Deep Thinking

I started laughing quietly to myself in Bible Study this morning because I just figured out after all these years that Deep Thought from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is supposed to be a mechanical version of John the Baptist. How slow am I?

A Twist for Who

I just saw the new Doctor Who episode Waters of Mars. Strange little twist. The story itself was nothing special for Who standards, but it also plays on the theme that the Doctor has a theory that there are some points in time that are fixed. It also sets up for the double episode grand finale. There's a teaser trailer at the end. All sorts of people from the previous episodes including John Simm with white hair.

Trailer for THE END OF TIME episode:

Happy Thanksgiving!

My first Thanksgiving in New York City!

Debbie's first turkey, which was awesome.

He's actually caught smiling on camera?!

The kids.

Birthday girls.

Birthday song

Blowing out candle

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving too!

ps. For anyone following my novel on National Novel Writing Month, you can read my chapter 7 if you click here.

New favorite show

Why have I not heard of Black Books? I went Christmas shopping and saw it on the discount rack. Three seasons of it. Reasons why I knew it would be good:

1. It's about people working in a bookshop
2. It's British.
3. It stars Bill Bailey.
4. It was created by (and stars) Dylan Moran.

Also, there are a lot of famous cameos like Simon Pegg, Martin Freeman, Nick Frost, Peter Serafinowicz etc. I've also seen the woman on Doctor Who.


I'm watching it on YouTube. You want to see the first episode?
Part One
Part Two
Part three

Commute from Hell

List of annoyances getting home Monday night:

1. Small delay at Howard Beach due to the bridge going up.

2. The bridge getting stuck. They had to send out mechanics. Longer delay.

3. The train giving up and going out of service, kicking everyone out.

4. Taxis cost $11 up front. Forget that. I wandered around until I found a bus stop.

5. Missed the bus by 30 seconds.

6. The bus was really crowded because all the people from the trains were getting on it.

7. Got home an hour late.

It was weird being stuck on that train with all those people calling their loved ones. One lady was screaming into the phone DON'T CALL ANYONE! DON'T CALL ANYONE 'TIL I GET HOME! and another guy was complaining about how he couldn't step out for a smoke. I high-tailed it to the bus stop, following hopstop on my phone in the dark (this was 7:30pm) until I found out I was by my church and got to the bus I take on Sundays. A lady showed up in a cab and recognized me from the train. We got to chatting and more and more people from the train started showing up. Finally the bus came. Thankfully, we fit even though we had to stand. After that, the bus went by tons of people without stopping because there was just no room.




I got three job rejections last night, just to top it off. But the good news is that I only had to work two days this week (even though I would have happily worked tomorrow for the extra money).

Friday in the city

This Friday, I got to hang out with Katie! She's my London flatmate who I haven't seen in over a year. She had an interview at her dream job, so I really hope she gets it. Plus, we could hang out more if she was working in New York.

We chatted at Starbucks for a couple hours and met her friend Brenna at a Dominican restaurant. Katie ordered first, then I ordered the seafood soup, then Brenna asked if their soups were any good. Our waiter said "The chicken, yes." And I was like "Wait! What about the seafood soup?" And he said, "No." Most honest waiter ever.

Then they gave me an empty bowl with a shell cracker in it. What kind of soup is this?!

It was a veggie brothy soup with a whole lobster hand in it that I had to crack open. Very weird. There were some other animals in it like snails and unidentifiable ones. But it tasted good. What a strange restaurant experience.

It was awesome catching up with Katie. I hope we can do it again soon. We are both looking for jobs in publishing, she in magazines and me in books.



Moon

I saw the episode of Carpool (llewtube.com) with Duncan Jones, David Bowie's kid, who directed Moon with Sam Rockwell. They showed a clip from the movie. I kind of want to see it now.







NaNoWriMo chapter 6

CHAPTER 6

10 randomz on thurzday

1. First off, thank you everyone for the birthday wishes.
And secondly, happy birthday to Uncle Mike while we're on the subject.

2. I was supposed to go to a meeting tonight, but I got lost so I went home. This is why I don't make friends in the city. I'm lazy and directionally challenged.

3. Chapter 5:
http://j-leigh-nelson.livejournal.com/40262.html

4. The book A Time For Everything came in today. This is an amazing book and you should read it if you have the patience for 500 pages and lots of tangents. But well worth it.

5. For my birthday, I went to work where I went to my favorite place, the post office, had Quiznos for lunch, and met Leonard Bernstein's daughter.

6. I don't know if this link will work, but I'll fix it later if it doesn't. Whoever came up with this idea is brilliant:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H000bC3V5AU

I think I should do a post talking about all the wonderful things people are using YouTube for like saving lives through charity and creative little things like this and starting businesses. Granted most people just go to YouTube to watching things like David After the Dentist, but there are intelligent and creative people using it as well.

7. I now have loads of awesome new music thanks to Katie. Hopefully I will meet up with her in the city tomorrow. It's been over a year.

8. Anyone heard of Tim Dorsey? His books look funny. Maybe I ought to give it a try. Read the review for Nuclear Jellyfish. Apparently there's a whole series.

9. I have new ideas for stories, but I'm saving them until December when I'm done with my NaNoWriMo novel. Anyone besides Nicole read any? Impressions? The story ideas are exciting. Most seem to come from eavesdropping on people at work. One is bad b/c it was one of those dreams that sound brilliant at 2 in the morning until you try to read your scribbles after you get up.

10. Should my blog look more professional now that I'm applying to jobs? Does H R look at blogs? I hope they at least look at my website. I work hard to keep it updated. If you're a job recruiter, leave a note in comments.

J

22 Accomplishments

Today is my birthday, so I thought I'd look back on the previous year by listing 22 accomplishments of being 22.

1. I got a grant with which I hired an editor for my book.
2. I went to the most amazing retreat ever with JCV.
3. I put on 4 shows: Junebug, Gaelic Strom, Teada, and Ragamala
4. I became English Club VP and hosted open mic night
5. I completed a large scale art project about Ray Bradbury and presented it to my drawing class
6. I created the ENG Club tshirt.
7. I presented a story at Creative Writing Night.
8. I presented at a local and a national conference for undergard research.
9. I got paid to create a website for the band Senor Bop.
10. I started a fictional travel blog.
11. I recorded a couple episodes of a new podcast.
12. I graduated college
13. I wrote 8 short stories.
14. I moved to New York City.
15. I was accepted to and graduated from NYU. My group won second place in book publishing.
16. Found a place to live on the beach and made friends with great housemates.
17. Got 2 internships in publishing.
18. Found a new church and Bible study.
19. Went to Philadelphia.
20. Went to tons of great shows including Carnegie Hall.
21. Met lots of famous people including Spike Lee, Alan Tudyk, Loudon Wainwright, Augustana, to name a few.
22. Started a novel for NaNoWriMo.

J

Podcast and Ch. 4

Soon is a relative term, so don't get too excited just yet. I am busy writing a novel, after all. Not to mention job searching.

Speaking of the novel, check out chapter 4. Sorry, I don't know what's gone wrong with the formatting. Darn indents.

CHAPTER 4

NaNoWriMo Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Book Signing and Chapter 2

I went to a book signing party for HL. It was a book signing, a rock concert, and free dinner at the City Winery. A pretty sweet gig, and it was sold out, which is awesome. From 7-8, we just sat around, a bunch of people from a couple of the offices, and ate food and chatted. At 8, the opener came on. They were intense! I didn't stay for the Levon Helm Band because I had to get home. I live an hour and a half away. Everyone said I should have been there because I missed Elvis Costello, but that would have gotten me home at 12:30 with me having to be up at 7:30 the next morning. Plus I'm not fond of the shady people hanging around this part of the town this time of night. Just now I was trying to write a cover letter to a publishing company to the lovely sounds of "I'm gonna kill you, man! Get over here! I'll kill you!" outside my bedroom window.


In other news, who's been reading my NaNoWriMo novel? Anyone, anyone, Bueller? Well, here's chapter two:

CHAPTER TWO

Also, at work, we had a meeting with the people that make the Tonys about a new book we're doing. It was actually pretty cool.

NaNoWriMo

1. My book

In case you didn't know, I am doing NaNoWriMo for the first time this year. You can follow it on my writing blog. I have posted Chapter One in 2 parts. I will be posting all of it over the course of November.

CHAPTER ONE, part 1

CHAPTER ONE, part 2

2. Are you kidding?

I'm trying to keep research to a minimum, but researching the novel today, I found a spray scent that you can spray your kindle with to make it smell like a book. God, I hope this is a spoof, but Wired did have an article on it. They also have a scent called "Eau, you have cats."

Check it out here.





3. Guess who else

John Green is joining NaNoWriMo this year! Sweeet.

Ricky Gervais's Guide to Society

I downloaded the newst Ricky Gervais podcast off iTunes. The Guide to society. If you're interested, get it soon, because they take the podcasts down after a while. It's under $2 for an hour of Ricky, Karl, and Stephen. In this episode, they ask Karl if he was in charge of all the laws of the land, what laws he would would take out and put in. He's full of nonsense, as usual.

I know Ricky wouldn't want to hear it, but I actually kind of like the XFM radio show more than the podcasts because the podcasts are so chill. The radio show could get completely out of hand sometime. Don't believe me? Go to Pilkipedia and download (for free) the episode in season two where they try to put Karl in the book of World Records by forcing him to eat hamburgers and stuff grapes down his throat.

I watched Gervais on Letterman and they put up an exclusive of the new cartoon tv show of the podcast! I can't say it's a terribly complex animation, but it's cute, anyway. Check it out here:

Here's Punchline's picture and brief article of the Comedy Fest.

Ricky Gervais

If you don't really care to read this post, at least scroll down to the bottom to watch the video of the amazing encore with a special guest. No, it's not Karl Pilkington, but he's still got a round bald head.

Right, so I had a ticket to see Ricky Gervais's Out of England Part II show at Carnegie Hall for the NY Comedy Festival. I was bummed that the tickets went on sale earlier than they said they would, so the best seat available was on the first tier, seat 8, row 57. Since the auditorium is round, seat 8, I knew would be way off to the side, and row 57...I wasn't sure I'd see the stage at all.

When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't row 57, but box 57. So actually, I ended up in row 3, seat 15, which was a great seat even if there were two rows of people in front of me.

The opener was Todd Barry. Ricky's rich enough, he could probably get whoever he wanted to open, except Robin Ince who won't travel with Ricky anymore because it makes his hair fall out. Ricky can get whatever he wants, so I'm sure he even picked the pre-show soundtrack because it was fantastic music, and Ricky's such a DJ at heart, he's playing songs on his blog now.

Todd Barry was hilarious. He was only on like 15 minutes, but he kept people in constant laughter. It was a clean set, too. He's a New Yorker, so he talked about New York food and trying to find apartments and smelly deodorants.

After he got off stage, a video came up of Louis C.K. (who co-starred in The Invention of Lying). I'm not even going to tell you what he said because it's really gross and there might be people reading this with some dignity left in them. But I will tell you that the video ended with footage of Ricky barfing into the toilet multiple times. I could tell this wasn't going to be a clean show. It's weird that Ricky's standup is so divergent from the personality you hear on air (I've listened to tons of episodes on his XFM show). He TRIES to come off as a bad person for a laugh.

Anyway. I tried to guess what Ricky'd be wearing. I bet it would be a black t-shirt and drawstring black pants, possibly black jeans. I was right. It was black jeans and a black t-shirt. Who does he think he is, Neil Gaiman?

He came out to an overwhelming applause and screaming that made him lose his composure slightly. Then he regained it and said "You lucky people. You've got tickets to see a legend. Pardon my french, but you lucky mother fucker."

Ricky said in his blog that it was supposed to be 95% new material, but I'd heard lots of variations of this material before, not in his standup, but in his podcasts or interviews.

He had an entirely new set of fat people jokes, which is what he started off with. He went on to talk about people who give charity gifts in other people's names as Christmas presents. This joke was clearly inspired by a conversation with Karl about giving an African family a goat for Christmas. Ricky blatantly stole the comedy right from Karl's lips! Tisk tisk.

Speaking of Karl, he did talk about him a few times, much to my delight. There was a part where Ricky wanted to make comments on the Book of Noah. He's done his criticism on Genesis in his Animals tour, but this time, it wasn't about Creation. It was the Noah Book--Bible for Kids version. So it was a critique on this particular book, not so much on the story itself. This book had been given to a much younger "Rikki Gervais" for good attendence back in Sunday School. The drawings look like they're done by an 11-year-old with crayons (it was on the slideshow). The drawing's definition of evil is pulling someone's nose. God calls it wicked and decides to destroy the lot of them. Karl said it sounded like God was gay, having an overdramatic hissy fit. When Ricky said that all those animals couldn't be in one giant boat because they'd eat each other, Karl said "But when you're in a crisis, everyone pulls together." Brilliant.

He also did a story about telling old people perverted jokes when he was drunk and one about drink driving (which he's gotten in trouble with the press for at previous shows), and finally the 5% that was lifted from a previous tour: Animals are gay. He has a book (and showed us the slides) about how there are "gay communities" in every species. He showed us the drawings of various species of gay animals having sex and read the introduction that said "The evidence is compelling." The punch line of course is that none of these drawings are PHOTOGRAPHS, so there is no evidence. At one point, he laughed at the pornigraphic animal drawings on the slide show and said "In Carnegie Hall!"

Then he was off the stage with a big round of applause, only to come back in a tuxedo along with an expensive piano. Is he going to play the piano? No!

It's Elmo! When Ricky was on Sesame Street, he fell in love with Elmo. (Watch the 2 minute clip here). They chatted a bit and then they sung a duet! Can you believe this? I mean, I know that Ricky could sing when he was younger because he was a singer in a pop group, but he can still sing really well! Oh, it was great and completely unexpected.

Ricky: I fuckin' love you, Elmo
Elmo: What?!
Ricky: I said I love you.


Okay, you can watch the whole song here:

Book Singing

One of the book events I publicized was last night at B and N. I got to go b/c it's in New York City. The author did a good job at telling interesting stories without giving too much away so that ppl would buy his book. The cool thing was that he sang songs b/c his book is an anthology of famous musical composers like Cole Porter, etc. He has a good signing voice, like the kind you hear on the radio and ask why no one sings that way anymore.

http://www.halleonard.com/product/viewproduct.do?itemid=332775&lid=0&keywords=herb%20keyser&subsiteid=1&

Comedy Festival tonight. Will update later.

More Halloween Pictures

A few more weekend photos from Luke and Nicole.

This was in our room. ???

Yay Halloween...

Happy Halloween!

For the weekend, Lindsey, Luke, and Nicole came to New York City and we stayed in a hostel in Manhattan for Halloween.



Thursday, we walked to the Village and had some bubble tea. We also got free pizza from the hostel. We had one cool roommate and one roommate we never met, but he snored loudly all night. I caught a cold and was up almost all night.



Friday, we walked to Time Square, checked out Macy's, Lindsey chased a pigeon, had gyro stand food, and walked up to Central Park. On our way, we went to Toys R Us to ride the ferris wheel. We got the Barbie convertible. See how excited they are?...


Then we splurged on a horse carriage ride through Central Park.

This is my favorite picture. It's so weird. (Columbus Circle)

This was one of our favorite moments. An Elmo that says OneDollaOneDollaOneDolla.

In the evening, we met up with Nicole's friend Charlie for dinner at Dave and Busters.

Saturday, we went downtown to see the World Trade Center site.

Then we dressed in our costumes and went to the parade. We got there kind of late and it started raining, so we went back to the hostel for a while. But lots of people recognized us as the Scooby gang. We even memorized our ccatch phrases. As Shaggy, mine was "Zoinks!" As Fred, Luke's was "Let's split up and look for clues." As Velma, Nicole's was "Jenkies!" and "I lost my glasses. I can't see without my glasses!" Lindsey wins with (as Daphne) "Will you do it for a Scooby Snack?" and "Help!"

We ate at Famous Famiglia's pizza...

...went to a crowded bar with 5 shots for $10...

...and then Lindsey and Luke went back to Time Square where nothing was happening. Nicole and I wandered around looking for bakeries. We met some strange people wandering about, offering advice on bread and trying to buy us drinks.

Sunday, we wandered around for a while more near the hostel before we had to check out at noon. Our new roommate was running in the marathon. Nicole left him an encouraging note, but the maid crumpled it up and threw it away.

Then, sadly, we had to part ways.

Want more photos? Check out my FB photo album just for Halloween in NYC:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2169378&id=73405296&l=296a57b1cb