Well I can tell the holidays are now over - my OCD has calmed down.
The Holidays are generally pretty stressful for me, esp since I got laid off and have just been doing freelance. I can slip into these bizarre habits without even realizing it.
Like I went to Cliterati to hear the reading and had to stop by the grocery store to pick up a few things. I realized while shopping that my favorite yogurt was marked down to .39, which generally means I can get 6 (3-9=6). Not that that formula makes any sense at all, but it's just that there has to be some formula or reason for every little decision.
I also, got to the .99 frozen pizzas and usually means I get 3 (cause 3 goes into 9), but I actually only got 2.
I know we measure things in small victories sometimes, but I actually got a big thrill out of living dangerously and breaking the rules.
I finally have the gas pump thing licked. I used to have to always find the gas pump number that matched how much gas I wanted to get. For instance if I wanted $10 in gas, I'd have to go to pump #10. If that one was busy, I could go to pump #9 or $11, but I'd then have to get $9 or $11 worth of gas. I realized that had gotten out of hand though when I actually would find myself leaving a gas station and going down the street if a) only low # pumps were available (cause it didn't make sense to just get $1 of gas - duh) or b) only high # pumps were available (cause I couldn't get $18 dollars in my tank).
Funny how the mind works.
I even used to be that way with my poetry, I was a hopeless counter. Squeezing each piece into some bizzare meter like: 5-5-5-5, or 2-3-4-5, not that it had anything to do with the work, it's just that if I didn't make all the meter work, it drove me crazy.
A lot of people would probably find this strange, especially considering I'm such a laid back and relaxed person generally. I'm certainly not up in the leagues with the chronic house keepers (I wish) or the hand washers.
But if you ever open up my fridge and find some bizzare number of things, like 9 bottles of pancake syrup, or 12 jars of mustard -- you'll know I must have been having a bad day.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Merry Xmas!
Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas. It's going to be pretty quite here, just visiting with friends around town. Hope everyone has a great holiday with friends and family.
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Outide the Green Zone - Review in The Pedestal
The new Pedestal Magazine has a review of "Outside the Green Zone".
http://www.thepedestalmagazine.com/Secure/Content/cb.asp?cbid=5049
I'll have to do a more extensive blog on this. After it's all said and done, now that I've been working on this project for so long now, it might be time for a recap/lessons learned post on that project. So look for that.
http://www.thepedestalmagazine.com/Secure/Content/cb.asp?cbid=5049
I'll have to do a more extensive blog on this. After it's all said and done, now that I've been working on this project for so long now, it might be time for a recap/lessons learned post on that project. So look for that.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Pretty Amazing video, especially the first half, you keep thinking it just has to be special effects. What makes this particularly amazing too though is that it's done by 21 members of the China Disabled People's Performing Art Troupe, doing what's call the Thousand-hand Bodhisattva dance. They're all deaf which makes it even more amazing since there's no music ques they can follow.
Ode to the Silver Grill
This is a piece I wrote on an Atlanta Insitution and one of my old favorites:
+++++
Country Fried Steak at The Silver Grill
Atlanta is full of contradictions. To start with, it’s a large cosmopolitan southern town. Cosmopolitan and Southern are words most people just don’t usually put together. Yet the great strength of the city is that it not only attracts people from around the country, but it’s in particular a regional hub for the best, brightest and most ambitious of the South’s sons and daughters. I myself came here over twenty-five years ago looking for opportunity and community and now consider it home, and wouldn’t consider living anywhere else.
It’s been said Atlanta often favors the latest and greatest, the newest and shiniest over its history and more homespun institutions. Even on a personal level we often try to distance ourselves from our small town roots and lose the thick southern accents.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this Atlanta’s “Southerness” lately, mainly because I’ve been visiting the Silver Grill on Monroe drive. I’m trying to get in all the fried chicken and country fried steak I can before they soon close their doors. They’re soon to be the latest in a long line of Atlanta institutions to make way for redevelopment.
I find myself really torn on this, I’m all for the cities redevelopment and renewal. I’m excited about all the new condo towers in downtown and midtown, the expanded museum, the new aquarium. I realize that it’s good for the city I love so much. However, I do miss some of the little things that are getting lost. I miss not only the historic buildings like the Pershing Point Hotel and most recently 615 Peachtree, but even the little things, the institutions like the Silver Grill.
In a city that aspires to build the “Midtown Mile” a long overdue retail district in midtown, I sometimes feel words like upscale, high-end, and “the next Rodeo Drive” get tossed around a bit too much. I’m reminded that if we aspire to build the next ____ (fill in the blank) then it will never be more than an imitation, a cheap copy of whatever we’re trying to emulate. True institutions are built as unique entities with their own personalities and charm.
That brings me back to The Silver Grill. The restaurant was built decades ago so that country folks coming to work construction in the big city could find a little piece of home, a nice plate of comfort food, a meat and two veggies, and a good cobbler. Over the decades, it’s been pretty much the same story. The workers changed a bit, construction workers and day laborers giving way to office workers, and lawyers and now even web designers. It’s always been for the same reason though, to get a little piece of home in the big city. To eat in the Silver Grill is to feel a little bit closer to home for a while, to feel a little more comfortable with ones southern roots. To have Peggy give you a big smile and “hey hon” is like getting a big hug from a favorite aunt.
Not that I really have a solution. It’s a problem that some people can’t even get their heads around, but it’s just something we need to keep in mind. With growth comes choices, but progress isn’t always measured by biggest and newest, much like our lives aren’t always measured in the size of our paychecks and having a corner office.
If I had a few million bucks lying around, I’d buy the property to save it. The sad thing is there will more than likely be a chain restaurant there in the end, but it will probably serve burritos or sushi. If I had my way I’d make sure everybody got a nice vacation and have them come back to a nice new (but not too shiny) Silver Grill on the corner of a new condo building.
But all I can do for now is call up friends I haven’t talked to in a while, and meet them for dinner and enjoy the country fried steak and the company. We sit around in the booths and catch up, maybe talk about family and where we grew up and whatever happed to so-and-so. We find that we talk a bit slower and relax after a long busy day, and though we all try to watch our weights there’s always room for cobbler.
+++++
Country Fried Steak at The Silver Grill
Atlanta is full of contradictions. To start with, it’s a large cosmopolitan southern town. Cosmopolitan and Southern are words most people just don’t usually put together. Yet the great strength of the city is that it not only attracts people from around the country, but it’s in particular a regional hub for the best, brightest and most ambitious of the South’s sons and daughters. I myself came here over twenty-five years ago looking for opportunity and community and now consider it home, and wouldn’t consider living anywhere else.
It’s been said Atlanta often favors the latest and greatest, the newest and shiniest over its history and more homespun institutions. Even on a personal level we often try to distance ourselves from our small town roots and lose the thick southern accents.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this Atlanta’s “Southerness” lately, mainly because I’ve been visiting the Silver Grill on Monroe drive. I’m trying to get in all the fried chicken and country fried steak I can before they soon close their doors. They’re soon to be the latest in a long line of Atlanta institutions to make way for redevelopment.
I find myself really torn on this, I’m all for the cities redevelopment and renewal. I’m excited about all the new condo towers in downtown and midtown, the expanded museum, the new aquarium. I realize that it’s good for the city I love so much. However, I do miss some of the little things that are getting lost. I miss not only the historic buildings like the Pershing Point Hotel and most recently 615 Peachtree, but even the little things, the institutions like the Silver Grill.
In a city that aspires to build the “Midtown Mile” a long overdue retail district in midtown, I sometimes feel words like upscale, high-end, and “the next Rodeo Drive” get tossed around a bit too much. I’m reminded that if we aspire to build the next ____ (fill in the blank) then it will never be more than an imitation, a cheap copy of whatever we’re trying to emulate. True institutions are built as unique entities with their own personalities and charm.
That brings me back to The Silver Grill. The restaurant was built decades ago so that country folks coming to work construction in the big city could find a little piece of home, a nice plate of comfort food, a meat and two veggies, and a good cobbler. Over the decades, it’s been pretty much the same story. The workers changed a bit, construction workers and day laborers giving way to office workers, and lawyers and now even web designers. It’s always been for the same reason though, to get a little piece of home in the big city. To eat in the Silver Grill is to feel a little bit closer to home for a while, to feel a little more comfortable with ones southern roots. To have Peggy give you a big smile and “hey hon” is like getting a big hug from a favorite aunt.
Not that I really have a solution. It’s a problem that some people can’t even get their heads around, but it’s just something we need to keep in mind. With growth comes choices, but progress isn’t always measured by biggest and newest, much like our lives aren’t always measured in the size of our paychecks and having a corner office.
If I had a few million bucks lying around, I’d buy the property to save it. The sad thing is there will more than likely be a chain restaurant there in the end, but it will probably serve burritos or sushi. If I had my way I’d make sure everybody got a nice vacation and have them come back to a nice new (but not too shiny) Silver Grill on the corner of a new condo building.
But all I can do for now is call up friends I haven’t talked to in a while, and meet them for dinner and enjoy the country fried steak and the company. We sit around in the booths and catch up, maybe talk about family and where we grew up and whatever happed to so-and-so. We find that we talk a bit slower and relax after a long busy day, and though we all try to watch our weights there’s always room for cobbler.
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