Kristina! Nirav! Kristina! Nirav! Aaaaargh! I can’t decide!
Sep 25 '03 (Updated Sep 28 '03)
The Bottom Line See the pictures at http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/~dkaplan/epinionsnyc.html ! And, hey, this is my 100th review!
“I’m going to see Kristina!” This was the thought echoing through my brain as I boarded the train Saturday morning. It was September 13, 2003, the day of the New York City Epinions Meet and Greet at ESPN Zone in Times Square. Wow, ‘sallot of words I just capitalized. Anyway, I am originally from northern New Jersey, but I moved to Baltimore, MD, after I graduated from college. Since I had (and still have) no idea if Epinions will do a meet and greet in the Baltimore/Washington area, and New York City is easily accessible from Baltimore by train, I decided to come to the NYC meet and greet and then visit my mother and sister in New Jersey for the rest of the weekend. Going into it, the only two people I knew would be at the meet and greet were Kristina--the woman who truly gave me my start at Epinions by taking notice of my work, being practically the first person to trust me, and exposing me for the first time to the Epinions community at large--and Nirav Tolia--the CEO of the company, or the president, or whatever. I wasn’t sure to expect from him, since I’ve disagreed with many of the decisions he’s made over the years, and I didn’t really know anything else about him. But the important thing was, I was going to see Kristina!
As I mentioned, I was taking a train out of Baltimore. It left at 9:02 am and was scheduled to arrive at New York Penn Station at 11:45 am, which it did. It rained pretty much the whole way up. The ride up was uneventful, but as we were getting close to NYC, I overheard the two women in front and to the right of me talking about a man’s visit to a spa. As they continued, I realized that they were talking about an episode of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Then they were talking about Will and Grace, and how things were working out all right with the Leo character. I invited myself into their conversation, pointing out that the Leo character only works because he has been in Africa most of the time. Anyway, it turned out that the son of the woman sitting directly in front of me is a friend of Jhoni Marchinko, the show’s executive producer. I asked how her son know her, and she went on to tell me more about Jhoni Marchinko and her girlfriend, for, as the woman confided to me in a hoarse whisper, Jhoni Marchinko is gay. I think the woman I was talking to must have been Jewish. All my life, Jews are the only ones I know to drop their voice dramatically to say the words “gay” and “cancer.”
Once in Penn Station--it was my first time being there--I had a look around to figure out where the exit was. On the way, I came across a throng of Mennonites (They’re like the Amish, only with some electricity) and a Krispy Kreme that beckoned to me, and in fact wouldn’t shut up until I bought a plain glazed doughnut and a glazed devil’s food doughnut. Then I easily found an exit and headed up onto the mean streets of New York. It’s a funny thing about those streets. I lived in northern New Jersey for eighteen years, and made relatively frequent visits to the city, but what I discovered that day is that I know where absolutely nothing is. Penn Station is at 7th Ave. and 33rd St., or thereabouts, and my mother had told me that Times Square was at 6th Ave. and 42nd St. Easy walking distance, right? I picked a direction and started walking along 7th Ave., and luckily enough the street numbers were increasing. So far, so good. I got to 42nd St., and then I had a bit of trouble finding Times Square. I think I headed straight for 6th Ave., but that wasn’t Times Square. I did a sort of right angles serpentine thing across roughly nine blocks until I found the Times Square with which I was familiar, with the TKTS booth, the new Toys R Us, and the MTV offices. If it hadn’t been such a nasty, icky day, I’m sure the Naked Cowboy would have been there, too. But that void would soon be filled; I was going to see Kristina!
Now it only remained to find ESPN Zone itself. I sort of meant to print out the information from the Member Center, but I sort of forgot to do it. But I sort of memorized the address. Incorrectly. I remembered it as 17xx Broadway, where xx were unknown digits. However, it’s actually 1472 Broadway. This ultimately led me to notice something about New York City that I’d never really been aware of. Unlike Pittsburgh and Baltimore, where building numbers increase according to blocks (e.g., Houses might be numbered 601, 603, and 605, and then if there’s a cross street, the next house will be 701.), building numbers in New York City just go up, up, and up, or down, down, and down in order, sequentially ad infinitum. As a result, what in Baltimore would have been the error of a mere three blocks, instead put me at Broadway and 54th St.; ESPN Zone proved to be at Broadway and 42nd St. Evidently, I just had my back to it. Well, the extra 24 blocks journey (1.2 miles, by my calculations) is just the sort of thing that helps me keep my girlish figure, and it gave me a healthy sheen. In other words, I was sweating like a whore in church (I’d have said “pig,” except pigs don’t sweat and I refuse to propagate the misconception.). Also, all told, I passed five McDonald’ses. (I’m going to go with that plural formulation, but feel free to send me your alternative suggestions.)
As I finally made my way into the thankfully air-conditioned interior of ESPN Zone (Even though it was fairly cool outside, it was humid, and I’d been schlepping my shoulder back across the equivalent of twenty football fields.), around 1:15pm (The event was scheduled to start at 1pm) my sprits remained high despite my desperate odyssey through the concrete jungle; I was going to see Kristina! There were a pair of young maitre d’ettes at a counter in the entrance, and I asked the one on the right where I could find the group from epinions.com. They pointed me to the elevator and told me to go up to floor “M.” I was initially confused, but then I rallied and realized that it stood for Mezzanine. Exiting the elevator, a woman was standing there on the landing. I asked her if she could direct me to the Epinions gathering, and she told me to go to my left and through the door. When I got close to her, I could see she was wearing an Epinions sticker. I’m trying to remember now who it was. I think it was Sarah, but I’m not sure. Anyway, I could hardly contain my excitement at this point. I was about to see Kristina!
I entered the glass doors to the skybox private party area, and was greeted by Alexis and Garrett. I told them that I was DavidK93, and they quickly found my name tag sticker for me. Garrett warned me that “Kristina is back there. She’s been talking about [you] the whole time” and that it was possible she would jump me. I said that wouldn’t be the case, if I managed to jump her first. I asked Garrett if he could show me where to put my bag, so I could have a clear run at Kristina. He offered to take it for me and put it somewhere, and so I was off at a near-run in the cramped quarters, seeking the love of my online life. I worked my way rapidly to the shorter back wall of the long room, bypassing several people who may or may not have been attempting to greet me, in the quest for my fair lady. And then...I didn’t find her!
I’ve seen pictures of Kristina, so of course I know what she looks like. She has very dark brown hair, light skin, she’s probably about average height and--dare I say?--somewhat, erm, “zaftig.” I didn’t see a woman like that. There was one woman who I suppose looked vaguely like she could be Kristina, but I just wasn’t sure at all. I rather guardedly said, “Kristina?” in that low sort of volume you use when you want to be able to later pretend you didn’t say anything at all (C’mon, I can’t be the only one who does that!), and nobody looked up. Confused, I went back to Garrett, and sheepishly asked, “Which one is she?” Garrett pointed out the very woman I had spotted earlier. As it turns out, Kristina has shimmering auburn hair, about shoulder length, with beautiful almost-strawberry highlights. She’s taller than I expected (about 5'10" I guess), and she really is zaftig, but only in all of the wonderfully curvy ways implied by the word’s legitimate definition, and not with any of the euphemistic connotations for which it is usually used. Let me tell you, this woman is built like a brick house!
With the woman of my dreams finally in my sights, I revved myself up and soared back across the floor, yelling out, “Kristiiinaaaaah!” and then colliding with her while enfolding her in the most crushing embrace my 135 pounds and 5'5" frame could muster. She seemed startled to say the least. Then she told me that I was sweating like crazy, and we got me a ginger ale from the complementary soft drink bar.
Let me give you a quick rundown of the skybox and what was in it, because this review is going to lose structural integrity very soon. There was a table with various finger foods, including buffalo wings, chicken fingers (with several varieties of dipping sauce, which eventually included barbeque, but only after repeated urgings), pieces of bread, and steamed vegetables. Everything was beneath unnaturally lighting, red heat lamps. As I mentioned, soft drinks were free at the bar; you had to pay for alcohol. Oh, and the bartender was cute. There were many comfortable looking couches around the room, but I barely sat the whole time. Crammed into every cranny and crevice of every piece of furniture were foam rubber dolls in the shape of the four Epinions face icons (plus, equals, minus, and bang) with poseable arms and legs.
Okay, from here on out, everything is going to be, well, let’s say, sort-of-the-order-it-happened-in...ish. But it’s certainly going to include everything I can remember, and it should possess something that at least resembles coherence.
I was super-psyched to discover that Robin was at the meet and greet. Robin is quite an attractive young woman, and I had long known from just her profile pic that she had a powerful, raw, animal sexiness pouring forth from her. What I had not known from her profile pic, though, was that she’s about 5'2" (Ack! 5'3", she's 5'3"! Please, put down the whip, Robin!). Seriously, girl is tiny. But no less sexy than I expected. She was obliging enough to tell us that her user name, xiphoid, comes from the name of a bone in the general vicinity of the sternum. In addition, she has cool tattoos on her shoulders (The Rebel Alliance crest on one, and the symbol for nuclear power on the other.) Oh, and she was drunk. Really drunk.
So, Nirav turned out to be a much bigger deal than I ever expected. As I said, I have definitely disagreed with some Epinions command decisions over the years (*cough*EBD*cough*), and I guess I thought that Nirav was going to be some random Indian guy. Well, although he was, of course, Indian, he was anything but random. He was surprisingly young in appearance. In fact, he was offering everybody Income Share bonuses, depending on how young we said he looked. I told him, with total honesty, that he looked about twenty two to me; I would not have been surprised to look up and see him in one of my classes at school, or perhaps TAing. Robin said he looked eleven. It turns out that Nirav is really thirty one, and he just kept shrugging off our declarations of his apparent youth, making weak protestations about gray hairs that I didn’t believe for a moment.
Not only was Nirav young, he was also hot. Seriously, he was extremely attractive. I’m rarely attracted to Indian men, but Nirav Tolia is one sexy cinnamon stick. When I first approached Nirav, he was posing for a bit of a photo op with Robin and drdevience. The two ladies tilted their heads up while their tall, slender male companion stooped down to come within their reach. Then somebody asked if there would be more kisses lavished upon other attendees, and I guess Nirav said that he’d be glad to have more us kiss him, and that he’d be willing to do anything for us that day. So, horn-dog that I am, I immediately asked if I could give Nirav a little peck on the cheek. Nirav said that he was sure I’d much rather be kissing Alexis. To which I responded, saying to the room at large, “Something tells me that Nirav has never been to my profile page.” Something clicked then for Nirav, I think. But he said I could give him a little kiss, and the cameras were there to record it. (Then I offered Robin and drdevience the opportunity to kiss a guy who wouldn’t make them stand on tiptoes. They obliged me, and I again have the pictures to prove it.) Nirav’s dark skin is also amazingly smooth, and I could have just kissed it for hours. When I compared the color of his skin to that of caramel, he corrected me, explaining that it was more of a mocha shade (Gitcha-gitcha ya-ya da-da, anyone?). Nirav was later heard to joke about originally having hopes of finding a girlfriend at the meet and greet, but instead having acquired a potential boyfriend.
I had brought my thong, Matt Damon, with me. I brought it out and showed it to Kristina and Robin, and anyone else that wanted to see. Then I asked Nirav if he would do me the honor of posing for a photograph, with an item I had reviewed. He agreed, but then recalled that he had heard that I had brought the thong, and said, “Not the thong.” But he eventually acquiesced after I pointed out that the thong was the only item I had with me that I had reviewed. I think the pictures are rather priceless. I eventually posed while wearing the thong over my pants.
Plenty of other Epinions staff members were on hand. I don’t remember any of their actual jobs, but there were there. I already mentioned Alexis and Garrett. Alexis was an adorable blonde woman, very sweet and friendly. She makes all kinds of expressive hand gestures, as evidenced by pretty much all the pictures people took of her. Garrett was like a big, adorable teddy bear. Kristina told me later that he’s too clean cut for her tastes. But he’s married anyway, so it’s really a moot point. When I met him, I thought he was Filipino with that round face and dark complexion. It turns out, though, that he's Mexican and Japanese. But, if you think about it, isn't that sort of the same thing? I mean, basically you've got Spaniards + Natives + Japanese in either case. More Kristina’s style was “Dealtime Paul,” who I’ll admit was cute, but he was a little bit too greasy looking for me. Not that I wouldn’t do him, though. And then there was Sarah. I didn’t really get much of a read off of her. She was kind of like an Enforcer of some sort, all work and no play. We couldn’t convince to do anything even remotely compromising or, you know, fun. And every time Nirav did something like that, she sort of eyed him warily.
trust12345 (“John”) was there as well. He was a very nice guy, and he brought his unicycle. He has ridden it across Norway, but at the meet and greet he just posed on it briefly. John is kind of cute, and I initially thought he was gay. In fact, I thought John was gay for two and a half hours. Then he said something about how most of his girlfriends initially think that he’s either gay or Italian. So he’s not gay after all. It’s a funny thing about the “gay” accent though. Sometimes it really does sound as if the person comes from some exotic country. You know, like Belgium or the Netherlands, since nobody really know what an accent from there would sound like anyway.
There were a number of video game reviewers in attendance, whose stuff I had to admit I haven’t read. Ernest and Henry are two high school seniors from Brooklyn. At seventeen years of age, it wouldn’t be legal for me to do anything with them, and neither of them showed a glimmer of homosexuality anyway, but Ernest especially was cute. Have you noticed that I’m pretty much always in hornball mode? Anyway, Ernest also gets huge bonus points for having a picture of Minsc and Boo from Baldur’s Gate as his profile picture. 32_footsteps “Rick” was a pretty cool guy. He reminds me a lot of many people I know through KGB (www.cmukgb.org). His shirt was really awesome, and you can see it on the picture website. In case you’re too lazy to click over, it said, “DON'T MAKE ME GO ZELDA ON YOU.” But, you know, not out loud. In writing.
Jozef is from Bratislava, Slovakia. He originally said Czechoslovakia, and was impressed when I asked if it was the Czech Republic or Slovakia. He told me that people usually zoned out when he just said Slovakia, because they hadn’t heard of it, and he’s say Czechoslovakia just so people would understand. It’s fun being smart. [whistles nonchalantly]
Ashok was awesome. He’s a big, jovial Indian guy who was immediately friendly with everybody. If you haven’t seen his photo website yet, do yourself a favor and head over to http://www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/porton/464/id71.htm right now. Well, okay, you can finish my review first.
Mmmmm, and then there’s Andy. Andy is a serious hottie. He’s a recruiter for Epinions, and he’s my hero because he explained how Income Share works. The system actually keeps track of what people did after they read your review. If they read more reviews and then went to a website where they could buy the item in question, that’s good. If they left the site right away, then your review probably isn’t what they were looking for after all, and it’s not likely to increase your IS. I’m sure he said more, but I was gazing dopily into his eyes by then, losing myself in the architecture of his face. Kristina said that somebody (Garrett, maybe?) told her that Andy has a girlfriend, but Kristina and I aren’t buying it. No straight man has a shirt that nice and wears it that well. Andy, call me. No, seriously, please call me. (410) 837-6389. I usually get home by 6pm on weekdays. Me love you long time.
I guess that rounds out the cast of characters. So now there’s all kinds of anecdotes to relate. Let’s see. Oh, well I don’t remember why exactly, but Robin wanted to order another beer, and the subject came up of the correct way to do so. I proposed, “Get me a beer, bitch!” and I said as much to the bartender who, incidentally, was pretty cute and quite possibly a friend of Dorothy.
I have alluded to the barbeque sauce saga. You see, there were chicken fingers, and there was honey mustard sauce, and ketchup, and two other kinds of sauce that I’m pretty sure nobody touched. But there was no barbeque. And we were all, “Hey, what’s up with that? No barbeque?” Because you gotta have barbeque sauce for the chicken fingers. I think Nirav said something to the ESPN Zone staff, because eventually they produced some barbeque sauce.
Did you know that Nirav is moving to NYC to be close to the Dealtime folks, and that he’s leaving his long-term girlfriend to do so? He also once had to fire his parents’ best friends’ son. The life of a website developer is a lonely one indeed. (His parents wanted him to be a doctor. Indians are a lot like Jews, it seems.) He’s lucky he has me to bring him his slippers, draw a nice bath for him, rub him down with lilac-scented oil... Oh, wait, he doesn’t have that. But all he has to do is ask.
Kristina was supposed to touch Bijou’s nipples while she was in town. Unfortunately, that was not able to happen due to conflicting schedules. But her proclamation of the expectation did convince at least one person (I can’t remember who.) that Kristina was a bisexual. In fact, I thought the same thing after I read her “Women We’d Leave Our Men For” write-off entry back in 2000. Anyway, I offered up my own nipples as a replacement, and Kristina accepted. Unfortunately, Kristina’s Indiana upbringing prevented her from allowing me to touch her nipples in return. But I know that on a spiritual level, Kristina’s nipples will never again be far from my fingertips. And Kristina did get an eensy bit frisky with Robin, so that was cool.
sslabs had extracted a promise from somebody (I think it was Kristina, but I couldn’t swear to that) that we’d get a picture of Nirav holding a placard that read, “I (heart) sslabs.” So we did. It’s on the picture website (See link at top.).
I’m sure there’s more, and that’s why we say things like, “You should have been there!”
Towards the end of the get-together, Nirav told us that we could take the Epinions icon toys with us, so I grabbed a complete set. I got them to stand up on the low divider between my dining room and my living room, but only by posing them with their legs very wide apart, like cowboys or prostitutes. In order from left to right, plus (pastel green) has his arms raised high, equals (rich amber) has his arms spread wide, minus (periwinkle) is hanging his arms low, and bang (yellow--just yellow) is supposed to be covering his mouth but instead looks like he’s grabbing his crotch. It’s kind of funny. Anyway, some people (Editors, Leads, and Top Reviewers, apparently) already had some of these, and evidently it’s pretty common for small children to take a bite out of them. I mean, they do look a lot like really big M&Ms, especially every since they animated them for those commercials.
Kristina was exhausted by the end of it all, and she slumped into a chair near the exit. Gentleman that I am, I promptly offered her a shoulder rub. And she knew it was sincere, because obviously I’m not trying to get into her pants or anything like that. Well, okay, maybe, but only if I really thought they would complement my waistline.
So, there we were at 4:45pm: Me, Kristina, Robin, John, Andy, and another few people. Cute bartender guy had already let us stay for an extra three quarters of an hour, but it was finally time for us to go. We speculated as to if he was going to kick us out, and then we started talking about how he was pretty cute (hence the nickname), and he came up behind Kristina while she was totally talking about him, but she didn’t really care which was kind of funny.
So I left ESPN Zone and managed to wander into a subway station where I looked at their map of the city, figured out where the hell I was, and then walked to Port Authority to catch my bus to New Jersey to visit my mother and sister. On the way there, some random woman poked me with her umbrella, and I was all, “What the hell is this crazy woman doing?” and then it turned out to be Robin! Man, she’s cool. I hope I get to hang out with all of them again sometime.
Epilogue: The week after the meet and greet, Kristina came to Baltimore on business. We met at her hotel on Monday and had a rather opulent dinner that her company paid for (Yay!). After the meal, we went back to her room and her laptop computer. There, we purchased a very special gift for Nirav. (http://store.yahoo.com/intimo-store/m201026.html in gold) I wonder if he’s received it yet...
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Epinions.com ID:
DavidK93
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 - Top 1000 |
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Member: David Kaplan
Location: Baltimore, MD
Reviews written: 119
Trusted by: 180 members
About Me:
Passions has been canceled, again. But I think I'll get over it; I've gained perspective.
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