“It’s funny, you and I eat differently,” Boyfriend says, popping another bite of eggs florentine in his mouth. We’re sitting at brunch, enjoying the unseasonal sunlight streaming through the window and letting coffee wash away the previous night’s vodka remnants.
Swallowing a bite of toast buried under layers of raspberry jam, I make a quizzical […]

“Stop it, asshole!”
It’s Thanksgiving dinner with Boyfriend’s family, and ten of us are enjoying post-meal narcosis at a makeshift dining table in his mother’s Upper West Side living room. Sitting opposite us are Boyfriend’s teenage cousins, B & D, who’ve taken their cue from the conversation lull and started pounding on each other.
“Shut up, […]

And so, dear readers, after the obligatory three-year stint bleeding cash through our tear ducts to pay for a cramped, leak-prone, sunlight-devoid 700-square-foot shit shack in Manhattan’s Central Village, the time has come to do what every urban zealot who dreams of in-house washer/dryers while gulping down twinges of yuppie guilt must one day do: […]

“It’s a pretty easy life when you think about it,” one of my dinner companions says with a sweeping gesture. Between the thick Australian accent and mouthfuls of Kingway beer (never Fosters; “Only Americans drink that shit,” he tells me), I’m registering his words on a 3-second time delay. We’re sitting in Hong Kong’s Soho, […]

It’s a cloudy Sunday morning, and I’m sitting with Boyfriend at a tense Sunday brunch. We pick at our $13 pancakes and $12 eggs (serves us right for eating in Tribeca), while staring at Blackberry screens and stack of printouts, both immersed in our lists of immediate tasks that need to be accomplished so we […]

I was pretty surprised the first time I got an email from an incensed Bruneian objecting to this post. The fact that I didn’t remember writing it, let alone keeping it in my archives, led to a few moments of total confusion (not uncommon for me, I’ll admit). But after a little quicktime recall, I […]

I’ve never really gotten the whole men-catcalling-on-the-street phenomenon. It seems like men have honed the art of ogling and hooting to a science, perfecting timing and peripheral vision so they can stop on a dime, drop whatever they’re doing and stare like hyenas eyeing the baby zebra falling behind the herd. Sure, I understand the […]

“Keep your hips in! Tuck them under you!” my nineteen-year-old instructor calls out, motioning with both hands as the Long Island bay laps over his calves. I turn to look at him, the mop of blond hair, Billabong wetsuit outlining his reedy build and wraparound sunglasses reflecting sunlight directly in my eyes.
Bam! My balance […]

“So! Is this your lady friend?” one of the septuagenarians at our table asks Boyfriend, her voice prim but friendly. Her husband shoots me a wink and I smile back, fixing my gaze on the lapels of his powder blue suit to avoid staring at his rheumy eyes.
Leaning back in our fold-out chairs, we […]

It happens every morning at 7:30 A.M. I open my eyes, look out the window, glance at the clock, stretch my arms, uproot the cat from her burrow in the blankets on my stomach. And then it hits, like a 4X4 swung by a forklift. Panic, gushing from my stomach into my sternum, spreading through […]