A Laundry List

A Christmas laundry list of things I want. The things themselves are nice but not very important. However, I find that writing thoughts down is calming. Even if only writing the superficial lists of objects that may or (most likely) may not greatly improve my life.
A book.



Another book.

The game Taboo.

This wine rack.

A Krylon Leafing Pen.

This cool LightBox for viewing old slides. Which we plan to transfer to CDs (note to self to actually help P boy do it).

Awesome sport earphones.

More Starbucks City Mugs.
My little collection has NY, obviously, Chicago, Washington and I had Toronto but gave it away. One from Geneva or Switzerland will come my way this week. But I want more, more, more. I only started collecting them this past summer, I'm sure the collection will nicely grow soon.

I will add more to it as it comes to mind.
Cheers.

Cold Springs - Quintessential New England

Cold Springs is about one hour north from New York City. The village is great for a day trip, or even a 4-5 hour trip, which is what we did. The drive on the Palisades Parkway is as nice as it can get and we passed Bear Mountain and Lake Welch on the way, so one can easily combine a nice swim at the lake or, if more ambitious, an energizing hike at Bear Mountain, with an afternoon of antiquing and relaxing or even kayaking in this beautiful New England village.

Just one of the many colorful boutiques on the main road. This was my favorite shop, while my friend almost moved into the
chic chocolate shop next door that sells an amazing array of the yummy stuff packaged, among others, in bright shiny red wrappers adorned with the Mark of Twin Telephones symbol and that read something like: "Emergency Bar - for immediate relief of chocolate cravings, lovesickness, exam pressure and extreme hunger". The chocolate was okay but we all agreed that it was the weird mix of cheesy humor plus lots and lots of sugar that made it hit the spot.

Just a bit of the interesting (and very deep!) antique stores on Main Street. They look so tiny from outside that all four of us were afraid of going in at the same time, and then, surprise! They seemed to go for miles and miles and were chockfull with great vintage stuff.

A lot of stuff to peruse and I found one amazing vintage black and white photograph, of a photographer in action, in perfect condition and only for six dollars and now I cannot wait to frame it.

Happy V-Day My Darlings!

Sexy lips by Tasslehoff Burrfoot on flickr.

 For a Valentine's Day smile - “I'll Be There For You” by Louise Cuddon:

I'll be there, my darling, through thick and through thin
When your mind's in a mess and your head's in a spin
When your plane's been delayed, and you've missed the last train.
When life is just threatening to drive you insane
When your thrilling whodunit has lost its last page
When somebody tells you, you're looking your age
When your coffee's too cool, and your wine is too warm
When the forecast said, “Fine,” but you're out in a storm
When your quick break hotel, turns into a slum
And your holiday photos show only your thumb
When you park for five minutes in a resident's bay

And return to discover you've been towed away
When the jeans that you bought in hope or in haste
Just stick on your hips and don't reach round your waist
When the food you most like brings you out in red rashes
When as soon as you boot up the bloody thing crashes
So my darling, my sweetheart, my dear...
When you break a rule, when you act the fool
When you've got the flu, when you're in a stew
When you're last in the queue, don't feel blue
'cause I'm telling you, I'll be there.

Frozen Journey - NYC Central Park in a Snowstorm

Ever since childhood, when I lived within an earshot of an alluring ski slope in the Carpathians, I have seldom seen a snowstorm and not wished I was outside, squarely in the middle of it. In spite of the foreboding, biting cold I could not resist taking a detour through Central Park today. As soon as I set foot in it, I realized that the charms of New York are suddenly yet exponentially increased with every falling inch of snow. Devising a sort of lens-out-camera-in-hands-in-flannel-trouser-pockets pose so as to keep my canon dry was not an easy task. Even so, I managed to snap some shots and also quite enjoyed myself in the process. By the way, New Yorkers are atypically friendly when they are allowed to play with snow.

 

Please donate to Haiti humanitarian aid

     Haiti - Quake Survivor 
    Originally uploaded by The Peacekeepers

    Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

To donate $10 to the Red Cross for Haiti earthquake relief, text the word HAITI to 90999.
To give $5, text YELE to 501501 - this goes to Wyclef Jean's grassroot organization Yele Haiti.
Or you can text HAITI to 25383 to give $5 to the International Rescue Committee.

The amount will be charged to your phone bill and phone carriers will give 100% of donations to the respective organizations. They also vouched to waive texting fees. It seems that it will take thirty to sixty days for the money to reach their target - phone companies will pay up when users pay their phone bills - but many of these organizations upfronted cash on hand (Red Cross -10 million dollars) to buy much needed help in Haiti right now. Let's hope all this is true, so give.
For those living outside the U.S. and for those preferring to donate via credit card, there are other options and other organizations to give to, detailed in this article: Haiti Quake: How to Help.

The earthquake combined with the already-existent wretched living conditions, i.e., extreme poverty and the long history of misuse of this land by other nations amount to an almost-unparalleled human tragedy. No pig should live in such squalor, let alone a human.

Here is another good photojournalistic report of the current situation in Haiti. 

An everyday account of life in Port-au-Prince in images. More hunger and rage.

Feel free to skip this NY Times article about the recent tragedy - not much historical accuracy here - but do read the comments if you want to learn a bit about Haiti's troubled history. I often find I learn much more from readers' comments to a piece rather than directly from the article. With a reader's ability to respond it seems that journalism has drastically changed since twenty years or so ago, no? There is much more room for debate.
A contributor's article is likely to present one point of view (or usually strives for objectiveness outside the opinion section). Thus I get the feeling I have incomplete information about a topic unless I at least skim through the comments. These present many brilliant responses, well-thought-out reviews and novel viewpoints, sometimes backed by first-hand experience.
I have now come to assess a paper by the quality of the readers' responses. Sure, I still think the Times has the duty to pick their contributors with greater care. Case in point: Brooks on Haiti; Friedman on anything?! But it should not bother one too much that while these characters are allowed to write for a major newspaper one gets the feeling some skipped history lessons en masse or are simply too creative, inaccurate writers. Because they fill a minor role. If the readers are the audience as well as the participants in the debate, Brooks is simply the guy who announces the topic. Not even the one who pulls the little paper describing the topic out of the black hat. His editor does that, choices shaped by current events. So, you can ignore him and read the comments - but do lick on that block of salt!  Ah, the wisdom of the masses...

Note: Thanks to flickr users The Peacekeepers and Jan Sochor for use of their photographs.

Flickr

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