Categories
personal

In the bag with me

What I pack when I travel

What's in my bag when I travel
No real post today – instead, I’m going to point you over to an interview I did with my friend Channy about my trip to Europe a little while back.

Click here: http://naturalselectionnyc.com/in-the-bag-with-logan-lo/

She has an cool series about what people pack when they travel and she interviewed me back when.

Think it’s interesting because I find what I pack to be rather mundane but everyone else seems to be much more compelling – suppose that’s just how it is. Things are always more interesting on the other side.

In any case, take a look and leave a comment or two.

Now, wonder what you pack you travel…

Location: back to the gym shortly
Mood: rested
Music: waiting on a slow boat to China, want to sail away to the sun

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.

Categories
personal

A copy of a copy of a copy

My insomnia’s much better these days

Mannequin heads
There’s this weird thing with insomnia: Everyone that has it seems to try and top someone else that has it with stories of how bad theirs is.

I think that some are resistant to getting better – at least at some level – because that would be an admission that it’s not actually that bad.

I can admit that was definitely me in my 20s and most of my 30s. Wore my insomnia like a badge of honor. It made me miserable but also let me do things that most people couldn’t because I felt I had 13 months a year to get things done, while other people had only 12.

But, at 41, I’m starting to realize the costs. Mainly that I just don’t remember things that well for most of that time.

Wrote in my private diary almost a decade ago this line from Fight Club that goes: With insomnia, nothing’s real. Everything is far away. Everything is a copy of a copy of a copy.

There are outlines but nothing is distinct.

I meet people who are kinda familiar from that period but mostly not. I remember things, kinda.

You know, I remember buying my apartment but not really. It’s like someone else bought it and I watched it happen on TV and left the room a buncha times.

Happy to say that my worst nights of insomnia these days are about on par with my regular nights of insomnia. Most weeks, manage to sleep pretty well. Had some insomnia the other day but still managed to get five hours of sleep.

Much better these days.

It’s like when I got HD television for the first time and realized that I’d been watching a fuzzy picture in black and white all these years.

Wish it was clearer, though, all of my fuzzy yesterdays.

Mood: better
Music: early morning yesterday, I was up before the dawn

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.

Categories
personal

Genetic Fallacies and the Citibank Building

Listening’s a lot harder when your ego’s on the line

Citibank Building in Manhattan 3

Him: I don’t understand what happened.
Me: Maybe there’s a reason why they went with someone else.

That’s a picture of the Citibank building here in Manhattan. I took it along with the picture below in March of last year for another entry.

About a month after I took it, read this article that said that the building was ridiculously flawed.

How ridiculous? There was a 1-in-16 year chance that the entire building would come tumbling down with a strong wind.

That’s pretty ridiculous.

But the weirdest thing about how this all unfolded was that a female college student from NJ figured out it was flawed, tracked down the lead engineer, and contacted him to tell him that his design was fatally flawed.

And despite haven’t any number of reasons to not listen to her, he did.

Then, as Hurricane Eva was barreling down onto the East Coast in 1978, NYC and these engineers all secretly fixed the problem. All without most of the city finding out. In fact, most people didn’t learn about it until 1995.

Citibank Building in Manhattan 1

I thought of this recently when a colleague of mine was wondering why he lost a major account. I knew why. So I told him.

There’s this illogical argument called a genetic fallacy, where you don’t want to believe something that someone says because of the person saying it.

The engineer could have sneered at any one of the things about the person contacting him: her sex, where she was from, her age, her experience, etc.

But he didn’t. Because he was smart enough to realize she was right. That’s something I still find really amazing.

People wanna have any number of reasons they believe what they believe. Even if it’s not true.

Him: (later, upset) What do you know? You’re a lawyer, not a psychologist.
Me: This is true. But what I said is also true.

Location: midtown east
Mood: tired but super happy
Music: You’ve got the talkin’ down, just not the listening

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.

Categories
personal

Black suit and a white shirt

It’s the right tone for a wrong day

Black suit and watch
I bought another suit a while ago. My tailor isn’t in the US so it takes a few months to reach me.

Got it because my old black suit was looking worn. And the reason I need another solid jet black suit is because I seem to at an age where I’m going to funerals and memorials a lot more than anyone might want.

Not that anyone ever wants to go to them.

Have a memorial coming up next week for my buddy Bobbie and the suit arrived in time for that. Unfortunately, sad events don’t follow anyone’s timeline.

About two years ago, went to a funeral for my buddy’s mom.

Then, unexpectedly, had to go to one for his brother just last week. It seems terribly cruel for such misery to visited upon anyone, let alone someone so young.

In any case, my suit arrived the very next day. I found that odd.

Writer Neil Gaiman said in one of his books:

I wore a black suit and a white shirt, a black tie and black shoes, all polished and shiny: clothes that normally would make me feel uncomfortable, as if I were in a stolen uniform, or pretending to be an adult. Today they gave me comfort of a kind. I was wearing the right clothes for a hard day.

I agree with that.

For me, a black suit is comforting in it’s own way. It strikes the right, somber tone for a very wrong day.

Me: I’m so sorry, man.

Location: last week, upstate
Mood: hopeful
Music: Sometimes it seems like lately I just don’t know

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.

Categories
personal

Bad luck is better than worse luck

You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from

Fire in the UWS
A few days ago, rented a car to go that birthday party and also pick up a buddy from the airport.

Unfortunately, the tiny compact car I’d reserved had a dead battery.

So I called up the car rental company and told them that they needed to get me a replacement.

Customer Care: I’m so sorry about that! The only thing we have is an SUV. Do you want that? No additional charge.
Me: Sure, I’ll take anything. I just gotta go.

After losing about twenty minutes, the wife and I were on our way.

But during this time, the snow began to fall. It was only supposed to be an inch or so but it was clear that it’d be more.

A lot more.

Me: We gotta go.
Her: OK, let’s start saying our goodbyes.

Not long after arriving, we were back on the road. Had to call up my buddy and say we weren’t coming to get him.

Thankfully, we had that larger car so getting back home wasn’t all that bad.

This writer named Cormac McCarthy once said that, You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from.

The thing is, it’s rare to actually realize that this is the case. This was one of those rare times.

But really, you could go through your whole life thinking you had terrible luck while, in reality, you’re far better off than if you had gotten what you wanted in the first place.

Moon in the daytime

Alternatively, you could always try and see the positive, however, small, of everything that’s ever happened to you.

This poet warrior – and I think that it’s telling he was a poet and warrior – named Mizuta Masahide once had a poem that went:

Since my house burned down
I now own a better view
of the rising moon

But there’s an even shorter translation I prefer. I told you about it once. It goes:

Barn’s burnt down —
now
I can see the moon.

Location: last night, shoveling all that damn snow
Mood: thoughtful
Music: She is running to stand still

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.

Categories
personal

Bookending

I’m in a funny place, mentally

Child's Birthday Cake
February’s over and it’s been heady.

It was strange in that there were two children’s birthday parties and one death. The children are young: one’s my nephew, who turned one; the other, my niece, who turned two. The death was that of a college buddy about my age, 43.

It was the first time I’d been to any child’s birthday party since I was a kid. And the death was the first time someone I knew well, who was my age, passed.

In any case, my nephew’s birthday party was in Queens, my niece’s was in NJ. It was bitterly cold both days. The kind where every inhale burns the inside of your lungs.

And for the one in NJ, got the added bonus of being caught in a snowstorm so that meant a slow crawl home.

All that traveling gives a fella time to think.

Thought mainly of the bookending of life in these events: Two children starting their journey in the world, one young man finishing his.

Wonder how the children will spend the time they’ll have; wonder how I’ll spend the time I have left.

Clock in West Village, NYC

Oddly, my brother called me last night talking about that very subject.

Told him that I’m pretty content with my life. Wish I had more scratch and less injuries, but, on the whole, I don’t have a ton to complain about. After all, I won the lottery where it really counts.

But I’m turning 42 in less than two months, which makes me think about my own life more and more. I suppose I’ll tell you about that some day.

Of course, it’s all time and tide. We just don’t know what either will bring us.

But, I hope good things.

Man at the birthday party: Have a safe trip home, old man.
Me: (leaving) That’s just cruel.

Children's cupcakes (purple)

Location: yesterday, crawling to the Lincoln Tunnel
Mood: thoughtful
Music: away from you, it froze me deep inside. So come back

Like this post? Tell someone about it by clicking a button below.