Better Halves

"ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT N?!" a coworker of mine asked today as I stood at Sunny's cubicle. Well, it wasn't so much "asking" as "accusing," and her tone was more "threatening" than "inquiring." I don't know what she overheard. I don't blame her for asking, as she was one of a sea of people who e-mailed me thought-out pep-talk paragraphs and launched into you-break-up-with-him-girl speeches when N was being a jerk.

"No..." I said. "I was talking about his friend, Six-Two." (This was true, actually.) As an afterthought, I added, "I'm not dating Six-Two." (Also true.)

I don't remember what I was saying about Six-Two -- maybe I was just telling Sunny a story or making some sort of soft comparison. But as I walked back to my desk, I had a thought: When did N go from being my cute, rogue-ish Nicky Arnstein to my detrimental bad habit -- my Blake Fielder-Civil? My Raffaello Follieri? My Pete Doherty? I suddenly find myself reading news stories about Amy Winehouse and Anne Hathaway and their blind love for their shady men and feeling some sort of kinship with them. Okay, so N has never been in jail (that I know of) or swindled people out of thousands, but where is the line between love and bad decision-making?

I'm afraid to mention N to much of anyone, because I don't want to hear the criticism. I know it all, in my head, already, so even if I feel that N is genuinely trying now -- really working to communicate with me, be present, and be nice to my friends and me -- everyone else is still going to hear what I said before, when he was making me miserable.

The question is, Will he be able to sustain this? And will I ever be able to trust him again?

Fleeting

I dreamed last night that structures were crumbling. Old billboards were collapsing on themselves and falling down as dust. Green-leaved trees were singeing internally and burning to the ground. I was trying to find my grandmothers. Everyone outside was milling around, not really panicking, but awestruck. I felt an overwhelming sense of sadness, and I kept looking up at the destruction and repeating, "It's fleeting. It's fleeting."

I woke up from the dream with a start in N's bed. I panicked, my heart fluttering and my chest ever so slightly in pain. I don't remember this, but N said I was crying in my sleep, and then suddenly I sat up and looked at him and said, "I didn't know where I was."

When N is happy, he is wonderful, and I feel wonderful. He tells jokes and does funny impressions of people we know. He makes up sarcastic, hypothetical stories and relates them in movie-like dialogue, and I laugh out loud. He kisses me and holds my hand and tells me about books I'd like or news stories I should read. His eyes are clear and large, and he tells me how he feels about me. I smile, and my concerns dissipate. I feel like the woman I always wanted to be: pretty and happy and confident and metropolitan, with the man she loves next to her.

But I can feel when N turns. His eyes go dark, and his forehead creases. He doesn't talk as much, and I find myself trying to fill the space between us with stupid anecdotes or subway observations or updates on a subject we talked about days before. It's when I can feel him closing that I want to reach out for him and scream, "No! Come back! I love you! Please don't leave!"

But it is always too late.

Land of the Manchildren

I went out tonight with one of my favorite friends, Platonic Married Guy (PMG, for short). PMG and I were former coworkers, and we have a lot in common, including our religious upbringings and the Midwest as our true heartland. I adore Platonic Married Guy, because not only is he insightful on all things work- or relationship-related, he has never once insinuated that our relationship is anything but friendly. That, my friends, is nice. And rare.

I met PMG and a few of his buddies out for drinks tonight. It was unintentionally fantastic: me at a table with four other dudes. I wasn't expecting that. One of them was cute and looked about my age. We made eyes at each other, and I listened to him: Midwest-born. Artist. Eloquent. Smart. Funny. Ummmm...hello!

Later I made all of the boys fess up their ages. Cute friend was 43. Good God. I already upped my limit for N, but 43 is ridiculous. I tried to pay for my drinks, of course they insisted I didn't, and I went to the ladies' room.

I came back to the table to grab my purse and my jacket, and PMG's cute friend was showing off the shirts he bought at an outlet mall to the rest of the guys. I had an unpleasant flashback:

Shopping. Old but looks young. Fancies himself an "artist." Lives in Brooklyn.

No. Not again.

New York City is the official Land of the Manchildren. If your genes are right, you can coast for 20 years with no commitments, no rings, no children, and no spine.

I. Can't.

Buh-bye.

Barely There

I went to work today with my glasses on and a bare face. That is to say, I didn't wear any makeup. I don't know how many of y'all know the Midwest, but we Midwestern women like our makeup. That's not to say we necessarily apply it well or pick shades that are right for our us or our current decade, but we know the value of a good lipstick -- especially when we're trying, even if we're just putting our best foot forward at church on Sunday morning.

I don't remember the last time I went out to see people I know without makeup on. But there was something about this morning (aside from my pills-and-booze minihangover) that made me not want to try. I wasn't giving up, per se, but I was giving in -- to the temptation of sadness, maybe. All week I've been swooshing and jangling about in bright outfits and touseled blond hair and megajewelry to put my pain on mute. Today, I wore black and the small diamond studs that the Boyf gave me two and a half years ago.

Maybe it was the giving in that caused me to e-mail N.

After writing and deleting a billion potential works of prose, I sent him three short sentences succinctly expressing the fact that it was possible that I was going crazy. I hadn't contacted him since I ended things. He was nice about my e-mail. Says he wants to be there for me. Says he has "regrets" about how everything unfolded. Yes. Yes. Don't we all? Don't ALL of us -- every single person reading this -- have regrets about our failed relationships?

I'm coming to the conclusion that N tried. My black-and-white version of the story was always, "I tried. He didn't. The end." Truth be told, in his own barely visible way, he tried. But, as Sunny said today (sorry, Sunny, I'm lifting from you for this post), "He gave 100 percent, and that was 60 percent of what you wanted." It just. Wasn't. Enough.

I love big. I expect big in return. Emotions drip out of me like I'm a saturated kitchen sponge -- every time someone touches me, I gush. When N touches me, I pour rivers. I still do. I still love that man more than any man I've ever loved in my natural born life, but he and I are (to quote my friend P) "wired differently." N is dry, even when he tries to be wet. I wish so much that he weren't.

I think about my apartment now -- how haphazard everything is, how neglected it all looks. The good news is that I'm puzzling out how to change that. I fantasize about wiping off my windowsill and hanging the (awesome) framed poster I just received in the mail. My apartment isn't all I think about, but I do think about it sometimes. Maybe this weekend I will get the impetus to organize it and then I will try.

Men: Dating Don'ts

I'm not sure that dating in New York is harder than any other city. It's just that here, there are more people to date, hence more idiosyncrasies, more idiots, more jerks, more morons, and more bad, bad, bad nights that one wishes one could have instead spent watching "30 Rock" on DVR than out and about wearing a too-done hairdo and a bored look on one's face.

So. Men of New York, here are some basic guidelines to follow when attempting to woo a lady in Manhattan (or any of the other boroughs, for that matter, save maybe Staten Island):

-Do not bring up your gastrointestinal issues. If that pizza was too heavy or if that Coke Zero you ordered made you "feel like a volcano" inside, please keep it to yourself. We don't know what to say in return, and you've just grossed us out to the point that we will not be having sex with you that night...if ever.

-Do not tell us, within the first three dates, what age you lost your virginity and attempt to solicit the same information from us. It is creepy, and it brings up high school issues (of the virgin or non-virgin variety) that we'd rather not revisit.

-If you have asked us out on a first date and requested that we go to dinner together rather than drinks, do not split the bill evenly in your head, push the leather receipt-holder toward us, and inform us what our share is. It's tacky and rude, and a storm cloud of resentment will soon appear directly over our forehead when we realize we could have spent that $28 on our very own pepperoni pizza and a six-pack.

-Do not get drunk off of fewer beers than us and then attempt to paw us at the bar. We don't like lightweights.

-If we tell you (for whatever reason) that we will not be having sex with you, do not ask, "Why not?"

-If we are kissing for the first time, do not grab our limbs and constantly reposition them, as if we are made of Gumby-like soft rubber and wire. You may be used to blow-up dolls, but we are also not made of vinyl.

-Do not text us two hours later after we end our fifth date with a peck on the cheek. We obviously don't like you in that way. Also: Do not text us throughout the workday. We have work to do that doesn't involve reading three urgent messages about this funny thing your coworker said.

-Do not attempt to fact-check basic background information we give you on a first date so that it turns into a Lincoln-Douglas-style debate. If we say we're from the fucking Midwest, we're from the fucking Midwest! Our home state is not in the motherfucking Southwest!

-If we are making out with you, do not tell us, "Don't rip my shirt. It's Brooks Brothers." By the time you get out the "s" in "Brothers," we will have left your apartment.

-If you take us to your favorite restaurant and we ask you for a food or drink recommendation, do not say, "Um, I don't know." Just say something. Pick a dish or drink. Any dish or drink. It's your favorite restaurant, and we're trying to make awkward first-date conversation, so go for the assist and help us out here.

Now it's your turn. Comment and either excoriate me or agree vehemently with me. And always, always share your own.

High/Low

"High/low," Michelle Pfeiffer said at the dinner table with her fictional family, playing a character in the contrived movie The Story of Us. Each night, the members of her nuclear clan -- Bruce Willis and two children -- would go around the table and say what the best and wost parts of their day were. I loved that. I remember watching the movie on VHS, alone, in my bedroom, in college, and I secretly promised myself then that if I ever had a family, we'd do the same thing.

Having a family someday seems laughable now -- especially here in the city -- but I still like the idea of high/low. I had my high and low right close together yesterday:

The cheapest place to buy beer in New York is Duane Reade. (If someone knows of a cheaper place, please do comment and tell.) So I headed out there on Saturday to buy my usual 18-pack of Bud Light, because I am white trash from the Midwest. The cashier was sweet: "Would you like a bag? Or would you like to carry it like that?" "A bag, please, if you don't mind," I said. I like that I answered her question with quasi-Victorian phrasing. What I should have said was, "A bag, please. I'd rather not the whole island of Manhattan know exactly how trailer I am."

So I waltzed out of the DR, my beer in my bag. Five steps out of the store, the bag broke. Handles ripped clear away. So I stopped, picked up the bag like it was a baby, and began the 10-block journey to my apartment. And then I think I saw Tim Robbins (ha-cha-cha!), but he was unfortunately not around for the bag-breaking incident, because if he had been, he surely would have offered to carry the thing home for me.

I continued walking, Bud Light papoose in my arms, then I realized I smelled beer. That couldn't be good. Then I heard a hissing sound. Again, not good. Then, 10 steps later, I felt it: Beer was leaking into my woefully broken Duane Reade bag, soaking my Wall Street Journal and the box of condoms I had bought in a fit of hope.

I had nine blocks to go. Fuck.

I began a somewhat dainty run/walk through Madison Square Park, streams of Bud Light trickling out of my bag intermittently. I caught a glimpse of myself in a store window once I was clear of the park -- hunched over, carrying this white plastic whale of a bag that was quickly filling with light beer. I wondered what people thought. I know, after this many years in the city, that I shouldn't care about the opinions of passersby, but it's still funny to think about. This girl -- blonde and in black gym clothes -- run-walking a leaking bag of discount beer, a Wall Street Journal, and condoms.

I made it to my apartment, dribbling beer up three flights of stairs, and assessed the damage in the kitchen sink, faucet on: Only two Bud Lights had ruptured. Two were dented. The rest appeared to be fine. Thank God.

High: Seeing Tim Robbins.
Low: Being a white-trash hooker who frets over two lost beers.

Finally, Some Truth in Advertising

A swanky salon near my neighborhood has a chalk-written sign outside advertising the "Laguna Bee-otch Mani/Pedi Special." This amused me.

Oh, It's Possible

As a single woman in New York, it is possible to really enjoy the title tracks to these records at the exact same time.

Sincerity Assault

I'm going to get hella sincere on y'all for a second, okay? (And I swear I haven't had more than a glass and a half of this pleasant, subtle, inexpensive Chilean pinot noir.)

The past few weeks have been a major adjustment period, as you all know, but a major savior in all of this has been New York City.

If you've never lived here, know that New York is the town that can kick your ass and take your lunch money one day and then save your bacon the next.

I can't count the number of times I've been at some horrible hipster party on the LES some Saturday night, standing in the corner while drinking a bottle 0f Bud Light and trying to appear fascinated by a weird neon-colored painting on the wall because no one thinks I'm cool enough to talk to. I've been dissed out loud at fancy job interviews and forced to smile through the remainder of them. I've had $25 in my checking account that had to last one week.

But these past few weeks, there has been something uplifting about the city that's not unlike a heavenly hammock of distraction. I was downtown in the early evening today, and I looked up at the short-ish brick buildings and the new summer clothing everyone walking down the street was wearing, I felt the weight of the totally decent bottles of $1.99 malbec I had just procured from Astor Wines in my palm, and I caught a glimpse of myself and my oversized sunglasses in the bar Butter's reflective glass, and I became sublimely, inexplicably happy.

Why?

That this is my life -- carrying good wine through Astor Place like I owned it. That I came from a nondescript town deep in cow country that no one's heard of and that -- years later, despite near-poverty and random, assorted disappointments -- I am Still. Fucking. Here. That I have developed that exoskeleton that every New Yorker knows about. Not only that, but I function. There's cause and effect at play between me and the city, and it gives back now. I've worn it down with persistence, and it sort of likes me sometimes, when I'm not annoying it by talking too much or asking it for favors. It lets me win at five-card stud occasionally, and I walk away, counting my bills.

I refused to be swallowed up, a Jonah in the city's belly, and I wasn't. That deserves another glass of pinot. Or two.

New

I had a couple of drinks at an Irish pub tonight, and I saw a guy about my age sitting at the bar, pint of beer in hand. A see-though blue plastic sack was draped over the back of his chair. I tried to make out what the cylindrical object inside it was. Coffee. A tin of it. Maxwell House, I recall. There was something supremely sad about that to me. I didn't know this man. I'd only seen him once. But already I knew how his night would end and how his morning would begin.

I don't want to be that way now that I'm single.

I stepped off the train near home tonight, and I felt a surge of satisfaction with my lot in life (okay, maybe that was the Harp draughts talking, but bear with me here). I wanted to French-kiss the people who exited my subway car. I wanted to tell the blond woman on the bench near me how much I liked her bag. I wanted to dance through Koreatown, drinking up the lights, so happy to be a red blood cell in the city's artery.

I am lucky. No matter what happens to me, I am going to try hard to remember that.

P.S. Listen to my show tonight, Dr. Blogstein's Radio Happy Hour, at 9 p.m. tonight. The player is in the margin of my blog, but click here to listen in real time.

Four Fundamentally Wrong Aspects of the Movie "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days"

Chick flicks are really not my thing. I like them if they're well made (see: Working Girl), but if they're thrown together and cliched, they're reeeeeaaaalllly bad. And unfortunately, that definition comprises most of the genre (see: How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days).

I settled in with a bottle of red and the remote this weekend only to find How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days playing on the We network. Considering my mental state (not totally balanced, but more on that much later) and my unwillingness to rise from the couch and my wine glass to pop in another DVD, I made the decision to watch it despite the fact I absolutely hated it when I saw it the first time. Choosing to watch the movie was much like confronting an old foe: "Ah, subpar chick flick. We meet again, yes? You want to convince me of your quality, you say? We'll see about that. Oh, yes, we'll see about that." Do I need to mention that I'd been into the wine already?

What I found surprised me a little. The movie wasn't quite as bad as I'd remembered, if only for the mildly entertaining performances by Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey, who is apparently required to ride a motorcycle in every leading-man role he signs on for. Actually, it's not hard for me to watch McConaughey in anything. You could sit me down in a dark theater to view a film of McConaughey watching paint dry, and I'd probably still consider it $11 well spent.

That is not my central point, though. My central point is that the first time I watched HTLAGITD, I did not live in New York. Now, I live in the city and was able to spot the wild inaccuracies that dot the movie. I'm not even talking your standard "Friends" inaccuracies, such as renting a huge apartment on an out-of-work actor's salary or the fact that everyone, including extras, is model-attractive. Let me break it down:

1. Kate Hudson's attempt to write "serious articles" for Composure magazine
-There is no way in hell that any woman working at a women's glossy in the city would whip up a little Word document on "serious issues" and try and give it to the editor in chief like there's a place for it in the mag. "Hey, Kate White, here's a little piece on genocide in Darfur I've been knocking around for the past week. Wanna put it in the mag, maybe next to the teal-bracelet roundup?" (This problem was familiar to me. See: Thirteen Going on 30 and her crazy ideas for the magazine.)

2. Depiction of Staten Island
-In the movie, Matthew McConaughey is supposedly from Staten Island. I sat up when I heard that, because I didn't remember that detail from my first viewing. So he takes Kate Hudson there (across the Verrazano on his motorcycle, natch). In movie-speak, "Staten Island" must mean "West Texas," because his entire family has a Southern accent, is white, and is playing cards on the back deck over some nice brews. What the hell? Even saying he lived in Jersey would have been slightly more believable.

3. Composure magazine's printing schedule
-I rolled when Kate Hudson waltzed into the editor in chief's office and said, "I can't do this article." As. If. She. Had. A. Choice. And then EIC Bebe Neuwirth said something like, "The cover is already at the printer, so have a draft on my desk in 48 hours." From what I understand of the magazine industry, there is no possible way the cover could be "at the printer" before stories were even in. Doesn't work that way. Also, giving Kate Hudson TWO DAYS to write the rest of the piece? That's an eternity in medialand. Bebe would have flipped out and made her turn it in in 15 minutes. And then, the "article" she finally turns in? Notsomuch a service piece. At all. Especially for a "how-to" reporter. (This problem was also familiar to me. See: Never Been Kissed and what passes for immersion journalism at the end of the film.)

4. Use of taxis
-Apparently, Kate quits Composure, and, the very next day, goes to Washington for an "interview." What kind of interview? We can't know. But I certainly hope it's for a "serious journalist" position. That's not even the problem, though. As Matthew McConaughey chases her down (on his motorcycle, natch) she's in a taxi. A taxi? To Washington, D.C.? That'll be $5,000, please. And even if I misunderstood and she were on her way to La Guardia, that doesn't make sense, either. She'd obviously take the train or bus rather than a plane. But the train wouldn't make for a very good McConaughey-on-motorcycle scene, now would it?

So, after my movie-viewing death match with HTLAGITD? Yep, it's still awful, just in different ways.

Me: 2 HTLAGITD: 0

My intelligence: 0 HTLAGITD: 2

"You Know What's Hip? Starbucks."

I just love this old-ish video from E!'s Starveillance. The quality's not so hot, and you can stop watching at about the two minute and 50 second mark, but I assure you that those three minutes will be funny. Especially if you like making fun of the Olsen twins.

New York Disney

The Boyf and I watched a great old movie today: John and Mary, starring Dustin Hoffman and Mia Farrow. It's set in New York in the late '60s. I like comparing old New York to the sanitized version of New York we know now.

Case in point: Early in the film, Dustin asks Mia where she lives. She replies (and I'm paraphrasing a bit here): "Murray Hill. It's nice. There are trees on the streets, lots of men with little dogs, and only two stabbings a week."

The Boyf and I couldn't help but crack up at that one.

Both of us live near Murray Hill, and we like our neighborhood, but all New Yorkers know that Mia's characterization couldn't be further from the truth now. The gay men of yesteryear have been replaced by grunting, flip-flop-wearing frat boys, and the stabbings have been ousted in favor of overpriced boutiques helmed by nasty saleswomen. It's more like, "Only two sorostitutes blowing their chunks in the gutter a weekend," or "Only two or three drunken brawls on Third Avenue a week."

So I said one prayer of thanks for not having to worry about being stabbed on my walk back from the Boyf's place, and I said one prayer of wish that I hope reaches the heavens by the time doors open on the new condos that are now going up on every side street in Midtown:

"Please, Lord, don't let the jerks from Thursday's Post story price me out of my walk-up."

My Financial Accountability: Day 4

Newbie to NYC's Spending Journal for Mid-April (cont.)

Thursday, April 12, 2007

Breakfast, two hard-boiled eggs and a cup of grapes: $3.16

Lunch, delicious curry with chicken: $9

Two Bud Lights: Free, courtesy of very cool friend A

Pilsner Urquell: $8 at a semi-chic West Village haunt

Cab back from semi-chic West Village haunt: $10

Total for 4/12/2007: $30.16

I'm getting too old to be cute about this: I'm frittering away my money on alcohol and cab rides, but that's sort of the New York way, is it not? If one does not drink, one does not socialize-slash-network nearly as much. And therein lies the rub. I sometimes wish I had either the inner confidence or the disdain for society that would enable me to be a hermit.

My Financial Accountability: Days 1 and 2

You know what's disappointing? Having to pay the IRS a somewhat hefty sum due partly to a ton of freelance work one did in the year 2006. That scenario, coupled with my desire to buy plane tickets to see my friends who are states away this summer, has caused me to reevaluate -- or at least become more aware of -- how I spend the mad money that's in my pocket. And, friend, I want you to join me on this journey. (This, of course, does not include the money I save regularly for my emergency fund, rent/bills, random money I add to my mutual funds, and my 401(k).)

So, in the spirit of New York magazine and other budgeters who have come before me, I present:

Newbie to NYC's Spending Journal for Mid-April

I want to do this for a week at the very least. Let's get on with it, shall we?

Monday, April 9, 2006

Banana -- $.35

Laundry (washer and dryer -- heck yes, I do my own laundry) -- $5.25

FICO credit score online at myfico.com (this was something I've been meaning to get for some time, and thanks to my new favorite website retailmenot.com, I saved 20 percent) -- $12.76

Total for 4/9/2006: $18.36


Tuesday, April 10, 2006

Breakfast, two hard-boiled eggs and a cup of grapes: $3.16

Lunch, falafel sandwich and Diet Coke: $5.75

Two glasses of wine with roommate at a steakhouse in the neighborhood: $20

Total for 4/10/2006: $28.91

Heckles/words of encouragement/bursts of creativity welcome in the comments section.

Classin' Up the Joint

Taking the Greyhound bus round-trip from New York City to Baltimore isn't the classiest voyage, but that's how I roll. Today, on the trip back to the city after a fun stay in B-more, I was reminded of exactly how posh Greyhound can get when a busty thirtysomething woman with a young baby stood up near the front of the bus and turned around. The following phrase was printed in black on her tight white T-shirt (original punctuation and capitalization retained):

If you think I'm a Bitch, you should meet my Mother!

"Luxury coach," indeed.

Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child

Okay, I was going to spare you all from my usual stupid-rich-people rant and not blog about this story, a Times Real Estate feature on parents who "help" their children buy fancy New York apartments. But then I saw that Madame X blogged about it, and she has real class, so I decided to follow suit.

Whenever I read stories like this, about parents giving so much to their children, or meet people who have had extraordinary help from their parents in their adult lives, I get ever so slightly angry. Is it because I'm jealous? Hey, maybe I am. If, upon my graduation from college, I had had a set of rich parents who offered to buy me a studio in the high-rise Manhattan sky, I would not have had to endure nearly as many hardships -- financial and interpersonal -- as I did trying to get here.

On the flip side, if I had acquired that fancy, free apartment...I would not have had to endure nearly as many hardships -- financial and interpersonal -- as I did trying to get here.

Let me explain:

At twentysomething years of age, I have been through deadbeat subleasers, insane roommates, disrespectful roommates, dirty roommates, credit-card debt, three dollars total in my wallet, asshole temporary friends, a move to a strange post-industrial town all for the promise of a short-term job, and general despondency in Jersey while looking across the stretch of the Hudson River at everything I could not have. But I survived. I figured shit out. I saved my pennies. I worked hard. I suffered in silence. I acquired a thicker skin.

But most importantly, I acquired some semblance of self-respect that I don't know that I could acquire otherwise. I call bullshit more often. I don't trust as quickly as I used to. I obsess over my financial accounts. I still choose generic groceries over name-brand products because it just makes good sense. I know in my heart that I got here, mostly* on my own, all the way from a lower-middle-class family smack dab in the middle of Nowheresville, Midwest. That makes me less willing to give it all up, be it for a shaky new job, a man, or a whim when I hear California whispering to me. And it makes me love New York and appreciate good restaurants, diversity, and the way the sun glints off of skyscrapers' windows that much more.

The people I've met who have had a lot of help from their parents? They're worldly in the materialistic ways of the rich but naive when it comes to picking their acquaintances. They spend too much money. They don't quite understand the value of a dollar. They have no backup plan.

But they don't need a backup plan because of their family's money. Unless, of course, something bad happens. But they can't see that, either. Dare I say it, when bad situations arise, they might not have the wherewithal to manage themselves in a time of personal (or financial!) crisis.

It is my view that if I ever have children (God forbid), I will teach them to be independent. That if they fuck up, there will be no hammock woven out of hundred-dollar bills to cradle their fall. That if they spend all their money on booze and coke, there will be no reservoir into which they can dip. That is they can't afford a fancy New York apartment, guess what? They don't get one. Unless, of course, they save their pennies, suffer in silence, work hard, and buy generic groceries, and even then, there is no guarantee.

The downside of working for what you have is that you become just a tad bit bitter.

If you liked this rant, you're gonna love the ones here, here, and here.

*I did have a minimal amount of post-college help from my parents, but we're talking a few hundred dollars when I was working two part-time jobs and was still unable to pay my rent for a month, not a few hundred thousand for a sweet penthouse.

I Can Die Now

I went out with my fantastic old friend D tonight. He's of the same mindset as me: Give us an Irish pub and some karaoke, and we're set for the night.

Of course I did an old standby ("Black Velvet" by Alannah Myles), and after a duet with D, I debuted Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U." Note to ladies who are thinking of singing that in the near future: It is not as hard as you think to bust out. Trust me: You already know the words after hearing it on the radio 5,000 times in the early '90s. (See my other karaoke posts here, here, and here.)

What I consider the prize comment came early in the night, from a woman who was sitting at the bar while I was singing Alannah. "That's not fair; she's a professional," the woman said. Oh, if only. If only. I think that was the best thing I've ever heard in my karaoke career. Those of us who adore the karaoke also adore the compliments, and I was beyond flattered.

D and I shared laughs and deep thoughts and all the things you're supposed to share after a few beers (only one of which I spilled squarely on my pants, thankyouverymuch). I walked home looking at the reflections in the office building windows on Madison Avenue, walking on the concrete of Manhattan's empty streets, and breathing in deeply, the chorus of U2's "City of Blinding Lights" in my head.

Corner of Margarita between Booze and Sauced

I had a couple (okay, a few) margaritas after work with my awesome friend N tonight. We left the bar and parted ways, and about halfway home, a woman asked me where Lexington Avenue is. "That way," I said immediately, motioning to the left. "It's two blocks down. One, two." She bounced off happily.

Then I realized something: I never give the correct directions when I am sober.

Usually, I'm trudging up the steps from the train around 7 p.m. sober as a judge, in my usual routine, thinking things about work like, "Why, God, hast thou smote me so?" so when some 21-year-old blonde forces me out of my reverie by saying something abrupt like, "Excuse me. Where's Madison?" I say, "Uhhhhhhh. Uhhmmmmm," and then, puzzled, I stare at the intersection next to me, almost as if I've licked my index finger and have raised it straight upward to see which way the wind's a-blowin'.

One time, I said, "This is Madison." The young lady looked at me, and then she looked at the street, pointed to the telltale grassy median, and said, "This is Park." I muttered something about "long day" and "ask someone else," and then I tried to pretend the incident had never happened.

I should set up some sort of a directions booth in Midtown around 1 a.m. on a Saturday and charge for my stellar map services. Payment in booze, of course.

"Well, the Jerk Store Called..."

Like any normal pair of twentysomethings looking to culturally atone for a previous night of boozing, the Boyf and I made our way downtown to the Outsider Art Fair in the Puck Building on Sunday around noon or so.

As we meandered down Lafayette Street, we passed three rough-looking guys outside of what we believed to be a rehab center. They were visibly and audibly disturbed by something.

"He's a fucking jerk!" one guy wearing chains and khaki-colored sweats yelled, gesturing at the street. "He's bumped into all the cars already!"

The Boyf and I turned to see some guy in a tiny vintage Porsche that was sandwiched between a green sedan and a white minivan with Florida license plates. And when I say "sandwiched," I mean sandwiched. He was trying to parallel park his penismobile where a parking space did not exist. You couldn't slide a sheet of paper in between this Porsche's bumper and either of the two cars.

And then Porsche guy hit the gas. Hard.

It was like watching a bad comic farce in action: As he jimmied his Porsche back and forth between the two cars, he would ram one car at least a foot, brake, put his car into drive, wait until the minivan rolled back to resting position, then he'd do it over again, in the opposite direction, with the sedan. This continued for at least three minutes.

All the while, the Boyf and I were watching in horror, not believing we were actually seeing this, and the bedraggled rehab guys are yelling at the street: "He's a fucking jerk! No! No! Don't do that! He's a fucking jerk!"

Porsche guy finally decided he had wedged his vintage automobile so tightly between the cars so that no one -- not even him -- would be able to pull out, and he exited his vehicle, with his longish brown hair and professorial green blazer, to inspect his job. The Boyf and I scurried along because we thought he was going to come after us, but no. He circled his car, and, apparently satisfied, left.

I think the lesson I learned is this: When rough-and-tumble rehab-center guys are repeatedly yelling on the streets of New York that you're a jerk, you probably are. And how.