Hajj
So last week I was walking around midtown when I stumbled upon the 5th Avenue Apple Store. This is the vaunted “Cube” flagship store. Seriously, I didn’t know it was there (I thought it was more downtown) — it’s right on the edge of Central Park, sorta near the Museum of Modern Art. Jobsian gravity must’ve pulled me there.
So there’s the glass cube. Inside were mounted four giant-sized iPhones displaying all the cool things you can do on an iPhone. The cube is in a plaza with benches and tables and chairs — a nice place for lunch or for smugly writing blog entries on your MacBook.
The store itself is underground and it is huge as a mother. Noisy, chaotic, full of people. Working there must be either a rush or something that drives you nuts. Seriously, there were something like 300 people in there, all yammering and gnashing their teeth and trying to get Genius Bar appointments. Kids checking their email, hipsters watching skateboarding dog on YouTube, various 5th Avenue big-sunglasses types wanting their iPhones NOWMOTHERFUCKAS!
I recommend going even if you’re not a mac fan. It’s definitely worth seeing.
iPhone Tidbits:
- The guy waiting in line for an iPhone at the Cube is a Professional line waiter.
- Paris Hilton has tried to order an iPhone from jail. Also, dignity. But apparently you can’t buy that.
- Chance of yours truly getting an iPhone on Friday: 62%.
Panoply
The best part of being back in LA is driving my own car around. That’s one thing that gets irritating about NYC — you have to carry all your stuff around all day. You go to a meeting and you need your computer, then that night you’ve got to schlep it around with you. A car is a small mobile fortress containing stuff that you need/may not need, but it’s all there and you don’t have to lug it around. I carry several cases of Diet Coke in my trunk.
So I’m back. It’s a busy week — got a lotta stuff to do, a lotta stuff to read, and a lotta cranking to crank before I have to go again. It’s nice to have things to do and to travel in the name of creativity and stuff like that, but it’s also nice to lie on my couch and watch Top Chef. There must be balance in all things — Top Chef is my little black dot in the white swirl of the yin/yang.
This Is Serious Business
My favorite breakfast in the entire world is cold pizza and a Diet Coke. There is something about the flavor profile that creates a magic molecule of deliciousness for me. I have simple needs and tastes. Real is where I keep it!
Lloyd and Jeanie took me to get the best burger in Brooklyn at this place called Bonnie’s Grill on 5th Avenue. It really was the best burger I’ve ever had in Brooklyn, maybe among the top 10 best burgers I’ve ever had anywhere. Keep in mind that this top ten list consists of simply-great burgers and also burgers that, for that particular moment in space and time, were great.
We had hot chicken wings to start. Now that I’m reading the restaurant’s profile (“started by two guys from Buffalo…”) it all makes sense. These wings were pretty much perfect. Fried crisp and then sauced. Never soggy. All texture and thick, liquid hotness. Thinking about it, that’s what you want life to be all about, right?
Then the burgers. I think it was the seasoning that made them great. Lloyd sensed cumin in them. They were topped with sweet grilled jalapenos. They were large. In charge. Like a power move in burger form. Like Cusack holding up a boombox that’s playing Peter Gabriel in burger form.
People in Manhattan have gotten nicer. I’m talking about everyday people that you deal with. It’s weird.
I’m trying to reprogram myself to say “You’re welcome” when someone thanks me. People don’t say that enough. I like how it sounds. Right now I say “No problem.” It’s difficult to switch.
Quality of Life
I was on stopover in Detroit when my flight to LGA got cancelled. Every flight going into NYC and Newark was cancelled that night, so I had to stay over in Detroit.
The Detroit airport is all right — the Northwest Terminal is brand new and so large that it has a light rail system running through it overhead. They have not just one but two Borders bookstores. The area surrounding the airport was… Bleak. Flatland. The hotel window had a nice, Dickensian view of the situation.
So then the next day I finally got into JFK without my bags. Being without your toiletries and haberdashery turns you into a hobo. I was also without chargers for my computer and cell phone. I went to Duane Reade and bought brand-new stuff — the airline said they would credit me for the inconvenience.
I worked all day yesterday; on the way back to Brooklyn I got caught in a cloudburst and got soaked. I was definitely being tested by the J-Man.
My bags finally showed up today. Nothing is better than using your own stuff and changing into your own clothes — you finally smell like yourself. Otherwise you feel like a roving ghost, in a different place and in the body of a different person. It’s very important to feel like you are yourself at all times.
The thing about New York is that there are so many beautiful women that you fall in love every thirty seconds. This is very distracting.
I will be doing Q&As at the opening weekend of Cowboy in San Francisco, so please stop on by if you like. The exact dates will be announced on the AATC website.
Pretty
So I went in to the store to buy this:
And there on a table of new paperbacks, I saw this:
I had to get it. I ended up getting both. Cowboys and Indians.
What’s great is having a trusted stable of authors, bands, film directors, cooking show hosts, etc. — whenever they put out a new product you know that it’ll be good. For some of them I don’t even need to know what the thing’s about — I’ll just go ahead and buy it.
Artists gain this kind of trust from me in two ways. Either they build that trust with a series of works that I connect with (Sherman Alexie, David Fincher), or they hit me with one extraordinary thing completely by surprise. I walk around a bookstore and there are endless possibilities — for disappointment. But I’m always looking for someone whose work I can latch onto like a jawless eel.
One recent disappointment has been the new CYHSY album. I really wanted more of what the debut album had. I guess a good lesson to take from it is that you shouldn’t try to grow up too fast — do what you do well just long enough to build an audience that’ll grow with you.
Cowboy Summer
Two Cowboy Versus Samurai productions are landing this summer on the west coast! One in San Francisco, home of the cable car, gay pride, and Rice-a-Roni; the other in Vancouver British Columbia, home of the Canucks, extremely awesome totem poles, and very very many Chinese people.
These productions mark the California Debut and Canadian Debut of the play that flips the hot-button topic of race onto its back — exposing its soft underbelly — and tickles it until it giggles like a little baby. It’s about the power of love, letters, and friendship, and how the worst kind of rejection is the kind that we create for ourselves.
Come check it out!
In San Francisco at The Asian American Theater Company — July 5th-22nd
Thu.-Sat. @ 8PM, Sun. @ 2PM — Thick House, 1695 18th Street — San Francisco, CA
In Vancouver BC at Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre — July 20th to August 3rd
All evening performances at 8:00PM, matinees at 2:00PM
Evening performances at 8:00PM, matinees at 2:00PM … Tuesdays to Saturdays (evenings) + Sunday (matinees) — Opening Night + Reception: Friday, July 20 … Closing Night + Reception: Friday, August 3
Directed by Josette Jorge — Featuring Marc Arboleda, Lissa Neptuno, Ryan Swanson and Minh Ly. Stage Managed by Susan Miyagishima, Produced by Joyce Lam
Boooop
Say what you will about the new Safari 3.0 beta, but the Find feature is awesome. Boooop! Okay, so it doesn’t make that noise — but it looks like it should.
Crucial Analysis: For me, looking at complex things requires some hand holding. It’s good to have someone there to explain art in a museum. It’s good to have someone to discuss books with.
Some of the best Sopranos analysis has come from Salon — not the writers at Salon but the letters from readers. Especially the Editors’ Choice letters. They’re so well written and elegant in their thinking. It makes me wonder what these people do for a living.
Need a new murse. Any suggestions?
My Work in Print
Year Zero
Available from Samuel French and Amazon.com
Cowboy Versus Samurai
Available from Samuel French and Amazon.comFor a complete list of books containing my work, please click here.
