Brush with Fame Confirmed July 14, 2008
Posted by KG in Etc., Mumbai.add a comment
Well that didn’t take very long. It turns out the guy at the gym was John Abraham, a Bollywood actor I actually had heard of, though I couldn’t pick him out of a lineup until today. Not sure why I know who he is — maybe he’s the favorite celebrity-type of one of my relatives. Thanks, Mumbai Mirror film section!
No, Really: How Are You? April 23, 2008
Posted by KG in Etc., FS Life, Food, fitness.2 comments
Reunited with the wife, left my old job, currently in training, organizing our lives together, preparing to move to Mumbai for our new jobs, still getting used to collective pronouns, managed to take a week off from the gym and preserve my sanity, the Concept2 rower is an evil machine, rockfish and Ethiopian food remain delicious, constantly expecting to wake up and have to say goodbye but happily have not had that happen, the Radisson Lord Baltimore is a lovely hotel, did you know that in Mauritania the Arabic “bint” becomes “mint?”, Rosslyn will always be a wasteland, it feels strange to be together again but I’m loving it, how are you?
Cliftonblackhillburglips March 27, 2008
Posted by KG in Etc., Internet, fitness.1 comment so far
http://www.observer.com/2008/nerds-steel?page=0%2C0
Words escape me.
Well, that’s not true. Insightful, analytic words escape me. Probably because I’m still trying to sort out the subculture neologisms (”ripster”??) from the endless neighborhoods-as-signifiers. Not that I was surprised; it is the New York Observer.
Conclusions: I have absolutely no patience for the navel gazing New York set. None. And cooler-than-thou references are boring, empty, and artless.
My Poor Neck February 20, 2008
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Fully cognizant that the number of blog readers I have who know the answer to this question approaches zero: does anyone have advice on how to avoid clavicle pain when performing front squats? The major limit I hit yesterday was not in how much I could squat, but how much pain my poor bones could take. Tips and suggestions are appreciated.
Someone Find Me a Quince February 13, 2008
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Kumquats. They were prominently displayed at Whole Foods for $2 a box. And of all the fruits and vegetables in the produce section, they were one of the few I had not eaten before. Honestly, who can resist that sort of temptation? Not me.
The only thing I knew about kumquats was that they were some sort of fruit with a funny sounding name that could score you 72 possible points in Scrabble. And that’s about all there is to know until you eat one. Then, if you’re as strange as I am, you become utterly captivated by a peculiar fruit that doesn’t seem to make any sense. For one: they look like teeny little oranges. And yet you eat them whole, rind and all. The flesh? Ridiculously tart, while the rind (which I thought would be bitter) is almost too sweet. That makes the experience of eating a kumquat rather different then other fruits, a progression from a quick hit of sweetness to overwhelming sourness and then, just when your lips are pursed from the citric acid, back to sweet.
I’ve been through the entire container of kumquats at this point, popping them one at a time randomly (having too many at one time ruins the fun). And of course I went on a furious Googling spree to come up with other ways to serve them, like pickling. That led to the inevitable side roads, where I learned that along with ketchup, kumquat is one of the few loan words to English from Cantonese (who knew?).
Produce: fascinating if you let it be.
U2 3D GR8 February 4, 2008
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It must be incredibly difficult to not think of oneself in messianic terms when day after day, night after night, thousands of screaming fans who may or may not speak the same language as you sing along to your songs.
That’s probably one of the more clichéd ledes for anything written about Bono (a Google search of “Bono messianic” comes up with 22,000+ hits — and how’s using Google search stats for cliché!), but the thing about it is that it’s true. Take U2 3D. Even better, take how I felt before, during, and after watching U2 3D. It’s been about 14 years since I first bought Zooropa, but songs like “Pride (In the Name of Love)” and “Bullet in the Blue Sky” (!!) still make my inner adolescent pop out, ready to spout bumper sticker epithets about becoming the change and so on. That welling up of idealistic emotion probably hits a select segment of the population; what is startling is how large, heterogenous, and fervent that swathe of people can be. Even more surprising is the fact that I’m only slightly embarassed to admit that my dormant fanboyishness is alive and well. (After seeing U2 3D on Saturday, I loaded most of The Joshua Tree and War onto my shuffle.)
The best part of seeing U2 on an IMAX screen is that you get most of the fun of the concert experience at near-perfect sound quality and without the $100 price tag. Of course, the IMAX experience also magnified the drawbacks of the concert film medium: you get to *see* an amazing concert, but the 3D photography amplifies your separation from the chanting Argentinians who watched Bono do his best Pavarotti impression during ”Miss Sarajevo” (!!). “Amplify your separation” is just my artsy-fartsy way of saying “I felt jealous.” It takes quite a lot for me to desire standing in an enormous stadium, sweaty and sore, singing at the top of my lungs. In fact, I doubt I’d want to do that for any band currently active — with the exception of U2. Not that I’m a superfan, but the IMAX film shows you that unlike many stadium bands, U2 makes the unpleasantness of the experience worth it.
The Natural History Museum isn’t the best place in the world to see U2 3D, but it is the only place in town. I would advise buying tickets in advance online and showing up early for a good seat. The chattering museum-goers, expecially those of the younger than Zoo TV variety, may get on your nerves, but this weekend they were quick to quiet down by the first bars of “New Years Day.” That leaves you about 73 minutes of U2 wowing what looked like 80,000 Argentinians. And you wishing you were there with them.
Whither the Skinny Ones? January 30, 2008
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During a regular shopping trip, I was saddened to observe that the ancillary merch at my usual comic book shop isn’t meant for me. They had some cool shirts that I was sorely tempted to buy (let’s avoid the topic of my ever-expanding t-shirt collection, okay?) . Sadly: they had sizes beginning at large and working their way upwards. At some point, I may have considered buying something a tad too big, but that seemed silly* so I decided to ask the comic book guy (whose nom-de-travail is, no joke, “Rambo”) what the deal was.
Me: Hey Rambo, does your store only buy shirts for the larger comic book fans, or do the makers anticipate the dimensions of the target market?
Rambo: Umm.. well… a little of column B, but mostly column A.
Me: So your store doesn’t consider the more svelte comic book fan?
Rambo: Basically, yeah. You could say that.
The fact I’m blogging about this (not to mention the fact that I, you know, take regular shopping trips to the comic book store) confirms my nerdiness. Or is it geekiness? Dorkitude? Does someone deeply invested in comic books fall under the category of a geek, dork, or nerd? If Wikipedia is to be trusted as a cultural hivemind, the terms have evolved and are family-resemblent enough to be nearly interchangeable. So let’s just say “comic book nerd” for now.
And this comic book nerd wears a medium.
*The idea of buying a t-shirt with the logo of an obscure comic book character did does not seem silly at all.
The Frumious Mr. Glitch January 14, 2008
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Fans of The Wire: Norman Wilson look familiar? He certainly did to me. Who is that actor? Where have I seen him before?
The answer? Square One Television.
And with that segue, I give you the best song about ancient Greek mathematicians ever written. You’re welcome.
This New Year January 8, 2008
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… started in the lovely city of Portland, Oregon at the side of my beautiful wife. It was a good beginning to what will be a wonderful year. More on our holiday trip to the Pacific Northwest later.
For now, here’s as close as I’ll come to a 2007 year in review: a list of post titles that are currently in draft. Will these blog entries ever see the light of day? Doubtful. I’ll let you guess what the entries are about, because for the most part I forget.
Candy
A Little about TV
18.5 million hong kong dollars
Food Media Overload
Patchouli Stinks
Yogurt jones
That Baltimore Juice December 14, 2007
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More embarrassing than the fact that there are so many Orioles on “the list” is the fact that despite Roberts, Segui, Tejada et. al. being jacked on various substances, the O’s have had ten consecutive losing seasons. A team so bad, they couldn’t even win when cheating!
Also: who else was surprised by David Segui’s massive head when he came back in 2001? I remembered him being pretty skinny during his previous stint in Baltimore and at the time (naively) just thought he was training hard. Hmph.
