But Call Me Betsy

I've been walking down Walnut Street from Broad Street most mornings to get to work--it's about a thirty minute walk and I listen to music and avoid the same two homeless white men with cardboard signs every day. I keep my eyes peeled for potential story ideas or oddities, and here are three I've seen in the last week or so. Not sure if I would ever really write about them, but I like the idea of getting writing prompts from what you're observing on a normal day. This one is my favorite. The "what if" of the ad is what if this were your boyfriend and he were plastered all over town in this suggestive ad? Also, what if he were a terrible boyfriend and so you especially hated the posters for being a misrepresentation of his personality? And what if that character made it her mission to go around defacing all of the ads she could find on subways and street corners and billboards? And just as an aside, what is this even an ad FOR? I took this on Wharton s...

To get in step with the next big holiday, my friend Padhraig's birthday on St. Patty's Day.

I didn't have much time to take photos of windows this past Christmas, but here is one I captured. It looks like one of those roadside memorials--you know, the place where a car or bike accident happened and someone died. Here, it appears as if perhaps Santa was run over right outside of this house. Last weekend, Dan and I decided to be nice to ourselves and stay at a bed and breakfast in Lambertville. However, when we got to the B&B, we found it was run by a crazy old lady and her creepy son. For $155 a night, you might expect a luxurious room with a jacuzzi. This place had a TV the size of a shoebox, a plastic stand up shower, and kitschy decorations. The room was tiny, the wallpapers bubbly and water-stained, and the decors was tacky and gross. My biggest fear was that the son had privately drilled holes all over the place and would be watching us as we changed our clothes, took showers, and slept. We left, but not before having a terrible altercation with the strange own...

Lots and lots of great window displays and house decorations this time of year. South Philly people do not skimp. Not like me who has a 99cent felt pumpkin Scotch-taped to the window. I pretty much hate this one because it's too scary. Here's the fuller view. You have to admire the amount of work put into this, along with the dollars wasted. Frankie Awesome witch and ghosts. Ick. And cute! Home-made. 

Dan and I were sitting at the light on 11th and Snyder, on our way to Home Depot, when we overheard this couple standing on the street corner. We noticed first that they were arguing, and so Dan nonchalantly rolled down his window so that we could hear what it was about. The woman was half-crying, and she said, Tell me what I physically did wrong! I could be mistaken, but I think she meant that he should tell her what she literally did wrong. Unless, of course, he was her dance teacher and they had just come from a recital at the Walnut Street Theater. This didn't seem to be the case. That's my grammar snobbery for the day. Here is some street art for you: And then this is window dressing from the American Apparel store in West Philadelphia. The "in" thing for youngsters now is to wear petticoat's on your head, apparently. It reminds me of being in high school and how we used to think it was funky and subversive to put giant bows in our hair ala Material...

Happy Halloween windows from South Philly.

Even though I haven't been walking quite as much lately, I do find the occasional moment to snap pictures of windows.It's been rainy and gross in Philadelphia lately, but next week should be better and I will try to get out and about more. Until then: An Ernesto look-a like And this cat looks like it's looking at the cat about it ala the boxes in the opening of The Brady Bunch He just wants to go outside Perpetually looking as if she's saying, What is this mess on the floor? Awaiting your return   And this is the second in the series of ink drawings Dan is doing wherein he takes regular song lyrics and substitiutes the word kitty or cat somewhere.

Did you know that it's possible to get lost in Philadelphia, even if you've lived here for going on seven years like I have? It happened to me last Friday, when I decided to walk to Penn's campus via Fitzwater Street. I figured that somewhere around 24th street, I could just cut North and West and find the South Street Bridge. Instead, I found myself faced with a sudden Naval Square and jumbled streets---Catherine meeting Christian, the numbered ones suddenly seeming to veer East/West. I'd accidentally found my way into the no man's land of Grays Ferry. Granted, I have a terrible sense of direction, but it was still a weird sensation not to have any clue which street to take, especially when I knew it was only a few blocks away. I found my way back via the modern version of following pebbles along the path--I used my map app on my i-Phone--the one that tracks your progress as you're walking, which I find to be in equal parts creepy and fascinating. So, this m...

Well, we can still get flooding from the Schuykill River which is supposed to peak at 2 PM today. I was briefly listening to Fox News this morning at the gym and one of the reporters said, We're taking viewers' questions and the one that keeps coming up is: "If this were a snowstorm, how many inches of snow would we have gotten?" That's maybe the dumbest question I've ever heard in my life. Like asking, If this had been squirrels falling from the sky instead of rain, how many squirrels would have landed and would they have survived or just been flattened? In any case, I categorized the devastation for you. Millimeters of rain fall flooding my street: Recyling bins filled with inappropriately heavy material toppled. Fortunately, the neighbor's blow up pool, which comes out at the first sign of spring and stays out until its frosted over by ice, did not fly away in the night. Little Paulie can continue to play in it rather than ever being able to go ...