2. Fortunately for us, our downstairs neighbors are the nicest people in the world and drove Kath and I into the city this morning. No muss, no fuss. And as we drove over the 59th Street Bridge and saw the thousands of people walking, biking (and even scooter-ing) along, I couldn't help but feel like I was in some sort of movie. It's hard to explain - it's just that most of the time, when I read the news, I read about these amazing events that happen somewhere else, and I felt like I was watching some sort of documentary footage this morning, except with my own eyes.
3. I felt a similar sort of thing during 9/11, walking downtown to meet up with Kath while the rest of the city was walking uptown, some of them covered in smoke and dirt, seeing the progression of military presence the farther south I walked - police cars in the 50s, tanks in the 30s, and by the time I got to 14th Street there were F-16s buzzing by every 20 minutes or so; and, also, seeing lots of papers and debris scattered along the street, and people crowding in front of electronics stores to watch news reports, and all the while staring up at this horrendous black cloud of smoke. That felt a lot like watching a movie, too, although I was probably disassociating myself from the situation as hard as I possibly could.
4. My bosses have given me some pretty generous birthday/holiday presents over the last few days, so I had all this cash burning a hole in my wallet, and so I bit the bullet, scoured Craigslist and paid too much (but not THAT much) for an Xbox 360. I know that I had said that I wasn't going to make a big deal about it, and that I could wait until it wasn't such a pain in the ass to get one, but - this guy was selling it for pretty cheap, AND he lived in Queens, AND he drove it to my house. I don't have an HDTV, but I do have a nice 27" TV, and the games STILL look phenomenal. Not only that, but the user interface is fan-fucking-tastic, PLUS I can connect my iPod up to it with a USB cable, PLUS I can download all these awesome old-school arcade games for $5. The wireless controller (!!!) can shut down the console all by itself. The PS3 may end up being a more powerful machine, but for my money the Xbox360 is where it's at, in terms of the online experience, the ease of use, and the elegance and simplicity of the user interface. The games, also, will play a part. I bought Kameo (beautiful platform-y action-y adventure-y), Perfect Dark Zero (beautiful sci-fi first person shooter/stealth), Project Gotham Racing 3 (insanely beautiful driving game), and Call of Duty 2 (World War 2 shooter, which is the only one I haven't spent any time with). I also downloaded Geometry Wars, which is completely insane and trippy and ridiculous.
5. What's this about the Yankees picking up Johnny Damon? I thought that was just a ploy to make the Sox have to pay more to keep him.
