July 14, 2009

Today I wrote a lot in my note pad, so I feel like I've contributed to the writing cause, though I can't stand how much my novel idea and now my tv show idea is eating at me. I thought the restaurant I work at would be a great basis for a tv show in the vain of Party Down, my new favorite show. And all the people I work with are divine inspiration. I don't want to jinx it, though, so that's all I'm going to say about it.

Come to think of it, I did a lot of writing today.

I got up early, shaved, showered, and dressed in a suit to report to the Village by 7:30am. I surprised myself by getting there on time. I even had time for a quick coffee and bagel. I knew there was a reason I saved that five dollars from yesterday.

So the reason I had to be at work so early, though, was because I was moonlighting today at my old job. Lorelei called me up to see if I could fill in for them today. My job was to assist in registration and then take notes at the individual breakout sessions for a conference that was being held at NYU on behalf of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygeine and the Office of Emergency Management.

I worked this event last year, but I didn't have to take notes, I mostly just stood around.
This time, I was to take notes, which meant sitting through some pretty boring seminars and pretending to be interested.

The interesting part of the conference is that it involves all levels of emergency services in New York City, the Fire Department, the Police Department, Poison Control, the Health Department, and the Office of Emergency Management, not to mention a bunch of other agencies presenting information on stuff.

I learned all about a new service called GeoChat, which will probably replace Twitter in a few years, and if not, then something like it.
Then I learned about fire truck and ambulance accidents, which was not that interesting.

Later in the afternoon, I learned about the water sanitation in New York and asbestos control.
The water sanitation presentation was a lot more fascinating than I thought it would be, mostly because I am amazed that so much water flows though this city per day, and that there hardly ever seem to be any problems with that. It's one of the things that makes this city great.

But I had to take notes on my little laptop the whole day, and that was kind of annoying, but it made the whole day go by quicker, and the lunch was pretty good.

The other thing that made the day go by quicker was my discovery in the bathroom. When I was taking my morning dump, I found someone had left a Metro newspaper (one of the New York dailies they hand out for free), which told me the New York Philharmonic was playing in Central Park tonight.

Having had such a great time seeing the Orchestra in the Park last year, I couldn't stop thinking about it all day, and just wanted to go home and prepare for it.

I texted a few people to see if they wanted to go, and I got responses from two of them, who said they'd like to go. Now I was really excited, and I was texting furiously throughout the day to make plans. I needed to get out of NYU as soon as possible so I could go home and change and then head back up to the Park. People seriously get to these things three hours in advance to stake out their seats. Blanket space is hard to come by in Central Park when the Philharmonic is playing.

Fortunately for my, I signed up for Central Park's Twitter feed, so I'll be notified whenever something like this happens.

I ran home, changed, and brought a few snacks to eat on the train. I got up to 86th street and my duty was to get more snacks for the picnic I was going to share with my friends. I wanted to get beer anyways.

But it took me forever to find a grocery store that wasn't ungodly expensive, and I finally did after about 45 minutes of walking around and shopping. By the time I go to the Park, there were no good spots available, so I picked one out along the side, figuring my friends would be able to find me easily once they showed up.

Only they never did. And the concert started and I was still wondering where they were. I was texting like mad and getting no answers. That's when I started to get mad. Finally I gave up, and just walked around Central Park, listening to the Philharmonic play Beethoven's 7th Symphony. I didn't want to leave before it was over, based on principle. Also, it's a beautiful piece, much like anything by Beethoven.

Plus, after the concert is over, they launch fireworks, and I kind of wanted to see that too. I ended up seeing them real close, because I was down by the big fountain by the time they shot them off, and that is approximately right next to where they launch them from.

So that made me happy after a kind of glummy night in the Park by myself, being surrounded by bunches of other people enjoying themselves. But I did get a lot of cynical, angry writing done, which I like. And tomorrow I'm going to see Harry Potter during the day before work. I'm really excited for it, seeing as it'll be the first time I've read the book before seeing the movie.

So, until then, good night!