Personal News - Part XX

Good Evening Everyone and welcome back to more news from Brooklyn & NYC. Pull up a chair and have a nice, comfy amble through some funky thoughts & reflections. Its okay ... no harm will come to you ... well ... not at first. :-)

Back on Tuesday, May 4th, a few of my bosses took me out for a belated Administrative Professional Assistant lunch to a restaurant of my choice. I very much enjoyed dining at ARNOs on West 38th Street a week or so back, when a Senior Manager [Debra] took me to lunch. The food and service were quite good. I mentioned that to Marc, Angela and Rich ... they were all for it, so I made reservations. We had a great time and I partook of salad, fillet of sole and abit of chocolate mousse cake. Divine! That evening, after work, I went to Rob Jereski's place for a working meeting on certain campaign points. Ed and Deborah were also there. We worked on re-writing Rob's bio for website and press releases. Also worked on his "stump speech" and fine-tuned the 14 "important points" that he's focusing on in campaign. I'd say about 50% of the stuff we worked on kind of boggled my mind, as I'm not too familiar with much political lingo. It was definitely a learning experience.

Then on Thursday, May 6th, I had another busy evening. My personal trainer [Jamie] really put me thru the paces with a good workout at gym. As I type this I'm still alittle bit sore in some spots. Afterwards, I hightailed it to the subway to get out to Sunnyside neighborhood in Queens to attend a Community Board #2 meeting at 7pm. Took me 5 to 10 minutes to find the place after I got off the subway, as I'd never been in that neighborhood. These monthly community meetings take place in a Senior Citizen Center and about 50 people were there, along with NY1 news crew. I'm attending these meetings at Rob's suggestion, to get a feel of the community and what is discussed. I also took some "Jereski for Congress" flyers out with me. Of which I pasted out some when leaving subway, placed a stack on a special table at meeting and spoke to a few folk. When I was leaving the meeting at 8:30pm, I noticed several of the NY1 news crew took some flyers. Great! At the beginning part of the meeting some folk from the community would go up to the podium to air complaints and board answered questions. These complaints ranged from topics regarding Con Edison, work or lack there of on Queens Blvd, parking facilities, buildings for businesses and much talk regarding mosques [they need support from community]. Then a roll call of Community Board members was done and we all had to stand to recite the "Pledge of Alligence". I omitted saying "under god" and received a few sly looks. People are so strange. Then came the evenings big discussion on current project, this one involving helping out those in community with drug problems and setting up a mobile van to distribute clean syringes, as well as other helpful services. The board voted on certain points and most members were very favorable. And everything was recorded by NY1, as well as by a few reporters. On May 18th there is another Community Board meeting that Rob wants me to check out in Astoria.

Finally on Friday, May 7th, another Senior Manager [Scott] took me out to lunch. Same as Tuesday lunch ... appreciation of my Administrative Assistant services to the department. We originally wanted to go to HARU on West 43rd Street, which is a very nice Japanese cuisine place. I should of made a reservation, as they were booked solid and put us at a shabby corner table. [Before being seated I noticed an ex co-worker (Jack E @ WCP) of mine having lunch with a client. Hadn't seen him since 1997 and let me tell you his hair went from chestnut color to gray/white, plus many wrinkles. Despite that he still looked like the same amiable, charming man I knew from WCP. I didn't chat with him, as I wasn't sure if he'd remember me.] Scott and I decided not to have lunch there and instead strolled over to 42nd Street to eat at Times Square Brewery. We had a fun time ... talked about travel and rock concerts. I had a delicious grilled salmon with rice pilaf and creamed spinach. Service was okay and we had a nice view of 42nd Street from our table.

I'm really enjoying and getting into this DVD technology. So many features are offered to viewers when you purchase many films on DVD. [Back in the 1980s one used to think VHS was so groovy & now its DVDs that thrill.] Not just the movie, but extra film footage, commentary on making of the film, trailers and so much more. Case in point ... the directors cut DVDs of first two LORD OF THE RINGS films ["The Fellowship of the Ring" and "The Two Towers"]. Back on Friday, after work in my neighborhood, I stopped by Blockbuster to see if they had any cool DVDs for sale or discount. They did ... I purchased "Patriot Games" starring Harrison Ford and Sean Bean, plus "Pirates of the Caribbean" with Johnny Dep and Orlando Bloom. I'll definitely be purchasing more down the road, when I have some extra cash. :-)