On Sunday I taught Six-Year Old Daughter how to ride her bike without training wheels. It was pretty satisfying stuff, but sprinting down the street wile bent over at a 45 degree angle and holding onto a speeding Strawberry Shortcake bicycle is not only exhausting but, even worse, it severely compromises my city cred. I’m afraid that a semi-regular exercise program only counts for so much when you’re kicking down the door of middle age. Despite the fact that I was obviously near death, all I got from Daughter were pitiful pleadings for just one more lap. Perhaps she got hold of my Benevolent Dictators, Inc. life insurance policy and discovered she is second in line for a payday and was looking to expedite a payout by giving me a fatal heart attack. You can get a ton of Disney schwag with that kind of coin.

In addition to a level of exhaustion that I am generally not accustomed to, there was a small piece of me that just wanted to sit on the patio in the sun and read the special summer movie supplement that was in the Sunday Times. What a hero. I try my best but I am imperfect.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms. To Mrs. Wife: I apologize for not keeping my eyes open in the delivery room. Either time. That afternoon really seemed to belong to you and the girls, and I think I know what would have happened if I had peeked. I didn’t want to make it all about me and the immediate medical attention I would have required. My heart was in the right place.

We saw Iron Man so summer is officially underway. I don’t care what the temperature is, if I see a movie that cost $100M+ to make, it’s summer. It was fun and anyone who says otherwise needs to lighten up. I’m glad they made the effort to develop the characters, although the big fight sequence at the end between Iron Man and Crazy Jeff Bridges Robot looked an awful lot like RoboCop, which I hated. I was hoping that Crazy Jeff Bridges Robot would step on and squish Gwyneth Paltrow like a bug, but then I realized that it was only a movie and that she would, in reality, still be alive. Well, it would have been a visceral thrill, that’s for sure. They could have done that little favor for us. The CGI probably would have only cost another $10-20K and they could have easily paid for it by taking up a collection. I’d have kicked in. It would have been for a good cause.

During a recent office luncheon, we were all asked, given the choice, what superpower we would like to have. I volunteered to go first and said that I would like to have the superpower of never needing sleep. Can you imagine! I’m Wide-Awake Man! You could live the equivalent of two lifetimes. I thought I was being creative. I thought that choosing flight or invisibility or the ability to see through a pretty girl’s clothing, although quite useful, was too obvious and lacked originality. I wanted to prove to a room full of investment bankers how clever I could be.

Each and every person after me picked something that would benefit mankind. The ability to end war. Cure disease. Eliminate hunger. What a bunch of losers. Seriously! If you were given the choice of any superpower you wanted, why would you waste it on something stupid like that? Boy, I showed them.

* * *

Cell phones are here to stay. They are permanently weaved into the fabric of society and people are going to abuse them. That’s never gong to change, so I need to just get over it. When something gets under my skin, I don’t pussyfoot around. I make stewing about it part of my every waking moment. Otherwise, why bother? In my defense, if you had to put up with as much cell phone nonsense as I do, you’d be driven mad as well.

* * *

Take it from me, no matter how many times you do it, you never get use to spending $10 for lunch. It costs me upwards of $200 per month for a sandwich, bag of sea salt chips (crisps, for my UK readers) and a bottle of water every day. Awful.

* * *

I love the tourists. I really do. They are a vital part of the city’s economy and a constant reminder that I am lucky enough to live in a place where people like to visit for vacation. There isn’t a tourism office where I grew up in Cleveland, so I know the difference between the two environments and this is definitely more to my liking. But, JESUS CHRIST they’re overrunning my city! Because of the pitifully weak dollar (thank you, Mr. President, for fucking-up our currency on the world market), the city is choked with British and European tourists. You have to wait in line to walk up Fifth Avenue, for cryin’ out loud. And it’s only going to get worse as the weather improves. Other than that, they’re great.

I thought it was going to be just another dull Wednesday. It wasn’t. Late in the afternoon I impulsively got my mitts on tickets to see Port Authority, the Connor McPherson play at the Atlantic Theater that’s currently in previews. It’s the U.S. premier of one of his older plays. (“Older” being relative. He was born in 1971 so he’s still quite young, especially for someone who has had so many plays produced.)

How is it that one guy can pump out one great play after another? It doesn’t seem possible. Or fair. Three men, representing three different stages in life, sit in a train station and take turns telling the audience a story. That’s it. So simple, yet, so amazingly effective. A young man and a girl are too afraid to act and risk losing each other. A middle aged man is given a chance to be better than he is. An old man wonders if, 40 years ago, he should have pursued a woman he barely knew, but loved, instead of staying with the one he was married to. Does that sound plausible to you? Can a person ache for someone year after year without ever actually seeing or speaking to them? I’m certain that it happens all the time.

Prior to the play I went down to St. Mark’s Place for dinner. I wanted to eat at the DoJo but I’m sorry to report that it’s gone. Replaced by I don’t know what. Some stinking nuevo restaurant with a lot of bright, fetid colors. Instead, I ate at a Korean restaurant and had big helping of Dak Di Ri Tang, which is a spicy chicken stew. It’s served in a black stone bowl that’s kept in the oven. The bowl is so insanely hot that the stew continued to boil for a few minutes after it was brought to my table. First, a few layers of skin on my tongue were peeled back because the stew was the temperature of molten lava and then my guts were seared by the Korean spices. Please mum, may I have another!

Before eating I popped into the Strand rare book room to feed the beast. I scored a signed proof of Right Livelihoods by Rick Moody, a signed first edition of The Yiddish Policeman’s Union by Michael Chabon and, best of all, a signed proof of Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson. Everything was inexpensive except for the Denis Johnson book. He’s a recluse and never goes out on promotional tours (much to his publisher’s chagrin, I’m sure), so you have to pay a premium for his signed books. I also visited St. Mark’s Books and picked up a signed first of the new Michael Chabon book that McSweeney’s just published, Maps and Legends.

The irony is that because all of these books are signed, I cannot read them since reading them—even once—will degrade their condition. If I want to read one, I have to go out and buy a reading copy. Who the hell buys books that cannot be read? I also picked up a paperback copy of The Best American Short Stories of 2005. It has a stellar lineup of writers and was edited by Michael Chabon (a theme emerges). I found it on the carts outside of The Strand and it was only one measly dollar. The opposite end of the spectrum.

I have a colleague at Benevolent Dictators, Inc. with whom I have one of those jokey, elbow-in-the-ribs kind of relationships. You know the type; lots of sarcasm and insults that aren’t really insults. He makes fun of my gray hair, I tell him how happy I am that I’ll never be bald (he will be).

This morning I mentioned my upcoming trip to Mordor—I mean Disneyworld—and he said he wants a full report upon my return. He’s a divorced dad with an adorable 9-year old daughter who lives in New Jersey. He lives in the city with New Younger Mommy. He said that he’s been thinking about taking his daughter to Disneyworld for quite some time and feels like a bad dad that he hasn’t done so yet. My clever retort was, “Well, you can go ahead and take her, but you’ll still be a terrible father.” The color drained from his face and his eyes reddened and welled-up with tears. I went drilling and hit a nerve. I didn’t mean to. We had a few uncomfortable moments and recovered. Things are fine between us but, shit, I need to watch what I say. Actually, that’s a reoccurring theme throughout my life. I’ve been fired from jobs because of how clever and witty I can be sometimes.