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Oh, give me cabs, lots of cabs, and the subway down below—
Don't fence me in!
Let me stroll up and down every pavement that I know—
Don't fence me in!
Let me be by myself midst the strutting punks,
Listen to the murmur of the stinking drunks,
Send me off to Coney and I'll pack my trunks!
But don't fence me in.
Just let me go, let me wander over yonder to the old NYPL!
And you just know I'll be basking in the archives while I'm soaking in the smell...
I want to walk through the park to where the west commences,
Drink at the Dublin 'til I lose my senses,
Can't look at forests, and I can't stand fences...
So don't fence me in.
I wrote that two decades ago, during a three-year stretch when I was commuting by bike from upper Manhattan to central Brooklyn twice a week to teach. The ride took me more than an hour each way, so I had plenty of time to work on it.
(It might have been "stride up and down all the pavements that I know," now that I think of it, or something not-quite-that. I remember having a hard time getting that line to land.)
By the way, that commute took me through Central Park, down Seventh Ave to Times Square, down Broadway past Union Square and City Hall, over the Brooklyn Bridge, through Grand Army Plaza and past Prospect Park, through Flatbush to Brooklyn College. A goddamn movie, that ride.
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Angus Johnston 😷
@studentactivism
Today in petty quarantine frustrations: I scored a couple of yards of this at my favorite janky fabric store last year, but I can't make a mask with it because Melanie took it to Brooklyn so we'd be more likely to remember to take it to a tailor to discuss tie possibilities.
(Apparently this fabric was made seven years ago, one of nine PDtB-themed designs. I have no idea how one roll of this particular one wound up in this hole-in-the-wall upper Manhattan fabric store, but somehow it did.)
And in case you're wondering, yes, this one was the best of the nine.
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Angus Johnston 😷
@studentactivism
I keep not posting another recipe, and I promised to put up another one yonks ago, so let me go get a drink and I'll come back and tell you how to make puttanesca. It's delicious, it's easy, it looks and tastes impressive, and it can be made with all shelf-stable ingredients.
On the one hand, puttanesca is just a simple pasta-with-red-sauce dish. It's a bowl of spaghetti, nothing more. Not even any protein to speak of. At the same time, though, it's incredibly rich and strong and resonant—a meal with positively Lovecraftian depths.
Here's what you're gonna need: A can of anchovies. Some garlic. Some oil. A big can of tomatoes. Some capers. Some black olives. Some red pepper flakes. And some pasta. That's it. Here we go.
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Angus Johnston 😷
@studentactivism
The post office is my go-to example in class of stuff that the government does because (1) we all know and understand that it should exist and (2) capitalism will never in a million years do it. To take down the Post Office is sheer nihilism.
"Here's two quarters. Can you get this to my grandma in rural Idaho in three or four days?"

"Sure thing."

"Thanks, The Government!"
"Oh, and I hate to even ask, but she's old and she likes to send me cookies, and she lives in the middle of nowhere. Can you have an office like eight miles from her house where she can send the cookies from, even though it makes no financial sense to have one?"

"Damn straight."
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