the chommo chronicles

.morning musings.

I’m what you might would call a “morning person” – not in the sense that I am all chipper in the morning and want to run around and hug the world (sohelpyouGod if you want to talk to me before 8AM), but rather in the sense that I like to get up early, take care of my running/coffee/make-up/wardrobe/packing business at a leisurely pace, and ease myself into this cruel, cruel world by dint of silent, contemplative preparation and the dulcet tones of British white-girl soul singers. But some mornings, man, some mornings try the limited patience that I have for dealing with the fuckery of this world.

.bloggus interruptus.

Wait – does it sound at all like I know anything about Latin? I don’t. Surely the fact that my darling friend La Doctora – and her two sisters (it was a total family domination over dead languages up in Connecticut) – all won the Latin prize in high school counts for something, right? But don’t cry for me Argentina: I won the history prize. True, I tripped going up the podium to collect my prize and my hair was colored a shade of red I like to call Ronald McDonald red, but I was a freaking winner too, damn it

Anyhoodle, this past week my government job* had me on the road to Madrid, which sounds exciting and all until you realize that on these types of trips I work from 8am to midnight with barely enough time to sneak in jet-lag combating power naps during the day. Meetings, meetings, meetings all day – meetings in 4-inch heels, because even though they hurt my feet and appear to be wholly unnecessary to conduct human rights business in Spain, they make me feel like a professional rather than a moppy-headed imposter. It's the Dominican in me. Meetings over two-hour lunches, meetings over three hour dinners, conference calls with the office back home and partners in other cities, countries, continents, disturbed sleep patterns, and barely enough time to:

• viciously lust after beautiful Spanish fashions;

• ponder the popularity of the lady-mullet amongst the Madrileñas;

• convince myself croquetas de jamon are a perfectly healthy way to start every meal;

• remember how much I hate the full-fat and/or long-life milk everyone puts in the coffee;

• feel guilty about missing my training runs (jet-lag makes my body hurt and feel like it weights a ton and produces instantaneous shin splints, okay?);

• remark on the forgotten sensation of sitting in an indoor restaurant or bar where smoking is still allowed; or

• furiously finish my book club’s monthly selection (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – I recommend it, even though I’m still slightly traumatize

Above all, I didn’t  have time to write. But, si Dios quiere, regular posting will resume  as of now.

Well, not right now-right now, since at the time I am writing this I am heading dome on a jittery plane over the Atlantic, reminded once again that turbulence is the work of the devil and that I hate to fly. At least I’m up in Business/First class – awwwww yeah beeches! Complimentary upgrades from my travel agent, that’s what I’m talking about! – but you know what?

I’m not being treated right. It’s like the stewardesses think I’m an impostor, even though I’ve racked up well over 300,000 frequent flier miles on Delta.

True, I am wearing a long black t-shirt embroidered with a white sequined owl. And yes, My hair does look make me look like an electrocuted lion. And, okay, I did get on the plane with about 6 different trashy British celebrity magazines.

But damn, Gina! Read the boarding pass:  seat 2A. One-two-aye. That means I’m at the front of the plane. That means I’m one of the fancy people, if only through a mixture of an incredible stroke of luck and relentless kiss-assery to my corporate travel agent. So, you know, when you offer me – nay promise me! – warm nuts (heh – warm nuts), how’s about you deliver on the promise, huh? How’s about you don’t conveniently forget about me and give everyone else but me some warm nuts? And how’s about you clear my table first, and not last?

Also, ew. I think the old man sitting in front of me just farted in my general direction. People who fart in other people’s general directions should be barred from the fancy seats. 

See you soon.

*Again, by "government job," I don't mean an actual job with the government - just my real life job, he one that pays into my social security benefits and keeps me in bubble gum, comic books, baseballs cards and $30 tubes of mascara.

© Chommo, 2009.




*Again, not an actual job with the government, just my day job – the one that keeps me in bubblegum, baseball cards, and expensive mascara, not to mention Uncle Sam’s good graces.

.friday fotos.

What? Is that you I hear muttering that it's actually Monday and not Friday, so why I am deliberately misleading you with the post's title? Well, I'm sorry. I had a busy, busy, busy end of week/weekend, what with the recuperating from a brutal session with the nice-on-the-outside, evil-eevil taskmaster-on-the-inside personal trainer, the planning for a business trip to Madrid, the nerves at having my hair cut by a non-Dominican for only the second time in my life, the getting ready for my niece's Sweet Sixteen and the subsequent dancing all night long in 4-inch heels even though I swore we were through, the running of eight horrendous, horrendous miles as part of my half-marathon training schedule, and the eventual collapse before the Emmy Awards telecast. [Don't worry, you'll be hearing more about all these things in the future.]

So, only a few days late, I present to you this week's (last week's?) installment of Friday Fotos. This time around, nothing fancy - shots captured with my Blackberry Curve, modifed with the lovely Picasa. Do forgive my tardy(ness) to the party(ness).

.confounded.

I an confounded by a lot of things and spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about them. If you ever see me walking around with a completely blank look on my face (which I do 99% of the time, much to my husband’s irritated dismay), it’s probably because I am contemplating fielder’s choice plays in baseball, black holes, and why middle-aged women get tattoos right on their upper titty area. (That, or I’m fantasizing about eating a big plate of french fries.)

Thanks to the wonder that is Pandora, I’ve spent most of the day contemplating that sub-genre of R&B songs where two people in love with each other, but they can’t be together, even though they love each other so much that they're singing about their love for all the world to hear?

Do you know what I’m talking about?

.bye bye summer.

Summer doesn’t formally end for another five days, but there are signs aplenty that autumn is already upon us – stuffed backpacks on crowded subways, daily countdowns to the MLB playoffs, a sleepy sun that wakes up a little later each day, sartorially dissonant ladies with jackets and scarves on top and pedicured, be-thonged toes on the bottom. Pretty soon the leaves will start to change color, the jackets will get heavier, and the interminable wait for spring training will begin anew. I can’t say that I mind much – an astrological Libra through and through, I live for the briskly temperamental in-between seasons of autumn and spring. Summer makes me sweat and expose more of my raw chicken-colored skin* to the world than I care to and winter gifts me with perpetual hat hair and ashy, dry skin. 

Still, summer in NYC does bring with it some magical moments: street fairs, zeppoles, outdoor concerts, piraguas and Italian icies, Macy's 4th of July fireworks, the orgasmic moment of getting on a chilly subway car after idling for 30 minutes on the 34th street station platform.

But nothing in the New York summertime is quite as magical  – baroque - fascinating – as the Coney Island boardwalk.

.a local request.

The bodega across the street from my house will provide you with all your daily necessities : a wide variety of Jarritos sodas, organic low-fat chocolate milk and aloe vera juice;  calling cards shaped like big Latin booties, french fries, plantains, and mariachi hats; starchy starchy cereals; aluminum food containers in all shapes and sizes;   Fabuloso and Mistolin floor cleaners; an impressive array of feminine hygeine products; tomatoes, avocados, potatoes, yucca, onions; Bustelo coffee; confectioner's sugar;  homemade Dominican cake; Aunt Jemima's pancake mix; ghetto wannabe Froz-Fruit icies; and chile and lime covered Mexican-style peanuts.

They just ask one thing - one teeny-tiny thing - in exchange:

Thank you. They really appreciate it. 

.self-inflicted torture.

At some point in July, I decided I would train for and run a half-marathon before the end of this year. Let me tell you some facts about myself that have been immutable since puberty knocked me on my ass in the late 1980s/early 1990s: I have problematic hair, I am a bit of a chubster, and I am very well-developed in the boobular area (very). For a very long time, these last two traits made me never, ever want to take up the “sport”* of running. And yet there I found myself, looking up Hal Higdon’s half-marathon training schedule, and deciding I had it in me to run 13.1 miles.

Holy isht. What have I gotten myself into? Why? Why, sweet Jeebus, why?

.vee-vah-poh-roo.

The past week chez Chommo and Kim Jong-Illmatic has been full of nothing but sore throats, snot-filled noses, achy limbs, congested heads, half-days at work and prayers to various deities that we had not contracted the swine flu. Thank Jeebus, we are already on the mend and appear to have escaped Porky Pig’s revenge.

Still, it was a pretty miserable week at our Brooklyn pad, and not just because all the cold medicine I was taken made me mistake the Manhattan Bridge for the Brooklyn Bridge. When I’m sick, I like nothing more than to be left alone, a self-contained bundle of misery snuggled up in bed with my comforter and a trashy historical romance novel (they cure all ills); Kim Jong-Illmatic, on the other hand, likes to be doted on, catered to, taken care of, blahblahblah treated like a precious wittle baby. It’s never good when we get together at the same time, since all we do is get irritated at each other and wish out loud that we had a second bedroom because goddamn are you loud and annoying and I don’t want to share a bed with you and could you please stop sniffling and touching me and I think it’s your turn to go sleep on the couch. Yeah, fun times.

But in the midst of all the cold-induced misery, there was a bright, shining, in-the-same-category-as-unicorns-rainbows-and-YSL-faux-cils-mascara gold-silver lining: my discovery of Puffs Plus tissues with Vicks®.

YOU GUYS!  OH.EM.GEE.

.friday fotos.

Surely there exist 10 million cliché photos of the same thing, but the Brooklyn Bridge never fails to amaze and enthrall this born-and-bred NYC girl with its urban grace and beauty.

(this shot taken with my trusty Blackberry Curve as we were speeding up the FDR in our weekend getaway car)

EDITED: YES, I KNOW REALIZE THAT THIS IS THE MANHATTAN BRIDGE . THANKS, BABY BRO (EL PAPO) FOR POINTING THIS OUT (I HAD REALIZED THIS EARLIER IN THE DAY). I PLACE THE BLAME SQUARELY ON ALL THE SUDAFED I'VE BEEN TAKING THIS WEEK. THAT, AND MY PROPENSITY TO WRITE/POST BLOGS THE MINUTE I WAKE UP. PLEASE DON'T REVOKE MY NY CARD. YOU KNOW THIS IS THE NICEST PICTURE OF THE MANHATTAN BRIDGE YOU'VE EVER SEEN ANYWAYZE.

And because today we awoke to gloomy and broody half-summer/half-autumn skies, and because I love you, here's a shot of equally broody and gloomy skies above Woodstock, NY.

(this shot taken my new favorite toy, the Fuji Instax 200 camera)

Happy Friday, peoples!

© Chommo, 2009.

.subway rules.

One of the best things about living in NYC is having access to a 24-hour public transportation system. Sure, the stations are dirty and smell like urine more often than not, and a sudden torrential downpour can shut down the entire B/Q line for the rest of the day, and you are often thrust into too-close contact with public masturbators and deodorant-haters. Still, there’s something to be said for being able to getting anywhere you want at any time of the day for the low-low price of $2.25. Believe me: I’ve taken the Noctilien bus in Paris.

But man oh man. There are some days – days like today, when all the kids who were mercifully absent from my commute for the last two months were heading, very loudly, into their first day of school, when I was all congested, scratchy-throated and drippy-nosed with a cold that I am praying to Santa Barbara and San Miguel is not the swine flu (pleasepleasepleasepleaseohplease) – when my fellow subway-riders get on my last damned nerve and I spend my entire commute rolled up into a hot ball of please-don't-touch-me commuter rage.

Really, the world would be a better place if people just followed my subway rules.