Big Ups to the Blogroll

Maybe you've noticed my list of links to other blogs and websites, off to the left down there. I hope you clicked on one or two, they aren't there for nothing. Because it is indeed a slow blog day, and Superfly and I are off for another outrigger canoeing and karaoke extravaganza, I thought I'd pay tribute to those fine URLs.

E-A-G-L-E-S: 'Nuff said. Hardest working team in football.

The Rack: My friend Rackie's had more than her share of challenges lately, but maintains her wry humor at all costs. Supportive and kind beyond measure, she's the kind of friend everyone wants.

Lucky Bastard: I don't know this guy, but he's living the life. A successful LA writer, I want to hate him, but he's insightful and funny. Bastard.

Bushwick Bombshell: No idea where the "three-toed sloth" comes from, but Tracy's blog consistently cracks me the hell up. Plus, she's a redhead, and half-Irish, half-Jewish like me. Separated at birth, we were.

LB and Ally da Pup: Well, Miss LB is a classy show-biz lady and Ally is her faithful canine companion. I can't believe she doesn't have her own show yet.

Mr. Oogie Boogie and
The Water Princess: Most darling couple, ever. So chic, urban, and sweet, their blogs are a joy to read.

McSweeney's: What can I say? I heart Dave Eggers.

The Erudite Bouncer: Our man on the box will be published later this year. Check out his inspired ramblings while the gettin's good.

Marty the Magnificent: Marty I know from JDate. Accountant by day, actor by night, Marty is so adorable, funny, and smart, I have to say: Ladies? He's single, get crackin'!

Frum Funnies: The Knish. Not updated as often as I'd like, but a source of much kosher amusement.

GAWKER rules!: I want to be a gawker correspondent. They are the cool kids in the lunchroom, y'all. If you can get through a day's postings without snorking whatever you're drinking, I salute you.

Page Six: What can I say? Celeb gossip is my crack.

Get Banged: Bangitout.com, another kosher jokefest, but from Philly Phrums! Best Kosher Top 10 lists, ever. A must read.

Heeb: The New Jew Review: Backstory: When I was doing my magazine in Denver, I saw the first issue of Heeb while dropping off a stack of Hootchie Mama Magazines. It totally blew my skirt up, with it's Jewfro feature and centerfold of Neil Diamond. I wrote them a complimentary email, she checked out HMM's website and returned the compliment. Love-Love. Support Heeb Magazine, it provides a rare and wonderful service to Jewish America.

The Awful Truth: See: Page Six

Joke Repository: Ebaum's World is THE source for email forwards of crazy photographs, videos, and jokes. You can (and I have) spend days perusing their site.

OPEN FIRE!: This guy is so nuts, so talented, so brilliant, what's not to love? I'm a longtime Fling Fling fan, but his other rock videos are awesome and his daily posts are hysterically funny.

There you have it! I'm proud to feature all of the above on my stupid blog that no one reads. MWAH!

*Warning!* Political Rant Ahead!

Disgusted with his initial election. Appalled with his re-election. Shocked at the arrogance of his handlers and supporters and amazed at his ability to commit illegal and egregious acts against the American people in broad daylight and, aside from some weak grumblings in the newspapers, walk right on by, whistling a happy tune.

Both elections were rigged.

Michael Moore was certainly right about the war in Iraq and the President’s lies.

The President holds nothing but contempt for his fellow Americans.

The level of evil cronyism in our government rivals that of the most corrupt third-world junta.

And there was talk about impeaching Clinton because he cheated on his wife and made a bad investment? Such interesting priorities we require of our political leaders.

You can murder our soldiers to advance your wealth and power, you can spy on us, but by golly, you better not cheat on your wife!

Don’t confuse me with a Bill Clinton fan, please, that is inaccurate. Clinton is highly intelligent, a talented communicator, and a foreign policy ace. (Let’s think for a moment about how Dub fares in these areas….) I thought Clinton was fine as President. At least he was qualified. But I wasn’t a fan of his Hollywood act; I found that inappropriate.

For all his Democrat assurances, Bill Clinton, in reality, advanced many conservative objectives; ones conservatives were unable to push through a Democratic Congress. NAFTA, anyone? You’d think maybe the right would appreciate this. You’d think wrong! No amount of bipartisan success could erase Hillary, who the right deems evil incarnate.

You will see, in the next few years, a great leap backward in time, to before human rights, civil rights, and equal rights for women. Make no mistake, the right-wingers are intent on accomplishing this before the end of Dub’s term. Stacking the Supreme Court through calling in favors and Gestapo intimidation is just the beginning.

The right yearns to abolish abortion, the EEOC, the teaching of evolution, and to reinstate the rich, white, Christian man as the authority on all things. And they want this done before Hillary gets a chance to run for President.

It’s too late for us to do anything about any of this. We’ll just have to play clean-up when the Republicans are ousted. Like everything else in life, politics moves in cycles.

I’m much more worried about Israel. Hamas’ victory, Iran’s nuclear program, and the West’s seeming abandonment of Israel is beyond dangerous. All of militant Islam seems to be gunning for Israel at once and I have a terrible sense of foreboding. Although I know Israel will not hesitate to defend herself by any means necessary, it’s very, very scary right now.

Compass

Ah, Restaurant Week...

I chose this Upper West Side fine dining establishment because a) reservations were available for reasonable times, b) the online menu offered a chance Superfly could get something vegetarian (with the blobs and smears of who-knows-what on plates around town, he fears eating what he thinks is yak ear, or something), and I, who lives for haute cuisine, hadn't been there before.

Beat Superfly there by a few minutes, so after alerting the staff to my presence, I cooled my heels in the lobby, listening to servers talk about a recent karaoke party. A group of grandmas came in and huffed about, shedding layers of hideous coats and barking at one another. One had the affrontery to ask for my chair. No sight of Superfly and our reserved time ticking away, I asked to wait at a table.

The interior of Compass is rather nondescript. A rectangular dining area, lots of wood and recessed lighting, boring art. Due to its proximity to Lincoln Center, it caters to theatre goers. Judging from the crowd present last night, probably those from Ohio. From our vantage point on a raised seating level we could watch patient servers explain reductions and confits to bewildered guests.

Excellent wine list, our server knew his wine and made fabulous recommendations. Each menu item offered a wine pairing, and I noticed on the way out that Compass received Best Wine Cellar awards from Wine Spectator, three years running. Neat!

Superfly finally arrived in all his handsome glory and we settled in for a feast. Well, I did. He's a man of simple tastes when it comes to food and is wary of plates looking more like art than food. Because we are creatures of habit, he had Chardonnay and I had Zinfandel. Both were sublime. Marco, our friendly server who looked like he might stuff his starched shirt and bowtie into a leather backpack and ride his Chopper home after work, brought the Amuse course, not hesitating before explaining what that meant.

The crisp, fennel did indeed amuse our palates. We opted to order from the prix fixe Restaurant Menu, although the rest of the menu looked amazing. My butternut squash soup was so good, I totally sopped it up with the fancy bread. Superfly was less enthused with his Cured Salmon Salad, the consistency of the fish was somewhere between sushi and lox, the fleshiness of it didn't sit well with him. It helped to eat the fish with the accompanying watercress and brussel sprout, but I didn't care for the fish, either.

My main course was brisket, one of my favorites. Me and my palate were amused to see the wee perfect squares of brisket, drizzled with a gravy reduction and matched with fantastic grits and some spicy mustard vegetables. Never has brisket been so tender, so fancy!

My main Superfly was picking away at his skate, he didn't like this fish, either. Said it had a strange consistency. He should have ordered the salmon teriyaki, we agreed.

However! We both chose the chocolate dessert offering, and neither could complain, both so busy jamming it down our gullets. Basically, we're talking a haute cuisine Devil Dog. It was freaking awesome.

All in all, dinner at Compass was a lovely experience. Superfly's experience was less so, but he always scarfs down what I cook him, so he stays.

Compass restaurant is 203 70th Street, Upper West Side, Manhattan.

I'll rate Compass 2 1/2 stars. After all, it's no Daniel!

Adrift No More

Assuming everyone feels the same way at some point in their life certainly helps with coping, doesn't it?

For four long years I've been adrift, barely surviving the hits that kept on coming. Not a droopy ghoul by nature, I became concerned that I really was doomed to walk the Earth alone, in the giant, deep footsteps of the mighty Hulk. Divorce, illness, crisis after crisis; Existential Depression was the only raft to cling to in a churning sea of trauma.

Therapists praised my ability to SURVIVE but all I could say was, what's the point? It's incredibly hard to believe this too shall pass, when this too is sucking the marrow out of your bones. Impossible to accept things can only get better when them things are making you feel like a rubber stress doll whose eyes pop out ever further with increased pressure from the squeezing hand.

And, yet, like Moses in the desert suddenly espying a shiny something off in the hazy distance, you reach a point where you believe in the promised land. Sure, it's a challenge to survive. What's infinitely harder is sloughing off that angst and fear and allowing faith (not the Jerry Falwell variety, more the falling backward and trusting someone to catch you variety)to swoop in and blow your hair straight back. That's really motherfucking hard to do when you're comfortable with the idea that nothing will ever go right for you on account of everything being against you.

Anyway, things sure are getting better for me. However unsettling success may be, I am pleased and profoundly grateful.

Tomorrow night is our Restaurant Week date. Wheeee!

Shmooze-o-rama

Attended a meet-and-greet with some random publicists and PR types last night, courtesy this organization.

Haven't done something like that in a long time, it was reassuring and motivating to talk about the occasional triumphs and frequent woes of freelancing with other writers. Collected a handful of business cards and free booze from several flacks, and one especially weird one followed me around, talking about his Craftmatic bed.

Guess I expected more pushy, cut-throat action from other writers, and less accessibility to the PR/Publicists--seems I have the potential to be wrong, after all.

Here's to professional shmoozing and to certain people geting crackin' on writing!

at Denver's Downtown Aquarium
photo credit: Superfly

The Bitch is Back

Hellooooooo!

Highlights from our trip:

1. Superfly met: my kids (mutual admiration society), my mother-the-sociopath (he listened to her blathering, so she really likes him), my best friend J (Hadn't seen her in two years!), and Mr & Mrs. F, and their baby. He appears none the worse for wear and is now officially part of the greater Trouble family. Huzzah!

2. We saved the meeting my douchebag of an ex-husband and his wife until the absolute last minute. Said douchebag fawned over Superfly, telling him several times how nice it was to meet him. I was too busy staring at his nearly-40-year-old wife standing there in overalls. I smartly choo-choo-chose not to make the vicious remark that sprang into my head.

It was a phony-baloney encounter with beige people in a beige house, in a beige neighborhood, in a beige city that is a blight upon civilization. National Geographic Magazine used this city as an example of the worst kind of urban sprawl. In the World. I told Superfly, "Welcome to Stepford".

I'm only comforted by the knowledge my kids are smart and savvy, and no amount of suburban ignorance and lock-step conformity will alter their Trouble DNA. Take that!

3. I'll have you know that Superfly and I entered a Live Trivia contest and won a pitcher of beer and a bar tab for being oh, so smart!

4. We traveled to Fort Collins, a college town an hour from Denver that's a favorite spot for people who are the outdoorsy type. Supe met up with a mentor from the world of outdoor/sports photography and again with the mutual admiration society. Everybody takes an instant like to Superfly!

5. All in all, it was a fantastic and relatively drama-free weekend, and I'm so glad we went. So, what did I miss?

Off We Go!

Have a great rest of the week and super weekend, everybody! Supahfly and I are jetting Westward, ho. It's gonna be fun. :)

If you're lucky enough to be off work for MLK day, shag your butt down to BAM for their annual exhibit. It'll be good for ya.

Remind me to blog about how I made a complete jackass of myself at karaoke last weekend. That one's gonna take awhile to live down.

Too Twitterpated to Blog, Here's a cute dog

New Year, Same Old Bullshit

EVERY damn time I go to Denver to visit my children, I endure the same flurry of idiotic emails from my ex-husband and his new wife. They live to fuck up my plans!

This time, he doesn't want me to pick up the kids when he's not home. His new wifey is so terrorized by the sight of me, she can't even bear to send the kids outside when I honk the horn. Sheesh.

So, a week from Friday, there's a chance I'll be at her front door with a Sheriff. So pointless, so stupid, so damaging to the children.

All I want is to see them, introduce Superfly to them, and have a blast for a couple of days. Why must my bastard bitch-ass mofo ex-husband jack it up for us?

Feh!

Get Your Kicks in 2006

Well now! Hope everyone had a blast on NYE and then survived Sunday's hangover.

Time to regroup and TCB: To hell with resolutions, let's just say the slate was wiped clean of distractions and laziness over the weekend and now it's time to cowboy up on that To Do list.

My first To Do items for 2006 are: get crack-a-lackin' on my book, join NYSC, and arrange for some volunteering opportunities. Plenty of those to go around, I know, but I think I'd like to concentrate on kids with mental illness.

Wish me luck! I'd love to hear your ambitious plans for the year, or salacious details of your New Year's Eve.