Halloween For Real

We went to St. John the Divine's Halloween party on Friday. Mostly we were zombies. Mag and I were republican zombies- she was the wife of the indicted executive who killed herself and I was the exec. Gabe was a brit-pop zombie who maybe was our son. The cathedral gets all spooky dolled up with a masked creature playing cello amidst smoke and lights. Then they played the silent horror movie "Phantom of the Opera" from the 1920s.



Then the procession of the ghouls began and the most amazing costumes started pouring out from the altar. There was a person way up the walls dressed like a bug who crept down slowly, and animal skeletons, huge-headed babies, goblins of all sizes marched by. I recommend this event for next year. An unfinished cathedral is the perfect place to spend Halloween.

Singing with the band

Here is a photo of me singing with West, the band made up of Ben and Sam Taylor plus Peter. I sang five songs with them and had the best time. It was my premiere as a singer.
After the show, my "Kryptonite" bike lock wouldn't open. It wouldn't budge though every person who was at the show or who walked by tried to open it. Keep in mind this is a replacement lock less than a year old. Also keep in mind that Naomi and I locked our bikes together because her "Kryptonite" lock wouldn't open when she arrived. What are the chances. So Naomi and I went back the next morning with some WD40 thinking that'd do the trick but nothing. (We at least stopped at Donut Plant on the way. We had a keylime glazed donut which was amazing and a really good sticky bun.) After a few tries with the WD, I went in the garage across the street and a guy came out with a can of liquid wrench. As he was trying in vain to open it, two other guys come up and ask what's going on. They were working at a construction site on the block and wanted to help also. Nothing doing still. So one of them says to me "We can break?" and I say "Hell Yes Please," and they go to the site and come back with a grinder and cut through the thing in thirty seconds. Turns out they live on Monitor Street in Greenpoint, on the same block as Sameer. We may go have some drinks with them sometime. I sent it back to them the next day and they said they'd send a new one in two or three weeks. But for now I'm lockless and dragging the bike up flights of stairs and freight elevators wherever I go. My question is, if you only do one thing (make bike locks) why can't you fucking do it right?

Obligatory pictures of my cats

I got these little things at the shelter down in Brownsville over the summer. Go get some yourself. (The site has an advertisement for "Wife Swap" for some reason, but other than that you can look at all the animals up for adoption. They have great names like Lil Kim and Sassy. Miele was Zanzibar and Bird was Senorita.) The grey one is Miele (honey in Italian) and the stripey one is Bird. Bird is tiny but I don't know if you can tell here. They get along great now and are crazy running around the house often. At night they curl up on me and that's great except that Miele likes to walk on my head and chew my hair when the sun comes up and I have to throw him off the bed a few times. He's pretty heavy especially when I'm asleep. We're still working it out.

They'll let anyone in here these days

Naomi, Mag, Sameer, and I went to the 25th Anniversary of a restaurant we'd never been to named Capsouto Freres in Tribeca. It was a whole lot of fun. Good champagne and lots of nice food plus too many desserts.



The owners are these wonderful French-Egyptian brothers. At the end, they brought out this huge chocolate cake and a magnun of champagne and the three of them plus all the kitchen staff gathered around it. The first brother, Sammy, started to speak but was too emotional to say much. The other brothers took over and talked about their mom who died two years ago, and how even though she's not there anymore, she is still the glue that holds them together through hard times. We were all a little choked up though they were total strangers. We met some nice people and drank more than I can remember on a Sunday. The party winded down and Sameer took over on the piano, since the hired guy only knew a few songs, including somehow "Rainbow Connection" and "Desperado." Mostly he just played "St. Louis Blues" over and over. Sameer banged out "Personal Jesus" and the three of us sang along. It was a hell of a Sunday.

Why Blogs are Good, Why Blogs are Bad

Mag, Kate, Dad and Ingrid at the Party

Here She is Now

Wow.

Etta turns 100

Here is my Gram who just turned 100 on October 1. She was probably 30 here. When I get photos from the big party I will post them.

Also, Sameer and I made a video about her that included a song at the end. It was Young at Heart, of Sinatra fame. Here is a picture of me during take 18 or so.