what to do when it happens, because it will...

...and of course, the 'it' of which i speak is the day on which your regular coffee-cart man finally asks you out.

i have always enjoyed popularity with the numerous coffee-cart men of my acquaintance. i don't know what it is, i show up to the same one twice and they smile broadly and yell 'my friend!' when i was a nanny on the upper west side, i was sick with strep throat one week. my coffee-cart man said he had been so worried he didn't know what to do, and if i was sick, why didn't i call hime? he would have brought me chicken soup! i mean, other than the phone number logistics, the fact that i didn't know his name, me being in brooklyn...apart from that, it honestly just hadn't crossed my mind. i almost wish it had. waking up horrifically ill, unable to drag myself too far from my bed, suddenly realizing, 'wait, i can just call my friend at the coffee cart!'

i've been worried about this one for a while, though. things quickly progressed from 'my friend', to 'sweetheart'. he's been awfully attentive to my schedule, and definitely chastises me when i'm late. he can't seem to fathom those days when i get tea instead of coffee, or, horrors, a bagel.

but last week. he asked me what i was doing at the weekend, and i said, well, i'm not really doing anything. he wanted to know, didn't i go to parties? i said no, i really prefer reading (and believe me, if i wasn't fully aware of the fact that i am a total loser, dork, etc., i would have realized it with that statement). he said, 'what, don't you like the movies?' i didn't think it was the time to get into the fact that i actually have a master's degree in film studies, so i just said, 'yeah, i really love movies.' that's when he said, 'why don't we go to the movies?'

it was really incredibly embarrassing. luckily, there was a line behind me, so i did a sort of a charlie chaplin-esque exaggerated shrug and waved goodbye for the day.

even more awkwardly, circumstances were such that i didn't go the next day, but when i did go back, he didn't mention it, and believe me, neither did i. i mean, it would be horrendous to have to change coffee cart allegiances at this point.

and it's right there on the corner....

more city, less sex, please

i just read the review of the 'sex and the city' movie in 'the new yorker'. it's always nice to know that there are other people that express the same unpopular views that you do. i'm tired of hearing about how it's really not about the clothes or the shoes, but the RELATIONSHIPS.

two points. one. much is made of the fact that these women are simply doing what men have done for years, being free with their sexuality, free to do and say and sleep with whoever the hell they want to. but...isn't that why women usually hate men? because they do and say and fuck whoever the hell they want to?

two. if you ever had the incredibly poor luck of being cornered by these four aging whores with expensive shoes at a cocktail party....you would run screaming out of there. i have a pet theory that they are the kind of women that are only friends so they can keep an eye on one another, and make sure that they aren't all sleeping with the same guy.

also, with the spectacular amount of work that the writer one doesn't do, how does she afford anything more than shoes on a payless sale?

shower thoughts

i have some of my best thoughts in the shower. sometimes i wonder if i should stay in there full-time, like that episode of 'seinfeld'. but the other day my thought was this -- every one of those directors that make those shit blockbusters should be sat down and made to watch krsysztof kieslowski's 'the decalogue'. then maybe they would think twice about the way they all love to bandy about the word 'epic'.
just another thought, courtesy of the shower.

zero comments

i have been lonely. very lonely. not very, so recently, but i have been. read something in a book the other day: a woman looks at her answering machine to see if there are any messages. there's a big red zero. she presses play anyway.

i have been that lonely.

and it strikes me that, if several years ago, i had looked at this thing of mine and seen '0 comments', i might have cried. the kind of crying that gets the tears smeared all over your face, and you try to take a huge breath in through your nose, but you find that your nostrils are completely blocked. the kind of crying that always makes my forearms feel empty. and i would keep checking and checking, obsessively, many more times than the already pretty obsessive once an hour.

but. i don't think i care now. is anyone reading this? hello? maybe i would have once thought, it's like being the invisible man. but NOW i think, it's like...being the invisible man. whereas before i might have though, oh, poor invisible man, woe is him! no one can see him, no one loves him, he can't even collect himself a houseful of cats and become a crazy cat lady, because the cats would be afaid of him, and he's not a lady. but now i am more inclined to think, oh, the joy of the invisible man! since no one can see him, he can sneer derisively! he can stick out his tongue at ugly children and mean people! he can leer suggestively! he may never get seen, but he will never get laughed at. he will never get caught.

i don't like cats anyway.

they're makin' a film about midgets

the only real downside of the film 'in bruges' was the mentally deranged lady who sat next to me, picking her nose, muttering non-stop, occasionally hurling obscenities and come-ons to the actors on the screen, and generally smelling like the devil himself.
brendan gleeson is a big fat fuck, and that's his charm. he's a bit colm meaney these days though, and by that i mean he's in every single movie that comes out of ireland. i have to say that the idea of a sweet, gentle, cultured hitman is more than a bit tired, but i put that aside for brendan.

colin farrell's eyebrows served their usual purpose. i think he gets bad reviews too often. obviously, he's been in some real shit. but, in 'tigerland' especially, he can actually move beyond the puppy dog eyes. his character in this film is a few points up in intelligence from the one in 'intermission', which i think helps. he's good at kind of dumb, but if he's playing too dumb he turns into a caricature.

ralph fiennes...didn't show up till late in the film. and his voice on the phone during the early parts of the film sounded not a bit like him. he's always scary good as a bad guy ('schindler's list', obviously) although i think some colored contacts would work wonders. bad guys don't have such pretty eyes.

the script was pretty delightful, especially several throwaway comments by farrell's character of such ridiculous impropriety (my favorite is about a retarded black girl on a see-saw) that the entire audience (my mad seatmate included) seemed to cough nervously and wait for someone else to say something. martin mcdonagh proves that he can pen a good screenplay without the classic playwright problem of coming off as too stagey.

bruges is a lovely city. i don't know why farrell's character finds it so vile. themes of hell and death and purgatory blend in nicely with a healthy dose of hieronymous bosch, which sadly turns a bit heavy-handed at the end. there's a gorgeous, if highly unlikely chase scene through the wet moonlit streets that made me feel like booking a ticket for belgium (which is probably the first time that phrase has been said). well. i suppose it's as good a place as any for an existential dilemma.

several bit players are memorable, especially a bad-tempered canadian tourist played by the little bald guy who was on 'law and order' for years. and ciaran hinds is far too brief as a doomed priest.

one thing...not that this bothered me, but i can see how it might...there are several scenes of intense violence towards the end. the black jollity of most of the movie is of such a chatty, kickabout nature, that when things start exploding (heads, big fat fucks) it's a bit shocking.

all in all...the film makes no grand statements, and it doesn't really do anything that hasn't been done before. but the quirky juxtaposition of disgruntled characters amid 'fary-tale' bruges seems somehow really fresh.

and it always helps to have a midget.

now we are six.

why couldn't i have enjoyed being six when i actually WAS six? why do i hate things that are happening until they are over and then i cry because they're gone? it would be nice to be able to actually live in the past, and then the present would be the future, and the future would be...the WAY future, like when you're little and you call it the 'way back' in the car. i wish that i lived in a present where i could still ride in the way back. now my legs would get all crampy and i'd probably get carsick.

i always loved the 'choose your own adventure' books. but i never read them the way you were supposed to. i was a big cheat. i would see what happened with either choice, and sometimes i would go a few choices farther, if i wasn't convinced. sometimes it was easiest just to start at the ending and work your way back, like in mazes they put in kids activity books. backwards is so much easier than forwards.

maybe the reason it is all so difficult is this...you can never completely know anyone. you can never know their every thought. you can never know every memory they have. you can't see into their dreams at night. you'll never really know what they think of your shiny blue shoes or your new haircut. like in movies, when they have the camera acting as someone's 'eyes', and they make it look 'realistic' by putting glasses around the lens or something. you know it's not quite right. it just comes off pretentious and cheesy and fake.

maybe i shouldn't get so disappointed with people. i too often expect that they truly know how i feel, that they feel things in the same way that i do. i am constantly taken aback by friends who...suddenly reveal how very different they are. sometimes it's okay, sometimes it's not. maybe the best thing to do is just cut your losses and move on.

honestly. you know? just...honestly.

i've come to a conclusion....i don't like computers. sure, they're nice when they're new and working correctly, and i'm very grateful that my ancient iBook (her name is iRene) consents to keep playing dvds for me. and gee, isn't email handy? (truth be told, i prefer letters. i like to hold something in my hand, something actually written by putting pen to paper. it's no fun to put an email printout under your pillow for sweet dreams.) but the internet is...well, isn't it all just a bit much? i actually don't want to be in constant communication with every single person i know. that's why i moved away from home. i'm not even all that keen on the telephone. i had a myspace page, but then i remembered that i'm in my late twenties. i have a facebook page, but i only got it so i could talk with a friend in ireland. what are all of those 'applications' for? none of them have any place in real life. i don't want my zombie chump to bite my friends. i don't want a virtual bottle of chocolate syrup. i don't want to play scrabble with you, or see what you wrote on my wall, or compare our knowledge of 'shawshank redemption', which i thought was a lousy film anyway. i mean, if you were sitting with someone, face to face, you would never -- okay, you could play scrabble. i concede that point. but would you draw pictures for each other? would you pinch or poke each other? would you endlessly challenge each other's accumulated movie lore?

of course not.

so why are we doing it?

what makes people think, that because they spot your picture, read your profile, and send you a friend invitation, you have ANY inclination to accept? it would be like some randomer coming up to you on the street in the middle of the day and saying, 'i like you let's be friends tell me your secrets lol.' to be honest, that may be the thing i hate most about the internet. the spawning of 'lol.' i make it a point to try and avoid contact with anyone who knowingly uses that and is over the age of fourteen.


maybe i'm not taking it all seriously enough. there are people who, when i log in because i've been invited to yet another pointless non-existent group, change their 'status' like most people change underwear. so-and-so likes blue today. so-and-so keeps watching 'the hills.' so-and-so is so incredibly devoted to chronicling every moment that it boggles my mind. maybe i, too, would be happier if i did this. maybe i should accept that group invitation. there are currently 32,248 for 'chocolate=love!' but they can't compete with the 155,720 over at 'kids who hid in department store clothing racks while their mom was shopping.'

i'm sorry, but...give me a fucking break. do they all get excited when they meet other group members in person? do they have weekly chapter meetings?

maybe i'll start my own group.

i'll call it 'omygod how rad is it to have brown eyes?!'

lol.