Resident Laments Neighborhood’s Passing

“Williamsburg died long ago. I put the exact date before Zebulon closed, before Savalas closed, before the unbelievably shitty Brooklyn Bowl opened, way back when the life-changingly awesome Jelly Pool Parties ended. Dunkin changes nothing.”

by Alan Hanson

5. Constellation

It is twilight. You are living inside of a prism beam. You are slowly falling through a prism beam without worry and with a satiated stomach. All of your childhood pets are running toward you in slow motion and they are hungry for your love. Your favorite blanket is playing your favorite instrument on a bed of newly fallen autumn leaves. Insects do not exist and yet, the ecosystem remains beautifully balanced. Your boss who respects you very much enters your line of vision and unrolls a long scroll. She reads from the scroll. She reads all of your favorite words, slowly, then disintegrates and is carried off by a warm wind. You have never had a parking ticket. Your dentist is in awe of your brushing habits.

4. Silk

You are folding laundry in the laundry room of your modest suburban Colorado home. You are pleased with this zen task. A cool breeze fondles the lace curtains of your open window. The crisp midday air begs you to inhale fully, which you do, and this also pleases you. Suddenly, but without startle, a marble-worker’s firm hands delicately grab your waist. You are flush. You are dreaming. You decide not to wake up. You see where this goes.

3. By The Seaside

You are Tom Cruise in Cocktail. Except in this version of Cocktail, the film starts right when you arrive in Jamaica and ends right before you stupidly flex your man-pride and show off for that older woman at the tiki bar, you know, just to prove you could get her? With that improbable match trick? Leaving poor Elisabeth Shue pregnant and betrayed? That part never happens. You don’t even think about that part. Instead, you perpetually live in the waterfall where your passions grow. You no longer require food nor drink to survive. Love and a crooked smile are the only forms of sustenance you need. The soundtrack is updated. The swimsuits are not.

2. Night Owl

YOU ARE THINKING ABOUT DANCING. NO, YOU ARE GETTING READY TO DANCE. YOU ARE NOT YET DANCING, BUT OH BOY, YOU SOON WILL BE DANCING. THIS PREPARATION UPON ENTERING FULL DANCE MODE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE ACTUAL ACT OF DANCING. YOU ARE WARMING UP. YOU ARE ‘FEELING IT.’ YOU ARE TAPPING A FOOT, NODDING A RHYTHMIC GRIN. YOU ARE NOTICING THE FLUID PROPERTIES OF YOUR COMMANDING AND GLISTENING LIMBS. SOME OF YOUR FRIENDS ARE STILL AT THE BAR, IDLY TWISTING THEIR COCKTAILS IN THEIR HANDS, UNSURE IF THEY ARE PREPARED TO ESCALATE THEIR LOITERING, BUT YOU, YOU HAVE TAKEN FOUR STEPS TO THE EMPTY SPACE BETWEEN THE BOOTHS AND THE HALL LEADING TO THE RESTROOM. YOU WILL SOON COMMAND THIS 8’X8’ ARENA. YOUR EYELIDS SLIP INTO A SEXY POSE, DIMMING THE LIGHTS A BIT BUT STILL SHOWING A BRAVE GLIMPSE OF LOWER EYEBALL, THESE SULTRY, WET PEEPERS SAY TO THE CROWD, “I AM ALMOST READY TO DANCE, AND ONCE I BEGIN IT SHALL ENTRANCE YOU FOR A MULTITUDE OF ETERNITIES. UNTIL THEN, YOU STATIC, STATIONARY PEONS, YOU WILL WATCH MY GROWING SMOLDER AND PANT.”

1. Playtime

You are coasting down the main drag of your small town on a scooter. But in this world, scooters are not universally mocked. Scooters are the smooth, gliding chariots of the respected. It is a balmy, spring afternoon. Your favorite townspeople eagerly wave to you from the storefronts of their successful small businesses. You are magnificently happy to see them. You are content with the world. You have never heard of war, never have you seen the film Crash, not once have your gorgeous and soft ears fallen prey to the gnashing and soulless sounds of Sleigh Bells. The band. You pause your ebullient gliding at a water fountain. The pressure and temperature is ideal. From a nearby bench, Ernest Borgnine motions for you to join him. Yes, he is still alive. Also, he has baked a pie.

Alan Hanson is a Californian writer living in Harlem.

“I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

🙂

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use

:-(“
 — Happy birthday, emoticons!

I guess they can pack it in over at BuzzFeeᴅ, because this has pretty much fulfilled their mission.

“’This morning as Simon McCoy was preparing to introduce this story, instead of picking up his tablet to hold as he went to air, he mistakenly picked up a ream of paper that was sitting next to it,’ said a spokeswoman for BBC News. ‘In the rush of live news, he didn’t have an opportunity to swap the items, so simply went with it.’ Mr McCoy has previously been seen on screen briefly resting his head on his desk when the camera cut to him.”

“Rumors have been circulating on the Internet that beavers’ anal secretions have the scent and taste of vanilla. Earlier this week, the Swedish National Food Agency confirmed that, saying that anal secretions that beavers use to mark their territory, called castoreum, can be used for vanilla flavoring in baked goods, chewing gum, pudding, etc.”

by Michael Macher

Every four minutes someone is diagnosed with blood cancer. But for people with life-threatening blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, a cure actually exists. If patients are connected with the right donor, they can receive a marrow or umbilical cord blood transplant that could save their life. All they need is a match.

Be The Match provides patients and their families one-on-one support, education, and guidance before, during and after transplant. The nonprofit organization matches patients with donors, educates health care professionals and conducts research so more lives can be saved. And you can be someone’s cure as a member of the Be The Match Registry®, a financial contributor or even a volunteer.

Be The Match has created a site called My Social Strand to raise awareness around blood cancers, and to invite as many people as possible to join their registry of donors. So what is My Social Strand?

My Social Strand is a tool that cruises through your Facebook data to unearth interesting facts about your social network. The experience combines “lighter” findings (such as the No. 1 movie the year you were born and what your choice of phone case says about you) with more serious messages about the need for marrow donors and the prevalence of blood cancer in your social network

When I took the My Social Strand quiz, I found out that despite having way more than the average number of fb friends (550 compared to the average of 130), I still manage to post below the average amount per month (9 posts a month vs. the average of 90) and appear in way fewer photos than the average person (160 vs 282). I also discovered that 7 of my friends will likely be affected by leukemia in their lifetimes, either directly or indirectly through friends or relatives.

You can check out the tool here, and sign up to be a donor on BeTheMatch.org. Why not? You could save someone’s life.

More Facts About Blood Cancer and Marrow Donations

• Every year, more than 12,000 patients are diagnosed with life-threatening diseases — such as leukemia and lymphoma — for which a marrow or cord blood transplant from an unrelated donor may be their best or only hope of a cure.

• 70 percent of all patients who need a transplant do not have a matched donor in their family. They depend on the Be The Match Registry to find an unrelated donor or cord blood unit.

“New research from the University of Copenhagen provides an explanation for why moderate exercising helps an individual lose more weight than if they exercised at a more intense level…. The answer was the subjects in the test group that exercised the least had more energy throughout the day to perform healthy behaviors throughout the day (in addition to their exercise session).”
 — I am going to take this to its logical conclusion where not exercising at all gives you the absolute most energy to do “healthy behaviors” during the day. And then I’m going to skip those “healthy behaviors,” just so I can conserve that energy for when I really need it, and voila, people are going to intervention me for skinniness! I see no flaws in this plan at all.

Happy birthday to the last genius of the 20th Century. 50 seems weirdly young to me, but good for him either way,

“We’re not advocating treating infants, children and people in their teens. What I would suggest is at whatever point [people] begin to notice and are bothered by some of these things like frown lines or forehead lines … it’s reasonable to consider starting treatment with Botox. It’s easier and more effective to inhibit progression than come in 10 years later and take them away. We’ve termed it ‘prejuvenation.’”
 — It may already be too late for you to start Botoxing!