So, I’m crazy about this guy named Rufus. For the past 2 years, I’ve let him sleep in my bed almost every night. But, frankly, I’ve had enough.

Rufus is my cat, and he sleeps on my loft bed. And, the only reason I purchased said loft bed was to give me more space to create a “home office” beneath it. The Scandinavian-cramped-chic that is my apartment just doesn’t lend itself to house a normal bed. But, I hate having to climb a ladder in order to go to sleep. And, I’ve never liked planning on going to bed anyway. I like to just pass out. I blame this on my parents; they never gave me a bedtime. Ever. And, anyone from Upland (what-what!) will attest that I never slept in my room at home. I always crashed on the couch or the floor.

Unfortunately, I’ve taken with me this bad habit all the way to the N-Y-C. So, the middle cushion of my beautiful leather couch is completely worn down now. It offers no lower lumbar support, and thus, I’ve been in pain for a few weeks now. So, I’m taking my bed back! And, Rufus? You can roll your beady, yellow eyes all you want, but that’s my bed, bitch! I’m just going to have to learn to appreciate a planned-bedtime. Maybe I’ll start lying down to read before falling asleep or something (shudder).

Fun: Walking by this cool neon sign on a chilly Williamsburg excursion this morning. The place was closed, so I couldn’t tell what it was.

Not so fun: A Google seach reveals that it’s a bar featuring clown decor. Even more creepy for a clown-o-phobe like me is this Citysearch page, which mentions that “Saturday is clown night.” I guess I’m lucky I wandered by on a Sunday morning instead.

So I need a new car. I’m going certified pre-owned, but I’m not sure if this is the best move. But then again, after today, I don’t know if I want a car, used or new. I had a really horrible experience buying my first used car (J&A Dealership on Queens Blvd in Elmhurst). The used-car salesman literally took my keys from me and held me prisoner until I physically produced a certified check. It turns out that he had accepted the payment from me unknowingly in regular check format. Had I known that they needed a certified check, I would have presented it to them . . . but we didn’t know it and so it became this huge mess and for a long time, I had terrible ill-will towards him.

Anyway, so today I go back to the car dealerships – trying to forget and be extremely weary of what the sales team has in mind. I know now that when I first go in, they will be welcoming, everyone will be the bad guy except for them. They will work to get the best deal for me. Meanwhile, their best interest, really lies in the best interest of the dealership. A quote from an infamous Edmunds.com article that everyone who plans on buying a car should read says:

While Michael was training me, he didn’t ever say, “Here’s how to cheat the customer,” or, “This is how we inflate the prices.” In fact, he stressed that I was supposed to treat customers with respect to build a strong C.S.I. (Customer Satisfaction Index). But manipulation and overpricing was inherent in everything he said. The reason for this was simple — without overpricing we couldn’t make a living. What we were selling was profit. Or, as Michael put it, “This is money for you — money for your family.”

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Twice this week, I’ve ordered a sandwich at the bagel place up the street, and realized once I got home that they gave me the wrong thing. (They all look the same when they’re wrapped in deli paper.)

Tonight, I stopped at the Mexican place around the corner for some nachos. I asked for “an order of nachos with guacamole, but no sour cream.” I guess it’s a tiny bit tricky, but I’ve had the same thing there a bunch of times. The cashier was a girl I’ve seen before, but tonight she looked at me like I was speaking another language. I repeated myself. She said, “I’m sorry, what did you want again?” and I repeated myself yet again. At that point, she seemed to understand, so I sat down and waited for my nachos.
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On my way to work today, I thought I’d try to outsmart the incredibly expensive midtown eateries by going to the deli next door instead of the corporate lunch time hang out (Pasta Day! $6.99 unlimited toppings!).

I know I was risking it by getting a Naked Juice, but I thought, hey, what’s the worst the damage could be? $3? Then I also asked for a buttered roll. You know, the ones they already have wrapped up by the register. When the total came to $4.89, I felt like I was being anally raped by a street lamp. I don’t know if this is better or worse than the cost of mailing a package via UPS, because I always feel raped there.

It happens to us all at one time or another, I suppose: everything comes to a head all at once, and before you even realize it you’re so buried in your life, your work, your travel, your responsibilities and obligations, blah blah blah, that you could be living this life anywhere–any city, any town across this country. For all the advantage you’re taking of living in NYC.

At least, this is how my life has been for the past month or two. I love New York, but it’s been so long since I’ve taken advantage of anything really uniquely New York, that I think I’m starting to forget what it is, exactly, I love about living here. My goal is to start reacquainting myself with that as soon as possible.

I miss you, New York. And yet here I am, day in, day out, pounding your pavement. Riding around in your belly.

My camera is broken, but my friend Luke’s isn’t. That’s his photo of NYC. He has more. I don’t know how he always manages to capture such great moments. Sigh. I love NY!

Some sleeveless wonder at the gym had the St. Ides logo tatooed (non-ironically no less!) on his bicep.

Which is, interestingly enough, both the end and the means in this situation.

Saw this on my way home last night. It’s not often that I see a cat and dog dressed up in star spangled outfits, at least not in my neighborhood, and so I stopped to leave a buck and take a pic. The next thing I knew I heard someone behind me say, “Don’t you think that’s kind of mean?”
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Rarely does my geeky work alter-ego get to hear anything remotely appliable to NYC (or remotely interesting for that matter) but I couldn’t resist noting this post on NetworkWorld:

We went down to New York for the long weekend. Despite the 16-degree weather, we walked down to Times Square – all the bright lights lured us the ten blocks from our hotel. When we got there, we stood like, well, tourists, gaping at all the electronic billboards. And then, across the square, I saw it: the world’s largest Windows error message – on a two-story high e-billboard (I guess everything really is bigger in New York). It was the only billboard in the entire square with absolutely no movement – since the PC running it had obviously frozen.

Very amusing stuff, although I hate to be a total nerd and point out that fact that this *isn’t* actually a Windows error per say, but a DirectX error. It’s hard to tell, but I’m willing to bet it’s an application error based on the wording. Still very, very funny though. More detailed pic after the jump…
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