Get To Know Your FiPS Writers: Thomas & Vee

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Ever read a great FiPS post and think to yourself, Hot damn. I'm in lurrrve with this writer (see also: I fucking haaaate this writer). Well for the next few months we're going to give you an insight into the writing staff here at FiPS. Contributors were paired together and asked to come up with some burning questions for each other so that you guys can learn a little more about the minds behind this FiPS-tastic blog. Because when it comes down to it, we're fucked in Park Slope JUST LIKE THE REST OF YOU SUCKERS. 

So far we've given you ERICA & URSULA, BEN & JESS, JUSTIN & MIKE, ROSHOW & MEREDITH, Kerri & Shawn. Next up: Thomas and Vee! 

Where's the least likely place that someone would run into you in Park Slope?  

Thomas: Three way tie: NYSC, Body Reserve, or astride any type of fitness equipment at the Prospect Park Y.

Vee: Hmm, I pretty much go everywhere. I'd say church or maybe a sports bar. Actually, the Co-op, I just can't be bothered.

Someone invites you to a barbecue or potluck, and when you ask what you can bring, they say, "Oh, Whatever."  What do you take?

Thomas: A bottle of something, and my super secret baked beans:  Two drained cans of kidney beans, two drained cans black beans, an entire bottle of high-quality bbq sauce, stirred and baked at 375 for two hours. Super easy, vegetarian, and so good that people will think you did something much more complicated.  *jazz hands*

Vee: Well, I like to bake so probably a cake or a homemade dip. If I'm super busy or the over is broken, I pick up a couple six-packs.

What is your all-time favorite subway stop on the MTA (any borough), and why?

Thomas: Smith/9th Street on the F-Train, construction notwithstanding.  I like that it's the highest stop in the entire subway system, and I also like that one of the deepest stops is also on the F at 63rd and Lex.  In my mind, sometimes I imagine that if the distance between F train stops were to be compressed and they ran it express really fast, it could be like a really fun roller coaster ride.

Vee: The Union Square station. Aside from it's convenience, it's this genuine cross-section sample of city- every walk of life goes through those turnstiles. It also has those old subway walls on display.

Best sleazy bad reality show that leaves you in need of a shower?

Thomas: Any one of the offerings in the Bachelor/Bachelorette/Bachelor Pad family.  The Bachelor is maybe my all-time guiltiest pleasure.  It's the best possible kind of train wreck--the kind where a train carrying a really hot guy and a tank full of nuclear waste and animal feces derails outside a pool side cocktail party for 25 women who are desperate to get married within the next 6 weeks.

The Bachelorette is the second best kind of train wreck, because one of the rejects from The Bachelor gets put on a train with 25 guys who each have a unique and terrifying psycho-social disorder.  At every mile, the most sane and presentable of the guys gets tossed out of the train as it careens along at breakneck speed.  Then, at the end, when there are only two guys left, the bridge explodes and the train plummets into a cavernous gorge.

Bachelor Pad isn't as much a train wreck as it is a festering cesspool of bad dye jobs, abs and probably syphilis. 

Vee: I watch the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Those women are so mean, but yet, I can't stop watching it. I don't watch the entire Housewives franchise, just Beverly Hills and NYC. It sounds like I'm trying to rationalize this disgusting habit. I'm not. I revel in the train wreck of it all and then I feel gross after.

Where do you cure your hangover in the Slope?

Thomas: One of my superpowers is that I do not get hangovers, ever.  It's somewhat astonishing, since I drink whiskey with a grit and determination that would embarrass Ernest Hemingway.  But I've actually never had a headache from drinking too much the night before, I don't black out, ever, and I've barfed after drinking exactly one time in my whole life, which I think was more about eating at Coco Roco earlier in the evening.  That having been said, if I ever find myself with a hangover, I imagine that I'll be headed to Dizzy's for their corned beef hash, because that seems like a pretty good bet.

Vee: Lately, I head to Fonda. The restaurant is quiet and dim so I don't have to wear my sunglasses inside. A combination of their homemade tortillas and Bloody Marys make me feel human again.

And now for the most segregating question of all time. Are you Team Pie or Team Cake?

Thomas: No question. Team Pie.  Always and forever.  Many years ago, I realized that at any given moment, I wanted a piece of pie.  I started keeping Mrs. Smith's apple pies in my freezer, in case of a "pie emergency."  Then I decided to teach myself how to make pie for myself.  I used to make a pie every weekend, and then I'd eat off of it for the rest of the week; the guy I was dating at the time was diabetic and accused me of trying to kill him (which wouldn't have been a bad idea, in retrospect).  Over the years, my pie-making has become less frequent, so I put it on my 101 Things in 1001 Days list to make an average of one pie per month, as a way of getting back into it. 

Vee: I like fruit in my desserts so the indulgence doesn't feel as bad. Naturally, that suggests I'm Team Pie but I'm not. Team Cake all the way, especially if it includes cake like Al Di La's chocolate and pear cake.