WRITING CULTURE 2012: Film, Food & Beyond

Philly AIDS Thrift is arguably one of the most fun thrift stores ever. The window displays and mannequins are always provocative and stylish. The walls are covered with art and eye-popping displays. Everyone is sincerely friendly and there are always interesting people to shop or chat with at PAT.

Philly AIDS Thrift

I especially love spending money at PAT since they contribute to 29 different AIDS/LBGT related charities in the Philadelphia area.

Wander around all the different rooms packed with lamps, TVs, furniture, paintings, clothes, jewelry, and records. Nearly all clothing items are under $10, and most are half of that. Pick up one of their neat PAD logo tote bags or t-shirts made from recycled items.  Besides all that, my favorite thing about PAT is that they have A LOT of books.

PAT has more books than a small bookstore. Boxes are piled on the floor because the shelves are often overflowing.  Philadelphia is a well read city and the book selection reflects that. If you’re looking for mass-market bestsellers, try the $1 room. 

The books are neatly organized by genre, Art, LBGT, Politics, Poetry, History….. One afternoon, I spent at least an hour  just looking at art books.

Even if you leave empty handed, you will leave smiling. It’s just a fun place to go. But I usually find something, and often leave with a bag full of clothes for around $20. You can find anything here. They have lots of vintage as well as gently used designer items.

 On this visit, I noticed lots of nice jeans, a few shirts and a French Connection pencil skirt for just $1, but I didn’t buy anything.  I just didn’t see anything I really needed.

Sometimes it’s hard to pass on things that are nice and a great deal, but if you don’t need it, it’s really just a waste. I’ve been thrifting for years, but sometimes I still have to remember to be mindful, and not buy stuff I don’t need. At these prices, it’s easy to do.

Buying stuff you don’t need defeats the purpose of thrifting. You don’t save money or the environment by buying and hoarding stuff you don’t need, even if it is a great deal, and for a good cause like Philly Aids Thrift.

Next post, this “thrift store” has mostly NEW clothes.

To be as objective as possible and keep my subjective-ness removed, if possible.  Beasts of the Southern Wild is a beautifully filmed, and well executed film.  It is not my taste – I would much prefer to watch a romantic comedy where someone is in love and out of love and there’s something funny and lighthearted and a happy ending.  This is not that movie.

Hushpuppy and her father live in the ‘Bathtub’ of Southern Louisiana, where life is hard and the people who live there are die-hards.  They are born there, raised there, and die there, and it will take something terrible to get them to leave – and even then, a lot of them won’t go.  This is somewhat realistic for a place like the Bathtub in real life – however, in the midst of a terrible storm (it is assumed it is a hurricane without actually being told that it is), it is time to go.

Hushpuppy’s father,  who seems to be a relatively small minded, wife-beater, is raising this poor little girl on his own (and mostly she is raising herself) is adamant they will stay, and so they do.  They stick out the terrible storm and get stuck in the ‘Bathtub’ with the other folks who refused to leave.  They have none of the things they need to survive, and it is all too real to watch them struggle the same way as the people who in real life refuse to leave before a storm and then get trapped and are in trouble.

We also learn after the storm that Hushpuppy’s father is very sick, another thing to make this little girl’s life harder.  The only redeeming qualities of this film (to me) are the beautiful cinematography and the fact that there is a semi-happy ending.  I would actually recommend going to see it – if only for the beautiful camera work and the fact that it did win the grand jury prize at Sundance.

As a former Girl Scouts, the motto, “be prepared,” is engraved into my brain. With both parents as scout leaders, we were prepared. We took out the candles, changed the batteries on the flashlights and set the hot pot stove (aka butane stove), therefore, in case a black out occurred, we would still have light and a way of cooking food.

Fortunately, the worst didn’t happen to us. The worst we experienced during Hurricane Sandy was the loss of internet connection.  It took Time Warner Cable two weeks after the storm to return the service to my house. The commute to do homework at school made my parents uneasy, especially after the hurricane. But nonetheless, compared to others, I’m thankful that I still have a home and a family.

“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, an initial girl-child. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was born as my age was that summer. You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this tangle of thorns.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita

Have you heard of Nabokovs “Lolita”? This book is located in the “banned books” section in “Strand Bookstore”. My boyfriend does not read books at all, so to make him interested in reading, I got him one of those.

And this is not just a weird love story of a 36-year-old man and 12-year-old girl, this is life.

“Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”

Anton Chekhov not only was one of the brightest Russian writers, but also one of the kindest people on Earth!

If you ask who my favorite writer is, the answer will be Chekhov. He was the smartest man, and his writing was just brilliant. He felt the Russian soul, he knew what it was to live in Russia of 19th century.

He died at 44. If he lived today, the tuberculosis would have been treated and he could have written much more..

image credit: http://www.google.com/imgres?q=chekhov+the+cherry+orchard&um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&tbo=d&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&biw=1280&bih=852&tbm=isch&tbnid=UnlxVwsNYidLBM:&imgrefurl=http://www.oocities.org/warrickw/lit/chekhov1.htm&docid=5GE-iosDqCT4zM&imgurl=http://www.oocities.org/warrickw/lit/Chekhov.gif&w=304&h=294&ei=6NrQUJTtIezK0AGU14GwBg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=810&vpy=259&dur=705&hovh=221&hovw=228&tx=154&ty=159&sig=113842195199827723178&page=2&tbnh=158&tbnw=155&start=33&ndsp=39&ved=1t:429,r:64,s:0,i:284

Let me explain, I know this blog is supposed to be about NYC,  but I just have to post from wherever I happen to be thrifting.  I will get back to NYC soon, but I must tell you about my day in Philly.

I Love Philly. Photo from Fodors.com

I go to Pennsylvania a lot looking for antiques, and some of my best thrift store finds are found in Philly.

I love hitting up the shops in and around Philadelphia as much as I can. I find they have similar items found in NYC, but at extremely reasonable prices and with less crowds and attitude.

Like NYC, there is so much to do in Philly besides thrifting. I usually eat at the Reading Terminal Market or in Philadelphia’s version of Chinatown or Little Italy.

Philadelphia is a gorgeous city, rich in culture, food, art and of course thrift stores.

You can take a two-hour bus ride to Philly for about $8, and they run nearly every hour. It’s worth the trip.

I highly recommend that you check it out, and I will be writing more posts about my visits.

Philly Aids Thrift always has the best displays.

Next post will be about one of my favorite thrift stores in Philadelphia….Philly AIDS Thrift.

Goodwill

809 State Route 17

Paramus, NJ 07652

Driving home from Albany I stopped by the Goodwill in Paramus, NJ.

Normally, I wouldn’t review a Goodwill since they are everywhere, all similar and most people have most likely visited a Goodwill Store. I only will post about Goodwill if there is something special or unusual at a location.

Right now this Goodwill is packed with wedding dresses, tuxedos and bridesmaid dresses. At first glance, I thought they were used, and there were just a lot of them.  But no, they are brand new.

When I asked why there were so many wedding dresses, I was told this “rare occurrence” is the result of a wedding shop going out of business.

Prices from $69.99.

These dresses are beautiful! If you are getting married soon, I hope you get down there soon and check it out.

Save your money for the honeymoon!

“I am who I am and that’s who I am” ― Nikolai Gogol

I did not like to read boring books by him when I was in school. I re-read some of his stories recently and rediscovered a brilliant writer!

Some interesting facts about him:

• -He was only 42 when he died, some people say he died a virgin, because no one ever saw him with a woman
• -He burned the book he wrote.
• – Several years before his death he asked not to bury him until after one can see him rotting, but no one listened to him and they buried him right after his death. When re-burying the body, the workers found him skull less and turned around (I was told this when I was a kid and everybody would tell this scary story in class.)

Image credit: http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6rO3xKDCRG8/TpHqKcKFxaI/AAAAAAAAB6s/J8J0XLDls6w/s400/gogol.jpg&imgrefurl=http://wwwbillblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/kind-of-face-you-slash-day-9.html&h=400&w=400&sz=16&tbnid=P3o_RaJLkyAwVM:&tbnh=92&tbnw=92&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dnikolai%2Bgogol%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=nikolai+gogol&usg=__-_8imd4mZjyXKx32Z7IkXE-RHqw=&docid=758VVcNVNGsM9M&sa=X&ei=E97QUNf0JKiF0QHCpICQCg&ved=0CJYBEP4dMBI

Breakfast at Baruch for me is just like breakfast anywhere else. It doesn’t exist. I do enjoy a hot beverage in the morning, no matter the weather. This morning in particular, I popped into My Way Cup (102 East 23rd st), which is known for their coffee, to pick up some tea. The reason being that they carry mighty tea. I had a craving for the Citrus Chamomile. Mighty Tea makes a particularly satisfying balanced blend that doesn’t prompt me to remove the bag the second it sinks into the water. It can hang in there as long as I feel like dwelling over my beverage in enjoyment. A well chosen alternative for their staple.

Long Branch, by Dane Clark and Linsey Stewart, is a short film about a potentially long relationship.   The film opens with our lead characters making out in a tunnel with a car driving past.  Our female lead (name still tba) bluntly asks the guy if he would like to have sex, in a much more crude fashion than we’ll touch on here, to which she receives a reply that is expected of any straight male; yes.  Her roommate has people over so they have to go back to his place – as he checks his phone for the time, he asks how good her shoe’s arch support is and they start running to make the train, which they do.  If they hadn’t the rest of the somewhat predictable plot would not be able to play out.

Long Branch

Once on the train, they make the few other people in the car uncomfortable and myself too a bit, to be honest.  Finally, after their make out session goes on for a while and a station name is announced, our female (who’s name we still do not know) asks where this guy lives to which he finally admits he lives in Long Branch – nearly 2 hours away.

Cue to them now being on a city bus in the snow – at this point, quite unrealistic.  Their down to awkward conversation when at least the girl lets us know why we don’t know character names “basic one night stand etiquette”.  That cleared a little bit up at least.  Finally, they make it back to his house where it is clear to the audience immediately that he lives with family.  She stays and they end up cozy-ing up to sleep, no sex involved, and leave the viewer thinking they may actually go on a real date. Not original, but cute and relatively enjoyable.