Hawaiian Surf Princess

Kauai, January 2008. Northbound Highway 56. Surf report on the radio.

Hawaiian Surf Princess

Malia Manuel

Point your board toward the next run

Waves rolling on Kaelia Beach 

where one long day runs free

Sea sun glisten off taught brown body and 

navy wet-suit top

and bright blue bikini bottom

Lakey Peterson

Shot like a bullet through a barrel

Rip the surf and fall like an angel 

To rise and ride again and then return to shore 

where I am paralyzed by your beauty

Throw your board atop a friend's car 

Pop the trunk and rinse your mocha hair

Its length, the only excess on your sleek frame

Malia Manuel

Breeze blows your ethereal mist in my face

as you peel your top off your taught back

Aloof calendar pose, 

"Was doing terrible before you showed up"

Board a bumblebee and scatter off  

Sunlight kisses your lips and strokes your hair

Heavenly statue in the parking lot of Kaelia Beach 

Lakey Peterson

The sea is your throne 

the fragrant air your kingdom

A gallon of fresh water, your coronation.

Kaelia Beach, Kauai

Mexican Mayor Maria Santos Gorrostieta Murdered

Across the border of the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave, a woman who personified these beliefs was savagely beaten and murdered. Although her death made headlines around the world, the barbarous animals responsible for this crime will likely go unpunished.

Maria Santos Gorrostieta was a mother and wife who survived previous assassination attempts, one that took her first husband, before being abducted in daylight while dropping her daughter off at school. As mayor of the small town of Tiquicheo, Mexico she stood against the illegal drug trade and poverty that ravaged her people on behalf of the "men who break their souls everyday without rest to find a piece of bread for their children."

Thirty years after Nancy Reagan pleaded with Americans to "Just Say No," the many broken souls who find solace in artificial paradises will turn a blind eye to this slaughter as if it were part of the food trade, unavoidable, and the profiteers will get back to the business of delivering the medication to numb the guilt. The idea of justice will be left to comic book heroes and the guys wearing the white hats in westerns. 

After all what can we Americans do?

Can we saddle up the horses and ride until we hang every last one of those responsible before loping off into the sunset leaving the poor man we liberated to fill the void?

Can we attack the demand side of the equation by collectively saying no? Can we end addiction after seeing how insidiously it took the life of Whitney Houston and countless others?

Perhaps the most effective way is to eliminate cartel profits by legalizing drugs with the same wariness we applied to alcohol. It is estimated that American states that have legalized marijuana have siphoned billions from criminal enterprises across our border.

The answer may be all of the above. 

In the meantime, I will pray for Maria Santos Gorrostieta and her family and when the time comes for me to stand up for what's right, I will pray that I may find her strength.

Liz Cho Dating Josh Elliott

@LizCho7: Collecting shells
on Long Island

Liz Cho seems hellbent on turning the part-time, hyper-local gossipy-gops like Weird Long Beard (WLB) into full-time hackitty-hack snoops. 

Back in June, WLB reported that Liz Cho and her husband Evan Gottlieb were still married only to be scooped three months later by Page Six with this bombshell: "Anchor Liz Cho & hubby split: dating Josh Elliott?"

Curiously, the timing of her separation seems to coincide with her new hair-do, which I for one do not like. The bone-straight approach is not nearly as luxurious as the full-body quiff she used to don and seems to lose its fizzle in the evening broadcasts.

Unfortunately, if these rumors of Liz Cho and Josh Elliott do not fizzle, it proves that she is human and at 41 years-old not immune to the mid-life crisis we ordinary folks hold so dear ... but why Josh Elliott? 

Liz's new do

I did catch Josh Elliott over the summer on Good Afternoon America, but mainly due to his co-host and WLB fav, Lara Spencer. While I concede he possesses the criteria: tall, dark, handsome and on national TV, the only memorable flashes of personality (aside from Lara) during the GAA run were at the hands of guest-in-residence D.L. Hughley. But I digress ...

Lara did a masterful job of supporting Josh as a boy-next-door with a young daughter for the mommy demographic, so it was surprising to see him suddenly catapult himself into the most enviable bachelor in the tri-state area. I suppose work's an easy place to fall in love after all.  


Eyewitness News team.



Breaking Bad in Happy Valley

The much lauded AMC series Breaking Bad is mesmerising in its expert, intricately woven story directed beautifully through the finest detail. It's precise like a thematic chemical reaction that loans an air of authenticity rarely found on TV.

Among the myriad of human entanglements portrayed in Breaking Bad is the notion that someone wicked and evil can appear right before your nose without presenting a single clue. In this its final season, there is a scene where DEA agents Hank and his partner Steven are sharing a drink with their retiring boss, George Merkert, in his office when it becomes evident that George can't forgive himself for not recognizing who the druglord Gus Fring really was. He laments having invited him into his home and among his family when the camera deftly stops on Hank's face alluding to his brother-in-law Walt, who has been perpetrating the meth explosion Hank seems powerless to stop, chasing a mythical figure named Heisenberg.

The truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. As such, it is hard not to see a correlation between this show and the massive scandal that has shaken Penn State University to its very core. Although it would appear that Joe Paterno may have known more about his coach than initially suspected, it is clear that Jerry Sandusky's child molestation remained undetected for many years.

I had a chance to catch up with my high-school classmate, Gerald Filardi, over the weekend at our reunion and I asked him if there was any notion of this scandal while he starred there from 1994 to 1996 at linebacker. He shook his head with the same disbelief that we all did when the allegations of abuse were finally brought to light. This idea that evil could be right in front of our nose while we are completely unaware is deeply disturbing.

In the wake of the recent massacre in Aurora, Colo., I again find myself searching for answers. Were there any signs? Could we as a people have prevented this tragedy? How can we detect the next human time bomb before it detonates?

I don't think there are any definitive answers, but it is clear that the human personality has many facets and often the public facade we present is all there is to go by. Sometimes it is judged fairly, other times not so much. I am reminded of the line from the brilliant film Miller's Crossing where Tom Regan says, "No one knows anybody. Not that well"

The quest for answers could lead into a greater philosophical discussion about the journey of self and the struggle we all share to determine who we are and what our life is about, which may only deepen the mystery. Maybe ignorance is bliss ... until the next bomb goes off.

Sun Bleached and Beautiful

A summer shower falls oh so gently on the hood of my Jeep while I put off the day's errand and head to the beach where I'm greeted by the sun-washed jagged stones that stand guard over the Sound while the sailors, runners, bikers and fishermen weave in and out.

Tod's Point, Greenwich, CT

I pause along route, too lazy to fiddle with the automatic windows, and amble to a nearby bench facing the island of Manhattan. A fisherman jabbers that the fluke are small, but it looks like a meal to me. The doldrums have set upon the sailing school so that the women lay across the bows of the dead ships paddling wistfully while others hop overboard to cool off or perhaps answer a desperate nature call.

Two runners approach as if they popped out of a hi-def screen airing the Olympics from London. They are tall and lean wearing hardly anything. I follow the long-legged woman for a bit until I feel useless and out of shape, so I hop back in the Jeep and spin around the Point at a cruising speed of 15 mph, letting the cyclists race past as I glide into a spot by the beach. A few dedicated goers shuffle through the sand while others get their laps in, no doubt competing against the great Michael Phelps in their minds while they battle the wakes from the yachts that drunkenly drift about without a care in the world.

Local Baywatch

The lifeguard stands are abandoned, while those on the town payroll sip coffee and stare at the horizon. Then I see the unmistakable red swimsuit and a perfectly tanned beauty brush her sun-kissed hair from her face while she listens intently to her handsome counterpart as they traipse barefoot over the tarmac which would be too hot to do on a busy day.

The smell of the sea is in my nostrils and I look forward to rendezvousing with the clam-lady at the farmer's market in a few hours where I will buy a dozen to throw on the grill, careful not to blow out my flip flop ala Jimmy Buffett and feeling rejuvenated, sun-bleached and beautiful like an ethereal horizon.

New York City view from Tod's Point, Greenwich, CT

It Appears Liz Cho Is Still Married

Looking at the recent queries that lead to this blog, there is still a great deal of wonder about the marital status of WABC-TV Channel 7 Eyewitness News' anchor Liz Cho. Admittedly, I have fanned the flames with a gonzo-style report that she may be in love with her co-anchor Bill Ritter, but people, that was four years ago!

Of course I still watch Liz Cho and like the rest of you I am still intrigued by this notion that she does not wear her wedding band or engagement ring on her left ring finger during the broadcast. I seem to recall her flashing a rather ornate diamond once upon a time. Maybe there is a trade secret as to why news anchors don't wear their rings, but her colleague Lee Goldberg always seems to wear his.

Intrepid blogger that I am, I took to search and found a recent article in the New York Post that not only reports that Liz Cho is still married to Evan Gottlieb, but that the two are involved in a "nasty legal battle" over renovations they had done to their Westchester mansion.

Really, Liz, couldn't you have gotten 7 On Your Side after them? I mean Nina Pineda would just get a door slammed in her face, but you know Tappy Phillips. Couldn't you lure her out of retirement for old-times' sake? She'd get to the bottom of it. And maybe she could figure out what happened to your ring, too.

Margaret Brennan No Longer InBusiness

I was caught by surprise last Friday when I read Margaret Brennan's farewell to the NYSE and her show on twitter. I had been a loyal follower of InBusiness since she left CNBC's retail beat to join BloombergTV in 2009.

It seemed as though the show was doing well. She moved from the studio to the floor of the Exchange and her image appeared on posters in Metro North rail cars and banners strewn across city buses.

According to TVNewser, Andrew Morse, head of U.S. TV for Bloomberg, said the changes are a continuation of Bloomberg’s “evolution into a digital, multi-platform news organization.” 

I suppose it only fair that in this age of disintermediation that a change to a daily TV program be reported on twitter. No indication as to where Brennan will land, but I can't imagine a bright journalist like her will be sidelined for long. 

And so it would appear that the glittering money-honey path away from CNBC may not be golden after all, e.g., does anybody tune into Erin Burnett's program on CNN?

  

Brooklyn Pizza Odyssey

Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story of that man skilled in all ways of devouring pizza. Toppings or none, any pie spread before him, soon to be done.

Grimaldi's Pizzeria, Brooklyn

The journey begins across the Brooklyn Bridge with the steely eye of John Augustus Roebling cast upon ye merry band of travelers as ancient souls swim among the caissons still searching for the allusive bedrock never found.

Cameron Diaz

Under the bridge downtown lies Grimaldi's whose line stretches out like the famous suspension bridge and whose savory mozzarella and thin crust beckons like the sirens' song along the block where the beautiful Cameron Diaz once traipsed with the solemnity of Penelope herself. You sit and order a pie hot out of the coal brick oven and you're filled with a sense of promise and good cheer.

Dom DeMarco of Di Fara

From there, the wind blows out to Midwood and Di Fara, where another crowd gathers as the old man painstakingly puts together his pies grabbing basil from a pot on the windowsill and drenching his masterpiece in olive oil pressed in the old country. Check to make sure the shop is not closed due to health code violations, which from time-to-time will happen as a matter of bureaucracy and nothing more. Dom DeMarco is as much a part of the pie as any ingredient and nothing sits in that shop long enough to pose a health risk. One bite and you'll be transported, dazed at the thought you may never have tasted pizza until that moment.

L&B Spumoni Gardens, Brooklyn

Set sail again upon the unpredictable waters of the Gowanus to L&B Spumoni Gardens in Bensonhurst, where you want two squares, preferably the corner pieces. The sweet crust and delicious sauce and sublime cheese will remind you of all of the monumental moments you have amassed in your life. They will flash before you in the comfort of the outdoor space and relaxed neighborhood and for a moment, you are a kid again. Afterward, indulge in a spumoni or a lemon ice to cleanse the palate and cool down. Check your watch, if there's time, a quick shot to Coney Island and a ride on the Cyclone might be in order, but as the sun sets your path circles back toward to its point of origin.

Mark Iacano of Lucali

Lucali in Carroll Gardens only opens for dinner and it's always mobbed, pun intended. This pies de resistance will conjure memories of the earlier pies and seemingly fix what ails you. It's stunning simplicity and craftsmanship achieve perfection. Weather permitting, a stroll along the nearby Brooklyn Heights Promenade is highly recommended before returning across the bridge where the evening or a much deserved nap awaits.

There are organized bus tours of Brooklyn pizza, but true pizza lovers must set out on their own and experience it at their pace. While the journey is not for the faint of heart, the reward is divine.

On this pale fear seized every one; they were so frightened that their arms dropped from their hands and fell upon the ground at the sound of the goddess's voice, and they fled back to the city for their lives.

Map of the Brooklyn Pizza Odyssey

One Take

Leap year into forgotten wonder bra commercial 
where a young lass’s hair ain’t all that bounces like a quarter 
off a sticky bar or the driving rain off the hood of a car port 
in a quaint New England town overlooking Long Island Sound 
and the spawn of a million oysters to end up as empty shells on tables amid fables of barroom romances from a century ago and actors like Grant and Gable who were able to say more with a wink than a good long Plato think on the underprivileged and lack of clean drinking water or vapor in the form of Vader and the force that pulls us all in some precarious direction or perhaps to the top of the masthead in a magazine or a vessel of blood drop oozing from the corner of a wolf’s mouth somewhere in the deep south of Jack London’s mind behind the steaming carcass of progress and inevitable debt and dirty diapers that the earth brings to the unsuspecting moms who accept the challenge in return for fading beauty and eternal memory of all to be accomplished and soon to be forgotten until the next spin of the dice thrice more behind 
the creaking door where Poe did urinate his poetry on solemnity or crancousity or some other absurd word never heard before I wrote this post so that most could turn a blind eye and rattle the center stone within Nathaniel Hawthorne or woebegone internet porn and teenagers broadcasting their boredom to anyone who will listen or write some trite nonfiction of catastrophe and blasphemy while grabbing their balls and spitting in the ocean to be devoured by the oyster before it is devoured in the eternal circle of life and death and backwoods crystal meth to promote sleepless anxiety 
for pharmacies to tackle like a crooked quarterback sweating steroids from his eyeballs to the glory of a million more who will wake up sore and check the score of the price of wheat 
before they beat their feet to the drum of another day whose outcome lay amid the fray of a medieval hangman’s noose.

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson is an elegantly crafted story and one that will forever remain among my favorites.

Most of us have never met Steve Jobs face-to-face and yet I think we all feel we know him on a personal level having been seduced by his products at some point in our lives for one reason or another. My memories, while not of him, are of Apple, which may be as close to him as we could get anyway.

They begin when I took a computer class in high school with my best friend. The main reasons we took it were the teacher was likable and the hottest girl in school happened to be taking it too. The by-product of this hour long oasis was learning the features of the Macintosh which were intuitive and then utilizing them to compose documents such as "Why Michael Jordan Is the Greatest Athlete on Earth."

Fast forward to my first editorial job at Forbes magazine and my desire to purchase a laptop so I could write wherever inspiration struck. My colleagues in IT, who I knew from the softball team, convinced me to cancel my order for an IBM Thinkpad and buy a Mac Powerbook instead. I did so and they were high-fiving one another as if we won a game against The Wall Street Journal. My great memory of that machine was a road trip I took to Key West to see Hemingway's house and then writing "Notes on South Beach" in the airport waiting for my return flight and trying not to be too distracted by an amazing sun-kissed beauty in the seat nearby.

The machine died much too soon. As did the first iPod that I received as a gift from my wife, who was then my girlfriend. I remember taking the defective iPod to the Apple store in SoHo and fighting the masses to arrive at a table where a kid wearing a black "genius" t-shirt acknowledged the product's fault and then insisted I pay $35 for its replacement. I turned around and walked out and stayed far away from Apple products, promising to not give them another dollar. But there was no alternative to iTunes and on my honeymoon I was grateful that my wife brought hers so that I could listen to David Gray and Damien Rice songs while lying poolside sipping cocktails and fantasizing about what we would have for dinner in between swims and excursions along the beach.

When the iPhone was introduced, I patiently sat on the sideline as it was not available on the Verizon network. Its arrival in 2011 coincided with my birthday and after looking at every alternative, I decided to buy one. Everything Isaacson writes in his book is true. The elegant packaging, the ease of use, the instant set up, all made for a wonderful user experience.

The device is more durable than its predecessors; however, mine developed a software glitch and when I walked into the Apple store to complain, this time on Greenwich Ave, the staff replaced it in seconds at no expense or inconvenience to me.

When news of Steve Jobs death broke, I remember it was in the evening and I was painting the room that would become my son's nursery. I quickly grabbed my iPhone and quipped on twitter that I wonder if Saint Peter would confiscate Steve's iPhone at Heaven's Gate. Then I was sad at the loss of this iconic figure, much like the day Princess Diana died, for reasons I'm not sure I even understand.

As I thought about Steve Jobs, I was anxious to read his biography as well-timed as all of his product launches and I shuddered at the thought that he might figure out a way to communicate from beyond the grave. As impossible as it sounds, all of us aware of his genius probably giggle a little uncomfortably at the possibility.

It is clear that Walter Isaacson's biography is the manifesto for Jobs' legacy. Apple shares have resumed their steady ascent in the market as many of us understand that this company is our link to him and the wonder he inspired and that Tim Cook and Jony Ives embody its philosphy wholly. Of course the possibility that his son Reed may take the reigns one day is also intriguing, or perhaps it will be Eve and I can't wait to read those headlines.

Jobs had me scratching my head recently while I was waiting for a friend at Cipriani's in Grand Central Station. I was looking up at its starry ceiling and then across at the mobs of people congregating under the famous Apple logo and the echo from his earlier ad that "those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who usually do" spun in my head.