tsunami total

Earlier this week the New York Times stated that 5,395 were killed in the tsunami. That is a very different number from the 100,000 that was reported last year after the terrible incident. 100,000 is the kind of number that made me want to donate my life savings. What's up with the very disparate calculations?

tarot revelations

Ben Fine read my cards last night. I think what sums it up is a quote by Joseph Campbell:
We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.

sparkling holidays

Wishing you a beautiful time after the great winter soltice - merry christmas, happy hannukah, the festival of lights, cheery kwanzaa, and of course a fabulous new year.

I've received lovely xmas cards this month, but one of my favorites has to be the one from the Japanese hitchhikers I picked up by the Queensboro Bridge during the strike. One of the girls drew a crying sun and underneath it said:

Happy!!!
Have A Happy Holydays

:)

Luxury travel

The trains are back. I'm ecstatic about it. It's great to see the platform performers, the panhandlers, the newspaper stands, the conductors... I heard a guy say on the radio that he was going to hug a homeless person on the subway and welcome him home (sad I know). I told my conductor on the E today that it was like luxury travel and he laughed. He said he hadn't heard that one yet.

Sitting back and sipping coffee while my underground chauffeur takes me to my destination is awesome... It's also nice that a lot of New Yorkers are gone today for xmas...next week it'll be rush hour all over again and I'll be ready to beat up the stinky person next to me. But for now, it's all heavenly.

everything has to be about the strike

The transit strike is all I've been thinking about. When I turn on the radio it's all I want to hear about. When I talk with people I want to know how they're doing with regard to getting around town. So it's weird to get emails from friends and family in California and Boston and Iowa, that are not about the strike. Don't they know what we're going through? It's mayhem in NY without our ride! (I was happy to finally see CNN reporting on the strike yesterday, that's more like it.)

I was interviewed for the Daily News about picking up hitchhikers. We'll see if I make it into the story tomorrow.

The Tookie Manifesto

Schwarzenegger still acting like The Terminator...

In case you were curious about the Tookie Williams peace protocol, now adopted by the most recognized gangs in America:
http://www.tookie.com/protocol/table.of.contents.html

magazine sensitive

For a while I put my New Yorker subscription on hold because I could no longer stand to read Anthony Lane's movie reviews. Every single one was negative and I'd had it. I also got really mad after reading Sascha Frere Jones' review of The Pixies reunion when she said no one was really that into them the first time around. Fuck you. I was and I was devastated when they broke up. Because I'd never seen them in concert. And my friends were into The Pixies too. So double fuck you to Sascha because she obviously doesn't know what no one means.

Anyway, I get angry at magazine writers. I cancelled my Jane subscription because a guy I know wrote a sexist article (against men) and I had had it with all the sexism that I just said no more. If we're gonna be equal, we gotta be nice to guys too.

OK the point of all this is that Anthony Lane actually wrote something positive about a film. He liked Brokeback Mountain. And he said it was neither gay nor a western.**

**Speaking of westerns, my friend Will's movie about Batman and Robin got into Sundance. Extremely exciting. It's not a Western and there's no duel, but they are a dynamic duo!

Check out Will's film site www.redheadedleague.com. (I'm in a few of the flicks.)