Drove into The Big City yesterday for lunch with an old friend and to have my photo taken. The lunch I was looking forward to. Having my picture taken… I’ll choose the root canal, please.
(Lunch was at Phoebe’s. Food was good, not great, but the atmosphere was wonderful. (Nota bene! They have a coffee shop, serve breakfast and have WiFi. Might be a good public writing space.)
After lunch and lots of good chat, it was off for the pain and torture sessions. Background: Syracuse was hatched a wonderful new magazine, Central New York, a few months ago. They don’t have a web presence yet, but it is very much along the lines of Philadelphia Magazine; articles about the region, interesting people, arts calender, etc. It has an outstanding design and extremely high production values and is enough to make a Central NYer proud.
So anyway, they let me write a small piece for it that will come out in November. Which made me very happy up until the moment they asked me to come down so they could take my picture. “You don’t have to do that,” I said, as the hives broke out. “I had a new PR photo taken in May. Really, it’s nice. It almost looks like me.”
It wasn’t good enough.
So that’s how I came to be standing in downtown Syracuse at 2:30 yesterday afternoon (across from the Post-Standard** building which is very cool), wearing a winter jacket and bright orange mittens, holding a bowl of salt potatoes that were nestled in a bed of dry ice (to make fake steam) contorting my face into bizarre expressions of salt potato lust. I’m just grateful that we didn’t cause any accidents.
Once I got over feeling really dumb, it was fun, so a big shout out to Linda, Tim, and Dave for showing me such a good time.
Salt potatoes really are a food of the gods, you know.
**Congrats to the Post-Standard staff for pulling down 29 Associated Press awards!
No WAY!!! You were in Syracuse? I would have snuck out of work for the chance to meet you.
Salt potatoes rock, don’t they? What’s weird is, when the food service student workers at SU dining serve up salt potatoes, they always ask, “Do you want butter?” Um, hello? Salt potatoes are merely a vehicle for melted butter!
Hehehe. Now you’re making me crave Rudy’s salt potatoes. Mmmmmmmm.
little quirk
Standing in the cold holding potatoes? Sounds like a good way to catch tuber-culosis.
Spud-dah-dum! (cymbal crash)
i just found a salt potato “recipe” that i am anxious to try. it sounds great.
hey, can i see the photo once it’s done?
You bet. Feel better – more tea!
I finally had the chance to read Prom! I thought it was great, of course. I thought you did a great job at depicting the high school experience. You’re always really good at that. =)
Thank you!
cool lola iconthing, krazymazy!
Thank you for posting the Philadelphia Magazine link 🙂
I had no idea Philadelphia had a Magazine!
No problem! I can’t wait to read your new book!
Thank you! =)