no kitsch there

[lapsedmodernist]

so i stop by this beauty salon in Greenpoint today that's right next to my bank. it's run by a bunch of Russians, and always results in total linguistic confusion for me, because while the owners speak in Russian, there is always US radio playing, Polish locals talking amongst themselves, and two women from Venezuela who talk in Spanish. Anyway, I used to get pedicures there when I lived in Greenpoint, and I know that they rent out apartments above the salon sometimes, so I ask if they know of an apartment, for Nuncstans, a nice place for about a $1,000.
The following conversation transpires:

The owner: For a $1,000? Sure, but it has no bathroom.
Me: I think they need a bathroom.
The owner: Well, it has a hose, so they wouldn't need a shower.
Me: what the hell kind of a place is it that does not have a bathroom and has a hose in lieu of a shower?
The owner: It's the basement under Key Foods at the corner. They could eat right there.
Me: At the supermarket?
The owner: yeah.
Me: Well, I really think they want a place with a bathroom.
The owner: If they really love each other, they don't need a bathroom.
Me: I think they do.
The owner: don't you know that story about the couple who got help up at gunpoint, and the robber told them that he would shoot them unless they took off their pants and took a crap...
Me: PLEASE don't finish that story.
The owner: so anyway, he told them they had to eat each other's crap. And then the girl got mad at the guy because he took a larger crap than she did, and she said it meant he loved her less than she loved him.
Me: Um.
The owner: you know where that happenned?
Me: No.
The owner: It was in Moscow, right in front of the Pushkin Statue, the great Russian poet Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin witnessing the whole thing.

LONG PAUSE

Me: Anyway, I am going to go now. And I still think they want a place with a bathroom.
The owner: Well, for that they'll have to pay $1,800.


I hate people.

Comments

Scary

[mistershush.livejournal.com]

but it made me laugh pretty hard. Anyway, I was just going through my LJ, noticed a comment from you (2 months ago, I don't use it much) so I figured I'd repay the visit. So, hi! I enjoyed reading some of your entries--very thoughtful and quite appealing. Your exchange with Amazon.com boy was comedy gold. :) Are you an athro grad student at Columbia?

Re: Scary

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

Thanks :) sometimes the material just kind of provides itself like the the Amazon uberJew. or this. did i post in your lj about duran-duran? or about USSR & Germany during WWII? i think i rememebr reading an entry about that, and i was going to recommend a book, but then i realized that i don't think it's translated into English, so oh well...
i am anthro at NYU, i just took a class at columbia last semester...what do you study?

Re: Scary

[mistershush.livejournal.com]

A 'double dip' of sorts--philosophy and research methodology. Main areas of interest are the philosophy of social science, epistemology, and philosophical anthropology. I'll complete my dissertation proposal this summer, defend in the fall, then it's a mad mad sprint to the finish line. How far along are you in your program?

Re: Scary

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

what exactly do you mean by philosophical anthropology? like de certeau? or more ethnopoetics type stuff? i am sort of midway in my program. i have had my M.A. for a while now; after this semester i am done with classes...except for video production (because i am doing a joint program--anthro Ph.D and certificate in ethnographic documentary filmmaking), next year i have to write grants in the fall, take my comps in the spring, and if all goes well leave for the field (ecuador) at the end of next school year/next summer. are you at UIUC? lots of corn there...what is your dissertation going to be on?

Re: Scary

[mistershush.livejournal.com]

Philosophical anthropology: roughly, the philosophical study of what it is to be human. The 'approach' to PA that I'm most interested in is rooted in the Heidegger-Gadamer-Taylor tradition of philosophical hermeneutics....more specifically, I'm interested in how that tradition can inform our theorizing and research practices in the human sciences. Don't know enough about de certeau or ethnopoetics to sketch the overlap, but you probably could.

My dissertation won't really involve any of it though. Instead, I'll be 'dissertating' on the concept of evidence. It's a little unclear at this point whether it will be more of a straight-up conceptual analysis, or a series of case studies examining the 'evidentiary' practices found in a few fields (psychology, sociology, law, etc). "Manufacturing Evidence" would be kick-ass title, but I'm not sure it will be an apt one by the time I finish. I've got a busy summer ahead sorting all this out for my proposal.

Yes, UIUC, and yes, we have mucho corn. And that's about all we have. Free-floating suburbs make for shitty college towns. I attended Indiana Univ. for a stretch...a proper college town if there ever was one.

A friend of mine finished up her fieldwork in Vietnam last year. Some amazing 'tales from the field'. I do a lot of fieldwork myself (evaluating educational and human service programs), but in a way that's far more limited than what you anthro folks are about. :)

Documentary stuff: very nice. Will your dissertation be a film (whole or in part)? Topic(s)?

[vaguerant.livejournal.com]

Oh my god
I cannot stop laughing
my spleen has gone AWOL

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

yeah, well, if you and your friend need a bigger place, you now know where to go for gems of real estate advice. How do you feel about the basement of Key Foods? I hear it's for rent. Do you have Key Foods where you are? I always found it strange that there is no national food market chain, there are regional ones, but I have not seen a natioinal one. In New York there is Key Foods and Associated, in Chicago there's Dominick's and Jewel, in L.A. there is Pavilion, and in DC...I don't even know what the hell they have in DC, because that city depresses me and my brain refuses to process any sensory input from there.

how's the packing coming along?

[never-the-less.livejournal.com]

Hi. In case you care, which, well, at this point you probably don't, in DC they have Giant, which is actually really nice, and Safeway, which is also popular on the West coast. But yes, DC sucks.

I like reading your entries...do you mind if I add you? Also, where did you go in Greenpoint to get your pedicures? With summer around the corner, I really should find a place, and since Greenpoint is both where I live and generally cheaper than anywhere else in the city, I might as well go local.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

that's right...safeway...i remember that. but still--no national chain. that's a little odd, no? i mean, i am happy, rather than unhappy about the absence of yet another huge monopoly, it just seems unlikely.
of course you can add me, i'll add you back.
the place in greenpoint: beverly hills salon (name says something about the Russian-emigre-imaginary-of-American-beauty-culture).
It's on Manhattan Ave, I think near Calyer? I don't remember the exact crossstreet, but it is on the next block from Dime Savings Bank of Williamsburg, and I think either on the same block or next block after aforementioned Key Foods. They do really good pedicures, and everything there is very cheap. Just don't ask the owner for real estate advice. Where in Greenpoint do you live?

[never-the-less.livejournal.com]

yeah, no national grocery chains is weird. i wonder if it has anything to do with the whole freshness issue concerning produce (i'll have to think about what the relation would be though...) it's also strange how there can be such a disparity in quality between individual stores in a chain. for example, the safeways in DC suck, but in Washington state they are fantastic, with great produce and lots of samples. or that the associated in greenpoint is relatively nice while the associated on 5th ave. in park slope is horrible. i file the prominence of duane reades in new york (and their complete absence everywhere else) under the same phenomena.

i live on leonard and meserole in greenpoint, so the beverly hills salon is right around the corner from me. yes, the name in hilarious. i had no idea that it was russian and not polish.

[mysteryfood.livejournal.com]

So sick, but so hillarious.

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

Maybe he had just read Moscow 2042, this Russian dystopian satire novel where food is reprocessed out of shit. I don't know. I really don't.

just no.

[(Anonymous)]

it made me realize that i really don't want to know just how much anyone loves me.

seltix

[klingrap.livejournal.com]

That's the best thing I've ever heard. That apartment with no br and a hose is like one block from my house. Maybe I'll move there.

Are you doing anything at all tonight? Wanna get drunk?

[lapsedmodernist.livejournal.com]

yes, let's get drunk! later is better than earlier as i have a hair issue that needs to be resolved before i go out. i'm gonna call you when i get off-line, so this is rather moot. on jeopardy yesterday they had a "cow" category where adding an "O" to an existing word made it into a different word, like "rot" to "root" -- one of those stupid jeopardy things, and they had a question about a melville novel, and i thought the answer was Mooby Dick.
oh well.