Red-eye rants

So I’m sitting at the gate waiting for my JetBlue flight to Cally to leave, and all I can say is, thank God for the free wi-fi here. Another reason to love JetBlue. It’s 5 am and I’ve been here already for about a half hour even though my flight doesn’t leave until 6.45 because freakin’ SuperShuttle insists on picking you up three hours before your flight, even though there is absolutely no traffic on the road at 3.30 am, even in New York City.

I don’t really want to sleep in my chair, so I thought I’d blog, even though I’m bleary-eyed and totally delirious from sleep deprivation. While I was packing earlier tonight (last night?) I was watching episodes of American Idol and Top Chef, two of my favorite reality shows. On Top Chef the final two are Ilan and Marcel, which the producers probably planned because they pretty much hate each other on the show. Well, all the other chefs have pretty much hated Marcel throughout the show because he’s a cocky nerd who gets on everyone’s nerves, but the boy can cook and plate and makes foams out of pretty much any liquid.

My pick to win from pretty early on in the competition though was Ilan, though I must admit I lost the faith a little based upon the recent reaction from the judges to some of his more curious dishes (a desert made from chocolate and liver--what?). But definitely he, Cliff and Sam were my top choices, except that Cliff got kicked off for manhandling Marcel and Sexy Sam got kicked off during the Hawaii challenge for not actually cooking any of the Hawaiian dishes he presented (i.e, his dishes were mostly just prepared but not set to a flame of some sort, I think).

I actually saw Ilan at Casa Mono, Mario Batalli’s tapas restaurant where he works as a line cook, and where they serve a lot of things that go in Scrapple (I’ve since learned from the show that such things are called “offal” in haute cuisine.) The food overall was good, and our party had it’s share of interesting dishes, including cock’s comb, which really comes out red and jelly-like and in the spiky shape of a cock’s comb. It almost looks like red jello made from the mold of a cut-off star. Ilan looked pretty much like Ilan except he was wearing really big nerd glasses. Still a cutie-patootie though. Even if he’s a winner I guess he still has to do his day job until the winning episode airs. No one really seemed to be gawking at him, so I wonder if people in the restaurant even knew that he could very well be America’s Next Top Chef.

Ilan’s not the only reality TV star I’ve had a real-world encounter with. Ian Benardo was a really bad contestant on So You Think You Can Dance, and last night was a really bad contestant on the latest episode of Idol (he readily admits he has two therapists who tell him he can sing and dance). I actually saw him walking in the East Village this past summer, and he was unmistakable, with his sweat headband.

Sigh…more time to kill. What else should we talk about as I delete the 300+ messages in my junk Hotmail account? Here’s some interesting tidbits:

In other news:

Surimi, the designer imposter otherwise known as imitation crab meat (and what non-authentic sushi eaters put in their California rolls) can now legally be labeled as "Crab-flavored seafood, made with surimi, a fully cooked fish protein." Is that like bacon-flavored bits or grape “drink”? I grew up on “grape drink” (I don’t think it could be legally called soda) and I think the real description for it was supposed to be processed sugar water. What I don’t understand is why they don’t just label it “surimi?” That almost sounds like sashimi, and is fancier than either “imitation crab meat” or “crab flavored fish proteins.”

This story perfectly exemplifies the lengths men will go to to NOT have to ask for directions.


Okay, almost time to board--and to get out of this freakin' freezing NYC weather!

Five-second movie haiku reviews

So while I’m waiting for my at-home dye job to complete its magic, thought I’d provide a few more haiku reviews. Now that American Idol is in full swing, I’ll have to do them here instead. Here’s a few more recent flicks I’ve caught:

The Departed
Faithful to Hong Kong
version, and Leo is great,
but Jack still steals show.

The Little Children
Sordid affair plot
That proves adults aren't mature
Subplots make the film.

Dreamgirls
Jennifer Hudson
is the real star. She should win
an award—and did!

Notes on a Scandal
Cate makes BIG mistakes
But Judi is the real wench.
Twisted, but great plot.

Blood Diamond
Lots of disturbing
images of kids with guns.
You should toss your rings.

Discipline update: Week One

Okay, so it’s been about a week since I’ve made a resolution to be more disciplined, and I think tracking it will help keep me more accountable. I think by disciplined, I mostly mean that I want to be less lazy in all facets of my life and stop procrastinating so much. Of all the seven deadly sins, sloth is by far the one I have the hardest problem with. People used to joke that in college my default mode was sleep, and it’s true—I used to sleep in the front row of my sociology 101 class with my jacket over my head in full view of my prof. What was I thinking??!! I would have hated me if I were her.

So I’ve been pretty good about going to the gym when I have a free night, but I’ve also been good about not having the gym take over my life—for instance, last week I forewent my favorite hip-hop/step duo of gym classes to exercise my brain and attend a screening with a friend of this documentary of playwright Tony Kushner, and listen to a Q&A with him afterward at the 92nd St. Y. Boy, can Tony talk. And talk. And talk. And talk some more about what a raging liberal he is. There is definitely no middle-of-the-road for him, and the documentary focuses a lot on his political activism. Overall though, the Q&A and Tony himself are quite intriguing. I didn’t know he also wrote some musicals and books. But I felt the documentary was only okay—it was a little slow at times.

I’ve also been trying to be more disciplined at work by surfing the Net less, trying to answer e-mails right away, and space my work out so I’m not in a last-minute crunch (like now, but I count this as a result of activities that I did or did not do prior to setting my resolution. And technically while I’m writing this I could be doing real work, but it’s 2 am and my brain is fried). I stayed till after 10 pm today to write a story and did NOT IM all day. That’s asking a lot of me. Of course, I didn’t finish, so I’m planning to wake up really early tomorrow and get to work before everyone else (Ha.)

But here’s a sign that I still need a little help. While eating the half of my Saigon Grill Bun Xao lunch that I didn’t finish for dinner, I realized I was getting fish sauce on my fingers. Instead of walking the 50 feet to my work kitchen to get a paper towel, I took a blank sheet of paper off my desk and used it as a napkin. I even used it to wipe the fish sauce off my face when I accidentally pushed the cap down too hard on the little container, sending a spray on me.

Eventually though, I did haul my ass to the kitchen cuz I realized fish sauce don’t smell so good when you use only 8.5 X 11 20-lb paper stock to get it off. You actually do need a wet paper towel. There’s hope for me yet.

In other news: Does this mean I only view Clive Owen as a fling, while Orlando Bloom would be my husband? At the very least, it does explain why I think manly pretty boy Wentworth Miller is a perfect 10.

It’s already 2007??

This holiday season has been lovely. I got good gifts, gave good gifts, saw the Nutcracker, and vegged out to several late nights of Dog Whisperer Week.

So I had big plans for ringing in 2007. Big. Me, one who loathes running and starts panting after a quarter mile, had this big plan to do the 4-mile Midnight Run in Central Park. Last year, I went to cheer on some friends who did it, and I thought this year I’d kickstart my new year’s resolution of being disciplined by forcing myself to run.

Problem is, whenever I looked at details of the race, I would google it, and Google’s results would take me to the 2005 race page, when the entry free was $35. It never occurred to me I was looking at the wrong page—the 2007 entry fee was $50. How’s that for inflation? That was supposed to be my drinking money. So that idea was pooh poohed. However, before going out for the night, I decided to run about 2 miles along Central Park, so I still feel I was a bit disciplined. (Including the fact that I was a gym a-hole this past week to “train” for my 4-mile run—I worked out T, W, Th, Sat, and Sun. A pace I am sure to NOT keep up.)

The rest of the night was lovely, spent partly at a party in some loft of some person I would never have met without a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend-connection because he was clearly out of the income range of people I would know, judging by his apartment; and partly at Schiller’s, which was surprisingly not that crowded, but unsurprisingly as beautiful-people pretentious as usual.

Anywho, here’s to resolutions (can I keep this “discipline” thing up?), new experiences, new decisions, new successes, and probably a few new failures as well. Hopefully it'll all be stuff that will make me a more well-rounded (not literally, one hopes).

Happy New Year!