September 20th,
2002. Friday
Jenny G from DC is in town. I met her after work last night at the Fat Black Pussycat. She was with a co-worker, and had been sitting there since 3, waiting for me to get off work, which I did around 5:30. When I found them, they were starting their 4th pitcher of beer I think. I immediately asked why there was no snack mix. The free snack mix is just about the best feature of that bar, next to the ice in the urinals. No, not really. Anyway, we finished the pitcher, then Jenny G and I headed back to Greenpoint.
I had wanted to head back into the city to catch my former neighbor Rachel's band, but Jenny G had an early morning, so I put the kabosh on that and we decided to stay in. Which was actually fine with me. I don't like when out-of-town guest visit and want to run all around the city. So after fetching a pizza and some beer, we plopped down on the couch and watched a few hours of The Lord of the Rings, which Jenny G hadn't seen yet. After two hours though, she was pooped out, so we sat on my fire escape, watched the fast moving clouds, and shared a Budweiser tallboy. Then I talked on the phone for about an hour, and Jenny G went to bed.When I got out of the shower this morning, Jenny G was plopped on the couch watching tv. On my way out the door to work, she pointed toward my ceiling and said "Why do you have a boob hanging from your ceiling?" I looked over, and sure enough, there was a breast-shaped protrusion coming out of the ceiling, right over my stereo. "Fuck." I says. I prod it a bit, and of course it's full of water, just waiting to burst. I go to cover up the stereo in plastic, when I realize it's already too late. This was eerily reminiscent of the time I returned to my Park Slope apartment, found water on my guitar from a leaking ceiling, and upon wiping it off discovered that the guitar was actually full of water. So the first thing I see is moisture buildup on the inside of the plastic cover of my record player. My first thought was "My copy of Billy Joel's 'The Stranger' is ruined!" But itw as ok. There was mild water damage to a burned copy of Ryan Adam's "Heartbreaker," which was no big deal, and to the outside cover of Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, which was more disappointing. And disgusting brown water all over the floor and record player. So I had to stay and clean up the mess. And, you know, the leaking ceiling protrusion really did look like a boob. You could have suckled at it if you wanted to. I think this is going to be a persistent problem. It looks like it's in the pipes leading to the heating pipe in the living room. And the heat isn't even on yet. I am very concerned.
So the plan tomorrow is to attend the third annual Potato Potluck Picnic in Prospect Park, or the PPP in PP, P3, as Jenny G likes to call it. Jen also came up for this last year. It was unpleasantly chilly, but still a lot of fun. Definitely interesting. And this year, she's doing all the cooking on Friday night. So there will be no early morning scramble for potatoes and whatnot. She's making some sort of potato-peanut butter concoction. As usual, i'm a bit apprehensive. Last year's chocolate covered potato balls were pretty tasty, but still pretty weird. Anyway, at least it's something different.
Mail to G-Rock