Adventures in Drummland

Minidrumm Comes to Town

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 17:20:00 +0000

My sister, Miriam, is in town for 10 days. I have to say that I was very excited to see her, as we've never had this much time to spend alone together... well, ever. And I have been itching to parade my cutie-pie of a sibling around town for years.

She got in Friday night and we headed to the East Village for some food. Now, in the past, I have made it a point only to take pictures of her while she's eating. The reason I do this is because it cracks her up every time she sees me snapping one off, and she's got food in her mouth. It is both gross and adorable at the same time, or as I like to call it "agrossable".

After dinner we headed over to my friend Gabe's Birthday party, also in the East Village. As per usual, buckets of fun.

Gabe makes a speech...

Awww...

Fast friends...

What's this? Underage drinking? For shame... :)

Over the weekend, I took her to not one, but two of my Bocce games. After the second onf Sunday, we went to a bar with my friend's Josh and Gabe to play some Euchre.

Ah, raspberry beer...

Monday we did some shopping. We stopped b Hebrew Union College to check out the "campus", as Miriam is considering it for graduate school. They had a nice building nestled in the heart of NYU's West Village campus.

Afterwards we sat in a Starbucks and played Go until we met up with Josh for dinner.

So, we have the rest of the week to look forward to. I will keep you all informed.

It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 19:48:00 +0000

Need I say anymore?

Wings

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 04:45:00 +0000

So my parents were in town this week. It was good seeing them, as I usually only see them around Thanksgiving. They've been out in California now for 6 years or more, and my mother's blood has thinned a little bit. I didn't think it was that cold, but she bundled up:

Look familiar?

They got to meet Kat. I've been seeing Kat for a few months now, and though it seemed a little early to do the whole parental introduction thing, it appeared to go over well, even though my dad was as goofy as ever. Oh well, I guess it's that Drumm charm.

After having brunch with the family and friends, Kat and I headed over to Floyd's to roll a little bocce. On our way to Courtney's place afterwards, we found the greatest door ever.

That's right. We found the door to the foam room. One's imagination can only fathom what's behind that door...

Later that night we had a friend who had a birthday party at a restaurant specializing in wings. They had about 10 different types of sauce. We tried most of the sauces and yours truly got a little drunk.

aftermath...

it took a few tries to get this one right...

the boys...

They also had a palm computer interactive quiz going on. As you can see, at this point I was not doing so well.

Well, there you have it, another week under the belt. In two weeks my sister comes to town for 10 days. Until then, keep on truckin!

Games, Family and Work

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:48:00 +0000

So the long weekend was good. I played bocce, saw Kat, and played many a board game. One in particular I was introduced to was Ticket to Ride. It's a game where you try to build a rail system across Europe. First game of the day and the only one I was able to win.

Another game I really liked was Carcassonne. This game involves a series of tiles that each display a section of a field, road, castle or some combination of the three. You take turns placing the tiles and essentially building a world. You also get little wooden people called "meeples" that help you score points depending on where you place them. It's a very interesting and fun game, and can be played with as few as two players. The first time I played it took me a while to get it, and the second time I did much better.

In addition to fun and games, I shot yet another job with Whoopi Goldberg this week for LA Weight Loss. For those of you who don't know, I shot a commercial with her last Fall. Here's the picture form that:

This one was a lot bigger and a little stressful, but we wrapped super early, and you can't complain about that. Here are some pics:

asleep on the job...

sets we built...

brownie, anyone?

My parents were also in town this week. They were cleaning out my grandmother's house to get ready to sell it. I got a lot of cool stuff like a a 25" tv, stereo speakers, paintings and kitchenware. It's nice to get cool stuff, but it did feel strange dismantling a house I grew up in and had many memories with. It was like taking apart a section of my childhood and releasing it into the void. Here's a picture of me in my grandmother's kitchen for the very last time:

Bye, grandma. I hope you are in a better place.

So there you have it. Bring on the SPRING!

Jury Duty

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 11:39:00 +0000

So, after years of postponing, I finally have to go in and perform my civic duty. I had never served before, so this was an entirely new experience for me.

I didn't have any paperwork, but I knew today was my day to serve. I had recently been called to a court hearing for missing my jury duty last February, and I arranged the date myself. So I go in to get my official jury duty paperwork for the day. I am at the window and the lady asks me:

Lady: "You going to be here all day?"

To which I take a moment, look around, and respond:

Me: "Only if I have to"
Lady: "Well, you have no choice."

So this is how my day starts. Seems pretty fitting. Anyhow, I trudge my way through the cold to the court building, pick up an egg and cheese and make my way to my day's destiny. There's a long line to get into the building through security. It's like going to the airport and I have to remove my belt. Something I don't like to do, as then you have to hold your pants up while you walk through the metal detector and look like an idiot dressing yourself in a goverment building. Anyhow...

So you walk into a big room with lots of chairs and sit down. The mood is very somber as you look around. Everyone is wearing the same half-frustrated. half-bored face, and nobody is talking. Someone sits at a podium and addresses us, starting off with a schmaltz joke in the vein of "So, everyone excited to be here?". There were few laughs.

The first thing they do is show us a 20 minute long video on jury duty. I thought it was going to be somethign informative and possibly helpful. I was wrong. The first 10 minutes are used to show us a reenactment of the justice system in medieval Europe. I'm not kidding. Don't believe me? Well, I thought not. That's ok, because I took a picture:

Seriously. The rest is just time filler narrated by Ed Bradley.

So we go through a series of questions: has anyone been convicted of a crime, is anyone not a resident of Brooklyn, can anyone not understand what I'm saying, blah blah. We weed out the non-essentials and move on to being called for either criminal or civil cases. I pick up the court newsletter and get to work on the crossword, which I actually finish. I never have time to do that.

So I get called for a criminal case. They shuffle us into a court room with a judge, representatives of the city (DA and Asst. DA) an a defendant plus council. In this case, the man is being accused of holding up a cab. They call prospective jurors up to the jury box at about 20 at a time. I should say, before this, they asked if anyone had a problem being on a case that might go to the end of the week. I stood up and made my case, pleading that I was a freelancer that had been otu of work for a couple of months and would like to take a job that started on Friday. The judge was not sympathetic.

So I had the privilege of watching the first 20 people be questioned by the judge and council. It was questions like, where do you live, are you married and what does your spouse and/or children do, are you related to any cops or anyone who drives a cab for a living, have you ever been the victim of a crime, and so forth. The questions were designed to determine who might have a bias that would make them non-ideal to judge this case.

Since I did not want to serve as I had work to take, I decided that I wasn't going to answer any questions or divulge any information I didn't have to. In other words, the defense and prosecutor were looking for the people they thought would rule in their favor for the case. I figured if I said and impressed nothing, then I would be relatively unknown to them, making me less likely to be picked as neither one would know which way I might lean in the case. All they knew of me was that I was 27 years old, unmarried without children and work in entertainment.

So, alas, I was not selected. Here's to another 6 years of freedom. The system marches on.

Back and on the run...

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 19:23:00 +0000

So I've been back for a week now, and I've already started and completed another shoot. Talk about hitting the ground running. I think the picture below says it all...

Yep, men in penguin suits. This is what my life has come to. It's also a fitting welcome to the bitter cold in NY. The other day, it was -13 degrees with the windchill. I though my head was lodged up Jack Frost's ass.

But regardless, it's good to be back. I have seen a lot of my friends, played and won 2 games of bocce, won $155 on the superbowl and been settling back nicely into my normal life, though it must be anything but normal these days.

My parents fly in on the 20th for a week. My grandmother died last year and we're getting rid off what's left in her house. The reasons may be sad, but it'll be good to see my parents regardless.

Until next time... TTFN

The End of A Journey: A Retrospective

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 01:29:00 +0000

So here I am, at the end of my journey to South America. And what have I learned? Well, it's hard to say, but one adage remains true: absence makes the heart grow fonder. I never knew how much I liked Brooklyn until I was away from it for 2.5 months. Or maybe it's being away from my friends, or both. Either way, I am ready to come back and jump right back into my life, of which I know is eagerly waiting for me. But I do not want you to think I didn't have a good time down here. On the contrary, I had a blast. But instead of recapping everything, instead I 've decided to compile of things I will miss, and things I will not miss. Here goes:

Miss: The fact that it's summer.
Not Miss: Being really sweaty.

Miss: The charming people with alluring Spanish accents.
Not Miss: Not being able to communicate with everyone

Miss: The fact that you can sit at a cafe or restaurant for hours and they don't care and won't bother you
Not Miss: How much of a pain it is to get a check if you're in a rush

Miss: Not having to feel like I need to order anything "to go"
Not Miss: Not being able to order anything "to go"

Miss: Drinking coffee to enjoy the flavor and not to keep me awake
Not Miss: Not being able to find a decent cup of coffee... seriously, what's the deal with that?

Miss: The amazing red meat.
Not Miss: Most of the rest of the food, or lack-there-of. I miss good sushi, thai, and god help me even chinese food

Miss: The fact that there are always people hanging out after midnight
Not Miss: You just can't get a good mixed drink down here. They're just not into getting wasted.

Miss: Licuados. It's hard to find a really good, fresh fruit shake in America.
Not Miss: Having to always order water and specify "without gas"

Miss:Having nothing I have to do.
Not Miss: Finding things to do when I have nothing to do.

Miss:The exchange rate.
Not Miss: Always having to find a way to get small change.

Miss: The cool people I've met down here
Not Miss: Not being around my good friends

Well, that about covers it. I hope this has been both educational an informative. I will be rotating back to los Estados Unidos in 2 days. See you soon.

Solamente yo...

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 21:34:00 +0000

So, I've been here on my own for a whole two weeks. I have been keeping it very low-key. I went out a lot when Ezra and Gabe & Courts were here, so I've been trying to take it easy. Haven't been drinking and been doing a lot of reading. In fact, I have managed to read the entire Harry Potter series in 12 days. It was the only interesting books in English I could find. I would say the later books are or will probably be better than the movies, whereas the earlier books weren't as good. It definitely gets darker as you get along, though I do feel it loses a bit of steam with the last 2 books and spends most of it's time giving you backstory rather than keeping you interested. I am, however, eagerly awaiting the 7th. So I guess I'm a part of that club now...

Other than that, I have been doing some shopping for gifts for friends. I can't help myself. It's the best part of being in a foreign country. I have one more thing to get and I'm all caught up. I have been watching the NE Patriots climb their way towards the superbowl, even though the commentary is in Spanish. I have managed to do some writing, though not as much as I'd hoped. Still plugging away though...

Yeah, not too exciting, but hey, I'm on vacation so who cares. In my last week and a half I might go check out a few things I have not yet seen, but I kind of crammed a lot of touristy shit in with Gabe and Courts, so I'm not promising anything.

I am definitely ready to return to my regular life. The bocce courts are calling...

Gabe and Courtney continued...

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 18:33:00 +0000

It's been long enough that I won't remember exactly what we did every day, but I would like to start this post with some pictures of our trip to the Recoleta Cemetary. This place was by far the highlight of our tourist activities. It's an immense cemetary with many famous Argentinians, Eva Peron not excluded. It's essentially like walking into a village of the dead, and very rich and/or famous. I went camera crazy, so here are some of my favorites:

Walking into a place like this, you can't help but feel a certain sense of awe. It's a place with it's own spirit and life to it, which I suppose seems like a paradox considering it's full of dead people. It's as if the wind whispers secrets down the corridors of the tombs. If you ever find yourself in Buenos Aires, this place is a must-see.

At a cafe outside the cemetary is a huge palos borracho tree. There are a number of these behemoths all over BA. They are quite impressive.

I would like to take a moment to share with you another gem I found while down here in Buenos Aires

That's right, Papa Gino's has made it to South America! On another note, Courtney spotted a Dominoes Pizza one night. I guarantee you these are not the same businesses. If America ev er comes down here there's going to be a lot of explaining to do...

We also took a trip to the Japanese Gardens, a second trip for me as those who actually read my blog will know. I couldn't resist a few more pictures:

On our way to another park, I decided to snap a few more pictures. Courtney is not fond of having her picture taken. But I of course can't help myself partly because I'm a shutterbug and partly because i think Courtney is beautiful. But try and convince someone of this while you have your camera in their face :) Anyhow, here's a few Courtney pics. I can only hope she doesn't yell at me to take them off the blog (you may laugh, but it's already happened once).

Now let's all make Courtney feel better by leaving comments about how pretty she looks, and just maybe I can leave these pictures up.

Anyhow, we made it to another park that was pretty big. There was a big flower garden and a lake with paddle boats. I of course was attracted to the graffitied statue:

That sums up the pictures I took while Gabe and Courtney were here. Other things we did were shop at some awesome crafts fairs, drink mate, and eat at Cabana Las Lilas. At Cabana Las Lilas, our steaks actually came out with this in them:

Estoy jugoso means "I'm rare", which is how we ordered our steaks. Awesome!

So now Courtney and Gabe have left and I embark on my 3 1/2 week-long stint of solitude, which as I post this is now less than 3 weeks. It's been nice being by myself for a little bit. I realized the last time I actually lived by myself was about 5 years ago for around 4 months in LA before I moved to NY, and I was too busy to enjoy it and I had a few friends around. Now I am in a foreing country and know nobody (well, that' snot entirely true), but the point is I am spending some much deserved time with myself. I hope I don't drive myself crazy ;)

Bye Gabe and Courtney. I will miss you for the next 3 weeks.

The Adventure Continues: The Arrival of Courtney and Gabe

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 21:38:00 +0000

Last Friday, the 29th of December 2006, my good friends Gabriel Ware and Courtney Arrived at Ezeiza Airport in Buenos Aires just as Ezra was getting into a cab to head to the airport himself to head home after having been here for a month. Courtney and Gabe will be here for approximately 9 days. Here is a day to day update of everything that's happened so far:

Friday. December 29th:

I realized as I was waiting with Ezra for his car to arrive that I had told Gabe and Courtney the wrong address to come to. Thankfully, the address I did tell them was less than a block away. I figured it would take them a while to get to my place after customs and a cab and all. So around 6:30pm I headed downstairs to wait at the address I had given them. Sure enough, as I walk down the street, there is Gabe and Courtney wandering around having just been deposited from their cab. I casually said hello and our vacation begun.

That night I took them to La Cabrera because it was close and it's one of the better touristy parillas. A few days before they arrived I had contracted some kind of throat infection. That day I had managed to find a health clinic and got myself some penicilin. Unfortunately, I was on doctor's orders not to drink alcohol for a few days. I did not partake in the wonderful San Felicien Malbec we ordered. Needless to say, we made it an early night.

Saturday, December 30th:

Gabe got up well before Courtney and I and headed to Micro Centro where all the government buildings are. We joined him later and checked out a few places including the market at San Telmo and the Puente de la Mujer footbridge. That night we had dinner at Divina Patagonia, a big favorite of Ezra and I when he was here. Gabe had the wild boar, Courtney had the Lomo (tenderloin of the cow), and I had the Venison. All in all it was a knockout again. Courtney was introduced to Cinzano, a common vermouth drunk down here. It is currently her favorite drink.

Sunday, December 31st (New Years Eve Baby!):

I should mention that the night before, Courtney had decided to plug her hair dryer into the outlet. She used my power converter, but this did not save us from, the inevitable... you guessed it, power outage. Thankfully, I have a cool landlord who came on Sunday to help resotre the electricity. We slept without AC for a night, but managed to live through it. Thanks, Courts... ;) (she's very sensitive about it, so be sure to tease her a lot)

It was pretty hot out and there wasn't much open, but that wasn't going to stop us. We headed to Plaza Cortizar to have a light breakfast and do some reading. We then headed to the Botanical Gardens.

This is a really beautiful park in the Northern area of Palermo that has many beautiful statues and is overrun with ferral cats.

These statues represent the 1st, 4th, and the 5th movement of Beethoven's 4th Symphony. In person they are truly breathtaking.

After wandering around some more in the heat and realizing that nothing else was open, we found a cafe and chilled out.

Later that night, we went to a New Years Eve Party that we knew about through this American couple I had met the night I went to Casa Saltshaker. Here we are before going out.

We're so cute. Here are some pics of us at the party.

That glitter shit was very annoying. I had to take a shower to get most of it off. New Years eve was similar to Christmas in that there were fireworks EVERYWHERE. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to it, on ly that once midnight hit they appeared to be more and more frequent. They were exploding all over the city, and usually no higher than the 20th story of buildings. This made for a very exhilarating (and a little scary) show of lights and sounds. I tried to capture some of it on camera.

I have a video as well, but it's a little big, so you'll have to wait as I figure out how to post it.

So that's all for now. I have more to show you, including our awesome visit tot he Recoleta Cemetary, but we must head out for dinner now. Keep checking for more updates.

Landmines and Too Much Meat

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Sat, 23 Dec 2006 01:47:00 +0000

I was up early one morning, which is not surprising as nobody goes out until the am, and I took some sunrise pics.

So the last two weeks have been fun. I've been learning lots of Castellano and eating ridiculous food. Again, you can see all our food adventures at BK in BA. I've decided that I might cut back on the meat intake for a while because I'm beginning to start getting things that I like to call "meat headaches" and "meat comas". We'll see how successful I become.

So the other day I went down to the Japanese gardens in the big park section of town. I ate at a little sushi restaurant they had. Needless to say it was not very good. I've given up on getting good sushi down here. It was a pretty little park, not what I would call a decent Japanese garden, but certainly a relaxing place to be. They had a pond with what I believe are Koi, which, if you stand on the bridge, will surface and open their moths hoping to be fed. There was also a cool duck that would wander around the park. Here are some pictures.

It's been getting pretty hot down here, and we've seen some crazy heat storms.

I would like to take a moment to talk about dog shit, or as I like to call it here, "landmines". It seems there is no social or financial repercussion for not cleaning up after your dog. That and the lack of well maintained sidewalks, walking around at night can be treacherous.

The holidays are coming up. We're not sure what we're planning to do yet. Apparently the 24th and 25th of December are big party nights. Ezra leaves next week right before my friend Gabe and Courtney arrive. I still have another 5 weeks left. I must say, I do miss NY a bit as I was away for a lot of November as well, but I am looking forward to having a few weeks here by myself.

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 01:02:00 +0000

A side note to start:

Before I start my regular post, I would like to make a comment on my previous post where I had mentioned the unusual amount of 80s music. The other night, Ezra and I were out at a bar/cafe, and the music was pretty loud. Without much choice of ignoring it, it became clear to us that they were playing some sort of 80s super mix. Then, the world stopped spinning and stars collided when the theme song to The Never Ending Story came on. I nearly lost my biscuits. Slightly funnier was the Ghostbuster's theme, but I would have preferred the song from that movie that starts with "pleeeeeasssseeee.....ppllleeeeeeeeaaaassssseeeee...I believe it's magic magic..." At my Spanish lesson my homework is usually to write sentences. I mentioned this weird phenomenon to my teacher at one point, in Spanish no less, and she gladly informed me that the lead singer of A-Ha had learned Spanish from her. I mentioned that I found the whole 80s music thing rather funny, and she promptly taught me the word for "fun", at which point I told her it would serve me better to know the word for "ridiculous".

--

So I've been here for over a week now. Definitely working on the tan. I have been learning Spanish as well. I definitely understand a lot more now than when I arrived (which is not hard seeing as I knew nothing), and can pick up on things here and there and even communicate, though poorly. I have a few funny/frustrating Spanish stories:

My first tale of folly took place at an Irish pub near the Plaza Cortizar in Palermo Veijo's center. I wanted to sit down, do some writing and have a Guinness. I went up to the bartender and said "me gusta una Guinness". I found out later that I apparently said "I like Guinness". Kind of silly, but he got the point.

The real funny incident was at Veijo Indecente, a cafe near my Spanish school. The waiter had brought me the check for a meal, but I had ordered an additional coffee as well. When he came to collect the money, I wanted to know how much the coffee was. I couldn't remember and in fact probably hadn't learned yet how to say "how much is this?". So, in my infinite wisdom, I had said "Como mucho?". Now, let me explain a few things. In Spanish, como means "how" and mucho means "much/a lot". I didn't think that this was the way to ask how much but thought the general idea would get across. The thing is, the verb meaning "to eat" is comer, and when conjugated with "yo" which means "I", it becomes... you guessed it, como. You don't need to include personal pronouns in Spanish, so I literally told my waiter "I eat a lot". Funny. Thankfully he spoke a little English.

I should also point out that I am in fact not learning straight up Spanish but "Castellano", which is supposedly what the nobles spoke in the castles of spain, hence castellano. It is also what they speak in Buenos Aires. Not Argentina, per se, just Buenos Aires. I am not sure who else speaks this particular dialect, but I know that if I ever want to learn Spanish fluently, I will likely have to undo a lot of what I am learning.

--

I'd like to take a moment to talk about keys. There is a type of key they have here in BA that looks like those old victorian house keys. We have one that opens and locks the top bolt to our door. Now, like New York, that key is a little shaky and was giving us trouble. Well, one night as we were getting back home around 4am (and I should point out that down here people don't go out to dinner in general before 10pm), we tried to get into our apartment and couldn't because our key wouldn't open the door. Needless to say, we were upset, no one more than Ezra, who, for lack of a better term, was fuming. We tried to see if there were any hotels that had available rooms in our area, but our luck was not so good. We decided that since it would only be for a few hours anyhow, that we would sleep in the hallway of our apartment. This, by the way, sucked. We would wake up every half hour or so and try the lock again. Finally, around 6:30am, it worked. We will not be locking the top lock again.

Ezra and I saw the Departed the other day. Strangely enough, most of the movies here are subtitled, not dubbed like in Germany. So not only can we go see a movie in English, but it'll also give us the Spanish translation so we can learn as well. Aint life swell? Movie wasn't bad. Still like the original "Infernal Affairs" a little better. I'm not much of a Scorcese fan, so it was a big deal for me not to hate this movie.

I would like to introduce you to a freind of mine I met down here in Argentina. Her name... empanada. Quite perfectly the perfect snack food, it's flaky dough surrounding steak, cheeese, or ham and cheese. Mmmmmm.

Yesterday we decided to take a break from going out for dinner and try our hand at asado cooking. Unfortunately, I bought what I thought was 2 tenderloin steaks and turned out to be tenderloin cutlets. They came out well though. Here are some pics:

The asado grill is a little different than what we're used to , as it has no vent to keep the coals oxygenated while they're heating up. Ezra had to set up a mini fire on the bottom of the grill and put the coals on top. Then you spread the hot coals out and replace the grill. The grill itself is adjustable so you can get closer or farther away from the fire as you cook. He also grilled some corn and I made guacamole. Once again, I felt like a pile of stacked meat after this meal.

More fun to come as week two of my adventures in Buenos Aires continues.

Some Cultural Observations

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 22:19:00 +0000

It's amazing that I've only been here four days, but I feel like I've been here for a couple of weeks. Instead of running out and doing the common tourist crap, we've been out walking around, checking out different restaurants, bars, and getting to know our neighborhood.

Our place is on the edge of Palermo Soho and Villa(veeja) Crespo. The double L here has a j sound.

We have been hanging out mostly in Palermo Viejo (Palermo Soho and Palermo Hollywood). It's a very hip and social neighborhood with wonderful restaurants and lots of shops. Clothes here are relatively inexpensive when compared to medium to high end stores, but imports are about the same if not more (they wanted over $200 for an airport express). Here are some casual observations I've made:

Fashion:

There is definitely a different bent on fashion in BA. Firstly, haircuts seem to be somewhat Williamsburgish (keep in mind I've been hanging out in the hip part of town). I have seen lots of mohawks, mullets, mohawks with mullets, and other strange hair inventions. It seems like a lot of women wear different layers of thin clothes, or have one interesting feature like a big belt or a shirt that shows one shoulder. .

Otherwise, it's about the same. There isn't anything significantly different, and they aren't trying to coopt American style or try to mimic our fashion. Basically, nothing really stands out as so obviously different

The funny thing is people down here can easily be mistaken for Americans. They all have a very light complexion with a European facial structure. It isn't until they start to whip off Spanish that you can always be certian they aren't foreigners.

Customs:

It is common for two young ladies to walk down the street holding hands or with arms interlocked. And as far as I can tell, either there are more outward lesbians here than I realize or women are more comfortable showing affection with one another.

They do the one cheek kiss. Some places do the two cheeks, and even the three cheeck, and I made the mistake of going for the two ckeek with my friend Paqule and was corrected. I have no problem kissing cheeks, but I prefer the awkward hug. Must be my oafish American sensibilities :)

Music:

Ok, and I am not exaggerating when I say this, but I have heard Men at Work's Down Under maybe 5 times since I've been here. The cherry on top was when the video came on the tv. It's as if after 1988, no more music was allowed to come into Argentina. They love their 80s down here. It's a little funny. You can be in a decent restaurant with white table cloths, and a remixed version of Dead Alive's Spin Me Right Round will come on.

On a side note, yesterday Ezra and I were walking around and there were a whole bunch of girls lined up outside a cd store. He asked me who I thought they were there to see, and jokingly I said the one name I thought would be the funniest and probably not true, Ricky Martin. Turns out, it was Ricky Martin. Ridiculous.

Architecture:

In Palermo Viejo, there are some amazing buildings. There seems to be a strong mixture of a more old, rustic style and new modern looking buildings. The pictures I have below here aren't the perfect example of this, but give you some idea of what things look like. In Palermo Viejo there are a lot of amazing homes with their own garages, courtyards, terraces and atriums. There is also a fair share of graffiti here and there.

The restaurants are also very cool. They are usually open with a lot of natural light. They all have this kind of rustic style that have European quality, or are very modern and could rival some of New York's newest diggs.

People:

Overall the people are very friendly and are happy to see you try to speak their language. Many people have warned me about theft and being careful, of which I have listened to, but overall I don't fele unsafe walking around. There are definitely neighborhoods I wouldn't go to at night or walk around by myself in certain situations, but otherwise things are all good. Mainly, the people are friendly and willing to talk to you if you engage them.

By the way, commercialism still rules

On a side not, I found a film shoot down here. There is apparently a lot of tv/film/commercial production down here. Pakermo Hollywood supposedly has a few cool tv studios that I'll probably go check out or at least walk around the outside of :)
I have definiteley seena lot of ENG shoots (small crews), but this looked like a normal sized deal.

Argentina's version of craft service. As you can see, they are leagues beyond New Yerk, if only because everything looks fresh and edible

Here's a sight we're all used to seeing. I wonder if Local 52 has some sway down here

So that's all I have to say about that. Tomorrow I hope to get out early and take some more pictures, maybe hit up a park or three. Ezra and I are taking Spanish lessons. I hope to be a master of the Argentinian menu by the time I leave.

Buenos Aires: The Adventure Begins!

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 06:52:00 +0000

Before I start, please check out Ezra's Blog for detailed descriptions of our meals and food adventures in BA at BK in BA.

So, Ezra and I caught a cab to JFK Thursday night for a 10:00pm flight out of NY directly to Buenos Aires. It was a 10 and 1/2 hour flight, but it seemed to go by rather quickly. Ezra slept well, but I was up most of the time. I did manage to squeeze in a couple of uncomfortable hours, but what can you do. Anyhow, we arrived in Buenos Aires around 11am (BA is 2 hours ahead of NY).

We got to immigration and waited in a real long line. This was the first time I whipped out my camera. Ezra does not look happy here

Nobody wants to wait in a long line after 10.5 hours of flying. But the prospect of being in BA was keeping us going. By the way, all these pictures were taken with my new Pentax K10D digital camera. I have this sweet fisheye lens that I used a lot.

Waiting for luggage.

Our apartment wasn't ready until Saturday, so we stayed at this little place in El Centro, which is a group of neighborhoods in the heart of the downtown district of Buenos Aires.

So, after dropping our stuff and talking with Jorge, the guy who ran the place we were staying at, we decided to hit the streets and check the city out.

Ezra had come very well versed in the Time Out guide to Buenos Aires, and already had a long list of restaurants to go see.

We found this little place in Barrio Norte that had great empanadas. I won't say more about it as Ezra's basically covered it all in his blog which is all about the food we ate. Needless to say, it was very tasty. Eating beef stew on a hot summer's day isn't always ideal, unless it taste ridiculously good.

After lunch we decided to walk around Recoletta and the surrounding areas.

I picked up a watch at a place around the corner. I don't usually wear one, but I left my phone at home and needed something slick, so I picked up a nice Oceana, or something like that

Buenos Aires is a very big city made up of many different neighborhoods, much like New York. We walked through a few of these, looking for places in the guidebook, on the map, or just to look around.

I didn't bring my medium lens with me when we went out, so I only had my 10-17mm (becomes 16-27mm with my camera) so a lot of these pictures are more than a little distorted. Takes a cool picture, but I promise, as cool as the architecture is here, it's not as wacky as it appears in some of these photos.

We stopped at a cafe near the Recoleta Cemetery
, a famous and grandiose place that I'll definitely come back to later and take more pictures. Recoleta is a mroe upscale neighborhood with a mixture of tourists and diplomats depending on which part you're in. This cafe was jsut what we needed to keep us going.

When you order a cafe in BA you get a tasty little espresso, which are usually accompanied by a packet of small sugar cookies. Right next to this cafe was a massive tree (see pictures above) that canopied part of it. As we walked around, I saw a lot of these ancient behemoths in little parks and gardens.

The rest of these are some more interesting images from walking around.

Ezra made fun of me, and rightly so, for my poor sense of direction in this new city. My excuse was I wasn't paying attention because I was too busy taking pictures. This is only partially true.

Anyhow, after all this we headed abck to our room. I put the camera away for the night and a while later we headed out again to hit up another cafe. It was around 8:30pm and we weren't quite ready to have dinner yet. Everything starts much later here in BA than in America. We figured by 9:30pm people would be out having dinner. Not so. It was pretty dead, and a Friday no less. The place Ezra wanted to check out had a few old people in it, so we decided maybe another time. We walked around for another hour or so and ended up eating at this big restaurant near our building. This was our first steak experience here, and it was definitely not disappointing.

We turned in around 12:30am, determined to catch up on sleep and be all set for day 2.

DAY 2: THE ADVENTURE CONTINUES

We woke up inadvertantly around 8:45am. Much like dinner, nobody was out and about. But we decided to head down to the famous Cafe Tortoni, a popular hangout of many artists, politicians, you name it. It was very nice, parisian, and filled with tourists, some of which who came only to take pictures. I ordered what I imagined to be a small plate of cheese and olives (as it said for one person), and they brought me this giant plate of food. On a side note, the food here is exceptionally cheap. Not a point of pride of the Argentinians, as it is a result of the major economic collapse they had here around the turn of the century. However, it does allow foreigners to enjoy amazing cuisine at 1/2 to 1/3 of typical New York prices.

I made a small dent in the cheese plate, and then it was off to Florida St, where all the main touristy shops are. We walked down block after block of basically the same 5 stores: Sunglasses, Shoes, Clothes, Chachkis, Specialized or American knockoff or an American store. It was interesting, but not very engaging. Ezra did not find the sunglasses he was looking for, nor did I find anywhere to buy new shoes or shirts. My big purchase was a few Cuban cigars, Partagas, to enjoy later. We then headed back tot he room and chilled for a while

Around 3:00 we caught a cab to Palermo Soho and moved into our permanent residence for the next two months. Here are some pictures of the place.

Here is a view from our terrace, which I might add has a sweet BBQ we will definitely use for asado.

This one is a little panorama I whipped together. Click on it for a bigger picture.

Befitting our hedonistic natures, Ezra and I decided to christen the new place with a tasty cigar and some beer the previous occupants, a German couple, had left.

We chilled out for a while and I decided to call my friend Paule. She's a french girl I met in the states through my college friend Vanessa. Vanessa knew I was going to BA, and threw a little party with her friends who had been or were going so I could meet them. Paule had been here for a month and a half already and had found a job working at a shoe design company. I just called her to say hello and let her know I was here, but she immediately invited us out to have dinner with her and friends. We of course didn't make it to the restaurant till about midnight, but we had a great time and a lot of... you guessed it, red meat (there was a little chicken, but who's counting?) They told us about a lot of cool stuff going on around here and where to go to get concentrated Spanish lessons.

Ezra and I got back around 2:30am and here I am posting this immensely long blog entry. It's now 5am and I need to head to bed, not that I have a pressing agenda tomorrow or anything ;)

So that's the first installment of my trip to BA. Don't forget to check out Ezra's blog. No pictures but good food descriptions. I will be out and about with my camera in the next week, so keep checking back for more updates.

Adios till then.

Buenos Aires Goodbye Dinner

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 15:09:00 +0000

Last night myself and a few friends dined at Bogota, http://www.bogotabistro.com/ , a Latin Bistro on Park Slope's illustrious 5th Avenue. I had never been to Bogota before, but a former roommate of mine, Celeste, works there and had recommended it to me many times as a good place to go. I wanted to find an appropriate place to go before my trip to Buenos Aires, and there food is pan Latin. I also noticed that Wednesdays they had happy hour all night and live music. This seemed like the right place to go.

All I can say is...wow. The food and the atmosphere was great. When I got there, a few people were already at the bar making use of the happy hour and eating appetizers

I brought my new camera. It's the Pentax K10D, http://www.dpreview.com/articles/pentaxk10d/, an awesome new 10 Megapixel camera. I am still trying to figure out how to use it correctly, so even though I took a lot of photos, there were only a few that were worth posting (sorry I wasn't able to get everyone). It's difficult using this camera without a flash in a low lighting situation, but I will definitely figure out how to do it.

Everyone had a great time and really liked the food. I was drinking a strawberyy and guava mojito. Nice.

After all the goodbyes were said, Kat and I went back to my place and played with my roommate Courtland's dog, Mia, for about a half hour.

Fuck this dog is cute :)

So I am catching a plane with my friend Ezra tonight to head off to Buenos Aires. This is where we are staying http://www.stayinbuenosaires.com/pringles1200_e.htm . I got a call this morning telling me it won't be available for the first night we're there, so they will be putting us up in a bed and breakfast. Boo hoo I guess.

The next time I post, I will be in South America, probably hung over.

Till then...

P.S.: Anyone who wants me to send them a postcard from BA should email me their address at M_Drumm@yahoo.com.

The Turducken Factor

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 00:07:00 +0000

There are many things that go into the creation of a perfect Thanksgiving feast. Often times it's a combination of things like a juicy turkey and creamy mashed potatoes, Sometimes it's a succulent ham with candied yams, and other times it's a good selection of wine, conversation and merriment. Well, we had all those this year, and it was great. But what made the ultimate difference was what I like to call "the Turducken Factor". This is a scientific term that plots a graph where one axis measures the tastiness of a Turducken and the other measures the amount of fun had on Thanksgiving. I have put an example here from Science Weekly.

As you can plainly see, the amount of fun had at Thanksgiving is directly related to the tastiness of a Turducken. All I can say was our graph was off the charts this year. It was juicy, succulent, and tasti all wrapped up in a multi-meat and stuffing adventure. Here are some pictures of the creation of this years Turducken.

First you start with 1 raw chicken, duck and turkey. The turkey is the biggest and ours was about 24 lbs. The next largest is the duck and ours was 6-7 lbs. Our chicken was 4-5 lbs. You must completely debone each bird (except for the turkey, where you leave the leg bones). This is not an easy process, as you have to keep the bird intact, especially the skin as you remove all the bones. To do this, you must cut down the spine of the bird and begin to seperate the meat from the bone while trying to keep the meat together in one main piece.

Note: These pictures are not for the faint of heart.

Success!

Once you've deboned all the fowl, you lay them out and put stuffing on each one.

We had an andouille sausage stuffing for the turkey, a cornbread stuffing for the duck, and a shrimp stuffing for the chicken.

Then came time for the fun part. We closed the chicken up with skewers

Then we put the chicken in the duck, and closed the duck around the chicken, then skewered that shut as well

Then we put the chicken and duck inside the turkey, where yours truly then sewed the turkey shut

And then VOILA! You have Turducken

The next day, after cooking for 9 hours, we pulled it from the oven

Oh so tasty brown! We then remove the skewers from inside and cut it open. As you can see, each piece has three layers of meat with a different stuffing between each

And then time for the feast. The chart proves correct again and science prevails as there are nothing but happy faces

So what have I learned from all this? If there's birds for the pluckin, and fingers for the suckin, then you had better make a Turducken.

Happy Thanksgiving from the Three Chefs!

Coming up next:

Buenos Aires Goodbye Dinner and off to South America!

Thanksgiving Menu

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 17:47:00 +0000

Ok, so here is a menu I have made for our Thanksgiving feast. You'll notice there are little people next to some of the dishes. This is will tell you who's making what.

I know this looks like a lot of food, but we're expecting around 18-20 people this year, so I think we'll make a sizeable dent in it.

Shopping for this has been a multiple day affair.

Bocceriffic

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 17:23:00 +0000

So I took my family to play bocce the other day at the oyster shell courts down the street. Here are some pics:

My sister steps up to the plate.

My Dad surveys the scene.

Too close to call.

Nothing like a little form.

We've been there a few times now. I'd say my family is hooked. My dad was even thinking of putting a court in by the side of the house.

It's good to have Miriam home with us. She adds that extra topping of cheese to our family's pizza.

Off to California

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 08:32:00 +0000

I arrived in Oakland California on Thursday. I slept through my alarm, so I about 5 minutes to pack when the car arrived. Thankfully I got everything I needed and managed to perform some AM duties in the process.

Here's a pic of me with my Dad's ridiculous license plate.

So I did some research and found out that there are 8 outdoor bocce courts literally down the street from where my parents live. I conviced my Dad to get a set of balls and we hit the courts.

I had never played on an outdoor court before, but seemed to do well regardless, much to my Dad's chagrin. I certainly didn't make it easy for him. But I think he's caught the bocce bug and will be ready to play any time I'm out here.

My sister flies in tomorrow. She was supposed to come Tuesday, but I convinced her to come earlier. My whole family's excited.

Stay tuned for the making of the Thanksgiving feast which includes a fully functioning Turducken.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turducken

Welcome

noreply@blogger.com (DrummStyle) — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 08:30:00 +0000

Welcome to my Blog. I am starting this to chronicle my trip to Buenos Aires this December, but I might as well make use of this forum so my friends can know what's up in my life.