patrickjegan

March 20, 2017

Dante’s Ninth Circle of Hell is in My Kitchen

The ice cubes freeze quickly, too quickly. I don’t even have time to think what the ice was for…a martini (I don’t drink them), a Coke Zero (I don’t drink it), a single cube to chill my wife’s Chardonnay? Now, that’s likely. But one thing I can say…and this can be a warning to all…

March 8, 2017

The True Cost of a 5 cent Root Beer Barrel

This post has nothing at all to do with Pop Tarts. I just put the photo out on Instagram and Facebook so it was handy to use. Pardon the deceptive lead-in but I had no photos of Root Beer Barrels to use. I could have Googled for one, but it’s nearly dinner time…and my time…

February 17, 2017

Love at the Beacon Bar

I spend most of my time alone…here in New York City, a city of 8.4 million people. Sometimes I get very lonely and sometimes I feel forgotten. None of this is Mariam’s fault. She works very hard at Mount Sinai…slowly but steadily toward total retirement which should happen sometime after the middle of May. Sometime…

January 31, 2017

I Am…

It was the day before the inauguration. I found a local gym that offered a month to month membership. No long-term contract. And, it was only$49 per month. Ok, there is no pool (I don’t like to swim anyway and ALL pools have water that, to me, is just above freezing. “Heated pools” …just a…

January 27, 2017

The Man in the Crowd

[My photo: Not on the night of the party] I was surprised that the Beacon Bar didn’t just close for night to provide the space for the private function. Only the bar itself was open to regular customers. The rest of the space was ‘reserved’ for a party…or whatever it was. And a party it…

January 19, 2017

Remorse And A Frozen Bottle Of Poland Springs: My Dinner With Chuck

Perhaps some of you remember a rather obscure film from several decades ago called My Dinner with Andre. It was a really intense movie about two guys who have a conversation over dinner on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. A two-hour movie about two guys talking over dinner…’nap time’, you may think…but the film…

January 3, 2017

My First Two Weeks Back In New York City After Five Years Of Living In The Far North Country

[Say what you want…this comes with the apartment] Okay, It’s maybe three or four weeks now since we’ve left the cold and hostile fields of the North Country for the Cold and hostile streets of the Big Apple. So, you might ask, How are we doing? [Across the street from out building. A line waiting…

December 16, 2016

The Winters Of My Life

“Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail. If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see.” –Robert Service. The Cremation of Sam Magee I live in the Adirondack mountains of upstate New York. I don’t live in the Yukon. But lately, I feel…

December 8, 2016

Coal For Christmas

[Artwork:Watercolor sketch by Paul Egan (Date unknown)] Note to my readers: If you think you’ve read this blog before, don’t thing you’re getting senile…(the doctors won’t release such information)..this is perhaps the third, maybe fourth time I’ve posted it. Hey, maybe I’m the one getting senile. I’ve tweaked the story several times to try to make the narrative better,…

November 21, 2016

Walking In A Winter Wonderland

Sure, I could be walking down this snowy, quiet and picturesque road. I could be thinking about the approaching holidays, the snow men, the fire in our downstairs living room wood burner…but I don’t imagine I’ll be making this walk. Don’t get me wrong, I love snow. I always have. But as I stand in…