October's final day

Halloween is a very special day. There’s a spirit in the air – the excitement of dressing up. The one day a year when everyone has the option to be, nay is actually encouraged to be, something that they’re not.

This morning, the deli owner from whom I buy my morning coffee was actually a detective. The hot dog vendor on the way to work was not a hot dog vendor, but a vampire with a hot dog stand. And outside the subway was an old man dressed up like a smelly homeless person. Oh no wait, he’s always there.

Halloween for the pups

Halloween weekend. One of the few times a year when everyone, and I mean everyone, dresses up. Even our friendly, four-legged friends.

Dog costumes have really become trendy these last few years. Who started this ridiculous and yet adorable fad? I'm going to go ahead and suggest my mother. She's been dressing Stella, the family miniature poodle up in costumes for years. She claims that Stella enjoys it. And I can't really prove otherwise, as she always has a silly grin on her face when she comes bounding up to me sporting a button down shirt, cowboy hat and tutu (Stella that is, not mom).

I never thought I'd meet another dog-owner like my mom, until I moved to Brooklyn. Shoes, wigs, jewelry, these people have no mercy when it comes to costuming their furry companions. But yesterday was the Brooklyn Doggie Costume Contest and Parade, and all in the name of Halloween. So how can I not approve?

Plus it was quite a sight, dog after dog in full costume. Purebreds and mutts, coming together on the windiest day of the year - ears flapping in the wind, Yoda barking, Superman peeing on fire hydrants, Elvis sniffing Orphan Annie's butt. Here were a few of my personal faves:

The world's strongest golden retriever.



Well-known rapper, Mutt Daddy, complete with bling.



The king.



What's more appropriate for a rabbi than a beard?



Check out the pom poms on this little cheerleader.



And my all-time personal favorite: Little Orphan Annie. Don't worry, angry little pug. The sun will come out tomorrow when your owner takes off that ridiculous wig.

When I grow up, I wanna be Heather.

After almost five months of successful daily blogging, I think it's time I paid homage to the woman who inspired me to start blogging in the first place. She’s smart, she’s funny, and she’s one of the most successful bloggers on the interwebs today.

Her name is Heather Armstrong, aka dooce.com. Though I've never met her, spoken to her, nor even received a response email, I consider her to be one of my closest friends, as do millions of other readers. She manages to open up to her online audience with a candor and charm that I rarely get from anyone I encounter on a daily basis.

Her posts are so humorous, poignant and endearing that she's able to support her family - husband, daughter and dog - by selling advertising space on her blog. Basically, she's my idol.

Heather was recently featured on the front page of her city's newspaper:
The Salt Lake Tribune. If you have time to read a long article, it's worth the read. It discusses how her blogging affected her family (her parents stopped speaking to her), her job (she got fired) and her life (she ended up being hospitalized for severe clinical depression). See why I want to be just like her??? But the article also explains that over time, her blogging has brought her family closer together and become her fulltime job.

She also balances all kinds of food and objects on her dog's head. What a star!

Project Peak Time Foliage: the Movie

I’ve been back from my vacation one week, and already my brain’s turned to shit (get it, that’s a joke about my new job. Ha ha, nevermind). Just one week home I’ve already slipped back into the excitingly fast pace of New York City. Once again in love with the option of a vegan café, Polynesian bar, Indian fast food and Kosher deli all on one block, if not in one restaurant. How can Bennington, Vermont even compare?

BUT, I have held on to some of the relaxed contentment I experienced on my trip. No feeling can compare to that of being on the open road, watching the trees pass, stopping in adorable towns along the way and African dancing amidst the autumn leaves.

Here’s my humble attempt to share this moving experience with you:



(soundtrack by Iron & Wine)

They never use my good stuff.

I consider myself to be a talented copywriter. I joke around a lot, but when it comes to writing good copy, I can focus and be productive. However, with this particular assignment, I’m having a hard time taking the work seriously. I recognize that chronic constipation is a real problem for many people. But dude, I'm writing about poop.
I think the art director with whom I’m working, we’ll call him “Ken,” is getting annoyed.

ME: I have an idea for a headline.

KEN: What?

ME: At ______, we understand that you don’t have time for this crap. Get it? Crap?

KEN: I’ve been working on this client for two years. I’ve heard it all.

ME: How about this one – “Chronic constipation can be a real pain in the ass.”

KEN: Believe me, after two years, it stops being funny.

ME: “You say you have chronic constipation, but your doctor thinks you’re full of shit.”

Still writing about constipation

It's ironic, because just this weekend, I was watching TV at home with Claire and we were laughing at some terrible commercial for Pepto-Bismol. We watched in horror as giant super heroes grabbed their stomachs and butt cheeks in pain while cheery voiceover sang the catchy "Heartburn, indigestion, diarrhea" jingle in the background. I thought to myself, "Thank GOD I don't have to write crap like that."

And I still don't. For what I'm writing about is the opposite of diarrhea. Constipation is sooo much cooler. If diarrhea were to ask constipation to go junior prom together, constipation would totally say no, because constipation is, like, so out of diarrhea's league.

I have to keep laughing at this assignment because if I don't, I will cry. However, I should count my blessings. I just found out that another medication this agency writes for is a treatment for genital herpes. I’m one lucky gal to be stuck with chronic constipation. Wait, that came out wrong.

Coffee and a bran muffin ain't working?

It's a new week. A new season. And a new job. That's right, started a new freelance job today. As you know, I can't state company names, but it's another big well-known agency. One that I know produces quality and creative work.

I was excited this morning to be starting out at a new place. Excited for new people, new clients, new projects… then I got my first assignment. I will be writing about medication for chronic constipation and IBS.

I kid you not.

You can call it fancy names like “slow moving digestion” and “infrequent bowel movements,” and I recognize that New York's ad industry is fueled by many big pharmaceutical companies, but let's get down to the point here - I'm writing about poop. Or, more specifically lack thereof.

Ya know, I'm trying not to be picky. I know I'm new to New York industry and only have a few years copywriting experience. I'm happy with what I can get. And I like this new office - I do.

Let's discuss the pros and cons…

Pro: The agency's in a great location, near lots of cool stuff and not nearly as crowded as midtown.
Con: I have to use words like “bloating” and “straining” in the brochure I'm writing.
Pro: My office has a huge window with a beautiful view of the city.
Con: The phrase “hard or lumpy stools” will most likely appear in my copy, possible multiple times.
Pro: The building has a very cool interior design - open, modern, spacious.
Con: I have to not only type, but actually visualize the concept of rectal bleeding.
Pro: The salary is ideal.
Con: I am forced to inform people that they should cease taking the medication if they get so much diarrhea that they get light-headed and faint!

So much diarrhea that they get light-headed and faint?!? Ugh, I think I need another vacation.

Mission Autumn Enjoyment: COMPLETED

Back in Brooklyn. Back in the land of too many people and not enough parking spaces. Instead of waking to birds chirping, I woke up this morning to honking horns and cars blasting hip hop at ear-splitting levels. Home, sweet home.

Here are a few favorite pics from the trip. More to come soon.

Keep on truckin'

Cruising down the 114 South from Providence to Newport, RI. Baby Dayliner on the stereo. Cool, grey water on my left, fiery autumn trees on my right. This is one of those times when I say to myself, “Remember this moment. This is a rad fucking moment.”

If there’s one thing that’s been great about this trip, it’s that the traveling has been as much fun (if not more) than the destinations. The cities I’ve visited have been beautiful and interesting, but the roads in between them, the trees and the lakes and the little towns – those are the parts that I enjoyed most.

I’m going to steal a line here from a girl in my copywriting class a few years ago, I think it was an ad for Amtrak or something: “Somewhere on your way from A to B, you realize the distance between the two is the point.”

Excuse me while I pretend to be deep for a moment. This road trip experience is a good lesson for life – it’s not about getting to each milestone, it’s about enjoying the journey. It’s about appreciating the sights along the way, listening to good music, and always looking before you change lanes. I think I just lost the metaphor at the end there. But you get my point.

P.S.
I pulled over into some person’s driveway to write this, and miraculously, there’s a wireless signal here. Things really are working out quite nicely.

One if by land, two if by... um, plane?

Massachusetts. The “Spirit of America.” And yet another state I can’t write correctly without spell check.

Touring around Eastern Mass these last few days, I’ve learned a lot about the origins of this land they call the Home of the Free.

In Boston I saw a statue of Samuel Adams (famous for his beer) and the home of Paul Revere (famous for his song with the Beastie Boys). Yes, seeped in American history, this area is.

In Lexington, I saw the place where people gathered and revolted, fighting for what they believed in.

And in Salem, I saw the place where they tried and killed a number of women believe them to be witches.

Ah, America. Well, nobody's perfect.

The Open Road

Driving with no destination,
No where to be nor when.
It’s more than a vacation,
It’s complete and utter zen.
The iPod plays, small towns pass,
Tree after glowing tree.
With a borrowed car, a few tanks of gas,
I finally feel free.

Brilliant menu item

The Quebecois got it right. Talk about a good idea for a Sunday morning.

Voulez vous coucher avec moi?

Eventually I start just nodding and smiling rather than explain that I forgot every word of French I ever learned in high school. Nod and smile. Who knows how many unseemly things I’ve agreed too as opposed to saying that I don’t understand anything they’re saying. Shauna and I have been getting by fine though, we just move to the next bar when the French Canadian boys get too creepy.

Despite the language barrier (which doesn’t really exist because everyone speaks English once you ask), Montreal is a lovely city. Here are a few shots. Why are they all black and white? Because these were all taken in Old Town (Vieux-Montreal) and color didn’t exist back then.

Okay, it’s just cause I want them to appear deep and pensive as opposed to grey and dreary like the weather today.

Road Trippin'

How strange, after spending two days soaking in Old Timey Americana – perusing the Norman Rockwell Museum, hiking in the Green Mountains of Vermont, buying maple syrup from old ladies at the side of the road – we cross one little border and now we're in a whole new country. In a city that doesn’t speak any English. So crazy, that Canada.

It’s been a fun two days. Lots of beautiful trees and lots of driving. And lots of Montreal punk rock bars. Well, just one Montreal punk rock bar. Leaving me utterly exhausted. Get it, LEAVing. Sorry, it’s been a long day.

Here are some highlights from yesterday's drive through Connecticut and Massachusetts.

Beautiful trees.



Beautiful cemetaries.



Beautiful ladies.


And beautiful sunsets.



The end to a very beautiful day.

Early riser

Whoopee, I'm up at 7 and I'm SO excited to be going on a road trip instead of going to work. Hooray. Plus, the rain has stopped. Cross your fingers that it stays away.

M.A.E.

T minus seven hours until Mission Autumn Enjoyment commences. That is, if I’m actually capable of waking up at 7am, something I haven’t done in a number of years. Going to bed before 1am would probably help. I’m too excited though; the leaves are at their peak right now. See Foliage Report #10. (I never really cared about leaves before, perhaps this is a new development from living in NY. Though there are more trees on my street here than there were in SF. Strange.)



Blogging for the next week will be done on the road. I will be sure to report fully on how Project Pretty Tree plays out. So far, it looks like it will be heavy on the rain and fog. I hope this will not impede the mission. Tomorrow we'll be heading north through Connecticut, Massachusetts and possibly the southern part of Vermont. I'll post pics.

Third grade genius

I just completed my first night of mentoring. It was interesting, though not quite was I was expecting. I imagined that my 8-year-old boy from the projects would be, I don’t know, a little behind in school? Maybe in need of some help? I mean, isn’t that why they’re in the program? As it turns out, the kid is smarter than I am. I’m not sure what good I’ll be to him. Here’s an excerpt from our conversation today:

Him: “Is this how you spell ‘Connecticut?’”
Me: “Um, I don’t know.”
If anything, I’ll be able to teach him how to use a dictionary. And an atlas. And spellcheck. Three items without which I would have never graduated from college.

I suggested we draw a monster together. I drew the head and he, the body.
“See, it’s part dog, part bird, part bear and that,” he pointed proudly to the fourth limb. “Is his mechanical arm.”
“Cool.” I said, honestly impressed. “I made the monster’s head look like a pumpkin ‘cause, um, ya know, Halloween’s coming up and all.”

I think perhaps I bored him. He looked wistfully past our Boggle game to the next child-sized table where another mentor-mentee pair sat playing chess.
“I know,” He suggested. “Maybe I’ll play chess with Brianna and you can play Boggle with her mentor?”
Yeah, I think that defeats the purpose of this whole program, kid. I know I’m dull and a shitty speller, but you’re stuck with me.

Maybe next time I'll bring in some of my work assignments so he can write them.

Putting the "Man" in Manhattan.

It never fails to entertain on the train each day. Every time I look at the New York subway map, I can't help but be reminded of the scientific male genitalia drawing we were forced to examine in Human Anatomy class. Seriously, I'm not just being a perv, check it out.



This means that I live somewhere in the lower testicle region. And I work smack dab in the middle of the urethra. At least I don't live on Semen Island (for that lovely visual you'll have to look at a map that shows Staten Island, a stain-shaped puddle of land located just south of Manhattan)

Project Pretty-Tree

The project I am currently working on ((Hepatitis education for prisoners) is ending next Wednesday. Which means mid-October, I will officially be between projects. Which means... it’s vacation time!

I thought long and hard about where I would like to take my mid-October vacation… Journey back to Cambodia? Hike Machu Picchu in Peru? Navigate the fjords of Scandinavia. And then it occurred to me – the perfect Autumn destination…

Exotic, exciting… New England!

It’s prime foliage watching time, the season when the leaves turn into all the colors of the rainbow. (I’ve heard tales of this thing called “Autumn” during my 29 years in California). I’ve never been up to New England, and what better time than when I’m living in New York – I’m only a few hours’ drive from the gorgeous forests of the Northeast, and my incredibly wonderful friend Michael is lending me his car!

Totally perfect right?

Until the project I’m working on got extended, cutting right into my vacation time. Thus sparking this chat:

Shauna: My boss always said, the beauty of freelancing is that you can make your own schedule; rearrange if a project comes up. Just tell your boss a project came up. Project Peak Foliage Time.

Me: Exactly! And you never know how long those PFT projects will take – could be weeks.

Shauna: Project Pretty-Tree

Me: I’ll just tell her that I can’t be in on Friday because I have an important operation… Operation Falling Leaf.

Shauna: Yeah! In any case, PENEL is a priority, any boss should understand that. (Project Enjoy New England Leaves)

Me: PENEL is a once-a-year opportunity and we are required by the ALA (Autumn Leaf Association) to take advantage!

Shauna: Yeah didn't your boss get the memo about this year's PAFOP (Proper Autumn Foliage Observation Protocol) regulations?

Me: As if leaf-peeping wasn't dorky enough, we're currently winning the MPLD (Medal for Prime Leaf Dorkage)

Shauna: Totally

But, all that being said, it truly will be peak leaf time next week, as you can see here in the Foliage Color Report #9.



Therefore, Shauna and I are taking the only appropriate action in this circumstance and leaving for New England next week to peep some serious fall foliage! Hooray, Mission: Autumn Enjoyment is in full effect!

Spokes-woman

Biking through Manhattan is, in a word, exhilarating.

Yesterday it took me forty minutes to bike to work – over the Brooklyn Bridge, through the Financial District, up the Westside Highway. It was great. But I gotta say that my favorite part of biking Manhattan is, shockingly, midtown (wearing a helmet, a neon yellow vest and a special no-hit shield made of fiberglass, mom).

At lunch I pedaled my way over to Park Ave. and 46th. Weaving through the taxis and police cars, tourists and businessmen, garbage trucks and delivery vans, I truly felt, I don’t know, like a New Yorker. I felt like I was part of something. I even took my iPod earbuds out to listen to the sounds of the city. It was exciting.

I was part of the brave group of cyclists that battle the Manhattan traffic everyday. A diverse crowd including Chinese food delivery men, Thai food delivery men and Japanese food delivery men. I was tempted to hang two plastic bags of take-out from my handlebars just to fit in.

But being in that traffic, in that collective energy, in that living, breathing chaos – what a rush. Which is why I’ve decided to quit my job and become a bike messenger.

Signs

I took a picture with my camera phone of this sign I saw in Penn Station yesterday. As far as I can guess, it reads:

Info | Men's Room | Ladies' Room | Questionable Umbrella Glove

Um, I know I'm not a native New Yorker, but does this make sense to anyone?

Nice Tips

Last Thursday was Claire's birthday. Because of her undying work ethic, Claire decided to labor for her birthday. She volunteered to be a guest bartender at a local pub. To help her in her efforts, Cate and I silkscreened Claire a shirt. What good roommates we are.



Claire did an excellent job behind the bar.



And, as her loyal friends, we did an excellent job in front of it.



An excellent job getting drunk.



And an excellent job shooting things.



P.S. Don’t play with guns.

Mini-cupcakes. Major hassle.

"Hi, we wanted to buy mini-cupcakes for our friend's birthday. Do you have those?"

"We can make them, but you need to order them in advance."

"Okay, great. We need two dozen mini-cupcakes by tomorrow night. Is that doable?"

"Uh, these are mini-cupcakes you're talking about here."

"Uh huh."

"We don't usually make mini-cupcakes."

(blink, blink)

"We usually make regular sized cupcakes."

(blink, blink)

"So we'll need at least a week."

"Uh huh. I see. Okay, thanks for your time."

As we left the bakery, I turned to Cate. "Did she just say: 'These are mini-cupcakes you're talking about here.' as if we ordered two dozen grams of plutonium or something."

"Yes, Audrey. The creation of mini-cupcakes is no simple process. You need mini-cupcake tins, mini frosting, mini-cupcake papers, mini-eggs..."

"Hmmm, good point. Of course it takes seven days."