This is just a post for anyone who might take a nanosecond to wonder if I still have a pulse. I do. Or, at least, I had one that bounced off the sky when a creepy crawly critter skittered across my naked thigh (the perils of wearing shorts on a hot summer’s day) in the dark of a movie theater recently. Life outside the blogosphere is still very demanding. I anticipate that it will continue to be so through the months ahead on both the work front and very soon, on the home front, when those walls will come crashing down for a while compelling me to continue my disappearing act. The home front hysteria of this year’s mania will one day be Lame Adventurized. It’s epic.
On The Grind front, I have been adapting to working in Long Island City. The commute is about ten minutes longer from my sanctum sanctorum, I’m not feeling tortured in The New Place, but I’m not in my bliss, either. Culturally, it’s very different from Manhattan’s chic and trendy Tribeca. But, the take out is cheaper when I don’t bother to pack my organic kale lunch. I like that. There’s a nearby Greek deli that makes an excellent chicken gyro. Even though my boss and colleagues have not complained, I know that when I get that gyro, unlike my usual kale, carrots and whatever else I add to that dreariness, it stinks up our entire office something fierce. Possibly, it stinks up our entire factory. With that in mind, I’ve cooled it with inhaling gyros at my desk.
As for settling in, that’s proceeding at tai chi pace. We still have mountains of stuff to slog through and shelve. It fills much of our factory space and about two thirds of our new location’s cavernous basement. It’s overwhelming. One of our sales associates thinks that the lost ark of the covenant is somewhere in there.
Mountains of overwhelming.
Last week, I ventured down to that basement with my colleague, Godsend, to look for something other than the lost ark. We didn’t find what we were seeking, but I think we stumbled upon a piece of the San Andreas Fault.
“Godsend, don’t step on that!”
We made a quick exit to avoid antagonizing it.
We’re fairly settled in in my department’s new office space. The Boss has planted her roots; she’s shelved both her ceramic lizard and industrial sized light bulb.
Elspeth’s lizard.
Elspeth’s holy honking light bulb next to cup of headache pain reliever.
I have followed her lead on a reduced scale. I placed my polished onyx alligator between my keyboard and monitor next to my favorite mystery tile.
Gator bud and don’t ask me what the thing behind it is.
Something that I could not take with me from our former location were the pigeons that perched on the sill outside my window and the mourning doves that cooed under the air conditioner. What’s outside my window now are subway trains rumbling on the elevated track and a symphony of horns honking on Queens Boulevard. Naturally, the horns honk most when I’m on the phone.
The 7 train perched outside my window.
I think I might be going through something akin to bird watching withdrawal. Occasionally, I see a few when I’m waiting for the train to take me back home to Manhattan. I find the sight of a perched pigeon comforting, particularly if that pigeon is not perched on the bookcase in my sanctum sanctorum.
A pigeon perched in LIC. So close and yet so far.
Recently, when I was home on the Upper West Side, I had this up close and personal encounter with a feathered friend.
I wish everyone well until whenever I next resurface.
Lame Adventures 
I was wondering and I sure am glad to hear from you!
One word: courage! 😉 Looking forward to your next resurface! 🙂
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Rest assured, Marina, I am still as courageous as the next weasel hiding from the heavy lifting behind the dumpster down the hall.
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Not only do you have a heartbeat,your quips say all is normal … more frantic than usual … but you still have the touch of your special insanity.
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Thanks Frank. I do believe that my great Aunt Florence’s nick name was Special Insanity, or maybe that was her married name, but hyphenated.
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Ah ha … genetics is a great defense!
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So happy to see you and glad that you are surviving. I laughed and laughed at your video and I am assured that you are still alive. Thanks for your talent and being you–looking forward to the next installment of your Epic life.
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Thanks for watching the video, Sarah! I was wondering if anyone would click the link. I do have a rather epic LA coming up in the months ahead. Possibly my Lamest ever depending on how things go …
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Our Rocky Mountains here are no match for those mountains of overwhelming there, V. Good luck with the unpacking! Loved the video. And like you, I really like pigeons. They strike me as pretty intelligent critters.
I always look forward to your resurfacing and I really do appreciate the fact that you check-in at my place given how busy you’ve been. Have a great week, buddy!
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Thanks for watching the video, Cathy. I agree with you about pigeons. I also think that they’re rather bright. In fact, I’d put one on currency, another outside my lonely window over here and maybe have a third one run on the top half of the GOP ticket, knock forever crowing Donald off his perch. You have a great week, too!
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Good luck settling in
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Thanks. I need it. And maybe a morphine drip.
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Hey! Thanks for sharing and look forward to your next resurface. God bless and take care.
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Thanks for visiting and for commenting! I have been generously spacing my posts in recent months, but I will be back more regularly by the end of this year or in 2016.
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Good to read you again. I missed you. Did your boss let you have any old tiles or accents for the new sanctum sanctorum refurbishment? I hate that when bugs crawl across my body. The video is cute and funny with balloon narratives. Take your time resurfacing, you have important duties to do this year.
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I don’t know what it was that crawled across me, but it was very fleet of foot, hoof, pod, etc. I was very much glued to the ceiling in its wake. Fortunately, the film was so good I even forgot to grouse to Milton about it. Thanks for watching the video!
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Moving – ugh. Good luck on scaling the mountains of stuff, and I hope you’re feeling all settled in soon.
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The way we’re settling in Peg, soon is spelled 2-0-1-6. We won’t be popping champagne on New Year’s Eve. We’ll still be stepping on bubble wrap.
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Okay, now you’ve got my interest piqued about what’s going on with your home life. Can’t wait to hear about it! That is one determined pigeon. It has as much trouble opening things like that as I do sometimes, especially stuff that’s supposed to be child-proof. And thanks for stopping by my blog. It’s good to know you’re still around. Take care.
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All (or, more likely, just about enough) will be revealed in the months ahead. Stay tuned. It’s very lame and quite an adventure.
I loved that pigeon, even though I’m quite sure that the feeling wasn’t mutual. I probably should have done it a favor and removed the candy from the wrapper for it.
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Good to know that someone has more “stuff” to organize than I do (but only a bit more). I haven’t moved but I still find boxes of mystery items stashed around the house. If you don’t find the ark at work, it may show up here. Let’s keep in touch about that.
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I work for a company of hoarders, Terri, where I admit I blend. We never threw anything out. We never needed to. We always had tons of space. Is that biting us now! Everything came with us, but we don’t know where so much of it is! And we don’t have space to put it! If you find my burnisher, let me know.
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Great to see you. That does look like a lot of stuff in your basement. These transitions take time. Give yourself the space whatever if is you’re feeling to process it all. It will come together. I enjoyed your pigeon video. Perhaps you could tape these and play them when you feel sad they’re not there. Hang in there, V!
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Amy, that picture of the stuff wasn’t what’s in the basement. That’s outside the door of my office. The basement’s packed with ten times that much stuff. We have oceans of stuff to unpack. Maybe at some point a few pigeons will even fly out of some of our hampers.
Thanks for watching the video!
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Give yourself the space to feel whatever it is you’re feeling to process it all. There!
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Okay! I will! thanks for the advice.
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Bliss doesn’t happen overnight. Reet?
Are you saying a delicious gyros smell bad and kale doesn’t? Same planet. Different worlds.
I think I saw mystery tile in Babeland.
Did you catch that PS1 art book fair? I missed it by virtue of living in the suburbs. ‘Hamlet in Bed’ intermittently amusing.
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That’s very true about bliss. From my POV it can even be about 33 years in the making …
Ding! Ding! Ding! I refrained from saying it, but yes, it is not lost on me that The Mystery Tile looks VERY vaginal. If it was phallic, I’d pass it onto Milton.
No, I did not catch the PS1 art book fair. I’ve been a real homebody lately, but I will step out when the New York Film Festival kicks off later this week. Milton and I will be all over that. I doubt that we’re going to catch Hamlet in Bed. Yesterday, we unloaded a king’s ransom to see Shuffle Along next June. Yes, June 2016. Tickets are selling at warp speed because Audra MacDonald is only going to be in it for a few months, before taking three months off and then returning in late September 2016. Milton was determined that we would not screw up seeing that and that we’d get good seats. We both love AM. Did you see her in Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill? Wow. The second after I saw it I was all over my boss to see it and she was blown away, too. We got rush tickets to that for $37 and lucked into sitting on the sides in the front row right next to Audra. That was bliss! Also, Joan Rivers was in our audience being so gracious to her fans. When I look back on all the great times I’ve shared with Milton through the years, that day will always be in the Top 10 greatest of great days.
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A Hillbilly’s review of the short film, “Pigeon Pecks a Wrapper”
The film’s director, V. Antonelli, has outdone herself this time. Alley cats are lining up in droves awaiting the premier to “meow” their approval of this cinematographic masterpiece.
“The pacing of the action and the catchy dialogue kept me nodding on the edge of the ledge,” says High Times film critic Stony Bongsmeyer. “This is sure to become a classic among bird lovers and taxidermists alike.”
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Hillbilly Shmillbilly, Russell! Stony Bongsmeyer is the second coming of Roger Ebert to me! Thanks for watching the video!
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Oh dear, V. There is probably a lot of stuck chi in there. Once you get all that cleared out and organized, I think you’ll breathe easier and not as frantically. If I were there I’d pitch in because I love to organize. It’s seriously one of my talents.
I’m not going to say what that thing near your albino gator looks like but I do love the vibrant blue hue. Be well, take a load off every once and awhile, and repeat: REE-lax, REE-lease. I listened that phrase during hot yoga that the instructor sing-songed to a big sweaty mass of people (one of which I was) until I said “Enough! This is for the birds.” Or maybe that pigeon. Nah, s/he seems content wrestling that food wrapper. Be well, V!!
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Brig, my company’s chi is seriously clogged these days. Godsend is an accomplished organizer, but that skill has eludes me. She has worked wonders with our storage rooms. My talents lean more in the direction of taking out the trash.
You and Mark both caught onto exactly why I keep The Mystery Tile on my desk. It goes where I go. I made sure that didn’t get lost!
Thanks for the “REE-lax, REE-lease” suggestion. I’ll try that and then I’ll quaff an icy cold one (or two) for total relaxation.
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Congrats on the work move. I recall it was coming up. I’m a little surprised that it’s only a ten minute additional commute. That’s not bad at all, although it might take just a little getting used to after so long with the same trip to work.
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It’s about ten minutes longer and 10,000 light years removed from the Big Apple hustle and bustle I prefer, Smak. On the bright side, I’m employed.
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Whenever someone brings some kind of chicken gyro thing for lunch, the person must issue a “stinky food alert” to the neighboring co-workers.
Sorry to hear that your new windowsill is pigeon-less.
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That is true about warning one’s colleagues, like a good neighbor policy. In an earlier life, with my bud, Martini Max, we shared a small office with a total lunkhead who used to eat some hard boiled egg and sardine-infused mush that stank to high heaven. We wanted to kill that guy. Instead, we would go out for lunch and drown our irritation in our local watering hole. Yes, those stinky lunches drove us to drink!
No sign of bird life outside this window, but I can hear the 7 train louder than my own thoughts right now.
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Oh my god, V. I have to compose myself – seriously, I am in tears from laughing so hard. The pictures with the captions and the video! You are so HILARIOUS! Glad you could manage to post something to let us all know you’re okay. I don’t know how I missed this post, and I’m sorry I’m so late, but you just made my whole night – unless that moon turns out to be really something… but I doubt if it will top that pigeon or the fault line or that freaking light bulb!
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That freaking light bulb is one of my boss’s favorites! It is quite a conversation piece. It’s very old. I think it might have been used to illuminate the Parthenon.
Glad you liked the video. I was wondering if anyone would watch it.
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Great video skills as well, I must say! I wouldn’t be able to pull that off! Sounds like you work with some interesting people – just be careful with all that commotion around the sacred bulb!
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The sacred light bulb is safe on the sacred shelf. All the commotion is spread out far and wide in the factory outside our office. That’s like entering the Twilight Zone.
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Well keep us updated on any strange new sightings of weird stuff you see – you know it can always get weirder! I think there’s a law of some kind that says so!
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If you knew our lunk-headed contractor, The Boss might be more inclined to say, “It can only get dumber.”
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LOVED the video! (in fact, i’m still smiling) looking forward to hearing all the good news, sweetpea! xox
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Thanks for watching Savannah! I enjoyed working with that star.
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Good to know your heart is still beating, though this left me wondering if your home is about to get torn down.
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The old Grind is gone. Almost all of our employees are here. From what I’ve been told, our building in Tribeca sounds like a shell of what it was. As much as I preferred our old location, I realize that what makes The Grind, The Grind is The People. There’s been a lot of solidarity. This transition has been a shared experience. I recently told a friend that I feel like I’ve survived being in combat.
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