Anti-Rove in New York
Greetings, everyone. Six hours and thirty-six minutes from now I will be in-flight, en route to the not-so-sunny, not-so-tropical environs of Gotham itself for a little mingling of business and pleasure. Lucky me, I managed to convert a two-day Microsoft seminar into a nearly four-day half-vacation, with my employer footing (most of) the bill.
That I’ll be in the belly of the beast, at Microsoft, for two days is an irony in itself. About a month ago I ditched Internet Explorer, making the jump to Firefox and haven’t looked back. In addition, I am currently in the process of moving my personal email account from its decade-long home on Microsoft’s hotmail servers to Google’s superior gmail, which, while it takes some getting used to, I’m lovin’. Thanks Bonati.
I’ve never been a fan of Microsoft products, much less its business tactics, yet it’s more difficult these days to come down too hard on Gates & Co. when he’s running around donating nearly a billion dollars to such worthy causes as third-world immunization. Sure, you could be cynical and say that it's mere pocket change to Gates, who only wants these folks alive and healthy so the brute Microsoft can expand into those untapped markets, and you might be right. But I would counter that by saying it doesn’t matter so much why he does it, it is a wonderful thing; and if driven by the stench of rapacious capitalism, well then so be it. You know, means and ends.
Anyway, this will mark only my third visit to the Big Apple. I came through back in ’99 while on tour with Planes Mistaken for Stars, and before that, in the summer of ’97, while interning in DC, I partnered with the aforementioned Bonati on a road trip up to NYC. So it’s been awhile. And neither time did I spend more than a day or two in the city, so let’s just say I have yet to experience all that the city has to offer.
I’ll be meeting up with a couple of friends that I rarely get to see—Mark Iwanski and I may hit up a jazz club tomorrow night, and I’ll see if I can convince him to join me on an all-day rampage through the record stores of lower Manhattan on Saturday. Friday night I’m meeting up with Andrew Bottomley, of Skyscraper magazine fame, for drinks and lord knows what else. Perhaps he can introduce me to his boss, you may have heard of him, one Martin Scorcese. One can dream, at least… :)
I’ll be missing my lovely wife and beautiful baby girl (the pit bull, that is), but I’ll be home soon enough. I’m crossing my fingers for broadband in my hotel room, but right now, I’m not sure just how connected I’m gonna be. So the blogging is unlikely to be as frequent as usual, but we’ll see what happens. Depending on the setup at MS, I may be able to sneak in a post or two during the seminar. Plus, I have an old article I wrote for Skyscraper a few years ago that I’ll be posting as well, so Unfinished Novellas will not be dead anytime soon. But it might take a nap.
N/P Dreamies – s/t
That I’ll be in the belly of the beast, at Microsoft, for two days is an irony in itself. About a month ago I ditched Internet Explorer, making the jump to Firefox and haven’t looked back. In addition, I am currently in the process of moving my personal email account from its decade-long home on Microsoft’s hotmail servers to Google’s superior gmail, which, while it takes some getting used to, I’m lovin’. Thanks Bonati.
I’ve never been a fan of Microsoft products, much less its business tactics, yet it’s more difficult these days to come down too hard on Gates & Co. when he’s running around donating nearly a billion dollars to such worthy causes as third-world immunization. Sure, you could be cynical and say that it's mere pocket change to Gates, who only wants these folks alive and healthy so the brute Microsoft can expand into those untapped markets, and you might be right. But I would counter that by saying it doesn’t matter so much why he does it, it is a wonderful thing; and if driven by the stench of rapacious capitalism, well then so be it. You know, means and ends.
Anyway, this will mark only my third visit to the Big Apple. I came through back in ’99 while on tour with Planes Mistaken for Stars, and before that, in the summer of ’97, while interning in DC, I partnered with the aforementioned Bonati on a road trip up to NYC. So it’s been awhile. And neither time did I spend more than a day or two in the city, so let’s just say I have yet to experience all that the city has to offer.
I’ll be meeting up with a couple of friends that I rarely get to see—Mark Iwanski and I may hit up a jazz club tomorrow night, and I’ll see if I can convince him to join me on an all-day rampage through the record stores of lower Manhattan on Saturday. Friday night I’m meeting up with Andrew Bottomley, of Skyscraper magazine fame, for drinks and lord knows what else. Perhaps he can introduce me to his boss, you may have heard of him, one Martin Scorcese. One can dream, at least… :)
I’ll be missing my lovely wife and beautiful baby girl (the pit bull, that is), but I’ll be home soon enough. I’m crossing my fingers for broadband in my hotel room, but right now, I’m not sure just how connected I’m gonna be. So the blogging is unlikely to be as frequent as usual, but we’ll see what happens. Depending on the setup at MS, I may be able to sneak in a post or two during the seminar. Plus, I have an old article I wrote for Skyscraper a few years ago that I’ll be posting as well, so Unfinished Novellas will not be dead anytime soon. But it might take a nap.
N/P Dreamies – s/t
posted by Jonathan Wright at 9:16 AM EMAIL POST
