Oh My God

Today I went to another spinning class, and the instructor was someone that was recommended to me. I know I've previously said I'd met the mother of all instructors, in terms of who kicks my @ss the most, but hot damn, today's was an absolute killer. I went to the NYHRC's Astor Place location for Rosa's spinning class. I've never seen anyone pedal as fast as she was (with resistance on the bike) and move so fast. I couldn't keep up. And honestly, when I take spin classes I usually don't keep up 100% of the time. But I really did not keep up! And not to mention this instructor's antics...she was a cross between super in shape instructor, hip hop DJ, dancer, and militant motivator. When she wasn't on the bike, she was literally rapping, dancing, and forcefully screaming at us to go faster. She pumped so much energy into this class, it wasn't funny. It was pain and party time all rolled into one. I left drenched and exhausted. But there was no time to take it slow because I had to make it back home to watch the Brazil-Chile game. On my way home I stopped at Baba Ghanouge, which is this Middle Eastern take out joint in Tribeca that's great. I'm obsessed with it now. Marcus and I get delivery from them all the time, and I'm personally really into their Hi-C lemonade drink: freshly juiced orange, lemon, and honey. And that's exactly what I ordered on my way home today. We've been ordering chicken manoushi a lot...it's spicy chicken with bread that's drenched in oregano. It's overload, but it's good. But when I googled manoushi, it seems as though the bread is usually seasoned with thyme...hmm...weird. But it tastes good anyway! PS: Brazil won 3-0, but Chile was giving 100% till the end, and not for nothing, so was Brazil...and that was cool to see both teams not giving up or taking it easy, even though towards the end it was apparent who was the winner. Also, speaking of Chile, I read about this former Chilean goalie who back in the '90's feigned injury in a game (in hopes of keeping Chile in the World Cup qualifiers) by cutting his head with a razor blade he hid in his glove! Crazy and so not cool.

Out: The U.S., England, and the Parade

Yesterday I was rooting for the U.S. soccer team, but they got the boot, which sucked. But they didn't play as well as they did in prior games. Last night we went to the movies and watched "Get Him to the Greek"...which was lukewarm, at best. Oh well. Then this morning the Germans creamed England, so England's out. Right after the game, Marcus and I headed over to the West Village to watch some of the Pride Parade. It was a good turn out. But one question remains: why is it that whenever a woman at this parade is topless, it's a severely overweight, middle-aged woman with a gut and horrible, drooping boobs? Seriously--why can't it be a young, attractive, toned woman? Well, that question may never be answered. In the vendor area, there were tons of things to buy, including 3-D gay porn, which come on, is awesome...ha ha. We then rushed home to watch the Argentina-Mexico game, which is currently in progress...

The Bionic Cat, Euthanasia, and The Obscenities Online

Marcus just sent me a link to an article about a young cat that lost both his hind limbs in an accident, and the British veterinary surgeon who implanted prosthetic limbs. It's pretty fascinating, and very exciting. The prosthetics have been so far successful. (What could go wrong? Sores, pain, INFECTION, the implants move, bone fractures, the list continues...) I'm always excited with these types of strides not only for veterinary medicine, but for human medicine, since a lot of veterinary based research and techniques are then used to enhance human medicine. My concern with these types of things is quality of life. Since in my opinion animals live in the "here and now" it's hard for me to justify doing extensive procedures IF animals will be in pain or stressed for long periods of time. And of course vets NEVER want that, and I'm sure that the cat was made to be comfortable and pain free. I'm just saying that since animals can't talk, I'm always scared that people will go above and beyond not for the well being of their pet, but for them. And that's not what it's about. But this whole prosthetic procedure is really exciting...the reason why is because this surgeon has successfully gotten the cat's skin to bind to the metal prosthetic, and of course because now this cat has bought more time to live (comfortably). F#ckin' cool. Apparently he's done this before with a canine patient. Speaking of medicine, in Germany it's been decided that unassisted euthanasia is legal, meaning if a patient wants it, life support can be removed. Now although this is a step forward for humane euthanasia, I argue that this example is not truly one of euthanasia. Because euthanasia literally translates to "good death"...meaning pain free. And if someone requires life support to live, taking it away, sure will lead to death, but it may not be pain free. If someone needs a ventilator to breathe---and you take it away, they technically can suffocate to death. And that's horrible. Anyway. Onto something much more light hearted: have you heard of chatroulette.com? Well, it was supposed to be this free chatting website where you log on and you and some random person somewhere in the world can start chatting. And if you're not feelin' them, you can move onto the next. Great, fun idea, right? Well, the complaint is that most of the people on the site are masturbating men! And Christina and I checked it out, and yup...it's true. We did chat with a normal person, but ya encountered, well, you know...ha ha. But it was super easy to get on the site, you don't need to register or make complicated adjustments to your computer settings to get the video cam on and running.

Virgos Unite, The Go -To's, and the tale of the Spinning Monster

Last night I met up with my NYU friends Tina, Matt, and Chantima. We ended up at a Thai restaurant called Rin. It was good, but even better was seeing my friends. Firstly, I hadn't seen Matt in years! And he's my fellow Virgo, and it's so comforting to have another Virgo around...someone who understands and shares my anal-retentiveness and all that good stuff. Tina had just come back from Roma, and had a great time. On her way back she stopped in London and hooked me up with chocolate, biscuits, and tea from Harrods. Yummy. And Chantima had been most recently working with the princess of Thailand (she works at the Thai Mission). We all had a good time. Recently something has urked me...or maybe "urked" isn't the right word. Just an observation. U2 has apparently contributed their songs or a new song for the World Cup because every game seems to start off with a a montage including them. Why is U2 the "go-to" band for everything? Need a fund-raiser? Need a theme song? Go to U2! Not that I'm knocking them, I love (old) U2. But still. I mean, they really couldn't tap into some maybe newer talent? And you know, I really liked Ricky Martin's song for the World Cup back in the day...I'm not afraid to say it! You know you heard it and wanted to shake...just a little... (the Spanish version is better)...the official song is by Shakira, which really isn't the greatest, no offense to her, she's cool. And speaking of my thoughts on music, if you want to ever hear my theory on the evolution of the R&B group Jodeci, lemme know...well, I just got back from spinning class. And there was a substitute instructor. Now whenever I walk into my class and find out there's a sub, I internally cringe, because you never know what you're gonna get. But what a wonderful surprise! This instructor was a spinning monster! It was a great class, and he was doing the entire workout with us. Love it. Well, I'm going to check out the next soccer game, and head out to Queens to meet up with my sister Jennifer. We're going to wander through Little Manila in search of good Filipino food.

Another All Nighter

Once again, it's been World Cup mania. This past Friday, Marcus and I went to watch a local soccer team- we watched the New York Red Bulls play a Brazilian team, Cruzeiro Esporte Clube. It was a fun match, and a really nice soccer stadium. We had incredible seats---the first row. It was pretty easy to get to...we just hopped on the Path train near us. Then Saturday night my former intern-mates and friends Christina, Vivian, and Gina came over for a sleepover. Marcus was going out with a friend of his, so it worked out. We ate some dinner, then bar hopped. My friends seemed to like the drinks the most at Ward III. By 2AM we ended up at Duet 48, a box karaoke bar. Although Christina kept saying she was scared to sing, she seemed to have on problem when we got there! We ended up coming home later on, and finally got a little shut eye at 6AM. The next morning we ate some brunch at Plein Sud, a local restaurant, and the food was really good! I gave in and had some pancakes with a mascarpone butter, which was scrumptious...the rest of the day Marcus and I hung out and took a short walk along the Hudson River. On a "yucky" side note, last week I developed some kind of weird allergic reaction that has manifested itself as some disease looking patched on my neck...so needless to say, I'm not thrilled. I went to the dermatologist who gave me some medication, but this s#it better go away! Because I don't want to walk around with pink patches on my neck! And I don't even know what I had a reaction to!

Summer!

So now that Marcus finished with studying for the CFA exam, which had consumed most of his free time, we have been able to start to spend more time together, which I love. We started watching the HBO series "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency", produced by the late Anthony Minghella (think "The English Patient" director) and starring Jill Scott. The story line is good, but more impressive is Jill Scott's wardrobe! It takes place in Botswana, and I have a major soft spot for African cotton prints. She's rockin' these beautiful traditional African dresses all the time. Yesterday Marcus and I busted out the field hockey sticks and the soccer ball and played for a while. We were on one of the lawns in back of our apartment. It was great, but there are people all around, so everything has to be pretty tame. The past few years he's been teaching me how to play soccer (apparently I'm a lefty kicker) and I have been teaching him field hockey and lacrosse. And I just saw that the baseball field two blocks from us is open to the public, so that's another place we could play, and I could bring along the lacrosse sticks, too. Oh! I failed to mention that in the past couple of weeks I got Japanese hair straightening. My longtime hair stylist Yasuko did it, and I am so happy with the results. In the past 6 months I've noticed slightly more wave in my hair, and I was not happy about it. So even though the results in my hair (since my hair was more on the straight side) aren't dramatic, the maintenance is! Now I can wash my hair and when it air dries there's no frizz, and no fear of waviness happening. Before I was straight ironing it when it got bad. Life is good!

Recap

Wow. I've been absent on this blog for a while. So what's been going on lately? Well, most recently Caroline (my sister), my father, and myself headed down to Miami to visit our relatives. It was good to see them, since I hadn't seen them for a REALLY long time. All my father's siblings live there. Interestingly my aunt and uncle told me they used to go out and see members of the Buena Vista Social Club play and sing back in the day, which is pretty damn cool. We also got to overdose on Cuban food and Cuban coffee, and that was great. I mean, damn, they even had excellent Cuban food in the airport! We stayed at the Sofitel, which I was pretty happy with. It was a great deal, and a nice place to stay. It wasn't beachfront, but since our stay was so short, we had to prioritize to be near the airport. There was a pool, so we took advantage of that. Although we did share an elevator with people we seriously thought were two under age prostitutes and a john. It brought repeated entertainment for us three when we brought it up. Anyway, I got home last night, and finally got to watch some of the World Cup. I couldn't watch it (it started when I was going to Miami) for the past few days, so I was so excited to finally watch. Today I watched Japan unexpectedly beat Camaroon, and I just finished watching Italy and Paraguay draw. Hmm...so I'm trying to plan my life for the next few weeks around the World Cup...

Animals Dying Everywhere.

I've been a little MIA from this blog lately. What has been happening lately? Well, I've been watching movies, of course, like "The Motorcycle Diaries", which I enjoyed to my surprise. In the past few days I've become sick and really not feeling well. The BP oil spill is out of control. I can't believe they didn't have emergency equipment ready, on site, in case something like say, an oil spill happens. How is that allowed?! And seeing all those photos of the oiled animals really, really kills me. It's so f$ckin' depressing. It's amazing how messed up things are. And then I just finished watching the classic "Apocalype Now", which I thought was a great film until towards the end, when a cow is killed on camera...and it's for real. I mean, a huge sword type tool is flung down onto its back, the animal falls, and you can recognize anatomy---muscles, ligaments, and all. There's no way I can ever watch this movie again. It really horrifies me that someone can actually justify staging something like this for the sake of cinema. Slaughter is horrible as is it, but unless it was seriously happening anyway, and it was in no way happening because of the film, then fine. In which case, most likely, I'd be watching the slaughter in a documentary type film, which this one wasn't. And apparently the filmmakers and lawmakers deemed this slaughter okay because the Filipino tribe performing the slaughter (the movie was shot in the Philippines) usually did this kind of thing as a religious sacrifice. Which really doesn't matter, because the whole thing was staged on a set built there for the sake of the film. This really made me sick. It's so depressing what we humans do to animals, isn't it? Makes me wonder about us humans.