It’s hard to pick a least favorite moment of “Eat Pray Love.” Cause I hated so many of them.
But if pressed, I would go with the scene where she and another gorgeous woman chat about how they are both developing “muffin tops” during their trip to Italy. In this particular monstrosity of a scene, Roberts advises against worrying about weight and going ahead and eating the pizza and the pasta and Italy’s other great culinary gifts. She tells her pal and the rest of us that they will go out later and buy “big lady” jeans. I think that was the comment. Then, unfortunately, we get to see that scene . . . complete with Julia struggling to get into a pair of jeans.
So wrong on so many levels.
First of all, there should be a Constitutional amendment against Julia Roberts talking about being too fat. She’s basically skeletal. Second, she’s making the argument that she does not care about the weight gain or needing bigger pants and then she’s out struggling to get into jeans that are too small. Why the struggle, when the God-awful script just had her saying that the pizza was worth the bigger size? Sorry. My fault for paying attention to any of the words spoken here. Third, there’s an obesity epidemic going on and it’s jarring—it takes the audience out of the movie, way out—to listen to Julia Roberts talk about being too fat. Which takes me back to the Constitutional amendment.
I had read that this was a bad part of a bad movie. Probably right on both counts. Although I did like Richard Jenkins in his one big scene, where he basically gave a lesson in how to steal a film, and I liked Javier Bardem in everything he did, wherein he basically gave a lesson in how to be hot. Viola Davis was the wry, wise best friend, who was right to worry about whether any of this particular trip was necessary. I would have been happier if we had stayed with Davis in the city, seeing up close what it's like to juggle with good humor a job and a mate. Not as scenic as what "Eat Pray Love" offers us, but probably in the long run more useful.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
The Waiting Game
What a way to spend an afternoon.
We got to the doctor’s office before 1 p.m. Then we waited and waited and waited. My mom was finally called in at almost exactly 3 p.m.
I don’t want to go all street on you, or street from several years ago, but: Whassup with that? I mean, are people waiting two hours to see a general practioner?
They are in Riverdale in the Bronx. Granted, the cast of “Cocoon” in the waiting room was not going anyplace. Maybe this is the plus of being a doctor for the geriatric set. I sure as hell would not be waiting even an hour to see my doctor. But then again, I don’t love my doctor as much as my mother loves hers.
Sometimes it’s nice being me. This was one of those times. Not while we were waiting, but when we actually got around to seeing the doctor. The phrase “two hours” came out of my mouth within seconds after saying hello. Actually, I’m not sure I said hello before going for the complaint. She took it pretty well. Later, she even agreed to a profile in the New York Post, if my editor in the At Work section decides he would like an interview with her. And once we were in there, she really listened. Which is what I guess my mom likes about this doctor.
As I said to the doc, though: call and tell me that you are running behind a couple of hours. I’ve even had veterinarians do that much. Alas, when it comes to medical care, my cat is more likely to be treated well than a lowly human ever is.
We got to the doctor’s office before 1 p.m. Then we waited and waited and waited. My mom was finally called in at almost exactly 3 p.m.
I don’t want to go all street on you, or street from several years ago, but: Whassup with that? I mean, are people waiting two hours to see a general practioner?
They are in Riverdale in the Bronx. Granted, the cast of “Cocoon” in the waiting room was not going anyplace. Maybe this is the plus of being a doctor for the geriatric set. I sure as hell would not be waiting even an hour to see my doctor. But then again, I don’t love my doctor as much as my mother loves hers.
Sometimes it’s nice being me. This was one of those times. Not while we were waiting, but when we actually got around to seeing the doctor. The phrase “two hours” came out of my mouth within seconds after saying hello. Actually, I’m not sure I said hello before going for the complaint. She took it pretty well. Later, she even agreed to a profile in the New York Post, if my editor in the At Work section decides he would like an interview with her. And once we were in there, she really listened. Which is what I guess my mom likes about this doctor.
As I said to the doc, though: call and tell me that you are running behind a couple of hours. I’ve even had veterinarians do that much. Alas, when it comes to medical care, my cat is more likely to be treated well than a lowly human ever is.
Monday, August 16, 2010
Did Late-August Arrive in Mid-August?
It feels like the dog days came early.
I could be wrong. One of the dangers of freelancing is that I sit here alone in a room—well, you could count the three cats, as I certainly would—and come up with ideas about what is happening out there in the universe. I’m not sure that the notions imagined correspond with reality. Even when I warn myself about that, though, I cannot help coming up with a sense of what’s happening in the city and the nation and the would, what the mood is.
Especially when it comes to the city. And the sense I get on a Monday morning, the one that passed by relatively uneventfully a few hours ago, is that not a lot is getting done in the offices of my hometown. It’s not that I think that everybody is out of town. I worked 50 or so weeks a year in an office for too many years to believe that there are too many completely empty workplaces. But I do have the suspicion that not a lot is happening. People are in Wait Mode, getting done the absolute necessities and not much more. Returning my phone calls not necessarily having scored a spot as an absolute necessity. Unfortunately.
I read recently in one of those not very helpful stories about job-searching that it’s best to go full speed ahead in August. You don’t want to be one of those jerks who is calling prospective employers on the days after Labor Day, announcing to the world that you are back in the game. Better to make it clear during the dog days that one is ready, willing and able to rejoin the workforce.
That sounds sensible to me. Right now I’m after an array of writing assignments, from the full-time gig to the very-very-freelance assignment, but the editors I’m eager to harass are in Wait Mode. Unless, perish the thought, it’s just me.
I could be wrong. One of the dangers of freelancing is that I sit here alone in a room—well, you could count the three cats, as I certainly would—and come up with ideas about what is happening out there in the universe. I’m not sure that the notions imagined correspond with reality. Even when I warn myself about that, though, I cannot help coming up with a sense of what’s happening in the city and the nation and the would, what the mood is.
Especially when it comes to the city. And the sense I get on a Monday morning, the one that passed by relatively uneventfully a few hours ago, is that not a lot is getting done in the offices of my hometown. It’s not that I think that everybody is out of town. I worked 50 or so weeks a year in an office for too many years to believe that there are too many completely empty workplaces. But I do have the suspicion that not a lot is happening. People are in Wait Mode, getting done the absolute necessities and not much more. Returning my phone calls not necessarily having scored a spot as an absolute necessity. Unfortunately.
I read recently in one of those not very helpful stories about job-searching that it’s best to go full speed ahead in August. You don’t want to be one of those jerks who is calling prospective employers on the days after Labor Day, announcing to the world that you are back in the game. Better to make it clear during the dog days that one is ready, willing and able to rejoin the workforce.
That sounds sensible to me. Right now I’m after an array of writing assignments, from the full-time gig to the very-very-freelance assignment, but the editors I’m eager to harass are in Wait Mode. Unless, perish the thought, it’s just me.
Monday, August 9, 2010
If An Election Fell in the Forest, Would Anybody Notice?
The headlines about my Congressman, Charles Rangel, continue unabated. Certainly you cannot blame the dailies or the TV networks for noticing the alleged ethics violations, an 80-year-old legislative battler who refuses at this hour to give up the fight. He’s gone from being an inspiring figure to some of us…to an embarrassment. Sure looks like it’s time to give it up, Rep. Rangel. Thanks for proving the lesson of George Orwell’s “1984” all over again: Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
An entertaining and newsy lesson. But I wish that more attention would be paid to the electoral contest in Rangel’s district. A few years ago in another election season I interviewed Joyce Johnson. Now she’s among the candidates running against Rangel in the September Democratic primary. She’s barely mentioned, as are the others who want the job. They are not given much of a chance against Rangel, and Assemblyman Adam Clayton Powell IV gets most of the ink when anybody does get around to writing about the actual primary.
Actually, it seems from here like nobody’s writing about the primaries at all. The New York Times has not even gotten around to many of its one-shot pieces about various metropolitan area elections. I live in a district where there are contested Congressional and state Senate primaries, but the only signs of that are, well, the signs with the contenders' photos. Or bumping into the people on the street, which is how I found out the Anna Lewis is running for state Senate in the district that for so long has been the province of Eric Schneiderman, who is now running for state attorney general. See, we've got races.
Alas, we do not have much coverage of them. Maybe our radio stations are doing a fantastic job and I’m just missing it. But I doubt it. I’m pretty much the last person to media-bash, but the outlets that make fun of voters for not turning out to the polls should at least, in the weeks before voting, present the notion that there’s an election. Otherwise, we’re all just helping our Members of Congress and other politicos win re-election without anything resembling a contest. That’s a journalistic ethics violation.
An entertaining and newsy lesson. But I wish that more attention would be paid to the electoral contest in Rangel’s district. A few years ago in another election season I interviewed Joyce Johnson. Now she’s among the candidates running against Rangel in the September Democratic primary. She’s barely mentioned, as are the others who want the job. They are not given much of a chance against Rangel, and Assemblyman Adam Clayton Powell IV gets most of the ink when anybody does get around to writing about the actual primary.
Actually, it seems from here like nobody’s writing about the primaries at all. The New York Times has not even gotten around to many of its one-shot pieces about various metropolitan area elections. I live in a district where there are contested Congressional and state Senate primaries, but the only signs of that are, well, the signs with the contenders' photos. Or bumping into the people on the street, which is how I found out the Anna Lewis is running for state Senate in the district that for so long has been the province of Eric Schneiderman, who is now running for state attorney general. See, we've got races.
Alas, we do not have much coverage of them. Maybe our radio stations are doing a fantastic job and I’m just missing it. But I doubt it. I’m pretty much the last person to media-bash, but the outlets that make fun of voters for not turning out to the polls should at least, in the weeks before voting, present the notion that there’s an election. Otherwise, we’re all just helping our Members of Congress and other politicos win re-election without anything resembling a contest. That’s a journalistic ethics violation.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Can Rhinebeck Be Rhinebeck Again?
How weird to see Rhineback go national. Or international. Or whatever the hell happened over the last month or so, culminating last Saturday evening in what looked like a lovely wedding for Chelsea Clinton.
My partner and I stumbled on Rhinebeck a few years back, an unexpected treat that has become something of an addiction. We talk a lot about Oblong Books there. And the fantastic Rhinebeck Department Store, where the selection is smallish but smart. And the movie theater. And the restaurants, including the French one that looks too expensive but that absolutely figured in some of the Clinton-wedding stories of recent weeks. Having one of the world's great culinary institutes nearby does not hurt.
My own passion for the area stretches back decades, back to when my dad took me to Hyde Park to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Museum, the first of its kind. As a kid, I remember the cold day in Hyde Park that marked the 100th anniversary of Roosevelt's birth. The Roosevelt family home is there on the same site in Hyde Park, and in recent year the home of Eleanor Roosevelt, Val-Kill, has become an even more charming stopping point. There’s so much history in Hyde Park, but the modern-day town and its offerings have also grown on me over the years. The farmer's market in Hyde Park on Saturday mornings is worth catching. Eventually, over time, one drives around to neighboring towns and to communities beyond that...which is what we did. That's how we stumbled on Rhinebeck, which has an even more walkable downtown.
It’s fair to ask: will all the hoopla mean anything in the long term to Rhinebeck? At first I thought not, that there was only short-term attention and then Americans would go back to paying attention to other weddings and other towns. But now that I think of it, there really could be some long-term benefit to Rhinebeck.
Why? Because I know that after seeing it just once, being there a few afternoon hours, I pretty much fell for the place. I think that could happen to others, including the hundreds who went to last weekend’s wedding and the thousands of media folks who watched and chatted about the proceedings. If only a small percentage of all these people come back and spend some dollars and lavish some love on Rhinebeck, there may be an upside to the traffic of the past few weeks.
Rhinebeck richly deserves that kind of upside. It’s a lovely place, worthy of attention whether one is attending a wedding or not. How weird to see one of our secret places become anything but.
My partner and I stumbled on Rhinebeck a few years back, an unexpected treat that has become something of an addiction. We talk a lot about Oblong Books there. And the fantastic Rhinebeck Department Store, where the selection is smallish but smart. And the movie theater. And the restaurants, including the French one that looks too expensive but that absolutely figured in some of the Clinton-wedding stories of recent weeks. Having one of the world's great culinary institutes nearby does not hurt.
My own passion for the area stretches back decades, back to when my dad took me to Hyde Park to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Museum, the first of its kind. As a kid, I remember the cold day in Hyde Park that marked the 100th anniversary of Roosevelt's birth. The Roosevelt family home is there on the same site in Hyde Park, and in recent year the home of Eleanor Roosevelt, Val-Kill, has become an even more charming stopping point. There’s so much history in Hyde Park, but the modern-day town and its offerings have also grown on me over the years. The farmer's market in Hyde Park on Saturday mornings is worth catching. Eventually, over time, one drives around to neighboring towns and to communities beyond that...which is what we did. That's how we stumbled on Rhinebeck, which has an even more walkable downtown.
It’s fair to ask: will all the hoopla mean anything in the long term to Rhinebeck? At first I thought not, that there was only short-term attention and then Americans would go back to paying attention to other weddings and other towns. But now that I think of it, there really could be some long-term benefit to Rhinebeck.
Why? Because I know that after seeing it just once, being there a few afternoon hours, I pretty much fell for the place. I think that could happen to others, including the hundreds who went to last weekend’s wedding and the thousands of media folks who watched and chatted about the proceedings. If only a small percentage of all these people come back and spend some dollars and lavish some love on Rhinebeck, there may be an upside to the traffic of the past few weeks.
Rhinebeck richly deserves that kind of upside. It’s a lovely place, worthy of attention whether one is attending a wedding or not. How weird to see one of our secret places become anything but.
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