It rained heavily today... or it rained today, heavily. Rain fell today in large quantities. It rained a lot today.

Update on weird usage of quotation marks! I saw two signs on the gate of a playground on 43rd St. One of them was incorrect in the way that, though so common, still drives me slightly mad:

There is no "smoking" in playground

OK, we're used to that, even if it still doesn't make any sense. The other was almost unfathomably bizarre:

"Please Keep"
"Gate"
Closed

What? What could they possibly have been getting at. Why is "gate" in its own set of quotation marks? If they're using quotation marks for emphasis, why isn't "Closed" the only word in quotes as it's the defining word of the sentence? What the hell's going on here?

I also don't recall discussing Chicken Shack on this site, so now's a perfect time. I think the restaurant is called Chicken Shack, because on its banner it has

"The World Famous" Chicken Shack

Is it world famous? Do they want us to believe that it is? Has someone been quoted as saying that Chicken Shack was "the world famous" and if so, why isn't a source cited? What's the actual name of the restaurant on their ownership documents? Does it include the quotation marks?

In my eighth grade yearbook, the editor-in-chief's quote was this: Friends come and go, but friendships are forever.

That doesn't relate to the rest of the stuff I've discussed, but it also doesn't make any "sense."

It rained heavily today... or it rained today, heavily. Rain fell today in large quantities. It rained a lot today.

Update on weird usage of quotation marks! I saw two signs on the gate of a playground on 43rd St. One of them was incorrect in the way that, though so common, still drives me slightly mad:

There is no "smoking" in playground

OK, we're used to that, even if it still doesn't make any sense. The other was almost unfathomably bizzare:

"Please Keep"
"Gate"
Closed

What? What could they possibly have been getting at. Why is "gate" in its own set of quotation marks? If they're using quotation marks for emphasis, why isn't "Closed" the only word in quotes as it's the defining word of the sentence? What the hell's going on here?

I also don't recall discussing Chicken Shack on this site, so now's a perfect time. I think the restaurant is called Chicken Shack, because on its banner it has

"The World Famous" Chicken Shack

Is it world famous? Do they want us to believe that it is? Has someone been quoted as saying that Chicken Shack was "the world famous" and if so, why isn't a source cited? What's the actual name of the restaurant on their ownership documents? Does it include the quotation marks?

In my eighth grade yearbook, the editor-in-chief's quote was this: Friends come and go, but friendships are forever.

That doesn't relate to the rest of the stuff I've discussed, but it also doesn't make any "sense."

The song is "O Fire of the Paraclete." But in Latin, so "O Ignis Spiritus Paracliti." The story of the first time I heard this song is a well-documented one. It even made it into a performance piece one time. The story, I mean. Though, come to think of it, the song was part of the piece too.

It is a story of a too-long bus ride and an inability to sleep in moving vehicles. It is a story of an accidental happening upon an almost-frequency, of the haunting voice that passed my ear and hit me someplace deeper, and of my hand upraised in the darkness--not in a celebration of religious spirituality--but in a searching grasp for something beautiful and true.

I got to the theatre on opening night of Forensic and the Navigators very early. I sat in the middle of the stage floor. No lights were on. "O Fire of the Paraclete" surrounded me, an aural blanket that seemed to flow from the speakers above and envelop me. I played it so loudly that it knocked from my mind every ounce of doubt and knot of stress. I sat in that theatre sightless but sure with the music as comfort and guide. In ninety minutes or two hours the same room would be in utter chaos--chaos I had organized--covered in breakfast cereal and filled with shouting rage. But for a moment it was calm, and for a moment it was perfect.

I have sung in cathedrals older than I can imagine. I have touched the stones of walls older than my mind can comfortably process. I have blended my voice with others and known for a moment at least a part of the whole. This music nine centuries old that nonetheless feels like a letter addressed just to me.

Here in Central Park today the song is the same. The bench I've chosen is dedicated

Every Second of Every Minute
August 8th 1997 -

The second part of the equation is left blank, waiting for an ending date.

Every second of every minute.

Rising above me, the buildings of this city with height to outmatch any cathedral I've seen. But between those buildings and this place that I sit are flowers, and this lake, the arc of a bridge sweatered in ivy, and birds skimming low across the glimmering surface.

I don't know the words they're singing. I think I prefer it that way. For me it is just the voices as one, stretching upward like my hand in that darkened bus. The voices calming my spirit like they did in that empty theatre. The voices altering the world in front of me just slightly. I am not sitting on a bench in a man-made park surrounded by this heaving metropolis.

For now it is a cathedral. This bench a pew. This pond and these trees an altar. These towering buildings stained glass above me.

O Fire of the Paraclete.

The song and this place are offering me something, I gradually learn. As the solo becomes a choir and the voices blend and pitch and yaw and soar the trees suggest the movement of a windy day. I am offered something here, so I reach my hand out expectantly to grasp it and for just a second I know that I have it. But I pull my hand back empty. And I have to wonder now if it was anything at all.

Random images of cranberry sauce and an updated book section. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

It's like 3:17 AM. I'm sitting at Scraps's apartment watching Die Hard: With A Vengeance and considering going to the deli to purchase some tasty potations.

I love New York.

Zac has indeed joined the Turbo Awesome crew, which is maybe awesome, but since I don't really know quite yet what the hell we're going to do with it, it's a little early to get excited. Scraps's initial goal was to have a site that promotes discussion. He's continuing to tinker with format in order to provide a more interesting, content-oriented feeling. He's also playing that stupid superhero game like goddamn 24/7 so who knows what's up.

But that "Equal parts turbo and awesome" at the bottom of the blog is me. All me.

***

This afternoon, I saw an undercover drug-bust that was thrillingly well-executed. After a relatively obvious drug hand-off had just taken place on 43rd St., a crowd of regular-looking guys surrounded the dealer. I thought they were friends, or screwing around or something, because all the guys were laughing.

Then up he went against a van. Out came the cuffs. Out came six bages on strings around necks.

There was no way to tell these guys were cops. The subterfuge was perfect. One of them had on a Randy Moss Jersey. Two of them looked like they were on their way home from work. They just looked like regular guys you might pass on the street. I know that's the whole point of undercover, but I've only seen it in movies when the dashingly handsome detective sticks out like a sore thumb. These guys were awesome.

More police drove by in an umarked white van that looked for all the world like just two guys making deliveries. Looking through the black mesh in the van, you could see the back was filled with police officers. Computers, phones, the works it seems.

Absolutely awesome. If you're into that sort of thing.

This isn't an especially interesting post. Fair warning.

Let's begin with extra-special good news. For all the non-believers that didn't believe it when I said it, let it be known that Family Guy is officially coming back on the air, and even has its own fully functional website. Huzzah.

Also, I think pretty much everybody who reads this lives in the NYC or LA areas (I count one confirmed Chicago and also I think one suspected North Carolina reader) so this shouldn't be too much of a journey for any of you (Elisheba excluded): Go watch the film Reconstruction when it opens near you. It's a Danish film that I was lucky enough to see at the London Film Festival and I'm pretty certain that it kicks ass. It's always possible that I'm wrong.

Finally, not that anybody gives anything approaching the ass of a rat, but once again Blogger and I are having relationship issues re: archives, so if you were hoping to read my post from like November '02 where I described a particularly amusing video-game level you're outta luck.