The Beginning

Hi. I'm Nick. I live in New York City.

I moved here September, 2008 from Ohio. In July of 2008, I took the nine hour drive to the city to look for an apartment with my girlfriend. We were staying with a friend for an extended weekend to adventure around and look at apartments. It was this day that I decided to keep a record of the interesting people I see in the city.

It is now March, 2010; 19 months since I decided to keep this record. I know there have been certain opportunities that I have missed in not recording my observations. There have been interesting people that I saw, thought about for a little while, and those memories have now evaporated into nothingness. Do these people still exist? I suppose so. Do I remember anything specific about them? No. Do I remember seeing something interesting? Yes.

Why do I remember seeing interesting things? Because interesting things are what you remember. Dull, boring, vapid days are those that go by in the blink of an eye. The interesting things are what stick with us.

The word "interesting" as I'm using it covers anything that is out of the ordinary. Defining "ordinary" is much more difficult. We'll leave that open to interpretation. Things I find interesting might seem lackluster on the surface, but the act of experiencing them is what truly makes them interesting.

I decided to start this record today because of two interesting things:

1. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking

2. Zombieland

I'll explain:

Zombieland was a pretty sweet flick. The reason it influenced me to write this is because there is a scene in the movie where they're talking about what happened in 1997. I hear the year 1997, and nothing comes to mind of what happened that year. I have to do the math to figure out how old I was and what grade I was in. Then I try to think of who my teachers were in school, but I can't recall. Of course I remember things from my past, but I never remember when those things occurred. I remember a surprise birthday party my parents had for me, but I don't remember how old I was turning. I guess this part of my brain works differently that other people. Another part of my brain that may work differently is the part used for recall. I'm better with visuals, but basically if I see or hear a fact, I will remember it. I will be able to recall that fact when the time comes. This is what makes me pretty decent at crossword puzzles and general trivia... until it get the question "What movie won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2007?" I have no idea who won Best Picture in any specific year, but I can recite a list of many Best Picture winners in no particular order. Just for the record, and I had to look it up to get this information, but No Country For Old Men won best picture in 2007, and that is one of my favorite movies. It would have been among the list of Best Picture winners, I just didn't remember what year it was released. This blog will hopefully make me perceive common things as being more interesting, making me remember what happened when.


Blink is about, as the full title clearly states, thinking with thinking. First impressions. Simplicity. Unconscious thought. When I make observations about people, most of the experience happens in the first instant. I unconsciously notice things, as many people do, that influence my thoughts on this person. Some examples of the more obvious things that people unconsciously notice and consciously realize would be what this person is wearing (or not wearing) and/or their confidence level.  Do they have good hygiene? Do they seem intelligent? There are many more interpretations about a person that is made before you realize what's happening. There are many unconscious interpretations that remain unconscious. Certain aspects of personality and character are observed without realize it. This happens with more than 99% of the people that we encounter. We don't have dinner with everyone we see and spend time with them and know their favorite movies, their family history, where they're from and what they've done, we just make observations. These observations are the some most fascinating things that happen between two people. All these people are making the same observations about me, except I'm writing a blog about it.

I guess what I'm saying is that I want to keep a record of people I see and what I think of them and what happens. Everything I write will be 100% honest. I'll try to differentiate between what is actual truth and what I perceive as being true, but that might not always work out.

I hope you find all of this interesting.