First, here’s a picture of the Botanical Gardens:

It was built in the late 1800s and both the building and the surrounding grounds are beautifully organized and maintained. The orchid show was predominantly in two major halls, but there were touches of orchid-ness throughout the whole building. When you first came in, there was a giant orchid wall. Remember, orchids don’t grow in the dirt, they use little “fingers” to attach to the bark of trees, so they can be vertical with no problem.

Near the end there was an gorgeous orchid corridor that you could walk down. I was blown away.

And then there were orchids all over the place hiding in pre-existing floral situations. I said hello to all of them.

There was a case of teeny-tiny orchids being all wee and precious.

And there was an orchid tower.

It was amazing. I’m going to go again next year. And I got to walk through all these non-orchid exhibition halls that had great plants in them as well. My favorite, as always, was the cactii room.

One of the coolest plants we saw was the wax rose. It was a large, exceptionally spiky plant with things that looked like triangular pieces of cheddar cheese on top. I was very intrigued.

There were also carnivorous plants, which I find charming for some reason. It’s a plant! That eats meat! Wacky! What will they think of next?

The water pond section was stunning, with the overhanging arches of some kind of creeper.

And there were various other awesome plants doing their plant thing.

After we had done a full circuit of the inside of the buildings, we went outside and saw the outdoor exhibits. The azalea and rhododendron field was just starting to bloom…

… and the crabapple trees was in the middle of its blooming season and were fluffy and fairy-like.

There were different varieties of pansies in pots scattered around, which delighted me because I love pansies.

It was a lovely experience, very scenic and zen. I’m already looking forward to next year.

1. I have a bacterial infection in my head. Specifically in my sinuses and my left ear. The post-nasal drip is causing my throat to feel like it’s ON FIRE all the time for the last four days and my sinuses are filled with cement. Sometimes, when I blow my nose, horrible things come out, things that make me make this face.

Except imagine this cat has hands, and in his hands is a tissue filled with atrocities. It’s all not okay. The worst part is the ear thing. Because my ear parts are all swole up and twisted, sounds aren’t boppin’ around in there like they should. In my left ear I hear everything in stereo, like everyone has a back-up singer who’s saying the exact same thing at the same time they’re saying it, but (and I am not making this up in the least) the back-up voice is tinny-sounding and slightly out of key, like a poorly-tuned jangly piano in a saloon in the Wild West. You might think this is awesome, but you would be wrong. One grows weary of everything sounding terrible. I stopped listening to music after everything started sounding like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpFQLw5_N2o

However, I bit the bullet and hauled my disgusting self to the doctor where he gave me a prescription for ten days of antibiotics. They’re working (music sounds like music again and my throat is not quite as on fire as it was) but I still sound like one of Marge Simpson’s sisters.

2. I went with Snorth and her husband Speeb to the Museum of Natural History to see the “Creatures of Light” exhibition. It’s supposed to be an awesome exhibition about animals/rocks/plants with bioluminescence. So I, like a fool, assumed there would be all kinds of jellies and mushrooms and fireflies and whatnot, and you know what I saw? Helpful diagrams. Little models. At the end there were, like, ten fish hanging out in a tank with wee glowy spots on their cheekbones that you could barely see. I was furious because I have been through this before. A few years ago, there was an exhibition on poisonous dart frogs at AMNH and I was so excited because I was gonna see a million killer frogs, oh boy! Guess what? Helpful diagrams. Little models. Four frogs at the end. You would think I would have learned from my previous experience, but clearly I did not. Seriously, AMNH, how much money does it cost to grow a couple of glow-y shrooms in some mulch? THEY SELL BAGS OF GLOW-IN-THE-DARK MUSHROOM MIX IN THE GIFT SHOP, FOR EFF’S SAKE. Come on. I have friends who have fish tanks, they would lend you one and you could put wee jellies in them with a black light on top. It would cost $1,000 tops. Stop having weak exhibitions.

3. I went to the Macy’s Flower Show across the street. I’ve blogged about it here and here. This year due to repairs being done in the bag/makeup/accessories department the flower show was in an enormous tent on Broadway right in front. So I lined up and went in the text and it was lamey-lame-lame. The theme was “Brasil!”, but it pretty much resembled a very nice garden center with Brazilian music playing in the background. They had a couple cool plants, like mini-pineapples, but I felt it was yet another opportunity missed for awesomeness.

4. Enough with the Adele already. Enough.

One of the only things making me happy right now is this:

http://iheartmomonga.tumblr.com/

1. I went to Madison Square Garden yesterday for my Annual Pilgrimage To See The Doggies (also known as 136th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show). It was not so good. I mean, the dogs were amazing, but I think they’re redoing parts of Madison Square Garden so the show was all jacked up. How it normally works is there are seven rings in the arena, and then in the backstage area there is something called the benching area where you can meet the dogs and pet them, etc. There are rows which have hanging signs like a supermarket, with the names of the breeds in that row. Yesterday there were only five rings in the arena and if you wanted to see the toy breeds you had to walk aaaaaaaaalll the way to the other side of Madison Square Garden to the theater. And the benching area was not organized at all. All the handlers/groomers were set up all over the place and there were traffic jams everywhere, so bad that the people competing had to carry their dogs over their heads and beg to pass through. But next year I hear they’re holding Westminster in a pier in Chelsea, which hopefully will be big enough. I took some pics this year, check ‘em out:

Sometimes, if you’re a particularly awesome Cardigan Welsh Corgi, you sit up on your butt and wait patiently for snacks after competing.

A Grunewald, also known as the Belgian Sheepdog. This is a favorite of mine. It’s terrifying-looking in person, like someone ripped a piece out of the night sky and wrapped it around a wolf. I’m always psyched to see them.

A Pembroke Welsh Corgi getting brushed before entering the ring.

A poodle gettin’ its hair did.

It can be hard work.

And I bumped into Martha while I was there.

At no point did I call her out for her BS “simple ‘n’ easy” gravy recipe because I didn’t want to make a scene in front of the doggies, but if I ever get her alone in an alley it’s on.

2. What the hell?!?? Look at what visited the Buzzfeed office today:

We never get to hang out with mini-horses at work! I went all Veruca Salt on the HR department as soon as I saw these (“I want a pony, Mummy! I want a pony now!” *foot stomp*) and they promised to rectify this atrocious oversight by next Valentine’s Day. I recommended a basket of puppies. We’ll see how it goes.

9:52 a.m. - Show up at work. Make enormous vessel of herb tea. Meet up with co-workers (there are five of them) to discuss previous evening’s activities. Consider laying down on disgusting never-washed carpet and going back to sleep.

10:07 a.m. – Read emails. Answer work emails. Divvy up work between me and my co-workers. Børkke walks in to office to have meeting about daily work tasks. She has composed a new song about cheese.

10:07 a.m. -10:11 a.m. – Listen to horrible Michael McDonald-style song about cheese.

10:12 a.m. – Discuss what everyone’s going to have for lunch.

10:14 a.m. – 1:43 p.m. – Design a Keynote presentation, or a brochure, or an email signature, or a headsheet for a meeting, or a letterhead, or photoshop some images. Listen to unch-unch-unch dance music the whole time while wearing big floofy earphones. Refill giant tea mug twice. Go tinkle forty-seven thousand times because of it.

1:44 p.m.-2:03 p.m. – Actually eat some real-person food. During that time, check myriad of websites like Buzzfeed. Snort-laugh repeatedly at videos while wearing earphones so no one knows why you’re laughing. Reinforce pre-conceived notions that you’re mentally unbalanced.

2:04 p.m. – Have important office meeting. End up coming up with dance moves for The Cheese Song.

2:05 p.m. – Figure out with co-workers how we’re going to deal with the enormous soul-crushing project happening the next week. Make mental note to see friends and do laundry this week, because next week I will be so strapped for time that I will be unable to find time to shower. Consider laying down on too-small uncomfortable couch and going back to sleep.

2:09 p.m.-6:04 p.m. – Continue working on the Keynotes or brochure or email signature, etc. More tea. More bathroom. At some point inflict a video of a bunny/kitty/owl on co-workers. Co-workers feign interest while you make squeaky noises and threaten to pet subject of video to death a la Lenny from Of Mice And Men. BECAUSE YOU LOVE IT SO MUCH.

6:30ish p.m.-7:15ish p.m. – Put on coat and head out for hour-and-a-half commute home.

Peppered throughout the day: “Your mom” as responses to almost all questions, and “That’s what she/he/your mom said” as responses to all other statements. Also, cram as many racist/religious/sexist comments into your day as possible. Compete with co-workers to see who can say the most offensive thing. Hope HR never visits.

Photo of Børkke and me working late one night:

Addendum: Picture of my whole department at the Holiday Party.

Yup, yes it is.

There were a lot of the usual suspects at this year’s procession. Not that they’re bad, just expected. Like this lovely cow.

Some llamas and an alpaca:

A wee pig:

The tortoise that, due to all the foliage around him, unfortunately looks like he’s being served for Thanksgiving dinner:

A dromedary and a yak and a duck and that woman who clutches the fennec right up to her chest so it’s impossible for me to get a decent photo, they were all there.

There were two distinctly new additions to the beastie-parade. There was a macaque (oooooh) and a coati (ahhhhh).

But, as always, the real winners were the people of New York and their pets. Were there demented owners who insisted on putting bows in their dogs’ hair and pushing them them around in strollers? You betcha.

A guy brought his turtle to be blessed.

But the most impressive blessed creature of the day was the British guy who brought his…wait for it…jellyfish to church.

There are two of them. I circled them because, you know, they’re see-through and therefore difficult to spot.

A bunch of other people took a whole lot of stunning pictures that people emailed me all day. They are far, far superior to my photos, so please enjoy.

http://www.bugcomic.com/

Here are some ones that make me especially happy.

2. A friend of mine came into the city from out of town and went to KidRobot because she had a coupon. She bought some Dunnies, one of which was an avocado. I own about six or seven of them, but once I saw the avocado one, the FIRE was LIT within me once again and I had to have more Dunnies (specifically the avocado one). A Dunny, in case you don’t know, is a bunny/humanoid-shaped figurine, often made of vinyl. Its natural state is plain white, so artists are commissioned to make designs that go on them. Those are semi-mass-produced, and then artsy folk such as myself can collect them and have wee 3″ sculptures all over our respective homes and/or workplaces. I went on Amazon and, sure enough, they had the one I wanted, but you can’t get just one Dunny, can you? (Answer: No, you cannot.) End of story: I now have nine new Dunnies coming in the mail. If I keep going at this rate, when I die my phenomenal clutter will AWE THE MASSES.

3. As you may know, I work in the sparkly district of Manahattan. Not the diamond district (47th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues), the rhinestone and costume jewelry district (peppered on 6th Avenue between 27th and 37th Street). And let me tell you, things get GAUDY. For example, even though I walk past these glittering treasures and become immune to them, from time to time something leaps out and accosts my eyeballs in a manner that I cannot ignore. Like this necklace.

Once again, WHO WEARS THIS?? It looks uncomfortable and stabby, and I don’t think it would lay right on a woman’s decolletage, all pointing out at different angles and whatnot. Not good. But it was positively glorious next to the newest addition to this window.

That’s right – wacky phones from Spencer’s Gifts completely bedazzled in high-end rhinestones. I don’t even know where to start. First of all, they’re crappy plastic phones that are now weighed down with small chunks of glass, so if they were going to break before, they’re definitely going to now. Also, when you hold them up to your face for a long time, the rhinestones are going to leave dents on your hands and face. Pretty! Then you’re gonna leave sweaty hand-and-face debris all over them, and you know how easy it is to clean something that is rhinestone-covered with a rag or paper towel. I must have stood in front of this window for a solid minute, jaw agape. You really need to imagine this window as the morning sun hits it, blinding the crap out of all the passersby. Sometimes I think these stores are just fronts for the mob, because who has this in their house? I have no idea how these stores stay in business. None.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6OhjpyveNw

But we were all trapped in this metal tube that reflects sound like nobody’s business, so even though I had my headphones on she was slicing through my podcast and my skull like one of those boats in the Arctic that punch through the ice and leaves crunchy piles all around it. This is my podcast experience:

“So, Chris, tell me about the latest book you’ve read –”

“I TOLD HER THAT SHE SHOULDN’T LET HIM TREAT HER LIKE THAT!”

“– excellent novel that really evokes –”

“I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT! YOU KNOW, I SAID THAT WOULD HAPPEN! YOU REMEMBER!”

“– that last one I read that made me feel –”

“HAHAHAHAAHAA!!”

This went on for a good five minutes. All the white people were looking around, silently trying to figure out who would get up and talk to her. Finally, this gray-haired fella walked over, got her attention and made the “quieter, please” gesture. Primary Hispanic Lady apparently misconstrued this to mean stop talking in English, so she continued to have her insanely loud cell chat, but now in Spanish. I wanted to explain to her that even though I couldn’t understand what she was saying, it was still, shall we say, dampening my travel experience. It now sounded like this:

“I would recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys –”

“ME GUSTA EL QUESO CARPINCHO VAGON AXILA MUCHO TORPEDO QUE LO COMPARTAS CONMINGO!”

At some point the super-trendy late-teens Scarsdale lass sitting across from me looked at me and shrugged her shoulders as if saying, “Eh, ethnic people, what are you gonna do? Am I right, Fellow White Person?” And I wanted to say, “No, no no, I am not in your camp just because I share your honkitude. I have traveled on the train with a large quantity of splendidly rude white people. Please do not try to commiserate with me.” By then the train trip was over (hooray!) and the Primary Hispanic Lady turned to Secondary Hispanic Lady and said, “Did we miss 125th Street?” The Scarsdale Trendy Girl leans over and, in the most passive-aggressive way imaginable, smiled and said, “Well, if you had been listening to the conductor…” then flipped her hair like they did in teen 80s movies and stalked off. I’m surprised her feather extensions didn’t fly out, she flounced so hard. At that point I became torn because I couldn’t decide if I hated Primary Hispanic Lady or Scarsdale Trendy Girl more. I decided that I hated everyone everywhere and I wanted to live on a mountaintop where I could just watch all the internet’s cat videos until the end of my time here on earth.

Moral of story: I’m thinking of getting the word “misanthrope” tattooed as a tramp stamp on my back.

What the huh? And this one:

But what I read was this:

I was truly out of my milieu. But I had a jolly good time anyway. First of all, as you come in there is a giant dinosaur made from car and truck parts with a couch in it that children were sitting on. And fire was coming out of its nose. I want one for my living room.

Then there are a variety of white tents set up all over the grounds. The first one I hit was the Craftacular sponsored by Bust Magazine (motto: “getting it off our chests”). I was familiar with everything going on there. In fact, I bought myself some steampunk items from a lovely woman who came all the way from Columbus, Ohio. I got a necklace made for a watch exterior with a morpho butterfly wing in it, and I also got a pendant made from the watch’s interior components.

Then Cricket and I headed over to the Maker Pavilion:

Where the big thing this year is 3D printers. What is a 3D printer, you ask? Good question. You make an object in a 3D program, then you send the file to the nice printing machine. On top of the printer is a spool of plastic, and what happens is the plastic string is drawn down to a heated little element which lays it out in rows over and over itself, not unlike how one makes a coiled clay pot. It can make just about any shape. It totally blew my mind. Here’s what the big industrial machine looks like (note the spool of plastic):

They were also selling an Ikea version that came flat-packed that you assembled yourself, which was adorable:

And here are some the crazy-awesome things the 3D printer could make:

Apparently it can also do it in metal and glass, but I couldn’t figure out how.

Anyway, instead of buying one of these machines, you can also just send some of the companies your designs and they will print it for you (which is what I would do if I was making something). Here’s one company’s information:

Another big tent that was there was the Arduino Pavilion.

When I asked Cricket what an Arduino was, he sighed heavily and told me it was a small computer. I waited outside this pavilion while Cricket pottered around inside looking at…Arduinos.

There were a variety of littler tents scattered all around the grounds showing other people’s cool ideas. For example, there was the lock picker tent.

Another tent had a rather genius idea in it based on Archimedes’ mirror death ray.

You, a doctor in a rural area without an effective way to keep your tools disease-free, receive this box with angled bits of wood in it and a pile of 3″ x 3″ mirrors. You place the mirrors on the angled bits of wood and when the sun hits it, it focuses the sun’s rays on one very hot spot. You put your surgical knives or clampers or whatever in that beam, and it’s so hot it burns away all the evil bacteria and/or viruses. It never goes bad or loses its potency and is relatively easy to transport and/or repair. I think it’s brilliant.

Outside the tents was a solar carousel.

And a fish bike which I believe I saw at the Mermaid Parade.

And this guy eating chinese food.

By then, Cricket and I were peckish, so we stood in line for paella, which was cooked in giant paella pans. And the paella was mad good too.

I felt bad for the fresh fruit vendor next door because he had a bit of a honeybee situation. The honeybees were lovin’ it, though.

But my favorite thing was definitely the Sashimi Tabernacle Choir. I heard about it a few years ago, but I never thought I would see it in person. And lemme tell you, it is magical. I’m not even being obnoxious. It’s magical. Cricket and I stood in front of this thing for at least three songs.

Here’s a video someone took of the Sashimi Tabernacle Choir performing Bohemian Rhapsody. I don’t know what’s up the the filmer’s camera, but the clicking noise is NOWHERE that loud in real life. You can totally hear the music all the time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L-ikHb7mJA&

And this video’s pretty great too. Note the conducting lobster near the top.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV-kPlqEzAg&

And this one. Because I love this car.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NR2_jjbBMuo&

The most important thing there, in my opinion, was this chihuahua who was sitting on this woman’s shoulder right in front of me. Totally underwhelmed by the proceedings going on around him.

There didn’t seem to be much structure to the parade. There were giant trucks with massive generators on them that would roll on by and music would be blasting out of the speakers. People were standing on or around the trucks, but they didn’t do specific choreographed moves or anything. They just walked alongside it. The weirdest one were these two people on the first truck to pass us by. The guy was yelling into a microphone, but the woman was in this backwards crouched pose. She wasn’t dancing or even moving. She looked like she thought the truck was excessively dirty and she didn’t want her pristine white costumed butt touching it. Or perhaps someone told her they would kill her whole family if she didn’t stay in that position for the whole parade. It looked uncomfortable, being frozen like that.

The one thing that was amazing was the costumes. There were all kinds, but the uniting thread between all of them was bright colors and feathers. Many birds are now bald and have to wear sweaters because of this parade. Sometimes feathers were all the ladies were wearing. This was probably the smallest costume I saw. Ribbons, feathers and glitter. That’s it.

It seemed like there could be any theme to the costumes. There was Mardi Gras (or Venice, depending on who you’re talking to):

Native Americans:

Greek motifs like the helmets and shields from “300″:

This woman’s headdress has an Thai feel to it:

And there were a bunch of people dressed like British colonists, with the white wigs and the triangle hats, but I was eating curried chicken and rice at that time and was unable to get a shot.

There were also quite a few people who looked like they made their own costumes, and some of them were fantastic. I can’t imagine how much time and work went into those. The best was the man with the gold carousel-type costume with the life-size dolls hanging off the four corners. That costume had wheels, it was so big (and probably heavy).

There was the one that looked like an African shield with peacock feathers around the perimeter:

There was the unfortunate person dressed as a giant red flower who needed someone to walk in front of them and guide them down the street:

But my favorite was this guy. I cannot for the life of me figure out what’s going on here. I feel like he’s going to rob me with the bandanna over his face, but then he looks like a bat…with hearts all over his wings? Is this a thug homage to Alice in Wonderland? Cricket had no idea either.

A group of men walked by celebrating what I can only construe is the Ripped Ab and Pectoral Society of Gentlemen.

Chihuahua is unimpressed.

Oh, and there were stilt kids.

The one thing at the parade that really took me by surprise was the dancing. I’ve seen a lot of dancing in my day, but nothing like this. Women would stand in the middle of the street, bend over at the waist until their fingertips were touching the ground, and any random guy would come up behind them and grind up on them something fierce. Maybe he would call his friend in and his friend would start humping on her facial area, thereby creating a “train”. In the middle of the street, people. In full view of everybody. At one point I turned to Cricket, and without a shred of humor said, “Is no one thinking of the children?!?!!” And then I clutched my pearls and fainted. Here’s a picture of the “dancing” happening on the sidelines.

Now that I’ve gone, I don’t think I need to go again. It was hella-crowded and it took forever to get there from the suburbs where I’m at, so perhaps if it was broadcast on TV I would watch it, but otherwise I’ll just stay home and craft like I normally do.

Which was a huge, huge mistake. Because then I saw this:

And this:

And this:

And this and this and this:

And I felt like a colossal douche. So let me make a formal apology: I didn’t think, I just looked out the window and assumed everybody had the same non-existent storm experience that I did. As we all know, assuming makes a hind-quarter out of you and me. So I am sorry. It won’t happen again.