Talking Loudly

i'm out of here

2008-02-01T18:06:17Z

it's been a good 2.5 years or so, but i think i've had enough of this place. maybe i'll be back, maybe not. if you're supposed to find me, you'll be able to.

A few weeks ago I did the unthinkable.

2008-01-22T03:34:29Z

I turned 25. I thought maybe the quarter century mark would be followed with some other remarkable event. Perhaps a mental breakdown, or a moment of total clarity. Maybe I would suddenly become wiser, more grounded, more self-actualized. I'm not sure if that's happened or not, unless those changes would be signaled by the pile of human diarrhoea I found in the subway station today. So far, 25 seems to be business as usual. My life is just as manic as ever, filled with madcap misadventure and a crazy characters, and that's how I like it. I can't help it.

buh.

2008-01-08T14:39:05Z

dear new york, the following things are gross to do in public. especially on the subway. when i can see you. or smell you:

eat. this means anything. smacking your lips while you eat chinese food makes me want to smack you in your face. listening to you eat yogurt while we're sitting thisclose on the morning f train makes me want to die.
touch me with your frizzy hair. gross. reign that shit in, ladies. hair tie. headband. babushka. i don't care.
listen to your crappy crappy music as loud as you can. chances are, everyone around you has something better to think or read or listen to than your Ja Rule mixtape.
lean on the seat next to the doorway. it's not really a seat so much as it is a shield protecting those seated from your butt in their face. so stop leaning back against it, i don't want my sweet baby forehead touching your butt. not in public.
barf. i don't know how much money the mta has spent on ads telling you not to get on the train if you're sick, but it's got to be a lot. still, i've seen a good number of people puke up cornflakes on the subway platform. funny? yes. gross? that too.

thanks so much, i look forward to seeing you monday-friday at 8 am and 6 pm. love, me

hark! the death knell for facebook hath sounded:

2007-12-21T14:41:56Z

who are the two friends we have in common? my sister and my man friend. awesome.

business (trip)

2007-12-19T14:54:18Z

Santa Fe was beautiful. A sky so full of stars you felt like they could fall on you. Mountain ranges turning purple in the sunset. Beautiful art, beautiful food, beautiful people. Snow-covered brush sparkling on the hillsides. Butler breakfast in a private casita. Makes a girl want to jump. Oh, and I found a mini pony. He warmed up to me later.

business lady

2007-12-11T15:34:30Z

i'm off to santa fe until friday, on business. i'm not entirely sure if i'm qualified as a business traveler, as i lack the requisite blackberry or even pants with a waistband. i do, however, have a roll-on suitcase. it's pink. in my absence, you can direct all your attention here, here and here.

happy holidays to you and yours

2007-12-06T21:45:41Z

hungry.

2007-12-03T14:37:36Z

last night i dreamed that i went grocery shopping just before the apocalypse. i woke up disappointed that the on-sale greek yogurt i bought was just a dream.

emotional intelligence

2007-12-03T03:46:17Z

"you have to sing with me sometimes", she said, "or i'll scream til my voice is all gone."

ms. nora goes to washington (D.C.)

2007-11-21T15:38:23Z

last time i went to D.C., i went to the white house. i ate some waffles. i saw the memorials. i also gave FDR a lapdance. what hijinks will i get into this time!

looking for silence in the city of sound

2007-11-21T14:17:19Z

my ipod broke the other week. it still turns on, but none of the buttons work, which means i can't even re-set it. this means that my commute has become almost unbearable, my ears constantly assaulted with the horrible music taste of OTHER PEOPLE. i try to avoid teenage boys, because as much as i loved rap music in high school, and as much of it is currently sitting dormant in my ipod, there is nothing more annoying than hearing several different fabricated beats pounding out of several pairs of headphones. nothing, of course, but also hearing the fabricated sound effects (dog bark! gun shot! whistle! dog bark! car door slam! girl moaning! dog bark!) pounding out at various intervals. today i got the middle seat on the F train. it's awkward, especially because my arms are long and gangly and whenever i have to hold them close to my sides i have a sudden urge to start flailing them about. weird, i know. anyhow, the man next to me was listening to his music too loud. i was about to sigh and rolls my eyes when i realized he was listening to a song i like. no, a song i love. i loved the next song and the next song and the next song, and then i realized that i wasn't just idly overhearing his music, but was leaning into him like he was my boyfriend. what's more, he didn't mind. awkward?

love, dr. josh

2007-11-16T22:41:26Z

i'm never ever sad because i have a friend who sends me stuff like this. and then when i can't find it, he sends it again.

because good manners make a person nice to know

2007-11-15T04:51:19Z

Today, I was running early for work. I even had the time to stop by the bodega for my favorite snack of all time. I was about to swipe my card at 8:05am when the train sped by. What the F, MTA? That train is supposed to come at 8:11, and I know that if I swipe my card right now, I'll be waiting until 8:25 for another Northbound G train, my blood pressure increasing with every Brooklyn-bound G train stopping on the other platform. Fine, I thought, I'll cross the street and take the G the other way. I'm stupid. I gave up this commute long ago, when I realized that G train --> L train--> R train really just ends in a shitshow where my blood pressure is so high that you can see my heart beating behind my A-cup BEFORE I EVEN GET TO WORK. I did it anyway. 20 minutes of waiting, and the mob on the L train pushed me inside the packed train. Some assface standing in the doorway had A DOLLY with him. A DOLLY. ON THE MORNING TRAIN. So the mob pushes me, all 6 awkward feet of me, between the tiny spaces between people until I'm awkwardly wedged in between some dude with a mustache and 500 other faceless people. And that's when I feel it. A punch to the back. Like right in the back. Not even in the kidneys. Just a punch to the spine, basically. The culprit? A crunchy-perm-haired troll with crackhead fingernails and a leather lady trench. I thanked her for her amateur Chiropractic services. You're VERY WELCOME she says, in that horrible way that only born and bred New York bitches can really say things. And that's when the last bit of Minnesota nice melted away, and I brought my Brooklyn out. Yeah? Okay. You're a bitch. I graduted Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. in English and that was the best thing I could come up with.

granny knows style.

2007-11-13T18:18:28Z

and you can buy her amazing creations here.

home again home again jiggity jig

2007-11-04T23:36:37Z

Minneapolis has been on my shit list for some time. Not for any reason in particular, at least not that I can remember, but for some reason as soon as I left for college I dreaded any return to the North Star State. Maybe it was the bitter cold, that horrible biting freeze that hits you directly in the face when you open your front door, and freezes your gloves hands to your steering wheel. Maybe it was the elongated vowels, which I learned to mask in the non-regional dialect country of Cincinnati, OH. Maybe it was when Dayton's turned to Marshall Field's, and then, in a horrifying turn of events, ended up as a Macy's. Maybe it was when my mom packed up all of my most sentimental possessions and gave them to Goodwill, telling me as I wept for the lost relics of my childhood that I was welcome to go to Goodwill and buy them back AS IF A GIANT FRAMED POSTER OF THE VELVETEEN RABBIT OR A LAMP SHAPED LIKE A GOOSE HEAD WOULD GO UNPURCHASED! At any rate, my visits became fewer and further between and by June of 2006 I hadn't been home in 9 months. My whirlwind trip to the City of Lakes for Cara's wedding involved flat tires, bridesmaid dresses, red wine and a hangover, par for the course as far as my weekends go. Minnesota seemed different that weekend--maybe because it was all a blur of emotion--but either way, that anxious trapped-in-a-box feeling I usually got when the plane touched down at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport was noticeably absent. [I think this is a good point to add that I don't hate Minneapolis. I'm even considered somewhat of a fan, especially here on the East Coast where people proudly announce their ignorance of "flyover country" and mix up Minneapolis with Milwaukee or Michigan (which is not a city but an entire state the last time I checked, which was around 5th grade) as if it's somehow a mark of high culture to be totally ignorant of 50% of your country.] This time, I flew into Minneapolis at 10am on a Thursday morning, having left the office the night before with my shoulders and neck so tight that I was afraid to turn my head for fear of shattering all of my muscles in a messy display on the subway. My Grandma turned 90 yesterday, so we threw her a party on Saturday night at Pulaski Hall in Northeast Minneapolis. If you haven't heard of it, it's because you're not Polish. We're not either, but we know a guy who knows a guy. Four generations of Farleys/Nagans/Whathaveyou were present to celebrate the most amazing woman I know. To be fair, the Fourth generation spent most of their time on the floor participating in the 2007 Baby Summit, but they showed up and stayed awake past 7 and that's what counts. After Granny's party, the McInerny siblings hung out together for the first time in over 2 years. TWO YEARS since all the little birdies had been back in the nest together. So what did we do? We played Tetris on Jeremy's PS2, screamed, fought for attention, farted on each other, sent Patrick to Byerly's at midnight to buy some snackities and finished the night with a few episodes of The IT Crowd. I left on Sunday feeling like I had purified myself in the water of Lake Minnetonka. Four days of intensive family time, the kind where my brothers and sister and I alternately laugh hysterically and threaten each other with physical violence, the kind where my brother and I find my mom's black bra in the backseat OF MY DAD's car, the kind where my brother-in-law has to remind me to stop saying the F word in front of the baby to the point where I think he thinks I'm doing it on purpose, the kind where I mock my Dad for getting a nose job JUST BECAUSE I'M JEALOUS, the kind where I'm amazed that with all the fluffy towels, amazing coffee, poached eggs, Apple computers and high-quality crafting products around the house I would have ever LEFT THE NEST, I soaked this shit up like a sponge. I'm back in Brooklyn now, staying up too late, eating take-out for every meal, drinking 100 ounces of coffee a day. I feel great.