Wednesday, September 27, 2006

New York Grannies

Now I'm not naturally of irritable comportment. To be sure, it takes more than the errant swashbuckler to ruffle the McPipe feathers. But I must say, the grannies of New York are somewhat driving me to the end of my tether.

About a year ago, I wrote a post about NY grannies, racing around on their zimmerframes. And I mentioned how endearing I found them. A year later, having had time to sufficiently meditate over my opinion, I must confess to a somewhat differing perspective.

More than anyone I know, I'm a lover of ye olde peoples. Their kindly eyes and dentured smiles, the white sneakers and oversized coats, the way they launch into lengthy tales of reminiscence, assuming that you too have all day to sit by them on the park bench, soaking in the sun - these are all part and parcel of being olde peoples, and I'm a lover of it all.

That is, except the New York Grannies, who are a species of their own.

Hurtling down the crowded sidewalks, zimmerframes thrust forth like weapons of mass destruction. ZimmerGrannies.

Weaving through (and over and under and within and without) the sidewalk crowds, elbows stuck out as they forge their way through the unsuspecting throngs. ZipperGrannies.

This afternoon, as I strolled peacefully towards the park to indulge in a spot of lunchtime reading in the sun, I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my side. Looked down, and there was a belligerent grannie, glaring up at me over her rimmed glasses, eyes disconcertingly magnified behind the ponderous lenses. "Move it!" she barked. I was instantly irritated, but obligingly stepped out of the way. Not because maturity demanded that I dont' stoop down to her level of rudeness. Oh no, no such moral high horse for me. Mostly just because she had scared the jeebies out of me. So I stepped off her sidewalk, and she clumped angrily by.

Which reminded me of a scene Doobie had witnessed, not so long ago. A granny was crossing the avenue, when a car started to turn the same corner. Spotting Granny, the car slowed to a halt before reaching the crossing, but probably still came too close to her for her comfort. What would you have done in this situation? Given the driver a dirty look? Shuffled hurriedly on? Well, Granny stopped there in the middle of the road, brandished her cane on high in a likely Don Quixote impression (coming dangerously close to toppling over), and screamed "PHEHCK OHFF!!!" at the poor driver. Pedestrians around, New Yorkers hardened to any kind of weirdness, stopped to gawk. The driver, a New York taxi driver who's probably had guns pulled
at his head, cowered quiveringly behind his wheel.

If such be the rules of life, I'm going to have to see to it that I don't grow old in this city.

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Am I not meant to own a camera?

You may recall my run of bad luck with cameras a year ago: Lost my old camera, so bought a new one, lost the new one a week later, then miraculously found the old one, so returned to status quo with the old camera, but only $500 poorer.

But what with a year having passed since that series of unfortunate events, the urge to have a new camera tugged once again at my heartstrings. And rationalism, usually the check and balance to my impulsiveness, offered little resistance. So new camera it was.

Having only recently made my first tentative forays into the world of online shopping, I was especially determined to buy my new digital camera online. The assessment and decision-making process in choosing the exact camera was elaborate, if not empirically substantive.

I asked friends and colleagues for recommendations, and the majority opinion seemed to incline towards Canon. Then I walked all the way over to BestBuy, torpedoed straight over to the Canons, and was relieved to see they were also the prettiest and smallest ones on the shelf. Then walked all the way back to the office, and indulged in a spot of internet research and informative googling. I dappled in a smidgeon of online brand comparison, just enough to sufficiently reassure myself that the Canons which were the prettiest were also reasonably competitive in function and cost.

Then I took a deep breath, crossed my fingers, logged into the BestBuy site, and paid for the camera online. That's all I had to do, the trusty site informed me, and poof! the camera would appear at my doorstep in two days. So I pressed the 'confirm purchase' button and held my breath.

Five days later, I was still holding my breath.

I knew this internet shopping thing just doesn't work! I thought to myself irritably. So I logged back into my BestBuy account to track my order. And what did I find?

Razorsharp Ficali had input the 'delivery to' address as a mix of the office address (West Village) and home address (mid-town East), in an interesting melange which would lead nowhere. Yep, street number of one and postcode of the other, to create an imaginary place that existed only in the fantasy of my own mind. And in the mean time, the camera's been shuttling around conscientiously, but fruitlessly, defying geography, reality and the precision of GoogleMaps, in the black hole of the UPS.

Oh dear. I look forward to an interesting conversation with UPS tomorrow.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Some islands, you just can't leave

Delta was due to fly back from Athens on Tuesday. So Tuesday afternoon, I texted him:
Welcome back to NY!

I immediately got a response:
Still in Athens. Missed flight. Long story.

Missed his flight?? How can a pilot miss his flight?! So I shot back:
What happened?!

Plane six hours late. I went out for lunch, came back, flt left without me. Not my fault. Took other pilot from previous flight.

Oh dear. And so it came about that brave Delta, for a fault no greater than wanting a quick bite to eat, ended up missing the flight he was due to pilot. Heh! What is this world coming to.

Monday, September 18, 2006

Cirque de So-Lame

There comes a moment in all our lives when we must stand atop and afar, and gaze down at life with distanced perspective. For me, that moment was enforced from up high on the launching platform of the New York Trapeze School.

I can't remember at what point it was, when it first came upon us that we simply HAD to do the trapeze. And so, this weekend past found us, with much trepidation, shivering and quivering at the trapeze school on the Westside Highway.

"Erm," Jenn said nervously, "what if the harness breaks and we fall down from the trapeze and bounce off the safety net onto the floor and we land on our heads and we die?"
We looked at her incredulously. Not because we didn't believe that the string of coincidences was possible, but because we couldn't believe she had just spelled out our suppressed (and very rational) fears.

Of course, some of us took to it like naturals, and made the whole act seem elegant and graceful.

And then, there were, erm, others, who.... well, got a bit over-excited.

But THEN, there was the catch! The best feeling ever, to be caugh in mid-air and swung around!

Weehee! I thought, in my head. But it must have actually been out loud, cos when he put me down, the instructor shook his head and smiled, "boy, you're the noisiest trapezist I've ever seen!"

Oh.

Street smart and city slick

After much perturbed pontification and postulation, Doobie, Bobbis and I decided it was time to invest in a new bolt for the door. Then, like every bright idea, we at once were faced with an immediate seemingly unsurmountable hurde: cost. Have you seen what locks cost nowadays?! Just the basic multi-unpickable-can't-do-without-lock??! Hundreds!

I was aghast. Doobie was appalled. Bobbis was agog.

And then, as we were entering our building, Doobie and I ran into the locksmith repairing the maindoor of our building. Just coincidentally. As one does. You know.
"Hello, you," I said. "When you're done with this lock do you have the time to come see our lock too?"
"You want new bolt? Cost 350 call to my company," he said.
"No that's too expensive!" Doobie argued.
"Tell to my company," he countered.

Doobie and I glanced at eachother. Now how were we going to make the transition from where we were to getting him to do the work, for less, outside of his company? What is the next step? How does one put the proposition out there when you know its not entirely legit?

So I said very eloquently, "Erm. You know. Erm..."
But I guess that's the official language, because then he said, "If you want I do it for you myself, you no call company, and you give to me 165 no credit card only cash"

Yay!

And that's the story of how, smooth slicktalking streetsmart Doobie, Bobbis and Ficali now have a new lock on their door.

Sunday, September 17, 2006

Sorry, Mr. Thief

In our run-up to our one-year anniversary in this fair city, we found ourselves faced with the quintessential New York experience. Our apartment was broken into.

Friday evening, upon returning home from work, Doobie rushed straight into my room, where I'd been beavering away industriously. "Ficali did you open my bedroom window??!"
"No, why would I?" I responded, puzzled, since I've always known how particular Doobie is about keeping her window pulled shut. We both walked back into her room, and looked at the gaping window in puzzlement.

"Oh look!" She suddenly exclaimed. "Someone's been in my room!"
And then, glancing around, "someone's gone through my stuff!"
And then, stepping in closer to examine her bed, "someone has walked on my bed with their shoes on!"

And like that, much in the same way that the three bears sleuthed their way to the realisation that their abode had been intruded upon by Goldilocks, it dawned upon Doobie and me that we too had had an intruder.

That in itself was enough to infuriate us and fill us with a sense of invaded privacy. Calm down, oh thumping hearts!

But then, upon further perusal and astute summation, we realised pretty quickly that our losses were limited. A camera, and some junk jewelry.
"Did you lose anything of value?"
"No. Did you?"
"I don't own anything of value."

Sorry, Mr. Thief, that of all the apartments you could have broken into, you ended up at one where there was nothing worth stealing. And I'm sorry you thought to take the junk jewelry but leave this dear laptop.

Heh heh.

Friday, September 15, 2006

Kiltman

We were all hanging out in Doobie's room, shootin' the breeze before the Roger Waters concert. Dougal had somehow managed to acquire tickets for us at the last minute, so there was a general feel of excitement and spontaneous thrill in the air.

"So what kind of a name is Dougal anyway?" someone asked, and we all turned to stare at Dougal questionningly.
"Erm, I think its a Scottish name, not sure where it comes from," Dougal mumbled, as he always tends to do when the subject of his name emerges (which it inevitably does often).
"Oh, I know!" I input brightly. I already had automatic authority and street cred bestowed upon me by virtue of having lived in the UK and this being a Scottish name. "A Dougal is a kind of kilt, isnt it?" Of course this was far from the truth. Of course I'd just plucked the first Scottish item that entered my mind. Sometimes, I don't know where this mental skittishness comes from.

There was a marked silence. Dougal, rough and outdoorsy character that he be, was decidedly unimpressed with his being likened to a kilt.

"No," he said, in disbelief. "That can't be!"
"Sure," I insisted persuasively. "Everyone who lives in the UK knows a dougal is a kind of kilt! Infact, its one of those designer cashmere kilts," I added with a sly grin, knowing this would be even more horrifying for him.
"I don't want to be a cashmere kilt!" he grumbled. "Ficali, are you messing with me?"
"Hey, if I was messing with you I'd have called you bagpipes, wouldn't I?"
He was still suspicious. Frankly, I'm surprised I could instil even an iota of belief. But there you go, I guess not everyone is as streetwise as yours truly. He looked at me with narrowed eyes, "I'm going to google that when I get home,".
I shrugged with feigned nonchalance. That's my fallback reaction when I don't trust my mouth to speak without laughing.

The next morning, when I checked my email, there was a note from Dougal, prompt and early: "After having done comprehensive internet research, I can say with 100% certainty that a dougal is not a scottish kilt."

Hardly to be dissuaded by such gentle rebuffs, I found myself wondering whether a dougal did actually mean anything. So I searched it on my handy ready-reckoner, www.urbandictionary.com.

Didn't really expect it to have a meaning.

But what do you know - here's what came up: A dougal: a klutz, or someone who takes a longggg time to do something that would normaly take seconds.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dougal

Poor chap! I'd have rathered believe I was named after a kilt, methinks! Oh, how its sometimes just best to let sleeping dogs lie.

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Gadgets that zig but don't zag

Macklaine's about to take the plunge in abandoning his current job and embarking on a mission of cerebral expansion in the world of software development. I, as an HR bod for techie nerds, am the most excited from this swerve in life's long road. From slacker to hacker, whaddaya know. Leaps and bounds ahead of the gun as usual, I've already started envisioning a future with Macklaine and I working at the same company, perhaps him even transitioning over to lovely New York, etc etc etc.

So I've been considerably enthused (and supportive) about his java-coding studies.

And then the other day he IM'd me: "Hey Ficali, I've coded a program for a web-based calculator! Check this out!" and he sent me a link which, when clicked upon dutifullyl, opened a screen that looked like a caculator.
"Use it! Use it!" he urged.
So I typed in a tentative 2 + 2, and it threw back my way a proud and blazing 4.
"Try more complicated stuff!" he urged.
So I typed 3745.23 + 2947.79, and it instantly flourished a series of digits which I could only assume were the correct answer.
"Fantastic, Macklaine!" I enthused.

But then I got cocky, and typed in a 5 * 2.
ERROR ERROR
Eh? Macklaine? What's up with that?
"Sorry," he said sheepishly, "it, erm, doesn't multiply yet. But it adds pretty well, eh?"

Even as I emitted a hearty laugh (for one must never lose the opportunity to laugh, especially at the expense of others), I couldn't help but feel proud. I mean, who else has a friend who's built a calculator! And now that we have Excel, who needs a calculator that multiplies anyways!