Author Archives: WaterCooler

H just asked my advice on the format of her resume.  I  gave her my opinion and then promptly reminder her that I have been “working from the home office”  for 3 months, myself. Perhaps she should seek some other counsel on the matter.

Seems akin to my friend asking my opinion on who to start for his fantasy football team.

friend: Would you use Beanie Wells or Austin Collie this week?
me:  You do know that my team has a 1-11 record this season? Whatever I say, I suggest you do the exact opposite.

My name is George. I am bald, I am unemployed and I live with my parents

Just got a piece of mail from a local dentist, inviting me to try his new services. It says he has been here for the past 30 years and then goes on to list all of the benefits I can take advantage of:

hey Dr, can you pop this Phish DVD in and come back in 3 hours?

Not sure I need a new dentist, but sounds like a fun place to go unwind on a Thursday night.

The home office is dropping off the interns at Grandma’s house and hitting the road. We’ll have a special guest, Artie Lange’s audiobook, and some beef jerkey on this good old fashioned road trip to Cleveland.

Beyond the Rock and Roll HOF, Lebron James and that my friend now lives there, I know very little about Cleveland.

On the way we may detour to Pennsylvania Dutch country. H has not stopped talking about making pretzels, seeing beet farms and interacting with “real live Amish people”. *

I am personally looking forward to deep fried brussel sprouts.

*H spent many a summer family vacation in Lancaster, PA and keeps regaling me with tales from Dutch Country. I have a feeling the “good food” and “awesome fun” that she is getting giddy about might be a tad bit disappointing 25 years later.

We’ve come to realize that in addition to being a bully, our Puppy may also be a doggie bigot. It’s a bit embarrassing

if you look like this and you see a pretty red dog walking your way in Prospect Park, you should make a u-turn immediately!

Apparantly, our Puppy’s got serious beef with fluffy white dogs and LabraDoodles.

I need a haircut. I stopped commuting to an office 5 weeks ago and haven’t gotten a trim since then. H thinks it’s absurd that I travel from Brooklyn to the Upper East Side and pay more than $10.

H’s arguements:
– “There’s nothing to cut! What kind of skill do you need for that?”
– “Two blocks away you can go to an old school Brooklyn barber shop. Why travel on 3 subways for a haircut”*
– “You just go to your place because all of the people who work there are hot European women”
– “While we are both working at the Home Office, you are going to drop $40 on a haircut? How cost conscious is that?”
– “Josh has a guy in walking distance. He does a good job, has been in the neighborhood for 40 years, and only charges $7″

All fair points, however…I am a loyal customer. And while it is a bit embarrassing to walk into Amour de Hair (or admit to frequenting it), they do love hair! I somehow ended up going there while living on the UES and will not stray from my “stylist” Niki* (granted, there is limited styling that can be done to my head at this point).

I’ve never seen him, but this is how I imagine “Josh’s guy”. That is not what Niki looks like.

One of my friends is also a loyal patron but he prefers another one of the women there. We’ve debated who is better and he has even suggested that Niki was Elana’s apprentice. Ridiculous.

Despite H’s protests, I made the trip last night and was delighted by a new service at ADH. As the young pretty Croatian girl began to wash my hair she gently reached under my chair for a moment. To my surprise and delight, at no extra charge, a massage ensued.

they’ve installed brookstone massage chairs where you get rinsed. Bukur! (that’s “beautiful” in Albanian)

Josh has good recommendations on pizza, the best inter-borough driving routes to take and other helpful hints. However, he can keep his 75 year old Italian man, his free shot of sambuca and the $25 he saved on his trim. I’ll happily take my 45 minutes with attractive Eastern European women who have an unparalleled love for hair!

*The old school Brooklyn barber shop H references has only 2 choices – mushroom or fade. Sorry if I don’t want to look like Pete Rose or Kid N’ Play.

**W fun fact. Only 3 people have cut my hair.
1) My Mom
2) Jimmy (we have him to obliging my requests for the classic Long Island spiked hair and tail!)
3) Niki
(ok – there is a 4th; the woman in Argentina who could not speak one word of English. With my limited Spanish vocabulary, I think she thought I said “Make me look like Maradona”. I subsequently walked around Buenos Aires for a month with a mullet)

HOLLIE UPDATE Note that despite W’s $45 haircuts, I haven’t had as much as a pedicure since August, forget about haircuts.  Also, this topic seems very familiar, I feel like I’ve blogged about it before.  It’s ringing a bell… I think I wrote something on an old blog when “Amour de Hair” was featured on The Real Housewives of New York.  I also remember googling “hot european girl”.

One of my good friends, who is also a staunch Met fan, admitted something horrible to me last night. I think he felt guilty and was confessing his sin, but I wish he had gone to a priest, as I am horrified to hear that he actually attended the Yankee parade last week! There was some lame explanantion but I stopped listening and just proceeded to pound my pint of Brooklyn Winter Lager*

he probably shouted something disgusting like "hey Jeets!" or "hip hop Jorge!"

This rivals my other friend’s discpicable actions a few years ago. He also bleeds Mets royal blue and is my partner in misery with Mets season tickets. One night a few years ago, on the Upper East Side, we ran into Roger Clemens, who was one game away from winning his 300th game. As BP walked up to the cheater, I expected some clever anti-Yankee remark. Instead, I was appalled at the betrayel that fell before my ears…

Mets fan extraordinare exclaimed "Good Luck Rocket!"

The Yankees are pure evil. Period.

*Since when is the “seasonal beer” a winter Ale, the first week of November? This was more disturbing to me then when I ordered a Sam Seasonal on Labor Day and was poured an Oktoberfest.

Seems the boyfriend of one of our upstairs neighbors has moved in. We’ve heard activity upstairs during the day, for the past week and a half, and attributed it solely to the move and reorganization of the apartment.

Between all of the Moms and jobless, weekday Brooklyn looks like midtown Manhattan at 5PM.

This morning both H and I determined that either R works from home, is independently wealthy or is  without gainful employment.

Nonetheless, the good neighbors we are – we are thinking of offering R an internship at the home office. We noticed him doing his part this AM, sweeping away leaves in front of our building (perhaps our older neighbor also subtly commented to him about how quickly the leaves pile up?), so we think he can be a quick contributor. I suggested that we ask him to walk the dogs this morning, in exchange for a breakfast plate of Swedish pancakes and a hot cup of coffee. Coincidentally, this was the deal that H struck with me. Stay tuned…

our very own park slope kibbutz?

PS. Not sure how this will go over. So far we have yet to have much of a social relationship with our building mates. Why wouldn’t we hang out? They seem cool and roughly our age; although socially awkward at times, we are not that offensive; we have a backyard, bbq and plenty of beer. hmm.

More to come as we refine our recruitment strategy…

H UPDATE They’ve been suspiciously more wary of us since that late-night, wine-fueled fight we had during which I threw a 5 lb sack of onions at your head at 2:30 am.  Also, your Tim Gunn impression might carry through the brownstone.  Oh, and when my friends are over, they aren’t exactly politically correct or quiet.   A few guesses.