[youtube c7_NPSeAb8Y nolink] Sunday was Rap Day for me. First, brunch at The Grey Dog in the West Village. Highly recommended spot, but I was there to say hi to the daughter of a friend back home who waits tables at the cafe when she's not going to auditions. She just got a one-month role […] Read More

A few highly personal images from my Bonus Life in New York:From the Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden in the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. At home, I live beside a little pond with a Japanese zigzag bridge. Husband Bob has very Eastern tastes and philosophy. A piece of the Tudor City neighborhood, on the east side of mid-town, […] Read More

5:40 a.m. I was up getting ready to go get my ticket to see live Saturday Night Live. I arrived under the famous NBC marquee at Rockefeller Plaza by 6:30, only to learn that the making of the shows is “in hiatus.” But that’s not what the website had told me. Furthermore, the security guard […] Read More

Posting in the morning today, for a change, while I'm feeling fresh and clear-minded. Never mind that it's 12:13 pm. That's mid-morning for me in this New York 18-Day Bonus Life. I've settled into a schedule of going to bed about 1:30 or so and getting up about 9. Not really much different from my […] Read More

Lotta lotta walking — twice across the island of Manhattan, and from 87th down to 42nd and halfway back. And almost every instant of it interesting. And a little shopping: got a couple of light cotton tops at Forever 21 for dealing with the heat. (I know I’m actually 28 on this trip, but I’m […] Read More

[youtube v=rk3vk_ltP2Y nolink] Anyway, I had a pleasant and long walk on the beach, which wasn't as crowded as pictures of NY beaches always seem to be. Admired the prodigious size of the Ferris wheel and the roller coaster. Bought and consumed exotic jellied candies, presumably Russian. Heard a lot of Russian spoken, came to […] Read More

After the euphoric first day of my 18-day life in Manhattan, I learned that even in a bonus life, one has to run errands: the drugstore, the ATM, etc. However, doing these mundane things here makes them fresh and new. For one thing, everything was in walking distance. No driving. That alone was staggeringly refreshing. […] Read More

Have embarked on my 18-day life-within-a-life in New York, the one I promised myself as celebration of turning 60 a year and a half ago. I hadn't yet figured out how to work it out (pay for it) and then this marvelous house-sitting arrangement fell in my lap and suddenly I'm here. And it's thrilling. […] Read More

My friend, Christina, knowing I’ll be in Manhattan next week, passed on word of a cool workshop there. I love the idea, and it can be done anywhere: turning your junk mail, your pile, into a piece of art. When you think about it, there’s no end to the forms one’s pile of garbage paper […] Read More

New York has called me and I need to cancel the Get-Published workshop that I announced in my last post. Thanks to those who expressed interest. I’m sorry for any inconvenience. The situation: I got an offer I couldn’t refuse: 2.5 weeks plant-sitting and being a “New York writer” in an apartment on the Upper […] Read More