Oscar Wilde to close

Another casualty of the financial crises they say. No, I am not speaking of the venerable author but the bookstore in New York.

I distinctly remember year ago when I was new to this country I was wandering the steets aimlessly with Puja and we happened to see this tiny bookstore. Those were the days when I was really high on his writings, his aphorisms and mannerisms. I was blown away to see a bookstore in his name. I promptly entered and started looking at the books. It didn't take long before I realized that it wasn't exactly the kind of bookstore I was expecting. No, no clear homage to Oscar Wilde in celebration of his plays or his writings or hosting of other authors in the smililar vein. No. This was a bookstore specializing in guy and lesbian books. Now, I have precious little interest in those topics specially in those days and even now my interest remains spotty, not that there is anything inherently wrong with that genre. I sped out promptly from the store almost feeling cheated. I had gone to see one side of Wilde's personality and was reminded that it was the other side that was really of interest to folks in my new adopted country.

Every day and every trip is a lesson.

Well, just read this in the Times this morning that the bookstore is closing. It cannot survive in the current climate of economic collapse. People have stopped spending money and specially on exotic topics and even more so at exotic bookshops.

The 'closing time' continues...

Tim Russert Dies

Can you believe it? I am shocked in a way I rarely am. I mean he was 58 and seemed just about the healthiest guy you would ever see. I am almost standing face-to-face to my mortality right now. Just this morning I was thinking about how he was going to take out his slate and chalk during the election reporting. I just cannot believe this.

I was shocked when Peter Jennings died but he was older and was fighting cancer. This is just strange.

Another one bits the dust

The giant Barnes & Noble store on 6th Ave and 23rd street closed a few weeks ago. This is just another one of those things that I like that has ended unceremoniously. Most restaurants either stop serving dishes we like if they've not shut doors already. Most stores we like close doors. Most things we like deteriorate. Very strange how that works.

Anyway, this closing of B&N is particularly troubling. This was one of those places where I could go to after work once in a while and be just between books. No one but me and books. I could browse through, buy and just feel elevated in some snobbish but very real sense.

But of course, all good things (and even some bad ones) must come to an end. The big bookstore closed without much fanfare. I fear that it will be replaced by an Old Navy. It is strange how we want to put less and less inside our heads and more and more on our bodies.

I wonder kids will ever even know a bookstore other than Amazon ?(which I have nothing against but doesn't make up for B&N for ambiance)

Food Blues

Getting lunch is becoming harder and harder in Manhattan these days. No, not because there aren't enough places to eat or not enough variety. Far from it. A new deli, restaurant or take-out place opens practically every other week. It is far more insidious, far more real. It has to do with the ever-increasing inefficiency of your everyday deli, coffee place, eatery, you name it. Less than half the time I am getting my order wrong. If I ask for cheese on my veggie-burger I usually discover later, back at my desk in the office, that I did not get any. If I ask for butter I end up with cream cheese on my bagel. I ask for toasted bagel and half the time I get toast. And this is when you actually can get your order. Every place is so crowded that if you get there during popular times (8.45-9.15 for breakfast, 12.30-1.30 for lunch) you stand in huge lines, you scream your order over a bunch of heads and you have to repeat it multiple times and you generally fail to communicate what is it you exactly want. That is if you can order at all. Half the time you will be cut off by folks who don't understand how a line works, don't care or don't see. Then you get charged wrong, or too much (or even too little at times.) Overall, it is a mess; an unpleasant experience at best. Don't even get me started about the quality or the cost of the food. A funky soy-chai nonsense for $5, give me a break!

There was a time when there was joy in the idea of discovering new foods everyday. Now, it is simply a chore. It probably has to do with aging but my guess is that it also has to do with just a general sense of collapse that I am beginning to observe. A slow, but sure decline in quality of life as the pressure of population starts to weigh a society down.

Walgreens - The Ministry of Truth

Photography is becoming difficult every day. Read this thread on Flickr. Apparently, if you tried to get Walgreens to print really good shots that you took -- they wouldn't do it because they wouldn't believe they'd be yours! You MUST be stealing someone's photos, you thief!

Wow!

What next? Should we be discredited of everything good we do?

In fact, now that I think about it -- something similar happened to me a long long time ago. I wrote a poem on the Bhopal Gas Tragedy in 1984 (now that year couldn't possibly be mere co-incidence) and my Hindi teacher admonished me for stealing it from somewhere. I tried to convince her that I wrote it myself but no sir she would not have it. The poem was too good to be created by me. I was only 11 years old. How could I be 'good'? She wanted me to admit to my error of judgment in front of the class. I of course would not do it. I cried, I was young. I wrote even more poems after that. Some good, some bad but I guess most beyond my youth.

Microhoo!

Can nothing good ever happen? Are we doomed to a lifetime of resentment and anger at thing that we cannot control but things that control our lives completely?

Microsoft buying yahoo would destroy the following for me:
- my primary email
- my photo sharing (flickr)
- my primary contact mgt app
- my primary calendaring app
- my primary home page app
- my ability to get email on blackberry
and several other things that I cannot think of right away.

oh, well. I guess it is time to move everything to Google...which actually sucks because they are not quite there in terms of products

You know its the holidays when...

...your stock broker (yes, broker) and not your high school pal you haven't spoken in years, sends you an innocuously online holiday greeting.

How does one opt out of this holidays "pain-in-the-assry"?

In case you must know -- here is the link to this dud from TD Ameritrade.

http://www.tdameritrade.com/apex_holiday_2007/

Frailty of moral compass

Every morning as I struggle to get out of the bed, I feel alright when I recalibrate my moral compass to the monetary north.