ONE MONTH GONE

On February 11 we were here for exactly a month, and Bea has already forgotten me -- mind you, she does have a hundred children, and she’s scriptwriting, so I’m not blaming her. And Miriam forgot my birthday, which even Nandi and Sam Bauer-Cope remembered; however, in their case they most probably sparked because they couldn’t believe that anyone could be as old as I am and still have teeth to chew with.

Top of the recap list is that February 12 saw the publication of Sizwe’s Test. The New York Times Book Review did a double-page spread on it, used two of Gideon Mendel’s photographs, and got Adam Hochschild (King Leopold’s Ghost) to review it. (I’ll add the text of the review to our website.) Yesterday’s edition of Time Out says: “Not since Abraham Verghese’s haunting 1994 book about eastern Tennessee, My Own Country, has the AIDS epidemic been described so deeply and humanely, and from so many angles. … Steinberg has ended up with a big, brave, poignant look into the heart of his country…”

Just one pic of the book on the shelves at Barnes & Noble, and then I’ll stop being so full of bursting pride.

NADINE ZYLSTRA AND JOHNATHAN DORFMAN

We saw them last Sunday for brunch at Downtown Atlantic in Brooklyn (again, the Bloody Marys were exceptional). Did anyone know that Nadine got an Oscar -- I mean, an Emmy -- last year for her directing at Sesame Street? She forgot to thank her husband, she says. And he has completed another film (Chuck Palahniuk’s Choke; last year he produced Joshua). They have a really gorgeous girl, Ella, who must be about nine months old; like Damon Galgut she could say “Tyrannosaurus rex” at six months. Obviously. One’s friends only have geniuses for kids. I mean, Ella is Gertrude Stein.

Going down on Atlantic: is that the right orifice?

After walking with the Zylstra-Dorfmans to their really nice house (around the corner from where Heath Ledger lived), we got stuck in admiring the light and black clouds along a street whose name I have now forgotten, and then it started snowing. Actually, it was a blizzard. I am such a snow-struck Karoo boy that my hands had to start bleeding before we went into the subway.

Here’s a pic of the street -- ah, now I remember, it was Court Street, because that is where the bar is that you can sort-of see: it’s called Miriam’s. Never was a bar more aptly named.

BARS, PARTIES, DINNERS

Despite Jonny’s deep insecurities about not meeting enough people and not going out often enough, we are doing wonderful things, even though just being on the streets is almost enough for me right now. We’ve been to dinner at the apartment of a really, really nice guy called Hylton White (he’s straight, single, seriously clever and really good-looking -- who wants to visit?), who we met at Kelly and Leigh-Anne’s wedding at the end of 2006. He grew up in South Africa and teaches at the New School here.

Douglas Rogers took us along to Tom Downey’s birthday party in Brooklyn last Saturday, and that was wall-to-wall with more nice people. I met Tom when Doug and I went out for drinks in April last year.

We sometimes hang out at a bar in Park Slope, called Union Hall, where I have befriended the doorman. We didn’t have photo ID when we went the first time (to see a stand-up comedian who never pitched, but sent a copy of Spielberg’s Jaws in his place), and when we went again, with ID, the second time, it was all hail-fellow-well-met-and-no-go-in-go-in-I-don’t-need-to-see-no-ID. I love that doorman (but he's not the one in the picture).

Union Hall is all huge, solid bar counter and dark corners and deep couches in pools of yellow light and walls lined with books and a fireplace and two bocce courts and a basement where they play great music. Bliss.

And they don't allow strollers, which is causing an outcry. As Douglas warned us: Park Slope is full of strollers and lesbians. The "no stroller" policy made the New York Times, and that's where the pic is from. Wanna move into Union Hall, Janine? Imagine: no kids