The Luna Park Gazette

"But I'll teach my eyes to see, beyond these walls in front of me." --Jimmy Cliff Tara Lipinski has nothing to worry about. I went ice-skating today for the first time in... oy ...35 years and I think it's safe to say that no skating records were broken today. But then neither was my spine, so I'm happy for that much. I was in high school the last time I tried this. I went with some friends to a rink in Coney Island, where I move around in cautious little stomps while the rest of world whizzed by. I was just starting to feel some degree of confidence when a friend of mine skated by, patted me on the back and the two of us nearly went flying on our asses. I never went again, although each winter I made half-hearted promises to myself that one day I would try again. Today was that day. This was my first weekend since being laid off and I had all sorts of negative thoughts going: what if I trip and crack my head open? Shouldn't I b...

God, I'm frightened. My father used to say in times of trouble that "scared money never won." I understand that idea, I really, do. Fear only makes your problems worse and blinds you to all possibilities. But I have to be honest: Right now I am very scared. Today I became a statistic and joined the swelling ranks of the unemployed. I am still in shock as I write this and I know I will feel the full impact of this tomorrow morning when I have no place to go. I wanted a clean slate for '08. Well, I got one, brother, in spades. My old job has been cleaned right of my life. It seems they're making changes at my now former company and I, along with my supervisor and three other co-workers, have been laid off. I thought we were relatively safe. Last week they called us into one of the conference rooms and told us that our department would not be getting a raise this year. Fine , I thought. Thank God--at least I still have a job. And then we were called into another conf...

"Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." --Matthew 16:17-18 If I never hear the phrase "wind chill factor" again for the rest of my life, I won't complain a bit. It's cold here in Brooklyn as I type these words, cold as a bastard. And with memories of Hawaii stilling in my head and the remnants of my suntan still clinging to my skin, the nose-diving temperatures are even more depressing. But I'm thankful the oil burner is working now, after the thing tanked on me last week. Although this is a three-day weekend, I barely left the house, aside from a book reading and wine-tasting on Friday and the Brooklyn Blogade get-together this morning, which, by the way, was a lot of fun. I enjoyed great people, good food, and the introduction of yet another Brooklyn neighborhood--Clinton Hill--that I knew little or nothing about. This group is sure making me get around. Aside from Blogade it look...

"A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams." --Unknown This is certainly the week for celebrations. My two beautiful nieces were both born this week and today marks the third anniversary of this blog. I should take myself out for dinner. I was looking over my initial entry of the LPG--"Coronation Day"--and I believe I've come a long way from the very unhappy man who sat down in front of his computer three years ago and pressed the "Publish Post" button for the first time. I talked about being "marooned" and having no job or family or any of the other good things in life. I haven't moved physically, I still haven't found the love of my life, and I still suffer depression, paranoia, hypochondria, fear of flying and a shocking addiction to diet soda. But still... I feel a little better. I can barely remember the women I seemed to have been so upset about back in '05. ...

We dodged the blizzard today, but I got hit with the gunk. The huge snowstorm that was supposed to hit last night never happened, as the weather people appear to have the success rate of a New Hampshire pollster. Of course, I'm in no position to point fingers. Many years ago while working at a small paper in Pennsylvania, I was the author of a story headlined "Major Snowstorm Misses Poconos," which I suspect many readers never saw as they were too busy digging out the 9 feet of snow that hit the Poconos right between the eyes. I have mercifully forgotten what precipitated that particular screw-up, but I remember being sure about the story before I left the paper that night--something reporters always say after the fertilizer hits the air conditioning unit. Screw all that--I don't do weather stories any more, so I feel free to complain. I had planned to get up early this morning so I could shovel before going to work, but when I looked out the window at 6 a.m. there wa...

On Christmas Day, my family went to Puuhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park . It must have been close to 80 degrees that day and the water was so blue it could bring tears to your eyes. Now I'm back in Brooklyn and it's hard to believe I was ever in such a beautiful place. My eyes may start producing real tears any second. There's a big snowstorm on the way tonight, or so I'm told. The weather geniuses are talking about accumulations of three to seven inches tonight and tomorrow, which will give us all yet another reason to hate Mondays. The air is charged and cold outside; it feels like something very big is going to happen very soon, and I've got the shovel and the ice melting crystals ready to go. I'll have to get up early to shovel or possibly go out tonight to make a preventive strike on the impending blizzard. Maybe I should stand outside all night and attack the thing flake-by-flake. Or maybe I should just haul my ass back to Hawaii. It's been 11...

You can never outrun a bad dream. I learned this little lesson during my trip to Hawaii. There was a point a few days into the vacation where I thought I had stopped worrying and was starting to relax. I had forgotten about the plane ride to the island and refused to think about the return flight. I had been worried about leaving the house empty, but I decided there was nothing I could about it since I was halfway around the world. I had given my neighbor a key to the front door and my cell phone so he could call me in case of an emergency and then I just let my fears go. Or so I thought. One night early into the vacation I dreamed I came home to our place Brooklyn and found bars across the doors. I somehow got into the place and saw workers moving out furniture and totally remodeling the place. An obnoxious woman behind a desk told me I no longer own the place, that it had been taken over somehow, and she started mocking me, taunting me, about how she and her cohorts had screwed us ou...

I can't believe I'm back. But then I can't believe I went in the first place. I spent the holidays with my family in Hawaii this year, which is so far beyond my normal routine that I'm starting to wonder if I imagined the whole thing. But it was real. I actually got on airplane--the first time in about 8 years--and spent 10 days in fecking Hawaii. And it was fantastic. My sister, my aunt and myself represented the East Coast in this family summit meeting, while my brother, his wife, and my niece weighed in from San Francisco. We stayed on the Big Island, first in Kona and then in Hilo, and I couldn't believe I was walking around in shorts and a t-shirt in December. I've always wanted to spend one Christmas away from home and now that my parents are both gone, I'm not sure what "home" means anymore. Obviously I don't want to quit celebrating the holidays at all, but they lose some of their meaning without my mom and dad around. While we're ...