mmmm.... new york

yet another reason why new york is wonderful... the delicious, mysterious maple syrup smell that wofted across the city the other day. sure, we're all gonna die of mapleborne illness shortly... but it was worth it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/29/nyregion/29smell.html

5 minutes of iFame

my brother (who also happens to be in the same program as I am at NYU) wrote an article that was posted on createdigitalmusic.com, one of those music nerd sites I so love to frequent. rock on.

link

3 things that rocked my world today in the span of 15 minutes

1) the dosa man at washington square park south. apparently he's a very important fixture in the food scene of this area-- there is always a line at his little food stand for his fresh-made dosas. this (search for 'dosa') is an article about him. Delicious.

2) while eating my dosa in washington square park on this lovely frigid afternoon, some guy started playing the flute. normally I'm not so into that sort of thing, he did this sort of beatboxing thing as he was playing and i quickly realized he was playing an incredibly funked-up version of the super mario brothers song. as i polished off the dosa and complimentary lentil soup, he launched into the sesame street song. if only i had more sheckels on me.

3) i had a bit of time to kill before class, so i took a detour and noticed the John Lennon educational tour bus parked outside the NYU bookstore. I had wanted to see this bus before up in Boston, so I stopped by and met the nicest people ever (since the dosa man, at least) who basically drive this amazingly pimped-out recording studio packed into a tour bus around the country for 10 months out of the year. They go to schools, colleges, and festivals, and somehow get a group of people to come in- no matter whether they're seasoned guitarists or have never played a musical note in their lives-- and over the course of a day, write, record, and mix an original song and give everyone that participated a DVD. These guys seriously rock for turning on so many people to music and recording. If the bus ever makes it to your town, take a tour and shake these guys' hands.

okay, but really, I'm writing this because I'm trying to avoid doing my Java homework.

love
b

what have I gotten myself into?!

mech2001

The woman in the video is the professor for one of my classes and she's using the software that we're learning in class to make those... interesting... cow-in-labor sounds. Enjoy!

you know what really grinds my gears?

a) shitty weather + not having a car. I was (and still am) very happy not to have a car, but getting around on days like today
2) the MTA on the weekends. at least in brooklyn. at least in october on shitty rainy days. track construction, terrorist threats, and a pervasive urine smell all contribute to this.
d) time-warner and 'supervisors' there that take themselves too seriously but still don't call you back as promised (yeah, that's you, supervisor ms. shaniqua). long story short, we're finally going to get internet probably next tuesday after maybe 6 or so hours on the phone and a dozen or so phone calls to time warner. but we'll see.

but on to better news... I got (another) part-time job, this time programming for a startup company that's going to be making some high-end audio software stuff. i can say no more, but it's a pretty damn cool opportunity (somehow they were impressed that i worked on missiles... how little they know) so i went out and treated myself to a new powerbook yesterday. it's gonna suck when apple announces new powerbooks next week because i've waited maybe 6 months to buy one but... i'll shut up now.

okay time to hand in my java homework... more posts when i get internets at home next week. i'll be in boston this weekend if anyone wants to have a playdate.

b

guten morgen

no internet nor cable tv at our apartment is rough, but hopefully that will be remedied soon. the move went well; we all may have sustained comical injuries while trying to move daver's brother's 300+lb tv up one flight of stairs (we ended up flipping it up the stairs end-over-end... somehow it still works) and i drank a lot of beer last weekend to celebrate the move. and now i'm mooching free internet from a very hip place that makes delicious coffee beverages in park slope called the tea lounge. some form of mega-housewarming will be happening soon. get your ass down here.

more love and pictures when i have more internet.