The Visible Woman...March 3, 2003

It's not raining but a cold wind bites. We stay in bed until 9:45. Our room in the Iroquois faces a blind air shaft that doesn't give a view or much light to wake one up. We have slept fitfully. I was getting a little sore throat and sniffles. FFP's feet were aching or something. We finally find ourselves rather late for breakfast having a bran muffin (himself) and a coffee and onion bagel with cream cheese (me) at a little deli on the block. They are changing from a breakfast crowd to lunch preparation, filling the cold case with soda and grilling up meat and slicing turkey. No one else is using the few tables in the back of what is mostly a take-out. We would patronize this place some more if we weren't leaving soon.

I suggest a movie. There is this giant movie complex on 42nd Street and they are showing Bowling for Columbine. We walk, facing the bitter wind down there but it isn't open yet. We take refuge in a newstand looking at magazines. In the end, I buy a couple.

Then the theater is open and we buy tickets for the show. The tickets are $10 but they give a senior citizen discount to over 55 so FFP gets one for $6.50. Can't wait until my birthday! Ha. There is a restaurant on one of the mezzanines and we retreat there for salads and coffee and tea and read our books and magazines. Our movie is showing at the very top of the tall stack of theaters and we go up and up escalators and finally get there. The movie is good and amazingly even-handed considered Michael Moore's proclivities to see things his way. The truth is, he is sad about gun deaths and is chiding K-Mart for selling ammo and the National Rifle Association for their seeming indifference and such but he can't really figure out the why to gun deaths in general. He ends up pinning the blame for that six-year-old who killed a classmate on work for welfare and, given the situation, he's only sort of wrong. (Busing people great distances to work for minimum wage when they have kids to look after hardly seems right. Still, the uncle had a gun where a kid could find it. There is blame there. Not in the gun but in the uncle.) Still, nothing really explains Columbine well. The scenes from Littleton look just like where my relatives live and work and stuff and it's spooky. My nieces wouldn't think of killing anyone however. They are older. But many of those boys' classmates would never have dreamed to do it either. Sigh.

We find our way to Carnegie Hall and then find some friends and then the entrance to the Weill Recital hall. There were a bunch of folks from Austin, well over a dozen anyway. Our friend sings, some great pianists and a violinist perform. There was a whistler who, um, whistled tunes. He was pretty amazing but you wanted to laugh.

At the end, instead of these award winners taking a bow, before they could do that, a brass band of about forty kids took the stage as a 'tribute to the winners.' I felt it was some payoff to someone who supported the organization who wanted his kid's school brass band to play in Carnegie. They weren't very good and the solo was played by a forty-year-old man who wasn't that great either. Finally the winners of the contest squeezed out in front of the group and took a bow. Again, I wanted to laugh.

Some folks were off to Le Cirque for a $300/person reception but we've elected to leave black tie at home and save the $600. We catch a cab to get out of the cold and present ourselves without a reservation at DB Moderne, a Daniel Boulud restaurant. They seem only too happy too accommodate us with a table and I have boeuf en gelée and crispy duck and FFP some smoked salmon and tuna. We wash it down with a Gary Farrell Pinot.

I am facing Forrest and a mirror and being able to see people seems to enhance eavesdropping. A man says, "It sounds like you are a one horse pony, er, one show pony, er one trick pony." Clichés aren't his, um, forté perhaps.

Sleep seemed right but we didn't sleep all that well again.

			cold wind blowing It's not raining but a cold wind bites. We stay in bed until 9:45. Our room in the Iroquois faces a blind air shaft that doesn't give a view or much light to wake one up. We have slept fitfully. I was getting a little sore throat and sniffles. FFP's feet were aching or something. We finally find ourselves rather late for breakfast having a bran muffin (himself) and a coffee and onion bagel with cream cheese (me) at a little deli on the block. They are changing from a breakfast crowd to lunch preparation, filling the cold case with soda and grilling up meat and slicing turkey. No one else is using the few tables in the back of what is mostly a take-out. We would patronize this place some more if we weren't leaving soon. I suggest a movie. There is this giant movie complex on 42nd Street and they are showing Bowling for Columbine. We walk, facing the bitter wind down there but it isn't open yet. We take refuge in a newstand looking at magazines. In the end, I buy a couple. Then the theater is open and we buy tickets for the show. The tickets are $10 but they give a senior citizen discount to over 55 so FFP gets one for $6.50. Can't wait until my birthday! Ha. There is a restaurant on one of the mezzanines and we retreat there for salads and coffee and tea and read our books and magazines. Our movie is showing at the very top of the tall stack of theaters and we go up and up escalators and finally get there. The movie is good and amazingly even-handed considered Michael Moore's proclivities to see things his way. The truth is, he is sad about gun deaths and is chiding K-Mart for selling ammo and the National Rifle Association for their seeming indifference and such but he can't really figure out the why to gun deaths in general. He ends up pinning the blame for that six-year-old who killed a classmate on work for welfare and, given the situation, he's only sort of wrong. (Busing people great distances to work for minimum wage when they have kids to look after hardly seems right. Still, the uncle had a gun where a kid could find it. There is blame there. Not in the gun but in the uncle.) Still, nothing really explains Columbine well. The scenes from Littleton look just like where my relatives live and work and stuff and it's spooky. My nieces wouldn't think of killing anyone however. They are older. But many of those boys' classmates would never have dreamed to do it either. Sigh. After the movie we had time for a short rest before the recital at Carnegie. We find our way to Carnegie Hall and then find some friends and then the entrance to the Weill Recital hall. There were a bunch of folks from Austin, well over a dozen anyway. Our friend sings, some great pianists and a violinist perform. There was a whistler who, um, whistled tunes. He was pretty amazing but you wanted to laugh. At the end, instead of these award winners taking a bow, before they could do that, a brass band of about forty kids took the stage as a 'tribute to the winners.' I felt it was some payoff to someone who supported the organization who wanted his kid's school brass band to play in Carnegie. They weren't very good and the solo was played by a forty-year-old man who wasn't that great either. Finally the winners of the contest squeezed out in front of the group and took a bow. Again, I wanted to laugh. Some folks were off to Le Cirque for a $300/person reception but we've elected to leave black tie at home and save the $600. We catch a cab to get out of the cold and present ourselves without a reservation at DB Moderne, a Daniel Boulud restaurant. They seem only too happy too accommodate us with a table and I have boeuf en gelée and crispy duck and FFP some smoked salmon and tuna. We wash it down with a Gary Farrell Pinot. I am facing Forrest and a mirror and being able to see people seems to enhance eavesdropping. A man says, "It sounds like you are a one horse pony, er, one show pony, er one trick pony." Clichés aren't his, um, forté perhaps. Sleep seemed right but we didn't sleep all that well again.

	New York delivery "a quote." someone, some time
	JUST TYPING The wind makes you want to turn. And go the other direction on the street. Just as some situations. Inspire nothing So much As the desire to turn away.

Monday, March 3, 2003