so there it is, eh?

a story in three parts.

I. wildwood
i have half an hour to write this post, and then i'm off to the beach. it's forecast to rain this weekend. i don't mind. the water up here has got to be freezing. i mind a little, but i'll brave the chill for a dip in the atlantic. i miss the beach already. i've missed ultimate every day. it should be a nice weekend.

II. vicki
went to my first bachelorette party last weekend. met the girls in park slope for manicures and pedicures; came back to change and met them again at the west end. stopped by what used to be cannons. cabbed it down to lucky cheng's, which is by far the single most outrageous place i have ever been - ever. claire, party organizer extraordinaire, had her wallet stolen. went on a manhunt for perpetrators, presumed to be wretched irish blokes. no dice. met police. spent the rest of the evening on the street and in bars getting vicki to sell the requisite kisses and obtain the items listed in her bachelorette handbook. discovered that a sparkly silver "bachelorette" tiara is the best way to attract boys - will keep for future reference. came home late, woke up at 2 the next day, slightly hungover. happy wedding, vix.

III. miami
so, home i went. miami's changed a lot since i was a part of it last; maybe it's just me that's different. i hung out with an old friend for the first time in some years and learned that miami is full of smart, clever, fun, sweet people if you just take the time to look. i spent time with three people who care about me like family, who i never want to take for granted again. i started the slow process of getting to know my brother again after living outside the city for over half his life. i realized - again - that my grandparents are the strongest and most loving people i will probably ever know. i had a wonderful, long-overdue coffee date with my aunt and understood that she's been vastly underestimated for most of her life. i could be happy living there, i think. there's work for me, and friends, and family that i'm ashamed to have lost touch with during my time away. so, the process begins. after five years in new york, i'm moving back home.

buzz lightyear to the rescue!

headed home tomorrow morning for a long weekend. back tuesday.

i have an early flight, so i should probably go to bed, but i'm going to watch one episode of the west wing before sleeping. i've been running around working and shopping and packing all day and night, so i need some unwinding time. we'll see if i can be disciplined enough to turn it off after just one episode. man, that is a great show.

don't hold your breaths for posts. yes, breaths.

madness.

"...More than a dozen other children from east Baghdad's al-Khalij neighborhood made up the majority of the 27 people killed when a suicide bomber drove into a crowd that had gathered around U.S. soldiers who were handing out candy and small toys, police said. The attack also killed one soldier, according to the U.S. military, and wounded at least 50 people...

"The suicide bombing occurred at 10:50 a.m. in al-Khalij, a mostly Shiite Muslim district adjacent to a U.S. military base in the Iraqi army's former Rashid Barracks. Two Army Humvees had parked in the street, and their crews blocked off a small area with razor wire and began giving gifts to children who immediately swarmed around them. A speeding Suzuki sedan plowed into their midst and exploded, turning a festive scene into one of carnage, witnesses said.

'The kids were laughing and playing with the solders when the suicide bomber drove his car bomb very fast into the crowd and blew himself up, killing all the kids who were around the soldiers, and some cleaners who were there,' said Ali Hussein, a police officer...

"Hussein, who was shot in the right leg last week in an attack that killed another officer, said targeting children was beyond comprehension. 'I do not know how anyone in the world -- whether they believe or do not believe in God -- could do something like kill a kid,' he said. The attackers 'are after us and the American forces, and we understand that because we are after them, too. But how could they hurt those innocent kids?'

"A U.S. military spokesman, Maj. Russ Goemaere, said in a statement that 'the terrorist undoubtedly saw the children around the Humvee as he attacked. The complete disregard for civilian life in this attack is absolutely abhorrent....'

"In the shattered neighborhood, children's shoes and sandals lay in the street. Piles of ruined possessions pulled from the wrecked homes still smoldered a few hours after the attack. Neighbors argued over whether the Americans should be blamed for attracting the children and creating a target.

"A woman whose son had been wounded and taken to the hospital said responsibility lay solely with the insurgents and their leader, Abu Musab Zarqawi. 'I swear to God," said the woman, who identified herself as Umm Salam, "if my son dies, I will drink from Zarqawi's blood.'"

washington post

al;sieur ojv;oaishdrkajsher;oijq12;i3ju !

there are times when you just want to grab someone by the lapels and shake the living shit out of them.

this is one of those times.

ggerrrhahrhhaagaaaaaagh!

ellipsis? or period?

today i went to what will probably be my last ambush practice.

it's the rightest thing, and the saddest.

let's see what life after ultimate is like.

high line pictures

the old subway (superway?) platform, complete with 4 turnstiles and 1 javier.

the empire state building, and other buildings.

someone's garden. plants, fountain, and art.

forgive us our trespasses

the high line is the old elevated subway track that runs along the west side from 34th to 14th streets. it's in complete disrepair now, the tracks all worn and rotted and totally overgrown with weeds. today javier and i went exploring along the length of the high line, and i realized--as has been happening more often lately--how much i love this city.

i definitely prefer this kind of urban hiking, rather than mountains or rivers or forests. we had to escape a security guard to get on the high line (at 34th street). there were all sorts of obstacles in the way, weeds being the least of our worries: abandoned buildings, large metal sheets with mouseholes in them to crawl through, having no way out at the other end, and other travelers as well. toward the end of the line (at 17th st), you hit a police impound lot. there's a staircase leading down, but if you take it you'll be trapped in a cage made of fence, a sitting duck for the lot guard and a trespassing ticket. farther down is the old subway station, complete with token turnstiles and platforms. there's a good bit of metal sculpture art there as well. at the very end is another abandoned building that's being developed into office space. it sits on the top of a gas station, maybe about 4 feet separating the roof of the station with the floor of the high line. i did some exploring there, looking for a way out, that involved crawling in the small space and trying to find a column with sufficent hand- and toe-holds. i was spotted. during the day i was reminded many times of disc golf.

javier said that the high line is a place where metal structures go to die. we saw one metal chair skeleton, still sturdy enough to hold my weight. there was a full-on classroom desk chair, one of the ones where the desk is attached to the seat. all along the way there are discarded pieces of metal, and there's a fair amount of artwork along the way. it's a bit of urban wasteland, sandwiched neatly between the west side highway, chelsea piers, and the hudson on the west, and the rest of manhattan on the east. i started noticing how pretty the buildings looked. at one point, looking north, the red buildings of chelsea looked like something out of m.c. escher's head. there's a pretty unobstructed view of the empire state building as well.

on the way back, just before the first metal sheet blocking the path, we ran into a garden. i still can't believe we didn't see it on the way there. it had a neat little fountain and everything. someone from the building nearby had run a hose out of his window onto the high line. the hose had little pinholes in it and was capped at the end, acting as a sprinkler. by then javier and i were quite thirsty, having forgotten to bring water. so, we uncapped the hose and washed some of the dirt off our hands and drank a bit. the owner stuck his head out of his window to ask us to watch our step--as if we hadn't noticed. we drank our fill and restarted the sprinklers, then moved on our way.

just as we'd resigned ourselves to walking all the way back to the beginning, we noticed a game of bocci ball happening just 10 feet below the high line, on the roof of an apartment building. we stopped to chat with a couple of the guys there, and it turned out they were in the middle of a family reunion weekend. a ladder was leaned up against the high line, and we asked if we could possibly use their staircase to get down to ground level. of course, they said yes. the friendly man walked us through what turned out to be a gallery of graffiti art, the aurora gallery. he showed us the proposal that he and a friend had submitted for part of the re-development project being planned for the high line. the plan calls for a two- or three-block area of the high line to be converted into an exhibit of international graffiti art with large sculpture monuments in the middle of the track. at one end would be a new museum, designed and run by dia (currently being renovated). the plan seemed really neat, a fresh take on the traditional art-in-the-park model. we wished him luck and walked down the stairs.

wait for pictures.