Author: Stacy Horn

Barbara sent these pictures of visitors to her deck. I’m more jealous about the possum. Very cute. Can they be domesticated? And get along with cats?

My Pare Down Project is complete and I own a lot less stuff. It feels great! I’ve been putting things down on the street to give away, and it always amazes me how quickly it disappears. The last thing I brought down was a box full of smaller stuff, figuring people would look through it and take what they wanted, but someone walked away with the whole box, minutes later. Greedy!

I took this the other day, on my way to the library. This was from a major fire on Greenwich Street that destroyed Village Paper, a party store that’s been there for … decades at least. I’m pretty sure I’ve been buying all my party supplies there since I moved here (1982, I think it was).

Nothing. So what is wrong with me? I bitch and moan about all the unaffordable places that continually open in my neighborhood, and yet every day I pass this place by and never stop in. Grilled cheese, soup and a salad for $6.50. Insanely affordable.

I’ve been working on a major pare down of possessions the past couple of days, and I just got rid of most of my video tapes. I decided to save an episode of Twin Peaks—I mean Northern Exposure—the one where a pregnant Shelley wakes up and she can’t talk anymore, she can only sing. At the end of the episode she sings a sad lullaby to her unborn child about how she won’t be able to talk to her, and then Holling shows up and starts singing with her. He tells her not to worry, he’ll always love her and they can sing together, in harmony. I just burst into tears the first time I saw it. It was the sweetest solution, and it was just so loving and generous.

I thought, maybe it’s on YouTube, and sure enough it was. It’s still as incredibly sweet and loving as it was back then. (And I can get rid of another possession!)

Just a couple of blocks from where I live, a building that used to be a police precinct. I never noticed. How is that possible?? That reminds me, I read that Frank Serpico lived on Perry Street. I wonder what block. Actually, which building? I know it can’t be mine because it said he had the garden apartment and the person who has the garden apartment in mine has been here since the early 60’s.

Buddy Update: He eats really well now. Here is the current (insane) system. He will eat the Friskies Prime Fillets, but only in the morning. And he’ll only finish if I sit on the floor with him while he eats. In the evening, suddenly he doesn’t like the Friskies anymore. At night he will only eat Science Diet i/d, dry food not wet. And again, he’ll eat more if I get down on the floor with him while he eats. When I think of all the trial and error that went into discovering this particular system, all the different combinations … good lord. He doesn’t seem to be gaining weight though and his diarrhea is as bad as ever.

I just ordered something called Gastriplex and L-Glutamine, because Gastriplex doesn’t have enough glutamine and that seems to be key.