and see your stock drop 30%.

Time Inc., for you this Christmas, I have nothing but warm fuzzies.

Blah bla blah blah blah blah blah

That's a lot of what making magazines is about, apparently. It's incredible. The pace is so different than newspapers; in any one day the Journal probably has the equivalent of four Money magazines in it, and they produce that EVERY DAY. Of course, the staff here is much smaller. But it seems that about 2% of the t ime here is spent actually reporting and talking to people, about 5% is spent writing, and the rest is TALKING ENDLESSLY about story development, how to "package" it, and then fact-checking it to death for hte most picky unie crap. Blab blab blab. Makes me miss the old days of real news reporting. Arkansas paid like crap and you weren't winning any pulitzers, but at least it was real news! Crazy people with a thousand cats who eat their dead husbands right before their very eyes (yes, a story I actually covered), AIDS funding, tornadoes, shootings, city council, Clinton...ahh, fond memories.

That said, I really do like it here at the magazine. The people are real nice and the offices are real nice and the cafeteria is delish. They had a meeting today for the temps and said when our terms are up we can keep in touch with their fofice in case they have other magazines that need people -- they do some fun magazines here, like InStyle, Time, People, etc., so that could be a good opportunity for more steady money adn to see what other magazines are like. Meanwhile, the Rockefeller Center area (and Radio city, across the street), are decorated very festively -- tons of lights and big holiday sculptures and trees and decorations. Really beautiful. New York around Christmas is divine. Wish I had someone to share it with this year. Boo hoo, poor me.

some days here the hours are ok, only about 10-6 but other days when there are big deadlines the days get very, very long. it's all right, though, i get paid by the hour. and anyway, the holiday season has seemed less insane with only my parties and my work and my friends to worry about instead of two people's parties and friends and obligatory holiday whatevers with family or work or friends and etc. So at least I have been able to get to the gym a bit, hopefully elevating my endorphins enough that I don't feel the urge to cry every 10 minutes anymore like i've been doing for, what, now, six months? I'm also back up and running on dad's web site (go see the changes) so hopefully we can track progress of hte office.

Saturday should be a fun day. First, the 20-30 group at church is having their holiday party, with an open bar and appetizers, at a pub in Midtown, starting at 830. After that's done, around 1030, I'm headed back to Brooklyn for a friend's holiday karaoke party at her apartment. I suspect I may not make it to the early service. Or, maybe, any at all -- i've been goig very regularly since the retreat so I may allow myself to sleep in that one time. However, I will make it on Thursday -- that's Fifth Avenue Presbyeterian's traveler's Christmas eve service. They do it every year the Thursday a week before Christmas Eve; its the exact replica of their actual Christmas Eve service -- the amazing choir and organ and traditional hymns, and trees and garlands all over the gorgeous chapel. Last year, Chris and laura came with me and afterward we decamped to the Telephone Bar in the East Village for stilton fritters (wonderful -- all gooey cheesy fried goodness!) and Guinnesses and shepherd's pie. I've decided to carry on that tradition -- so this year me, Laura, her friend Ashley, her boyfriend Jim, possibly bro in law Mike, my friends from church, and whoever else wants to come, are going to go get in the holiday spirit with a wonderful church service and then -- go drink beer. Well, we're halfway on our way to being good. :) I can't believe the Christmas eve service is coming up next week -- and I have exactly two christmas presents bought. gulp.