Wednesday, October 27

- NEWS AND REVIEWS IV

Some big news here. I'm making the move to Brooklyn. My time in Manhattan is done but really it never began because I've spent my 5 years here living in upper Manhattan which has pretty much sucked. I've finally had it with the lack of restaurants and zero nightlife. So long Washington Heights.

Of course there are some things that I will miss. I was always friendly with Jose across the street who owns and runs Sano Health Food store. He is one of the nicest guys I've met in the neighborhood and if you're ever up here I suggest stopping by if you need your fix of a wheatgrass shot or any other organic/health food stuff.

I will also miss Jose my barber who lives in my building and has cut my hair for the past few years. He talks a lot and sometimes I don't understand what he's saying so I usually just go, "Yeah I understand what you're saying," and he seems content with that. On Tuesdays you can get your haircut for 8 bucks. Can't beat that especially considering he is the same person you idiots pay 100 bucks downtown to have your hair cut. He used to work downtown in SoHo and charged that much. SUCKERS! My hair is good too don't believe anything you've heard contrary.

If two Jose's aren't enough, there is my neighbor who lives right next to me named Jose. The funny thing is that he calls me "Johnny" and has for all 5 years I've lived here. He always says, "How you doing Johhhhnnnny." I think he just mixed me up with my friend Jon who lives above me. I let it go and giggle to myself a wee bit every time. Maybe all us white guys look alike? Maybe I should just refer to all the Dominican guys who live here as Jose..oh wait they are all named Jose. I will definitely miss some stuff up here but it is time for a change.

I can't pass up this offer to move. A friend from my old job is moving to California and I will be signing a lease for her 1 bedroom at a cheaper price than if I stayed in the HEIGHTS! I like yelling HEIGHTS and calling it Hip Hop Heights. I don't think I'll be able to continue that tradition living in Carroll Gardens.. Hard to spin that one in a hip hop vibe. Yeah I just used the word vibe.

NOW FOR THE REVIEWS!!!! It's a good thing you kept your pants on.

Chat -n- Chew
10 E 16th St Between Union Square West and Fifth Avenue
Phone: (212) 243-1616


Had a very nice meal here tonight on Halloween. Chat -n- Chew is probably the most affordable restaurants in this specific area of Union Square considering they are wedged between Union Square Cafe, Blue Water Grill, and Mesa Grill (pretty boy Bobby Flay's joint which actually has delicious muffins that come with brunch..oh man they are great I'm getting hungry just thinking about them but that's for another review ok relax! relax!)

I had the Uncle Red's Addiction Honey dip't fried chicken with "skin-on" smashies. The honey dipped crust was really great and the mashed potatoes were phenomenal for some reason. Mashed potatoes are always pretty good but I wanted to swim in these for some reason. My girlfriend got the The Classic Grilled Cheese With fontina and cheddar on sourdough...The tomato is on us. Which looked pretty tasty and she seemed to like it. A friend at my current job suggested that grilled cheese. Had to give her some props there. I might have been able to taste it if I didn't have pieces of chicken smeared all over my face and fingers. She's a vegetarian and has a thing about me cross contaminating her food with my animal flesh laden food..unbelievable right? Just kidding.

We also ordered a thing of sweet potato fries with smoked chile catsup. Nothing to report about that. It came with the meal instead of an appetizer as we had planned and was ok..nothing to call home about and yell at my mother for not ever making anything like this....but I could have with those mashed potatoes..oh man.

The iced tea sucks. Don't get it. The waitress even said, "Oh yeah I hate that stuff I don't know why they serve it. I asked her why didn't you tell me in the first place? She said that some people actually love it. Why? I have no idea because it taste's like mild dish water.

The has a comfortable atmosphere and has some fun decor. Service was nice but the place was busy and the waitstaff was in Halloween costumes so maybe it slowed them down, took awhile to get our food. I would like to go back and possibly try a burger which looked great. Their brunch menu sounds nice too. Also a friend at my old job suggested the mac-n-cheese which I'm sure is tasty at a comfort food place like this.

Crif Dogs
113 Saint Marks Pl
Phone: 212-614-2728


"The best thing between a bun" That was the title for the review I wrote on menupages.com which is a food delivery website here in the city. I worship these wieners, but only in the context of writing a review for this restaurant which specializes in hot dogs.

Ok enough of the stupid stuff. This place is great. They have awesome dogs and my favorite is the Philly Tubesteak, Our Dog Casually Attired in Cheese & Sauted Onions (add jalapenos .25) Oh I always add those jalapenos and they make that thing unreal. They have a chili cheese dog which is great and my girlfriend adores their veggie dogs which I believe they make themselves. They probably throw some meat in there which is why they are so popular.

The cheese fries are also super-fantastic and they have great shakes. I went to the actual restaurant a few years ago and it is a funky little spot to have a late night dog after hitting the bars, but I suggest delivery. They are very good at getting orders right which is a rarity in this freaking city, and have insulated bags which keeps the food hot.

HOTTTT DOOOOOGGGGGGGGG!

Friday, October 22

- IS ALASKA FOR REAL?

I emailed this to Frank Murkowski, Governor of Alaska. I'm sure I will get some kind of response but up to this point I haven't heard back yet:


Dear Alaska,

I was thinking about this the other day and wondered aloud, "Is Alaska really a state?"

I know Americans are familiar with the word "Alaska" but no one I've ever met has actually been there. Come to think of it, I've never met someone claiming to have lived there at any point in his or her life. When people think of Alaska the only thing that comes to mind is cold weather. But in reality if no one has ever been there how do we know how cold it really is?

Does Alaska contribute to the real United States in any way? Do you guys give us oil or something? Or provide logs? I know Hawaii is also a so-called state but they have a little more to offer us here on the main land than you guys do. Hawaii is like America's vacation state for people who can stand long plane rides. Can someone please provide me with a few examples to justify your membership among the rest of our states? Did Canada ever try to buy you from us?

I mean no insult by this email. I am just trying better understand what is Alaska and how can I prove it really exists? Thank you for your time.



Sincerely yours from a concerned citizen,

Daniel Krieger.

Tuesday, October 19

- DAMN THOSE COOL RANCH BAKED DORITOS!

Food can be painful sometimes and I don't mean the emotional kind of pain like sitting in your closet in college, crying yourself to sleep covered with a tray of frosted chocolate cupcakes you stole from the cafeteria at 3 in the morning. I'm talking physical pain!

I remember one time at UCONN I was at this pizza/hamburger joint which had an Australian outback theme for some reason. The food was pretty decent I remember my favorite sandwich there was a huge chicken cutlet smothered with Swiss cheese. One meal I remember like it was yesterday. I was munching away with some of my college friends when I took a well cooked French fry to my mouth which somehow got caught in the upper part of my gum behind my front teeth. It hit really hard and actually started to bleed. No one but me knew what had happened so I ran into the bathroom and rinsed my mouth out with cold water until it stopped bleeding. I was kinda embarrassed and never told anyone.

Today I am purging myself of moments like these but only because of something that just happened to me a few hours ago.

My girlfriend is hooked on the baked cool ranch dorito's and buys them regularly. Tonight she was eating some so I had a few even though they taste kinda nasty and smell twice as worse. I was munching away when all of a sudden I felt a weird feeling in my mouth and started to bite down on something that felt like a pebble. I ran into the bathroom, spit into the sink, and saw a piece of my tooth.

Intermission: Is this post too gross? I'm sitting back thinking about this now wondering if you are A) interested in this B) holding your hand over your mouth or C) I can't think of a C it's really late.

I almost started to cry because I have this weird thing about my teeth. I'm always nervous about them and I remember why as I'm writing this. I got hit in the mouth with a baseball once when I was very young at a daycamp and lost a tooth because I wasn't paying attention. Man this writing shit is therapeutic. It now makes sense why I was always nervous playing sports in middle/high school and only felt comfortable playing golf (though I was still a little worried when someone screamed FORE!)

Another memory is the first time I slept over a friends house which turned out to be quite traumatic. The kid was named P.J. and his parents were a bit on the crazy side. I had a loose tooth which was ready to come out and the whole night I was nervous about it. This kids mother kept joking around with me about tying one end of a thread to my tooth and the other end to a door knob and slamming it shut. To top it off, The Shining was on tv that night and I didn't want to watch it but they were going to force me to. I ended up calling my dad and he picked me up and I never slept over. That friend lived like less than a mile away. God what a loser I was in 10th grade huh?

So back to the bathroom. Over the past year or so I had some major sensitivity around a few teeth in the back of my mouth. My dentist said it might be GINGIVITIS!!!and suggested Listerine. I thought I heard from another dentist that Listerine was just alcohol and didn't do anything but burn your mouth for a few seconds. Anyway I tried to ignore it but sometimes when I bit down on that part of my mouth I would feel a sharp pain. I knew something wasn't right and paid for it with one crunch last night.

So this morning I brought my little broken piece of my tooth into work and called the dentist. I told them I had an emergency and had to see a dentist as soon as possible and they gave me a 12:30 appointment.

I got two needles in my mouth and opted not to pay the $100 fee for gas (which isn't covered by my dental insurance) and then sat through a half hour of nerve racking drilling and another half hour of making an impression and putting all kinds of glue and nasty tasting pastes in my mouth, I was left with a temporary crown which looks like a piece of well chewed Wrigleys gum. I have to go back in two weeks for a permanent one but I am so not looking forward to going back there.

I don't think I would last on one of those Survivor shows.. or even a weekend camping for that matter.

Thursday, October 14

- BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT

What is "The Doubt" anyway? I think that is the only time you hear the word doubt presented with a THE in front of it. Am I right?

So I have to tell you about some stuff I've seen over the past few weeks and I decided to present these little snippets of life in this little segment called, "Benefit of the doubt!"

- On my way to lunch this afternoon I walked by a man sitting in his car eating out of a large plastic tub of margerine. It was a Parkay tub I believe and not one of those little normal sized ones, this was like the enormous COSCO sized tubs. I am assuming that it was washed out and he had his lunch in there, and that he wasn't in fact finishing off the remains of a once glorious tub of fat. He gets The benefit of the doubt! (I'm imagining a sound effect to accompany that finishing line, like a jail cell door slamming or a loud buzzer..something)

- On my way to lunch about a week ago I was walking when a man came running down the street with two small pigs slung over his shoulder. The pigs were dead and white in color. They were completely in tact except a long knife mark along the belly. The man was wearing a white shirt I think..I was not too focused on him as I couldn't take my eyes off the bouncing dead pigs on his shoulder. I am assuming he was a cook and was running from a meat market or grocery store and bringing them to a restaurant. I was hoping he was not some lunatic who had just sacrificed those pigs and was bringing them to the girl he is currently stalking. He gets, "The benefit of the doubt!"

- A man running around the streets of Washington Heights with his pants around his ankles screaming about Bush, Cheney, their regime and the CIA's new method of mind control and implanting computer chips into our forearms. I want to think that this man may be on to something but the outfit (or lackthereof) and the foaming mouth just makes me less credible. If you saw me doing that would I get "The benefit of the doubt!"??? ahhh come on please.

Tuesday, October 12

- MBNA = REPUBLICAN LOVERS ?

Wrote this to my credit card company MBNA after learning how much money they give to the Republican Party. I've read and heard differing numbers the past few years but MBNA is a company whose name continually comes up as one of the top donors so I wanted to give them my opinion on paper:


Dear MBNA:

I am writing to inform you that I have recently curtailed the use of my MBNA Visa credit card. The reason for my doing this is that I discovered that MBNA is one of the largest donors to the republican party in our country. I have no interest in supporting an organization which specifically supports one specific political party in this country.

I also found it interesting that not one of your customer service representatives that I’ve spoken with over the past few months had any idea about this. These calls were related to my credit card but during small talk I would mention this topic and ask for their feedback.

If MBNA was the largest donor to a cancer organization, a drug treatment program, or something beneficial to society that wouldn’t be a problem. I just refuse to have my money go towards supporting the Republican Party. I don’t plan to cancel my credit card because I’ve had it for many years and have a great credit history with you. I do however want my opinion on record.

Thank you.

Daniel Krieger


Here are two links to articles if you would like to read more. Here is an article from Mother Jones and another from a website called opensecrets.org

UPDATE

I received a reply from MBNA stating:

Please understand that MBNA a a company does not contribute to any political campaigns.

"Like most large companies, MBNA does have a political action committee funded by voluntary contributions from employees. This committee makes contributions to the campaigns of both Democrats and Republicans and is focused on supporting issues of interest to both consumers and the financial services industry. Etc etc etc"

Well I don't know what to think. If it is true that they give truckloads of cash to Republicans and a few leftover dollars to cover their asses to Democrats then something is up in my mind. I think they do in fact lend more financial support to the evil empire, which is not cool.

Thursday, October 7

- BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT

What is "The Doubt" anyway? I think that is the only time you hear the word doubt presented with a THE in front of it. Am I right?

So I have to tell you about some stuff I've seen over the past few weeks and I decided to present these little snippets of life in this little segment called, "Benefit of the doubt!"

- On my way to lunch this afternoon I walked by a man sitting in his car eating out of a large plastic tub of margerine. It was a Parkay tub I believe and not one of those little normal sized ones, this was like the enormous COSCO sized tubs. I am assuming that it was washed out and he had his lunch in there, and that he wasn't in fact finishing off the remains of a once glorious tub of fat. He gets The benefit of the doubt! (I'm imagining a sound effect to accompany that finishing line, like a jail cell door slamming or a loud buzzer..something)

- On my way to lunch about a week ago I was walking when a man came running down the street with two small pigs slung over his shoulder. The pigs were dead and white in color. They were completely in tact except a long knife mark along the belly. The man was wearing a white shirt I think..I was not too focused on him as I couldn't take my eyes off the bouncing dead pigs on his shoulder. I am assuming he was a cook and was running from a meat market or grocery store and bringing them to a restaurant. I was hoping he was not some lunatic who had just sacrificed those pigs and was bringing them to the girl he is currently stalking. He gets, "The benefit of the doubt!"

- A man running around the streets of Washington Heights with his pants around his ankles screaming about Bush, Cheney, their regime and the CIA's new method of mind control and implanting computer chips into our forearms. I want to think that this man may be on to something but the outfit (or lackthereof) and the foaming mouth just makes me less credible. If you saw me doing that would I get "The benefit of the doubt!"??? ahhh come on please.

Wednesday, October 6

- GOING TO HELL

Got this email yesterday concering my website:

Congratulations Daniel! Members of United Universists, the global freethought movement, have selected your site as an excellent Faithless Site! The Faithless Site Awards are presented to carefully selected websites that proudly demonstrate secularism, pluralism, empiricism, and eschew religious faith as a valid worldview.

The forces of religion have successfully made "faithless" a dirty word in today's society. We are fighting back. We will wear the badge with pride. Please show your solidarity with the movement to promote faithlessness by placing one of the following buttons on your site:

http://www.globalmeeting.org/faithless/

Notify us when you have done so - United Universists is creating a directory of the web's best Faithless sites.

With Reason,
United Universists
http://universist.org


- Not quite sure who tipped them off to my hellbound ways but I do have a few posts up which argue against religion, specifically the catholic church and it's destructive ways. Someone at the United Universists either ran keyword searches and came up with my site, or someone who reads my site may have submitted my link. I don't really know, but there's no real recognition for being an "Excellent Faithless site," not even a small cash prize. Whatever.

Monday, October 4

- NO SPITTING

that is an actually sign you see in Chinatown and not just anywhere but the Post Office for Christmas sake. I think there's a problem when you need to put up several signs to instruct human beings not to spit indoors, and yes I said several it's not like there was just one sign written in both English and some form of Chinese. I tried to imagine what life would have been like before the signs went up. A virtual slip in slide of saliva while trying to send home bootleg movies and buying stamps. Why do people spit that much? Is it like that in certain Asian countries? I don't get it. I know I do spit probably more than is socially acceptable but I try not to do it in front of people I don't know and I always use the outdoors and even go so far as making it in a spot where people don't walk. Maybe I should move to Hong Kong.

Speaking of stamps, I've kinda given up on the whole money counterfeiting experiment as the technology is just way too advanced for me. BUT don't give up on my so soon because I realized there is one thing that I could probably counterfeit and totally get away with. STAMPS! Yes my friends gather round while I explain to you the beauty behind stamps. Stamps are relatively simple pieces of currency to duplicate. All I really need is the scanner, double sticky tape and then a fancy cutter and I doubt anyone will notice. There are no watermarks or hidden grains or anything. Just the amount on the upper left corner, USA on the upper right, and on the specific stamp I'm looking at right now, 2002. I could even make one with my face now that I'm brainstorming. Hey is anyone out there listening?

I'm kidding. Please don't arrest me.

A better question is this: Why do apples sit on my desk for 4 or 5 days before being eaten, while a candy bar has barely a chance to get comfortable before I tear it's wrapper off and gobble it down?