Henry Miller is totally the man I hope to be (plus a little Larry David), when I’m a geezer. Miller has balls. he’s a man’s man. The kind of strange, old dude you down beers with and listen to horrible, debauched tales from, while killing time in a bar. This will be me. It’s gotta happen.
Look at this…just look at it:
This a a bacon cheeseburger, beer and onion rings from a bar called Royale in on Avenue C and 10th Street. I popped in there yesterday afternoon, prior to a mammoth evening of two concerts in a row. Since I’d be missing dinner, I wanted to have a rather big lunch. It was the third time I’ve been there. I ordered the same thing I’ve had each time.
Why?
Because it fucking rules. There’s a sign out in front of the place, declaring “Best Burger In NYC”. Whether that statement is entirely true or not, I don’t know, but I do know that it’s one of three burger places in New York (the others being Stand and Schnack) that I personally think are the best I’ve had so far.
This place definitely has the best onion rings I’ve eaten in my life. I don’t particularly like onion rings, being more of a french fry person, but these kick ass.
If you’re in Manhattan, around that area, try it. Do it, if only because I told you to.
This morning, I rushed onto the 2/3 train, heading into work, managing to catch a seat. As I settled, I spotted my upstairs neighbor a bit farther down the car from where I was sitting. I was about to wave when a man sitting next to where she was standing leaned over a let loose a massive wave of multi-colored puke onto the floor, liberally splattering her legs and feet.
Not even pausing for a moment of shock, she runs from the train, barely making it past the closing doors; I assume to go home and clean up. People quickly start moving to my end of the car. Meanwhile, Mr. Yakkity continues to hurl forth streams of joy and partial digestion.
For three whole stops, the man kept barfing. He must have had a second stomach or something, because it was fucking impressive. Someone gave him a bottle off water and some napkins and eventually, the torrent of chunks tapered off and stopped.
After wiping off his backpack, the guys stays on the train (thanks for that, buddy) and just slides down the bench, away from the scene of the crime and acts like nothing happened.
Gross, yet slightly exciting. I wish more morning commutes were like this.
This photo pretty much explains one of the prime things I dislike about Brooklyn—breeders with double strollers and a fucked up sense of entitlement, coupled with a total lack of awareness of how disgusting they are to the rest of the non-breeding world.
I snapped this shot as I was walking down Atlantic Avenue this past Saturday. The stupid-ass bitch’s stroller was completely blocking the only entrance to the store. Fuck anybody else getting into the place, the lady needs her shit, now.
On top of this obnoxious obstruction, she has a double stroller with only one kid. These buggies are a constant aggravation and eyesore in my area of Brooklyn, whether they be slowly strolling, taking up the entire sidewalk or completely blocking aisles in the supermarket, they fucking suck and so do the people that abuse them.
This morning, on my way to work, I made my usual transfer to the 4 train. Seeing an empty bench, I was about to sit down when I noticed a fairly serious shit (as in feces) smell. The bench looked clean, so I figured the girl in the corner was having some kind of diaper explosion and decided to deposit my body elsewhere, settling into the bench across from her.
Sitting there, with the smell still hitting me, I looked again and noticed that the edge of the seat was smeared with nasty, toxic diarrhea. Splattered and smeared—god knows why. The girl was sitting just outside the range of it, but seemed oblivious. Subways just smell bad sometimes.
Soon after, the train pulled into a station and when the doors opened, people flowed in, gunning for a seat. Noticing the stench, they checked the top of the bench and then sat, completely missing the fecal death smeared on the sides.
I sat there, watching them wrinkle their noses at the smell of their morning commute, stifling laughter as they rose and exited the train, the backs of their legs marked with the contents of some crazy fuck’s bowels.
Today is going to be a good day. I can smell it already.
I think the plan to have heavily-armed police randomly patrolling subways is a fundamentally stupid, fear-mongering, ineffective and money-wasting load of shit.
In the first counterterrorism strategy of its kind in the nation, roving teams of New York City police officers armed with automatic rifles and accompanied by bomb-sniffing dogs will patrol the city’s subway system daily, beginning next month, officials said on Friday.
Under a tactical plan called Operation Torch, the officers will board trains and patrol platforms, focusing on sites like Pennsylvania Station, Herald Square, Columbus Circle, Rockefeller Center and Times Square in Manhattan, and Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.
Officials said the operation would begin in March.
Financing for the program will be funneled to the Police Department and will come from a pool of up to $30 million taken from $153.2 million in new federal transit grants to the state.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Each team in the operation will comprise a bomb-sniffing dog and six officers: a dog handler and a sergeant and four officers from the Emergency Service Unit who will be outfitted in heavy, bullet-resistant vests and Kevlar helmets and will carry automatic weapons, either an M-4 rifle or an MP5 submachine gun.
This does nothing except intimidate people, waste money and promote fear. Pathetic. Atlantic Avenue is a daily stop for me. I’m not looking forward to commuting a route patrolled by some underpaid douchebag with an automatic weapon. Is the city going to equip the commuters with kevlar?
I was a little surprised yesterday to fire up my trusty Google Reader and see that some dude who lived 2 blocks over from me was stabbed in the side of the head with a corkscrew and killed. When I say surprised, I don’t mean the fact that someone was murdered in my neighborhood. People get killed or at least shot and stabbed on a fairly consistent basis in my neighborhood. Mostly, it’s gang-on-gang bullshit and/or drugs. Rather, I was surprised at the fact the crime made the news. Since violent crime in my area is 90% black-on-black violence and usually not involving children, the news never covers it. You can be sure this sudden attention was entirely due to the novelty factor of the corkscrew.
I’ve no shame in admitting that I burst out laughing at the mental picture of it all. Working for a wine magazine all I could think of was…
“THIS…*screw*…WINE…*screw*…IS…*screw*…FUCKING…PISS!!!!”
This weekend, as I was standing on the platform of my local Brooklyn subway station, heading into Manhattan for pizza, I noticed this homeboy coming down the stairs on the the opposite platform across from me. His winter hat was pulled low, covering his right eye completely with the obligatory puffy coat and too low pants represented. Noticing his shuffling gait, I got the idea that this guy was some strain of seriously fucked up; stoned, drunk…something.
I guess I my attention had shifted for a moment, but when I looked back, the guy was suddenly on his ass in the middle of the train tracks. On an almost completely deserted platform, he’d managed to somehow lose his balance and take an ass-dive off the edge.
Struggling to get up at a pace conveying that he didn’t catch the gravity of where gravity had landed him, the few people that were around yelled at him to get the fuck up and off the tracks because a train was coming (although it was a decent distance away, well enough to stop if warned sufficiently) and a woman ran up the stairs to alert the station agent. Finally standing, the guy shuffled around a bit like a zombie, before deciding that the best idea was to go to the middle space between the Brooklyn and Manhattan-bound tracks. So, he steps up onto the third rail covering, which, as unreliable and fucked up as he was, is a supremely retarded choice of foot placement, regardless of the the barrier shield above the electrified rail. More yelling at him ensues and eventually he shuffles back to the edge of the platform and a woman and a young man haul him up to safety, where he promptly drops his ass onto a bench and zones.
Pretty much everyone had their hearts in their throats the whole time, except me. Not only did I not feel sympathy, I was kind of rooting for the train to paste him. If the fuck is stupid enough to get that trashed and try and take a train, he’s basically earned his spot as professional rail-grease. The world doesn’t need his genetic pollution. I only wish I’d remembered to take a shot with my phone’s camera.
Here’s a link to plenty of photos I took of Death Metal bands, Vader and Malevolent Creation at the Death By Decibels tour at The Blender Theater, here in New York. Malevolent Creation were good, but not anything I’d bother seeing again. They put on a good show, but they didn’t really raise my blood pressure. Vader is a damn tight-sounding band live. I was really impressed at how solid and together their sound and all-around performance was. I’d definitely check them out again, but daaaaaamn…do they ever need fashion tips. They were all wearing retarded, Hot Topic, gothic club-baby pants, complete with too many zippers and the dangly string thingies. Think these pants having babies with these ones. Frightening. Guys, you’re a European Death Metal band…black leather pants! In a pinch, camouflage or olive-drab cargos. WTF?
I still think the Blender Theater is a complete and total shithole, comparable to spelunking in an old lady’s colon. The only thing they have going for them is that so far, to my knowledge, no one’s sued the shit out of the place after getting hurt. Their security sucks. I saw two fights, granted they were minor, but security was nowhere. There were a few assholes, getting off on dive-bombing random people, knocking a girl next to me to the floor without so much as an apology or a lift upright. As far as I’m concerned, if the person you hit is not participating in being a psuedo-macho hormonal douchebag with you, than that’s assault and that’s a fucking liability for the club. Accidents happen, but that place lets some rude, bitter, professional dishwashers and reprobates get away with way too much shit. Blender fucking blows.
Here’s about fifty photos I took of Swedish Melodic Viking Death Metal band, Amon Amarth as they played Irving Plaza last night. I can only recall one or two other concerts in my life where the crowd was as frenzied and pumped as last evening. The band seemed pretty amused and appreciative of the sheer amount of enthusiasm jammed into the club and they certainly know how to work a crowd. They are fucking hilarious, kick-ass metal dudes and their sound is just killer. They even drank booze from animal horns. I’m psyched to see them again someday.
