Why the caged lion sings

This is the mini zoo diorama on my desk at work. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but the duck in the foreground is only half an inch tall in real life.

Saturday adventures

I got sick this weekend, a consequence of having to wait in the 26-degree January air for ninety minutes just to get a table at Prune on Saturday. (That's 26 degrees Fahrenheit, you Centigraders!) I was crabby in the cold to begin with, but when we finally got in, the food and fruit juice blend (Meyer lemon, lime, orange and grapefruit) went a long way toward brightening my spirits. I remained in a good mood until that evening, when my body decided to develop a cough and fever. So, no church on Sunday. No blogging on Sunday either.

But if I had blogged on Sunday, I would have written a list of things I saw while out walking on Saturday. Here it is:

• A one-eyed Pekingese on 1st Street. Pekingese dogs are funny-looking enough, but being monocular makes them downright creepy.
• Three small breadfruit floating in a basin of water, at the Essex Street Market. I didn't even know what they were until I asked the Spanish-speaking fruit vendors.
• A chunk of the most beautiful piece of Kobe beef I'd ever seen, in a glass case at the butcher. Also, I saw a chunk of jamón ibérico (Spanish cured ham) at the cheesemonger. Ibérico had been banned from sale in the United States until just last month, so it was the first time I'd seen it. At $99 a pound, I couldn't afford it.
• And also, this was at the discount candy store:

Any way you slice it

Before there was a Pizza Hut in my Malaysian hometown, my mom used to make a homemade version of pizza, which was basically a deep-dish pie filled to the gills with mushrooms, peppers and tomatoes, and baked in a Pyrex plate. I'd have a hard time finding anything like that in New York City, where the most popular style of pizza is one with a thin, chewy crust, a rich tomato sauce, plenty of mozzarella, and no toppings. I have a slice of New York-style pizza once a week, on average (I live just around the block from the first Ray's Pizzeria in New York, and only two blocks from Lombardi's, the nation's first pizzeria). But come visit me in the City and I'll take you to Luzzo's, my favorite Neapolitan pizza joint in Manhattan. We'll order one quattro stagioni and one arugola. And we'll be happier than coals in a brick oven.

Any New Yorker knows that it's hard to find good New York-style pizza outside of the City. My experience has been the farther you travel away from Northeast, the worse the pizza gets. But what do I know? Brush up on the twenty regional pizza styles in the United States by reading this article.

Aye tunes

People used to ask me all the time what music I listen to. And I used to tell them that I listen to everything except country. It's a pretty standard response, especially in this part of the States. When I asked other people the same question, I often got the same response.

But that was a long time ago. Today, I do listen to country (Laura Cantrell, Faith Hill and Johnny Cash, if you're curious). I mean, I'd have to like country music if I listened to as much Christian worship music as I do. And, in fact, I heard lots of country music growing up, in the vein of Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton and John Denver, who were among my dad's favorites.

If you're wondering what kind of music I listen to now, I give you my list of nine songs I listened to the most number of times in 2007 (based on strength of melody, how they hold up to repeated listens, quality of production, and general awesomeness).

"Hard Sun" Eddie Vedder
Brought tears to my eyes and shivers to the back of my neck on first listen, even if Eddie didn't actually write it.

"Slow Show" The National
Not the best song on Boxer. But it's the one with the greatest piano refrain.

"Atlas" Battles
From the year's best album, Mirrored.

"Reckoner" Radiohead
The drums and percussion on this one are astounding.

"Spilt Needles" The Shins
Amazing drum pattern, excellently recorded.

"Straight Lines" Silverchair
I was just stoked to hear Silverchair on the radio twelve years after Frogstomp.

"Come Right Out and Say It" Relient K
Very typical Relient K, but richer harmonies and tighter instrumentation elevate it.

"1234" Feist
The best mainstream single of 2007 (Rihanna's "Umbrella", though good, doesn't come close).

"Detlef Schrempf" Band of Horses
Most atmospheric song named after an ex-NBA player ever.

Bonus: Any of the following off Björk's Volta album: "Declare Independence," "Earth Intruders," "The Dull Flame of Desire," and "Innocence."

By the way

Today, after work, I walked by the apartment building where Heath Ledger died. I wasn't expecting much. It's a nondescript building on Broome Street (as are most of these tony flats in this part of town), a block away from many of my favorite lunch spots. In all honesty, I didn't intend to walk past. I'm not particularly drawn to news scenes, but it was the easiest route home tonight because I was coming from the company's other office.

There were news vans parked on the block; I noticed vans belonging to Fox 5, My9, and the CW. Flash bulbs were going off among a small group of people gathered at the front door of the building. There was a huge pile of flower bouquets at the door as well.

Show business makes strangers into friends. If you watch someone on the movie or TV screen often enough, you start wondering if you might really know them. If you're taken by a piece of art, like a motion picture, you're also drawn to the one who created it. It's a human response. So here were all these humans, responding to a stranger's untimely death in the best way they knew how. Perhaps they'll go home and host a Heath Ledger film festival for their friends, as well. It doesn't seem like a bad way to remember a man.

Too fast, too furious

Since I last wrote, much has happened in my sphere of interest, and I haven't processed everything. Fred Thompson dropped out of the presidential race, Bobby Flay's restaurant Mesa Grill was downgraded by the New York Times to one star, tuna sushi in the City was discovered to contain dangerous amounts of mercury, Heath Ledger died in an apartment a few blocks away from mine, and I couldn't follow any of these news stories properly because of one exhausting sixteen-hour workday.

So please forgive me if I leave it at that. I have a date with my pillow.

In the field of clover

This post, despite the pilfered lyric of a title, is not about "Joker & The Thief" by Wolfmother. I sort of wish it were, though. That song rocks.

Today I saw Cloverfield. I have some brief thoughts on the movie, but they involve certain plot elements that you may not want to read about before you've seen it for yourself. So I've set my thoughts in black below. If you want to read them, just highlight the text, starting here: This was a bleak film. As promised in the trailer, the Statue of Liberty is spectacularly beheaded, and lots of very big things fall or explode, like helicopters, buildings, and a monster. Sounds like a standard action thriller, right? Wrong -- this film was depressing as all get-up. After it was over, I left the theater and walked around lower Manhattan, reliving images from the film in my head, not because I wanted to but because it was unavoidable. I know the film wasn't real, but for almost ninety minutes, I had subjected myself to the inner reality of the film. There was something horrible about watching New York City get trashed -- it was like watching my hometown get trashed. At least in I Am Legend, we don't see the city deteriorate -- we merely see the aftermath. In Cloverfield, there is no aftermath.

Cold comfort

I just turned off the TV. Remember when I wrote that 2007 was a bad year for New York sports? Well, 2008 is already turning out to be a great year for the New York Giants, who have just won the NFC Championship game and are heading to the Super Bowl.

I'm not a football pundit, really, so instead of a lame post-game analysis, here are tips on how to get dinner in NYC during the half-time segment of a Giants football game, without calling ahead and ordering:

• Get dressed at the end of the second quarter, preferably before the two-minute warning.
• Do not pack your cell phone. If you do, your wife might call you after you leave and change her order. This must not be allowed to happen!
• When the clock runs out, so should you.
• Make sure you select an eatery within two blocks of where you live. I decided to go to Whole Foods, which has a prepared food section. Appropriately manly dinner options: fried chicken, mac and cheese, hot wings, french fries, potato chips, salsa and dip. Unacceptable options: sushi, any sort of green vegetables, fruit salad, cake.
• Use the express checkout lane. If you have more items than allowed in the express lane, you have bought too much.
• Pay using a credit or debit card. By doing so, you can begin the payment process before the checkout lady has finished scanning your items.
• Be nice to the checkout lady, but don't pause to chat.
• Once back home, express shock at the fact that your wife has changed the channel. Command the woman to switch back, then apologize for your rudeness and make up for it by patiently explaining the difference between a "touchdown" and an "end zone." Do not laugh at wife when she asks, "Are they at the touchdown yet?"
• Enjoy the second half.

Mogul home

I had dinner with some co-workers tonight. Afterwards, we left the restaurant and walked up Mercer Street in SoHo, just a few blocks away from my apartment. A black Mercedes Maybach pulled over right next to us, and out stepped two men. I barely gave them a glance as they quietly entered an apartment building. In truth, I hadn't even noticed that a $400,000 car had just deposited a couple of nondescript guys on the very sidewalk I was on until my co-worker recognized one of them. "That was Irv Gotti. The other guy must have been his bodyguard."

So now I know where Irv Gotti lives. If you don't know who Irv Gotti is, or don't care, this post is not for you.

I've got mail

Every now and then, I get a Valpak in the mail -- you know, one of those envelopes stuffed with coupons and ads for services that I will never need or want. I got one today. On the front, there's an ad for CSI:NY, featuring Gary Sinise's smirking mug, and a sweepstakes promotion: "You could win a trip to New York City." I'm not even going to try entering. No one ever wins these things anyway.

Some examples of what's in the envelope: Introducing Dial-4-Limo. American Laser Centers: Hair Removal and Skin Rejuvenation. Enjoy Great Pizza at a Great Price. Free Groceries! Save Up To 20% Off Our Computer & Manual Business Checks! Why Settle for Cable?

And then, a true gem among the recycling fodder: Free Dinner Entrée - Buy one dinner entrée, get 2nd one free. It's a coupon for one of our favorite restaurants, Mottsu, the Japanese place across the street. The only thing I don't understand is why they'd bother putting the acute accent over the letter "e" in the word "entrée" and not write a grammatically correct promotional line.

Accident on the 42nd floor

For the past few months, the view from my office has been gradually marred by the construction of Trump SoHo, a 42-story "hotel condominium" located at 246 Spring Street, about seven blocks away. Before the cranes and scaffolding and concrete went up, we had a pretty nice view of the Hudson River. Today, the view got even worse: one of my co-workers stared out the window and noticed that a chunk of the building looked like it had broken off.

We checked the news online. In an effective example of citizen journalism, reports and pictures from the incident were quickly available on local news sites. Gothamist, for example, put up a frequently-updated page with photos taken by neighborhood residents. I remember something similar happening on hundreds of blogs on and after September 11th, 2001.

From what I understand, a construction worker was killed when part of the building collapsed. Scary stuff, and damning for the Donald, whose building has already been in the news for all the wrong reasons multiple times in the last few months.

Oh, and the crumbled corner of the building reminded me of the posters and trailer for Cloverfield.

"You don't look scary"

Yesterday, I was at Penn Station to catch a train. A woman with dark curly hair stopped me as I headed toward the ticket machines: "Can I ask you something? I would ask someone else but you don't look scary and you also look about my age."

I bet she uses the same line on everyone.

"I need to catch a bus to [a city in upstate New York whose name I now forget]. The ticket is $47 and I've gotten about $20 so far. Could you spare some money so I can get home?"

She may have also mentioned why she had no way to withdraw cash from an ATM, but I don't recall, because she spoke very quickly. I looked at her hands and saw a bus schedule and some one- or five-dollar bills. Also, I looked at her face, and although she was wrong about looking my age, she did look sincere. I gave her a $10 bill and wished her good luck getting home.

When I lived in New Brunswick, NJ, I'd often get stopped by men at the train station who claimed that they needed just a few more dollars to buy a ticket to Asbury Park, could I spare some? When I offered to buy the ticket for them outright, however, they refused. One guy made the mistake of approaching me twice in one week with the same sob story (he'd apparently lost his wallet). I gave him a look that would have made my mother disown me.

But something about Miss Curly in Penn Station made me feel some compassion. I'm not the greatest judge of character, though, so I may never know for sure if my $10 went toward that bus ticket. But I don't really care. What would you have done?

Giant step

The NY Giants beat the Dallas Cowboys tonight to make it to the NFC Championship game. 2007 may have been a bad year for New York sports fans, but so far, the new year has proven victorious for NYC's favorite football team. They play the Green Bay Packers next weekend. If they win, it's off to the SuperBowl.

A point of clarification for regular readers of this blog: I am not really a Giants fan, sorry to say. Football is a new and still relatively unfamiliar sport to me, so I haven't really decided who "my team" is. You might say I'm still at the fair weather stage of football fan-hood, although I will profess longstanding admiration for Brett Favre (who, along with Marshall Faulk, was one of the few NFL players I knew by name while I was a fresh-off-the-boat, wet-behind-the-ears foreign student in Indiana).

Living in two states

I've lived in New Jersey longer than I have in New York, so it's not surprising that most of my friends still live across the river from me. It's a strange set-up. I live and work in New York, but on weekends, more often than not I'll be in New Jersey (church is also in Jersey). We spent this morning (Saturday) at home, but we'll be taking the train in this afternoon to hang out with friends, Susie and Dusty.

Many have said in passing that "New York has really changed" me. It must be true to some degree. Here are three things I am doing now that I wasn't doing when I lived in the Garden State:

• Listening to New York bands. One of my favorite new bands is The National, based in Brooklyn. Battles, about whom I've written before, is based in New York. Hem is from Manhattan. Still, not all New York-area bands are worth my time. I still can't listen to Interpol, and The Bravery is one annoying band.
• Shopping for clothing at Bloomingdales. This one needs some explaining. For most of my life, I had a $30 limit on single clothing items. I never bought a pair of jeans that cost more than $30, nor a shirt, nor a winter coat. But at Bloomingdales, you'd be hard-pressed to find an umbrella for less than $30. I'm not saying that there aren't good clothing deals in Manhattan, but I have begun to see the value in buying quality threads that fit me properly (you can partially blame my fashion-industry wife for this awakening). There is also the fact that I work at a Manhattan ad agency to consider. But I'm also a notoriously picky shopper -- even my wife, who buys millions of dollars of clothing for a living, loses patience with me on occasion. This means that even though my jeans budget has gone up, the number of pairs I buy has gone down.
• Being environmentally conscious. It's not that I wasn't before. I was buying compact fluorescent lamps and turning down my thermostat even before moving. But city living has taken that to the next level. Here, there are restaurants for locavores, and just by moving to the city, you are reducing your carbon footprint. The truth is, it's easier to be earth-friendly in New York. So why not be?

An evening with Michel Gondry

Tonight, I saw Michel Gondry speak at the Apple Store in SoHo. I only found out about his free presentation a couple of hours before the event, and I couldn't leave work early enough to grab a seat in the front. So I ended up standing in the back among four hundred other people, who, judging by the number of men with impressive growths of facial hair, were mostly film geeks and would-be filmmakers.

I'm not exactly a huge fan of Gondry, but I've enjoyed the music videos he's done for Björk, and his 2004 film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was pretty good. I can't wait to see his next film, however. It's called Be Kind Rewind, starring Jack Black and Mos Def. Watch the trailer here.

To understand why Be Kind Rewind is on my must-watch list, I have to tell you about School of Rock, another Jack Black vehicle. I relate to virtually everything in School of Rock. Wanting to be in a band? Check. Teaching kids how to be a band? Check. Playing at the local Battle of the Bands? Check. Being housemates with Sarah Silverman? Let me think about that one. Actually, the thing I relate to the most is the real-world musical education part. And that's because even though both my parents were educators, I never took a day of guitar lessons in my life. It's not about which fingers go on which frets. It's all about joy and attitude.

But when I was growing up, I was also a film geek. How geeky? I built a full-scale Jabba the Hutt puppet in the living room with my brother (complete with moveable tail). I made papier mâché zombie heads with light bulbs for eyes after watching Night of the Living Dead. I could recite every line from Flash Gordon. I pilfered my dad's Bruce Lee posters. I made a cassette tape of the Conan the Barbarian orchestral score. My heroes were Frank Oz, Stan Winston and Rick Baker. I built a wire-frame T-Rex head when Jurassic Park came out. And, in what I submit as the ultimate proof of my geekiness, I'd watched Arnold Schwarzenegger's first motion picture Hercules in New York at least ten times before my sixteenth birthday. (That's probably just proof of my dismal standards.)

I'm no filmmaker, but I'm as enamored with the process of filmmaking as anyone. Which is why Be Kind Rewind, in which two video store clerks set out to film their own cobbled-together versions of classic movies after the real tapes get erased, holds such hilarious, romantic potential.

Back to Michel Gondry. He spoke for about 90 minutes about, among other things:

• The place of improvisation in filmmaking: "It's the job of the actors to be in the moment, and the job of the director to be around the moment."
• The importance of being flexible: "Sometimes the unscripted moments in filming are funnier than the things you planned for."
• Sequels: "This new movie is a reaction to the fact that sequels nowadays cost more to make than the original."
• Childhood creative outlets: "My parents really encouraged me."

Gondry also showed short clips from the new film, and also this Björk video he directed late last year ("Declare Independence"), a stunning piece of video art depicting a stunning bit of performance art inspired by a stunning song:

Web vs M.D.

As a young-ish adult, I take many things for granted: my ample head of hair, my ability to troubleshoot computer problems without calling a 1-800 number, and Sam Waterston returning for yet another season on Law & Order. One day, my hair will be gone, computers will be incomprehensible quantum machines, and Sam Waterston will be playing a 110-year-old district attorney on Law & Order. The one thing I shouldn't be taking for granted any more is my health, and this was never made clearer to me than a year ago, when I began treatment for a chronic pain problem.

Before last year, I hadn't seen a real doctor in about eight years. Once, in college, I went to the campus health center to get some prescriptions for a nasty case of the flu. The medical professional who treated me was the sweetest lady ever; she explained everything she did before she did it, smiled brightly the whole time, and gave me a printout from a web site that listed all the things I should be doing to feel better. "You're the nicest doctor I've ever had," I told her as I was leaving. "That's because I'm not a doctor," she said. "I'm a nurse-practitioner."

I had to go home and Google that one.

How seriously should you take your doctor's advice versus the advice you find on a web site? When my condition developed last year, the first thing I did was to do some research online. After several hours of reading and cross-referencing various web sites, I concluded that I had a pinched nerve. This shallow self-diagnosis informed all my interactions with actual doctors later. I told my general practitioner that I thought I had a pinched nerve. He referred me to a neurologist who then sent me to get a battery of tests over several months. The neurologist concluded that I did indeed have a pinched nerve, and the solution would be to undergo physical therapy for three months.

But a funny thing happened when I went for my first therapy session. My physical therapist, who asked me a few simple questions and made me do some stretches, determined within minutes that I didn't have a pinched nerve after all -- I had, in fact, a condition called bursitis. I'd heard of bursitis before, in professional sports injury reports in the news, but it had never occurred to me that I might have it. But the more research I did, the more I think my physical therapist is right.

Sometimes doctors are right, and sometimes they are wrong. Sometimes, the Internet can help, and sometimes, it can't. I wish I knew the lesson here, but I don't. For every doctor who thinks it's a bad idea for a patient to use the Internet as medical resource, there's another who disagrees.

Point: When the Patient is a Googler [Time Magazine]
Counterpoint: Is There a Doctor in the Mouse? [Salon]

Knicks at night

My friend Tyler and I went to the Knicks game a Madison Square Garden tonight. We've been to three Knicks games in the last twelve months or so, and the Knicks lost all three games. I said it the other day, so you already know: it hasn't been good for New York sports fans of late.

Still, watching the game was enjoyable, aside from having to tolerate the boorishly loud trio of Cantonese-speaking spectators sitting immediately behind us, and the home team, you know, losing the game. The visiting team was the Houston Rockets, notable for employing the greatest Chinese basketball player in the world, Yao Ming. Yao is also currently the NBA's tallest player, which is sort of like being the smartest student at Harvard. Some of his dunks were so impressive that even Knicks fans cheered despite themselves.

Oh yeah, and a number of celebs were in the crowd, including Zhang Ziyi, Ron Howard (who smiled amiably as the Happy Days theme song played over the arena speakers) and New York Giants running back Brandon Jacobs.

Thirty. Something.

Today was my 30th birthday. My friends and family asked me if I did anything special today. Below is a list of what I did; you can decide if anything is particularly special.

• Woke up, watered the orchid, fed the cat, took a shower, put on blue jeans and my third-favorite t-shirt and a pair of Converse All-Stars.
• Walked to the office.
• Left my cellphone at my desk. Went to the kitchen.
• Got a bowl of Kellogg's Frosted Flakes with 99%-fat-free milk.
• Returned to my desk and discovered that I'd missed three phone calls.
• Sat and worked for exactly three hours straight. Was briefly interrupted by a phone call from CT, one of my best friends from high school, calling to wish me a happy birthday. I wished that I could have spent a whole hour talking, but I couldn't due to impending deadline.
• Went to lunch with co-workers. One of them bought me a sandwich and a chocolate cookie at 'Wichcraft.
• Drank a bottle of Sprite.
• Had a conversation with co-workers about banana split sundaes, gay shoe salesmen, and American Gladiators.
• Attended a meeting.
• Worked until 6:45 PM.
• Took the F train to 14th Street. Met Sarah. Got on the PATH train toward New Jersey.
• Met some church friends at their home in Jersey City.
• Ate pizza and boneless buffalo wings from Domino's.
• Had a discussion about the intersection of work and faith in light of the redemptive nature of the death and resurrection of Jesus, among other light topics of conversation.
• Was surprised by sneaky appearance of three-candled birthday cake.
• Ate cake.
• Took the PATH train back to New York. Got out of the PATH station and decided to walk home instead of taking the subway. Saw about nine people walking dogs along the way. Noticed that there is a record store in the West Village called Bleecker Bob's Records. Made mental note to check it out some time this week.
• Got back home.
• Read and responded to e-mails. Overheard music by The National on the television. Made mental note to buy their new album, Boxer.
• Petted and fed cat.
• Took out trash.
• Wrote this blog post.

Free ride?

If, one day in the near future, all the subways and buses in New York City were free of charge, it will likely be because of a 93-year-old man named Ted Kheel. His proposal is simple: charge motorists between $16 and $32 in tolls for entering Manhattan's central business district. It's outrageous, but ostensibly realistic -- I'm excited at the prospect and hopeful for the future of Kheel's proposal, which is part of a study conducted by the Nuture New York's Nature Foundation. Imagine never having to worry about buying a Metrocard; you could just walk down a subway entrance and step onto a train!

Click to read:
Gothamist interviews Ted Kheel.
Kheel's proposal to eliminate subway and bus fares.
Nuture New York's Nature site.

Bamn for your buck

A week ago, we took a walk on St Mark's Place. I was on a quest to find a Lightning Bolt album (and figured erroneously that at least one obscure East Village record store would have it in stock). Shopping fruitlessly, I'm sure you'll agree, is tiring and hunger-inducing, and since we were meeting friends for dinner in a couple of hours, I needed something cheap and small and savory to tide me over.

That's how we ended up at Bamn!, an automat the likes of which haven't been seen in New York for fifteen years. You get loose change from a machine, then exchange it for all kinds of fast food at another machine. I passed up the two-dollar cheeseburger and went for chicken fingers (also two dollars, for two average-sized pieces of breaded fried chicken meat, plus honey mustard sauce). They were pretty good. This made me think about what other kinds of food you can get for about two dollars in New York. Here's a short list:

Cup of Dannon yogurt and two bananas from a deli. Junior bacon cheeseburger and small fries at Wendy's. Hotdog with sauerkraut from a street vendor. Slice of cheese pizza (no toppings) from the corner pizza joint. Empanada from a local cafe. Tall coffee from Starbucks. Here's hoping that, someday, the price of a slice of New York cheesecake will fall back down to $2.00.

Fumbles

Glaringly obvious comment ahead: 2007 was a bad year for New York sports. The Knicks lost 15 of their last 19 games to end the regular season last season. Playoffs? Not even close. Two months into this season, they've won eight games. Eight out of 31. The Giants have more wins than that in 16 games.

Speaking of the Giants, they squeaked their way into tomorrow's AFC wild card game. I say squeak because there was a point in the regular season that New York fans began worrying their team wouldn't make the playoffs. Now that they're in, they have to contend with Jeff Garcia, an arch-nemesis if there ever was one.

In Major League Soccer (which, by international standards, is sort of like the soccer you play with your cousins on 4th of July weekend while waiting for the cheese to melt on the burgers), New York's Red Bulls were dismissed by the New England Revolution. (If this blog were titled One Year in Boston, there'd be plenty of good news in sports, by the way.)

I'd mention something about baseball, but it's too early in the day for rage and depression.

And what about my beloved Rutgers, the closest thing to New York's official college football team? They finished the '07 season with a 7-5 record, good enough to be invited to a bowl game so inconsequential that it's being played in Canada.

No white

I'm unhappy to report that it hasn't snowed much this winter, though it usually doesn't in this part of the country until late January and February anyway. I didn't grow up in a snowy climate (unless you count the dandruff I had in 9th grade), and I still remember the first time I ever saw snow fall from the sky: on the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington, in November 1996, my first winter in America. Snow still holds a degree of romantic allure for me, even though it usually piles up in muddy slush heaps after a couple of days, and is apt to cause car accidents and slip injuries. Here, in anticipation of New York's first big snowfall (whenever that may be), are my five favorite things to do when it snows:

5. Go jogging. I kid you not. I love running in the snow, because every footfall sounds soft, like running in a cloud.
4. Sledding. I've been skiing (downhill and cross-country), and I once ice-skated on a frozen lake with a girl I really liked, but sledding is better because it's simple and fun. You don't need any special equipment, either; in college, my friends would smuggle dinner trays out of the dining hall for sledding.
3. Play a team sport. The other day, our soccer league canceled our games because snow and sleet were expected in the region. That doesn't make any sense. Soccer and football are even better in the snow.
2. Be indoors. Counter-intuitive, but fun. The best is when you wake up on a Saturday or holiday, look out your window, and see the world being nestled in beds of white powder. Then you make yourself a mug of hot chocolate, drink it, then go back to sleep. But the single greatest thing to do in the snow is...
1. Snowball fight. With as many friends as possible.

Breaking resolutions

Have you seen Super Size Me? Did it make you hungry for McDonald's? I've met several people who found themselves craving a cheeseburger and fries even after watching filmmaker Morgan Spurlock throw up his double-quarter-pounder. Not me; I stayed away from the golden arches for an entire year after watching only the trailer for the film.

I did get around to watching the whole documentary a couple of years ago, and since then, I've had McDonald's about six or seven times. That's about one Big Mac meal every four months. Long gone are the days when I'd eat two Burger King Whoppers a day, twice a week (also known as "the foolhardy college years").

New York has made me pretty conscious about what I consume, which is why I sympathize well with Gothamist's Food Resolutions for the new year. Except for one: "Eat less cheese." I may as well "breathe less air" or "be less devastatingly handsome" or "reduce sarcasm." Impossible! So to kick off 2008, I now reveal my very favorite cheese in the entire world: roomano. And I resolve to eat it much more frequently than every four months.

One embarrassment at a time

Yesterday, I ran out to buy toilet paper. The Duane Reade on Broadway was closed (what with it being New Year's Day and all), so I went to the deli around the corner. I bought a four-pack of Cottonelle rolls (the one with the puppy on the wrapping, because nothing makes me think of toilet paper like a yellow labrador retriever).

Sarah and I hate plastic bags. They clog waterways, cause illness in sea turtles, and take a thousand years to degrade in landfills. So when I paid for my toilet paper, I declined the plastic bag and just picked up the rolls and walked out. And yes, it did seem sort of weird to walk down a Manhattan street carrying nothing but toilet paper. It must have seemed weird to the group of people who walked past, because some of them laughed and I know they were laughing at me because I heard one of them say something something toilet paper something.

But... my temporary -- and probably unwarranted -- embarrassment was a small price to pay. For there will now be one less sea turtle with gastrointestinal distress out there.

Beginning at the beginning

Happy new year. I wish I could say that we did something uniquely New York-ish for the New Year's Eve countdown -- like watching a ball drop while trying to keep warm by rubbing up against a million other people -- but I can't. We stayed home and briefly watched Dick Clark on TV; the guy always seems to have a more rockin' eve than we do anyway. I made mango juice sodas and we toasted the new year. Then I went back to watching the Futurama marathon on Cartoon Network. Because lines like "I am the man with no name: Zapp Brannigan!" are way better than watching Miley Cyrus sing.