Grandma's House: A Tour

With my new schedule, I have Mondays off, so recently I visited my parents and borrowed their car to see my grandmother. Here are a few snapshots.

Even though we usually go out for a huge amount of deli food at Buddy's, she always feels the need to feed me when we return to her house. My favorite things to eat there are sliced green apples and refrigerated Chips Ahoy cookies.

When I was growing up, I thought this ceramic sculpture was the most beautiful thing in the world.

A photograph of two sisters: Her biological mother (left) and the mother who raised her (right).

A letter to my great-grandfather after he emigrated to America. It reads:

Dear Mr. Glass -

I had the pleasure of presiding at the term of Court which admitted you to the privileges and obligations of American citizenship and I want to drop you this little line of congratulations and good wishes.

I know from the report of the Government and from my observation of you that the country has gained a good and loyal citizen.

I am enclosing a copy of the oath of allegiance, which is recited in our schools, and I hope you will put it in a conspicuous place, because we will all be better citizens through knowing it by hear and reciting it frequently.

With best wishes,

Yours sincerely,

Frank S. Gannon, Jr.

And a picture of my baby cousin Sam, for good measure.

International Women's Day

I first read Sojourner Truth's speech Ain't I A Woman when I was in fourth grade. Some research states that the speech was embellished by Francis Dana Gage, but it still gives me chills.

AIN'T I A WOMAN?

by Sojourner Truth

Delivered 1851 at the Women's Convention in Akron, Ohio

Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?

Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.

If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.

Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.

The Most Dangerous Place

There has been a lot of talk recently about the billboard that went up (and then quickly down) in Soho. One of the best comments I've read came from one of the readers at Sociological Images

Bea Strike 2:03 pm on February 28, 2011 | # | Reply

Interesting.

I’d think the most dangerous place for an African American child would be in in our nation’s inner cities and small towns in which their parents are under and unemployed so the children are subsequently undernourished and mal-nutritioned, under-educated, and poorly housed while suffering health neglect that ultimately leads to, among other things, unplanned and unwanted pregnancies.

I’d think the most dangerous place for an African American child is a state that is hostile to their equal human rights but wants to use the specific tragedies and travesties of African American history to distort and distract from that fact.

But, that’s what I get for thinking.

(My) Top Ten 30 Rock Episodes: PART THREE

In honor of my chance encounter with Jack McBrayer the other night at the MOMI Salute, I'll finish what I started (a rarity for me) and complete this epic list. Forgive the writing style, I've been slightly flu-ish recently.

7. BELIEVE IN THE STARS (SEASON 3)

So many reasons to love this episode, but most of them involve Liz Lemon saying inappropriate things to a 13-year-old girl whom she believes is Oprah, while under the influence of drugs. It might have just been another Comanaprosil side effect, in addition to dizziness, sexual nightmares, and sleep crime.

Also, this episode introduced the idea of my work-self suffocating my life-me, which is how I feel 75% of the time.

FAVORITE LINES

Liz: I’m trying to adopt a baby. But my job is making it impossible because my work-self is suffocating my life-me. I’m Liz Lemon and I lost my virginity at 25. I saw the show about following fear and it inspired me to wear shorts to work. It didn’t go great. Do you know Tracy Jordan? I took a pill earlier. I didn’t get September issue of O Magazine. Do you have the number for subscriptions? Why would you!? I eat emotionally. And one time at summer camp, I kissed a girl on a dare but then she drowned.

Jack: It’s okay. It happens to the best of us. In-flight medication is how I met M. Night Shyamalan, until it turned out to be...
Jonathan: That was the best day in my life!

8. ANNA HOWARD SHAW DAY (SEASON 4)

This is another one of my favorites, but it features one of those classic television absences-of-logic that I find so annoying. Liz needs someone to drive her home from her deliberately planned Valentine's Day root canal, but everyone has romantic plans. She stoops to asking a male escort, who bails after a chlamydia outbreak. Woe is Liz. HAS SHE EVER HEARD OF A TAXI?

Sorry for shouting. It's still a great episode, because it features the return of all of her ex-boyfriends, Avery Jessup, a very thin Horatio Sanz, and the use of "bobsled" as a greeting. Also, I know she is onscreen for about 30 seconds, but I deeply love the tall dental hygienist who has the gap between her teeth. I often repeat her line in my head: "I say we order her some pizza and lock 'er in 'ere for da weekend."

FAVORITE LINES

Jack: Frankly, I could use a win.
Liz: A win? What’s with the euphemisms, Jack? Why don’t you just say you want some [makes hand gestures].
Jack: Is that sex?
Liz: It is the way I do it.

Frank: That cleaning lady finally agreed to go out with me. We’re going to pick up some pierogis and then eat them at her husband’s grave.

Liz: I scheduled a root canal for February 14^th, Jack. I will spend half the day in twilight sleep and then I will go home and watch the Original Lifetime Movie, “My Stepson Is My Cyber Husband.”

Lutz: Hey, has anybody heard about any cool new sex positions? My girlfriend’s visiting for Valentine’s and I want to keep things caliente.
Liz: Oh my God, Lutz. Are you still pretending Karen exists?
Lutz: She’s real! Would a fake woman have a personal website at jdlutz.com\karen\proof?

Liz: Wow, Avery Jessup. She’s hot. She was on Maxim’s “I’d Rape That 100.”

9. DEALBREAKERS TALK SHOW #0001 (SEASON 4)

This episode came out while I was still in China, and I remember sitting with Jessica and laughing hysterically. It's one of the straight-up funniest episodes of the series and, in addition to Liz's pre-show identity crisis, the HD Camera becomes an endlessly rich resource for jokes.

FAVORITE LINES

Liz: I’m a star! I’m on top! Someone bring me some HAM! I used to sing that when I was a kid.

Liz: Actually I got three haircuts. The first two made me look nuts. Hey, do I say the word “camera” weird? Camer-ah. Camer-ah. Camer-ah.

Pete: Okay, here we go! One more! This is the one. And action! Great. And smile. With your mouth! And raise the roof. Look boy, you can do it. Good!… Oh my God. Break it down, break it down. Oh, yeah, sassy. Sass it up. Wave to a friend. No, wave like a human being. Do you remember waving? And blow a kiss. No, with your hands! And uh, a little cleavage. Nope! Just have fun. Are you spinning a basketball?

10. BROOKLYN WITHOUT LIMITS (SEASON 5)

I've been having my misgivings about Season 5. They opened the show with a mediocre episode that also featured an oddly placed and unfunny rape joke about Pete's wife. The season continued on its bumpy way until Brooklyn Without Limits, which showcases Liz's faux liberal bleeding heart and makes fun of all the rest of the local-organic-Fair-Trade-outer-borough-hipsters. But most of all, it features overall shorts. Like any self-respecting 7th grader, I owned multiple pairs and I wore them until I realized how monumentally hideous they look on anybody with hips or boobs or both. Long story short, this episode was good enough to round out my Top 10, and I hope the season continues in this vein.

FAVORITE LINES

Liz: This place is trying way too hard. Why are their straitjackets everywhere?
Jenna: Because before this was a clothing store it was a mental hospital. It’s winky and fun.

Liz: They’re from Brooklyn Without Limits. It’s this very cool store with locations in Gaytown, White Harlem, and the Van Beardswick section of Brooklyn. And they don’t just look great. See the tag? “Hand Made in USA.” Because BWL is all about fair trade and local artisans and staying green.

Liz: These jeans totally make up for all the times I took a long hot shower because I was bored.

Liz: You and Tracy deserve each other. I don’t know who to be more disappointed in.
Jenna: Me silly. I’m more aware of what I’m doing!

Liz: I’m a freelancer, which is pretty much a modern day cowboy. And I live like a cowboy by buying quality locally made jeans. Also by eating beans out of a can, due to impatience.

Jack: Do you know who owns Brooklyn Without Limits?
Liz: Brooklyn Zach. He throws pool parties in dumpsters
Jack: Halliburton.

Jack: It’s not Hand Made in the USA. It’s pronounced Han Made in Usa. The Hand people are a Vietnamese slave tribe and Usa is their island prison. They made your jeans. You know how they get the stitching so small? Orphans.

Be Back Soon

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

(My) Top Ten 30 Rock Episodes: PART TWO

4. SANDWICH DAY (SEASON 2)

In this episode, the Teamsters engage in a yearly tradition of buying everyone sandwiches from a secret deli in Brooklyn ("and the dipping sauce - oh, the dipping sauce!"), and Floyd shows up for a brief reunion with Liz. I love this episode for a couple reasons, but mostly because it contains one of the most romantic lines in moving image history: "I wolfed my Teamster sub for you."

FAVORITE LINES

Floyd: Can I take you out to dinner tonight? Maybe we can go to that barbecue place you puked at.
Liz: (flirtatiously): You'll have to be more specific.

Lutz (to the Teamsters): I know what driving the long-haul is like! After my junior year at Oberlin, we road-tripped to South by Southwest!

5. JACKIE JORMP-JOMP (SEASON 3)

First of all, this episode starts out with Jeffery Weinerslav (pronounced "weiner slave"), who I bumped into at a CVS in Astoria a few years ago. I am starstruck by the most minor of celebrities, so I asked if he was on 30 Rock and told him how much I enjoyed his role on the show. He was extremely nice and we had a little chat and he asked if I was an actress, which made my year.

Beyond that, this episode is near perfection, from Liz's harassment of the Polish doormen to Jenna's role in the Janis Joplin biopic to the terrific performances by the women in the leisure/fight club.

FAVORITE LINES

Liz: No! I need a little more time off. I'm on humanity leave.
Jack: Good God, what Indigo Girls song is that from?
Liz: "Syllabus of Us." It's off Vagabonds, Martyrs and Quilts.

Tracy: Honesty and trust is very important in an entourage. Like that HBO show, John Adams.

Liz: Emily and her friends are happy!
Jack: Believe me, there is no solace in their luxury, only deep despair.
Liz: How do you know all these Indigo Girls songs?

6. THE BUBBLE (SEASON 3)

I know I'm getting hyperbolic with all of these favorite episodes, but "The Bubble" is just brilliant. I love how it highlights our society's lookism in such a playful, good-natured way. (Against my better nature, I myself give an incredible amount of leeway to attractive people.) Jon Hamm actually isn't my type, but I think he has a wonderful sense of humor and was great at portraying life inside the bubble.

FAVORITE LINES

Jack: Lemon, I don't share this often, but this is a photo of me when I was 25 years old.
Liz: What the what?! You have a Superman chest!
Jack: I know.
Liz: Oh my God, the lady will have two tickets to the gun show! Your eyes are so much bluer. What happened to your eyes?

Jack: Beautiful people are treated differently, from, say, moderately pleasant looking people. They live in a bubble. A bubble of free drinks, kindness and outdoor sex.

Drew: I don’t see it on the menu, but I would love a catfish po’boy and a diet raspberry Fanta.
Liz: Oh, that is a great idea. Let me order that for you.
(She covers his face with a menu)
Liz: Excuse me, we will have a turkey burger deluxe and a catfish po’boy with a diet raspberry Fanta.
Waitress: I’m gonna come back in five minutes. You try to order off the menu again I will smack those glasses off your face.
Liz: Okay. Thank you.
Waitress: You’re welcome.
Drew: What was that? Why didn’t she call you “sweetheart”? And where’s the complimentary app sampler? What’s going on?

Liz: See because of your whole, you know, Disney prince thing -
Drew: Actually they used footage of me from my high school swim team to draw Prince Eric.