May 2003 - Benjamin Wagner

What’s The Matter With You?

By admin | May 30, 2003 |

A warm breeze was blowing through the East Village last night as I stumbled to the NR from Ace Bar. The city doesn’t smell like garbage… yet. It will, though, when it really heats up, when the pavement begins to soften and the air turns heavy. For now, though, the wind was a sweet, promising…

Standing On The Shoulders Of They Might Be Giants

By admin | May 25, 2003 |

One minute, they’re one hundred feet high and made of light. Then, just as quickly, there they were, standing just a few feet away: life-sized, all flesh, blood, and spectacles. They Might Be Giants. Right there in the East Village, just four subway stops (two local, two express) from my Hell’s Kitchen apartment. Reason number…

By admin | May 24, 2003 |

The gray skies and ever-present threat of rain not withstanding, it was an excellent day in New York. The kind of day that had me saying ‘This town rules’ at least more than once. What could have promted such supurlatives, you ask? Even as the clouds swollowed entire skyscrapers whole? Simple … A slow start.…

By admin | May 23, 2003 |

Friday night. New York City is locked in fog and drizzle. I am alone. I’m on my fourth Grolsch. I single-handedly polished off a bag of Happy Herbert’s Low Sodium Oat Bran Pretzals. The microwaved just beeped: “Your Lean Cuisine Lemon Pepper Chicken is done, rock star.” Friday night. New York City … My life.…

By admin | May 22, 2003 |

I know, I know, I’m always late to the party. Or I don’t go at all. Or I’m not even invited. Whatever. I was late to puberty. I was a late to REM, David Gray, Pete Yorn, and Queens of the Stone Age. I was late to blogging. And now I’m probably waaaay late to…

By admin | May 20, 2003 |

Yesterday was an especially beautiful day in New York City. I was, of course, stuck inside, working. But I did get out before sunset, and rode up the Hudson River Park. The river was smooth and silver, like mercury. The path was clogged with really slow, really clueless dog walkers and rollerbladers and other riders…

Queens Half Marathon ’03

By admin | May 18, 2003 |

The Goldner’s Movie Corner), and many many more. It was cool and clear on the roof of their Upper West Side apartment, the kind of late-spring evening that reminds one just how reclusive they’ve been all winter. Everyone asked how I felt about soon being an uncle (“Uncle Benjamin,” I insisted, “Not Uncle Ben”), to…

No Eclipse

By admin | May 15, 2003 |

Outside my window, in the skies over Manhattan, the full moon is passing through the Earth’s shadow. But alas, the city is awash in clouds. There will be no eclipse here tonight. Still, something major is afoot. I’m not sure what yet, or how it’s going to manifest. But strange and wonderful things have been…

By admin | May 13, 2003 |

Were I an avid gawker.com contributor, I would have fired off word of my Sunday triple celebrity sighting: Howard Stern on the Upper West, Jay Thomas (‘Cheers’) in Chelsea, and — clincher here — Meg Ryan in Soho. I held the door for her exiting Once Upon a Tart. She said ‘Thank you.’ Sigh. Were…

By admin | May 9, 2003 |

I’m sitting on a dock in Tribeca, the Hudson River sloshing around below. Helicopters buzz overhead. Jets lumber slowly by en route to Laguardia. It is gray and hazy, about 65 degrees. It’s kind of a non-descript afternoon, the kind I might normally work right through without noticing, as are most of the 8 million…