I was looking through some old journals this evening in an attempt to date photos I am scanning and ran into some pages I didn't remember writing.

Here's a bit that jumped out at me. It was written in a Tibetan guesthouse high on the plateau. The year was 1999:

4/30 - Last night I heard howling dogs, screaming hawks and a strange low moan that might have been human, but was not. From my high window, I could see the dark shadows of hawks circling overhead against a tremendous canopy of stars. In my dream I had seen lightning leaping across the sky. A bolt struck the moon and it fell, crashing with the sound of a falling chandelier. The broken pieces scattered in the soft earth flickering out with long angry hisses. My eyes adjust. Without the moon even more stars lit the sky, but they too began falling, one by one with whispered sighs until the world was inky black. A paralyzing fear overwhelmed me until, in this absolute night, swooped creatures bristling with electricity gliding out of reach on great gossamer wings. Looking, while comforting, hurt my eyes so I closed them and drifted quickly, silently away from this cold place and back into the warm river of sleep.

Today I was surprised by a lady on a unicycle speeding down Atlantic Avenue and without thinking exclaimed, "holy mackerel". I don't think I've said that phrase since I was a kid... and then out of nowhere, there it was.

Occasionally I'll let out a "holy cow" or a "holy moly.""Holy smokes" isn't really my thing, but sometimes it will show up... much more occasionally, "holy frijole", but "holy mackerel" has been locked up for probably 30 years. What spurred it? Did I hear it somewhere,was it the fish shop I visited the other day, or is there something about fatherhood greasing the rusty wheels in my brain?

We live in a nice old townhouse circa 1831. It has been renovated in the past, but never horribly. But the worst architetural crimes are often cumulative, small nicks and tucks that eventually leave a buiding without it's architectural integrity...

A few weeks ago we complained about the cold (it's downright drafty). Instead of turning up the heat a notch our landaldy decided to replace the windows as the current ones are uninsulated. It didn't seem like a horrible idea at the time....then the windows arrived. Instead of nice period-appropriate wooden casings she is installing horrible steel framed unpaned windows... I feel the building's pain. This will leave me grumpy for months.

I have been Domokun fan for years, but only recently have I begun to see the domo meme take hold here in the US.

Don't know Domo. Here's his homepage.

Here's a domo sig I created for your email (use a monospaced font to see it):

        __________ 
       /           
     _/  O      O   
    / )  ________  | 
   | (| |////| | 
     | |        | | 
       |        | | 
      | |////| | 
      |      
      |            | | 
      |            (_) 
      |     ||     | 
      (_____)(_____) 
Domo is powerful!

...

I've been a fan of audioscrobbler for a few years, but only recently has the Mac plug-in been polished enough everyday use. Lately I just leave it on all the time. Interesting to see what you actually listen to all graphed out. Right now the sample is too small so it doesn't really accurately reflect my tastes, but over time it should get more and more precise as more and more songs are added. Pretty cool if you love music. And even nicer when coupled with last.fm
This is my page for the curious:
http://www.audioscrobbler.com/user/themexican/

Snippets from life with a newborn:

Jenn: ok. I'm exhausted, you need to take him for a while.

me: Ok little bear, let's play a game.... How about 'my nose, your nose'?

My nose.
Your nose.
My nose.
Your nose

(nothing)

Ok. don't like that one today. How about 'up down'?
Up.
Down.
Up.
Down.

(nothing)

Don't like that one either. Ok lets play 'Ramones original lineup'?

Johnny Ramone
Joey Ramone
Dee Dee Ramone
Tommy Ramone

(Raul Andres lights up and actually laughs)

[repeat for the next half hour]
. . .

. . .
The snow is getting really dirty... I'm ready for another blizzard.

When I was in high school my little brother received a call from a man with a New York accent claiming to be our grandfather. "You're not my grandfather," my brother said and hung up.

The only grandfather we knew lived in Mexico, my dad's dad. My mother's father was dead. According to my mom he had been a bad guy and had left her family when she was a child. She never actually detailed how he had died, "I don't talk about him" she would say, but that's the impression she left. Only when asked questions directly would she parcel out small fragments of information. He was Irish. He was in the Navy. He had blue eyes. He left Queens for California. Eventually she would would change the subject.

His name was Francis Peter and to this day I've never seen a picture of him.

That afternoon in 1983 the man on the phone kept calling. It was a little bit scary so we took the phone off the hook. My mom returned home and answered a call. She shooed us out of the room and closed the door. About an hour later she emerged clearly shaken. It was indeed her father. He was dying and wanted to visit. It had taken him 3 years to track us down.

My mom called her lawyer, a big bear of a man with a gravely Texas twang to warn her father never to call again. He never did. About a year later we received word that he had died. He had been living in San Francisco...alone apparently; a park ranger. Before he died he had put together a large box of things he wanted to give my mom, it would arrive a few weeks later.

The box was a crate made of wood. Well made and heavy packed. Notable was the address, hand lettered in black paint with a sure hand. Big old fashioned looking cursive.

Within 30 minutes of it's arrival at our house , the box was on a truck headed towards the city dump. It was unopened. I didn't think throwing it out was right, but I knew that on this issue I would have no sway. My mom never mentioned the incident again.

Still, even today, half a life later, I wonder...

Are you someone who looks at people on the street and wonders what they were thinking? If so Simon Høgsberg's Thought Project is for you. He stopped people on the street in Denmark, took their photo, asked what they were thinking, and recorded the results.

And while you are thinking... you might as well check out Swapatorium, an excellent blog of found photographs and objects. Angelica has the most amazing eye... Her flickr pages are also worthy of exploration.

I wrote a long post tonight about nothing in particular (it meandered from thoughts on our local Brooklyn Heights deli to some nonsense about an old dream), but managed to delete it with an over eager command-w (window close for you windows people).

In lieu of anything else, enclosed is another portrait of the baby this time with me. He's been smiling nonstop these days, except when the camera is pulled out. Then he puts on his serious face.

On days like today there is usually a window of time when the snow is still falling and before the snowplows and shovelers arrive where the city is transformed becoming the domain of kids on sleds, happy dogs, and intrepid urban skiers. Snowball fights erupt with random people in the middle of the street (which is indistinguishable from the sidewalk), snowmen are built and destroyed with glee, and life seems uncomplicated. As Jenn would say, happy times, happy times.

. . .
In the meantime, on the Upper West Side, Aunt Becky was having her own happy times:

Today people all around the city were hysterical about "blizzard of 05" . "Stock up on food and batteries, there will be a run on the grocery stores;" they said, "the city will come to a standstill. The water mains will break. The power will go out. You never know what will happen."

About a foot of snow is expected starting tomorrow.

Nothing to sneeze at, but my friends in Buffalo will hear of this with a chuckle. The last time we visited there in winter cars were covered with snow and 7 foot snowbanks turned roads into deep white trenches. And when the snow came off of Lake Erie visibility went down to a few inches. A foot is no big deal. We prepared by grabbing a few extra logs for the fire and some milk.

A digression

Because of the speed with which this cold snap hit us, the deeper subway stations have been turned into chimneys as the hot air trapped deep underground rushes to the surface. Most of New York's subways are actually right under the streets, built 100 years ago with the then innovative, dig and cover technique, but the stations around the edges of the island dive down into the bedrock to pass under the rivers. You would think the deep subway tunnels would be cool, like caves, but the constant heat escaping from the trains keeps them perpetually warm, and hence the strong wind on cold days. Today it was so bad men were losing their hats and women had to hold their skirts and coats down. Children of course enjoyed the phenomenon.

I sat near at the front of the train next to the window peering into the tracks. I always like watching the plunge from Court Street Station down into the the elegant tunnel under the East River. The tunnel is officially called the Whitehall-Montague Street Tunnel and was completed in 1917 with great fanfare. The man who oversaw the project at a ceremony for marking the final blast to complete the tunnel noted "There have been 800,000 decompressions, with air pressures reaching as high as 37.5 pounds, yet there has been only one death due to compressed air sickness. Less than 200 cases of bends have been reported. Although on the average as many as 2100 men have been employed daily, but 22 men have been killed due to accidents during the whole period of the work. This is an indication of the precautions which you have taken for the protection and safety of your men, and it merits the highest commendation."

Coming up into Manhattan the tunnel rises and starts to branch and curve. All along the way the train is guided by a simple system of stoplights. Unlike modern subways operated by a central computer. New York subways are still driven individual conductors. When the light is green the driver goes forward. When yellow he slows down. When red he stops. There is little communication between trains and no central control of the whole system although a dispatcher can now talk to all trains. In the City the trains rise to the "just under the street level" and from there the cold outside is obvious. Thick clusters icicles hang down from grates above sometimes falling onto the passing train. Here there is little wind. It's just as cold as it is outside.

Jenn keeps making me crop her... I might have to disobey her orders soon.

And we thought our boy was large:

This boy was 16.7 pounds!

I'm sleepy. It's the baby, it's too much work. It's the cold. And I haven't been getting my naps.

I subscribe to the English school of naps:

"You must sleep sometime between lunch and dinner, and no halfway measures. Take off your clothes and get into bed. That's what I always do. Don't think you will doing less work because you sleep during the day. That's a foolish notion held by people with no imaginations. You will be able to accomplish more. You get two days in one--well, at least one and a half." - Winston Churchill