Pat Kiernan is my favorite person on TV.
Apparently, I'm not the only person who feels this way.
There are countless Facebook groups (complete with fan art) dedicated to supporting Pat's popularity goal to replace Regis Philbin. I can see it.
The best segment on TV news ever is "In The Papers." For those of you who do not live in NYC—or, worse, think that you can get a better deal through Verizon instead of TWC—you have never seen Pat Kiernan grace your screen during NY1.
This is how the segment goes:
-Pat Kiernan collects all the daily papers (NY Times, NY Post, Daily News, etc.)
-He (let's be honest, his staff) carefully combs through them to pick out the most interesting and pertinent articles in each paper
-He reads the headlines and explains the gist of the article
-He looks adorable while doing so
It's amazing. It makes you feel like you've read the entirety of all the newspapers and wisely selected which articles were worth your time to read. Now that you have "read" them, and now you know everything that people will talk about that day.
As Jon Stewart put it on his show this past Wednesday 1/29:
"NY1 is the pulse of our city...Just literally sitting there reading you the paper. They read it to you...NY1 is always there for us."
I couldn't agree more.
And, it saves me the cost of a daily NY Times subscription.
"Excuse me, do you mind if I sit here?"
That was my opening line as I boarded a rush hour Metro North train.
I think it's a little presumptuous of any passenger to take an entire row (aka prime real estate) to yourself, forcing others to stand.
I actually would have sat down without even asking, but this current seat-occupier's fur coat (sorry PETA) was overflowing onto the bordering seat, where I was hoping to sit.
After I asked to join her, she nodded nonchalantly, but made no effort to move her coat.
So, I sat down.
Of course, I tried to be courteous, but the narrow seats only allot for so much room, and I inevitably ended up touching some of her dead animal.
She started huffing and she aggressively grabbed her coat and yanked it back to her side (which she should have done in the first place).
I didn't really feel bad, at all.
But, for those few seconds, the fur felt very nice to sit on.
"Excuse me, miss. Do you have a minute to save the world?"
I'm positive that the average New Yorker has been accosted a minimum of 2-3 times per season by dedicated young individuals devoted to [insert cause].
Just last week, I was approached in Grand Central Station by a young guy who started off by saying "Hi, we're talking to people wearing purple scarves today."
Yea, right.
I didn't buy that for a second. But I had a few minutes to kill, so I decided to humor him.
He started asking me all these questions about how much money I spend on essential living (food and water) every day. I knew the purpose of this was to make me feel guilty about how much I spend and how I could afford to live on 50 cents less a day and instead donate that money to [insert cause].
I wasn't having it. He could tell. His approach wasn't even original, and he was representing an organization that I had actually never heard of. When I asked him for some literature, he couldn't even show me a packet. I was calling bullshit.
He tried a new approach—he asked me about the ring that I was wearing on my middle finger, and if I knew what that represented. (I did not.) He then told me that wearing a ring on my middle finger indicates that I "know what I want to do in life but go about it in a chaotic way."
I told him that he couldn't be farther from the truth. There are very, very few aspects of my life that could even be considered remotely chaotic.
At this time, I decided that it was time to leave him. No, I did not want to give him my credit card information. I was positive that I would be subscribed to some unbreakable contract that would extract monthly payments from my account for the rest of my life.
Fact: Nearly everyone in middle class America has access to Netflix.
Why is this? Because there are virtually no limits on how many people with whom you can share your password. Of course, there are limits as to how many people per account can watch at a time, but that rarely seems to be an issue.
Netflix is one of those services that seems to be a superfluous expense, and yet everyone seems to pay it —just like smart phone data contracts and manicures. At one time, we all thought it was ridiculous to spend that amount of money, but after communication became seemingly impossible without an iPhone/you realize you suck at doing your nails, it was much easier to cave.
If you read my recent post about the importance of TV as a conversation initiator, you would (correctly) assume that Netflix works the same way. It is now possible to watched an entire series in a matter of days (depending on episode length and the extent of your dedication). Excuses like "I was too young when the show came out" or "It conflicted with Grey's Anatomy" are no longer viable reasons as to why you are not an expert on Boy Meets World or Mad Men. It is unfathomable for current teenagers to imagine how sick days were spent with only the possibility of daytime TV shows to pass the time; they now have a virtually endless library of quality shows for viewers of all ages, thanks to Netflix.
It's safe to say I'm very jealous of opportunities, so I have no choice but to make up for lost time.
And, for the record, if/when Friends comes to Netflix, you'll know. I won't have the time to write posts; I'll have succumbed to the pleasure cycle that is binge-watching.
22) Poor Gifting
I pride myself on being a courteous gift giver. What does that mean? If I give someone a gift (and modestly admit that it may not be to their liking), I make sure that:
a) it is from a regularly-patronized store*
b) I attach a gift receipt
*A regularly-patronized store is a place that has multiple locations and/or is located close to the gift recipient's residence. (Example: Target)
You should not be gifting a shark tooth necklace that you got from a street peddler while on vacation in Sedona unless you know that the recipient will love the gift. (In this case, unless they are a member of an aquatic species or a dentist, they probably will not.)
If you buy an item from a regularly-patronized store, attach a gift receipt.
Failure to do so is not only impolite, but increases the suspicion that you are re-gifting something that you got a long time ago.
Note to sales associates: When a customer asks you for gift receipt for an item, that means that said customer is likely going to be giving that item as a gift. Ergo, you should remove the price tag. I cannot tell you how many times a sales associate has wrapped my gift up in beautiful tissue paper in a box (with an expertly-tied bow), only to have me later ruin all of it because I have to open it up to remove the price tag.
