SOUP TO NUTS: Columbus Self-Discovery Weekend Edition

The latest nutty bits from Nueva York — in time for the Columbus Day weekend — crazy miscellaneous photos, amusing and/or bemusing odds and ends not to be overlooked, even if they don’t get the full page Nuts in NY treatment… Don’t miss ’em, just don’t… Forget about that big rally to burn a political rival in effigy… Til you’ve looked over these items, forget about the neighborhood low-lifes to whom you owe money… all that can wait!

BREAKING: MANHATTAN CHEF CREATES A DISH YOU COULD NEVER AFFORD

It’s that time of the semester, boys and girls: NYC’s comic book journos have gone for the gasp by running one of their formulaic stories about a dish so darn expensive who can believe it?! OMG! I mean who would pay a million dollars for mac and cheese?!

This time it’s thousand dollar paella, created by chef Ricardo Cardona at Sofrito on E. 57th St., made with imported truffles, baby eel, octopus, Maine lobster and Alaskan prawns. Imported stuff.

The Daily News riffs on the irksomeness of their own story, given the state of the economy:

With ingredients imported from Spain, Italy and all over the U.S., Cardona can guarantee there will be no belt-tightening at his establishment.

“Who said ‘recession’? Who said ‘bad economy’?” he said. “I think that’s the way to fight the bad economy, and if you have the money to spend, then why not enjoy yourself?”

Source: NY Daily News, via Guanabee
Photo credit: Monaster/News

SURFIN’ N-Y-C: CATCH A STRESS WAVE

America’s most esteemed Buddhist monk describes NYC in surfing terms:

Surya Das believes that New York, the stress center of the universe, lends itself perfectly to his ideas. “The energy is so high here,” he explains. “It’s like good surfing – either you drown or you have a great ride. If you can be grounded and not get carried away with competitiveness, workaholicism, unhealthy eating, caffeine or worse drugs, then you can ride that wave.”

The 48 year old Long Island native isn’t what one usually thinks of as a Tibetan monk. The more common image is the Dalai Lama. But Surya Das, who grew up as Jeffrey Miller on Long Island, eschews the funky colorful robes in favor of a jacket and a tie. His grandparents, according to Huliq News, owned a Brooklyn sporting goods store, and his parents were accountants. As a kid, he wanted to be a major league ball player, and he grew up playing basketball everyday with Leslie Moonves, president and CEO of CBS Television.

Read more at Huliq News about the guy who’s mother calls him the “Deli Lama”, about the years spent becoming a monk — the “rituals, philosophy, ethics and morals, and yoga,” and years of solitary retreat. It’s a far cry from his conventional childhood in North Valley Stream, L.I.

Source: Jennifer Tung
Photo credit: Dzogchen.org

IMPORTED NUTS: TOURIST FILES SUIT AGAINST NYC FOR LOUSY WEATHER

Well, OK, not really. But you have to feel sorry for a tourist like Leslie from Fort Worth, Texas. The 20 year old visited NYC recently and all she got was this lousy weather:

Or, wait… maybe those aren’t storm clouds… maybe they’re clouds of smoke… Could it be the very same stuff Leslie was seen puffing away on, with a strange man on a blanket, at a recent Dave Matthews concert?… Hmmmmmm???

Photo credit: thenamesarealltaken

THOSE WHO LIVE IN GLASS HOUSES: STINKY PR STUNT DU JOUR

Netflix, the DVD rental service, constructed a voyeur-friendly, see-thru house in Times Square, for a contest they called a “Popcorn Bowl”. The 2 winners broke the Guinness World Record for “most consecutive hours spent watching movies”. They watched 57 movies in 123 hours — that’s 5 days in English.

Public relations pro Carolyn Leber lays it out in the language of PR: “Netflix has proven that it’s about as innovative as the imagination can run… Their latest stunt…took place…where else? Times Square. The world’s top destination for wave after wave of buzz branding.”

The contest’s rules, according to Leber: “Each movie had to be viewed until the last credit rolled. Under Guinness World Record rules, competitors could not divert their eyes from the screen, but were allowed 10-minute breaks between movies.”

This photo might explain why it was hard to find a shot of the contestants in action: it doesn’t especially flatter the corporate logo, with contestants in their stinky, complimentary Netflix shirts:

Ironically, you’d think our grown-in-the-USA sofa yams would have the edge — afterall, it’s not a contest that takes effort, like hot dog eating — but winners Suresh Joachim and Claudia Wavra are natives of Sri Lanka and Austria, respectively. And further irony: neither country has Netflix.

Photo credits: HackingNetflix via Flickr
Sources: marketwatch.com; Carolyn Leber Public Relations

CAUTION: LOW KEY GUERRILLA STREET ARTIST AT WORK

Well, not exactly street art. Rather the subway platform in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn:

Source: The Cosmas, via animalnewyork

WE’VE GOT IT ALL — MONKEYS, NUTS, FASHION, CLUB KIDS

Science guy Martin Lindstrom reports:

Deep inside our brains…you’ll find something called “mirror neurons”. Mirror neurons were identified in the late 1980s…by Giacomo Rizzolatti who had been monitoring monkeys. Rizzolatti discovered that if one monkey watched another picking up a nut, its brain imitated the action, embedding the sense that it was actually collecting the nuts itself.

Humans are equipped with exactly the same neurons…

I’ll never forget passing by a nightclub in central New York City and seeing the young people who were queuing up outside. All the guys, and lots of girls, had positioned their outer clothing to allow the apparently fashionable hip bands of their underpants to be visible… Weeks afterwards, I strolled past a similar line of young people outside a nightclub in Sydney, Australia… The kids were dressed in exactly the same fashion. It was the same in Tokyo, Paris and Copenhagen…

Source: livemint.com

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