Here’s an excerpt from the NY Times’ Sunday column called (appropriately enough) Sunday Routine. The article is called: A Day Without a Train and it’s about Park Slope’s Gene Russianoff, who has been the  staff lawyer for  New York Public Interest Research Group’s Straphangers Campaign for thirty years.

He has championed the rights of subway riders. Most days, he is one: He and his wife, Pauline Toole, the program director of the We Are New York Community Leadership Project, do not own a car. But on Sundays, Mr. Russianoff, 57, Ms. Toole, 54, and their daughters, Jennie, 14, and Natalie, 11, who all live in Park Slope, dash around Brooklyn on foot, by bus and, if they are late to a soccer game, by car service. “Taking the train on the weekend,” Mr. Russianoff said, “is like Russian roulette.”

So much to do, so little time. That’s why I scour the listings to find the best and the brightest things to do every weekend for readers of OTBKB.

Movies

This weekend at BAM: Hereafter, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, The Social Network

This weekend at Brooklyn Heights Cinema: Howl, The Town and Wall Street Money Never Sleeps

Theater

Saturday night only at BAM: Brooklyn Omnibus by Stew, the Tony Award-winning creator and star of Broadway’s Passing Strange, joins his band The Negro Problem and co-creator Heidi Rodewald for an irreverent, genre-bending song cycle that considers what it means to call Brooklyn home.

This weekend at St. Ann’s Warehouse: Druid Penelope by Edna Walsh: “Based on the final chapter of Homer’s The Odyssey, Penelope is the newest play from Ireland’s Druid Theatre Company, written by 2010 OBIE winner Enda Walsh. This American Premiere marks St. Ann’s third collaboration with Druid and Enda Walsh, following the critical and popular productions of The Walworth Farce and The New Electric Ballroom at St. Ann’s Warehouse.”

Music

Saturday, October 23 at 8PM at Barbes: Andy Statman, klezmer artist extraordinaire.

Saturday, October 23 at 9PM at the Jewish Music Cafe: Rav Schlomo Carlebach’s 16th Yartzheit with Soulfarm’s C Lanzbom and Noah Solomon.

Saturday, October 23 at 9-11 PM at Zora Space: “Guitarist Oscar Peñas epitomizes a new wave of emerging artists who are an integral part of New York’s flourish “unofficial” music scene.”

Sunday, October 24 at 8PM at Sycamore: Underground Works is a new jazz series curated by the members of the Brooklyn Jazz Underground and Connection Works. “The focus of the series is to create a greater awareness of the depth of creativity in composition and improvisation that exists in Brooklyn and extends beyond the scope of any one organization.”

Literary

Saturday, October 23 at 7PM at the Park Slope United Methodist Church: Brooklyn Poets Against the War with Sapphire,  author of the novel Push (Random House, 1996) which was made into the Oscar-winning movie Precious, Tina Chang, poet laureate of Brooklyn, Donald Lev and Dayl Wise

Steampunk Shopping

On October 24 Brooklyn Indie Market presents the third annual Steampunk Day at the Dumbo Loft (155 Water Street, Dumbo) from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Steampunk Shopping and Fashion Show at 4 p.m. $20 Victorian/Steampunk portrait sitting with vintage camera by Tsirkus Fotografika $5 entry. Take the F train to York Street Station and travel to a re-envisioned Victorian age that features retrofuturistic fashion, brass and copper clockwork, ray guns, jetpacks, bustles and inventions that go far beyond 19th century technology. Think steam-powered mechanical wonders, brass-fitted computers, dirigibles, goggles, airships, and clockwork inspired accoutrements.

A portion of the Berlin Wall is on display on the  (inner) grounds of the UN.  I was there, at the suggestion of a representative of Brooklyn for Peace, for a briefing on worldwide military spending called “Military Expenditure and Prospects for the Future” which included these interesting figures:

–Estimated total world military expenditures (or “milex”) in 2009 was: $1.5 trillion.

–The US continues to be the largest spender, with $661 billion, or 43% of the world’s share.

–Other big spenders: China ($100 billion), France ($63.9 billion), UK ($58.3 billion) and Russia ($53.3 billion).

Several groups collaborated to produce the briefing, including Religions for Peace and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

From 11AM – 2PM on Saturday, October 23rd you can be a Clean & Green Volunteer at the north end of 2nd Ave where it meets the canal.

There you can help the Gowanus Canal Conservancy create a new street end garden, which utilizes compost, recycled materials, native plants and trees. Construction began last month, when the group reclaimed a large area of the street end by reconfiguring several large concrete blocks which help define and protect the garden.

Planting beds between the blocks will filter and decrease the volume of stormwater runoff before it discharges into the canal.

There’s a lot to do and they can’t do it alone. Volunteer tasks include site preparation, tree and shrub planting, and mulching.

You must wear closed shoes, long pants and a long sleeved shirt. Tools and gloves will be provided but if you have heavy-duty work gloves or specific clean up/gardening tools that you’d like to use, please feel free to bring them (make sure they are labeled with your name).

Also bring drinking water for yourself. If you’re interested in volunteering for the October 23rd event please email: volunteer@gowanuscanalconservancy.org or call us at (718) 541-4378.

Volunteers under age 18 must have a parent or guardian on site to sign a release and available to supervise them (call if you need more information).

More than 10,000 people voted for the first Brooklyn Do-Gooders award sponsored by the Brooklyn Community Foundation.

“Do Good Right Here,” is the motto of the BCF and the the first annual Brooklyn Do Gooder Awards celebrate “altruism, philanthropy and commitment of five Brooklyn Do Gooders who are working toward a stronger Brooklyn.”

In September they invited the greater Brooklyn community to submit nominations for people who are making a positive contribution to their communities. Then there was a  public voting period from October 1-October 15, 2010.

Now the finalists have been selected by the public voting and judges will select five winners from among 20 finalists. On November 3, 2010 at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden there will be ceremony to honor the winners.

Click on read more below to see a list of the finalists. One person from each of the five categories (Arts for Everyone, Caring Neighbors, Education and Youth Achievement, Community Development and Green Communities) will be chosen as Brooklyn Do-Gooder of the Year.

Continue reading Finalists for Brooklyn Do-Gooder Awards →

I’ve written about Fashion East, the new dress shop on Lincoln Place in Park Slope. It’s in one of the little storefronts just east of Seventh Avenue. “The name comes from the fact that both owners come from the east: Aleksander is from the former Yugoslavia and Jessica is of Chinese-Cambodian heritage,” they write on their website.

Every time I walk by I hear the owner, Alex, playing beautiful music on his electric guitar. He was a working musician in Los Angeles and in addition to running the shop, he’s teaching guitar.  Needless to say, I was delighted to hear from them via email about what’s been going on.

Here is your first email from our little clothing boutique in Park Slope!  We get new clothing every week, and below are our new items for this week.

We spoke to some of you when we first opened in July about a grand opening party.  Well, obviously its four months later and the party hasn’t happened…Our apologies.  We are simply a new, struggling business, unable to fund such an event.  If you were really looking forward to it, we’ll make it up to you by giving you ten percent off your next purchase.  Just mention to us!

Lastly, Alex is now offering guitar lessons.  He has over 12 years of teaching experience, and has taught to all ages and levels.  So beginners and kids are welcome!  A half hour lesson is $30, and a one hour lesson is $50.  You can try a half hour lesson for FREE!  Musical genres include rock, gypsy jazz, tango, blues, metal, funk, and more.  His specialties include power flat picking, improvisation, and song writing.

Stay warm in this cold weather…and hopefully in our clothes!
Jessica and Alex

Are your old bank statements and documents taking up valuable space?? Satisfy that urge to clean while at the same time supporting your school!

The Shred Services paper-shredding truck will be outside PS 321 — 180 Seventh Avenue between 1st and 2nd Streets — this coming Saturday, October 23rd, from 10am-12pm.

The cost is $10 per large box with $5 donated by Shred Services to the PS 321 PTA.

Get rid of your old confidential papers safely and conveniently — while supporting PS 321.

Good deal I’d say.

This weekend and next thousands of students will take the specialized test (SHSAT) to qualify for Stuyvesant High School, Brooklyn Tech, Bronx Science and the other NYC specialized public high schools. In 2004, Teen Spirit took the SHSAT test and the following is Smartmom’s account of that experience from her old blog Third Street.

The SHSAT is a timed multiple-choice test with two sections, verbal and math taken by 8th and 9th graders. It must be completed in a total of 2 hours and 30 minutes. In the first section, students demonstrate their verbal reasoning and reading comprehension. In the second section, students demonstrate their math skills by answering questions that require knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, probability, statistics, and geometry.

Written October 25, 2004:

Today Teen Spirit endured one of the great (or maybe not so great) rites of passage of a New York City childhood. He joined thousands of other N.Y.C teenagers at Stuyvesant High School to take the entrance exam for the specialized public high schools.

Needless to say, Smartmom and Hepcat were pretty ambivalent about the whole thing. They hate the idea of a standardized test defining one’s future and are pretty sure that Stuy, Brooklyn Tech and Bronx Science aren’t the right kinds of schools for Teen Spirt. In some deep way, the whole idea of it repelled them and made them feel caught in a really nasty and de-humanizing machine.

Yet, something propelled them to do it, to send their young boy into the fire, so to speak, to participate in this mass ritual of scholastic validation and opportunity. Perhaps they’ve been driven mad by the anxiety of the last few weeks of relentless high school open houses, tours and fairs, Maybe they’ve lost all perspective and were just desperate enough to try their luck at this crap shoot. Like Best & Oldest told her daughter: “You can either take the test or buy a lottery ticket, it’s your choice.”

In a certain way, the specialized high school entrance exam is one of those defining moments in this city’s so-called meritocracy. It’s that big chance, no matter who you are or where you are from, to get the proverbial foot in the door. Every kid in New York has the “opportunity” to take this blind test which basically measures one’s ability to excel on a multiple choice exam. That’s it. For kids who are “on-the-ball” academically, it’s a chance to spit out what they know.

But is it really all that democratic? The New York City school system, which is in the throes of reorganization once again, is pretty horrendous. Kids are struggling all over the five boroughs to get the kind of education they deserve. What of those kids who have never been given the chance to thrive academically because of the way this city and this country’s school system has failed them — are they taking the Stuyvesant test?

For that matter, navigating one’s way through the high school entrance process requires a good deal of savvy and equal amounts of smarts. Parents really need to have the time and the wherewithal to dive in and figure it out. For someone who doesn’t speak English or is holding down two jobs, it’s gotta be really tough to try to help your kid get ahead.

And getting ahead is what getting into Stuy (and the other specialized schools) is all about. It’s all about a test score on that bubble test. They don’t look at grades, they don’t look at recommendations or portfolios, they don’t interview, or care about family connections, or the fact that your parents don’t speak English and that you’re the first one in your family to finish middle school.

Nope, it’s all about a number. A hard and fast number that decides who will be chosen to fill the coveted seats at Stuyvesant and the other special schools.

Sad to say, many are scarred by this process. Not getting into Stuy can be one of those burning childhood wounds that some New York kids never get over. Best & Oldest, age 46, is still smarting over the fact that she didn’t get into Bronx Science and is totally appalled by the kids in her eighth grade class, who did. It didn’t make any sense — she was way, way smarter than any of them. Likewise, Smartmom is often surprised by the adults who tell her they went to Stuy. In this way she knows that going to Stuy is no predictor of future success, wealth or happiness. And it certainly doesn’t make you an interesting person! That said, it seems to have a symbolic value and is just one of the many ways that New York City parents transfer their own anxiety and aspirations onto their offspring.

Teenagers of every stripe assembled today, one of many testing days, on Chambers Street, waiting to enter the building. It was a colorful parade of faces from New York’s economic and ethnic melting pot. To say black and white, rich and poor doesn’t even begin to describe the diverse cauldron that is contemporary New York City. We are Chinese, South American, Latin American, Puerto Rican, Mexican, African, African-American, Japanese, Viet Namese, Cambodian, Russian and more.

Continue reading High School Tour Confidential: The Test →

An event billed as Brooklyn Poets Against the War will take place on Saturday, October 23rd at 7PM at Park Slope United Methodist Church and will feature poets Sapphire,  author of the novel Push (Random House, 1996) which was made
into the Oscar-winning movie Precious and Tina Chang, poet laureate of Brooklyn, Donald Lev and Dayl Wise

This event is a Benefit for Brooklyn For Peace and the Park Slope United Methodist Church Social Action Committee. You will have the opportunity to meet the poets afterward at a reception!

WHEN: October 23, 2010 at 7 p.m.
WHERE: Park Slope United Methodist Church, 6th Ave and 8th Street,
Park Slope, Brooklyn
TRAINS: F/G to 7th Ave at 9th St, R to 4th Ave (at 9th St)
ADMISSION: Suggested donation $15; no one turned away
CONTACT: 718-624-5921 or e-mail bfp@brooklynpeace.org
Website: www.brooklynpeace.org

Borough President Marty Markowitz has been open about his opposition to the Prospect Park Bike Lane. Here is his response to this morning’s anti-bike lane rally.

“Although I regret not being able to attend today’s community rally against the Prospect Park West bike lane, I again call on the DOT to remove this dangerous eyesore and bring the issue of our city’s bike lane strategy before a larger public discussion and City Council consideration.

It is common knowledge that the Department of Transportation installed this two-way dedicated bike lane to reduce alleged speeding along Prospect Park West. But instead of simply addressing this purported reckless driving, DOT opted to use the speeding issue to achieve its bike lane ‘vision’ and impose traffic congestion mitigation in any way possible. As a result, parked vehicles have been shifted to the center of the road, destroying the majesty and beauty of this magnificent thoroughfare and making it more difficult for visitors and residents to find parking, temporarily load and unload, and cross the street through bicycles coming at them from both directions—at the risk of those cyclists not yielding to pedestrians.

If the reason for this bike lane was to slow down traffic on Prospect Park West, then the DOT should have found other ways to do it, including additional traffic lights and stop signs. Taking away parking from a regional amenity like Prospect Park West—while forcing pedestrians to navigate the hazards of crossing through parked cars and cyclists just to get to the curb—is a terrible idea. In addition, it seems to unfairly target Prospect Park and Brooklyn, as a similar two-way bike lane is nowhere to be found along Fifth Avenue and Central Park West, which border Central Park in Manhattan .

Because the DOT is well on its way toward ‘re-engineering’ the street landscape of our entire city, I believe it should not be left to the discretion of a single city agency but rather require a public policy review by City Council to determine the future use of our sidewalks, thoroughfares and highways. We need to hear from the residents of our city, directly and through their elected officials, whether they support the notion of city policy encouraging and expanding bicycle usage as opposed to other means of transportation, such as light rail, express buses and cars.

What’s in Maira Kalman’s tool box: Design Sponge

A yen for a yurt: CasaCara

Historic Bed-Stuy snapshots: Reclaimed Home

Fab Halloween freebies: Limestone Adventures

Time savers for web designers: Swiss Miss

What to throw out and when: Apartment Therapy

A home in 600 sq ft: NY Times

Here’s an excerpt from the Brooklyn Ink’s reporting on the expansion of the Park Slope historic district:

The historic district of Park Slope has had the highest property values in the neighborhood, and has been able to ride out the slump in housing prices in recent years. Now, the Park Slope Civic Council, a community group, is campaigning to expand the neighborhood’s historic district, which could prevent the kind of real estate speculation that led to the slump.

“The district is the center of the neighborhood and also has the best housing stock,” says Marc Garstein, 64, the president of Warren Lewis Realty Associates, an agency that has a focus on Park Slope.

Garstein believes that the advantage of this expansion is that it will further prevent what he calls “bad fit” development projects that have fed speculation and real estate bubbles, especially through the destruction of old buildings to construct new residential developments.

A historic district designation limits the amount of new construction in an area by protecting the façade and size of buildings of historic character. The Park Slope Civic Council, which began its attempt to expand the boundaries of the current Park Slope Historic District in 2007, sees the expansion as a safeguard for a neighborhood that wishes to defend its residential property values from massive speculation.