Month: December 2005

I went with P- to her friend’s b-day party Thursday at Paprika, in the East Village. P and I didn’t really know many of the birthday girl’s friends that were at the table, they weren’t particularly interested in me — maybe they were, but no one could hear each other — and the ones that we did know were at the other end of a table for 20. That really left the food for entertainment.

With a name like Paprika, you’d be expecting Eastern European food, but it’s supposed to be rustic northern Italian cuisine. It’s probably not fair to judge a restaurant when they are hosting two 20 person birthday parties, but it pretty much felt like the 4 train at rush hour with dim lighting and a row of cocktail tables. The women on the bench were literally crawling over each other. The kitchen is not much bigger than mine, which is not saying much in my 550 square foot jr. one bedroom. I passed on the gnocchi this time because I knew based on what I saw was happening at the other birthday table that they had no chance of pulling it off without turning it into chewing gum.

I went instead with the hearty “Homemade Pappardelle with Braised Oxtail Ragu”. I’m sure if I got the dish when it was finished, it would have been fine and toothsome, but after being held while the other plates came out, it came out like a deconstructed ravioli, with a pile of cold, dry wonton skins hiding maybe 2 tablespoons of oxtail meat residue. Disappointing, but probably the reason why professional food reviewers go two or three times before writing their articles.

Some shots from the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor (you can also see them in the photo strip above also). We went during low season, so it wasn’t as crowded as would be normal, but because of the size of the facilities, there is a limited number of people that can go per day — something like 5,000 people. Last time I went there was no way I could get there early enough to get tickets (by the way, admission to USS Arizona is free — there’s no need to book a tour).

Mentally ill man is killed on jetway in Miami after claiming he had a bomb. Lots of guessing followed by conclusions of “sorry, but the right thing done” on the news programs tonight. The entire incident appeared to have taken only a minute from the man’s run off the plane and the air marshals’ pursuit and takedown. Apparently, the marshals were on high alert for a 50-year-old Egyptian claiming to be an Iowa university student that was inexplicably released even after his shoes tested positive for explosives. In any case, if I’m on a plane and some dude with a bag yells that he has a bomb, forget the marshals – given half a chance I and every other able-bodied passenger would pummel the guy like they did with sneaker-bomber Richard Reid.

Reading this month’s Wired magazine about rising oil prices, ads today have almost as many words as the articles that they accompany. During the dot com boom, ads had few if any words — the ideal would be a big picture coupled with 3 to 5 words. In Wired, a car maker ad on the inside cover has over 270 words. A major bank even has a whole board game for improving your credit. I don’t know if it’s an attempt to blend in with the content, people nowadays have increasing attention spans, products are just way more complicated to sell, or maybe marketeers are just shooting in the dark.

64 years ago, a day in infamy. The memorial’s not exactly in the greatest of conditions either.

“Nightline” – it really feels schizophrenic:

12/7/05 edition started with Cynthia McFadden covering the terror story (the air marshals shooting the unfortunate passenger, who turned out to be mentally unstable and not a terrorist).

And, then, Martin Bashir does a story on Narnia (the so-called debate about whether C.S. Lewis meant for the Narnia series to convert unsuspecting people to Christianity – umm, come on, I don’t think he was that kind of Christian; Lewis’ own stepson felt that Lewis was not trying to create a good Christian story but thinking that Christians should write good stories), which really could easily be its own episode entirely (Lewis was a complex man, as any man could be).

Indeed, it was jarring to go from Big News Story of the Day to the more human interest stuff so suddenly. A little segue would have helped, but there wasn’t enough time for it (they have to be done in 30 minutes, after all).

And, Bashir closed the night with a look at the Red Cross’ new logo – the Red Crystal, now that the Israeli sister organization and Palestinian sister organization recognize each other (a compromise logo, so that no one has to feel offended by the cross or the crescent or whatnot), creating one Red Something (sorry, Crystal, which looked more like a Diamond, really). That would have been a nice ending, but I felt so awkward about the different tone Bashir brought as compared to what McFadden had (she had an urgent tone, which got too chatty when she interviewed a plane passenger from today’s incident).

It’s just nuts. I want to like Nightline, but when you start the night with one person and end it with someone else – it’s just weird. I preferred it when Nightline used to stick with one voice – whether it was Chris Bury or Michelle Martin or John Donvan sitting in for Ted Koppell or just plain old Ted – it was one voice for the one half hour. Or, if you’re going to have multiple anchors, make them sit next to each other (as tradition would have it), or have the person who opened the night end it.