Month: April 2016

One shot from yesterday’s Mistakes Were Made 2.0 event. Pictured are: Peter Sachs Collopy, media historian and Mellon Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Digital Humanities Program at the University of Southern California, the moderator Finn Brunton, Assistant Professor of Media, Culture, and Communication, and Marisa Bowe, the former managing editor or WORD, one of the first and most innovative web magazines.

It was a great event, so don’t miss it next year everyone! Marisa was the best, and I’m not just saying that because she is my friend. She was the only one who didn’t read a prepared speech. It’s not that the speeches that were prepared weren’t good, but you want someone to talk to you, and to talk at least somewhat unscripted. Plus, she’s smart and honest.

I will never forget the advice Steven Levy gave me when I first started writing. “Just be honest. Tell the truth. If you tell the truth everyone will be riveted, because almost no one does.”

I took a picture of the new litterbox in the exact same spot on my desk, but it wasn’t catching the light properly. You couldn’t see how pretty the sparkles look. This angle gives you some idea.

I’ve got just a few more things to do and then I’m done. And then it’s off to Mistakes Were Made, a conference about computer history which, “gathers emerging scholars challenging traditional technology narratives, and pairs them with creative coders, new media artists, tech innovators, and other members of computer culture’s past and present “fringe.” It’s not too late to get tickets. It starts at 1:30!! You can make it!!

And then tonight I’m going to the Loser’s Lounge, one of the best and most fun musical shows in the city. So, a pretty perfect day. Clean house, interesting presentations, great music.

I’m doing my annual Spring Cleaning about a month early this year, because I really, really, really feel like having an immaculately clean apartment. And I want flowers. (I always buy myself flowers when I’m done.)

One thing I always do during every Spring Cleaning is make Finney a fresh litterbox. The shot below shows the box before glittering. I’ve cut the hole so he can enter and exit the box. Now all that is left is to make it pretty. I will post the after shot tomorrow!

While we’re on the litterbox subject, Bleecker, who is otherwise a very smart cat, never enters the litterbox from the front, where I’ve made it easy for them to step inside. He leaps into it from the side. Sometimes, he climbs up on the shelf next to the litterbox and dives in. It’s insane. And loud. What is wrong with him??

I spent part of the morning reading interviews of Triangle Shirtwaist Fire survivors. Prepare to have your heart broken.

From survivor Mary Mary Domsky-Abrams. Why isn’t this story more known and these men lionized for losing their lives trying to save others??

A group of men made a human ladder of themselves in an attempt to make it possible for girls hunched in fear at the windows not yet on fire to cross over to the next building, to which there was a small bridge (or passage.) But all the men, about 10 of them, fell down, not being able to bear up under the weight, and were killed together with those who tried to save themselves. We were all deeply moved by the heroism and tried to kiss their bodies as they were being removed to the morgue.

This one also demolished me, to get that close to making it out alive (this also brought me back to 9/11, and Father Mychal Judge). From Josephine Nicolosi.

When we came downstairs, the firemen were not there yet but the first thing we saw were girls lying on the sidewalk. We thought they had fainted and one of my girl friends said, “Thank God we are not like them, we’re alright.” She went over to one of the girls lying on the sidewalk and bent over her and she was hit by another falling body and killed.

The survivors who needed medical attention were taken to St. Vincent’s, a hospital near me that was criminally closed down in 2010 and demolished. Doctors and nurses at St. Vincent’s also waited in vain for survivors of 9/11. I’ll never forget that, all the people who congregated there, waiting and waiting for friends and family to be brought there alive.

Across the street, in its place, is Lenox Health Greenwich Village. I went to drop off a box of insulin syringes there yesterday which they refused to accept. They were technically within their rights. If you don’t have a medical waste container you’re supposed to put them in plastic soda bottles, which are hard to puncture. I don’t drink soda so I put them in the cardboard box my paper toner came in. It was made of very thick cardboard and it was also inconceivable to think any of the syringes could puncture it. But they wouldn’t take it.

I couldn’t carry a box of syringes with me where I was going to so I had no choice but to throw them away. I don’t know what I’m going to do in the future. Thanks for nothing Lenox Health Greenwich Village. You could have been more accommodating.

I’m planning a day off for myself. I wish I had picked a day with better weather. As I type it’s getting darker and darker and darker … but I need a break today, so I will plan inside things, like a movie and a museum. A perfect day, really.

A glimpse of spring in the West Village.