The Luna Park Gazette

The two fighters squared off in the cage as one of them unloaded a huge right hand toward his opponent’s chin. I tensed up, anticipating a brutal knockout. This was going to be a haymaker and—shame on me--I was actually looking forward to it. And then suddenly I was watching CNN. What the hell --? I was flying back from L.A. on JetBlue, where I was shoehorned into a window seat at the southernmost section of the plane, and the guy next to me had inadvertently changed the channel on my TV—and ruined the fight clip--when he moved his elbow. “Uh, sorry,” he mumbled. Yeah, pal, me, too. I was tempted to throw a flying armbar on this stiff, but it really wasn’t his fault. We were stuck in a flying sardine can where you couldn’t help but invade someone’s space. The flight out from New York was no bargain either. Once again I was crammed into the window seat--fear of heights, people, hello? --where a young woman sitting next to me had put her head on the food tray upon takeoff a...

“How are you?” the young woman at the supermarket asked me this afternoon. I’ve heard that line several times this week—I’ve said it myself--but it sounds a little strange in light of my recent trip to the ER. I was tempted to say, “well, I just got out of the hospital and I’ll probably be going back, and I’m dreading it. My left arm still hurts from having an IV needle stuck in it for three days and I feel tired, old, and cranky. How’s by you?” But the cashier isn’t getting paid nearly enough to listen to my grief, so I just smiled and said, “I’m fine.” I feel like I’ve been away for a long time. But unlike vacation, I don’t feel refreshed or relaxed; I feel drained. I looked at the pictures I posted on Facebook of my L.A. trip and I can't help but think that it wasn’t so long ago that I was happy and healthy, no idea that one of my organs was about to go haywire on me. I'm so emotionally fragile that I actually got teary-eyed when a nurse from my insurance company ...

I forgot how much I hate Jell-O. I’m back home now after a three-day stint at the hospital, where gelatin was the one of the few things I could eat—when I could eat at all. This particular hell ride began on Thursday morning when I started feeling stomach pains. I assumed I had eaten something that disagreed with me and that whatever it was would soon pass. I was incredibly wrong. The pain worsened over the course of the day, even though I was wolfing down Pepto-Bismol tablets by the handful. I kept telling myself that I was okay, but my doubts grew as the agony increased. I got into bed at 11pm, but the pain was so terrible that I knew I had to do something. Finally, I got up, dressed, and called for a car to take me down to the ER at Lutheran Medical Center. But I was still telling myself that the doctors would give me something for my guts and send me home in a few hours. I had even planned on going to work the next day. Clearly fortune-telling is not my strong suit. ...

The little girl sitting behind me on the plane Tuesday night said it best as we landed at JFK. “I want to go back to California right now !” she declared. “Me, too,” I muttered. Not that I’m complaining. Well, yes, of course, I am. I had no desire whatsoever to see my vacation end since I had an absolutely fabulous time visiting my Uncle Joe and his wife, Sara. I soared to new heights on this trip, as I tracked the migration of monarch butterflies in and around Monterey, hiked around the space shuttle Endeavor, met up with some of my West Coast cousins, and, craziest of all, took part in a “Pitch Slam,” where aspiring screenwriters like yours truly sit down with producers for a five-minute rundown on what they have to offer. I was only in LA for one night before we hit the road and headed north in search of the migrating monarchs. These amazing creatures cover thousands of miles as they make their way to their winter home. It’s just about impossible to photograph the monarc...

“Hey!” my neighbor’s young son shouted as I raced by his house this morning. I turned and saw that he was pointing at his chest, proudly displaying his Spiderman costume, which came complete with rippling muscles. “Spiderman!” he declared, making sure I had gotten the point. “You look great!” I shouted. “Happy Halloween!” I ran down to the corner just in time to see the back end of the 8:20 bus to Manhattan driving down Shore Road. This was actually the second bus I missed this morning, as I had raced down to the same corner a few minutes earlier in a losing effort to catch the 8:15 bus. I had thought catching the 8:20 would be a breeze, but then I realized I had left my lunch back on the kitchen table and I scurried back to my apartment to get it. Missing two buses in one morning is some kind of an achievement, I supposed, but if I had gotten the earlier one, I would’ve gone to work without my lunch—turkey sausages, green peppers and kasha—and more importantly, I wouldn...

I got up early Saturday morning to do something for my health, but I wound up getting all kinds of mental. I clicked onto YouTube to watch a video on qigong , an ancient Chinese practice that aligns the body, breath, and mind through a series of simple, relaxing exercises. I find these routines to be a nice compliment to my lunatic gym workouts. I was on tight schedule because I had to get to the gym for a cardio kickboxing class, get cleaned up, and meet with my sister for one of our theater outings with our auntie. So I switched onto one of my favorite qigong videos and…nothing. There was a message about updating something, but I, in my diehard digital ignorance, couldn’t make any sense out of it. Inching ever closer to the panic button, I Googled what I thought was Adobe’s home page and downloaded a ton of misery. My homepage was promptly hijacked by some outfit that offered to clean the living crap out of my computer—for a price, of course. I freaked, forgetting all about...

Godzilla may be able to flattened Tokyo with a swish of his tail, but he proved to be no match for a pack of paper dolls. I came to this conclusion during a recent weekend of excessive TV viewing. I had started my Saturday off by watching The Adventures of Prince Achmed that I had recorded off of Turner Classic Movies. I knew virtually nothing about Lotte Reiniger’s 1923 silent classic except that it is one of the first full-length animated films. I had anticipated something as visually stunning as Max Fleischer’s fabulous work, but my hopes were quickly cut to ribbons when I learned that this film “starred” a collection of black cardboard figures, which Reiniger had created with a pair of scissors and brought to life with stop motion photography. Did I seriously really want to spend my morning watching a 91-year-old feature length shadow play? How could I possibly stay interested in such a crudely made cartoon? How did I stay interested? Very easily, that’s how. Once Prince...