A Movie Night In New York City Looks Like This

I really, really hate sad books. And movies. So imagine my surprise about a year ago when I found myself reading - and loving - The Fault In Our Stars.

When I heard it was going to be made into a movie, nothing would do but that I see it. And last night I did. I met a friend for dinner, and after a quick trip to Dylan's Candy Bar for snacks, we headed next door to a tiny movie theater that was like a time warp back to the 80s, save for the electronic paper towel dispensers in the bathrooms.

I loved the movie so much that even the mouse that ran across the theater floor at one point didn't distract from the magic (although the shrieks of the group of the 13 year old girls sitting in front of us almost did).

When I left the theater I was a bit of a soggy mess, but in a cathartic, these tears feel really good way. If you haven't read the book or seen the movie, I suggest you go read it and see it, right away. Don't let the sadness deter you. It's a beautiful romance in print and on-screen, and definitely one not to be missed.

Because, bulk candy bins

Old school theater

Awards, Awards, Awards

As most of you know, I am in the middle of a blogging challenge called NaBloPoMo, or, National Blog Posting month, where I blog every day of the month of November, or for thirty days straight. It's a little tricky, but also a lot of fun.

One of the best parts has been reading posts from bloggers I wasn't entirely familiar with before this month began. I have Yeah Write and its massive NaBloPoMo grid to thank for that.

Recently, I have been the recipient of two awards from bloggers I have met recently. I got the Liebster Award from the lovely Michelle DeLorge at Scattered Wrecks, and I got the Sunshine Award from the incomparable Jake at Jake vs. The City.

The rules for the awards are similar. I write eleven random facts about myself, answer eleven questions posed to me by the giver of the award, and bestow these awards on some other bloggers of my choice. As I have been the recipient of The Liebster before, I have already divulged some little known facts about myself here, but who couldn't use a few more?

Here they are, in no random order:

1. I can't remember the last time I slept through the night. I sleep pretty well, but I wake up at least once in the middle of the night, every single night.
   
2. You all know I love romance novels, but did you know that I love post-9/11 spy novels too?
   
3. And YA novels about dystopian futures? I just finished the first book in the Divergent trilogy, and am re-reading The Hunger Games trilogy too.
   
4. I saw all 8 Harry Potter movies at midnight on the night they came out.
   
5. And also both Sex and the City movies.
   
6. I keep a handwritten red notebook filled with recipes. Not everything should be done online.
   
7. I love to cook but I rarely use cookbooks, relying instead on the aforementioned red notebook.
   
8. This year is the very first Thanksgiving in my entire life that I am not going to be with my parents. I'll be at my in-law's house for an epic Thanksgivukah (Thanksgiving + Chanukah) celebration, in honor of the last time Thanksgiving and Chanukah will overlap for more than 70,000 years.
   
9. I get a weekly manicure. It's one of my biggest indulgences, but I never feel completely put together without one.
   
10. In my house, when it snows we get to have special snow day treats. Think: doughnuts, cookies, grilled cheese, hot cocoa. It's a tradition held over from when my sisters and I were little, and I want to maintain it forever.
    
11. Sometimes I imagine what life would be like if I had a brother, and I can't ever get that picture in my head. sisters are the best.

And here are my answers to Michelle's questions. She asked us to pick our favorite movies in 11 different genres:

1. Drama - A League of Their Own
2. Comedy - It's a tie...Crazy, Stupid, Love and Pitch Perfect
3. Romantic Comedy - You've Got Mail
4. Romantic Drama - The American President
5. Epic - Apollo 13
6. Animated - Toy Story, the original
7. Biopic - The Social Network. Weird, I know, but I can't help but watch it every time it's on.
8. Historical - Does Pearl Harbor count? Because I really, really love that movie. 
9. Sci-Fi - Is Harry Potter sci-fi? Because, magic. I say it does.
10. Foreign - I just can't with foreign films. This might make me uncultured. I'm not so sure I care.
11. Mystery - The Life of David Gale

And here are my answers to Jake's:

1. If you were an animal, what would it be? - A leopard, because I like the spots
   
2. What is your favorite book and why? - This one is hard, because I have so many favorites, depending on the genre and what I'm in the mood for. But I think my all time, never goes out of style favorite is Just As Long As We're Together, by Judy Blume
   
3. If you could have 1 superhero power, what would it be? - To fly
   
4. What's your favorite color? - Purple
   
5. What strange thing do you do when you get ready in the morning? - Follow a routine that never, ever varies. If it does, I imagine all kinds of bad things that will befall me during the day.
   
6. What's your favorite movie? - I have lots of favorites, see above. But my all time most favorite is definitely The American President.
   
7. If you could go one place in the world, where would it be? - Italy
   
8. Harry, Ron, or Hermione? - Hermione. Smart, cool, and a really good friend
   
9. iPhone or Droid? - Droid all the way
   
10. Staying in and watching a movie, or going out to a movie theatre? - Staying in, I'm a homebody.
    
11. Why did you start blogging? - Mostly because I had a lot to say, and I was tired of keeping it all in.

Thank you so much Michelle and Jake...Stay tuned for my nominees!

Date Night

Note to Self: There Is No Such Thing As a Quick Trip to Home Depot

When I get home at night, I really never know quite what I might find. Last night when I walked in the door, the first order of business, as it always is, was to head upstairs to change my clothes. I walked into my room to find that David had replaced our pillow cases with these:

We had a good laugh, and since I was in such a good mood, when David suggested a trip to Home Depot I agreed to go along for the ride. Now, ordinarily I hate that store with the fiery heat of a thousand suns, but our shower has been draining at a glacial pace and we really needed some unclogging materials. It was a nice night, and since I figured we would only be stopping in the plumbing aisle, the trip would be a quick one.

We got to the store and, since we had done some research on what exactly we needed, the plumbing necessities were dispatched with quickly. As I turned to head to the check-out, David asked me where I was going, at which point I said something along the lines of:

"Home. Dinner. Modern Family. American Idol Hometown Visits. Whatever gets me out of this dusty home-improvement hellhole fastest."

And then he said the words I fear the most every time I reluctantly step through those garish orange framed doors.

"I just need a few more things. It won't take long."

"What kinds of things?" I asked, curling my hands into fists by my side so I didn't punch anything.

"Tools."

Excellent.

It's my own fault, really. I could have stayed home while my power tool-loving man strolled the aisles, basking in the glow of his handy man's heaven. But since I decided to go along for the ride, I had to wait while he chose hammers:

Consulted on drills:

Tested the drills:

And selected a drill to join the other two drills we already have at home:

But this drill is different. Really, it is.

We also had to stroll by circular saws and wrenches, but by that point I was already delirious and probably having an asthma attack from the dusty air so I couldn't capture those aisles for posterity.

Say it with me. There is no such thing as a quick trip to Home Depot. Ever.

I'll be staying home next time, thank you very much.

The Robot In My Living Room: A Follow-Up

There was an overwhelming response to my post Friday where I wrote about the surprise waiting for me when I walked into my house last Thursday night in the form of David sitting on the floor surrounded by tools, building a life-sized robot. Turns out, people think a robot in the living room is pretty cool, if that robot happens to be R2-D2.

Well, there is a bit more to the story.

All week last week small packages were arriving at the house addressed to David. This is not too terribly unusual, and I did with them what I usually do when the packages are addressed to him. I stack them up by the door, and forget that they exist.

It was a little strange that, when I left for work on Thursday, the packages were still sitting in the foyer, unopened, but ok, I thought.

Well.

Turns out that most of the robot's parts were delivered to David's downtown office, and it was there that he did the bulk of the assembly. Thursday afternoon when he left the office he brought R2 along. As he was loading his new friend into the car, it seems a bit of a crowd gathered to take pictures and ask all sorts of questions about why in the world a normal looking guy would be toting an extremely realistic model of one of Star Wars' most beloved characters on a very regular Thursday afternoon. Wanting to give them a bit of a story, David told them that he had been contracted to build the R2 for the new J.J. Abrams directed Star Wars movie expected sometime in 2015.

As you can imagine, the crowd went wild.

By late Thursday night, the robot was built, but there were a couple things missing.

Cue the packages stacked by the door.

One by one David opened them. And every time he removed the contents of one of the packages, he shouted with glee, and ran with it into the kitchen where I was making dinner to show it to me, and tell me what it was for.

A remote control to turn the head.

A circuit board for flashing lights.

A second circuit board and remote control for sound.

Wheels for movement.

So when all is said and done, I will have a flashing, rolling, beeping R2 flying around my house, just like the movies.

And he's pretty cute really. But my only question is, can I teach him to do laundry?

Oh, and also, there is talk of adding a fully functional C-3PO to our family when R2 is finally done. No need to take your kids to the theater to see Star Wars, guys. Just bring them on over to Casa Merel. We'll provide the entertainment.

When I Get Home At Night, I Never Know Quite What I Might Find

So when I got home last night, I walked in the door to this scene:

Then this happened:

And this:

And this:

And this:

And finally, after an emergency trip to Home Depot for glue and replacement screws, this:

I now have a fully functional robot in my living room. Someone is adorably excited about the news of new Star Wars movies on the horizon...

Ten Great Movie Moments and Quotes

I decided to do something new today. Every week, Stasha from The Good Life hosts Monday Listicles, where someone thinks up a topic, and bloggers come up with top ten lists in response. This week, Ally from Just a Normal Mom suggested the topic Ten Best Movie Quotes, or Ten Best Movie Moments, and being somewhat of a pop culture fanatic obsessed with things like last night's Golden Globes or next month's Academy Awards, I couldn't resist.

Since it's Monday, and on Monday I have a hard time making decisions on just about anything, I couldn't decide whether to go with movie quotes or movie moments, so I figured I would do a combination of the two.  So, in no particular order, here are my most favorite movie moments and quotes, an eclectic mix, much like myself.

1. "The Dirty Dancing Move" from Crazy, Stupid Love. Ryan Gosling. Emma Stone. I think the clip speaks for itself.

2. "I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible." When Harry Met Sally

3. The entirety of the movie You've Got Mail. For your viewing satisfaction, I stumbled upon this You Tube clip of the movie's most memorable scenes:

4. President Andrew Shepherd's big speech at the end of The American President. I have seen this movie approximately five thousand times (so deep is my love for Aaron Sorkin), and this scene never, ever fails to give me chills.

5. The moment in Indian Summer where eight friends arrive, as adults, back at the camp where they spend the summers of their childhood. For some crazy reason, a lot of people have never seen, or even heard of, this movie. If you ever spend a summer (or twelve, like me) at sleep-away camp, see this movie immediately.

6. "Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, our most inexhaustible source of magic. Capable of both inflicting injury, and remedying it." - Dumbledore to Harry at King's Cross Station, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II. I'm cheating a little here because this is actually one of my favorite quotes from all of the Harry Potter books, but I thought that the movie did the entire scene brilliantly.

7. "Hulk, Smash" - Captain America to the Hulk, The Avengers

8. George, Nina and Annie meet with the wedding planner, Franck Eggelhoffer for the first time - Father of the Bride

9. The final scene of Sex and the City (the movie). I could watch this over and over.

10. Jane and Kevin sing Benny and the Jets - 27 Dresses. People love to hate this movie. I just love it.

Top Six Reasons It's Not Bad to Work The Week Between Christmas and New Years

8:30am: Empty City Streets

I mean, I obviously wish that I wasn't working today. That I was home laying on the couch in sweat pants like I have been the past three days. But alas, here I am in my office. In the four years that I have been working I have always been in the office for the days between Christmas and New Years. I have to miss a lot of work in September and October for all of the Jewish holidays, and the people I work with really pick up the slack for me. So, since I don't celebrate Christmas, I always feel like it is only fair for me to be in the office this week, when most of my colleagues are on vacation.

But working this week isn't all bad. So here, for your reading satisfaction, are the top six reasons why I like working the week between Christmas and New Years:

6. Empty parking lots - To get to work, I drive my car to the train station and park it in a lot near the platform. Normally to get the first spot closest to the platform, one would have to get to the lot at six in the morning. I usually get there closer to eight, leaving me with a bit of a walk. But this morning, with most of the White Plains commuters still asleep, I got the first spot in the lot.

5. Empty trains - Unlike the Subway, which was my commuting method for the seven-plus years I lived in Manhattan, commuting via Metro North from Westchester is actually a pretty delightful experience. People are much calmer, and with enough seats for everyone, you are far less likely to spend your morning commute with someone's elbow jabbing into your side, or with your face smushed up against a fellow commuter's back. But there are still seats on Metro North that are more preferred than others, and they are really hard to get. Leaving from White Plains, which is a commuting hub in lower Westchester, I rarely ever get one of them. But this morning, with a mostly empty train, I had my pick of the best seats in the car.

4. Quiet office - There are approximately seven people working on my floor this week. It's super quiet. Quiet is good.

3. Quiet clients - Most of my clients are away this week, as are most of the bankers and trust companies that I deal with on a day-to-day basis. While this month has been my busiest December since I started my career as a Trusts & Estates lawyer (thanks, Congress and Mr. President for your complete inability to come to any kind of rational compromise about tax rates, leaving my clients uncertain. Uncertainty breeds fear. This is not news), this week is shaping up to be pretty quiet with most of my clients either on vacation or hunkered down with their families, so it leaves me ample time to accomplish the tasks I haven't been able to get to since December began.

2. The New York City streets are empty (at least today) - While by weeks end the streets will be crowded once again in anticipation of New Year's Eve, for today at least, the streets are blessedly empty. I know that by the time I make my way to the train tonight the crowds will be back in full force, taking advantage of the post-Christmas sales along Fifth Avenue, this morning when I was walking to work, most of the tourists seemed to still be sleeping off yesterday's festivities, making the walk a pleasure rather than the usual game of Survivor.

1. No line for coffee - Getting coffee in Manhattan on a weekday morning can really be a survival of the fittest situation. You have to be alert, guard your place in line with your life, and know exactly what you want before your turn at the register comes, lest you be subject to ridicule by your fellow caffeine junkies. But this morning, I walked into Dunkin' Donuts and went straight to the counter. No line, no wait, and no Banker-types making exasperated sighing noises just because they have to wait in line for more than fifteen seconds.

Anyone else working today, or am I the only one? What's good about your workdays this week?

Cozy Night

I don't celebrate Christmas, but neither do I do the traditional Jewish-person-on-Christmas-Eve movie and Chinese food. This is a perfectly delightful way to spend an evening, but just not the way I choose to spend December 24th. Even though Christmas is not my holiday, there is something cozy and still about Christmas Eve, and I have always loved staying at home to sink into all that calm. 

So last night. Last night we decided to stay home. A pile of blankets and pillows, pizza, ice cream, three movies, and a fire in our new fireplace made for an absolutely perfect evening.

And as an added bonus, our front yard was covered in snow. 

View from my front door.

Happy holidays to those of you celebrating today. 

Hope you had an equally cozy and family-filled night.

The Liebster

One of the most fun parts about starting this blog last February has been the other bloggers that I have had the opportunity to meet. There is an entire community of writers sharing bits and pieces of themselves online, and even though I have not met any of them in person, I feel like they are friends. They are smart, thoughtful and savvy women and men, and I love that they have let me be a part of their cyber universe.

Which is why I was thrilled and incredibly honored when Emma gave me the Liebster Award. And what, you might ask, is a Liebster Award? Kind of like a chain letter, it is an award given to a new-ish, up and coming blogger by another blogger, who in turn got in from someone else. Get it?  Just think of those chain letters you used to get as a kid. Although, I almost always broke the chain, and never did receive the promised 10 letters from around the world.

The origins of the award are a little murky, but it has been making its way around the blogosphere for some time now, and seems like fun.

The rules of the game are simple:

1. The recipient of the award posts 11 facts about themselves
2. The recipient then answers 11 questions posed by the giver of the award
3. The recipient nominates other bloggers for the award, links to them, and posts 11 questions for those bloggers to answer

Ok, so maybe it's not quite so simple, but it is pretty fun, and I am psyched to do it. So, here we go:

11 Facts About Me

1. I was speaking in complete sentences when I was just over a year old. I was like some kind of mutant child. My mom says strangers used to come up to the stroller and speak to me in baby voices, and I used to answer them, talking like I was 12 years old. It totally freaked them out.
2. If I hear a song once, I can remember all of the words for the rest of my life.
3. I love romance novels more than anything in the world, and I own every single book that Nora Roberts has ever written.
4. I have a notebook filled with ideas about a series of romance novels that I plan to write, and I have already started on the first one.
5. My favorite food is french fries. I need to eat them at least once a week or I get cranky. I sometimes think that I could eat nothing but french fries for every meal until the day I die and I would be completely content.
6. I love country music.
7. I didn't understand a single part of any of the following movies: Inception, Minority Report, and The Matrix 
8. I use Google as a spell checker. I am the worst speller in the world. Ironic considering, you know, this blog.
9. I can recite all the dialogue from the movie Speed.
10. I watch, regularly (as in, don't miss a single episode of) twenty-one television shows a week. That doesn't include Football, Gilmore Girls re-runs, The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. I watch all of those too.
11. I won't read a book that doesn't have a happy ending.

Answers to Emma's Questions For Me

1. What is your favorite tree and why? - The huge oak tree that sat right outside our house in Pittsburgh where I grew up that was inhabited by a family of squirrels that fascinated my dad. I'm pretty sure that we have pictures somewhere of that squirrel family.
2. Are you still in touch with anyone from elementary school? How about high school? - Neither, actually. 
3. If you could live anywhere in the world with no financial or language concerns, where would it be? - I don't really have aspirations for world travel, I'm pretty much a homebody, so I would probably choose to live right where I am. Or in Pittsburgh so I could be closer to my parents. Speaking of which...
4. Do you like your parents? - I know that for a lot of people this is a complex question. Not so for me. Yes, I like my parents. I also admire them, and am incredibly grateful to them for giving me strength, character, resilience, and a sense of humor, for teaching me to live with purpose, and for encouraging my sisters and me to blaze our own trails. Basically, if we were any closer, we would be one person.
5. What is a favorite book and/or what are you reading now? - My favorite book is Birthright, by Nora Roberts (see: my aforementioned love of romance novels). I have read it at least 100 times. Right now I am reading The Panther, by Nelson DeMille. If you have never read any of his books featuring retired NYPD cop John Corey, you are seriously missing out.
6. Do you have any pets? - No, much to my husband's dismay.
7. Would you like to travel to other planets, if possible? - I don't think so. Space travel kind of freaks me out. But I really love the movie Apollo 13.
8. Do you think encouraging children to believe in Santa is "lying" to them? - No way. I think it's good for kids to have something magical to believe in. 
9. Do you have a secret that only one or two other people know about? - I think that anyone who answers no to this question is lying.
10. What is the one thing that you would like you spouse/partner to stop doing? - Leaving Coke Zero cans all over the house.
11. What question have I forgotten to ask that you would like to answer? - How about my favorite season? I prefer fall/winter to summer/spring, and actually love when the clocks change and the days get shorter 

11 Questions For My Nominees

1. If your life is being turned into a movie, who would play you?
2. What was your favorite childhood book?
3. What was the last thing that made you laugh until you cried and your sides hurt?
4. Coffee or tea?
5. If you weren't doing what you are doing now, what would you want to do instead?
6. What is your favorite color and why?
7. If you won the lottery, what is the first thing you would buy?
8. What is your go-to, never fail recipe for a weekday dinner?
9. What is the movie that, when you say you have never seen it, people look at you with that confused "I can't believe you never saw it" face?
10. If you could pick a character from a book or movie to be your best friend, who would it be?
11. What is your favorite season?

And My Nominees Are These Four Amazing Ladies

1. Bea, from Living off Script
2. Larks, from Maybe I Should Blog
3. Michelle, from The Journey
4. Ashley, from Ashley, Etc.

Strange Things Seen On the Way to Work

If you read this blog frequently, you know that I have a love/hate relationship with New York City. I lived in Manhattan for seven years, and while I romanticized it a lot during my transition to the suburbs a month ago, there were also things about living and working here that made me absolutely crazy. Like having to carry super heavy bags of groceries five blocks home in the rain. Or being completely reliant on sometimes unreliable public transportation to get everywhere I needed to go. Or tiny kitchens with miniature ovens and sinks. Or lack of closet space.

Living in the suburbs, as I now do, I no longer have to contend with those things, and it is amazing. I can drive my car to the grocery store and home like a normal person, my kitchen (when it is finished) will have a regular sized oven and a sink that is downright palatial, and I am positively swimming in closet space.

But I haven't completely severed my ties with Manhattan. I still work here, and as I wrote yesterday, there are all kinds of headaches associated with my daily trip to my office in Midtown, particularly during this time of year.

But every now and then, I see something in Manhattan that makes me laugh like a loon, and makes me happy that I still have a connection to this crazy city that is unlike any other.

This morning, I was making my daily walk from Grand Central station on the East Side to my office on the West Side, and as I passed Rockefeller Center, preparations for tonight's Christmas tree lighting were well underway. The police were already out barricading all the streets from 47th to 52nd, people were already lined up to stake out the best spot closest to the skating rink where the festivities take place, and there was the usual crush of rubberneckers gawking at the still unlit tree.

As I made my way down 51st street, I was thinking dark thoughts about the tree lighting, and already trying to figure out my best route from the office to Grand Central tonight for my way home so as to avoid anything having to do with the tree lighting at all costs (side note: there is no best way. Every way is bad. Best to take the most direct route and prepare for evasive maneuvers). But my negative reverie was broken, when I passed the scene in the picture above.

Yes, right in the middle of 51st street, I saw a man holding those three camels on leashes. It was 35 degrees outside, everyone on the street was rushing to get where they needed to go and trying not to freeze to death, but there were camels in the middle of the street. This scene struck me as so hilariously absurd that I had to stop and capture it for posterity.

Manhattan may sometimes be annoying, but any place where you can accidentally bump in to camels on the way to work is a place worth staying connected to. Just saying.

Sandy

Storm's coming.

Well, actually, it's already here. We have been hearing about Frankenstorm/ Snowicane/Snoreastercane Sandy for days now. We have been urged to prepare. To make sure we have enough food, water, flashlights, batteries, and candles to last us until the end of time. And the residents of the Upper West Side of Manhattan sure took that advice in stride.

That was the line yesterday afternoon just to get in to the Trader Joe's down the block from my apartment. Because nothing will do but that we have organic produce and free trade coffee when we hunker down for the storm.

But I joke. In all seriousness, this seemed like a storm we should take seriously. It's a red-letter day when the Governor orders the entire New York City transit system shut down, so that was ominous enough to give everyone pause. Since our move to the new house was postponed until Friday because of the weather, I joined right in on the preparations, although I skipped the organic produce and free trade coffee in favor of regular old Folgers, and stuff to make grilled cheese and cookies. Priorities, right?

Since there are no subways, buses, or trains, and the bridges and tunnels were shutting down, my office is closed for at least today, and likely until they get the subways and buses back up and running once the storm is over. And seriously, I feel exactly the same was I did when I was growing up in Pittsburgh, and school closed for a blizzard. Completely, and utterly ecstatic.

This morning when I woke up, the weather didn't look so bad, and I was curious if the wind was as strong as it sounded whistling against our 23rd floor windows, so I got dressed and headed outside to check it out. Most of the businesses along my street are closed today, but my corner deli is certainly open.

Nothing shuts these guys down.

There were people on the streets, and the wind wasn't terrible, so I thought it might be fun to take a quick run through the windy park with all the leaves dancing around. I quickly ran back upstairs, threw on some running gear, and headed to the park. I failed to mention that most of the people on the streets were other runners. We are a strange breed, to be sure. There is just something fierce about running in the elements. Even (especially) a hurricane.

But when I got to the park, I was greeted by this:

My normal 72nd street entrance was barricaded, and there were literally guards at the gate. It seemed the Mayor decided that the city parks were unsafe, and closed them for the duration of the storm. The wind wasn't terrible, I wasn't really afraid of getting hit in the head by any falling trees or branches, and I know the park better than anyone, including all the backdoor ways to get in, so I decided to sneak in for a quick run along the deserted roads. Maybe not my most intelligent idea, but once I started thinking about a park run during the outer bands of a hurricane, I was obsessed. So I walked a few blocks in each direction, but lo and behold, they got every single one of my secret entrances, including this rarely used staircase behind Tavern on the Green.

God, Mayor Bloomberg, don't you trust people to just stay out when you tell them to?

Anyway, I was relegated to a run on the east side of Central Park West, looking into the park as I motored along.

It's kind of eerie completely empty like this, isn't it?

I finished my run, and after a quick stop for bagels (priorities, I told you), I made it home in the ever strengthening wind.

We will be hanging out here for at least the next day or two, and it's kind of fun, actually. The only caveat is that, since we were supposed to be moving today, we have already transferred our cable over to the new house, leaving us without cable in our apartment, while we are stuck inside for the storm. And if there two people less likely to be stuck inside without cable, it is us. I mean, last year, during the day and a half we were stuck inside during Hurricane Irene we watched a season and a half of The West Wing. That's dedication.

But my man never lets me down. Between a portable 4G modem, Hulu, a Netflix subscription, an HDMI cable hooking up a computer to our TV, downloaded movies, and ABC, CW, CBS, Showtime and HBO Apps for both of our iPads, it's like the cable isn't even gone.

Stay safe everyone, and stay entertained. Looks like we are settling in for a long haul.

Bring it on, Sandy.

On Reading Young

"When you read a book as a child, it becomes a part of your identity in a way that no other reading in your whole life does."

                                      You've Got Mail

Quotable Wednesdays 2: Paying Tribute

I'm starting a new tradition on this blog of mine...I have been reading lots of books lately, even more than usual. And in my literary (and pop culture) travels, I have stumbled across many, many fun bits of humor, brilliance, encouragement, and inspiration. Every week, pop by here on Wednesday for Quotable Wednesdays, where I share some of these delightful musings. 

Today, I pay tribute to the incomparable Nora Ephron, who passed away yesterday at the age of 71. Nora Ephron was an author, director and screen-writer, and was the creative genius behind such movies as When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, and my all-time favorite You've Got Mail. She dedicated her life to telling stories - both fictional and deeply personal - and was masterful at creating strong female characters who were at times both normal and extraordinary. She was a beautiful and remarkable voice; one certainly silenced far too soon.

"To state the obvious, romantic comedies have to be funny and they have to be romantic. But one of the most important things, for me anyway, is that they be about two strong people finding their way to love."
                    -Nora Ephron

"Here are some questions I am constantly noodling over: Do you splurge or do you hoard? Do you live every day as if it's your last, or do you save your money on the chance you'll live 20 more years? Is life too short, or is it going to be too long? Do you work as hard as you can, or do you slow down to smell the roses? And where do carbohydrates fit into all this? Are we really all going to spend our last years avoiding bread, especially now that bread in America is so unbelievably delicious? And what about chocolate?" 
                    -Nora Ephron

"Reading is everything. Reading makes me feel like I've accomplished something, learned something, become a better person. Reading makes me smarter. Reading gives me something to talk about later on. Reading is the unbelievably healthy way my attention deficit disorder medicates itself. Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it's a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it's a way of making contact with someone else's imagination after a day that's all too real. Reading is grist. Reading is bliss." 
                    -Nora Ephron