Alternate side parking rules will be back in effect on Monday despite the recent snow storm.
They were canceled Friday in most parts of Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens because of the snow storm.
Sanitation Commissioner John Doherty had this to say:
“Number one we were going to have warmer weather and two, there’s a potential for a storm coming in on Wednesday.”
Plows will cover 194 different routes starting at midnight Sunday night .
Elliot Sharp on guitar and Andrea Centazzo, percussion: two masters of improvisation meet for a set of wide-ranging sonics and rhythmic extremes at Issue Project Room on Third Street and Third Avenue in the Park Slope/Gowanus area.
Tuesday, March 2, 8 pm
Are you a parent of a teen? Are you dazed and confused about this crazy stage of your kid’s life and the impact its having on you. Try the Parents of NY Teens Monthly Support Group at the Old Stone House in Park Slope this Monday, March 1 at 7PM.
That’s 3rd Street and Fifth Avenue in Washington Park.
I’ve passed Palo Santo dozens of times on my way to the Fourth Avenue R subway station but I never once stopped into this lovely restaurant on the ground floor of a Union Street brownstone.
Until last night.
Twelve of us gathered in the backroom for a friend’s birthday party. They offered us a $35 prix fixe, which included an appetizer, a choice from three entrees, dessert and as much sangria (or beer) that we could drink.
Ooh la la.
It was white wine sangria with lots of fruit in it.
For an appetizer I had a delicious tomatillo soup, a Mexican-style chicken soup with tomatillos and chicken breast meat cooked with chick peas and wonderful seasonings. It came with a stack of delicious corn tortillas. My neighbor had a tasty looking avacado and tomato mixture that also came with those amazing tortillas.
I would return to Palo Santo for that incredible soup!
For entrees we had to choose between pulled pork, plaintain stew or blue fish.
I loved the very savory pulled pork that was served with a noodle that reminded me of a German spaetzle.
For dessert, those who ordered the bread pudding were the most happy. I had a pie that was a cross between an orange cheese cake and a key lime pie). I think it was called sour orange pie.
The sangria was a tad watery but it did seem to get everyone nice and drunk.
What a nice place for a birthday party. We were there from 6PM until 11:30 and the backroom was a fun, boisterous place to be.
The service was perfect for a party and clearly they didn’t rush us at all. Festive, fun, unusual food, nice atmosphere: a win win for a party on a cold winter night in Park Slope.
David Paterson for the Job
Sorta Lieutenant Governor Richard Ravitch
Probably would do less less serious damitch
To the state of Albany’s malfeasance,
And I say this for a host of reasance
I’m keeping to myself and to my posse,
Like Paterson, who’s insufficiently bosse,
And needs a job where he gets on with folks,
Doing what he does best, cracking jokes.
From this week’s Brooklyn Paper:
Smartmom, like many around the world, has been watching the Olympics from her new couch. Ice skating, snowboarding, alpine skiing — it’s been an adrenaline filled week in Vancouver and in Smartmom’s Third Street living room.
Smartmom is especially intrigued by the parents of the champions. What must it be like to sit in the stands and watch your child put to the ultimate test? Imagine the clenched teeth, the heartburn, the headaches. It must be close to unbearable.
Then again, think of the jumping-up-and-down pride and excitement when your child is up there on the podium. Think of the tears as you watch your child holding a gold, silver or bronze (yes, even bronze) medal, singing along to the national anthem.
Talk about motherly pride.
But Smartmom knows what it’s like sitting in the stands while her beloved child is put to the test.
Sure, the Oh So Feisty One’s piano recital last month at the Prospect Park Residence on Grand Army Plaza isn’t Vancouver, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t plenty of stress and agita. The morning of the recital, OSFO was still practicing her piece, trying to get through the whole thing without a mistake. But success was elusive.
Smartmom kept telling OSFO to play it again and again on the electronic keyboard in the dining room. And she did. Valiantly, OSFO struggled to get through some of the trickier measures. But it was like she was a alpine skier on a particularly slippery slope at Cyprus Mountain, OSFO just wasn’t able to deliver the goods.
Again, again, Smartmom said. And OSFO practiced until it came time to get dressed and go to the recital. Stoically, OSFO left without once getting through the piece without an error.
Smartmom put the morning’s practice out of her mind as she and Hepcat found seats at the recital. The annual Valentine’s Day recital is a treat for the elderly residents of this Park Slope assisted living facility and a chance for the parents of the studio’s young pianists and flutists to hear their children perform. Needless to say, Smartmom was stressing. Would OSFO pull it off? Would she be able to get through the entire piece without a mistake? Would she even make it through the piece? These questions were pulsating in Smartmom’s brain as she listened to the many young performers.
OSFO was number 15 on the program and Smartmom waited nervously as adorable 4- and 5-year-olds played their simple Suzuki pieces and took deep bows when they were done.
Smartmom felt for the young flutists, who are just learning to get a sound out of that difficult instrument.
She was impressed to hear children that she’s heard many times before now playing complex pieces with technical skill and feeling. Sure, there were plenty of wrong notes and errant squawks on the flute, but it was all in good fun, and the children seemed to survive their performances with their egos intact.
Then it was OSFO’s turn.
Smartmom was proud of her girl. Despite the fact that she had had such a difficult dress rehearsal, she looked cool, calm and collected when she got up to play. In fact, she looked especially beautiful in a black sweater, tight grey jeans and a neat ponytail.
As she began to play, Smartmom crossed her fingers (inwardly) and willed her daughter to somehow get through the piece without a hitch. At the start, she played beautifully, her fingers moving confidently up and down the keyboard.
Smartmom relaxed as she listened to her daughter’s effortless musicality.
And then she got to the difficult part of the piece and things did not go well. OSFO’s fingers attempted to play a major chord but dissonance came out instead. She tried again. But again there was disharmony where harmony was required.
Smartmom squirmed in her seat. She pressed her teeth together and clenched her stomach as her daughter struggled on the makeshift stage to find her way back into the piece. For 10 seconds, maybe it was only eight, OSFO fingers did not move as she mentally navigated the rest of the piece.
Smartmom felt for her girl with every inch of her maternal being. But then, just when Smartmom thought all was lost, OSFO’s fingers remembered what to do and Smartmom listened as OSFO made it to the conclusion of the piece, played the final chord with certainty and beauty and rose to take a deep bow.
Smartmom clapped louder than any other person in the room so proud was she of her girl. She clapped as loud as the parent of Shaun White after his gold medal snowboarding stunt. She clapped as loud as the mother of Lindsey Vonn or Apolo Ohno’s father after their gold medal races.
Yes, OSFO had struggled. Yes, she had made a mistake. Yes, she had been paralyzed in silence for what felt like the longest eight, maybe six, seconds in the world.
But OSFO ultimately triumphed because she didn’t give up, she ploughed through, and made it to the end. Just like the champions in Vancouver, who have to pick themselves up from a fall and keep skating, skiing, snowboarding until they are through.
When the recital was over both Smartmom and Hepcat couldn’t wait to congratulate their girl.
“We’re so proud of you,” Hepcat said. “You didn’t give up and to us, and that’s the best thing of all.”
Sadly, Marion McCleneghan, the 40-year-old Park Slope woman who has been missing since February 7th or 8th has not been found.
Last night at a dinner party I attended, a man who lives on 14th Street in south Park Slope, Marion’s block, told me that he heard from a neighbor that Marion had given her two beloved dogs away to her ex-husband just days before she disappeared.
That neighbor saw Marion on the street without her dogs and asked where they were. It struck her as very strange that this woman, who she’d seen for years walking her dogs, would give them away.
According to the Brooklyn Paper, Marion left her money and two packs of unopened cigarettes in her apartment. She was last see wearing jeans, a bright-colored shirt, a baseball cap and a “big pocketbook.” She had her hair down.
As the days pass hope recedes, deep concern and morbid curiosity rises.
Missing since, February 8th, Marion was last seen at the La Dolce Vita grocery store on the corner of 14th Street and 7th Avenue. She told the owner: “Goodbye — you won’t be seeing me anymore,”’ and she was crying.
Before that, Marion was seen at a party at her boyfriend’s apartment on 14th Street around 2AM on February 7th. His name is Richard Eric Sosa and he told police that they’d had a fight.
According to Barbara Sullivan, Marion’s mother who is frantically trying to find her daughter, she was planning to spend the night at Sosa’s on February 7th but they had a fight and she left his apartment in a huff. Sosa has a scratch on his face.
Sullivan told the Brooklyn Paper: “She was having a rough year — first she lost a friend, then her father and two aunts.” She had just started a new job in real estate.
How does someone disappear into thin air? Is it really possible that no one has seen her anywhere since February 8th?
Tonight friends wondered if this woman might be the victim of a terrible crime.
Others wondered if she killed herself. Someone suggested that she jumped off the Staten Island ferry (an allusion to the way Spalding Gray killed himself).
With no information, there is only conjecture, rumor, hearsay, gossip. We ruminate on her absence and wonder what really happened. We just don’t know. But our hearts go out to her family and friends, who are still searching.
If you have any information about Marion call 718-636-6483, case #109, Complaint #445, Detective Gibbons assigned.
Divas love the Clover Club! This week’s featured diva, producer, director, and Carnegie Mellon-trained actor HaJ, also chose the chic Carroll Gardens cocktail lounge as the spot for our interview. Over whiskey sours, HaJ told Sarah Deming about her new blog, the Home of the Urban Chameleon and her video content site Tickles TV.
Sarah: What does the term “urban chameleon” mean and how did you come up with it?
HaJ: I was sitting around with my friends Andress and Zuley and we were brainstorming terms to describe people of our background: people of color who were raised by parents who wanted us to excel, who grew up in low-income urban communities but went to the best private schools and colleges. We evolved the ability to move freely between various social spheres, to move left and right and up and down. Yet we never forgot where we came from. Urban chameleons are the type of people who work an office job in midtown, but go back to the old neighborhood to get our hair done, because it’s just not the same without the lady who knows your hair, has all the gossip, and has a guy out front selling bootleg DVDs. There’s a more detailed description of the term on the blog as well as some funny videos of classic Urban Chameleon moments.
Sarah: I was reading about how chameleons change color. Apparently scientists used to think that it was to protect them from predators, but now they think it evolved mostly to signal socially to other chameleons, for courtship and things like that.
HaJ: It’s not a defense mechanism; it’s a way of identifying. When Jay-Z shouts out to Marcy Projects or when Obama makes a veiled hip hop reference in a speech, it’s all about signaling to other urban chameleons. A key word you used is “courtship.” It’s all about wanting to connect and create commonality. One of my closest friends who is Haitian has been my muse for a lot of the work because her story represents the American dream. Her family came to this country from Haiti and sacrificed a great deal in order for her to excel. She’s the ultimate urban chameleon, goes from business meetings, to posh events around the city and then gets on a plane to help rebuild Haiti.
Sarah: In Prada pumps?
HaJ: I think she prefers Louboutin.
Sarah: This makes me think of the Carol Burnett quote “Comedy equals tragedy plus time.” Often there’s something quite dark and sad at the heart of your comedy.
HaJ: Absolutely. You have to be really careful whenever you make comedy about race, because you are going to piss some people off. Recently we curated an event at Howard University Homecoming. We submitted a couple of skits and got comments back like Korean Nail Salon being “coonish,” participating in a sort of minstrel tradition of stereotyped blackness.
Sarah: I think that’s an absurd misreading!
HaJ: I know. But I learned a lot from that experience. I don’t mind making people uncomfortable, because discomfort is how we grow. I love surprises. I love creating a situation where the audience is surprised by what comes out of a character’s mouth or the way they move their body. On my blog we wrote about this recent controversy where a group of white girls won the Sprite Step Challenge. They probably didn’t deserve to win based on their technical proficiency, and many people saw the judges’ decision as a racist one. It may have been. But I have to say I think surprise has its own value as entertainment. When you see a group of white girls get up on stage and move in a way you don’t expect, it’s exciting. I think everyone loves that kind of surprise. It empowers them to break out of the boxes society has put them in. For example, when we filmed that skit in the nail salon, the Korean ladies cracked up when I spoke Korean at the end.
Sarah: So that was real Korean?
HaJ: Absolutely! My friend who is Korean coached me on it. I’m saying, “Oh no, Young Sok, you have got to fix this one nail!”
Sarah: How do you develop your skits? Are they improvised or written out?
HaJ: I think of a scenario and give it to the actors. Sometimes I have certain lines I want them to hit, but often it’s just a beginning point and an ending point. We shoot a few versions and keep the best take. Improvisation is very important to the process. And the biggest rules of improv are to always accept and build and always say yes.
Sarah: You have to be comfortable with chaos to work that way.
HaJ: I’ve always been a non-traditional thinker. My mom likes to tell this story of how when I was about five my dad put on his overcoat and lay down in bed, just as a joke. He asked me: “HaJ, what’s wrong with this picture?” I said: “You forgot your hat.”
WHISKEY SOUR
This basic formula for a sour can be adjusted for other base spirits, but whiskey is the classic. This is one of the simplest and most crowd-pleasing of cocktails.
2 ounces rye or bourbon
3/4 ounce lemon juice
1 ounce simple syrup (equal parts sugar and water heated together to dissolve)
optional: 1/2 ounce tannic red wine such as Bordeaux
Shake all ingredients vigorously over ice. Strain into a rocks glass filled with large ice cubes. For the optional “claret float,” pour the red wine slowly over the back of a barspoon onto the surface of the drink. It will float atop the surface in a red layer, creating a graceful, multi-layered cocktail that commemorates the urban chameleons among us.
Was I out of line to write about Mack’s so early in its life? Especially since I haven’t actually eaten there?
Probably.
Blogs are an enhanced and more public version of the time honored on-the-street/avenue conversations that go on between New Yorkers.
Sometimes they’re word of mouth writ large.
You’ve heard this, you’ve heard that. People are saying. My friend didn’t like this place. I love that place. Have you tried the new place?
People talk. People opine. That’s life in any big city or small town.
But was I out of line to spill what I’ve heard from a small group of locals on OTBKB before the restaurant had the chance to put its best foot forward?
Valid question.
For clarification: I meant my note in a friendly way as in: we want to like the food, we want you to succeed.
I’m just saying.
MUSIC
–Saturday, February 27 starting at 7:15 with a reading of the Megillah followed by Purimpalouza at 8:45 PM at the Jewish Music Cafe
–Saturday, February 27 at 8 PM Glenn Branca CD release party with slide show by Robert Longo at La Poisson Rouge
–Sunday, February 28 at 9PM French virtuoso guitarist Stephane Wrembel channels the technique and the fire of Django Reinhardt.
MOVIES
–Shutter Island, Avatar and Crazy Heart at the Pavilion in Park Slope.
DANCE
–February26 & 27 at 8PM, BAM presents Mark Morris Dance Group in the premiere of the humorous Looky, choreographed to Kyle Gann’s idiosyncratic score for Disklavier (digitally driven player piano); world premiere of Socratesl; revival of Behemoth— the sole Morris work performed in silence—reveals that Morris’ genius can be independent of his love of music.
–Through March 7 at the Joyce Theater in Manhattan the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company presents the world premiere performance of Coltrane’s Favrite Things, set to an iconic recording of John Coltrane’s interpretation of the Richard Rodgers song “My Favorite Things” and incorporating Jackson Pollock’s “Autumn Rhythm.”
DIY
Learn how to felt and spin your own yarn at the Old Stone House, from 4pm to 6pm, as part of the House’s new Craft Saturdays series. (The next workshop, on March 27, will be devoted to knitting and big-needle basics.) The session costs $25. Call 718-768-3195 to reserve your spot ASAP.
ART
–February 26-28 at the Dumbo Arts Center: The Great Pop-Up Art Sale, a benefit for the arts center.
Dear Mack’s (new restaurant on Seventh Avenue between Garfield and Carroll Streets in Park Slope):
To put it bluntly, so far I’m not hearing good things about your food.
I know you’ve only been open a couple of weeks and there’s always that rocky shakedown cruise period at any restaurant, when it first opens.
So this is just a friendly note to say: Slopers are excited about the new place and WANT to like the food, and want you to succeed. You’ve got a great location and a good idea: a casual, fun place to eat with friends and family any day of the week.
Slopers really want Mack’s to work out not just as a bar but as a place to grab a decent burger or fish, chicken, meat or veggie entree.
I was in there last Tuesday night for drinks with a friend. We sat at the bar and had a great time watching the Olympics (Ladie’s Short Program ice skating) at the bar. We didn’t eat a thing.
The bartender was super nice about turning on the volume so that we could hear the skater’s music. We drank raspberry martinis, which were fantastic and I cried my eyes out when Joannie Rochette skated, just two days after her mother died.
The bartender told us that the “executive chef” is excellent but that some of the kitchen staff had to be replaced. I am hoping that’s why some notable Slopers have not been impressed with the food. The bartender told us that the chef makes his own pasta and that his food is “very good.”
But so far I haven’t heard good things (and I hear stuff).
I admit that I haven’t eaten at your place yet. So I may be out of turn making these comments. It’s just that, I hope by the time I eat there the kinks in the kitchen have been worked out and things are on the up and up.
In other words, I hope the food is as least as good as the food at your other place, Johnny Mack’s, on 8th Avenue and 12th Street, a place we love to go to after a movie at the Pavilion.
It would be a shame not to have a much needed place to have a casual dinner and drinks on Seventh Avenue.
Good luck and best wishes:
OTBKB
Last I heard, Bussaco, the one-and- a-half year old restaurant on Union Street, had brought on Katy Sparks as co-owner and executive chef.
Sparks ran Quiltys and received a Best New Chef award from Food & Wine Magazine in 1998. She joined the Park Slope restaurant in January after there was a parting of ways betwen Bussaco’s original chef/co-owner Matthew Schaerfer, formerly of Le Bernardin, and co-owner Scott Carny.
Now I hear that Katy Sparks is out and a new chef is in. Turns out she wasn’t a co-owner after all.
Personally I’ve enjoyed most of my almost 10 meals at the restaurant and I especially love the bar, which has a great wine selection. Not surprisingly owner Carnery is a top sommelier.
In the snowy recessionary winter of 2010, is the restaurant going to survive? It’s a nicely designed space with a fabulous bar, good service and generally good food.
What is happening?
Every year private and public schools hold silent auctions to benefit their schools. These silent auctions feature donated items, including fine art, dinner at local restaurants, services and tours.
Often you can get a good deal at these auctions. For instance, at the PS 321 auction one year I got four hours with a top notch lawyer for a fraction of the actual cost. I also got two nights at the Sea Breeze on Block Island for about one third of the room rate.
To my knowledge, this the first time that a local private school has opened up its silent auction bidding process to the public. At least it’s the first time that I’ve ever had a link to the items that they’re auctioning off.
Check it out: there might be an item that will interest you. Perhaps a Robert Longo digital pigment print? A private tour of the 2010 Whitney Biennial? Dinner at Blue Ribbon Sushi?
Better hurry. The online auction is up and running and open to the public before it closes Monday, March 1st at 12 midnight.
Indeed, they have a lot of great items from around the neighborhood, deals on art and all around great stuff at http://berkeleycarroll.maestroweb.com You can even submit a proxy bid for an item in the silent auction by emailing advancement@berkeleycarroll.org
The auction event is also open to the public but the price is a little steep. The theme this year is “Road to Morocco.” This is the school’s major fundraiser with proceeds going to support this neighborhood institution through educational programs and financial aid. Berkeley Carroll employs over 170 people in Park Slope and provides the highest caliber education to over 815 students in the neighborhood.
Donations to the school help more than 25% of the students receive some form of financial aid, one of the greatest percentages among any independent school in New York City.
This year’s co-Chairs are long-time PS residents, author and “Shiksa From Manila” Sophia Romero and Patrick Boylan, owner and designer of Grace Vestments, a leading brand in liturgical design.”
Craig Hammerman, District Manager of Community Board 6, just wrote with good news: There will be F train service this weekend between Jay Street an Church Avenue.
Greetings!
This just in from New York City Transit…
“Due to the heavy snow, this weekend’s planned shuttle buses between Jay Street and Church Avenue along the F line will NOT operate. Normal F subway service will operate. Have a safe weekend.
The Department of Parks and Recreation isn’t kidding when it advises New Yorkers to stay away from trees today due to the heavy snow.
Yesterday someone was killed by a falling branch in Central Park. Sad.
This morning on St. John’s Place just east of Seventh Avenue in Park Slope a tree. I will be walking by there soon. Photographer Tom Martinez got some pictures, which are forthcoming.
“Quite dramatic,” he said. “Could have killed someone but fortunately didn’t.”
I walked up St. John’s Place not on the sidewalk which is blocked off but right down the middle of the street. Police and firemen are on the scene. There’s lots of yellow police tape blocking off the street.
Hey folks, walk carefully today. And look UP. Something could be coming DOWN.
The Chair Man, that gift shop on Seventh Avenue in Park Slope right near Starbucks and The Clay Pot is moving to Fifth Avenue between Degraw and Sackett.
The Chair Man has been on Seventh Avenue for two decades so it’s definitely the end of an era. Like the Clay Pot, which used to be a pottery shop and studio and Little Things, which used to be a doll house furniture store, I am guessing that the Chair Man, back in the day, used to sell chairs.
You know the shop though you probably don’t know its name. It’s a gifty/ knick-knacky shop that sells earrings, incense, ambient music CDs, bags, scarves, stuffed animals, ornaments, odd Japanese string figurines, Buddha objects, clothing…you never really know what you’ll find in there.
I’ve been in there dozens of times because my daughter loves it. We bought a music box for her piano teacher there, those Japanese string figurines, stuffed animals, earrings…
Good luck to the Chair Man on Fifth.
Chuck Prophet and his band, The Mission Express, will be in the neighborhood at Southpaw next Friday, March 5th. I’ll have more to say about Chuck next week, but in the meantime, I have what looks to be a professionally shot video with great sound for you to get you in the mood for Chuck here at Now I’ve Heard Everything.
Not only is Neko Case’s People Got a Lotta Nerve one of my favorite songs released in 2009, I use it as my ringtone. But the second verse of the song which once seemed a literary allusion now seems to be predictive in light of yesterday’s sad story about a killer whale turning on its trainer. See an acoustic version of the song here at Now I’ve Heard Everything.
MUSIC
–Saturday, February 27 starting at 7:15 with a reading of the Megillah followed by Purimpalouza at 8:45 PM at the Jewish Music Cafe
–Saturday, February 27 at 8 PM Glenn Branca CD release party with slide show by Robert Longo at La Poisson Rouge
–Sunday, February 28 at 9PM French virtuoso guitarist Stephane Wrembel channels the technique and the fire of Django Reinhardt.
MOVIES
–Shutter Island, Avatar and Crazy Heart at the Pavilion in Park Slope.
DANCE
–February26 & 27 at 8PM, BAM presents Mark Morris Dance Group in the premiere of the humorous Looky, choreographed to Kyle Gann’s idiosyncratic score for Disklavier (digitally driven player piano); world premiere of Socratesl; revival of Behemoth— the sole Morris work performed in silence—reveals that Morris’ genius can be independent of his love of music.
–Through March 7 at the Joyce Theater in Manhattan the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company presents the world premiere performance of Coltrane’s Favrite Things, set to an iconic recording of John Coltrane’s interpretation of the Richard Rodgers song “My Favorite Things” and incorporating Jackson Pollock’s “Autumn Rhythm.”
WRITERS
–Friday, February 26 7-9 PM at Powerhouse Arena in Dumbo, Colum McCann will read from, sign, and discuss his 2009 National Book Award-winning novel Let the Great World Spin. Inspired by Phillipe Petit’s infamous real-life tightrope walk between the Twin Towers in 1974, the novel weaves together a panoramic array of disparate stories and voices: an Irish monk, a prostitute in the Bronx, a group of grieving mothers who lost their sons at war, a city judge, an alcoholic, and the tightrope walker who obliquely binds them all together. This is McCann’s only FREE reading in NYC.
ART
–February 26-28 at the Dumbo Arts Center: The Great Pop-Up Art Sale, a benefit for the arts center.
And it begins with a reading of the Megillah at 7:30 PM followed by Purimpalouza with Soulfarm at 8:45.
Jewish Music Cafe. 401 9th Street. $18.
John Kelley Woodrow presents myths in a new way: Art in Brooklyn
Stop editing yourself: An Artist in Brooklyn
Arrow Pointing Nowhere by Elizabeth Daly: The Written Nerd
Real Bushwick, Bushwick Real: Brooklyn Vegan
Felting & Spinning: The Old Stone House
Pop-up art sale where prices start at $50: Brokelyn
Abandoned paintings: Found in Brooklyn
Glenn Branca new CD and show: Brooklyn Vegan
Brought to you by the Feldman Family from their local weather tower.
The NYC Department of Parks and Recreation has issued a warning that people should stay out of NYC parks and avoid walking under city trees after a man was killed by a falling tree branch in Central Park yesterday.
Elmaz Qyra, 46, was walking near East 67th Street and 5th Avenue around 4 p.m. Thursday when he was struck by a snow covered tree limb.
Very sad.
.
Time Out NY says: choose sides. Which borough is better. Is it Brooklyn or Manhattan? As someone who grew up in Manhattan but spent my adult years in Brooklyn…
Every few months, some angry Manhattanite sends us a letter suggesting we change our magazine’s name to Time Out Brooklyn. Look: when it comes to culture, TONY is all-inclusive, and we acknowledge all five boroughs to be New York. But we get the attitude. It’s a time-honored tradition to identify strongly with a borough, and the chest-thumping has gotten louder in recent years as more and more Manhattanites move to Brooklyn. It’s tempting to pick sides over issues of transportation, finances, square footage, conveniences, attitude and culture. Are you Brooklyn? Or Manhattan? And will the two—should the two—ever be thought of as one?
Due to snow weather conditions, all New York City public schools will be closed today, February 26, 2010. All after-school activities and PSAL events will also be cancelled. Administrative offices will remain open.
Brooklyn photographer Nate Kensinger, just wrote to say that’s he’s posted a new photo essay on his blog.
And that is always cause for celebration.
Kensinger’s photos are often heart-breakingly beautiful observations of abandoned urban environments,
Here is an excerpt from the essay he calls simply, The Whole Foods Lot. See more text and many more pictures on his blog. His work is also featured in The Pink Elephant: Gentrification Speaks show currently at MoCADA.
While the pictures speak thousands of words, Kensinger writes eloquently and informatively about this particular urban landscape:
“The story of the Whole Foods lot is one of the best examples of how New York City’s recent real estate boom and subsequent collapse unfolded. Located at the intersection of 3rd Avenue and 3rd Street, this empty lot is bordered on two sides by the Gowanus Canal. In 2006, it housed an active scrapyard, but this closed when ground was broken for a planned 68,000 square Whole Foods Market, which promised “Brooklyn residents a wide array of natural and organic foods” alongside a public esplanade and community center. The idea of building this market on the banks of a toxic industrial canal struck some local residents as a far-fetched idea, but this was representative of the ambitious yet ill-conceived development projects that were common during the past decade.”
Thanks to lovely Liena at the Ditmas Park Blog for this photo. On a gloppy, snowy day like this it’s nice to remember that spring is coming.
