MAGIC MOLLY

Our sky was never darkened by a single cloud

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:17:46 -0500

Our sky was never darkened by a single cloud

Solving mysteries

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:53:15 -0500

At first I think they are speaking English, these wide-faced foreigners. Then British English, judging from the pitch their voices hit at a certain volume. A look at the way their mouths move alters this theory, too; then I see the blond hair—four heads of it, how hadn’t I noticed?—and the guide to New York City, in Swedish, on the table.

Grand Street

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:01:16 -0500

It’s one of those mornings on which it feels natural to tally all the pleasing things in one’s line of vision: the coffee girl, a German with ridiculous eyeglasses, a long stretch of Grand over which wiry Chinese and spherical Hasidim scuttle. Everyone walks slowly but for different reasons. Some are contemplative, some impaired, others listless.

Friday account

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:12:00 -0500

Because it was cold out and a Friday, the afternoon felt more luxurious than usual. Indoor lights looked rich and yellow. At lunch time I found that I had a full box of donuts left over from an assignment, so I offered them to the group of sullen youth clustered outside the local high school. They became very excited and began to eat the donuts; there followed a donut fight.

On the way to the bank I passed four people in psychotic states. They did that discomfiting thing that psychotics do where they yell at no one while looking directly at you. I wondered why there were so many of these individuals in such a small area, and tried to remember if there was a halfway house nearby, but I don’t think there is.

Donuts Part II

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 10:20:02 -0500

Donuts Part II

I am Eloise. I am six.

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 09:10:15 -0500

On Monday a box of clothes arrived, unexpected, as a gift. It was the largest box I’d ever received. Of the many classes of objects that can be gifted, my favorites are clothing and food.

One psychological hypothesis for this fact is that I love presents so much I want to physically incorporate them or at least wrap myself in them; I think that in this case the facile explanation is the correct one.

True or false

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:39:55 -0500

The world is divided into fun-loving girls and serious girls.

Metonyms

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:47:21 -0500

I woke up later than usual and went for a run. It was cold out and the high schoolers down the block were clustered in tight groups. The air had that snap that you feel when you get out of the shower on a winter day. It is also the sensation of peeling off a wetsuit and finding your skin icy and sleek underneath, like the way you’d imagine a seal’s pelt.

Basic Instinct

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 08:56:07 -0500

Basic Instinct

Obtain a reading

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:40:33 -0500

Some things seem designed to be eternally surprising. Campari is always surprisingly bitter. Edith Wharton is always surprisingly acute. New York’s Chinatown is always surprisingly massive.

I don’t know exactly how big it is—many chunks of Chinatown are not contiguous—but I do know that I live in it, and also that I can walk thirty minutes in one direction and still not be out of it.

Yesterday I met someone on Mott near Pell for tea, and it was a different species of the neighborhood than I’d seen before—glitzier and more metropolitan, with DVD stores instead of old ladies selling rice balls on the street. My tea came with a preserved plum at the bottom; it mimicked the texture of a brain and tasted like ten things at once.

If you’re in the mood to be surprised, get off the 6 at Canal and try to cover all of Chinatown. Or, alternatively: eat a scoop of plain vanilla ice cream (always surprisingly good), download Kool Keith’s Sex Style (always surprisingly shocking) or try on a pair of Birkenstocks (always surprisingly comfortable).

Hehe.

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 12:17:00 -0500

“The figures preferred by childhood are invariably round— the ball, the hoop, the marble; also the fruits which it prefers: the cherry, the gooseberry, the apple, the jam tart…”

This data is shot through with error!

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:02:13 -0500

This data is shot through with error!

A secret plan

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:58:26 -0500

We lay on the bed talking fervently about a secret plan. I was under a Mexican blanket; she wore a velvet minidress that served the same cozy purpose.

Our plan was difficult and multilayered. It required strategy and ruthlessness. We combed our past for hints on how to enact it.

Qué pena

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:58:23 -0500

Qué pena

Good things come in

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 13:12:58 -0500

-packets
-folios
-wax bags
-square envelopes
-barrels

Where's the seam? Where's the zipper?

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 09:23:30 -0500

We sat in the lobby reading the paper. This, I was thinking, is the way to spend Halloween. A doorman with a knife piercing his brain passed out candy to a Pippy Longstocking and a princess.

Then the elevator opened and a purple thing slithered out. This is the only way to describe it: a purple thing. A human child, male, encased in purple stretch fabric with no mouth or eye holes, yet somehow able to navigate the lobby.

The purple thing was funny and ontologically disturbing, as the best costumes tend to be. How did this thing breathe? With no visible openings, how did it enter the costume? What was it? And finally, why?

Girls Girls Girls!

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 17:35:07 -0500

1. I always enjoy reading Emily Gould’s food and cat-focused tumblr.

2. I also enjoy reading Marisa Meltzer’s tumblr (and the galley of her forthcoming book, Girl Power).

The satisfaction she’d savored was gone, and in its place...

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 08:48:12 -0500

The satisfaction she’d savored was gone, and in its place was the brassy taste of defeat

New England-style lobster dinner

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 08:45:03 -0500

New England-style lobster dinner

Sunday account

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 08:39:00 -0500

At 5:30 I woke up and went on a walk. The sky was an unusual shade of blue and my mood was dictated by the hour. It was that time of day in which you are awake only if you have a plane to board, and I felt a sense of readiness and heightened efficiency.