Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Holidays, Happy and Otherwise

This Moment: The last day of Christmas shopping, people everywhere, in good cheer, bad cheer, and various other moods. The reason to not wear earphones everywhere is to be able to hear the unexpected, and to bask in the wonder that is humanity. For example, I overheard these two gems today.

Mom #1

Setting: The middle of a crowded Toys-R-Us, dragging a child on the verge of tears.

Quote: "I will call Santa right now on the phone and tell him not to bother!"

Mom #2

Setting: The middle of crowded toy section in K-Mart, talking to a friend.

Quote: "What? No, that's for me. I looooove erotica."

I wish I had little awards to pass out.

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Year in Music

This Moment: As it is getting near the end of the year, music magazines, blogs, and radio shows are rolling out their top tens and other commentaries on music. In thinking about my music moments over the last year, one quickly came to mind as the most memorable.

For the last three summers I have been the program coordinator for a summer camp called Write on Sports. We work with middle school students on their writing by having them act as sportswriters for a few weeks. As part of this, we take them to cover a local minor league baseball game (the New Jersey Jackals). We usually end up being there on "camp day" and there are hundreds of young kids running around the stadium. The kids quickly get themselves full of sugar and are primed to get "pumped up" by the grating tunes on the PA and by the PA announcer asking us all to make some noise. This general chaos, and the fact that the games start at noon and the conditions are unbearably hot, lead me to take a break away from the action.

This past summer, I was crashing the tent area reserved for parties, when I saw a young boy in front of me, in full jock attire (baseball cap and brand name t-shirt), singing along to the chorus of the Indian version of Jai Ho (from Slumdog Millionaire) as it was being played over the PA. I thought to myself - funny that, what a world.