Nomad New York

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 05:01:00 +0000

View all Imogen Heap tour dates

Vynyl albums on 30th St

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 20:01:00 +0000

A remnant of days past

Election Guide

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 19:57:00 +0000

This is the election guide that I got for the New York City primary.

Interesting Rental News

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:27:00 +0000

Good news if you have a job! The only likely move that I'll be making is into a metaphorical cardboard box along with the rest of the unemployed in this city...

A proud moment for the Pittsburg P.D.

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 16:43:00 +0000

How they handle it in the U.K.

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 23:21:00 +0000

Link

LONDON — A police officer accused of striking a woman at a protest against the G20 summit in London in April is likely to be charged with assault, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said Monday.

London police sergeant Delroy Smellie is scheduled to appear at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court in central London on November 16 in connection with the alleged assault of 35-year-old Nicola Fisher.

The incident took place as Fisher headed to a vigil for Ian Tomlinson, who collapsed and died during the previous day’s G20 demonstrations shortly after being hit by police.

That officer was subsequently suspended and questioned on suspicion of manslaughter.

“The Crown Prosecution Service has decided that there is sufficient evidence to charge Police Sergeant Delroy (Tony) Smellie with the offence of assault by the beating of Nicola Fisher on April 2, 2009, at a demonstration in the City of London,” a statement from the service said.

The CPS said it had reviewed a file of evidence provided by the police watchdog, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, following their investigation into Fisher’s allegation, and a court summons had been issued.

The Metropolitan Police had already suspended Smellie pending the probe and the force said Monday that it would be “completely inappropriate” to comment further on the case.

Tomlinson’s death prompted widespread criticism of the police and sparked a review of how forces handle demonstrations.

Things that freak me out, Part I

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 15:46:00 +0000

Cow-Molesting Cop Gets Off

The judge in the case, James J. Morley, just before going home and beginning an inevitable slide into full-blown alcoholism, ruled that there was no way to tell if the cows Melia was molesting were in fact being "tormented." Yes, you heard that correctly. Who's to say they didn't like it?

"If the cow had the cognitive ability to form thought and speak, would it say, 'Where's the milk? I'm not getting any milk,'" Judge Morley explained, instantly winning the award for the most disturbing thing anyone's said ever.

Prosecutors, on the other hand, argue that Melia's actions were a "crime against nature."

F15 revisited

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 17:05:00 +0000

I wrote this on Feb 16th/17th, 2002 when I was very, very angry. Please forgive any grammatical errors.

Feb 16th:

Even journalists were arrested and injured during this fiasco.

What did I learn yesterday (Feb 15th)? Don't take small children to a peaceful peace rally in New York. I did not take my big children and I'm glad.

Stay as far away from the horses as you can.

Don't take your elderly parents for god's sakes!

Don't bring your video camera. I've changed my mind about this one. My brother has convinced me that I should - see the comments link at the top of this side of the page. Here are some tips (dead link) on videotaping police brutality at demonstrations. Read this even if you don't have a video camera. It's very enlightening regarding techniques used by Police Officers.

Dress very warmly in case you get arrested and are forced to sit for hours in the cold weather waiting to be processed. You may not want to drink much unless you have a strong bladder.

Remember this if the bombs do begin to drop and you try to make your way to Union Square in New York. Do it anyway, but be aware that you probably will not be able to get there.

I took lots of photo's. Most of them are of the Police. I did not take my video camera. Good thing. Many of those arrested happened to have video cameras. People with video cameras have a tendency to step into the street in order to film something. This was illegal. The only argument that I got into was with a police officer when I stepped into the street to photograph the thugs on horses.

We arrived at 3rd & 42nd shortly after 1:00 and were directed to walk north. Around the area of 51st - 53rd street, large groups of protestors from two directions converged trying to reach the rally. This included people walking from Grand Central Station and people walking from the station on Lexington which was eventually shut down. (Video of the resulting crowd here) A large number of people were corralled at Times Square. A count of 100,000 people? That may be the number that actually made it to 1st Avenue. If you count those on 2nd Avenue, 3rd Avenue and Lexington Avenue, and the large number of protestors attempting to make their way to the East side, a count of 400,000 or twice that many is more likely. It's hard to tell because we were kept apart .

Most of us were walking North, though the Police Department says that we "refused to walk North". Several people tried to go towards second Avenue. There were so many of us that we ended up in the street in spite of the fact that we were not allowed to march. We could barely move forward, but it was a friendly, non-violent and happy crowd shouting "Whose streets? Our Streets".

This didn't last. First, the police cleared the block between 51st and 52nd by creating "blue" barriers at 51st street and 53rd street using officers wearing riot gear. I assume that this is where the mounted police were able to get into the crowd. We were on the South East corner of 53rd St. We had already moved with my friend's two elderly parents to the sidewalk when the mounted police came through the crowd and forced the crowd onto the sidewalk. Naturally, there was not room for all of us on the sidewalk, but they kept pushing us back. The peaceful demonstration turned violent. Some people tried to push through the barriers and were arrested. People were trampled. We were being crushed. There were children there. Litlle stroller sized children. There were elderly people there. I'm not usually a vocal person, but I found myself screaming at them that there were children there (you can hear me in this video). We started to yell "Shame on you" to them (this is the part of the incident that the papers seemed to focus on).

The regular police officers (the ones not wearing riot gear or riding a horse) seemed as confused as we were. We were not allowed to move down the empty side street at first. I assume that they "unpenned" each block of "unruly animals" one by one in order to control the crowd. By the time we got out we were told to go down to 2nd Avenue, the avenue had already been cleared. My Mother, who had been on 56th Street was already on the Staten Island ferry going home.

Many protesters stayed behind, only to be attacked by thugs on horses again. I think the police moved to Lexington Avenue next and I believe that this is where many of the 300+ arrests occurred but there have been NO NEWS REPORTS of the non-violent sit-down demonstration that took place there. I thought that I heard frantic reports on WBAI from people on Lexington Avenue who were having the exact same experience that we had just emerged from (and boy were we all angry).

I also heard that they had to block off Times Square and corral people who were attempting to gather there. The subways had been shut down and anyone listening to WBAI knew that they were not going to make it to the rally.

When I walked up 42nd street, I found that they had blocked off 5th Avenue at the public library to keep people from going downtown, I presumed that this was to keep people from going towards Union Square where people traditionally gather. Reading further accounts, I have learned that not only were several arrests made at the library as people tried to get downtown, but the famous Bush head was crushed and destroyed by the police.

When I reached Times Square, it was indeed still completely shut down to people, again I presume to keep people from gathering together after the rally. There, once again, were our heroes - the mounted police, ready to protect us from ourselves.

As I entered the Port Authority I passed a snake march. The police were ignoring them at the time. I wonder how far they got?

Welcome to New York, all of you bus-loads and train-loads of people who have come to demonstrate. We hope that you did not bring your children or your elderly parents. We will do everything within our power to keep you from being able to gather together and express your solidarity.

Feb 17, 2003

Why use mounted police?

This incident was discussed on the Brian Lehrer on WNYC this morning at 10:00. I slept through it

It's been an interesting day. After laboring for the past 24 hours to get these links together (there are lots more, but I don't have any more energy today), it was actually suggested to me on a message board that all of this fuss was about demonstrators being angry about not being able to march (see the comments link at the very top of this side of the page to read some of this "discussion").

After pondering on that possibility, I started thinking about the MANY demonstrations (marches and rallys) that I have attended in Washington D.C. and in New York City over the years that I have been living on the East Coast (since 1969). Not once have I walked away enraged until this past Saturday. Not once have I seen an event even slightly bungled or mismanaged as this one was. Not once before have I seen police attack a CHILD or trample elderly people (or any people) with horses.

During my years in New York I witnessed many acts of brutality by police. When you are not there, it is easy to say "Oh, he must have done something to deserve it". I saw people attacked on Saturday for no reason at all except that they could not get onto the sidewalk due to the size of the crowd when the police told them to.

Yes, there were some anarchists there but they did not make up the majority of the terror struck crowd at 53rd and 3rd. There were people with babies and small children. There were elderly people. There were people in wheel chairs. There were innocent people walking home from Grand Central with their suitcases who got caught up in the melee. Most of these people came to the East Side of New York for the sole purpose of ATTENDING A RALLY, not to disrupt traffic or to disturb the neighborhood or to have an illegal march. I'm totally familiar with having my neighborhood disrupted by large crowds of people thanks to the Halloween parade held yearly in Greenwich Village where I spent most of my youth.

I also saw complaints about the cost to the city of the police action. There were suggestions that the organizers of the event be charged for this. The city decided how many police officers would be deployed, not the organizers.

In the meantime, I'v e been studying up on crowd control methods by reading some of the classroom manuals used to train police officers. As far as I can tell, there are at least two things that this group did wrong. First, they failed to inform us of what was expected of us and instead attacked us without warning. Secondly, they failed to provide a way for the crowd to walk away for around half an hour, which was something that many people attempted to do.

I frankly don't have any more time to argue with idiots because they will be determined to believe what they want to believe, regardless of how much videotape I am prepared to show them of actual incidents of police brutality and no matter how hard I try to convince them that most of us went there with the sole purpose of attending a rally. I am a patriotic, law abiding citizen of the United States. What happened in New York on Feb 15th is a disgrace. We can not allow this to continue.

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 16:49:00 +0000

To this day, I am still immensely pissed off over my own experience at F15 and the RNC so I can't even write much about this without spewing venom.

We watch what happens in Iran with disgust, we cheer on the students there but we ignore what happens in our own country, we even justify it. Here is a video of students being attacked in Pittsburg.

Self Defense vs. Communication

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 23:20:00 +0000

I had a traumatic experience when I was in my early 20's. My ex-boyfriend and some former friends locked me into a very close friend's store essentially kidnapping me. They accused me of stealing money from the store. I defended myself and became so upset that I started crying. This emotional display further convinced them that I was guilty. Eventually, I lied and said that I had stolen the money and it was only then that they allowed me out of the store. I went to the police (I did not press charges) and I never spoke to any of them again.

Defending myself just made things worse, it was pointless. I've learned this lesson over and over. I learned my lesson big time after my divorce. My ex husbands second wife accused me of everything bad in the world including the bad weather. I saw her twice and barely exchanged more than a few sentences in person with her for 8 years. I knew her intimately though. She wrote and called my voice mail frequently, only once or twice communicating with me directly if she happened to pick up the phone, screaming at me in the presence of my children. My ex husband frequently followed up these screeds on his own with explanations as to how I was wrong and suggestions that I "talk" to her. I would try to defend myself but this just encouraged them. Because we had children, I had to train myself to avoid them when I could and if I couldn't, to ignore anything that had nothing to do with the children and their well-being. Luckily his taste in women improved dramatically after that.

I developed a serious antipathy to drama (both mine and anyone else's) over the years and tend to withdraw from situations that have even the slightest whiff of it. Additionally, my ability to sit and be with someone else's feelings completely flies out of the window when I feel like I'm on the defense. This is not at complete odds with a very sensitive, very aware child who grew up in a house where the ability to be stoic was valued. I love my family, so this is not an indictment of them. I picked up on so much that was never discussed. I learned denial very early. I learned to pretend not to notice uncomfortable things and most importantly that it was bad to express feelings that would make other people uncomfortable. The antipathy was bred into me against my own nature, to the point of self revulsion when I was the one causing the drama.

Unlike warriors, snipers don't engage in direct battle, the only goal is to hit a target and not to be one.

I suck at playing games. I've tried. While I withdraw from conflict, I sometimes become an opposing magnet. I still want to make things right and to fix them, as though I actually have the power to do so (I don't). Even worse, like my ex's second wife, I am rarely able to do this directly so that people can talk back to me. How can you shut people out and expect them to listen to you? How can they respond? Trying to "fix" things is manipulative even when you think that you have the best of motives. This is particularly true if you're the only one who gets to talk. "Fixing things" involves a level of dishonesty because in trying to manipulate things to your satisfaction you frequently have to hold things back. Trying to manipulate things to "set them right" sometimes involves blaming people without taking responsibility for your own stuff, trying to make them see how they are wrong and putting them on the defense.This is game playing. If you can't talk honestly about what you think and feel and hear to someone else, that's LYING. Unless you are a real expert, which I am not, trying to fix things to your own satisfaction just creates drama. I've found myself in a vicious cycle where I was avoiding the very drama and conflict that I had created, only to create more drama and conflict. The cycle didn't stop until I did.

Ultimately, I've felt that the only option besides this kind of indirect, cowardly battle is to withdraw if you don't have the courage to be a warrior. More than once, I have gone so far as to ruthlessly eliminate people from my life.

My personal goals (sometimes achieved, sometimes not) these past couple of years have been A) Not to lie, not little unimportant lies, not serious untruths and not the lies that we tell to protect ourselves emotionally, B) Not to defend myself, C) Not to manipulate or play games. I am now adding D) Communicate with clarity. I recently found myself in a situation where I felt that I had been so badly misunderstood that I was completely speechless. While my intent to be fully present was genuine, I was completely unable to find the words that would not only be honest but would not be defensive. I still can't find the words and I probably never will. At that first whif of drama, I thought that I wanted to just let go and to do it kindly. I didn't want to deal with it then and to be honest, in this situation I know that I probably never will. What I ended up doing was give up and I did it unkindly.

I am remarkably lucky in so many ways. I have so many very beloved and treasured people in my life. I hope that I never again fail to let them know how much I cherish them. I'm hyper-aware of where I'm falling short. I have been working very hard on this and I think that I'm doing well in spite of this recent incident. It was educational and I am grateful for it. All I can do is stay present in a situation like this in the future and be more graceful about it.

A Visit From the FBI

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 01:24:00 +0000

My angry alcoholic boyfriend was in court the day that the FBI knocked on my door. He was on probation. He had been arrested for gun possession after he waved his gun around in his former employers face when he was drunk. Every now and then, he had to go back to court. In the meantime he lived in a domestic environment that his probation officer approved of and which helped to keep him out of jail.

I on the other hand, was in college studying to be an accountant. I had a cheap, Section 8 rent controlled apartment in Chelsea where I lived with the above mentioned probation approved boyfriend. I had a job working for an answering service and had just started a second job working for a hip restaurant in midtown as a bookkeeper.

I had offered myself up to this restaurant at an outrageously low rate, hoping to be paid off of the books. When I told him my rate, my new employer’s eyes lit up. “I am hiring you as a contractor and I am going to have to withhold social security”. I was naïve enough and young enough to accept it. I just needed a job and figured that I would do it until something else came up. At one point, my boyfriend was hired to cart trash for them during a garbage strike. He would throw the bags of garbage into his station wagon and then dump them onto another corner. He was paid off of the books.

The restaurant was very hip. I was extremely un-hip. The restaurant was a location for people with money to have a meal before they hit the clubs. It was somewhere near Times Square and was owned by two partners; the asshole and another dude who was fueled by coffee and cocaine, spoke really fast and bounced around the restaurant socializing. I spent a couple of very uncomfortable days working in the office which was occupied by some very hip people who sniffed coke off of the desk and ignored me completely. I preferred to work from home.

When the FBI showed up, I let them in. Mostly out curiosity. I kept the restaurant books in my tiny apartment. The restaurant did not use a computer and pre-historic accounting books were huge. They took up a great deal of space in my tiny living room.

I casually mentioned that I was doing bookkeeping as I moved the books off of the tiny couch so that they could sit down. They told me that they already know about my job. Once we were all seated, they showed me some pictures of several people and asked me if I recognized any of them. I didn’t particularly recognize any of the people in the photographs but they did look familiar. “I may have seen some of them on TV”, I offered to the agents. The background of the photographs looked a bit like the background of Patty Hearst's famous SLA photograph and one of the photos might even have been of Patty Hearst. They laughed and thanked me, still declining to tell me why there were there and left without incident. I never saw or heard from the FBI again.

The next day, I got a phone call from my asshole employer at the restaurant. “I’ve hired someone more experienced to do the books”, he told me. “I’m sending a messenger over to pick up them up” I was a little surprised by the suddenness of it but not particularly upset. It was a horrible job. I packed up the books and gave them to the delivery person who came to get them.

A few days after the books were picked up, I got another call from my former employer. He wanted, he said, to know where a specific receipt was. I didn’t have it. It seemed very odd that he should make such a big deal about a receipt.

I moved on from the probation approved boyfriend once he was off of probation and free to commit crimes again. A couple of years later, I caught a glimpse of a story about a woman being arrested and it all clicked into place. She looked like me, except that she was much older. My sleazy, thieving employer and his coke addled partner had mistaken me for a wanted fugitive and had turned me into the FBI for the reward. This was why he suddenly needed his books and the follow up phone call was clearly an attempt to ascertain if I had been arrested.

I never received an official accounting for the social security that the restaurant “withheld”. Fortunately, my next employer was an accountant who was outraged by my story. I had check stubs where the amount "withheld" had been very clearly recorded. “Write a letter to the IRS”, he instructed me, “send it in with your tax return. They will take care of it”. I don’t know what happened after that, but I can guess that they got a visit from the IRS. I bet that it sucked.

Hot fun in the city. (For Vaginal Use Only)

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:25:00 +0000

I love being back in the city.

The area right around the subway station at 28th and Park, where you can find a McDonald's and a Duane Reade is prime central for street vendors, beggars and thieving bums. I frequently see the thieving bums selling stolen items near this corner. Yesterday a man chased a thieving bum out the front door of Duane Reade and grabbed back a shopping bag containing items that he had just purchased. The victim returned to the store without a word. The bum and I looked at each other and walked off in opposite directions.

The Duane Reade itself is pleasant except for the pharmacy section which I utilized for the first time today. I went to pick up my prescription and was treated to a sullen and rude clerk. Out of curiosity I glanced at her name-tag which said "For Vaginal Use Only". It was appropriate.

The douche bags are out in full force on these fine summer evenings! Two weeks ago, I came home on a Sunday morning at 3 AM to find a drunken white guy passed out in the front door. I had to step over him. This Sunday I woke up to vomit on the exact same steps. I took a picture of it, but I'll spare you. Nobody cleaned up. Luckily it rains allot here.

This Week in General Stupidity

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 18:52:00 +0000

The big story this week is the sad story of a group of day camp kids evicted from a private pool club in Philly. The young children were, by all accounts well behaved but…well (insert whisper here) Black and this disturbed some of the patrons and a lifeguard who allegedly told the camp that minorities are not allowed at the club. A later explanation included the unfortunate comment that the presence of the children at the pool would "Change the complexion" of the club. They broke the law! While most of the comments on Philadelphia’s MSNBC site were rightly in support of the children, the initial reaction to this story was full of ironic racist screeds

NJ- Pools says:

Maybe if ya'll people start acting normal like everyone else then this wouldn't be a problem. It's your own fault. Do you ever see Black Princetons?

Whatever says:

if you want people opinins of blacks to change. then you should change how you behave. get and education and take respocibility for your actions

Bwa ha ha! If you are not stupid, you can sign this petition by clicking here:

New York Prep? It's the Diversity, Damn it!

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 21:07:00 +0000

I haven't seen New York Prep yet, but I suspect that a show about kids who attend public schools like City As School would be more interesting and would better reflect our city. This is not because they are really different from prep school kids. As a prep school kid, albeit a scholarship prep school kid who was not invited to the Hamptons nor particularly welcome there, I can assure you that they aren't really very different.

While these shows do counter the common belief by right wing uneducated conservatives that everyone in New York is on welfare, perhaps they reflect badly on New York City. Public school kids, particularly kids who attend a school like City-As school would be more of a real reflection of New York City. Why not show the unique challenges that teenagers and young people of different backgrounds face in this city?

Where, oh where is the diversity? Are there no Black people who are Real New York Housewives or who attend prep schools in New York?

So, go to a school like City-As where you will find rich kids, poor kids, homeless kids, home alone kids, and kids of different ethnic backgrounds (hello, this is NEW YORK for crying out loud!) gay, straight, trans-gendered...I could go on and on but you get the point.

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 23:27:00 +0000

I'm un-retiring this blog. It turns out that you can't actually choose to be a nomad or not a nomad. Who knew?

Why I'm really posting.
For my only real follower: You are a far better blogger than I am, but you knew that already. You may not get to read this for a while, but I love you {{{dude}}}. I am thinking about you and your wife and your kids. I'll see you somewhere at the end of that line.

Serious Thought!!!

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 00:53:00 +0000

~~I am retiring this blog. The title "Nomad New York" became too much of a self-fulfilling prophecy!!!~~

While I was not posting on my blog, I delightfully prepared to move out of my slummy apartment in the South Slope and found a beautiful apartment in Kips Bay (Somewhere on the border of Murray Hill and Gramercy, aka Curry Hill). I would be living on my own for the first time...ever. I gathered my movers and my kids and we all lugged my stuff into my new home, a beautiful duplex apartment where I sit now. I fantasized about my life here and the hobbies that I would take up and the new life that I would begin.

I knew, after one night here, that I was in trouble. As one real estate agent said, "Some of those great deals are not really such great deals". This is a guy that I've called twice in order to inquire about listings who declined to show me anything. He practically hang up on me both times. Odd. Believe me, in this market, it's very odd. Maybe it's just his hobby.

On my first night in my gorgeous apartment, I was assaulted by a constant mechanical noise in the bathroom and in the bedroom! When my Mother came to visit my new home the next day, I was barely coherent with lack of sleep. We called the Super who came over and explained that the pipes were vibrating due to the electric water pump. My son came over later in the day, dismissing my concerns and suggested that I get a "large fan". I called the landlord the next day thinking, foolishly, that there was a problem and that we could fix it. He told me that the pump was supposed to be off at night, that he had a complaint about the noise at night before. 4 days later when I finally reached him again, he explained to me, hysterical woman on the other end of the phone, that it could not be fixed. Nobody, he said, had ever complained before! He had called the prior tenants and they had never noticed the sound that makes you think that you are inside of a vacuum cleaner. He offered me the opportunity to move out if we found another tenant. Meanwhile, my healthy life deteriorated - I started smoking again to cope with the stress. Valium might help, but I don't have any handy. I have been too exhausted to get to the gym. To sooth myself, I've started eating chocolate ice-cream for meals and I actually look forward to going to work! Mon deiu!

After fully documenting the condition of the apartment on videotape and going completely insane, I moved my cat to my brothers apartment. I then vacated the apartment on weeknights. I went to go stay with my Mother, who, while polite and not unwelcoming, clearly prefers to be on her own. On Saturday, I returned to my apartment where, due to some miracle, the noise that could not be fixed had somehow managed to cease to the point where it was barely tolerable along with some actual extended periods of silence. I even woke up at one point Saturday night while sleeping on my couch (When I am here, I do not sleep in the bedroom - I sleep in the quietest place in the apartment) because it was so quiet! Of course, this improvement came about just in time for an open house that was held today (Sunday). I (once again foolishly) thought that perhaps my landlord had realized that something could be done about the noise. Tonight, the noise, while a bit quieter, appears to be closer to it's usual constant 24 hour a day cycles between the loud creaky noise and then whining with no silence between them. I may be back at my Mothers apartment in no time.

Meantime, I have been wandering the neighborhood. I love the neighborhood but it doesn't feel like home yet. When I went to school here, this neighborhood was prostitute city in the evenings. Thankfully, they are long gone. The neighborhood is now dotted with hospitals, cute townhouses, College students, elderly people, the very poor, junkies, lots of Irish pubs that serve Irish breakfast, a strip of CLUBS, several Dunken Donuts, zillions of dry cleaners, the usual zillions of drug stores and banks and, surprisingly, quite a few grocery stores that have not yet been turned into drug stores. Most of them are called Gristides. These things are almost obsolete in Manhattan where large crowds tend to hit Whole Foods and Trader Joes. There are no bike lanes, but plenty of men delivering food weave in and out of the traffic and onto the sidewalks all day long.

In spite of Curry Hill, no one ethnic group has taken over the area. There are several charity shops here, many of which are on 23rd Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue. I wandered through all of them although there is nothing at all that I need except to get rid of stuff right now. There is a badly organized and chaotic Salvation Army next door to a clean and efficient Goodwill and two doors down there is the Opera store. They all have sale signs in the window. I overheard a clerk in the Opera store telling a customer that they will have to close if the economy continues to go down (and it will).

A little perspective is always in order when I start to feel sorry for myself.

Compared to here, poor people are invisible in Park Slope as is the economic downturn. Yeah, you get those clean looking and well spoken guys on 7th Avenue who hold doors open for you and make a living off of your change. Yeah, there is the Armory for homeless women but they are largely invisible except for some who are mentally ill and haunt Windsor Terrace along with the alcoholics and junkies who litter the Windsor Terrace sidewalks but that's not Park Slope. Entire Mexican families come out at night and take away your recycling in Park Slope, quietly and neatly. Homeless people sleep in the parks near my old apartment on the southern edge of the slope, but they are always are gone by the time that you head off to work as if somehow, they might offend you. The minority non home-owning working poor who once populated Park Slope have mostly relocated to White Plains or somewhere in Long Island from whence they make their long and expensive commute into New York for their shitty minimum wage jobs. The remaining home-owners scoff and scowl at the people who have taken over their neighborhood.

Back to Kips Bay. Even on the Lower East Side, which was once the armpit of hell, poverty is not quite this visible and in your face.

Here, the mostly male and addicted poor can be found slouched all over the neighborhood. They can be seen carting their bags of belongings up and down the street at all hours of the day and going through the refuse outside of a Gristides on garbage night examining the discarded food. Over the past week I have seen, in both Chelsea and Kips Bay, bent over exhausted homeless people who own 2 or three large carts or strollers full of junk and recyclables. They push one up the block and go back and get another one. It amazes me that nobody tries to steal them - I've seen walking homeless guys try to roll (take money or shoes) sleeping/passed out homeless guys on 14th Street and 6th Avenue, but carts are sacred.

Here in Murray Hill & Kips Bay, the VERY poor and the VERY down and out are visible and in your face calling you "rich" which makes you laugh but it's not really very funny. When shops close down in Park Slope, they are immediately replaced by more shops, here stores sit empty. The rents in Park Slope have barely budged. Here, and this is bad news for me in my current situation, apartments are sitting empty and many, many people are unemployed or about to be.

I'm lucky to have a job and I'm lucky to have a roof over my head, even though it's a noisy roof. I'm lucky to have my family who have gone out of their way to help me out in my admittedly not so bad situation. All I have to do to remind myself that it's not so bad is to walk outside or to read the news. It could always be worse. I'm going to just eat my chocolate ice-cream and look forward to the future. This too shall pass.

~~Adiue Nomad!~~

Lyrics to Homeless Brother :
I was walking by the graveyard, late last Friday night
I heard somebody yelling, it sounded like a fight
It was just a drunken hobo dancing circles in the night
Pouring whiskey on the headstones in the blue moonlight
So often have I wondered where these homeless brothers go
Down in some hidden valley where their sorrows cannot show,
Where the police cannot find them, where the wanted man can go
There's freedom when your walking, even though you're walking slow
Smash your bottle on the gravestone and live while you can
That homeless brother is my friend.

It's hard to be a pack rat, it's hard to be a 'bo
But living's so much harder where the heartless people go
Somewhere the dogs are barking and the children seem to know
That Jesus on the highway was a lost hobo
And they hear the holy silence of the temples in the hill
And they see the ragged tatters as another kind of frill
And they envy him the sunshine and they pity him the chill
And they're sad to do their living for some other kind of thrill
Smash your bottle on the gravestone and live while you can
That homeless brother is my friend.

Somewhere there was a woman, somewhere there was a child
Somewhere there was a cottage where the marigolds grew wild
But somewhere's just like nowhere when you leave it for a while
You'll find the broken-hearted when you're travelling jungle-style
Down the bowels of a broken land where numbers live like men
Where those who keep their senses have them taken back again
Where the night stick cracks with crazy rage, where madmen don't
pretend
Where wealth has no beginning and poverty no end
Smash your bottle on the gravestone and live while you can
That homeless brother is my friend.

The ghosts of highway royalty have vanished in the night
The Whitman wanderer walking t'ward a glowing inner light
The children have grown older and the cops have gripped us tight
There's no spot round the melting pot for free men in their flight
And you who live on promises and prosper as you please
The victim of your riches often dies of your disease
He can't hear the factory whistle, just the lonesome freight train's
wheeze
He's living on good fortune, he ain't dying on his knees
Smash your bottle on the gravestone and live while you can
That homeless brother is my friend.
That homeless brother is my friend.

Don McLean

Don't try this at home

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 19:18:00 +0000

We can look forward to all kinds of fixed wheel helmetless lunacy on our streets thanks to a new film that is about to come out.

Empire from Empire on Vimeo.

It's possible that we can also look forward to this:

And this:

Why is Joe Six-Pack afraid? Why am I?

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 13:28:00 +0000

I’ve spent the past week watching what has been going on at the Republican rallies. Barring the Bradley effect, I don’t think that McCain can win this race but something very ugly has reared its head in this country and it’s not going to go away.

What are we, those of us who are not Joe Six-Pack to make of the ugly racist and xenophobic events at McCain-Palin rallies over the last week? What is Joe so afraid of?

Joe is afraid that a Black man can succeed. Joe is afraid that not only can a Black man succeed, but that he can succeed far beyond any place that Joe can imagine succeeding himself. Joe will do anything to stop it.

This world is not uncharted territory for me. It is the Jim Crow south that my father grew up in, so I can tell you what I’m afraid of.

This is the place where people needed to point to the lack of black success as proof of black inferiority after prospering and successful black communities and businesses have been burned to the ground.

This is the place that only allows certain "acceptable" and unqualified African Americans or women like Sarah Palin to be appointed to positions of real power but where not much is expected from them. Conversely, this is the place that hires the most qualified woman or African American like Colin Powell, and then undermines them and sets them up for certain failure.

This is the place where my brother with his exotic Japanese middle name is not really American and where Hawaii is too exotic to be one of the 50 states. This is a place where my children, half English-Jewish, half mongrel are not real Americans. This is a place where a man can put up a sign in his yard calling Barack Obama "half breed muslin" and be proud of it. This is a place where black people are not supposed to be articulate and if they are, they are "elitists" and they are "uppity".

I'm not saying that we are on the edge of a holocaust or that we need to panic. I am saying that we can't afford to write off the rantings of Palin's followers or to dismiss these concerns as mere "hyperbole". I believe that we should to pay attention to history and be aware of the parallels to events in our own and in other countries. We need to remember the radio hate fueled catastrophe of Rwanda and the religious oppression of Afghanastan and understand what led up to these events. I hate to bring up the Nazi reference, I don't believe that my fellow Americans are "Nazi's" or that McCain is like Hitler but understanding the climate in Germany before the Holocaust is important. We should never forget the causes of these events. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.

I love this country, but I am afraid. I’m afraid that, as some have been known to tell me over the past 8 years, I am believed to be Un-American. I’m afraid that, because of (or in spite of) my education and any small success that I’ve achieved in my lifetime I will be forced into the metaphoric back of the bus, perhaps the way that women were in Afghanistan under the Taliban. I'm afraid that too many good people will close their eyes and pretend that it isn't happening. I'm afraid that Joe Six-Pack will sit in front of me thumping his bible, his sense of superiority will be restored and all will be right in his world again but that mine will be gone.

Need a break from POLITICS?

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 19:07:00 +0000

Rudy Veritis

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 21:59:00 +0000

This little blog has been largely overlooked by the MSM (link to NY Times article) but it's full of inside gossip about Rudy Giuliani and other political figures. I particularly enjoyed the story about John McSame in Vegas. The blog is written by former Giuliani aid Russell Harding who appears to have some time on his hands after being released from prison.

Some of the pieces I will post will be of interest mainly to New Yorkers. Some will be blockbusters. Knowing the tabloid press, a few in particular. Others may just be of historical interest because they shed more light on the eight years of Rudy Giuliani's Administration and of the mindset of the man. One piece offers some new history on a foreign policy matter.

I do not claim to be a good writer. In fact, you may think me a lousy one. But I am not out to win a Pulitzer. I will be trying merely to convey historical events accurately.

Celeb Magnet? Me?

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 02:04:00 +0000

I had a star studded week a couple of weeks ago. Ok, a two star studded week. A very friendly Matthew Modine hang out in my section at a Liberty Game. He was promoting bicycle for a day. I missed it, A) because I hate the South Street Seaport and B) because I was canvassing in Pennsylvania that day. He's the nicest movie star I've ever met. He's still adorable in a very white guy way but not as adorable as he was in "Full Metal Jacket". Research tells me that he is Mormon and that he has married for almost 30 freaking years.

The next day, leaving work in Chelsea, I made eye contact with "sultry", slow speaking soap star Micheal Easton from One Life To Live. I watched this show during the many years that I didn't have an employer for various reasons. I find Easton to be phenomenally unattractive, but apparently, I'm the only one. Yuck. Thanks to a couple of young men in front of me, I learned that men without girlfriends know him from some action show on HBO (Total Recall 2070).

OMG, OMG, OMFG. Gossip Girl set up for a couple of days right on my doorstep last week! I saw lots of stars and I don't know who they are. And look, filmlover44 (that's me in one of my incarnations) made The Daily Slope (what is the Daily Slope?)

Why do stars make eye contact? Is it to avoid potential stalkers or is it to make sure that you recognize them? In the past, I've made eye contact with a toned down and friendly Queen Latifah who was with a female friend and Jeff Goldblum who gave off a serious sex-addict vibe....totally my type!

Jefferson Market

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 01:18:00 +0000

I read a rumor that Jefferson Market was closing. Jefferson Market is one of those New York places (like Zabars and Lehman Brothers) that has been around forever. You tend to take these places for granted. It's a huge, lofty space that sells bread, cheese and other sundries and take-out foods. New York Magazine called it a European Style grocery.

Jefferson Market was here before that newer gourmet places like that horrid place on Broadway (the name completely escapes me) that changed an entire neighborhood. It was here before Union Market, which is also horrid. Unlike these other, modern stores, there is plenty of space in Jefferson Market to navigate the aisles. Sadly, the store looks abnormally empty compared to the Jefferson Market of my childhood.

When I stopped by, a news crew was interviewing the owner. I was told that the news crews have been showing up all week. When I asked a cashier when they were closing, she hopefully told me that there is a chance that they will not be closing.

I hope not. I hope that if they do manage to stay open, they modernize a little bit but are able to hold onto that old neighborhood feeling. I hope that West Villagers stop taking Jefferson Market for granted.

New York Times article

The Battle Plan II: Sarah "Evita" Palin..

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 15:58:00 +0000

I realized early on with horror what I was seeing in Governor Palin: the continuation of the Rove-Cheney cabal, but this time without restraints. I heard her echo Bush 2000 soundbites ("the heart of America is on display") and realized Bush's speechwriters were writing her -- not McCain's -- speeches. I heard her tell George Bush's lies -

read more | digg story

Words fail me

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 21:57:00 +0000

Obama is the candidate and Gov. Paterson is still really, really cool, so is Nydia Velazquez

noreply@blogger.com (nomadnewyork) — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 23:13:00 +0000