Sunday, September 2, 2007

Middle of a three day weekend

A good friend, visiting, said it was easy to be a bachelorette when she lived here in NYC, but that it’s better to be coupled when living in America. Here, there were friends nearby, many things to do within easy reach, constant activity and connections, all within the context of what is essentially a walkable village. (Also, there isn’t nearly so much of what I call the tyranny of coupledom.) NYC does, after all, have the highest concentration of un-attached people in the country. But now that she’s out in America, she’s happy to be attached to someone because of the physical distances involved, the containment of stand-alone homes, the necessity of having a car. It’s so much harder to be a bachelor/ette in Suburbia (it starts on the west side of the Hudson and pretty much spreads all the to the Pacific, over the valleys white with snow).
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We watched The French Connection at the Film Forum for old time's sake. What a satisfying entertainment. And so nostalgic. The WTC can be seen being built in the distance of several shots. There's plenty of Brooklyn to be had, too. Most of it is still here, and looking a bit crisper now, actually.
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Hive inspection today. The honey supers went on four weeks ago, but there’s still very little built-out on the frames. So it looks like there isn’t going to be any honey harvest this year. I tasted a bit from one of the hives and it was quite amazing, darker than usual, very, very flavorful, all the sweetness of the East Village condensed. This honey drought is too bad for us, but the important thing was establishing two hives there and letting them get up to speed for the winter. Bees winter over, balling up and shivering to keep warm, burning that high carb honey to power them through the cold months. If the ones on the edges of the ball are cold, they move towards the center to warm up. The males, meanwhile, are killed off before winter because they’re just deadweight. (Ladies, no cackling in glee, please). First warm spell, the bees pour out to excrete. They are entirely too fastidious to do it in the hive.
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Next Friday, starting at 3pm, is the 24 hour bioblitz in Jamaica Bay. I'll be there.

3 comments:

Lorianne said...

I can't speak toward single life in NYC, but in Small Town, New England, it's definitely easier to be coupled. Small towns are geared toward folks with families, so if you're single with children, you're plugged into an automatic social network whenever encounter other parents at school-, sports-, or other kid-related events. If you're single, childless, and don't belong to a church, pretty much the only way to meet folks in a small town is to socialize with your coworkers...but then again, they're probably already busy with their kid-and-family-related social events. If you're one half of a couple, with or without kids, at least you have one other person to hang out with.

Matthew said...

That's what I mean. And down South, meanwhile, if you're not a member of a church, you're considered a pervert of some kind. This is why I remain a rooted cosmopolitan.

apt pupil said...

I came across some singles blog/magazine put out by the people who own one of the online dating sites--not Nerve. They have a woman blogging about being single in the burbs. Everytime I think of the burbs now I think of Weeds, and I don't even watch TV.