I was given the following hygiene report from 6 year-old daughter:

I don’t think Doree brushed her teeth today because she went like this to me—HHHAAAAAAGGGH!!!—and it smelled like pretzels.

Sure, it’s just pretzels now but what happens when she moves on to the hard stuff? Have you ever gotten close to someone who just polished off a big bag of sour cream and onion chips? Or, that neutron bomb of snack foods, Smokin’ Cheddar Cheese BBQ Doritos? It’s a slippery slope, Doree. Please don’t make me organize an intervention.

I saw Miss H. sing last night. She and her band participated in a Battle of the Bands at a club on 30th St. The bands, nine in all, are part of an organization comprised of weekend warriors. They are all highly accomplished musicians who got caught in the maelstrom of life and woke up one day to find themselves doing something other than making music for a living.

It’s a little disconcerting to be listening to a speed metal version of “Hocus Pocus” by Focus and look up on stage and see a bunch a guys who look more like accountants and plumbers than rock stars. There were a lot of receding hairlines, bulging waists and preening that’s more appropriate for people half their age, but do you know what? It was obvious that they were all visiting their version of heaven, so I will not judge. Miss H. ripped through a version of Alanis Morissette’s “Uninvited” that was a world away from her life as a former client service executive at a financial institution. I didn’t recognize her. She was great. There were girls dancing in suspended cages who were, thank God, age appropriate for that job.

Beforehand, I ate at the infamous Gyro II across the street from Madison Square Garden. How can a sandwich that smells so rancid and trails such a foul stench and looks like guts on pita be so scrumptious? A Gyro II gyro laughs at the laws of science and nature. It may reek and give you trench breath, but when you bite into it, it fills your mouth with happiness and joy. And for a lousy $6.50, well, you just can’t go wrong. I wish I were using a scratch-n’-sniff font so I could share its essence with you right now.

Here’s a pearl of wisdom to chew on from our friends the Buddhists:

Hey you, expecting results without effort! So sensitive! So long-suffering! You, in the clutches of death, acting like an immortal! Hey sufferer, you are destroying yourself!

-Santideva, Bodhicaryavatara

I’m reading Religions of the World: Buddhism by Bradley Hawkins. Holy Christ, it’s dull! I was hoping to supplement some of the material I’ve been reading about Buddhist philosophy with a history lesson but I don’t know if I’ll make it through this. The names are too long to remember and contain too many Y’s and V’s.

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Nick Lowe played Manhattan’s Grand Ballroom this week. I saw the same show last Fall. It was a balmy September evening and he played on an outdoor stage that was set up about two blocks north of a big hole in the ground where the World Trade Center use to be. If you have a minute, read the review that ran in the N.Y. Times today. That guy is a genius from way, way back and his new album At My Age is a quiet masterpiece. It’ll make you wistful. Get it.

I walked through Bryant Park this morning. It was just beautiful out. [Architectural highlight: if you stand in the southwest corner and look up, you can see the Chrysler Building in front of you and the Empire State Building to your right.] Around the edge of the newly-planted lawn were a bunch of signs that read:

Lawn Closed.
The new sod is establishing its root system.
Thank you for your cooperation.

A thin red rope about knee high ran along the perimeter of the lawn. The lawn looked like the fairway of a golf course. Each blade of grass was the exact same uniform height. Nobody walked on it. I started to think about the incredible arc that the city has traveled from the first day I got here until this morning. When I arrived, Bryant Park (along with Union Square) were dangerous, decrepit places that you didn’t even THINK about going into. They were overrun with drug addicts, homeless alcoholics and all manner of predators. The slime from the strip of porno theaters on 42nd St. emptied out into the Park. They would have used the “Lawn Closed” signs to feed their trash can bonfires and the rope to tie up and roll tourists who accidented into the area. It was a far cry from the 60’s when Mr. French use to take Buffy and Jodi there for walks.

I like it better this way. A lot of people lament the demise of “old” New York and scorn the Disneyficiation of 42nd St., and I get that. I see their point. Something was lost. But I don’t agree with them. It was scary and unpleasant and I’m glad that it’s different now. I like walking through the Park in the morning listening to Ella Fitzgerald singing out of my earbuds and not having to look over my shoulder. Just call me whitey-white man, I suppose.