Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Once More Unto The Breach, Dear Friends

Tomorrow, I head to exciting Grand Rapids for my semi-annual warmfuzzy with an unnamed regional big box retailer that will sell you groceries, garden hoses and Shania Twain CD's. I don't know about their grocery and garden hose businesses, but lately, their Shania sales have been a little light.

I used to like plane rides, because it was mental time off - no emails or phone calls to answer. No critical conversations to have, and no real work to be done. My M.O. would be to slap down eight bucks for the biggest piece of paperback pulp garbage the airport would sell me, and slide into some sort of pseudo-science or courtroom thriller for the duration of the flight. Now, in the time it takes to get from LaGuardia to Michigan, I'm on the hook for a bunch of December budget documents and a presentation. My 45 minute layover in Detriot will be filled with a phone meeting. With any time left, I might actually work on a graduate admissions essay. Yeah, right.

Weather report for Grand Rapids - Low 30s and sleet.

Monday, November 28, 2005

Chris Whitley, Dead at 45

I just visited the blog of an old acquaintance and found that Chris Whitley had died.

Chris was a blues musician who earned a degree of fame with his 1991 release Living With the Law on Columbia Records. His best work in my opinion was 1998's Dirt Floor, which made my top albums list that year.

I had the pleasure of chatting with Chris several times during my tenure as a music scribe. He always seemed very humble, very eager to please, and very smart, though obviously chased by his own demons.

Rest in peace, Chris.
Much to Sarah's dismay, Asher is in the thick of a strong pro-Daddy phase. Every time she's holding him and he sees me, he cries and reaches out towards me. When they're playing together and I walk in, he drops what he's doing and crawls over with a big grin.

On an unrelated note, Sarah sent out a Happy Thanksgiving email to all of her (Orthodox) friends, and cc'd me on the note. Everyone's writing back (which is nice), and the conversation has of course taken on a Jewish slant (which is lame). Now, I have emails in my in-box that say things like "minhag," and "kashrut" (which is really weird).

What the hell's a minhag?

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Conspiracy Du Jour

Microsoft Word does not recognize the word "commodification."
A couple weeks back, I got an assignment to review a live Phish CD that's due out in December.

I haven't seriously listened to Phish in about seven years, so it was fascinating to me that I still got that Pavlovian reaction when I heard those familiar opening notes to one of their more titantic songs - a slight shortness of breath and bitter taste in my mouth that comes with the burst of adrenaline I used to get when I knew I was in for a helluva musical ride. Or, maybe the shortness of breath and the bitter taste was just a faint echo of that dope/acid combo I favored back in the days that I listened to this shit with a fervor unmatched by anything else in secular society.

At any rate, I shouldn't be posting. I should be writing this damn review right now.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Sarah and I had a nice Tibetan dinner tonight, courtesy of the nanny. Now, we're listening to Andrew Bird's Weather Systems, sipping tea, and figuring the odds on Asher sleeping through the night.

My parents are coming to town tomorrow for Thanksgiving. They'll be staying a few blocks away in one of Park Slope's many quaint (read: overpriced) B&Bs.

That's it. No pithy insights. No musical tirades. Just sheer exhaustion.

Sunday, November 20, 2005

Well, so much for that...

Asher woke up again at 4:40am - not long enough for yours truly to get any sleep.

Since then, I've been taking care of him. Sarah's more or less out of the action for the day.

How am I supposed to do this AND work AND write a freelance article due tomorrow for Down Beat AND not sleep at all?

It's been two full weeks like this. It's gotta stop. It's gotta.
It's 3:40am.

I just put Asher down - I think successfully - after doing battle for two hours with a nasty cough and runny nose. We sat in front of a steamy shower. We watched Dances With Wolves on PBS. We walked around the apartment. Back and forth. Back and forth.

Sarah is barred from helping because she's got the flu, herself.

Is it too early in the morning for a glass of scotch?

Friday, November 18, 2005

Soul Killing Points

Ten years ago, I quit what was my first post-college job as a reaction to what I thought were several unfair and morally suspect moves made by the company's management. Unfortunately, I lept from the proverbial frying pan into the fire - That second post-college job was rife with a management that was not only morally suspect, but also psychologically abusive and borderline criminal in its operation.

What I learned from that first leap was that life isn't fair, and you have no choice but to put up with it. A tough lesson, to be sure. And as I get older, it doesn't get easier. A decade down the line, I'm now part of that management echelon, and if anything, I've found that these "life isn't fair" lessons are even more harsh. In attempt to claw my way back to sanity, I've creating the Soul Points Game.

There are several ways you can earn soul saving points, though those are unique to each person. They could be eliciting a laugh from your child, going for a run, reading a good book, having great sex, and so on.

Below is the point system I've developed so far for earning soul KILLING points. For what it's worth, I've earned 65 of these today, and it's only 3pm. Let's see if I can win an equal number of soul saving points over the weekend...

Soul Killing Points:
5 points - Being forced do something you know is not right in service of the bottom line
10 points - Being forced to do something you know is not right in service of corporate processes
25 points - Harming another employee in the process

10 points - Covering for someone who does not know how to do their job
15 points - Doing this repeatedly

5 points - Working with someone who has twice your salary, half of your business acumen and one-third of your utility
5 points - Every hour you have to spend attempting to "help them understand."

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Just made my first CD purchases since Asher was born. Amazon should be shipping the following today:

Wilco - Kicking Television: Live in Chicago
Just released yesterday, Kicking Television is a perfect example of a solid, latter-day Wilco set - meandering and melodic, giving life to the recent staid tunes and dotting the landscape with some old faves. These guys are the personification of mercurial on stage - either they completely suck, or it's an utterly transcendent experience. Thankfully, Tweedy & Co. picked off one of the better shows for distribution.

Miles Davis - E.S.P.
ESP is the first recording of Miles' second classic quartet, with Wayne Shorter rounding out the band. This is one of those records I'm ashamed to have never owned. It's been constant on my Rhapsody playlist since 2001. Classic hard bop.

Andrew Bird - And The Mysterious Production of Eggs
As my friend Kristen noted in the comments section a couple of posts back, this is hands-down one of the best records of the year. Don't get me wrong - there's not a single to be had here, but Mysterious Production works better as a whole than anything else out there in '05. Andrew has a tenor voice slightly more angular than Jeff Buckley's, and a sense of irony that matches Mark Eitzel's. But that's where comparisons must end. The songwriting and arrangements on this CD are simultaneously complex and accessible, bitter and earnest. And somehow, he manages to integrate whistling and violin without making them sound cheesy.
It's 3:25am.

Asher's been awake for two hours now. Crying. Screaming. Pissed off.

He does this every other night these days.

I hate it. Means a lot of two-hour sleep nights for me.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Sarah and I have a nanny AND a cleaning lady. I suspect that neither of them are in the country legally, and of course we pay both of them in cash.

I tell myself that there's no way for the two of us to work AND clean AND care for Asher 24/7. I tell myself that in this city where life is so hard, you have to use every bit of money you've got to ease the way. I tell myself that we pay them well - better than other families would pay. And that the cash-under-the-table gives them the financial flexibility to live their own lives in a way they could not if they were on the government's radar.

I tell myself all of these things, trying to reconcile myself to the reality that I basically have two servants.

Friday, November 11, 2005

Finally

Sarah had to spend the night at the hospital due to minor complications. They've just released her, and she should be home any minute. Asher's back from his Grandparents' home. I'm taking the day off work (again) to keep things in order.

Thursday, November 10, 2005

It's nearly 5pm, and we're still waiting for the feeling to return to Sarah's legs. The doctor says she should be ready to go home by 6 or 7 tonight. Other than that, all is well. Sarah's hanging out in the recovery room with a magazine and a vitamin water. Unfortunately, they wouldn't let me stay with her...
Checking in from the hospital

The waiting room in Mt. Sinai Hospital has free coffee - but no decaf. So, they give a bunch of already jittery people unfettered access to good old, thick-as-mud, Columbian Supreme. Brilliant.

It should come as no surprise that the waiting room also has free internet access. And so, here I sit, overcaffinated and nervous hands doing the jitterbug across a sticky Dell keyboard. I've already checked out all the political blogs. I've already read - but not answered - work emails. What next?

They started the procedure two hours late, which apparently is good timing around here. Sarah should be done in the next half hour. Then, it's two hours in the recovery room. From there, we'll see. The plan is to go home this afternoon.

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

This Thursday, Sarah is having surgery to donate bone marrow to an anonymous 18-year-old boy.

It's a relatively straightforward procedure - they extract it from your hip bone under local anasthesia - and she doesn't seem nervous. Nonetheless, I'm taking the day off, and we're shipping Asher to Grandma in Queens.

What struck me most about this was the risk involved for the recipient. Apparently, they have to eradicate his bone marrow shortly before he receives the transplant. If his body rejects Sarah's marrow, he has none of his own to go back to. It's a leap of faith, and they tell Sarah that the chances of success are 75-90%.

Monday, November 07, 2005

Obligatory Bath Shot


I really wanna know

Is it possible to have all of the following whilst living in New York City?

- A fulfilling family life that includes a child/children
- A satisfying work life
- Financial stability
- Physical and intellectual outlets beyond all of the above

Right now, I'm slowly killing myself trying to find the recipe.

Next question: Is this possible to achieve anywhere?

Sunday, November 06, 2005

The headlines have been pummeling the Bush Administration this weekend:

- A U.N. report found that Halliburton stole $208 million from the Iraqi government, and the U.S. government should repay it.

- The Administration planted Ken Tomlinson as the head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting specifically to turn it into a Neo-Conservative mouthpiece. Apparently, he proceeded to spend a lot of CPB’s money on partisan activities, push polls, and ghost employees who were cronies of the Bush administration.

- The Administration used information it knew had been discredited in its argument that Iraq trained Al Qaeda operatives in the art of chemical weaponry.

- There is a visible audit trail tracing Iraqi prisoner abuse back to Vice President Cheney’s office.

- Bush ordered entire White House staff to a special ethics class

- At the request of the Administration, the Senate passed $35 billion in domestic spending cuts, voting almost entirely along partisan lines. The spending cuts included knocking nearly 300,000 off food stamps, 40,000 children off school lunch programs, and other significant cuts to student loans, Medicaid, and child support enforcement. According to Senate Majority leader Bill Frist, next up is Bush’s $70 billion tax cut.

And then there were the several stories of riots, violence and massive protests that dogged Bush during his visit to Argentina…

Friday, November 04, 2005

I just got a phone call from the Ohio Coalition to Protect Families and Children. They want to know how many underaged children are using the new video ipod.

I told him a lot, and they're all downloading gay porn.

Okay, I didn't tell him that. But I wanted to.
What to say, What to say...

It's been one of those weeks - you know, when the dirty laundry is piling up, the dishwasher's been clean since Tuesday but there's been no time to empty it, crises at work and crises at home, you're debilitated by a nasty cold... and on top of it all, you accidentally let your New Yorker subscription lapse and now you have to pay newstand price if you want to read Nicholas Lemann's article on the Scooter Libby indictment. Damn, that sucks.

On the bright side, I'm looking forward to listening to Razor & Tie's 40th Anniversary Tribute to Rubber Soul today. The record - which was the first piece of music I ever bought, incidentally - is covered in its entirety by artists like Ted Leo, Dar Williams, Low, The Fiery Furnaces, Mindy Smith and Nellie McKay.