Archive for 'The Offical Record' Category
RESTAURANT REVIEW: SUSHISAMBA * * * 1/2 (3 and a half stars out of 4).
16 September 2002I had dinner last night with Debbie W. at Sushisamba. This upscale sushi chain with Brazilian influences has multiple locations in Manhattan and one on Miami Beach. It has delicious creative sushi rolls, as well as a wide variety of non-sushi dishes. I want to say that it’s over-priced, but by the time we left, […]
TV-MOVIE REVIEW: LATHE OF HEAVAN (2002) * (1 star out of 4).
16 September 2002Graham M. made me save this on my Tivo for him, and we watched it together on Friday. The basic idea is that the protagonist has dreams, sometimes, which alter reality, including the past, but nobody other than he notices that anything has changed. A&E; was really pushing this remake of the famous PBS version, […]
BOOK REVIEW: HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS * * (2 stars out of 4).
12 September 2002This second book in the series is a tired retread of the first, and contains some pretty big holes in its reasoning. The main flaw, I think, is this. The whole book is about how someone is trying to kill the children in the school who are not pureblooded children of a witch and a […]
MY 9/11/01 PICTURES.
12 September 2002I don’t usually click on the links in blogs, particularly when they are in long blog articles. So, I want to make a special note that you should check out these pictures I took on September 11 last year. The few pictures marked with an “X” after the number are especially recommended.
GROUND ZERO.
12 September 2002I went to ground zero tonight. I’d been there many times since the attacks, including on September 11, 2001 (when I took these incredible pictures), but you could not get very close to the actual footprints of the towers then, nor see much of the actual excavation site, even from the viewing platform they built. […]
HAPPY BIRTHDAY RACHEL!
12 September 2002September 11, 1982 is the birthday of my brother’s girlfriend, Rachel. Years ago, she became an emancipated minor and moved out of her parents house. When she did, her mother stole her Barbie doll collection. So, for her birthday, I got her a Barbie Dream House, and about 10 or so Barbie dolls. When I […]
AWWW.
10 September 2002My friend, J, left me this really thoughtful letter, that I hope he wouldn’t mind me typing in here, but I really want to save a copy of it forever. He stayed with me the last two weeks, after his girlfriend threw him out. He wrote: Dear Dave, Thanks for letting me stay at your […]
I HAVE STREP THROAT.
9 September 2002I was diagnosed this morning with strep throat. I’ve had a sore throat for about 12 days, but no other symptoms, except, early on I had a sinus headache, and I’ve had a very slight cough. The doctor gave me penicilin, and it already seems to be helping considerably.
THE FRIDAY FIVE.
9 September 2002Here’s the latest Friday Five. 1. What is your biggest pet peeve? Why? When people call that HBO show, “Sex in the City.” It’s “Sex and the City.” It’s not about sex in the city. It’s about sex and the city. 2. What irritating habits do you have? Well, I hardly know where to start. […]
MOVIE REVIEW: SIGNS (2002) * 1/2 (1 and a half stars out of 4).
9 September 2002There are some suspenseful moments, and some meaningful emotional ideas in this movie, but the M. Night Shayamalan (writer of The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable) trademark twist ending was a quite a let-down. It seems like Unbreakable was about 5% as clever as The Sixth Sense, and Signs was about 5% as clever as Unbreakable. […]
MOVIE REVIEW: THE GOOD GIRL (2002) * * * * (4 stars out of 4).
7 September 2002I loved this movie, and it is my favorite movie of the year so far. I was reluctant to see it because it stars Jennifer Aniston, and I’ve always been disappointed by all the “Friends” movies, even though I do like Friends very much. It is a black comedy about an unhappily married woman who […]
ANOTHER NEW LOOK-LOOK SURVEY.
7 September 2002They don’t usually come this close together. They definitely got their $5 out of me this time. 1. Name your favorite brand and explain why it is your favorite. Charge.Com, because it is my own company that I built. 2. Name one brand that has caught your attention in the last year. Explain why it […]
HAIKU (PLURAL).
6 September 2002I went to the Olive Tree last night for drinks and a very late dinner, with Graham M., Jessica D., and her friends Chris, and Joey. The tables there are made of black slate, or some similar material, and there’s a bowl of chalk for you to write or draw on the table. So, it […]
THE NEW LOOK-LOOK SURVEY.
5 September 2002Today’s turned out to be a big survey taking day. Here’s the new look-look survey. Look-look.com is a slightly evil research company that tries to predict trends among young people, mostly by having photojournalists try to spot trends, and also by polling us younguns. I’m in my last year before I’m too old to be […]
THE MONDAY MISSION.
5 September 2002At the suggestion of Blake N., here’s The Monday Mission. 1. What’s the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you on a date? I’d like to try to be more open on my blog. I really would. But there is no possible way I’m going to answer to that question publicly. 2. Do you […]
WASTING AWAY.
5 September 2002I weighed in this morning at 182 pounds. That’s the least I’ve weighed since I was a freshman in high school, and I was quite a few inches shorter then, and I’m quite a lot more muscular now. I blew right past 183 which broke my old post freshman-year record of 184, which I set […]
THIS OR THAT.
5 September 2002It’s Thursday, so you know what that means. It means I’m two days late for the Tuesday This or That. This weeks theme is “The name’s the same…almost…“. 1. Tom Hanks or Tom Cruise? These are two of my favorites, more because I most always like the scripts they pick, rather than because of the […]
BOOK REVIEW: A TRIAL BY JURY * * * 1/2 (3 and a half stars out of 4).
5 September 2002The book by D. Graham Burnett is about his experience as the foreman of a jury on a murder case in New York City. In law school, we lawyers are told that the jury is “a black box”. You can look at what goes in, and what comes out, but there’s no way to look […]
A MISERABLE NIGHT’S SLEEP.
5 September 2002I went to bed last night at 2 AM, but I couldn’t fall asleep until 5:30, even though I took some NyQuil when I went to bed (I am getting over a cold). Then I woke up at 6 AM, and I couldn’t fall asleep again until 7:30 AM. I woke up at a little […]
SOMETHING STRANGE IS WRONG WITH MY FOOT.
3 September 2002Sometimes, when I work out, I feel this strange numbness on my foot. Yesterday, I realized that the numbness is always on my right foot, on the middle toe, and the toe to its right (the “ring-toe”, if you will). It occurred to me, that this corresponds to the two numb fingers on my right […]
I HAVE A HORRIBLE, PERMANENTLY DEBILITATING HAND INJURY.
3 September 2002On July 4, 1998, I was leaning on a porcelain sink in a hotel room which collapsed off the wall. I fell with the sink, which broke on the floor. The jagged pieces of porcelain cut my hand and wrist very badly, completely severing five tendons, three nerves, and a minor artery. I had my […]
BOOK REVIEW: THE PAINTED WORD * * 1/2 (2 and a half stars out of 4).
3 September 2002Tom Wolfe persuasively argues that modern art, which originally rebelled against theory-driven artwork, had become, by the time the book was written in 1975, totally consumed by theory, and he laments that a few thousand art intellectuals decide what art is successful, as opposed to the general public who collectively dictate their own tastes in […]
THE FRIDAY FIVE.
3 September 2002The new Friday Five questions. 1. What’s your favorite piece of clothing that you currently own? A classy brown pin-striped shirt that I had custom-made for me in Bangkok, for only $18 (a week’s pay over there). 2. What piece of clothing do you most want to acquire? I need to buy more shorts. I […]
I WENT A LITTLE CRAZY AT THE GYM TODAY.
3 September 2002Saturday was my three-month “luniversary” of going to the gym, and today, to celebrate I did twice my normal weight-lifting, and then I rode the elliptical machine for three hours and 45 minutes, until it said I had burned 3,600 calories. Normally, I do an hour and burn 1,000 to 1,100 calories. I picked 3,600 […]
WILMINGTON, DELAWARE.
2 September 2002So, I met one of the other David D.s that I know, the one who lives in Washington, D.C., in Wilmington, Delaware yesterday, all day, for a day trip. We decided to meet at about half-way between New York and D.C. First, I said Philadelphia, which is about an hour and 15 minutes from New […]