I’m Amanda. I’ve got wide eyes, a smart mouth, and a MetroCard. And I’m not afraid to use them.
Some of the most interesting comments I receive are about teaching in NYC. Longtime readers (or people who’ve read the About page) know that I started blogging to chronicle my first two years as a middle school teacher in Harlem.
Those first two years turned out to be my last two years.
It was an experience I don’t regret, but it showed me that I didn’t want to stay in the education field for myriad reasons.
I remember the first time I shopped at H&M on a trip to NYC. The chain doesn’t exist in Texas, so when I wore my new, affordable duds, everyone asked where I got them.
And you know what I said?
I said they were from Sweden.
Project MAMM marches on, though the last few weeks have been difficult for Mike and me to coordinate due to scheduling and laziness and the love child of them both - procrastination.
And you know who’s been the bigger advocate of the program? I don’t want to say I’m the more committed member of the team or anything, but yeah. I’m Tiger-Woods-in-a-sex-addiction-treatment-center committed.
Minus the disappointed, ass-kicking wife.
Actually, I’m also my own disappointed, ass-kicking wife.
A piece I wrote called “The Accidental Chubby Chaser” is in this week’s NY Press.
Here’s an excerpt:
A few dates into what would become our relationship, I determined that the look John gave me was a sort of hungry admiration. Not that he ever let himself get too hungry. The guy had never met a cheese plate he didn’t like.
You know how people sometimes like to sleep where George Washington slept?
Or eat where Al Capone liked to eat?
Or see a movie where Pee-wee Herman busted a nut?
Well, I don’t have access to those famous spots, but uh, I have a catsitting gig for a few weeks. I’m subletting my apartment while I’m in another neighborhood Will and Grace-ing it up with a good friend. (I’ve lived alone for almost four years now, and I’m really excited to have a temporary housemate).
The apartment is a one-bedroom near Central Park North. I can sublet it on a daily, weekend, or weekly basis from March 8 to March 26 for $150 per day. This is way nicer than a hotel room and more affordable.
Last time I blogged about the universe farting in my face, commenter extraordinaire Sherri mentioned that I was begging for more. I mean, she’s read The Secret. I just read some blog posts by people who read it and then made fun of them, you know?
I’m not the informed person here.
Well, guess what? The cosmic force that propels The Secret - a coalition of goddesses or Allah or Bill Cosby or something - is real.
The Northeast has been pounded by snow in the last few days. NYC is no exception, though it hasn’t endured power outages or NBA-sized snowdrifts or anything.
Not like New Hampshire or Vermont or those other places that currently look like white blobs from space. Now those are hairy-chested states that can open beer bottles with their teeth!
Recently, I tried to recall the last time I didn’t have trouble sleeping.
I’ve always needed less sleep than other people, yes. But I mean, when was the last time I was able to get in bed and turn my brain off enough to sleep soundly?
It was June.
Now it’s February.
There’s this other thing that happened, too - something with a time frame I have an even harder time figuring out.
At some point, I started finding it hard to maintain this blog.
1) Woke up at 7:30 to neighbors having loud, unsexy relations. The bed bouncing; the woman shrieking. The man makes no noise, though I assume he’s partly responsible for the skidding of the mattress into the wall, the bedside table or something else crashing and grinding into the floor.
As oxymoronic as this may sound, the woman’s shriek is a passionless shriek. It’s a metronome, a baby doll’s programmed squawking while its eyes flutter open and shut.
The shrieking is her little way of saying “I’m retarded and very excited about something.” Or maybe “I’m not dead yet.” God, how it sounds like her partner is trying to remedy that.
I was tired after going to bed just a few hours earlier, but not too tired to bring my Bose SoundDock into the bedroom from the living room. They annoyed the folk out of me. I played Ani DiFranco full-blast for almost two hours.
Saturday was Annie’s first birthday. My mom served her a ribeye steak to celebrate.
