Amusement at the Staten Island Mall

"You're definitely not from the Brooklyn/Staten Island area, " was the line from a sweet Staten Island, Italian mother who was selling me jewelry at the Staten Island Mall right before Christmas. We had been chatting about rubies when she abruptly asked where I was from.

"I'm from here, but I live in Boston now."

I had expected that she would next pose the usual next question, "I mean where are you really from?", usually referring to my unidentifiable ethnic background.

"Oh Bawston. That's far. You're definitely not from the Brooklyn/Staten Island area."

"No no. I was born at St. Vincent's. I went to Notre Dame Academy and Staten Island Tech."

"No." She looked me in the eyes. "You just don't sound it like. No offense."

Moral of my trip to "the Mall": Can't live in Staten Island; can't live without it.

Staten Island Winter Wonderland

The house I grew up in that my mother still lives in in Staten Island sits right on the hilly Silver Lake Golf Course. In the 24 years we've had the house, I never managed to hop the fence and hang out on the golf course. Until yesterday. I never knew how fun or, dare I say it, beautiful, Staten Island can be.

With 30 inches of snow on the ground and no plow this morning to clear our street at the bottom of a steep hill, we had nowhere to go and nothing to do, except play in the snow.

The snow adventure started yesterday with a walk through the golf course and a little sledding.



It continued today with some igloo wins;



and fails;



some acrobatics;



some moments of zen;



until it slid into a sledding bonanza.









and finally sledded into the Staten Island sunset.



Our street had still not been plowed by the time we returned to the house. NYC plows will likely not make it down to our little street today. Maybe tomorrow. If not, we'll continue to be stuck at the house with more snow adventures to come!

Nature vs. Nature

Lawrence has one-upped himself. His most recent paper has made the prestigious journal Nature, and has also caught on in popular media. He's been on MSNBC, slashdot (the geekiest geek site around), and the official story on the homepage of MIT.

His research details how modern day genomes are in fact "fossils" through which we can learn about past geologic events, including the introduction of oxygen into Earth's atmosphere. His research is multi-disciplinary, spanning several facets of nature. Cool stuff, so cool that I complemented Lawrence today, "Your nerdiness has made the papers!"

But apparently, his contribution to knowledge about nature isn't nearly as cool on digg.com as "Dog in Germany gives birth to 17 puppies". While Lawrence's research was "dugg" 80+ times, the multi-parous dog was "dugg" 260+ times. Lawrence's nerdiness just isn't as popular septendecuplets (i.e., 17-uplets).

Yay Lawrence anyway!

Dear Darla

A summation of my experience tonight, in the spirit of "The Little Rascals":

Dear Darla (Boston Public Transportation),

I hate your stinkin guts (and your antiquated trains and roadways that made my 40 minute round-trip ride to and from an on-call night take 3 hours). You make me vomit (as you did the obnoxious passengers coming from a Bruins game who were also on the train, though their inclination may have been motivated by toxins other than you). You are scum between my toes (making my tired, swollen feet from running around all day and night on the hospital floors all the worse).

Love,
(Hate, as in the MIT reference IHTFP,)
Alfalfa
(Me)