4 posts tagged “pj”
So, a week ago today, The Lovely Virginia and I packed up The Bean and embarked on a family trip to The Big Apple.
Wednesday night, we stayed in Midtown. It was noisy and wonderful. Drunkle PJ and I went to a fancy-shmancy Hugo Boss event. Here's us before we left.
We had most of the day to cart Bea around town (mostly to Beard Papa's), and then we headed to a fancy Mad Men soiree.
Then came Saturday.
Boy, oh boy. Saturday.
I have been a fan of SNL since I was about, um, born. And I have been very impressed with this season so far, due in no small part to my friend Bobby Moynihan.
So attending the show as an audience member was, to put it succinctly, amazing.
Throw in that a friend and co-worker was hosting, which made it a thousand times better.
Put on top of that two friends and co-workers guest-starring, and my head started to get a little warm.
Oh, and as we sat down, we noticed a clear rendition of the Sterling Cooper set directly in front of us.
Uh-oh.
Once you realize that your-friend-the-SNL-cast-member is playing YOU in a sketch... Well, that's about when your brain starts to melt and seep out your EARS.
No way to put it into words, except to say that other than my wedding night, this was easily the best night of my life.
I am not exaggerating.
It was the culmination of about fifty dreams at once.
Un-f'ing-believable.
Oh, and then on Sunday, we took Bea to the dog run in Union Square Park. She apparently loves the crap outta puppies. You'll notice her puppy hat.
Many thanks to Meg and Kris for babysitting. Youse guys made it all work.
And it was fun.
I hadn't been there in a year and a half, since we moved out here for The Job.
Um, I still like it there. Although, I must admit, I remembered fairly quickly the things I didn't love.
Like customer service and humidity.
And grocery stores and jerks.
But otherwise: I could move back there tomorrow.
I went out there for this:
My friend Andy came with me. We stumbled upon the Mad Men window at Bloomingdale's.
At least there is this photo, the only record of Vinnie and Michael having been there.
Anyway, before we left, we met up with PJ and walked through Central Park and The Met. And it was nice.
I miss those people and that place. I hope that there's some reason, someday, that I get to spend a bigger chunk of time there.
But it was pretty nice to come home to this.
My friends in NYC are totally grownups.
Seriously.
PJ is an old man who rides skateboards, and Jeff sometimes has jobs.
Lohman quit hers, so I don't know what she's doing these days.
Oh, wait: Yes I do.
She's holding homegrown reality show competitions in her apartment.
Featuring my other grownup friends.
Here's what happens when three people decide to make a reality show, but have almost no resources to do so.
This is "Make a Shirt, Dumbass," by Patrick Jones, Sarah Lohman and Jeff Marsey.
Enjoy.
I was a poor student.
I mean, I feel like I learned a lot, but I've never been accused of being an academic.
History was easily one of my least favorite subjects. Take a kid who will do nothing he's told to do, and tell him to read a billion pages of dense text he feels he has nothing common with. Good luck with that.
Now that I'm an old man (having a kid allows me to qualify as an old man (that and the gray hair (I'm so old))), I'm finding more of an attraction to history.
This newfound interest is definitely, and embarrassingly, linked to board games.
It may have been borne out of the very cool connection I felt to one of my favorite games from last year, 1960: The Making of The President. The main connection being, of course, that my job at the time directly related to the theme of that game. A rare treat.
Since then, I've been getting into other games from other parts of history -- World War II, the Cold War, the American Civil War, the Second Punic War, the Wars of the Reformation, and, most recently, the American Revolutionary War. I find that whatever game I'm currently focused on inspires a desire to learn more about that period of time.
Which brings me to how I've been spending a lot of time lately.
Whenever The Lovely Virginia and I have been able to take a Bea Break, we have been taking in the John Adams miniseries on HBO. It's. Awesome. If you get the chance, please check it out. I know we're only two parts in (out of seven), but it's crazy-good. If HBO and Playtone choose to make a mini-series about History (see: Band of Brothers), you can bet it will be beautiful and amazing. And seeing my NYC poker buddy Zuck as Thomas McKean in episode 2 didn't hurt either.
If you don't have HBO, get it for two months and watch this thing.
I've also been reading a great book, Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer. I'm only about 100 pages in, but it's fascinating. So much surrounding the day of Lincoln's assassination that I knew absolutely zero about. Very, very cool.
In a kinda morbid sort of way.
PJ and I were talking about how movies like "John Adams" and books like Manhunt can take an event, the outcome of which you already know, and still make it exciting and intense and surprising.
I love that. And if I had known that history was exciting when I was in a position to learn about it every day if I wanted to, I might have done a little more work. Or paid a little more attention at least.
Maybe.
Ah, probably not. But that's what I'll tell Bea. While we're playing a game.
P.S. Hey, speaking of PJ, did your monthly issue of Thrasher come yet? Because he's in there, living out his childhood dream.
I wish he'd move here. I miss him.
