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Responses to People on the 6 Train That Hopefully Convey My Feelings in a Polite Way. “Thank you for so gently cupping my ass when we came to a stop.”
Update: The author of this list has a blog with some quick-witted observations of NYC. (thx, robert)
“Preliminary construction” will begin on the High Line Park in mid-February. Protective fences will be put up south of 20th Street, so it might be your last chance to see the High Line as it is and once was. Here are some photos I took of the High Line from a February 2004 excursion. (via gmist)
The Onion moved to NYC from Wisconsin five years ago. Lessons learned? “If your life is going nowhere, don’t try, and it’ll all work out.”
Mark Rothko’s Seagram murals were to hang in the then-new Four Seasons restaurant in NYC. How did they come to hang instead in the Tate Modern in London?
Caterina tagged me and it’s Friday, so what the hell?
Four jobs I’ve had:
1. Minimum wage worker, green bean canning factory
2. Tutor, in college physics
3. Web designer, for about 6 different companies
4. Blogger, kottke.org
Four movies I can watch over and over:
1. Ocean’s Eleven
2. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
3. The Day After Tomorrow
4. Finding Nemo
Four places I’ve lived:
1. Minneapolis
2. Rolla, MO
3. New York
4. San Francisco
Four TV shows I love:
1. Six Feet Under
2. Doctor Who (the original series)
3. Family Guy
4. Oh gosh, I dunno
Ten highly regarded and recommended TV shows that I’ve never watched a single minute of:[1]
1. 24
2. Lost
3. The Sopranos
4. Any reality TV show
5. Arrested Development
6. Battlestar Galactica
7. My Name is Earl
8. Deadwood
9. Desperate Housewives
10. The Wire
Four places I’ve vacationed:
1. Kauai, HI
2. Beijing
3. Paris
4. Rapid City, SD
Four of my favorite dishes:
1. Bologna sandwich
2. Soup dumplings
3. Cinnamon ice cream
4. Just about anything on a tasting menu
Four sites I visit daily:
1. google.com
2. flickr.com
3. robotwisdom.com
4. waxy.org
Four places I would rather be right now:
1. In a bathtub
2. On the beach
3. In space
4. Paris
Four bloggers I am tagging (but who won’t do it because they’re too old school…how’s that for a taunt?):
1. Meg Hourihan
2. Matt Haughey
3. Paul Bausch
4. Anil Dash
[1] I added this question because I was thinking about it the other day. I know, such a bad-ass rule-breaker.
The delicate marketing of Brokeback Mountain. In Manhattan for example, analysis of the city’s various social microclimates was used to select the opening theaters to de-emphasize the art-house aspect of the film. (via dj)
Manhattan’s Chinatown didn’t bounce back after 9/11 and the city’s Chinese are moving elsewhere in the city to find cheaper rents. (via dg)
“If you see something suspicious, welcome to how New York got started.” (via gothamist)
Haven’t tried it out yet, but SeamlessWeb At Home seems like a good site for ordering Manhattan delivery (i.e. lunch/dinner) online. Plus, you get 20% off your order from some places.
Photos of pool hustlers in NYC. (via coolfer by way of the actual janelle)
kottke.org favorites Andrew Zolli and Marissa Meyer (from a little company called Google) are going to be speaking at Core77’s panel on Design 2.0 in NYC at the end of February. Looks pretty interesting.
Cory has calculated the center of gravity of Starbucks in Manhattan…that is, the geographic point where all of them are pulling equally on you. It’s right around 40th St and 5th Ave.
The NY Times spends some time at home with Paula Scher. The gallery displaying her work is right around the corner from Eyebeam….I think I’ll head over there today.
Slate’s The Year in Culture for 2005. “As infuriating and crippling as the [NYC transit] strike was for so many, I selfishly appreciated having a city that was uninviting and briefly in turmoil.”
I can’t remember where I first ran across Edward Burtynsky’s photography, but I’ve been developing into a full-fledged fan of work over the past few months. From a Washington Post article on Burtynsky:
Burtynsky calls his images “a second look at the scale of what we call progress,” and hopes that at minimum, the images acquaint viewers with the ramifications — he avoids the word price — of our lifestyle. But what if viewers just see, you know, some dudes and a ship?
“Another photographer might focus on the loss of life or pollution,” acknowledges Kennel of the National Gallery. “He uses beauty as a way to draw attention to something. It’s a very particular strategy.”
The Brooklyn Museum of Art is displaying an exhibition of Burtynsky’s photos until January 15. Well worth the effort to try and check it out. The scale of modernity, particularly in his recent photos of China, is astounding. In Three Gorges Dam Project, Dam #4, this huge dam seems to stretch on forever and you don’t know whether to goggle in wonder or shrink in horror from looking at it.
New York magazine enters the NYC dining fray with a listing of the best 101 restaurants in the city. Only two got their highest (5 star) rating: Masa and Le Bernardin.
A list of what restaurant professionals want to see more and less of in 2006. Anthony Bourdain wants less “Truffle oil. ‘Fusion.’ Water sommeliers. Overdesigned dining rooms. Mayonnaise on sushi. ‘Concept’ restaurants. Novelty martinis.” (via eater)
New York City is in danger of losing its creative class as the high cost of living drives people to other cities.
Things Magazine has a great link-filled post about King Kong.
Adam from Slice documented all of the pizzerias on his 8.2 mile walk to work this morning (more). (thx, janelle)
Gothamist interview with my friend Lisa Whiteman about her photography. Lisa is one of the most thoughtful people I know and it shows in this interview.
MoMA just opened their show about Pixar last week and on Friday, we went to a presentation by John Lasseter, head creative guy at the company. Interesting talk, although I’d heard some of it in various places before, most notably in this interview with him on WNYC. Two quick highlights:
At 15 minutes long, the Q&A session at the end of his talk was too short. The MoMA audience is sufficiently interesting and Lasseter was so quick on his feet and willing to share his views that 30 to 40 minutes of Q&A would have been great.
[1] For you Pixar completists and AICN folks out there, the clip showed Lightning McQueen leaving a race track on the back of a flat-bed truck, bound for a big race in California. As the truck drives across the US, you see the criss-crossing expressways of the city stretch out into the long straight freeways of the American west, the roads literally cutting into the beautiful scenery. A cover of Tom Cochran’s Life is a Highway plays as the truck drives. The world of the movie features only cars, no humans…the cars are driving themselves.
NYC subways and buses are shut down as the city’s transit workers go on strike.
Witold Rybczynski on the success of Rockefeller Center as an urban project.
Subways and buses are still running in NYC, but the Transport Workers Union has called for a partial strike that will start on private bus lines and if no agreement has been reached, will spread elsewhere.
Ken Auletta explores the recent troubles at the NY Times in the New Yorker (interview with Auletta). As much as people complain about the liberal media, it’s hard to imagine a conservative magazine running a similar story about, say, Fox News.
Video of a building super catching a baby tossed from the 3rd story of a burning building. I’ve never seen such shameless maneuvering for a Christmas tip in all my life!
Slideshow of photographs by Annie Leibovitz documenting the building of The New York Times Building in NYC. (thx, michael)
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