Tag: birthday

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personal

Logan’s 47

Human Interaction

My gym’s shutting down our location for a number of reasons, COVID-19 being one. Ideally, it’s only temporary.

The owner posted that he, his wife, and Chad would be cleaning the place up that afternoon so I decided to finally venture out.

Took my electric scooter down Broadway and it was glorious. The city’s still mostly empty.

Made it to the gym in less than 30 mins. Woulda been sooner but I kept taking pictures and gawking at things. I’d not been outta the house in a meaningful way for over a month.

Walking into the gym felt exceedingly normal.

Owner: Logan! How you doing? Hey, do you smell something?
Me: (cautiously) Yes? What is that?
Him: OK, right before you walked in, I found this bottle in this locker. So, I shook it…
Me: Oh god…

Chad was there along with the other owner helping out.

Chad: How’re you?
Me: (laughing) I think this is the first time I’ve heard my own voice in about two days. Definitely the first time I’ve had any real human interaction in weeks.

Presently other people showed up.

Me: I gotta ask, did you find a bat in your apartment?
Her: (laughs) Yes. I’m the cause of this whole thing!
Me: I need to know more.

I’d gone out after a few minutes to get beer for the guys but I left my face mask at the gym, not thinking it’d be too much of an issue.

Store 1 staff: Sorry, we can’t let you in without a mask.
Me: S’ok. I respect your putting the safety of your people before short-term profit.

Store 2 staff: Sorry, we can’t let you in without a mask.
Me: While I respect your putting the safety of your people before short-term profit, I just wanna get a six-pack.
Staff: Sorry.

Store 3 staff: Sorry, we can’t let you in without a mask.
Me: WhileIrespectYourPuttingTheSafetyOfYour PeopleBeforeShort-termProfit, I just wanna get a six-pack.
Staff: Sorry.

Store 4 staff: Sorry, we can’t let you in without a mask.
Me: (walking quickly past guard to beer section) WhileIrespectYourPuttingTheSafetyOfYourPeopleBeforeShort- termProfit,IJustWannaGetASix-pack. Here’s a 20, keep the change.

I’m not (terribly) proud.

Owner: (looking at beer) Why’d you get watery-beer for us?
Me: First of all, I’m watching my weight, second of all, shut up, you wouldn’t believe what I went through to get this beer.

Just shopping made me run out of breath. This sickness really took a lot outta me.

More people came and left. Everyone practiced safe social distancing.

Soon, it was my turn to go.

Had an interesting ride back but it’s getting late so I’ll tell you about that some other time.

Right around when I got in the door, got a message from the owner:

Him: You classy bastard. You left those last two beers here. That shows good breeding and manners. You’d be surprised how many people don’t have that.
Me: Ha, really? Who takes the last two beers they brought for the group? My parents didn’t raise me that way, homie.
Him: You’d be amazed.

I was so engrossed in my thoughts that I almost tripped over a box on my doorstep.

Mouse sent me a gift for my birthday. She hadn’t contacted me in weeks, not until I got sick, anyway. Suppose that’s her story to tell.

I picked up the box and brought it home. When I opened the door, I yelled out:

Hey, I’m back!

But got nuthin in return. Harold’s still not speaking to me and the boy’s still away. Still, hope – and madness – springs eternal.

I’m 47 years-old by the time you read this sentence.

One, holy shitballs.

Two, hooray.

Location: my empty apartment, now with a box and lots of taco wrappers
Mood: empty also
Music: been roaming around, always looking down (Spotify)
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personal

You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here

5PM, right?

It was a long weekend, this past weekend, so I brought the boy to my in-laws and stayed for lunch.

MIL: Do you want a sandwich?
Me: Yes, please.
Her: (later) Do you want some pizza?
Me: Yes, please.
Her: One or two slices?
Me: Yes, please.

Because my son was away this past weekend, the Gymgirl and I celebrated her birthday.

Oh, and also because it was her birthday.

I tried to throw a surprise birthday party for her but my coach – god love him – kinda threw a wrench in our plans.

Him: (coming over to the Gymgirl and me) How are you two doing with today’s lesson?
Me: Good, we’re just practicing.
Him: Great! Oh, and for tomorrow’s game night, it’s at 5PM right?
Me:  …
Him: (looking puzzled, turns to Gymgirl) It’s 5PM right?
Gymgirl: (laughing) Yes. 5PM (he leaves) So…game night is at 5PM?
Me: (laughing) Yes. 5PM.

Now that the cat was outta the bag, she helped me clean up the joint that day and we ordered pizzas for everyone.

Me: Should I order two or three pizzas?
Her: Well, the coach and you will be here, so that’s two pizzas right there.
Me: Three pizzas it is.

Lots of people from our old and new gym stopped by for pizza and board games. We actually ended up playing games, including some Jackbox games, for about six hours.

The time really flew. It was 11PM before we knew it.

Coach: Should we start wrapping up?
Me: Well, you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.

Location: home, fixing the window
Mood: coooooold
Music: one of us gets too drunk and calls about a hundred times

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Logan’s 45

Another health scare


Had my own health scare the other day, on top of the cracked teeth and everything else. My left eye suddenly went blurry for no reason and stayed that way for a bit.

My brother – poor guy has to field all my goddamn medical issues – told me to go see a doctor.

Man, I should really stop calling him and just go straight to the doctor.

Went over to the same medemerge I just wrote about before. The same one that I brought Alison and the Gymgirl to.

The doc there said that she didn’t see anything that made her worry enough to send me to the ER but told me to see an eye doctor.

Wanna know my honest-to-god first thought?

Maybe I’ll see Alison and my dad again.

And my second thought was: Whoa, I gotta be ok. I gotta raise the boy.

It scared me because those two thoughts should be reversed.

I’m tired, you see. Life is tiring.

Feel like a copy-of-a-copy-of-a-copy again. I wanna raise the kid but I also wanna go see Alison and my dad and call it a day. Not that I have any faith any more.

Then again, the hope is that there are things that’ll make me wanna stay beyond raising the kid someday.

Suppose that’s always the cause and cure for all human suffering: Hope.

The hope that things might be better tomorrow.

Was thinking about that around this time 11 years ago and every day since. I’m still wondering what it all means.

Gymgirl: I was thinking of seeing you on your birthday.
Me: I’m all for that.
Her: Well, really, I was coming over for a sushi boat. (pause) Let me rephrase that: To treat you to a sushi boat and end up eating most of it myself.
Me: Works for me.

I just turned 45.

The past few birthdays have been horrific, for obvious reasons. It’s a low bar, but still, I hope that this one’ll be better?

Anyway, wish me a happy birthday, alla you bastards that read me and never say anything.

Me: Have you ever seen, “About a Boy?”
Gymgirl: No, what’s it about?
Me: …a boy?

Location: in front of a thermometer and a sick boy
Mood: curious
Music: I have lived ten years plus ten and ten and ten again. I have seen too much to pretend

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Logan’s 41

The 1s are a little different

Me with Abe
Tomorrow I turn 41.

There’s something about the “1s” that really hit you. Turning 40, 30, and even 20 is a shock, but turning 41, 31, and 21 is more of a: “Well, I guess I should get used to this,” type of feeling.

Because I have to see the rents tomorrow, the wife brought me out to catch the Captain America flick in a red leather recliner, and then dinner at Five Napkin Burger on the UWS the other night.

My seventh birthday was roughly the same except I went to see Superman II and had Burger King.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Speakinga staying the same, wish me a Happy Birthday, alla you bastards that read me and never say anything.

Hearts from www.stockfreeimages.com

Just to change it up a little bit, I’m actually going to give something to you instead of the other way around a week from today so check back then?

Location: off to the gym
Mood: 41-ish
Music: I’d go black and blue, I’d go crawling down the avenue.

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business personal

Logan’s 39 / Travelogue Malaga Day 1

Malaga, Spain

It’s my birthday.

And like always, say something, all of you bastards that read me but never say anything.

Logan Lo at the AC Hotel in Malaga, Spain

2012.04.13

Me: Did we check the stove was off?
Her: Go check.
Me: I put on my shoes already.
Her: (shakes head and slips off shoes)

HG and I go on our first airplane trip together. As i did in Paris last year, I’m speaking about intellectual property issues and video games in Malaga, Spain.

We’re out the door, on the AirTrain, and in the airport in less than an hour. Except for one minor hiccup, we make it to the plane without issue.

Me: Shoot, I can’t find my ticket or passport.
TSA Agent: Sir, you just put them into your back pocket.
Me: I knew that.

Soon we’re in our chairs in the sky and I start taking things from HG’s bag of snacks.

Her: Didn’t you say we didn’t need to bring that? And now you’re going to eat it all in the beginning of our trip.
Me: If you weren’t here, I would strap this on my face like a feed bag.

Six hours and one tiny can of Diet Coke later, we arrive in Ireland for a two-hour layover at around midnight. We have the airport to ourselves.

Airport in Dublin, Ireland

Announcement: last call for Amsterdam.
Me: We should blow this thing and go to Amsterdam. (thinking) We could smoke pot.
Her: You’ve never smoked pot before.
Me: I’m away. I’d smoke a pot.
Her: (laughing) The fact you just said “a pot” makes me think it’s not for you.

Ended up heading to Malaga anyway.

We finally get to board our connecting flight. As I can never sleep, read the entirety of Digital Wars during the layover and half the flight to Spain.

About 18 hours we walk outta our door in NYC, we walk into our door in Malaga.

We drop off our bags and we notice that we have a balcony so I get a beer from the mini-bar and look over the city.

Overlooking Malaga, Spain

We both try to crash for a bit but I don’t get much rest. It’s only 1PM there so four hours later, we get up in search of food and a SIM card and we find both on the same block.

The organizer of the event meets us for a chat in the hotel lobby but we’re fading fast so we politely make it short.

Unfortunately, it’s a sleepless night cause Spaniards have dinner at 10PM and we’re essentially in the Times Square of Malaga.

It’s been almost 30 hours and I’ve gotten five hours of sleep.

The conference’s tomorrow.

Overlooking Malaga, Spain
Having a beer on a balcony in Malaga, Spain

Location: finally back home
Mood: another year older
Music: Just give me credit, I’m just sitting on the shelf
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Logan’s 38 / What you pay for being alright

Logan LoJust check’n if all my hair’s still there.

Joe: Did they hurt you in there, Mitchel?
Mitchel: Not so you’d notice.
Joe: They hurt me in there, Mitchel.
Mitchel: I know they did, Joe. It’s all right now. Here. (gives him money)
Joe: You don’t have to do that.
Mitchel: Yes, I do. It’s a tax you pay for being alright.

— London Boulevard (film)

You know you’re old when you fondly remeber being 30.

Started this blog five years ago because of my breakup. Then it somehow morphed into my admittedly peculiar dating life punctuated with some really cool highs and some awful, awful lows. Now I’m just a boring married guy.

But at some point in the future, there’ll be more really cool highs and some more awful lows. It’s all about waiting for the next high, I suppose.

I’ll take the awful lows, though – as best one can. And I’ll try to do my own little bit to contribute something to world. It’s all parta the same thing anyway.

Think the above quote’s spot on, paying back to the aether’s the tax you pay for being alright. Isn’t that what a tax is? It’s what you pay to be alright.

I’m alright right now, and feel the need to pay a little more this year. Duuno what that is but I’m looking.

Having said that, you know the drill. Wish me a happy birthday and say something, all of you bastards that read me but never say anything.

Location: home, listening to the rain outside
Mood: hopeful
Music: One girl, one boy, Some grief, some joy
YASYCTAI: Oh, you know… (60 mins/1 pt)
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Logan’s 37/Adulthood’s funny

Location: in front of my iPad.
Mood: old but content
Music: find myself remembering now and then

Logan Lo with some rum

Heartgirl got me an iPad. She’s lovely – both the iPad and Heartgirl.

———-

Him: So why is oriental offensive to people?
Me: (shrugging) Three reasons, I suppose:
1. It means east, which implies easta someth’n, and if we’re east, then easta who?
2. It picks up connotations just like any word does. Like there’s nuthin wrong with the word piss, it’s just the monosyllabic Anglo-Saxon waya saying the polysyllabic Latin urination. But connotations, y’know? (pause) And
3. it’s a rug dude, something you walk on. Would you wanna be called something that people wipe their feet on?
Him: (laughing) No, I suppose not.

Met up with onea the fellas that I brought to court recently – not this idiot but his landlord – and cost me some Manhattan real estate. Nice guy, actually.

Adulthood’s funny.

People you war with today, y’might find sitting across a peach-coloured couch in the future, discussing the finer points of etymology. The key’s to not just fight hard but honorably. And when the fighting’s over, just move on.

He gets props cause he fought a good fight. If things were different, we mighta been friends.

Speak’na adulthood, 37 on Saturday. Way closer to 40 than 20. Luckily, there’s rum in my not-too-distant future to soften the blow.

For thosea you reading me for a while, you know the drill – wanna know if anyone’s still reading besides the four or five stalwart commenters I got.

So, wish me a happy birthday, all of you bastards that read me but never say anything.

Logan Lo at 37

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personal

So here’s what I remember

Location: 20:00 yest., eating another piece of sushi in Queens
Mood: burp
Music: I’m tearing at the seams. You on the other hand

Wedding flowers

Don’t wanna go out for my birthday but Paul insists. He, Hazel and WM take me out for some killer Indian food. Afterward, Paul and Hazel pick up a bottle of rum and we kill it on a balcony overlooking Broadway in the Village. Paul even picked up a cake.

Me: Have I thanked you enough for this?
Paul: Yeah…no prob, as long as you had a good one for a change. Everyone needs a good birthday.
Me: Well, my birthdays are usually pretty good – it’s just that the other 364 days leave much to be desired.

Stupid friends won’t even let a guy be depressed on his birthday.

Birthday with rum

Saturday, dash off to Brooklyn for something and rush home to make a wedding for a buddy I’ve not seen in years. The most beautiful woman in the room spies me walking in and takes my hand.

Her: (beaming) You came! I keep talking about you. (takes me by the hand and pulls me in front of a table of strangers) Everyone – this is my son.
Everyone (in unison): Hello!
Me: (laughing) Hi.

My world’s a small place. Alla my guy friends are comparing their ueber expensive automatic watches. Sold mine to pay for for law school stuff. Miss my Seamaster the most.

But don’t have time to be sad. Dash off to see my buddy El for her housewarming. Rain and the gang’re there including Tess (who’s in Kings, should it not get canceled) and Eve. We all go up to the roof, which is dark. But not in a cool way, more in a pitch black kinda way.

Eve: This is sorta nice.
Me: Yeah, if you’re a rapist.

Rape-y becomes the word of the night .
NYC rooftop

While there, get a call from a girl Shin I’ve not seen in 15 years telling me she’s in town. She’s a professor now. Crazy. So we meet up and soon, about eight of us are in a karaoke bar downtown where people are butchering Phil Collins.

My brother’s best friend is there with her 18 year old sister who delights in the fact that I’m, quite literally, twice her age now. She puts a note in front of me that makes me laugh. But it’s almost 3AM and Shin’s boyfriend turns out to be a drunk douche so I bounce before I can deck him.

Logan's old

Yesterday, I see Heartgirl. We go out and she has a glass of wine and listens to my stories. I like her more than anything. Even rum.

Today, have dinner with the family at an all-you-can eat buffet.

Sister: Why are you sitting like that?
Me: So I can get a better view of the sushi chef. You have to plan these things.

Thanks for the birthday wishes, they meant a lot to me. Really. Every writer likes knowing that someone, somewhere’s reading them.

YASYCTAI: Have you called your mother? (10 mins/2 pts)

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Logan’s 36/Say Anything

Location: noon, yest, midtown
Mood: stressed
Music: don’t know if our fate’s already sealed

Airplane Window at sunset

Two observations: (1) Got no fewer than four friends with relationships on the rocks; (2) I always get hit on more in the spring.

Think they’re related: it’s spring cleaning. People wanna be out and about maybe, capitalize on the weather, see what else’s out there.

As for Heartgirl and me, well, last weekend was just perfect. And we both know that perfect and I don’t work well together; she’s still tired of hearing me talk. But I’d like to see how our story goes.

There was a time when bad things happened to you, you put on a black mourning jacket as a quiet testament to your sorrow. Nowadays, it’s a lotta status updates, vitriol and poor grammar.

That’s why I try to sort things out before I write about them. Waited almost a month before I told you about the theft. And three months after my initial breakup to tell you about it. Need time to make sure something’s actually something and not a whole lotta nuthin. Wonder if I can still tell the diff.

Everyone’s got a place where they go to sort things out. King Midas had his reeds. Lloyd Dobler had his friends.

Me? I keep thinking that I’d like to go elsewhere, and still not necessarily somewhere and tell them my story. Cause who’d believe it? But since I can’t, suppose I got this here blog. Write it for me more than anyone.

But it’s my birthday and I get to make a request, yeah? I don’t ask for much, don’t think: world peace, some soup from time-to-time, the occasional call…

My request is this: who’s still reading? Yeah, I’ve got my stalwart group of people that comment and drop by with regularity (thanks guys) but I’m curious if it’s just them.

In my head, I imagine there’re people that never comment yet read me regardless.

So, just like last year and the time before: wish me a happy birthday and say something, all of you bastards that read me but never say anything.

Logan Lo

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Easter 2009

Location: four hours ago, my couch eating cold cereal
Mood: potentially sick
Music: I like me so much better when you’re naked

Intercontinental-Barclay Hotel

My birthday’s this weekend but I’ve got more weddings to go to. Wedding season has begun again. So Heartgirl gave me my gift early.

LOGAN’S BIRTHDAY WEEKEND SCHEDULE OF EVENTS – APRIL 11-12 2009

Saturday, April 11, 2009

10:00 – Casa Heartgirl
Breakfast by Heartgirl. I make the pancakes.
She gives me presents: a good chef’s knife and a bowl – cause it’s about time, I guess.

13:00 – Intercontinental-Barclay Hotel
Check in and have people call me, sir and Mr. Heartgirl.
Walking distance to the joint that Leona Helmsley sued me over.
Long story, I’ll tell you about it someday (maybe).

14:00 – International Centre of Photography
Get rained out so we just relax at the hotel.

18:00 – Smith & Wollensky’s
Order the fillet migion with Roquefort, she has the trout.
Dessert is a coconut cake with vanilla ice cream.
Note to self: Work out.

21:00 – Photography around Midtown East

NYC Easter Hats

Sunday, April 12, 2009

11:00 – Breakfast at the Intercontinental-Barclay Hotel
$65 for ok eggs benedict and coffee. Breakfast at Casa Heartgirl was better.

12:00 – Easter along 5th Avenue
Evidently, during Easter, people put on all sortsa funny hats and parade about on 5th Avenue.
35 years and I did not know this.

13:00 – Crash other Expensive Hotels
Heartgirl poses in front of a chocolate sculpture when a douche reaches over.
just rips a piece of it right off and stuffs it into his pocket.

14:00 – West Branch
Order the cuban sandwich with fresh chips, she has salmon and a salad.
Note to self: Really you fat bastard, work out.
You’re gonna be 36 soon.

17:00 – Church
Ask for more days like these, if at all possible.
Heartgirl catches me planning out a recipe during the sermon.

Smith & Wollensky's

Today, spent the day running around looking for coin to pay my dentist and accountant, waiting in line at the bank, and trying to straighten out some mobile issues.

Days like the past weekend help me get through the rest of them.

Intercontinental-Barclay Hotel

YASYCTAI: Plan a nice getaway, even if it’s only in your head. Hopeful is good. (60 mins/1 pt)