Home for the Merryness in Detroit

Well, I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Detroit because Ma has no Internet connection at the house. I got in yesterday. I guess it's a good thing. I'm ready to end my pilgrimages to Detroit for good. It's my hometown, but it depresses me to be here.

It's my first Christmas without my dad, who passed in August. It's just not the same. It's nice to see my mom and the new puppy, Tiger, but still, I could think of a million billion other places I would want to be. Oh, just thinking about it gives me a brain explosion.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a good holiday.

Photo: 11 Spring Street Graffiti Project, "There is Hell in Hello," December 2006, NYC

Black Friday 2006: Fur at Bergdorf Edition

Anti-fur Protestors Start the Holiday Season at Bergdorf-Goodman, Fifth Avenue and 58th Street, Black Friday, 2006

One of my favorite things to do during the Holidays (of which, I have learned, there are both many holidays and many favorite things to do from October - December), is walking through New York looking at all the pretty things.

Pretty thing Number One, is the windows of Fifth Avenue and Herald Square! The longstanding Christmas Window Battle of Bergdorf, Saks, Lord & Taylor, Macy's and Bloomingdale's is historically funny. Each classic shoppe goes out of their way each year to make more elaborately intricate and fantastical window displays; it's a tradition and tourist attraction in New York as each retailer battles for your hard-earned buckaroos. Cartier has outdone themselves this year with a lava of lavish red boxes cascading down the front of its building, ending in a humongous Cartier box that romantically springs open every now and then, blazing synthesized Christmas musical gradeur out and about, and revealing its lush, but alas, diamond-less white satin interior. Fuckers.

Anyhoo, I don't make a habit of seeing the windows every year, but I just got a new camera (a Panasonic DMC-FX50 to replace my old Nikon 3200), and I wanted to test it out. I'm not the maestro of photography, but I do like to take a picture or two.

I got my days confused a few nights ago as I was trying to find David Blaine, who was gyroscoping somewhere in Times Square. I was two days too early. I should really pay attention to dates. Whoops.

Before heading toward my unsuccessful destination in the Square, I traveled to the Plaza Hotel, hopping off of the 6 train at 59th and Lexington first, then walking west towards Fifth Avenue. I wanted to see how the construction looked at the Plaza at night, and I like roaming around there just after dark, especially since the Apple Store opened.

(It was my first night shot, so shoot me.)

So, there's the Plaza at night! You'll notice that that pesky little Eloise will get to run around the re-hauled Plaza yet again when the residential units are opened. Damn her. Sigh.

I walked around the little plaza outside the Plaza, going slightly South toward Bergdorf-Goodman, that beautifully elegant and lush store, which I've only been in once. That one time, I saw Ivana Trump in a suit with gold-fringed epaulets. The sight unnerved the hell out of me, and I've been afraid of going back in ever since. I still shiver at the thought of it. Brrrrr.

The Bergdorf windows were amazing! The ones that faced the plaza were full of little mechanical machines mixed in with the glamourous silks and glittering fake diamonds. There were intricate metal-worked machines, wonderwheels, animals, and fantastical creatures!

I walked around to the front of Bergdorf, on the Fifth Avenue side, at the corner of 58th Street. I looked up, and before me was a lush display, full of light and play and color.

The horses were finely detailed, the lights just perfect, and the mannikin was dressed in a circuslike dressage outfit, complete with whip. I don't know anyone who would actually wear the outfit out, but I don't think that's necessarily the point. In fact, most of the garments in the Bergdorf windows on any given day aren't necessarily for everyday fashion, unless, of course, you are part of the fashionista mafia, and can afford such outrageously beautiful designs. Gold epaulets, anyone? Eek.

Anyway, the Fifth Avenue windows (as opposed to the 58th Street windows, which were amazing, as opposed to Fifth Avenue's magnificient), included two black and white windows, and one with a cascade of sweets and delicacies in every sepia tone available. Included in this display was an oversized curio cabinet inlaid with mother-of-pearl and filled with fake cakes and treats. I could eat the carefully constructed cakes and muffins, even if they were made of glue and paper.

I was completely in awe of how the displays were concieved, created, and mounted. Bravo, Bergdorf-Goodman, bravo!





The window that most caught my attention was the second black and white window that portrayed a bow-tied, humanoid polar bear, elegantly opening a glass door to a fur-clad woman seeking entrance to his abode. Looking at the window, I was immediately drawn to an allusion from an amazing series of children's book with grown-up appeal: Philip Pullman's, "His Dark Materials." The set of three books includes The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass.

I first read the Pullman books on vacation in Martha's Vineyard in 2004 (the series was first published in 1998). I decided to reread them again when I heard that Daniel Craig would be featured in the upcoming film adaptation as Lord Asriel (Craig is perfect for the part... oh hell, he's just perfect), the paternal connection to the lead character, Lyra Balacqua, a child who fights to keep the Gobblers from cutting away children's daemons. The story is a wide-sweeping tale set in an interdimensional Europe where everyone has a visible soul companion in the form of animals or daemons, and visible to others. Lyra sets off from Oxford to the North to rescue the children from the Gobblers and her Uncle from the Slavbard armoured bears. There's a lot of talk in the books about animal skins and furs as the good and bad guys head toward the cold Northern reaches. Lyra eventually confronts the evil Mrs. Coulter (played by Nicole Kidman) and meets the inestimable armoured bear, Iorek Byrnison, a noble outcast from the bear kingdom. Eventually, Mrs. Coulter meets the King of the bears, and the window clearly plays on that theme. It's a beautiful display.



Which brings us back to the protestors. As you see from the photograph, both the bear and the beauty are wearing fur. And fashion fur in New York is a hot topic. The group, Caring Activists Against Fur (CAAF), protested Bergdorf on Black Friday, and will protest at other venues now until Feburary: Steven Corn Furs, Antonovich Furs, Macy's, Lord & Taylor, and Saks. (More info here, scroll down.)

Now, I can appreciate fashion fur. Fur is beautiful, and in certain situations (those artic ones with indigenous human populations that need fur to survive the cold weather conditions), I can understand its use. I'm tentative regarding fur in high fashion, however. My mom offered me one of her mink furs when I was younger, and I turned it down. I did, however, accept a lambskin short coat with fox cuffs. I accepted it more for nostalgia, as it's my mom's coat from the 1950s and it's way pretty. However, I've never been comfortable wearing it. (I'm uncomfortable in real-life dress-up anyway. I really much prefer stage dress-up. That's me in the photo, right, at the bottom in a production of "A Man's A Man.")

I cringe a bit when I see folks in New York wearing fashion fur, even in cold weather. It's a natural reaction to feeling that the mink and the fox would much rather have preferred keeping their fur to themselves. But that's a little hypocritical of me because I do wear leather. Are the cows no less... animal?

I didn't write this post to down fur or defend Berfdorf-Goodman's use of it in its windows. I think I wrote it mostly to highlight the intersection of beauty and horror that can occupy a single space. I had been in search of a Pretty Thing in New York, and I did find it. When I saw the "Entertain" window (two nights prior to the protest, which I hadn't known about), my immediate thought was of the Pullman books and secondly, the fur. I thought to myself: somebody is going to have feelings about that fur. I had feelings about the fur; it was beautiful on the bear (not sure if it was real or not) and it was unnecessarily clad about the figure of the woman, but nonetheless, beautiful.

Animal protestors get a bum rap because they can be over the top and confrontational in their rhetoric. To them, it's a matter of life and death, as many things in this world are. Humans do kill an awful lot of animals for personal use: food, fashion, hunting. I am not of the opinion that all animal use is anathema, obviously. I can, however, understand the feelings of those completely opposed to the use of animals. I can also appreciate both sides of the argument. When you see a clothing item intricately made out of animal furs, you can't help but see the beauty in them, either. Again, though, I think the animals would much rather prefer to keep their fur. Don't you?

Black Friday is always full of interesting little things. Anyway, go and read my friend, Jennifer Michael Hecht's reverie on Black Friday in the New York Times. If, of course, you can get behind the Times Select Wall. Happy Holidays!

Friday Cat Blogging

I'm serious about the non-political postings for a bit. Sometimes you just have to take a mental vacation from the weight of the world.
So... here's Paikea! Happy Friday Cat Blogging!
(And finally, I remembered to do this on a Friday! Geesh.)

Thumping the Democrats, with Love

My friend, Carl Skutsch, sent me the wonderfully funny, happy, and poignant photograph that he took to the left. I was so giddy when I opened my email and saw the photograph. The last six years have been utter hell (and if you count the Clinton impeachment fiasco, the last 8 years), made moreso by an obviously partisan President and hoodlum Republican Party.

It's been a nightmare from the right, but it's been a nightmare from the left sometimes as well. In fact, I was so fed up with the Democratic Party after Bill Clinton (who I love dearly, even when I want to slap him upside the head), that I ended up voting for Ralph Nader over Al Gore. I was safely enconsed in New York State, so I figured I was safe voting for a third party.

I wish Al Gore were President. My bad.

The last six years have been particularly hard, mostly because I never had trust in President Bush to rule in a way that would be wise before 9/11, and he proved me right in the horrific aftermath of 9/11. Unfortunately, I had lost faith in the Democratic Party as well, but I looked to them some how and in some way, to act as a lever against the craziness of Bush and his Republican Party.

It's not easy to be a Democrat in America sometimes. I believe in their platform of government for the people, benevolent government that helps the people without being too much involved in their personal lives. That means healthcare, jobs, a sane foreign policy. Unfortunately, there's always a pull between the left of the Party and the right of the Party, but it's a damn big Democratic tent, and the only way you move forward is to listen to both realms of the spectrum, attempt to get along and attempt to work out problems for the good of the People. Then, you go to the Republicans and ask them what they think. Unfortunately, you've got to listen to them to, even if they were really bad at that in the last few years themselves.

So, it was a shock yesterday, after receiving Carl's photograph, to have to read a story about bonehead, James Carville, making a play for the head of the Democratic National Committee, Howard Dean.

Dean, hailing from Vermont as he does, represents the more progressive side of the Democratic Party. It was Dean's idea to begin a 50-State Strategy, a brilliant plan to actually start talking with people in States that Democrats have thought were lost to their influence, the Red States of the Northwest, Southwest, and the South. The strategy, to put it in a nutshell, actually worked. Go figure!

Carville is a political shill for Hillary Clinton's presidential run and mainstream Democratism. (Clinton is my Senator, and I voted for her.) So, since Dean isn't running for President in 2008 and doesn't necessarily represent the mainstream of the Democratic Party, but rather the ENTIRE Democratic Party with a focus on the progressive side of the Party, Carville decided to fire the opening gambit in an attempt to displace Dean as the Chairman of the DNC. Carville floated the idea of running the losing candidate in the Tennessee Senatorial race of last week, Harold Ford. Why? Well, allegedly, Dean didn't bring in enough money and didn't readily genuflect to the DCCC or the DSCC. Ford is a center-right candidate that would probably sit well with that good old Mainstream of America, the MoA. It's whispered that Ford would help Hillary more in her MoA run that Dean would.

Well, la-de-da.

I don't know if Dean didn't bring in a record amount of money, or bested the Republican National Committee machine (numbers make my head swim, and there's a lot of spin in regards to this), but one thing I do know, whatever Dean did, or whatever Chuck Schumer (head of the DSCC) did or whatever Rahm Emmanuel (head of the DCCC) did, WE won. Together.

Dean rewired and reconnected the network of the Democratic Party with the actual people, while Chuck and Rahm helped bring home the bacon. Finally, the Democratic bigwigs in Washington were able to actually talk with their constituents in States that the Party left behind (because, let's face, we in the Northwest tend to make fun of everyone else), and lit a fire in their hearts. Ford may be able to that too, but frankly, he's so far to the right, you might as call him a Republican.

Carville has been getting on my nerves for a good while now. I think Jon Stewart's appearance on Crossfire kinda brought the whole thing home to me. Yea, Carville wasn't the interviewee that day (Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson were), but still, remove Begala and replace him with his co-host Carville, and my head would still explode.

It took barely 24 hours after the Democrats won the Senate for Carville to begin the power play. The glow was still glowing, the feelings of happiness were still happy, and for the first time in months, the Democratic Party felt like a Party again. And then, BAM, like some sucker punch to the head, Carville comes out and starts the "divide the party" tactics immediately. Can't we let the Republicans do that for us again? It would feel much better.

I've got a piece of advice for my Party: if they want me to still be part of the Party (which may be somewhat doubtful on both their part and mine), then they need to shut the fuck up about removing Dean as head of the DNC. Carville needs to take a step back, just like his wife, Marlene Matalin (his counterpart mouth for the Republican Party) and realize that both of them have lost their power because 1) the Democrats have found their power in the people and 2) the Republicans have lost their power to currently rule.

Chuck Schumer, on Real Time with Bill Maher last night, congratulated Dean on his work. Joe Conanson in Salon wrote, "Rebuilding the Democratic Party in every state is as much a matter of pragmatism as principle. There would have been much less for the Democrats to celebrate on Election Night if Howard Dean hadn't been so "crazy" -- and so persistent."

So, for the record, Mr. Carville, keep your opinions and your candidates for a job you can't wrestle control of to yourself, because no one really gives a crap what you think right now.

I love you, Democratic Party, now shut up and change. Consider yourself thumped.

The View From Your Window

Taking a page from Andrew Sullivan's daily "View From Your Window":

Museum of Jewish Heritage Conference Room Looking onto New York Harbor and the Statute of Liberty, Battery Park, NYC, 3:30 PM

To the Detroit Tigers

The Main Entrance to the Comerica Park, AKA Detroit Tiger Stadium

Dear Tigers,

The last time you guys won the World Series, in 1984, I had just left Detroit that September to attend New York University. I was a little sad that I hadn't been there to watch the Series with my dad, but a little happy to have missed the Bubba Helms mini-riot directly after the game. Dad and I use to watch baseball and football together all the time. I wasn't that into football, but I always liked the baseball, and dad taught me the rules of all the games and matches we would watch together. (I always impress men that I actually know how games work.)

So it's kinda funny that I left Detroit just when you guys last won the whole enchilada, which kinda means that's the year I left my dad, too. He and I were really close when I was younger, and from what I understand, when I moved, I kinda broke his heart. So now, you guys are back in it since 1987 and then he dies just before you make it back to the post-season. Strange. Possibly only to me, but strange nonetheless.

I told him the night before he died that I would come back and tell him what the game scores were; I didn't get the chance, as he died early the next day.

Anyway, my dad and I have been looking forward to you returning to the post-season game for some time. We badtalked you to no end at times, but he was happy when the new stadium went up. He only went once, but his legs were bad, and he didn't like the crowds, so he never went back. Vesti, over at the irreverent "Intellectual Comedy Salon," poked me with a stick when I kept saying how sucky you were. He quickly convinced me that it was "steady as you go" and that the team was rebuilding and doing well. I said fine, but I could still call youse guys sucky cause you weren't winning!

My dad owned a bar in Detroit, and back in the 1960s, baseball and basketball players from the Detroit teams would come into the bar. We don't have many pictures of the younger days at the Moonglow Lounge, but one of my favorites is a series of photographs of Detroit Tigers player Willie Horton, enjoying a night on the town at my dad's.

Detroit Tiger player, Willie Horton, at the Moonglow Lounge, 1960s

Dad passed away in August, so he won't be able to see you guys play. You might not win this year, but you're looking good for the time being. I'll look at the playoffs, like I usually do, with one eye on something else, but I hope you all the best against the Yankees.

I can see the Bronx bombers stadium lights outside my window, and I take the subway every day past the it on my way to work. The Yankees are tearing up trees and a park right now to make way for a new stadium right next to the old stadium. Actually, the trees disappeared three weeks ago. Steinbrenner throws money at things and knows that everything will work out in his favor. He took that park with promises that I only hope will come true for the immediate neighborhood. I personally, would like the Yankees not to win per year for every tree that was ripped out of the ground for the new stadium. For the trees' revenge. Someone's got to look out for them.

For my dad, I would really like to see you Tigers win. We'll see what happens.

Good luck. You're gonna need it. The score is already 5-0 (Yankees), bottom of the 5th, first game. It's gonna be a long night for someone.

Don't mess with me! I'll tear your heart out! I'm a tiger! Rooar!

Yours forever,
Edward and Elderta

Kayaking Update, Nan Melville, Photographer

Just an update on the fireworks of July 4th on the East River!

We had professional photograph, Nan Melville, kayak with us at the fireworks. The Long Island City Community Boathouse posted a link to one of the photographs that she took of us while the fireworks were in progress. Amazing! (There's a few more photographs here.)

From the LIC Community Boathouse website, a little more regarding the event:

In addition to the boathouse volunteers, we hosted harbor guests. One was Tim Gamble, a longtime officer at the pioneering Dowtown Boathouse (they really got the free paddling movement going in NYC!) and recent co-founder of the Red Hook Boaters, a great paddling group affiliated through the Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club. Another notable was Craig Kandell, who is a volunteer illustrator for the boathouse and a marathon swimmer with the Manhattan Island Foundation.

Some revelers stayed on the highground of the eco-arts and recreation center that John and Erik are assembling with Plaxall's help. After all, that's also where the food was. BBQ for carnivores and vegans alike. Other ventured out onto the East River aboard our kayaks!

It was spectacular. The waters were swept over with washes of color than rarely paused. The skyline began to bow to the fireworks as the flashes outshown lighted towers and smoke blanketed and smothered them. Several paddlers remarked that they'd never felt so near to fireworks this grand.

The LIC Community Boathouse is fortunate to have a launch on Anable Basin, which is literally yards north of the Coast Guard's holiday restricted zone. With lights, marine radios, and close coordination, we safely paddled out to see the show in a wide gap between the anchored pleasure craft. We scurried back before the traditional post-fireworks horn blowing was done. We also kept steady communication with the fireboats, police boats, and Coast Guard runabouts that were amply deployed.

I'm very happy to have found the Boathouse through my friend, John. I expect to be volunteering a lot to not only get the opportunity to ride the waters of New York, but to help the NYC community reconnect to our waterfronts. We are looking for sponsors for boats and if you feel like donating money or time or boats, please feel free.

Oh, and don't forget to come on over and kayak with us, too!