People are from here!

Today, we are all with James Woods.

Oh, joyous day! Just in case you haven’t heard the news, it’s official: Rhode Island’s own James Woods was nominated for an Emmy for his groundbreaking performance as Richard Fuld in the HBO miniseries Too Big to Fail. Which I totally saw. And am familiar with… you know, it being about banks? And the money, with the bailout and the things? I think? Yes, well. Moving on.

What’s that? You say you didn’t know that James Woods is from Rhode Island? It’s true! In fact, other people – several, even – are from Rhode Island. Sometimes people who are from Rhode Island leave Rhode Island, and then they do things you might hear about! And they’re not all embarrassing, either. There’s A.O. Scott from the New York Times; The Today Show’s Meredith Vieira; indie darlings Deer Tick; singers (and stepsisters!) Kristin Hersh and Tonya Donnelly;  SNL announcer Don Pardo; and the Farrelly brothers. John Cafferty, he of the Beaver Brown Band. And those are just the ones who are still alive! H.P. Lovecraft was from Rhode Island, and so was Nelson Eddy (look him up, children). 

Know who's not from Rhode Island? Seth MacFarlane. Nope. He's from Connecticut. Although he does provide the voice of Rhode Island on a regular basis. (It sounds just like Brian.)

Boom, boom, sigh.

At some point last year, when I wasn’t paying attention, fireworks were legalized in Rhode Island. Not the big, star-spangled types they shoot off from barges or the end zones of football fields, but sparklers and those things that snake along the ground, hopefully not setting other things or people ablaze. These are sometimes known as “why bother fireworks.” For the ones that bang – the still-illegal ones – you have to head to Connecticut or New Hampshire, where the biggest fireworks name in town is Three-Finger Eddie’s, which has to win the award for making business lemonade out of the oh-so-lemony dangers of a product.  (To get your karate supplies at the same place you get your fireworks, you’ll have to go a bit further.)

Last year they didn’t pass the law in time for vendors to get permits and set up shop in Rhode Island. This year is different. This year, they are everywhere. There are fireworks displays in the produce section at Stop & Shop. Pop-up stores line Route 2 in Warwick and Route 1 in Pawtucket to the Mass line. Farm stands. Farm stands! The storefront next to my favorite Chinese restaurant, where Curves used to be in Cumberland:

The "TNT" may be a little misleading.

They are everywhere. You’re probably sitting on some right now. Someone was selling them out of my car this morning, and that doesn’t even make sense.

The hilarious thing about this is that these aren’t even the kind of fireworks that go boom. The kind that someone in my neighborhood, wherever I have lived, has set off on a nightly basis for a week before and after the Fourth of July. It doesn’t matter if they’re legal or illegal. There is someone on my block, wherever I happen to be, who feels the need to blow shit up in the street, and I have a feeling that almost everyone in this country either has someone like that as a neighbor or actually is that person. And somehow those people will find the kind of fireworks that go boom, no matter how far they have to drive, no matter how much it costs. Did you know that the fireworks industry is utterly recession-proof? It is! Nothing – but nothing! – will stand in the way of people’s favorite way of saying “Happy Birthday!” to America: causing explosions.

To those of you looking forward to lighting fuses this weekend, I’d like to introduce you to someone:

This is Becky. She is my dog. Look at her sweet face! Look at it. Not only is she adorable, but she is super gentle and nice to boot. She is also enormous, weighing in at about a hundred pounds. We adopted her from a Southern rescue last year, and somewhere along the line in her previous life, she became terrified of loud noises. Know what she does when she hears one? She sits on you. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, she will find you, climb on top of you, and sit on you.  So, as it is for many dogs, the Fourth of July is hard on Becky.

Now, I would never ask you not to set off fireworks on the Fourth. I know it isn’t reasonable to ask people not to partake in a treasured tradition because it scares some people’s dogs. But could you toss her a bone, at least? I mean that literally. Toss my dog a bone. Or some beef jerky. She’s not picky. And you know what? It doesn’t even have to be Becky. Blow stuff up, but take something over to your neighbor’s dog, who’s probably cowering under the couch. It’s all about karma.

And if you see someone walking around with a gigantic dog wrapped around her shoulders like a stole, that’s me. I could probably use some Advil.

A private word to some incoming freshmen.

My friend the ProJo ran this photo today...

These fresh-faced rising freshmen are lugging suitcases around the downtown campus of Johnson & Wales University, their academic home for the next (fingers crossed!) four years. Let's all give them a hand! And now, if you don't mind, I'd like to address these and all other incoming JWU students directly.

First of all, welcome! You must be so excited to be embarking on your college career, especially if this is your first time in a biggish city. If you’re here for JWU’s culinary program, good for you! I look forward to sampling your wares in the future. For those of you from New Jersey, and I know the Garden State is especially well-represented at JWU: your long nightmare is almost over.

Now, you and I are going to be cohabitating to an extent in the Jewelry District, where I work and where a lot of you will live and go to class most of the time. In the interest of neighborliness, and short of bringing you a casserole, I’d like to offer the following advice:

Stay the hell out of the street. There are plenty of sidewalks in downtown Providence, and you don’t need to be navigating potholes big enough to swallow your best pair of Uggs in winter on foot. See those blinking light-box-things at most intersections? Those are walk/don’t walk signs. Obey them. If there aren’t any where you happen to be crossing, look both ways before you cross the street.  Don’t just fling yourself willy-nilly into traffic with a grossly misguided sense of who has the right-of-way. Chances are it’s not you, and although I’ll do my very best to not hit you with my car, I can’t make any promises, especially when there’s ice and snow involved.

You’re bringing a car to campus? Lucky you. Find a place to park it and leave it there until you have an errand that can absolutely not be accomplished on foot or by using one of those big blue buses your school provides. If you drive it around town, know that parking enforcement is the sole part of Providence government that runs like a well-oiled machine. Even if you can’t see the “no parking sign,” even if you didn’t know you were too far away from the curb, even if you were only thirty seconds over the one-hour time limit, you will get a ticket. If you want to get out of it, you have to go talk to this guy, and depending on his mood, the whole “but I just had to run upstairs to turn in a paper!” excuse – especially when whined – will not cut it.

When you’re driving your fancy car around town, please keep in mind that arriving at your destination is not a good reason to simply exit your car wherever it happens to be; say, in the middle of the street. Putting on your hazards does not give you dominion over traffic rules or basic manners. Same goes for Jersey plates.

That guy who’s name is all over your campus? It’s this guy. If you see him, try not to make eye contact.

And finally, and most importantly: if you’re not wearing a dress, skirt, or shorts, please wear pants. Tights are not pants. Leggings? Not pants. Jeggings? Not a word, and don’t let me hear you use it again or I’ll cut you. If a two-legged, bottom-worn piece of clothing highlights every contour of your behind and ends in a tight taper around each ankle, that garment is not a pair of pants. You’re in college now! So put on some pants.

Real estate-based fear-mongering is rather uncool.

So today I’m plugging along, doing my thing, secure in the knowledge that while many things in the world are bad right now, at least there’s no ticking time bomb within walking distance of my office. And then I see this:

Dammit!

But… wait. Turns out it’s not an actual explosive device waiting to detonate (even though the ad banner above is urging me to celebrate the fourth of July “with a bang.” Ha ha). Clicking through brings you to a much more boring picture of the downtown, um, “skyscraper,” also known as the Bank of America building, and the dire warning of a guy who will not stop running for mayor that if the Bank of America leaves that building when its lease is up, Providence as we know it will cease to exist. 

Questions/comments? I have some.

First, the “Superman building?” Oh, Providence, you are adorable sometimes. You know, if you photograph a stalk of celery at night, in fog, and with sentry-looking statues flanking it (although I think the upper one is Roger Williams), it might look Superman-ish, too.  But a more accurate representation may be how it appears behind the Griffins’ house on Family Guy:

Decidedly less super.

Second, what the hell? Is there a dearth of crises in this state, country, and world right now that necessitates the manufacturing of scary-sounding problems of a pseudo-violent nature? Honestly, I’m a little preoccupied worrying about how my local elementary school is going to have turned into a cash-for-gold depot by the time my daughter is ready for kindergarten to worry too much about downtown getting all Lord of the Flies if BoA vacates. 

And lastly, if BoA truly is one of the state’s largest employers, and the lion’s share of its employees work in this one downtown building, where do they all park? Where do they all park?

Stop it... other states.

So it’s finally happened. I’ve had to admit that while there are many, many things that irritate me about Rhode Island, there just aren’t enough to justify sitting down and writing about it on a regular basis. That is, there aren't enough new things. The ProJo still sucks, it takes a million years to go from point A to point B in a state the size of a postage stamp, etc. But be assured that this does not mean that Rhode Island isn’t irritating; it just confirms that it is small. (But not as small as me. HA! Beat you to it.) And so, in the interest of maintaining even a modest momentum, I am forced to turn my judgmental eye to other states, with the understanding that Rhode Island irritants take precedence over all others. You’re number one, baby.

Anyway. I’d like to begin with Maryland, the state in which I spent the bulk of my childhood, and the place I tell people I’m from when I’m asked, because it’s just easier than rattling off the relatively complicated list of places I’ve lived.** Specifically, I’d like to have a word with this guy, who has taken it upon himself to finish an open-water swim in the Chesapeake Bay with a few butterfly strokes.

[I'm having some trouble cross-posting the pic, so please click on the link and go to picture #11. Sorry.]

Hey, fella? Boasty McShowoff? You’re not impressing anyone with that. I used to be a swimmer, and while I was never awesome (I spent my swimming career nestled comfortably between “passable” and “kind of good”), I can say with certainty that I always had the good sense not to lollygag my way through a race so I could showboat at the end. Also? I stayed the hell out of the Chesapeake Bay. Know why? Sea nettles. Millions of them, all waiting to sting the hell out of someone fool enough to invade their house.

Am I a little jealous? Maybe. I’m big enough to admit it. In fact, I’m big enough to have abandoned the skintight one- and two-piece racing suits of my youth for a much  more sensible swim dress from Land’s End. So what? It hides the post-baby lumpiness I can’t seem to get rid of, jackass. Will you ever know that pain? No, you will not. The closest you’ll come is probably a few months of a few too many indulgent happy  hours at Pusser’s, and you’ll rid yourself of the resulting gut in two weeks by switching to skim lattes. So who are you to judge me? How dare you? I am working on it, okay?

On another note, a special shout-out to this guy for making me feel like a lazy ass.

sea nettle : Chesapeake Bay :: toaster : bathtub

** New Jersey, Minnesota, Poland, Minnesota, Virginia, Minnesota, Maryland, Chicago, Evanston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island.

A brief roundup of sad.

Has it been a while since you've sighed dejectedly? Do your eye-rolling muscles need some exercise? Well, here you go:

First, the Providence Journal thought it necessary to publish a list of the top ten reasons not to open up a fire hydrant on a hot day. One can only assume that there are people out there who need not one, not two, but ten reasons not to do something dangerous and illegal, and that those people look to the ProJo for guidance. This is sad.

Also sad is the fact that the couple who sponsored a public art project to erect a bronze statue of Providence native George M. Cohan in Fox Point can't raise enough money to pay the sculptor because nobody knows who George M. Cohan is.

And the final sadness  - for today -  is not only that this column happened, but that the ProJo commenters really, truly outdid themselves. Not just in inanity and petty bitchiness, but in honest-to-goodness, what-the-hell-are-you-talking-about confusion and off-topic-ness. Please to read and then throw up your hands in defeat.

You're welcome!

Begrudging respect? Fat chance.

Well, this sucks. (ProJo photo)

You know what, Providence? I’m sorry to have to say this so bluntly because I know you’re sensitive and all, but after today’s commute, it simply must be said that you are truly bad at this whole “being a functioning city” thing. Seriously, what the hell is the matter with you? You fail at the easy stuff, stuff that even tragically dysfunctional other cities can do, like… I don’t know, let’s say Detroit. Not because I know or I’ve ever been there, but because it provides the stark comparison I’m looking for. Yeah. Detroit! How does that feel?

I know that the storms that rolled through last night hit you pretty hard. But traffic lights were still out hours and hours after the power went out. You know what should get fixed first in the case of an electrical outage? Traffic lights. Oh, and would you mind mentioning to your fine citizens that an out-of-order traffic light is the same as a four-way stop sign, and not a signal that it’s an every-man-for-himself chaotic free-for-all? As the lone individual who remembers that rule from driver’s ed class, I sure would appreciate it.

Also? Instead of dispatching one crew to take care of downed trees one at a time, why not have them divide into smaller crews and tackle two – maybe even three! – tree branches at once, in different places? You know, like the Scooby gang! Scooby-doobie-doo, goddammit! And would you mind telling the cop who was sitting in the squad car that was used to block off the street  -- the one that the giant crew was working to clear –  that maybe he could step away from Angry Birds for a moment? There are a few intersections right off the end of a freeway off-ramp that have no signals and could really use some traffic direction. Look, I know that he’s probably about to lose his job, and that really sucks, but those intersections are an Italian-style fifty-car pile-up just waiting to happen.

And you know what would have been great about all this mess? A warning. But how? Oh, how could you warn citizens of this fair city that certain parts of downtown were nigh impassable because of the weather? Perhaps the LED signs along the freeways? No, no, of course not. Their current message – CLICK IT OR TICKET – is far too important to usurp for some measly weather-related tidbit. No, what’s important is that before puttering through a foot-deep, block-long puddle created by inadequate drainage, all the while praying that the electrical system in the car didn’t shit the bed, we were buckled up right. But wait! What about the news? I listen to NPR on my way to work in the mornings, and there was not one single mention of the state of downtown. It’s right there on the website, but apparently they didn’t see the need to say it out loud to those who were not presently on the interwebs. Because we were driving.

Look. Times are tough. I get it. But this is the easy stuff. This isn’t pensions or job cuts or unemployment. This is making sure traffic signals never go out. This is clearing the crap off of the storm drain grates so water can drain after a fucking storm. This is easy, Providence. This is putting on clean underwear in the morning. It’s just not that much of a challenge. And look what you’ve done to me! I’ve gone from being a writer the Times of London once called “a refreshingly modern satirical voice… the wit of Dorothy Parker melded seamlessly with the homespun wisdom of Erma Bombeck,”** to someone who wastes precious work time ranting impotently about a stupid anthropomorphized city on a blog few people read! Is that what you want, you sick son of a bitch? Well, fine. You win. You win because you’re a city and I’m just a writer of an anger blog about a state no one cares about. But you still suck.

** This did not happen.