Hurrican's and Hurrican'ts,

The Hairpin Chronicles Redux

September 2011

S

o it has been a very eventful month or so for the Hairpin Clan.  We've had nieces, camping, earthquakes, and 40th birthday parties.

Sweet stuff first, it was such a delight to have two nieces visit us.  
 Aloysius absolutely loves company, and took full advantage of waking up his cousins, playing with them, and obsessively checking out their belly buttons.  It’s always cute the first few times, but his cousins have something he and his parents do not – flat stomachs – so he is absolutely intrigued by abdominal muscles and a flab-less navel.  I really have to break him of his particular obsession before it gets him in real trouble.  His uncle candidly remarked to me during a family escape to Lake Placid, “You do know that your son is fondling my daughters.”  If I don’t fix this fetish, some other man will be saying the same thing without everyone in the room smiling cutely.

The best part of August was an almost complete Jimenez family retreat to Lake Placid.  For three days; Flounder, Aloysius, and I enjoyed a very relaxing time with family.  I know that generally speaking “relaxing time with family” does not go hand-in-hand.  Still it was a blast introducing Aloysius to gentle hikes, boat rides, canoe-ing, and nightly s’mores outings.  It was just what the doctor ordered if doctors were ever the type to prescribe prolonged visits to the past Olympic venues.  Before I leave this paragraph, I just want to say that I want to go back during the winter and try the “luge” and the ski-jumping.  For those not in the know, ski-jumping is when you turn off your brain, strap on two skis, and plummet down a gigantic ramp just for the thrill of flying through the air before gently landing.  My guess is that there are probably less than a thousand people in the world (outside of Norway) who would actually want to do this or could without destroying their bodies.  Though I don’t count myself amongst those 1,000; I’d like to believe that it would be an extraordinary experience if I were to survive it.

Generally speaking, I am not privy to every detail in your life, so I don’t know if you heard but we had an earthquake a few weeks back.  Very similar to my life in Japan, I was completely oblivious to the earthquake (I only felt one earthquake in Japan during my three year visit.)  Now I’ve heard from our friends in Japan who bitched that America was full of whiners because really a 5.8 is nothing in Japan.  Other than my immediate urge to whine, “We’re not whiners!”, I’d like to remind the accusers that Japan is built for earthquakes.  In addition to the best toilets and hot coffee vending machines in the world, Japanese technology focuses on construction to withstand earthquakes.  East of California, U.S.A. technology for earthquake-proof construction consists of one builder telling another, “Don’t concern yourself with earthquakes – there aren’t any here.” 

More discomforting was Hurricane Irene.  And no, it wasn’t because of all the destruction she brought to my fair city.  Nope, instead Irene pissed me off because she was nothing more than a thunderstorm wearing her “hurricane Halloween” costume six weeks early.  I understand that Hurricane Irene did hit parts of the east coast particularly hard.  And I feel for anyone who has ever had to live through a hurricane, it is beyond unpleasant.  HOWEVER . . . hurricanes don’t hit Manhattan.  They may pick up speed and knock the crap out of Long Island and New Jersey, but they DO NOT HIT New York City.  However, everyone who has lived in NYC seems to have forgotten this.  So when we stopped into our local grocery store two Fridays ago, we encountered “Apocalypse lines.”  There were intense lines coiling throughout the store in multiple directions.  Those who feared for their lives were stocking their supplies with water, water, water, groceries and for the young adults – beer.  It was very ridiculous.  Of course then we had to do the same, because even if I was close to being wrong (and let’s be honest – how often does that truly happen?) then I’d be considered a selfish jack-arse who doesn’t care about his family.  So I grumbled and whined the whole entire time that I waited in line for the two 24-packs of water, 5 1-liter bottles of Evian (because if you’re in the apocalypse you should “class it up”), and some powdered milk.  There was a box of peanut butter granola bars as well.  That’s right, we didn’t use one of them so I took them to work for snacks.

Just as maddening as these stupendously stupid lines (that’s right they weren’t just stupid they were stupendously stupid!) was the fact that the city packed it in and headed for the hills.  The MTA shut down, almost every single store (after they sold all their water and for the young adults – beer) was shut down.  Even Starbucks was shut down for the entire weekend.  This is not a misprint.  All Starbucks were shut down both Saturday and Sunday.  There were lines, LINES, out the door at Dunkin Donuts (and yes I hated typing doughnuts Dunkin’s way).  By the time I visited DD on Sunday, there were 8 doughnuts left – I didn’t eat any of them.  The conversations in line were even worse.  Some jack-arse in front of me wanted to make a joke out of everything with everyone.  Few people know this (I believe Patty has witnessed it), but when I am not interested I have a world-class “eat shit and die” look.  Now granted this is not something to hang my hat on, but really Guy, it’s 8 o’clock on a Sunday morning.  NYC left for the weekend and I’m waiting 30 minutes for a Dunkin Donuts coffee.  Now is not the time for Stand up.  (By the way, I’m getting closer to performing again.)

The best thing about “hurricane Irene” was getting to hear Patty say, “Eric was right.”  But the three of us did have a lot of fun walking amongst the completely empty Broadway and walking down to the Hudson River to check out the oncoming storm and use it for a great photo opportunity.  Aloysius, Flounder, and I had a great time.  At the storm’s worst, Flounder took her camera back out to the river to see the lower bike paths, clay tennis courts, and kids’ parks flooded by the cresting- river.  By the time, I got there the water had returned to the river (a nice place for it don’t you think).

I did begin a small tirade on facebook about the hurricane names.  I’m running out of steam, otherwise I’d continue my tirade with vigor.  However, it is very important that I finish the first ‘Chronicles in a very long time.

August ended and September began with the celebration of my “heart’s” 40^th birthday.  The person who means the world to me and is the most important was able to enjoy a family birthday party and a friends and family dinner and comedy show.  Flounder was and is incredible.  She makes every day a wondrous place for Aloysius and I.  I love her MOTE.

Okay I’m done.  So yeah, the Chronicles are back.

Your friend,

Hairpin