songbird's crazy world

Got my $.66 cup of coffee from Dunkin' Donuts.  Yeah!

As the MLB season comes to a close, the Mets are in first place in the race for the wild card, so it looks like we may see some October baseball.... Which is good news, considering the Ducks lost game 1 of their championship series to the Skeeters. And it looks like we may need to wear our rain gear to the game Friday night. It's supposed to be rainy and windy all weekend. I miss Jen.  Yes, we live in the same house, but we're both so busy lately that I hardly get to see her.  When I got home last night, she was getting ready for bed and was too tired to talk.  I hope she has fun this weekend in Baltimore -- a group of her friends are going there to see a Ravens' game.  I'm glad she's getting out of the house more often. Drew and I will be taking Becca out to dinner soon.  He's never seen her apartment, and she wants to show it off a bit. Sometimes it's hard to believe my babies are all grown up, with lives of their own. So my friend who has sp...

It was one of those days you can never forget: January 15, 2009.  I was sitting in my cubicle when someone said "There's  a plane down, it's in the Hudson!"  I got up from my desk, walked over to the window, where a crowd had gathered, and looked at the river. From our vantage point in Jersey City, 20 stories up, we could see the plane, we could see the ferries and the first responders in their boats.  But we were too far away to see any of the passengers. Later that day, the plane drifted downriver, coming to rest at the World Financial Center, just across from my office.  And there was Mayor Bloomberg, all over the TV, applauding the "Miracle On the Hudson". So yes, of course I had to see the new Tom Hanks movie, Sully . The movie begins after the crash, during the NTSB investigation.  We ultimately see the crash in flashback, during Sully's testimony before the board. Watching a movie based on a real incident, one you remember, is an i...

Well-prepared woman wipes the floor with misogynistic bully. Dare we say "Madame President"?

So...with a week to go in the season, the Mets (last year's National League champs) are chasing after a wild card spot.  Yesterday they played a real laugher against the Phillies -- final score 17-0.  Tonight they play the Miami Marlins.  The mood in Miami will be somber -- yesterday the Marlins' ace, Jose Fernandez, was killed in a boating accident.    Fernandez was supposed to pitch against the Braves yesterday, but the manager decided to give him an extra day of rest and allow him to pitch against the Mets instead.  If he'd been expected to pitch Sunday afternoon, he would not have gone boating Saturday night/Sunday morning.  What a twist of fate... But on the local front...how about them Ducks? Because the Atlantic League is so small -- only 8 teams --how the playoffs and championship are decided is a bit different than in Major League Baseball. The league is divided into two divisions, Liberty and Freedom.  The Ducks play in the ...

We were in Lincoln Center, and wanted Chinese food.  We decided on Shun Lee.  Debated whether to go for the traditional restaurant or the dim sum café next door.  Settled on the more traditional restaurant.    Decided to go for the traditional restaurant. We were not disappointed. The place is a bit pricey -- but that's understandable, considering the location.  We ordered two dishes, duck with vegetables and "Ants on a Tree".  The "Ants" turned out to be  cellophane noodles with bits of spicy beef served over greens.  Spicy but not overpowering.  The duck was served sliced, with bok choy, carrots and baby corn -- very flavorful and not at all greasy. The brown rice that accompanied the dishes was perfectly cooked. Service was uneven.  My water glass was never left empty, but I had to remind the waiter to bring me my tea, and my friend was never asked if she'd like another ginger ale.    And sadly, ...

We were headed to Lincoln Center for a performance, and wanted to grab a snack before the show. Starbucks just seemed too frenetic, so we decided to try 'Witchcraft instead. Nice surroundings -- an atrium with plants growing on the walls, and soothing music piped in.   The place was fairly busy but not overly crowded, and we had no problem finding a table.  We ordered our sandwiches at the counter, and the food was brought to us a short time later.  My sandwich was an interesting mix -- grilled ham and cheese, with cooked pears, on white.  I'd never tried fruit on a ham and cheese sandwich before, but I will definitely think about that combination again.  The pears were soft but not mushy, and gave a unique accent to an otherwise ordinary sandwich.  The menu has many sandwich choices, an a nice selection of hot and cold beverages.  Nice place for a quick bite, I will be back.

So a friend of mine has a subscription to the NYC Ballet.  She asked if I cared to join her for some of the shows this season.  As a former dance mom, I should be ashamed, because I'm not well-versed in ballet.  But I love live performances....how could I resist? So on Tuesday night we found ourselves in Lincoln Center, attending the ballet's Fall Gala, the event that opens the ballet's season.  Or rather, I should call it the "Fall Fashion Gala", because the costumes for the performance were all designed by major fashion designers, something the ballet company has been doing since 2011, when NYC's Fashion Week temporarily  moved to Lincoln Center. The Gala is a major fundraiser for the company, and is well-attended by the glitterati. Those of us who sat upstairs,  didn't walk the red carpet or attend the pre-show and post performance parties, but then again, we didn't have to dress up in black tie or evening gowns either.  We sat in the first ...

The change of season is official. Pumpkin bread and apple cider, anyone?

So, awhile back, Drew and I were invited to go on a cruise with some friends  of ours.  We decided that the cruise they picked wasn't for us.  But the idea of another cruise...well, we're going at the end of October.  A week on a Royal Caribbean ship, making port in Jamaica, Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Labadee, the cruise line's "private island".  We're going to see Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza and Dunn's River Falls in Jamaica, enjoy some beach time  in Labadee, walk around Georgetown in Grand Cayman.  Should be fun. And then...we're talking about a possible European vacation in late 2017 or early 2018.    We're not even in the real planning stage for that one yet, but I'm starting to get excited...

We had such a good time at the Faire in August that we decided to go back last weekend.  The free tickets helped, of course. We focused on entertainment that we didn't see last month.  No knife throwers, no living chess game...but we did see three ladies who do swordplay while reciting Shakespeare, a witty gentleman  who conducted a kangaroo court, and a puppeteer/insult comic (can't call him a ventriloquist when he wears a mask over his face). But we did see the joust again.  And it was a bit different this time around.  The Faire was filming the event, so instead of the usual four knights, there were six knights on the field.  Overall, another fun day.  Can't wait until next year.

So...a pipe bomb exploded on the Jersey Shore Saturday, just moments before a charity race was to begin.  No one was hurt, thank G-d, but it was truly scary ...echoes of the Boston Marathon bombing. And then Saturday night...a bomb went off in Chelsea.  Thank G-d no one died, but 29 people were hurt.  Another bomb was found, before it went off,  just a few blocks away. On Sunday we learned that another bomb was found, this time near the train station in Elizabeth, NJ. It exploded while the robot was disarming it.    And that a car was pulled over on the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, and the five people inside the vehicle were taken into custody by the FBI. And today there's a wanted poster, a 28 year old man, considered armed and dangerous. Scary world.

So the other night, after work, I headed over to Sunken Meadow.  It was a sunny afternoon,, with no rain in the forecast, perfect for a walk on the boardwalk. In the 20 minutes it took for me to drive to the park, the weather began to change.  A little cloudy, but yeah, I thought I could get a good walk in.... I got to the park and headed to the boardwalk. I always park at the main bathhouse, in the middle of the boardwalk.  Then I'll walk to the eastern end of the boardwalk, then to the western end, and finish in the middle. By the time I reached the boardwalk,    dark clouds hovered over the Sound, but I could still see the Connecticut shoreline in the distance. Overhead was gray, not threatening at all.  I started to walk. When I reached the eastern end of the boardwalk  --I'd been walking about 15 minutes --, I saw a lightning strike.  A bolt of lightning hit the open water.  A little scary, don't you think?  I d...

Now playing on Broadway, Holiday Inn , a musical based on the1942  Bing Crosby-Fred Astaire movie. We had a chance to see it the other night.  The movie, as you'll recall, had a thin plot designed as a framework for Irving Berlin's holiday songs.   Expanded to a stage musical, plot and character become far more important.  The basic storyline is the same -- Jim Hardy, his girlfriend Lila Dixon and his buddy Ted Hanover are performers, bringing their song and dance act around the country.  Jim quits to become a farmer, Lila dumps him for Ted.  when farming doesn't work, with the help of his new girlfriend Linda Mason,  he turns his farmhouse into an inn where shows are presented on each holiday.  When Lila dumps Ted, Ted shows up at the inn, and seeks out Linda as his new dance partner.  There are changes to the details, of course, and songs some songs have been dropped, others added. The Irving Berlin music is, of course, spec...

Took me awhile, but I finally read all four acts of the play. First thought:  reading the play is not at all like reading the novels.  Rowlings' distinctive, magical prose is nowhere to be found. Well, I shouldn't say "nowhere", but for the most part, the set descriptions and stage directions are very straightforward and practical. Becca, one of the biggest Harry Potter fans on the planet, didn't like Cursed Child .  She  felt that the characters in the play were not the same people she grew to love in the novels and the movies.  She felt the Rowlings' collaborators drifted away from her original concepts. I disagree with her assessment.  But I look at the story from a very different viewpoint than my daughter does. First of all, I am more familiar with the literary treatment of time travel and alternate realities.  I mean, we've all seen It's a Wonderful Life, how everyone's situation changed because George Bailey was never born.  A...

So I've been playing around with yoga and mindfulness for awhile, using DVD's and apps to explore the topics. It's time to take the next step.  I have always been nervous about taking a formal exercise class.  The reason I like Planet Fitness is because I can move at my own pace.  And yes, I am a klutz. But on one of my recent trips to the beach, I noticed a yoga class, they had their mats spread out on the sand.  And none of them were amazingly graceful.  they were just there to enjoy themselves. Our local high school offers several continuing education courses that re fitness-oriented:  power walking, Zumba, ballroom dancing. And two classes that sounded so very interesting.  Class #1, "Yoga", meets at 6:00 PM on Thursdays.  This Yoga class will provide physical benefits by creating a toned, flexible and strong body while improving respiration, energy and vitality.  This classical form of Yoga will also help you relax, quiet you...

The students in this year's high school freshman class weren't even born when it happened. To them, it's part of history, not something that happened to them. For the rest of us ... Where were you 15 years ago today? On that bright, sunny Tuesday when everything changed? I'd spent most of my professional life in lower Manhattan and Jersey City. On 2/26/1993 I'd watched the fire in the Twin Towers from across the Hudson. But on 9/11/2001 my office was on Long Island. Even so, my boss was in Manhattan that day, for a court appearance at 60 Centre Street, a case that he could easily have assigned to me. It was pure luck that I wasn't in Manhattan that day. Pure luck that I didn't see the planes hit the towers, that I didn't see the horrors that followed, that I didn't have to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge to get to safety. I watched the events unfold on TV, watched the chaos take place on familiar streets from the security of our office b...

So our long-time neighbors became empty nesters, put their house on the market and moved away.  the house sat empty for a few months, and finally a young couple with a three year old son bought the house. They haven't moved in yet.  Instead, they've decided on a massive project to alter and redesign the house and property.    The house they bought was virtually identical to ours -- a traditional center hall colonial built in the late 1960's.  They've gutted the interior and taken off all the siding and shingles, they plan an expansion upstairs.  they're regrading the property, cutting down trees, and have plans to put in a pool. And right now there's a port-a-potty sitting in the middle of their front lawn. Just lovely.  So they're having work done, we all have to grin and bear it... Except that the town enforcement officials have been here a few times already. They didn't have the proper permits to re-grade the land or to cut down tr...

So, with Labor Day behind us, we've turned the page, it's "fall". It's cloudy today, a bit  windy, with a chance of rain.  the remnants of Hurricane Hermine, the storm that wasn't.  The storm was supposed to hit us in the middle of the weekend, but fortunately it blew out to sea. My biggest storm concern was about Jen and her boyfriend.  Matt had a summer job, tending bar on Fire Island every weekend.  I had visions of a hurricane party on a deserted Fire Island, but no...Jen and some of her friends went over to the bar Saturday, but came home Saturday night.  Matt decided to honor the voluntary evacuation, and came home before the ferries stopped running.  Drew's barbecue was fun. A very small group this year, and way too much food, but we all enjoyed.  My mom's birthday was Sunday.  We had a family dinner -- my sister cooked, there were flowers on the table, we had cake from Reinwald's and cookies and pastries from Dortoni.  Mo...

Thank goodness the BBQ will be tomorrow.  The weather will be nice tomorrow. The rest of the weekend is going to be a washout.  Hemine is no longer a hurricane, it's now a tropical storm, but it's headed our way.