One Love

Bob Marley might be alive in Brooklyn.  If he is, he rides the 3 train and sings really loudly at 8 in the morning.  Ironically, he doesn't sound anything like himself on the records and "alternative" radio, but rather more like Prince singing Bob Marley with a sore throat.  

i love you cherry blossoms.

the world's largest playplace, and other reasons why i probably won't be back

Monday
April 28th, 2008

For better or worse, my first contribution to the Brower Park Times (or BPT, as the kids are calling it) will not be composed from the cushy surrounds of my day lit parlor, or Daf's ample fire escape (sooooo audrey in Bfast at Tiff's but it would have been cute right?). My offering this early Monday morning is fresh from Orlando, Florida, home of strip malls, swamps and a surprising number of Europeans. I'm only about a third done with my stay, and yes id like to come home. now. But on the other hand, I do love sunshine and alligators, plus being in Brooklyn would mean working the 9-6 in front of my really bad monitor that is slowly sucking the power from my eyeballs and I know this because my laptop can't be past my thigh bulge or else the words blur.

so Orlando, here's to you; you're not Crown Heights, and you're not the waft of my new eau de toilette and you're not my new kitty or my new little daisy earrings ( i got lots of new stuff last month!!!!!!!@#!@#) or anything else that gives me a general sense of comfort, but you're some other things that we'll discuss and think about.

happenings since friday night:

1) A crawfish party outside "Jockamo's New Orleans Cuisine!!" and the entire fire department was there plus other civilians and they were all eating pounds POUNDS of crawfish from styrofoam dishes and the crawfish were all over the sidewalk in big water pots and you got to pick them out yourself, and then this large black woman boiled them. boiled them in the parking lot. I opted for a Wendy's frosty and small chili cup.


2) Strange regional indigenous soliciting? Upon leaving the Florida Mall (note: largest 1 story mall ever) several different, non related children approached me- and not many other people around me, so what does this say(?)-with fliers for Native American Psychic Readings. One little girl sprinted to put the flier in my hand, like she had some type of agenda. is this a florida thing? or a south thing? or just a Florida Mall thing.....

3) Driving Galore! i've spent more time in a car these past 3 days than I have in the past 2 months. Mass transit has perhaps spoiled me, but in the best of ways, and I'm missing it right now (plus my monthly runs out in like a week and its lying fallow in my wallet, not a turnstile to swipe for miles)

Also let's talk about my condo- Despite the swampy 87 or so degrees it's pushing outside, something automated keeps our humble baroque residence at 69. Also we have a fake dog statue in the living room, and thick maroon and gold everything. fake flowers in maroon and gold, weird fringy drapes in maroon and gold, i have 3 blankets (wtf? its f-l-o-r-i-d-a!) and oh, my bed came with 10 pillows. Plus 3 TVs, just in case.

And yet, I will say that Disney is a fascinating and substantial chunk of Orlando. Imagine the power of an animator or of a mouse in pants to create jobs, infrastructure, schools, an Asian dictator's film cannon, corporations and mergers (Disney owns ABC who owned ESPN et al) marriages, deaths, lawsuits, pollution, fetishes, traumas, vocabulary, soundtracks, style (therein lies the Orlando-Brooklyn connection, via Mickey fitteds that are admittedly kinda hot) and...more. It's another 7 days of swampy heat and marble/granite conventionness, but if a sophisticat such as Walt can command such a place than surely I can withstand another week without the crab apple blossoms, Yemeni clerks at City Pride, and lovely housemates. The world's largest McDonald's Playplace is but a few minutes drive away, and we didn't rent a Dodge Grand Caravan for nothing.