Adventures in Eavesdropping

Last night over a lovely dinner I was surrounded by two tables. Table #1? Spoiled college co-eds talking about the apartments their dads had bought for them, their amenities, the first time buyer tax break "daddy" was getting for listing daughter as the owner. I almost puked in my pork-heavy kimchi.

Table 2? An excessively emotional set of paramours practically breaking up. "What if I said I wanted the last dumpling?" she inquired. "Would you say, 'I want you to have it, too,' or would you stand up for yourself and say 'Well I'd like to eat it.'" That's a real excerpt. Puking pork turned into wincing and cringing, mixing with loud sighing to combat the collegiate cocktail hour at decibel 10. "So I had sex with Adam's friend and he was like 'did you do that just because you can,' and I said YEAH, DUH." Another real excerpt.

I wish I hadn't overheard them. But I couldn't stop listening. What brand of elyptical DOES her TriBeCa loft have? And, my god, how DID he feel when she discussed their relationship in the past tense? But I wanted to stop. I wanted nothing more than to enjoy a delicious date with my honey, with whom I happily rent a modest appartment. In the present tense. Anyone know how to turn off the eavesdropping ears?

This morning, it got worse. Equipped with an iPhone now, I felt I'd be able to mind my Ps and Qs through the commute. No such luck. A young woman with a new baby sat next to me. Her husband hovered above, talking about all the great opportunities for Navy divers. "See, if there's a plane crash, I'd be the first team deployed. We save people. We look for down pilots immediately, when there's a chance to save them." Minutes later the conversation turned into how he felt about the job interview he just had. At a restaurant. Unsure of where she'd be living with her baby, or what kind of income her husband would be able to produce, the woman looked terrified. And I felt for her. Not the feeling you get when overhearing gossip. But the feeling of knowing someone, and knowing their struggles. Again, I wished I hadn't heard.

After exiting the train and abandoning the headphones (for walking safety, of course) I passed by a couple of down-and-out looking fellows having the following exchange:
guy 1: Well you're not behind on payments or anything are you?
guy 2, as if to say of course, how could you ask that?: Yeah man. I owe for February and now March, too!

When times get hard, people talk. Maybe they need to use a friend as a sounding board, or they know misery loves company. The problem is listening in to strangers' convos now isn't an appealing glimpse into a different life, but a collection of gut-wrenching, sad-sack tales. Too real, too widespread and too close to home to ignore. I'm starting to think this eavesdropping issue is no longer nosiness, but coming face to face with where we all stand. Which, apparently, is a very precarious place.

I Live in the Best Borough

I don't really have a blog to write about this, I just want to share this awesome article about Brooklyn's changing demographic, and the delicious artisenal food that follows.

A financier-cum-chocolatier says in the story, “Brooklyn is always in beta testing.”

Please read and salivate.

Obama Says

This morning President Obama told a crowd of Marines at Camp Lejune, NC that he's ending the war in Iraq. For serious.

“Let me say this as plainly as I can," he was quoted in Peter Baker's NYT story, "by August 31, 2010, our combat mission in Iraq will end.”

That's really awesome, but I have to say I get a little nerviosa when presidents make definitive claims like that. Call me a scaredy-cat, but I still get shivers down my short spine thinking about the ol' "Mission Accomplished" fiasco. "War will end" is not that far off.

Of course I still have faith in President Obama but, let's be honest, he was handed a giant shit-pile and no pooper scooper. Could anyone actually clean it up in that specified chunk of time? Even if he DOES make drastic strokes towards withdrawal of the troops, if the war is not completely dunzo by August 2010, he'll be called a failure.

Do you think the President is promising the moon, to just look like a really great astronaut? Or do we think he's wearing space pants (cuz he's outta this world)?

What? I don't get it either.

Obama says sit down.

[ed. note: given the soldiers' faces in the photo pasted above that accompanied the New York Times story (Doug Mills), they're definitely saying hm.]

Wow I'm a Hater

Sitting on the train last night, a tall, posey guy in nice jeans was leaning his jutted pelvis too close to my face (to achieve maximum posure). He was also canoodling his teeeny, skinny girlfriend whose royal-blue legging-clad legs were swimming in her tall, slouchy boots. With dissheveled, stringy hair she looked like a drama geek that grew up to be "hot" according to hipsters. I note a pair of wedding bands. More canoodling. More crotches close to my face. More posing.

I think, "I bet SHE has an iPhone. Bitch...

Yeah, but she also has an eating disorder and a gay husband."


That was, literally, word-for-word my thought process. What is WRONG with me?

This is real.

The corn refiners of america approve this message: high fructose corn syrup is GREAT.

Apparently people started being too "health conscious" and "reading nutrition facts" and the corn refineries (read: places that remove nutritional value from our corn surplus so it can be liquified and used as a sweetener in... EVERYTHING) are struggling.

If you haven't been lucky enough to catch their commercials, here's a link to the "branding site" which, incidently is called sweet surprise dot com. A sweet surprise, indeed.

Well, corn refineries, I would just like you to know that I'm trumpeting your cause: I just ate fritos and canned soup for lunch. And I'd like to think I'm keeping your operations open and layoff-free with my love of gummy candies alone.

You're welcome.

Laura is twitterpated.

I love the word twitterpated.

It means all lovestruck, googly-eyed and is a slightly (really, only slightly) less embarrassingly girly way to admit to being a smitten kitten. I've always loved this word. One could say I'm twitterpated with "twitterpated," but then one might be overdoing the use of the word, and I hate redundance. Unfortunately something's been putting my use of this fave word on pause; FUCKING TWITTER.

OK. I get that I wasn't on board with facebook when it first came out, but that's because I was in college and pretty annoyed with everyone in all of my classes. So I didn't want to join their "groups" and have them all in my photo-essayed life. I was on myspace. I was a party girl with flashy slideshows and emoticons and theme songs to my daily collegiate angst. What fun.

Now I've grown up, gotten over murdock's spyspace and become healthily obsessed with facebook. It's fine. Whenever I feel like it, I can update my status to say something about how stressed I am at work, or how I just realized that Nesquik spells kiuqnes backwards which means nothing, but it's still delicious. I'm OK with people occasionally having a look into my life, and am realistic about how much (little) they will care. I know that when I update my status, it will show up for a shining 15 seconds on everyone's home page, and in my 15 seconds, friends may notice what my status is, and they may even click through to my profile and respond (ugh, I wish).

What I'm not, though, is so narcissistic about my causes, my hobbies, my quipy third person descriptors, that I think these "friends" want to know what I'm doing/saying/thinking every second of the day. This is also why I so loosely maintain this blog, and why it's pretty much just ranty streams of consciousness aimed at distracting and entertaining myself only. Thanks, self. Keep up the good work.

So I'm you-know-what-ed with facebook. I can't even say it because that word I love to use to sum up love is on hold because its first half (twitter, are you keeping up?) is so annoying; in part for it's sudden proliferation, and part for how invasive it will become as a direct result of this spread. Mainly it's annoying because people are annoying, especially when they think everyone else wants to know what they think all the time.

With that, I present a makeyasayhm double whammy:
1. Should I maybe not have a blog?
(My take: So what, I'm a gigantic hypocrite. Back off.)
2. In what childhood-scarring Disney movie did my fave-o word originate?
('cause I know you won't wiki it: BAMBI!)

Leather and Lace

Ok, there's no leather. But I'm OB-sessed (like an all natural tampon) with these cast lace rings. I don't know if this is some weird conflict of interest, but I wrote about these joinks on julib.com a while back. I just can't get enough. I go to Masami Kelly's website like I'm visiting my husband in jail. Cast lace rings still online? Been shanked by an adversary? Phew. Seeya next week, shiny, pretty things.

It would be one thing if I had designs on buying one. But after consorting with the artist, and finding the seventy-or-so-dollar pricetag, well, it's probably not possible. As you know from my jaunts to dunkin' donuts, I neither have the funds, nor willpower, to save up for anything valuable. And if I did, I'd blow my wad on an iPhone in two shakes of Milkyway Hot Chocolate.

Jealousy doesn't look good on anyone, and envy's one of the seven deadly sins. But, come on. Who am I hurting by just plain WANTING SHIT? And if it's the obvious answer (noone but myself) do you think another genius bailout--wherein checks are sent to restraint-lacking shoppers--is in the works so I can put myself out of my misery?

Le sigh. I just looked at the rings again.