Afrin and Strip Clubs and Jeff Buckley, Oh My!

 

I had planned to unveil my artistic endeavors in this next post, but as they often do when you spend too much time with diseased Brooklyn riff-raff, plans have changed. You see, the reason I was rather incommunacado last month overall is because I spent nearly half of it being sick with what my doctor calls, “a really bad garden variety cold.”  As a person who never really gets sick - once every five years MAX -I don’t exactly handle it all that well.   I’m actually considering  just dealing with an Afrin Addiction (I’m not kidding- it’s a very real thing) because I can’t stand not being able to breathe through my nose.  Without medication, I feel like I’m in a constant state of suffocation.  I probably am being dramatic, but like I said, I’m not familiar with suffering beyond an occasional brazillian wax.  For it’s longevity and lack of upsides, this is wayyy worse.

Thirteen days and counting of sickness, three days off of work, an OTC medication bonanza, and four boxes of tissues later, I’m finally feeling better.  But, I also can’t yet consider myself totally recovered.  I tried the mind over matter thing Friday night to avoid yet another evening stalking “The Healthies” (as I’ve termed everyone, BUT me) on Facebook to torture myself with news of all the fun things I could be doing if I wasn’t busy being a booger factory.  Apparently, I overcompensated just a bit as my reintroduction to the real world ended with leopard-print-clothed strippers and boob-to-face contact at Lace Gentleman’s Club in the heart of Times Square.  Perhaps, the sickness is clogging both my nose and my judgement.  The one thing, however, that did peak through the mental fog and vodka tonics was the definate assessment that the stripper girls were very very… yucky.  That’s supposed to be one of the nicer places, too.  You’d think with this recession they could at least find an attractive girlfriend or mistress of a former investment banker looking for some additional cash flow to maintain her preferred state of living. 

It’s the Economy, Girlfriend

Once it was seen as a blessing in certain circles to have a wealthy, powerful partner who would leave you alone with the credit card while he was busy brokering deals. Now, many Wall Street wives, girlfriends and, increasingly, exes, are living the curse of cutbacks in nanny hours and reservations at Masa or Megu. And that credit card? Canceled.

Raoul Felder, the Manhattan divorce lawyer, said that cases involving financiers always stack up as the economy starts to slip, because layoffs and shrinking bonuses place stress on relationships — and, he said, because “there aren’t funds or time for mistresses any more.”

(One such mistress wrote on the blog that when she pouted about not having been taken on a trip lately, her married man explained that with money so tight, his wife had taken to checking up on his accounts.)

With my first and last strip club encounter checked off my bucket list - yes, with lapdance from the only quasi-acceptable, most Katie Holmes/Natalie Portman/Zooey Deschanel chick I could find, I am left fully baffled as to why guys find this appealing in the same way I don’t understand manly looking lesbians.  If you like chicks, wouldn’t you like pretty and feminine-looking ones?  Can I get some insight please???

My evening out ended with a few more funbutpoorchoices – of course- and now I’m left with the conclusion that dad (aka blog reader Digi God) did know best when he imparted this now paraphrased and artistically-licensed advice: “Don’t go all Girls Gone Wild tonight or you might relapse.”  I’m hoping the latter isn’t true and thus far I think I’m safe despite ignoring this sage advice, but I’m pretty certain that nothing good has come of my actions in 2009 (New Year, New You My Ass Cosmo!), except what I hope will be my relaunch into the world of painting – but that’s another post in itself.

Outside of my artistic talents, my other yellow brick road through the madness has been the talents of troubadour, Jeff Buckley.  As you may have noticed, I take quite a bit of effort and speedy ticket buying prowess keeping up with the New York music scene.  Reasons being A) Brooklyn probably produced more great music in 2008 than anywhere else (Sorry Sting, but you Brits can’t rely on Oasis forever, “Oasis Tops NME’s Awards Shortlist.”) and B)  I’m hoping to snag me a hipster boyfriend one of these days.  

I’m sure you’ll all agree that these are both very noble reasons for becoming a skilled music slut, and I’ve managed to keep up this year to a certain degree.  My only dissapointment is that I’m not yet able to get the complete experience as it was meant to be had because there is a very large gaping hole in my knowledge base that has been growing larger since the first unlikely troubadour ever uttered the first sprig of lyric poetry in the High Middle Ages up until about… 2005!  A sprinkle of Ella Fitzgerald, a dash of Paul Simon, a heap of Elvis Costello, and I’m steady on my way.  This week though, was all about Jeff Buckley.

The nice thing, for me, about Jeff Buckley is that his music catalog is rather small due to his accidental drowning at the age of 31.  With only an EP and one full length album released before his death, I’ve been able to understand who he was as a musician much more quickly than I’ll ever be able to understand Ella Fitzgerald, whom according to an untrusty internet source is estimated to have recorded 98 albums!  Just the thought of it is daunting and worrisome with how easy it is to click purchase on iTunes.

Clear your mind of colds and strippers and instead fill it with the tunes of the late Mr. Buckley.

Halleluyah: http://www.box.net/shared/5dhg2uysy7

Forget Her: http://www.box.net/shared/1eltz585zk

Last Goodbye: http://www.box.net/shared/6p4gktux2e

I gotta go take another hit of nose crack.