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My two worlds

A Logan divided against himself

Almost exactly 30 years ago, Seinfeld had an episode called The Pool Guy, which had George increasingly upset when his fiancée, Susan, begins hanging out with Elaine and Jerry.

The reason why is that he sees himself as two distinct people:

    • Independent George – the version of himself he is around his friends
    • Relationship George – the version he is with Susan

And he’s upset that the two might possibly merge into one, exclaiming:

If Relationship George walks through this door, he will kill Independent George! A George divided against itself cannot stand!

If you’re at all interested, the scene’s below:

Now, this past month had two notable things happen.

The first one I hinted at earlier this month but now I can tell you – Scenic Fights signed its first deal with a major studio: Apple TV+.

Essentially, we had to do a long-form breakdown of the season finale of Chief of War, and we got our grubby little hands on it way before it aired but couldn’t tell anyone.

I did double-duty, both as on-screen talent and as the attorney for SF in the negotiations.

We had to drop everything to crank it out before the season finale but we’re all pretty pleased with the results.

Here’s hoping it’s the first of many.

The second thing that happened is that I was interviewed for a NY Times article as a lawyer.

I’m predominately an intellectual property attorney – which is what I lectured on both in Malaga, Spain and Paris, France before everything turned to shit.

But I did my first real estate deal with my dad back in 1986, when I was only 13 years old, I’ve run my building since at least 1997, and have done more closings than I care to admit.

Plus, I have this specialized credential of which there are only 350 of us in the entire state of New York so real estate is definitely the area of the law that I know best after intellectual property career.

And after all the stabby-stabby, slashy-slashy.

In any case, I don’t think that – in all these years – I’ve ever let you see my legal work but here’s a (tiny) bit of it – it’s a brief mention but I still think it’s cool:

Ask Real Estate: Scaffolding Has Encased My Building for Years. What Can I Do?

To end this on a humorous note, remember when I told you I went to Brooklyn last week to see Cappy?

That was because he was giving me his sons’ clothes for my kid and The Firecracker’s kid because he and his wife are just the best.

Her: That’s waaaaay too big for either boy. (looking at them) Wait, I think you could fit these.
Me: Me?! They’re clothing for teenagers.
Her: Humor me. Just try them on.
Me: Fiiiiinne. (later) OMG [the shirt and pants] fit!
Her: (laughing) You have GOT to send them a picture a picture of you wearing their kid’s clothes.
Me: I’m wearing these. I look fetch.
Her: Fetch is not a thing, Logan.
Me: (grumble)

Location: Hoboken, watching the boys swim and then walking past Alison’s old pad
Mood: conflicted
Music: I may not be perfect, but I’m perfectly unique (Spotify)
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Only when danger is far distant

Are you sure about that?

Took a knee to my eye and an elbow to my cheek the other day.

Fun times.

Her: You’re 52!
Me: I am not unaware.
Her: Are you sure about that, Logan!?

My SIL rang me up the other night because Alison’s mom was having a milestone birthday.

So, the next thing you know, the kid and I headed to her place to celebrate.

I spoke to her mom a while ago and she told me not to come for her birthday as it was too much trouble.

Me: You didn’t tell me it was [an important birthday]!
Her: I didn’t want to make a big deal.
Me: So, you wanna make me look like a jerk and not show up, lady?!
Her: (laughing) Thanks for coming.
Me: Of course!

My SIL brought some Italian cookies that I absolutely loved.

See, when I was a kid, my dad’s office was right next door to an Italian bakery.

Once in a blue moon, he’d bring home these exact cookies, and it was like the greatest day ever.

Man, I miss my dad.

Speaking of Italian things, we ended up just eating food from their local Italian joint.

I thought it was great but, evidently, I’m super easy because everyone else thought the food was only meh.

Me: I grew up super poor. This woulda been a feast for us.
Her: Well, we’re not eating the rest of it, so you can bring that home.
Me: Heck, yeah!

Speaking of when I was young, I read Machiavelli’s The Prince way back in 1996 when 2Pac released his like last album under that name (it was his only album I truly disliked).

I remembered the below quote from The Prince and was reminded of it recently what with everything going on in the news these days.

In general men are ungrateful, fickle, false, cowardly, covetous, dissimulating, hungry for profit and quick to evade danger. As long as you succeed and do them good, they are devoted to you entirely; they will offer you their blood, property, life and children… but only when danger is far distant; when danger approaches they turn against you.

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, Ch. XVII

It’s funny how universal some things about humanity are and how they transcend both time and place.

I’m truly interested – and somewhat apprehensive – about what life will be like here in the US in a decade’s time.

Location: a lobster shop, buying a lobster roll
Mood: vexed
Music: The feds surely hope that they could finally nail me (Spotify)
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Always a loser

Doesn’t really matter

One of the reasons that I liked Andor so much was because it had a clear beginning, middle, and end.

That’s such a basic thing that you’d think all published media would have, at the very least, that.

Oh man, you’d be so wrong.

Like, I absolutely loved Heroes when it first came out. Ditto for Lost back in the day.

But, somewhere along the line, they were clearly just writing to keep the money coming in and I – and a lotta other people – just lost interest.

But that’s not just with television series, that can happen in movies as well.

Clearly the Godfather and the Godfather II were excellent. But did we really need the Godfather III?

And Rocky – man, that was a perfect film. And Rocky II was pretty good. Plus, I gotta admit that didn’t hate Rocky III.

But Rocky IV turned me off and I never saw a single other sequel after that – dunno if you know, but there were eight Rocky films, total.

Not Rocky but a cool shot I took a while back.

What made Rocky perfect was that, in a nutshell, Rocky was a loser.

And it was just so real – probably because, at that time, the author and soon-to-be star, Sylvester Stallone, was also a loser at that time.

Like, the dude was so broke, he had to sell his own dog for $25 to eat.

Little wonder it was such a popular film, especially with the awkward and overweight Chinese-American crowd.

Well, one of them, at least.

Somehow, Sly managed to convince a major studio to not only buy his script but also let him be the main star in it.

But, along the way, there was a noticeable mess up that they had to fix.

See, in the final fight, Rocky wore a pair of white trunks with a red waistband and stripes down each leg.

Unfortunately, there’s a scene where Rocky sees a giant poster of himself hanging in the stadium, but he’s wearing red trunks with white stripes.

This was actually a mistake by the art department and they didn’t have the time (or money) to redo the poster. Yet this was an important bit of scenery that was needed.

What to do?

Well, all they did was to have Rocky stare at the poster and mention to the promoter, before the fight, Rocky says that the trunks are the wrong color, and the promoter says, “It doesn’t really matter, does it?”

Because Rocky was a loser and he literally just had to show up and get the stuffing beat outta him.

So, what was a pretty glaring mistake ended up pushing the point that Rocky was insignificant in every aspect.

Except he wasn’t.

Just a random story for a random night.

Him: I can’t do anything right.
Me: Don’t say that.
Him: Why not?
Me: Because when you say things, you give them life, even if they’re not true. You are what you say you are. 

Location: A bar in Brooklyn this late morning
Mood: ick
Music: wrapping up his hand, he’s getting ready for the showdown (Spotify)
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Train (still) on time

Mentally mapping trains

Her: Before I buy more KFC can you check the freezer to see if we already have KFC?
Me: Check the freezer?! Baby, all we’re doing is adding to our current KFC stash if there’s *already* KFC in the freezer. That’s like saying, “Hey, before I make more money, check the bank to see if we have money in the bank already.” Do you hear how that sounds?
Her: Someone’s hangry right now.
Me: Clearly!

The kids are both back for school to start next week. While they’re growing up quickly, we’re still not ready to let either of them take the trains by themselves yet.

This is despite the Firecracker’s kid being just obsessed with trains.

Trains and the subway show up a lot in this blog – even way in the beginning – because that’s my main means of transportation, which is kinda strange if you think about it.

I suppose most of you travel by car and such but that’s a luxury here in the city.

When the Firecracker and I went to Vienna, we didn’t think twice about taking the trains.

And years ago – before this blog, if you can believe it – I went to visit Prague and Berlin and had to get someplace off the train line.

Asked a local where the nearest station was and he said we should take a cab instead because their subway system was so complex.

I remember laughing and saying, “I’m from NYC, I think I’ll be ok.”

And I was.

Same with Vienna and every other major city I’ve ever been to.

Essentially, if you can make it around the NYC subway system, any other system on the planet is a cinch, language issues notwithstanding.

Interestingly, I read this article which said that “city transportation maps with over 250 connections are too complex for most people to navigate. In fact, a staggering 80% of trips in New York already exceed this cognitive limit.”

Meaning that just being able to take the NYC subway system puts you in the elite of cognition as it relates to mental mapping.

In some ways, that’s part of why I wanna raise the kid in the city versus elsewhere – because he’s constantly being tested and pushed in ways that he doesn’t even realize.

Well, that plus the fact that I can readily get all sortsa fried fowl, even in the midst of a pandemic.

Hangry…

Location: by a pool in Central Islip
Mood:
Music: oh my, the train is gone (Spotify)
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Nuthin like it was for someone else

You pay to be left alone

Her: Hey, are you free to join some work colleagues for dinner?
Me: Sure – where and when?

The Firecracker had a fancy work dinner to attend, so I gave her some suggestions, including the really nice restaurant that I took her to on our first proper dinner date years ago.

She booked a reservation but then one person couldn’t make it, so I showed up in his stead.

It’s funny because someone mentioned on the Firecracker’s social media why we would want to eat in an empty restaurant, and we talked about that exact topic that night.

Me: (to the guests) The thing about living in NYC is that when you pay a ridiculous amount of money in a restaurant for food, you’re really paying for people to not be on top of you.
Firecracker: Yeah, most places are crowded and loud. You pay for space and quiet.

In any case, I got my usual burger…

…and a drink.

Afterward, I gave some of them – who were in town visiting – a tour of the St. Marks area.

Along the way, we walked by some old haunts of mine, including:

Spent most nights there with my friends Francis and Rain but that’s a story for another day.

We ended up at Criff Dogs…

…and Please Don’t Tell, the speakeasy that we didn’t make it into last time and actually made it in this time.

I may or may not have ordered some hot dogs.

Firecracker: I swear to god, he has a wooden leg.
Me: I’m a growing boy.

Afterwards, we all went our respective ways but I actually, sent Rain a shot of Cafe Orlin/Marlou Bistro…

…and his response was typically him.

Without telling his story, I think part of the reason he left New York was that the New York that he loved left him.

I think that’s why a lotta people leave this place.

There’s almost nuthin left of the New York City that I once knew.

But that’s ok for me.

Because I gotta figure that the New York City that I knew is nuthin like it was for someone else who came before me.

And it’s time for someone else to have their New York City.

Me: I miss the kid.
Her: He’ll be back this weekend.
Me: (nodding)

Location: 10AM, shooting a shirtless video for Scenic Fights and then eating $58 worth of carbs immediately afterward
Mood: so. so. so. so. full.
Music: In New York, you can be a new man (Spotify)
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Being special is the inverse of being happy

I want him happy

Me: Do you want me to wait with you?
Him: No, it’s ok, papa. I’m fine. I’ll just get on the bus and meet some people.

Woke up bright and early the other day to bring my kid to middle-of-nowhere Brooklyn where he caught a bus to another state for his first sleepaway camp.

He was fine. I was a mess.

It’s a special camp for kids that have lost an immediate family member – mother, father, brother, sister, etc.

An old and dear friend of mine told me about it, whose name is – fittingly – Heal.

She’s actually on the board of the group because she too lost a close family member as a child, so she walked me through the process of applying.

Well, he made it in and is currently living his absolute best life, at least based on all the pictures I’ve been seeing.

It’s a special camp for special kids, which makes sense, because my son is special.

Certainly, he’s special to me, but that’s not what I’m talking about.

    • He could read at 18 months.
    • He plays the guitar like a teenager.
    • He just beat me in poker (granted, a well-trained poodle could probably beat me in poker but just put a pin on that for now).

He’s also the kid that doesn’t have a mother.

That is the thing that – unfortunately – makes him special in a way that no one wants.

When I was a kid, I aspired to be special.

I was/am the middle child and probably the biggest nobody until I was in college.

But it was over a college summer working in at some office that I realized that there seemed to be an inverse relationship between the special and the happy.

The happy people were the middle-management nobodies that deeply loved their spouses and kids, and their innocuous little hobbies.

Conversely, the special people were either always trying to convince people that they were still special or – probably much worse – convince themselves that they were still special.

The special people were rarely happy.

And the happy people were rarely special.

Seeing my kid blissfully unaware that he’s at all special, but for the fact he only has a dad, means that he’s also blissfully happy.

But he’s been noticing that he’s special lately, because he’s the only one of all his peers with only one living parent.

It was because of this that I sent him to this camp – so he would know he wasn’t alone in the world.

If I had to pick one, special or happy, I would pick happy every day and twice on Sunday.

God, I just want him to be safe and happy.

He’s such a good little kid.

I’d pay any amount right now, if I could know that, long after I’m gone, that he’s safe and happy.

And I’d trade all he could possibly be – brilliant, famous, wealthy, respected, everything – for him to just be that.

Me: Alright, please be careful, ok?
Him: (nodding) I will. Don’t worry. See you next week.

Location: 7AM, the gym, trying to wake up
Mood: pacing
Music: I’m ready to show that I’m no ordinary (Spotify)
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What is home if not the people that call it that?

Never having a home

Speaking of home, movies like the Warriors – which is based on a true story that happened almost 3,000 years ago – can be countlessly retold because the themes of longing, home, and survival are universal.

Hold that thought.

While I enjoy the modern takes on the Incredible Hulk – particularly the 2008 Ed Norton reboot – for someone that grew up with the 1978 television series, The Incredible Hulk, it’s very different.

Not just in terms of technology, production values, and the like, but the thrust of the show itself.

Essentially, the modern movies make stories about a god-like/monster-like hero, the television show was mainly about the other part of the Hulk, Dr. Banner.

There, Banner is shown as a drifter, and I thought that the show was the story of a man with a mindless monster inside of him.

As I got older, I got wiser and thought it was the story of a man searching for a home with a monster inside of him.

But this was wrong also, I realized.

It was the story of man that can never have a home, ever. He must always be on the run and can never relax or settle down.

Not my copyright, obvs.

Because the moment he finds someone to create a home with, that person will forever be in danger of the monster inside him.

So, he can’t have any relationships – no friends, no lovers, no children, no one.

Which is why the ending scene was always of Banner walking alone, to nowhere, with nothing but the clothes on his back and a duffle bag.

Banner can never go home because he can never have a home. He will never have a home.

So, there’s no home to find.

Because what is home if not the people that call it that along with you?

And he has no one to call it that with him.

It’s such a tragic story and can probably explain how a primetime television series about a big, green, comic book character in the 70s lasted five years.

In any case, just a random thought.

Think I’m finally starting to understand the world a bit.

Which isn’t necessarily a good thing.

Oh, by the way, my son’s home.

Him: I’m home!
Me: (laughing) Yes you are!

Location: NJ, getting my treasure
Mood: steamy
Music: There’s a monster in me who shut down (Spotify)
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Tent or Cave?

Troglodyte

Me: I think all housing is either a tent or a cave. Like a modern home is a modern tent and a modern apartment is just a modern cave.
Firecracker: What would you call a stone house then?
Me: That’s still a cave. It’s like when you say all foods are soups or sandwiches, although I think that there’s a third category of salads.
Her: (shaking head) No those are soups. But I think there are a lot more things than tents and caves.
Me: Disagree on both points!

For years, I lived in my parents’ basement and then lived in my own basement for a while.

Told someone once that I was an actual troglodyte – which is someone that lives in a cave – in that an apartment is essentially a modern cave.

She disagreed as well.

But really, people have been living in caves since the dawn of time and things don’t really change, we just get used to things.

Like I live in a cave in the middle of Manhattan.

There are worse places to be.

The kid’s coming back this week and I’m super excited. There was a long time where I thought that home was wherever Alison was.

Suppose that’s a major reason I become unmoored after she died. I lost my sense of self.

But I’ve gotten better all these years because home is where the kid is now.

And the Firecracker and her son round out what home now means to me.

In fact, the Firecracker and I talk a lot about maybe getting a trailer and a car and traveling across the country when the kids go off to college.

Someday, maybe.

Until then, think I’ll make the kid some pancakes when he comes back for brekkie in our little cave we call home.

Me: You’re back in two days!
Him: I know! I can’t wait.
Me: Me neither, kiddo. Me neither.

Location: almost home
Mood: hot, hot, hot, hot
Music: don’t matter where we go, we always find our way back home (Spotify)
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The 8th Category

Poop Cruise!

We did binge Andor – which you should really do as well, honestly excellent writing – but we also saw Poop Cruise.

Now, if you were ever hesitant to go on a cruise, I would strongly recommend that you not watch it.

But it was pretty compelling, and we both found ourselves – probably because we were killing an entire bottle of wine between the two of us – randomly yelling out, Poop Cruise! for no real reason.

Me: Can I pay you a compliment?
Her: Sure!
Me: I always waaay overestimate how much time something will take when you help me out.

One of the reasons we could watch both was that we massively upgraded the home network.

One of the first things that Buckley did when he moved into the pad with me over a quarter-of-a-century ago was hardwire the whole pad for ethernet.

At the time, the fastest speed was gigabit, or 1,000 megabits per second (Mbps), which you could only get with Cat5e, the fastest commercially available ethernet cable at the time.

Regular Cat5 could do something called “Fast Ethernet,” which is about 100 Mbps.

We wired the pad with a combo of the two – with a couplea branches using Cat4 – never dreaming we’d ever need gigabit speeds or greater.

This is roughly what my room looked like 24 years ago – I saw 9/11 unfold sitting on that bed, watching that TV.

Then, during COVID, I decided to rip out all the Cat5 and Cat4 and just do Cat5e everywhere.

Well, we had a lightning strike here about a month ago that dropped us from roughly 500 Mbps to 80 Mbps, which was just awful (it’s less than 1/10th a gigabit)

So, this past weekend, the Firecracker and I both tore out every single centimeter of cable that Buckley and I laid out 25+ years ago and replaced it with 90% Cat8 cable, which has a theoretical maximum speed of 40,000 Mbps (!!!!).

AND because the Firecracker’s just so damn organized and focused, what we thought was gonna take the whole day, we were able to bang out in just four hours.

Afterwards, I tested everything and was pleasantly surprised at the results: While the cabling can handle up to 40,000 Mbps, with our current routers, we topped out at “only” 113 MB/s, which is just under a gigabit at 904 Mbps.

This is compared to the 80 Mbps that we were working with the past month.

Honestly, this was the best possible outcome since we were approaching theoretical limits on the current hardware we had.

This is roughly what it looked like 15 years ago when Alison was here and kept it tidy.

Because we finished so quickly, we also decided to clean out TWO closets, and managed to replace the hoses on the washer/dryer as well (you’re supposed to change your washer hoses every five years, so if you’ve not done that, you should).

In return for her help, I picked up some Xi’an Famous Food, from around the way – it just opened up less than a year ago and I’d been to the more famous one in Flushing and wanted to try it out.

The food was absolutely killer, and it was a great way to close out the day.

Me: Hey, thanks so much for all the help today.
Her: For you? Anytime.

Location: the gym, taking an elbow to my hose
Mood: ache-y
Music: got sunshine even on a cloudy day (Spotify)
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Tribute

Its name is *not* “Bear”

Him: What is it, papa?
Me: You tell me.
Him: It’s a bear! A little bear.
Me: Actually…


A song I’ve always enjoyed was Tribute by Tenacious D.

If you don’t know the conceit of the song, essentially the lyrics tell a story about the band meeting a demon that demands that the two play the best song in the world—or risk losing their souls.

So, Tenacious D improvises a tune that is so good that – miraculously – the demon’s defeated.

Unfortunately, however, they later forget how it went, leaving only a pale shadow memory of that legendary performance, which they call Tribute as it’s merely a tribute to a much better song.

Now, did you know that the word “bear” isn’t the word for the animal?

The animals we call “bears,” were such a horror to Europeans, they would never say the actual name of the animal, only calling it names like “The Honey Eater,” “The Destroyer,” or – and I love this – “The Brown One,” or…”Bear.”

And guess what they never wrote down?

The actual name of the animal they called, “The Brown One,” out of fear that it would be summoned when it heard its name.

So, when you call something a “bear,” you’re not actually calling it the name that those people who coined the word actually called the animal, you’re calling it the codeword of that name.

It’s a tribute to the actual name of the animal.

My point is that there are so many things that we think we know that aren’t actually what we think they are, like penguins and bananas.

Her: Your son was really nice to my daughter, tell him thanks. You and your wife are doing a great job raising him.
Me: Oh, that…she’s my fiance. My wife died not soon after he was born.
Her: (shocked) Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I…
Me: (interrupting) It’s ok. We don’t need to dwell on it.

I think I’m doing an ok job raising the kid mainly on my own, with help from my family, Alison’s family, and the Firecracker.

But, in the end, how I’m able to raise him is all just a tribute to the life he coulda had if things were different and Alison and my dad were still here.

It’s not the actual life I wanted for him but – if he’s a good, happy, and healthy kid – I think it’ll be good enough.

Well, that’s the hope, anywho.

His life is my tribute to her and my dad.

So, here’s hoping it’s an amazing one.

Location: my kitchen, quickly cooking dinner so I can get back to work
Mood: like college-finals-level busy
Music: You gotta believe it – and I wish you were there! (Spotify)
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