Striped Pineapple

A Handel’s Messiah Train Wreck

December 9, 2019 Rachel Comments 4 comments

I didn’t grow up really celebrating Christmas- Thanksgiving was more our thing- so I don’t have a lot of nostalgic traditions around this holiday. However, we had one little tradition which I loved. Nearly every year we would find a free performance of Handel’s “Messiah” and pack ourselves into the balcony. We’d sit there with binoculars, (the homeschooler version of opera glasses, I guess) and pass them about, taking turns watching the faces in the choir and the orchestra with…

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Little Letters, Thanksgiving 2019

December 5, 2019 Rachel Comments 1 comment

I know Thanksgiving has come and gone, and Christmas is now making its presence known with blaring music and lights everywhere I look, and even the prettiest snowfall, drifting down on this city of mine and creating a hush in the mania. But for those of us trying to fill our lives with gratitude, every day is Thanksgiving day, right? So without further ado… Dear Tough Decisions, I hate making you, and I love when you are made, much…

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Lottery Winnings, Love Life, and Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything

November 21, 2019 Rachel Comments 4 comments

I won the lottery. I imagine almost everybody has, at one point or another, fantasized about what they would do if they won the lottery. I certainly have done so, building grand castles in the air of traveling with part of it and investing the rest and living on interest and being able to spend my life doing all the things I actually want to do that don’t make a living. Surely you’ve made plans for the day you’ll win…

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The Ark Encounter With the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

October 21, 2019 Rachel Comments 2 comments

Good evening, ya fine folks. I am perched on my bed as I type this, gingerly leaning against the wall and hoping against hope that my somewhat broken bed does not come crashing down off its wobbly pedestal. It has been known to do that, you know. I had my fine friend the Little Kumquat come visit me and first thing, as soon as she sat on the bed and leaned against the wall, SMASH, the whole operation came crashing…

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New York City Fashion

October 1, 2019 Rachel Comments 1 comment

New York City is one of the fashion capitals of the world, I hear, alongside Paris and other such progressive places. It certainly is a place where you can expect to see just about anything and everything walking down a sidewalk, and even though there’s enough weirdness here that I should be used to it by now, sometimes I still find someone so interesting I can’t help sneaking a picture from the hip. Wanna see? Sometimes what you see is…

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A Post That Is Not About the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

September 16, 2019 Rachel Comments 5 comments

When I learn something new that particularly delights me, I want to share it with the whole world, over and over and over. After I started dance lessons a year or two ago I couldn’t shut up about HOW MUCH FUN it was, and how everyone should try it. (I still think that, by the way.) My friends patiently nodded along and probably rolled their eyes behind my back, but I couldn’t really blame them for that, because I ceaselessly…

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Auditioning for the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

August 25, 2019 Rachel Comments 4 comments

So, I did this thing. It’s been a pipe dream for years, but not something I ever thought would happen. Just kind of like living in Paris for a year- I mean, many are called but few are chosen, amiright? Of course I want to live in Paris for a year, but naturally I don’t expect it’ll ever happen. But this thing, well, here’s what went down… I was planning to audition sometime for the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir, not necessarily…

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A New York City Birthday

August 14, 2019 Rachel Comments 10 comments

I have made no secret of the fact that I love birthdays. I mean, I’m one of those annoying people who counts down the days and tells everyone when it comes and marches around collecting all the free drinks from coffee shops and that kind of thing. Ya know? I love to analyze the past year and see where life has taken me and for me it’s also a good mid-year time to make a few new resolutions. Finally, it’s…

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A Flying Trip

August 7, 2019 Rachel Comments 2 comments

A couple weeks I sat in a coffee shop feeling particularly homesick and forlorn and in need of adventure and decided to see what it would cost to go somewhere for the weekend, anywhere cheap. So I began browsing inexpensive flights and lo and behold, there was one for that very weekend to Charlotte. On a whim I snatched it up and spent the next few days of work just barely able to contain my excitement as I waited for…

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Who’s the Hottest?

July 25, 2019 Rachel Comments 4 comments

Summer has come at last, full swing, and all my questions about what New Yorkers meant when they said that summer is sweltering here and that the whole city smells like garbage are being answered. Today I went from place to place in search of adventure, and following me like a flea was the persistent smell of dog piles. Yes, I checked my shoes, but apparently this is what Queens smells like in the summer. The garbage piles smell like…

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Little Letters, Fashion Edition

July 10, 2019 Rachel Comments 5 comments

Dear Linen Pants, whoever thought of you should be knighted. You are the breeze to a July day, the ice to lemonade, the watermelon to picnics. Cool and baggy and light and airy, you wouldn’t deign to get static, and when you wrinkle you simply look more chic than before. If the hot south ever had a signature clothing item, it should be you. Dear Red Trench Coat, I can’t remember my life before I met you. Your capacious pockets…

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