Snarl

I have a million and one things to do in the next 28 days (give or take two). It seems only right, then, that this surreal month would happen to contain the four least pleasant days of my year (more or less).

I am talking, of course, about my Hidy Hair Days. I have only barely started Day 2, and I am already wound as tight as a guitar string.

For those of you who don't know: I have naturally curly hair. For those of you who are now thinking, "Oh! That would look so good on you! Why don't you ever wear it that way?": talk to Andrea. Or, actually, to anyone who has seen the picture she took of me in seventh grade. We are not talking about pretty, curly hair; we are talking about a huge, frizzy, evil, unmanageable mess. So, every nine or ten months, I head down to 32nd Street to transform myself into the unremarkable wash-and-wear girl you know and love.

This is not as much fun as it sounds.

For one thing, it costs a small fortune. In fairness, the value saved in hair products to calm the insanity, salons that specialize in cutting curly hair, and even just prep time helps to make up the difference. However, when just paying cash saves me enough for quite a nice dinner out, it is hard to keep these arguments so firmly in mind.

For another, it is just a wretched experience. It takes about four hours, and the waiver I had to sign during my first consultation (promising that I was not pregnant, and would not sue them if I had lied and anything went wrong) does not inspire one to want to marinate in whatever the hell they use for those four hours.

Seriously: when I walked in yesterday and the woman asked me if I wanted a perm (waving her hands a foot away from her head in a rough approximation of what I actually used to look like) I almost just took it.

I am told that the first chemical breaks down the sulphur bonds in my hair, which only partially explains the way that it smells. Now, on Day 2, I am already contemplating creative measures such as Febreezing® my head. The problem is that there are really only two possible outcomes of such a plan:

1) My hair, which must remain bone-dry for at least 72 hours after thermal reconditioning, will take on the texture of steel wool, the way a small patch of it did when this rule was not fully explained the first time (I had to cut it out--and switch salons), or

2) My head will be engulfed in a giant fireball. Seriously. It feels possible.

It is that bone-dry rule, though, that makes me so cranky for those three days. It is even worse than the burns sustained when three people are using straightening irons on you simultaneously, one of them burns you, and you instinctively jerk away. If you should ever find yourself in this position, I do not recommend instinctively jerking away.

Anyway.

Do you know how impossible it is to avoid every source of moisture in this city for three days? It's bad enough that I can't wash off the chemical smell, or that the final straightironing (to give each strand the shape it will hold as the sulphur rebonds) will make me look like a seal in an oilslick by the time I finally can. It's so much worse that I must live in fear of water.

My shower head drips, it snows, ice melts--hell, it's New York: people spit. Or worse--I am only one disgruntled pigeon away from total disaster. I wash my hands and then have to remember not to run one through my hair. I wake up in a sweat in the middle of the night from fear that I will, well, sweat. And by the way, even if perspiration weren't a problem, would you want to work out when you can't wash your hair for two more days?

There are bright spots, though, to distract me from the time bomb on top of my head. Most of my preparations so far have been easy--apparently my story is just romantic enough to encourage people to smooth my way. And, as if working in parallel, France Telecom has finally come through for Nick, so when I do go, I can call the U.S. incessantly for no extra charge. And apparently a DVR comes standard with his cable (as does VH-1, oddly enough).

Everyone should move to Paris.

The Art of War

Nick often remarks that no one talks to him when he is alone, but when I'm there we meet a steady stream of strangers at the next table. Apparently, this is a dangerous quality to bring into the mix with Melissa, around whom bizarre things happen on a regular basis anyway.

Last night, Melissa, Glenn and I went out to Uva--I got to tell them about Paris, and we had a lovely dinner. There came a point in the evening when Glenn decided to go home, and I swear I was almost right behind him, but Melissa and I were still awake, and we decided on one more drink.

One. I swear.

Shortly after that, Melissa left the table, and the two men next to us turned to me. "We kept your friend company while you were in the restroom," one of them announced. "Now it's your turn!"

Okay, then.

Of course, it's never simple. See, Rob was trying to get this girl, Amy, whom he spent New Year's Eve with but hasn't seen since. By the time I took over his cell phone, though (I can't stand it when guys can't figure out what women want to hear--it's not like it's that difficult), it was too late for her to come out. And Melissa thought Ed was into Rob, and Ed confessed that he thought Rob was flirting with him to get ahead at work, which did not thrill him. Ed was thrilled to hear that I was moving to Paris, which he adores, and Rob seemed cheerful as well, and around then his attention shifted from texting Amy to asking for advice about impressing Melissa. All good, right?

Machiavelli Rob was not.

Gentlemen, I'm going to lay down a few basic ground rules for you.

• A woman who is about to move to Paris to be with another man is not going to kiss you.

• It is even less likely if you have spent half the evening revealing just how short your romantic attention span is, and that doesn't even count the time you spent asking for her help to get her friend.

• There are times when the better part of valor is going with your stated intention--in this case, that would be keeping your attention on Amy. Or Katherine, at the bar. Or Melissa, although she had as much opportunity to witness your maneuvering as I did, and I rather doubt that she was much more impressed by it.

• Buying drinks is usually a good move. Shouting for shots immediately after being turned down is shady.

• Which reminds me: anger in general is not attractive.

This sounds harsher than I really mean to be, though. He wasn't a bad guy, I don't think. He was funny and kind and generous and sweet, and if he hadn't crossed the line we might well have become friends--at least for the next few weeks, during which time I would have been happy to introduce him to any number of more appropriate matches. If I sound angry or unkind, it is just because there was a better way for things to have gone.

And, truth be told, not all of this was quite so clear at the time: a no-brainer this morning took some thought last night. It was not as obvious as I make it sound, although I like to think that the conclusion was inevitable at any time of day. It was just that I was so very flattered--it's been quite some time since a guy has worked that hard for me, unless you are inclined to count the day-to-day work of building a life with me.

It turns out, of course, that I do count that.

It may be I'm the one who is off-base. Maybe there is a world that works the way Rob believes, and my views on relationships are just hopelessly idealistic.

I will say that I am just fine with never knowing for sure.

Throwdown

Iron Chef America, in addition to being one of the greatest shows ever, is also one of the only shows that Nick and I can easily agree on (the other two are Scrubs and Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Anything else is a negotiation).

But Iron Chef America is the best. It is the perfect combination of tension, low stakes, exotic food, new ideas, and harmless fun. So just imagine my excited anticipation of my lunch today with Andrea: we were going to Mesa Grill. Not only does Mesa Grill have an excellent Restaurant Week menu, but it also has Iron Chef Bobby Flay, and while his incessant citrus-grilling grates on me a bit, he seems to be quite amazing. And I like amazing food.

Of course, things got off to a bad start when I was late. The worst part is that I was painfully conscious the whole time of the fact that Andrea would be on her lunch break. In retrospect, someone who leaves as little room for error as I do should never take the A or the L, much less plan to use both during the same trip. I darted out of the subway and pulled out my cell phone, which rang against my ear. I assured Andrea that I was only about a block away, which is just the kind of cockiness that I should have known that I would regret.

The restaurant wasn't there.

I walked a couple more blocks while calling Andrea frantically, because now not only was I late, but I would have to confess that I had the cross streets wrong, and that's pretty pathetic even for me. She curtly informed me that it was where I had originally thought, and after some backtracking, it did indeed magically appear (it had been across the street, and behind a truck, and looked like part of the store next to it, and I had been expecting something...bigger).

When I raced in more than 15 minutes late, Andrea was unimpressed, but the bread basket seemed to cheer her a bit (plus I gave her the formerly-liquor-filled ceramic houses that Nick got on a flight from Amsterdam, which she had grown quite attached to in the process of emptying them of said liquor).

And the food was indeed delicious--and my chicken came surrounded by swirling drips and drizzles of cool-looking sauces, just like on the show.

Trouble came, naturally, with dessert. Since Andrea's nut allergy prevented her from trying the flan (which involved pecans), I had chosen that, while she had ordered a chocolate cake in pineapple-tequila sauce that just looked lovely. Which is why I was surprised when she stopped after just a bite or two--I mean, the girl's got willpower, but, well, she doesn't usually stare at me quite that way while exercising it.

I missed what she said to me, but apparently my confusion looked enough like shock and concern (the appropriate responses) that she felt that the message got across. It did a second later, when she rounded on the waitress and announced, "This is not nut-free."

Oh, God.

Although I did not realize it until I stood to leave later, that was the moment when my lower back, ever sensitive to my stress level, decided to seize up. It wasn't the annoyed sharp warning shot I have grown accustomed to, either; it was a wide, shimmering, creeping wrongness that licked its lips as it promised my eventual paralysis.

While the waitress insisted she had been told that there were no nuts (before ordering, I had heard Andrea tell her that she was allergic to nuts, including coconut, but apparently not peanut oil--who knew?), Andrea headed for the ladies' room to stab herself with whatever it is that will keep her from dying.

The terrified waitress sidled up to me a few minutes later and asked if my friend might be allergic to anything else, because the kitchen really had told her it was nut-free (she had just gone and double-checked). "Pineapple?" she asked. No. She almost walked away, but then turned back. "There, um, is coconut in the sauce," she admitted. "Could that be it?"

I figured that she was having such a bad day already that "Remember at the beginning when she clearly said 'including coconuts'?" would be overkill. I settled for "That would absolutely be it."

For the record, everyone was very nice and very apologetic (we got a lot of practice in the art of graciously acknowledging an apology without saying anything like "It's okay," because it isn't). And Andrea came back after a bit mostly okay, although I am still waiting to hear that she really is well.

It was an ugly afternoon all around, but seriously? The 16-spice chicken is unbelievable. I'm just saying.

The Beginning of the End

Three days after I decided to move to Paris, Mary's boss called to ask me to interview for a job.

The job, really. A phenomenal job: it combines everything that I have been looking for over this last evilly disappointing year. (It's been ten months, but the extra two are a bonus for pain and suffering.) And when I sent in my resume a month ago, it wasn't because I thought anything was about to change.

I am moving to Paris at the beginning of March, and I have just been called in to talk about a wonderful job in New York. "Oh," said Nick. "Will you meet with him?"

"Would you want me to do it?" I shrieked (in the middle of J. Crew).

"Of course not--if you wanted to, I would never tell you not to, but of course not."

That's better.

And the thing is that it's okay. This thing I have been waiting and hoping and fighting for--well, I would be lying if I said it wasn't tempting. This isn't one of those times when the light shines down and the world becomes incredibly easy. But it's not enough; not anymore.

It was a brutal day altogether, though, because I had to begin my goodbyes at my real job. I had to review everything I have done, and start selecting and preparing others to pick up where I will leave off, and it was...hours of that. And it was coming home to discover that a miscommunication will have me visiting Nick during the wrong week in February, putting an awkward strain on the timing of these endings that I am already torn up over, and....

And.

This morning, this decision was so simple, and now it's not, except that it is no less made for any of that.

This morning I was in denial, and now I have to put my lease termination in the mail first thing in the morning before I panic completely, because it is still what I want; it is just in my nature to unravel all at once, and the grace period is over.

There are upsides, of course.

The Upsides

• The French are really cool. They understand chocolate (it's not about being sweet; it's about the vicious contrast between the sweetness and bite of something strong, like coffee or liqueur.

• They also know how to put together a rhythmic and calming day, and even though Nick's blood pressure has shot up since he moved, I'm betting that both of ours will drop dramatically when I do.

• French women all look like models. I'm not talking about anything like the most conspicuous of the girls I went to high school with, who were overtanned and over-made-up and highlighted and blowdried into creepy uniformity. I'm talking about something you would see on America's Next Top Model: women who quietly and subtly play to their own individual strengths, and now I am going to learn. In fact, today, inspired, I made a stop at Sephora, and although I left looking like I was not wearing makeup, I got hit on incessantly afterward, so I think I'm getting the hang of it already. Nick has mixed feelings about this development.

• I like adventures.

• On the phone tonight, after just a few questions beginning with "Wait; are you upset about ____, or ____?" Nick expertly diagnosed cold feet and talked me down, all at 6:30am his time. Just imagine what he could do if we were in the same time zone.

The Corrections

I learned two interesting French facts during this most recent trip:

1) French people love to correct non-native speakers, and

2) the good people in charge of security at Charles de Gaulle have lost their minds.

Point 1

Nick swears that it happens to him, too, but I suspect that there is something about the way that I desperately try to come across as fluent that makes the French want to pounce.

It just so happened that I was visiting during the winter sales (there are two sales per year, and they really go all-out), so of course I had to check out the shopping.

It went well for the most part; my main focus was on reducing the percentage of times when I looked like a deer in headlights after being asked a question. We did have a cute little cultural moment after Nick (blushing and reluctant) followed me into a lingerie store. When I headed for the fitting room, a saleswoman stopped me and strongly suggested I use the one downstairs. "There is a larger one," she explained. When I questioned her about the open one straight ahead of me, she repeated herself, and added more. Although baffled, I complied, and Nick found a nearby bench where he could sit and stare at the floor.

Back on the street we compared notes (we often catch different words), and realized that she had been directing us to the larger changing room so that Nick could come in with me. Apparently we are not quite as progressive as we like to think, because our jaws hit the pavement as soon as the light bulb went off.

We had another little glitch on the way to Olivier and Penny's for dinner (that's Nick's boss and his wife). We had a bottle of wine to bring, but stopped off for flowers as well, and the florist said something incomprehensible. It didn't help that he was gesturing to me, since I was not involved in the transaction at all--and there was clearly some reference to the wine bottle in my hand, although we could not tell what. "You don't understand me," he suddenly said, appalled, and began apologizing profusely.

We got it eventually: he was jokingly asking if the bottle was for him. "French merchants joke a lot," Olivier confirmed. "They are very embarrassed if it does not work."

"The next one will be for you," I told the florist once we caught on. He laughed uproariously to show us that all was forgiven. "So now he thinks we are both witty and a bit stupid," I told Nick as we headed for the Métro. "Both kind of fit in this case," he pointed out.

The real frustration, though, naturally came when I felt that things were going unusually smoothly. At a shoe store off of Rue St.-Honoré, I was blissed to discover that 1) I did in fact know my correct French shoe size, and 2) French shoes fit me comfortably, which closed-toe American shoes virtually never do. So I was having a blast trying on both practical and silly shoes (all half-off!) while Nick tried not to fall asleep.

After a while, though, I started to notice that every time I tried to specify a pair of shoes, the saleswoman corrected me. "I would like to try these," I would say, pointing. "These-here?" she would ask. "May I see those in a 38?" "Those-there?"

Now. I acknowledge that there is a difference. And Olivier confirmed that the French are quite particular about the distinctions between these-here and those-there and these and those. But I was pointing to quite clearly indicate which pair I meant. There could be no doubt.

And around the tenth time she did it, I realized that it was deliberate, precisely because I was leaving no doubt as to my intent. She could only be doing it to make a point.

She was not the only one. As I headed off to Charles de Gaulle this afternoon, I chatted with the driver about the weather (freakishly warm still). "Terminal two?" he suddenly asked.

"Yes: 2E." I pronounced it somewhere between "eh" and "ay."

"E," he asked, pronouncing it more like "eu" (it's a sound we don't have in English). I would have thought that he was just clarifying, except that I glanced up just then and saw his half-smile in the rearview mirror as he glanced back.

Apparently, the moment I lose the deer-in-the-headlights thing, people pop out of the woodwork to tell me just what I'm doing wrong.

Point 2

But, speaking of Charles de Gaulle...well, the foreshadow was that my checked luggage was searched for the very first time. Which...fine. I don't think they really needed to roll my deodorant all the way up or snap the nozzle off my perfume bottle, but...fine.

Before the flight home, though, I had a first that was less fine--let me tell you, I would not have minded living out my whole life without ever getting patted down. My boarding pass was taken away and not returned until after the patting...and the bag searches (they asked if I had jewelry--why??)...and the wiping of my hands for explosives residue (I assume--they refused to answer when I asked).

I did eventually get to the gate, and just as everyone was lining up to board, we were told that, because of a plane change, we would be delayed by two hours. Eventually someone let it slip that it was a security issue, but they broke out free sandwiches and soft drinks, so I forgave them.

Temporarily.

When we finally began to board, I made a timing mistake, and ended up momentarily adrift just as the security agent doing body scans had released someone. And I accidentally made eye contact.

As he waved me over, I had this moment where I just wanted to refuse. I mean: I almost did. And then I thought of something better, and the best part was that I thought of it in French.

I stepped over to his table and set down my bags. "This is the second time today," I said a bit icily. "I would never have believed that I look dangerous."

"You speak French," he noted cordially, and even though the next thing he did was fire up his scanning wand, I think that that was the best news I had heard all week.

Take Two

I arrived in Paris this morning here, but last night in New York. I hijacked Nick's neighbor's wireless (sometimes it works) and was promptly baffled as to why I would have gotten my daily listserv digest email in the middle of the morning. It usually comes after midnight, and I remember deleting it last night, so...right. I'll be doing that a lot, I expect. Not to mention the five minutes of pacing that followed an email from a coworker--when she says "I'll see [other person] tomorrow, so I'll ask her," just what the hell exactly does that mean to me?

I have just spent 13 hours travelling; my head is not where it should be.

Actually, that's a funny story.

Earlier this week, I made a contingency plan in case I got work in Midtown yest--um, Wednesday. I decided I should leave by 3:30 (or maybe 3:00, really) in order to get out to JFK in plenty of time for my flight--it takes about an hour from Midtown. And it seemed like the stars were aligning to place me there on Wednesday, so I began to think of that as The Plan.

When I realized (Tuesday night-ish) that I would, in fact, be leaving from my apartment after all, I quickly did the math. Two hours to JFK from my place, so subtract two hours from 3:00, and leave at 1:00 to make it with time to spare.

Recall that the 3:00 version already included an hour of travel time, and you'll be well ahead of where I was when I realized that I was on the wrong A train and began contemplating my options for a switch. I could just get out, wait for the next train, and finish the boring two-hour ride, or I could switch at 59th Street for an orange train, go to Rockefeller Center, pick up the bracelet that is being resized there that I would love to have for this trip (Nick gave it to me; he should get to see it on), and then take the V back up to the E, which is much, much shorter from there than the A is from where I was.

Still with me?

The problem was that I had plenty of time for that extra errand, and to save my life I could not figure out where it was coming from. I kept tapping my watch, and counting forward and backward. I looked like a--well, let's just say I looked like I really belonged on the A train. I decided to go with Plan B.

The bracelet, of course, was not ready. I suspected that it would not be, since I was told the following when I dropped it off:

"It'll be ready Thursday. Wed--Thursday. Wednesday, actually. Wednesday. You'll come back Wednesday?"

When the girl seemed to hurt that I had not remembered that she had told me Thursday, I just slid the slip bearing the large "Wednesday!" in her handwriting back into my pocket and lugged my suitcase away with me for another round of trains.

On the flight I sat next to this five-year-old girl who was exactly like a huge puppy--floppy and squirmy and desperate for attention. She kicked me. All. Night. Long.

I did, however, get enough sleep (just) to look into Nick's suggestion that I take the train instead of a cab (much cheaper, and much less frustrating during rush hour--and maybe even a bit faster, although reasonable people can disagree on that point).

Paris's Métro scares me. It's not the trains themselves--the RER express trains can be a little confusing, but mostly I caught on quickly. My problem is buying the ticket to get on in the first place.

First of all, have I mentioned that my French "r"'s just blatantly suck? So when Nick always urges me to get un carnet--a discount pack of ten tickets--there's part of me that always wants to tell him to go buy himself a stupid carnet, if he's so clever. My first instincts are not always constructive.

Above and beyond that, there are all these rules for tickets: there are zones, and some won't work for the RER, and some RER tickets don't work for some RER destinations, and unless I just show the ticket agent my directions and throw myself on his mercy, I cannot negotiate the transaction--I have no idea which information about my trip will be relevant, and I get far too nervous to understand rapid (and usually so-so) French through a speaker that makes the agent sound as though he's under water. Hell, I can't do that when I'm not nervous (probably. We'll never really know, because I always am).

When I got to Charles de Gaulle's Métro station, though, there was a ray of hope--it was an RER-only station, and Charles de Gaulle doesn't remotely count as "Paris" in the Métro's system. There had to be a million people a day doing exactly what I wanted to do.

I sidled up to one of the automated machines (a sibling of the one that had actually reduced me to tears on one memorable occasion), held my breath, and..."One ticket to Paris" was an option. I hit the button, counted out my change, repeated the whole sequence because the stupid thing timed out while I was counting out my change, and was off and running.

It's funny: in the airport proper, everyone spoke to me in English. From the moment I got to the subway platform, though, in spite of the fact that it's still technically in the airport, and I still had all my luggage, everyone addressed me in French. I got asked for directions three times in one hour; how's that for bizarre?

Practice it with me: "Je n'ai aucune idée; j'suis desolée." (That's desolé for you, gentlemen.)

I have to say, crossing the Seine right under the Eiffel Tower gave me chills. I started grinning like an idiot. I couldn't wait to get to the apartment, take a nap in the non-bed, a shower in the absurdly hard water, and then see what's out there for me today. Even if I get no farther than the café on the corner (it's outdoor weather here, more or less) and some grocery shopping (I just polished off the leftover baguette; now there really is no food), it will have been a wonderful day.

And when Nick's across-the-street neighbor came out onto his balcony just now in his underwear (as always) and carefully dropped something silver and black and roughly the size of a thermos onto the head of a passerby (that part's new), it just felt like another kind of being home.

OTC

"So how much Sudafed® can I buy at once without setting off any red flags?" is a question I was sincerely looking forward to asking. "It'll be fine," Nick told me. "They'll see you're going out of the country right after the purchase, and they'll figure it's nothing."

Honestly, if sarcasm were out, I don't know that the two of us would ever be able to speak to each other at all.

Unfortunately, the fine State of New York has outwitted me once again. When I wandered into the pharmacy to stock up on American OTC meds for poor, sniffly Nick, I discovered pseudo-Sudafed® on the shelves, and stupid little "Please take this card to the pharmacy to purchase" cards where the real Sudafed® used to be.

As much as I was disinclined to take the stupid little card to the stupid little pharmacy window, I was about to do so when I noticed that Sudafed® has taken advantage of their supposed notoriety to jack up their prices enormously. I mean, maybe I'm just out of touch with the going rate, but I cannot imagine why real Sudafed® is more than twice the price of fake Sudafed® (not generic; it just uses a different active ingredient, which they swear is wonderfully effective).

Attention, Sudafed®: no one is fooled into thinking that your original product is behind the pharmacy counter now because it is such a terrifyingly potent nasal decongestant. It did not suddenly become worth more money just because it became more annoying to get; if anything, you should be dropping your prices. What you charge for your fake decongestant? That's about what a decongestant is supposed to cost.

Nick, honey, by the way: I'm bringing you fake Sudafed®. I'm sorry, but I'm taking a moral stand here.

So, off to Paris I go, OTC meds and Airborne® in tow. Hopefully Nick will have a phone line by Friday--it has been delayed for three months, but now that France Telecom has been sued for a fortune for just this sort of thing, they'll be happy to come take a look at his line. Come to think of it, there is absolutely no chance of a working phone by Friday. I'll be calling my boyfriend on calling cards for the rest of our natural lives.

And with the fake Sudafed®, I probably won't be able to understand a word through the congestion.

Old New York

I was feeling very New Yorker-y on Friday. Elena and I went to Bloomingdale's (I refused to go to Herald Square again--you get this feeling like you could crowd-surf, but if you did you wouldn't get anywhere, since the 89 zillion people are all milling in random directions), and I took four buses and only one subway over the course of the day.

Also, to celebrate Mary's birthday on her birthday, I agreed to meet her at Gobo--an allegedly vegetarian restaurant that turned out to be largely vegan, as well. As a dedicated meat-eater, I normally might have gently given her a bit of a hard time, but the fact is that it was delicious, and now I want to go back and try the twenty other things on the menu I considered having.

In point of fact, after the most flawless scallion pancake (with the de rigueur mango salsa) I have ever had, I ended up with a giant mound of spinach. I had expected "spinach and orange saute with cashews" to be more of a balance of all three, but no--almost entirely just spinach. Delicious spinach, you understand (in a bit of this maddening savory ginger broth), but there's only so much spinach you can eat without interruption.

Mary, who is always vigilant about the possibility that I will loathe anything I have ordered at a restaurant that she has selected, assumed the worst about the half of the spinach that remained on my plate, but the fact is that I was already daydreaming about turning it into a side dish for something appropriately Asian-inspired the next day.

And so yesterday, realizing that I had all the necessary ingredients (and even some of the know-how) to make panko-encrusted chicken, that is what I decided to do. I got out the poaching pan Nick uses, even though it's a pain in the neck to wash, and set out little bowls of flour, egg, and panko crumbs, since most of the recipes I looked up a while back involved dipping the chicken into all three.

"Make sure the oil is nice and hot," was Nick's only recommendation. So I dropped about half an inch of oil into my pan and turned the burner on low-ish while I triple-dipped dipped my chicken. And imagine my dedication at this point, considering how much I hate touching icky things.

When I returned to my stove, the oil looked exactly the same, except for some sort of coil of texture that I ignored, because any way you slice it, this was not hot bubbling oil. So I began washing some dishes to kill time, which is what I was doing when the oil first exploded.

I'm talking about a four-foot-high jet of scalding oil, followed shortly by more of the same. I was able to dart in to turn down the burner a bit, but the eruptions continued, oil spattering everywhere. Now I know how Nick always makes such a wreckage of my kitchen, although I'm pretty sure I would have heard the gunshot-like reports if he had ever done anything quite this appallingly wrong.

I developed this idea that maybe the oil would settle down if it had something to focus its energy on, so I slid over to drop in some of the chicken. I got two pieces into the pan, but the second one set off a series of explosions so violent that I had to hide behind my refrigerator. "You probably overheated the oil," Nick mused today. "That happens."

I could kill him; I swear I could.

It was all smooth sailing from there, though, and the chicken was a perfect counterpoint to the still-excellent spinach. Unfortunately, this drama put me even further behind for my trek out to Brooklyn for Mary's birthday (observed).

It was a great party once I got there, though; everyone was having a great time, and there was grilled pineapple, which is always a bonus. My highlight was when Mary's coworker, Jerome, whipped out his digital camera. "How impressed you are will depend on where you're from and how long you've been here," he warned. Then he turned it around, and my jaw dropped as three or four photos slid by of a 4 train covered in a massive piece of graffiti--every car was tagged, and we're talking one of those thorough, full-color murals here.

The kind that isn't supposed to be possible anymore.

I have not lived here long enough to have ever seen such a thing, myself, but I know enough to know how incredibly special it is to see now. The party spent the next half-hour arguing about whether it was commissioned, how and where it had been done, whether Jerome's assertion that it was by some group of Europeans had any merit, and how it had ever been allowed to leave the train yard that way.

Ever feel nostalgic for a place you've never been?

Another of Mary's coworkers walked with me to the train, while his friend dropped back and lit a joint. The contrast to the pot-smokers I knew in college who thought they were so reckless and daring could not have been more palpable as the slightly sickening scent wafted along the deserted sidewalk. And the stories the two of them swapped about falling asleep on late-night trains and waking up in trainyards to the sound of seagulls made me feel like a New York dilettante for all the cabs I have given up and fallen into over the last three years.

When I eventually got to 96th St., the subway station was packed, and there was a 1 train heading in just behind the 2 I had arrived on. And while I had had every intention of taking a cab, people being around is what makes me feel safe, so how could I be so arbitrary as to say that just because it was 2:30am it was too dangerous to walk seven minutes in Washington Heights?

As I walked up wide, well-lit St. Nicholas with the restaurant/bars still hopping, and then turned onto 185th with the three Yeshiva security stations in two blocks, I felt sick, if only because I felt so safe. One more barrier between me and the real life of this city has come down; I no longer have to find a way to be surgically dropped at my doorstep just because it's dark out. I no longer have an excuse to "have to" drop money on a cab.

I am one step closer to waking up under seagulls.

The Singer

After just a few days of living in Washington Heights, I came up with a basic rule that is now second nature: eye contact is bad. Actually, it's a little more complicated than that.

I do not make eye contact with most men in my neighborhood. The Yeshiva kids are largely exempt from this rule, if only because it's impossible to be too obnoxious while wearing a yarmulke. Hell, I've never even had to say "Back off or I'm calling your mother," but I'm 99% positive that it would work like a charm if I ever did.

Also in the "safe" category are men with small children, and anyone whose clothing would be appropriate in a Midtown law firm. On the other hand, any male wearing one of those puffy coats will be strictly ignored. This is because (although Mary will be skeptical) this rule is not about race; it's about culture. And the men around here who have bought into the dominant local culture are aggressive.

A lovely Southern woman I know who moved here and did not know this ended up terrified of the hallways in her own building after she made one minute of small talk with a man who lived there, who then got really creepy and insistent that she come in to his place and "get more comfortable." And some of the things that I hear from guys on the street are just obscene, and no one endears himself to me by jutting his chin out and staring as we pass each other, especially when he turns his head as we do so that it's about six inches from my face. Which happens far more often than you would imagine.

My personal understanding of what it means to be "polite" would triple the time (at least) that it takes me to walk to the subway, and would probably result in being followed a lot, if not outright stalked. My version of minimally "polite" (smiling when smiled at; responding to greetings in kind) is not appropriate in my neighborhood, at least not with the men.

So no eye contact; no change of expression.

Last night, the flaw in my plan was exposed: it only works for brief encounters.

As I left the subway station, I heard this guy singing to himself. Since I had to call Mary, I wasn't thinking much about it, until he drew even with me and began singing to me. He kept pace for four blocks, and I tried to keep up a normal conversation (although I did wish we were talking about something a little less silly than making plans and sharing gossip).

It quickly got ridiculous. I cannot describe how difficult it was to keep a straight face, especially when Mary suddenly asked, "Who is that singing?"

"I'm not talking about that," I said, hoping that would suffice.

"Okay, but there is someone, right? I'm not just making that up?"

"There really is."

"You're running up your minutes," the guy stopped singing long enough to inform me.

"Mobile-to-mobile" shot out of the side of my mouth, and although I tried to go right back to telling Mary that I wasn't sure if Elena would be up for a group thing on Friday but that I would totally let her know, my cover was blown.

Fortunately, my singer was, as his approach suggests, a bit unusual. When I paused to tell him a bit about Nick and my feelings on monogamy, compliment his singing voice, and firmly wish him goodnight, he did not exactly go gracefully, but his protestations were all made with a sense of humor, and he did go.

I do think, though, that this will make a lovely "How-We-Met" story for him and some single girl someday. It may take an awful lot of singing to strangers first, though....

Extra-Large

I've signed up for events/offers/news listservs before. They sucked. I got tons of useless mail, and eventually dumped them all.

Andrea somehow does this much, much better than I do. Shocking, right?

Somehow this remarkable young woman manages to be in the middle of everything. Not only is she a Nielsen family, but there was this one awesome evening when we had $2 glasses of sangria at the Park East Grill, which, frankly, is not all that easy. And last night, my walking in-crowd of a friend broke into her kit of promotional materials and threw a party for the premiere of Gay, Straight, or Taken, Television for Women's foray into the world of vicious reality TV.

She had T-shirts, and paddles (so that we could wave them when we thought we knew a guy's status), and snacks. And although her being a Nielsen family might have had something to do with Lifetime's selection of her as the sort of person who should really throw a party to watch the premiere of their new show, somehow I suspect that she would have been on the list anyway. 'Cause she's just that cool.

And although we had previously commented on how bizarrely addictive Lifetime Original Movies are, we still got sucked into the one that began a minute after the dating show. And it was worth completely missing my bedtime to see Kaley Cuoco (who has apparently gotten younger since she played an obnoxious college student on Charmed) play an obnoxious high school student in a fat suit.

Of course, food and weight mean different things to all of us, and by that point in the evening, everyone was ready to be vicious and sarcastic. And nothing is calculated to produce more tension than four women of distinctly different builds, histories, and philosophies sitting around making fun of a movie about being nice to fat people. There will be surprises, is all I'm saying.

It gets especially thought-provoking when they are all sitting around in large or extra-large T-shirts, since that's the only kind the network sent out--apparently junior sizes are more cost-effective.

In other news, I have found a new and exciting way to take care of my health. Wary of rupturing another hip with yoga (stand and place your right foot in the socket of your left hip. Fold forward from the waist, keeping left leg straight, until your palms touch the ground. Shift weight forward, bending elbows, and carefully lift your left foot off the ground, resting each knee on each elbow. Then we can talk), I am taking a bit of a break and looking to care for myself nutritionally.

My solution?

Wheat grass.

I saw some in WholeFoods, and immediately fantasized about all the healthy shakes I could make. Then I envisioned a huge box of rotting wheat grass in my fridge, and walked away. Remembering that I have a blender and plenty of alcohol, I walked right back.

"When we live together, I'm in charge of the grocery shopping," Nick told me when he heard this reasoning.

Anyway. Now I'm sipping a wheat-grass-tangerine-juice-and-rum smoothie, which could use less ice and more tangerine, but really doesn't suck, especially once the rum kicks in. So the joke is on Nick.

I'm going to end up as a Lifetime Original Movie. I just know it.

Lost in Transit

Ever have one of those days where you know from the moment you leave the house that it just cannot go well?

I wanted to turn around and go home before the first subway stop, when I learned that half of the 1 line between me and civilization was shut down. And while it's true that I stopped listening after I first heard the words "shuttle bus," I should point out that there would have been at least three more steps involved in picking up the 1 on the other side of the construction break.

I wanted to turn around. But I was on my way to meet Mary, and then rush over to meet Andrea, who was already (legitimately) skeptical of how much time it had taken me to walk out my door in the first place. And if I turned around now, I would never make it out to Tiffanie's birthday party later, and I really wanted to go.

Besides, I had just invested in an all-day Metro card.

What followed was an ugly snarl of subway lines, peppered with stupid mistakes of my own. It was in the high 70's in January, and it feels like I spent more than half the afternoon underground. To add insult to injury, what set this all in motion was that I need to get the lovely bracelet that Nick gave me for Christmas resized (I have freakishly small wrists). And that, as it turns out, will be quite a challenge, and I don't even know where I can get it done, so.... So I spent the evening fretting, with the thing still tucked safely in my purse.

And false starts were the order of the day: one of the reasons I was so adamant about going to Tiffanie's party (which, although far away, was at least easily accessible--by yet another line that was shut down) was that I hoped to see an old friend who had left me a mysterious voice mail the day before. Naturally, she did not attend, although she might have been the only 20-something in Manhattan who was not packed into Fat Baby last night.

To top off the evening, a giant rat jumped out at Andrea and me on 78th St. When I first saw it, I prayed that it was a cat, and when it bumped into her leg, and she said it felt a whole lot like her dog, but we saw it running away across the street. And it was just a giant rat. And although we both let out one heartfelt scream apiece, the two frat boys about fifty yards ahead of us didn't even flinch, much less turn around to make sure no one was, say, being raped. Thanks, guys.

Anyway. It was fine; everything was fine. I got lots of quality time with friends (some of whom I haven't seen in months), and I got to tell Andrea that I hadn't killed her hyacinth after all (my mother read my last entry and told me that that's what they do--they need to be propped up. She also implied that I really need to chill out a little).

And today I get to shake it off and start fresh, and that is even better news.

Thriving

Last weekend, Andrea brought me a hyacinth. And I've been staring at it compulsively ever since.

I love hyacinth. The blossoms are perky and unique, and the perfume is amazing. And, it turns out, it is the perfect plant to raise in my apartment: it dislikes direct sunlight, and I have none to menace it with. Also, it suggests a somewhat laid-back watering schedule, at least before it blooms. "She knows you," Nick gloated.

The thing that terrifies me is that it bloomed almost right away. The thing is thriving. It loves it here, and I know that this cannot last.

When I was younger, my mother, who has a great green thumb, tried to get me excited about plants. She bought a mini cactus garden, and we tried really hard. A couple of weeks later, when I carelessly bumped it, all the cacti fell over, their roots lifting right out of the gravel.

I had killed a whole cactus garden. By underwatering. Seriously.

My mother, undaunted, gave me a patch of garden in the back yard. None of my plants did better than indifferently (and most did worse), except for the morning glories that quickly grew over the top of our eight-foot fence and vaguely resembled Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors. This impression was in no way ameliorated by the sunflowers I planted one year, which grew to monstrous proportions and then promptly died, leaving their sagging heads to menace anyone who made it through the morning-gloried-over gate.

In high school I suffered through a reprise of the cactus garden incident when I brought an ivy plant in for extra credit in biology. Basically, we got points for keeping plants alive in the classroom, and my mother assured me that she had a plan. "This thing has been neglected for years," she said, thrusting the ivy at me. "There's just no way to kill it in two semesters."

I got the extra credit, but I'm quite positive that it was out of pity.

My mother threw away the poor brown plant as soon as I brought it home, and has learned to be wary of me, because in all of these cases, the problem was never neglect. I paid near-constant attention to all of these plants; I just suffered from some kind of mental block that prevented me from interpreting the care instructions correctly. (Except for the morning glories. Those were just weird.)

A few years ago in Philadelphia, I decided that I was ready to try again. I bought an African violet, and I bought plant food specifically for African violets. I read the instructions, and I called my mother and read them to her.

As it turns out, none of these precautions can make up for placing an African violet above a radiator, because although it initially flourished, it was only a matter of time before the whole thing began to discolor. And, because I did not know this then, I could only watch (and tear at my hair and face) as the leaves slowly drooped and died.

Now I own a hyacinth, and I love it, and I want it to be the plant that breaks my curse. And it has blossomed, and delicately scented every inch of my apartment, and this morning I woke up and something was wrong.

Okay; I know that plants grow toward sunlight. But when I glanced over this morning to see the three stalks completely flattened out, can you blame me for thinking that something was wrong? Would you have noticed right away that they were all flattened in the same direction?

And so now I sit here and fret, because even though it says it wants no direct sunlight, might it want more indirect sunlight than it is getting? Could the growing-to-light thing be a red herring? Is it languishing from lack of water while I complacently review photosynthesis? Am I killing it already??

I began doing yoga again tonight (my muscles are now jelly), but then I went right back to staring at the hyacinth. And now I'm sipping leftover New Year's champagne and typing and planning my dinner, but I cannot count the number of times that I have stopped to stare at the hyacinth. I turned it around this morning, but as of right now, it's still flat.

I need it to straighten back up; I really do.

Happy New Year

We never did make it to Kevin's party, and I do feel bad about that. On the other hand, it feels like the whole thing has a touch of fate about it, because that makes three years in a row that I have entirely intended to check out this amazing party he throws, and three years that I haven't made it.

Two years ago, Melissa had just moved into her new place in the Bronx, and I promised to go out there for her combination housewarming/New Year's Eve party. I had every intention of going from there to Kevin's before midnight, but the people who were supposed to leave with me didn't, and I was pretty jumpy about heading back to the subway alone. And since her apartment is cool and the party was fun, I decided not to fret over what I was missing--not Kevin's party, and not Matt's, even though I found out later that Nick might have gone to Matt's with Mary if I had gone, and I could have met him 4.5 months earlier.

See? Fate is everywhere on New Year's Eve.

Last year was not my fault; Aaron and Langley appeared in Boston, so we hijacked Mary and Elon and the six of us went out there. We wound up eating pizza with champagne around 3am, and had a blast. I was simply outvoted, city-wise.

This year might have been the tipping point, though: now I am beginning to believe I might never see Kevin on New Year's Eve. The party was ridiculously close to me, considering how ridiculously far from most of the city I live, and we had an extra bottle of cherry champagne all ready to go. We had no other commitments, and we were in New York.

Five minutes after my apartment was clear of my New Year's Eve Eve guests, Nick wrapped me in a bear hug. "This is the first day you weren't sick, and you were cooking all day. How about tomorrow we go get some good champagne, cook a great meal, and spend New Year's on the couch?"

Kevin, I'm so sorry. I hear it's incredible every year, and I wish I had been there last year, and the year before, and known you better the year before that, when I went to Avalon before I knew the city and it took me almost as long to get home as I had spent in the club.

This year, though--this year I wouldn't trade for anything.