Pastor Daniel Meeter wants to thank the community for their interest and participation in the conversation about the homeless men wh live on the steps of Old First Church.

A large number of people saw his original post on the Old First Blog, on the New York Times’s blog, City Room, and on OTBKB. At next week’s Park Slope Civic Council meeting there will be a discussion of this matter.

It is all very gratifying to Pastor Meeter who believes that the community can work together to find a solution to this vexing problem.

On his blog, there’s a update on this developing story.

There are some new facts on the ground. On Sunday afternoon, the cops were called in twice by neighbors. I have to say the cops were great.

As I left the church on Sunday evening, I found a steel bar the guys were keeping as a weapon. On Monday morning I learned that the men had been urinating in front of nursery school children and into their play-yard. On Monday evening a deacon confirmed to me that the men had exposed themselves in front of children while urinating.

Yesterday Frank showed me his face, very badly bruised. He told me had fallen, but I don’t believe him. His face tells a different story. This morning I removed a blanket with blood stains on it.

“It’s come to this, oh yes, it’s come to this.” (I guess I always expected it would come to this.)

I have been denying them permission to sleep on our grounds since last July, but I found it impossible to enforce. As of this morning, the Commander of Precinct 78 agreed with me that the police would enforce it…

READ THE REST ON PASTOR MEETER’S BLOG.

So how often did you laugh? Or did you just ignore Clever Doc’s first question? Clever Doc says that laughing, chuckling or smiling is good for you. Losing that ability is a danger sign. 

Here’s another post from from Clever Doc, also known as Linda Hawes Clever, friend of OTBKB and the founder of Renew.

A super-achiever with a streak of the Type-A, she’s a medical doctor and an occupational health specialist with a national reputation for activism and for professional and community service. In her work with Renew, she’s helping people battle the spiritual and physical exhaustion that zaps energy and the ability to live in the moment.

Just look around you on the subway, in the office, at school? Doesn’t everyone look hap hap happy?

MOST CHILDREN LAUGH 60 or more times a day. What happened to us? Our responsibilities grew; our simple pleasures diminished. We may be scattered or pressed. The first renewing question, “How many times did you really laugh yesterday?” checks out our sense of humor and fun.

Laughing, chuckling, or smiling is good for us; losing the ability is a danger signal.

Viktor Frankl, a psychiatrist who survived the Holocaust although his family was killed, is the author of a short, must-read book called, "Man’s Search for Meaning." In it he describes his efforts to conduct sense-of-humor workshops for fellow concentration camp inmates. 

Even in the midst of unimaginable horrors, Frankl discovered, laughing breaks a downward spiral and lifts us out of the muck. Even for a moment, life changes for the better.

On a more personal note, I have a colleague who avoids human downers and seeks out people who make her laugh. Laughing buoys her in the moment and also leaves good memories.

Now, let’s talk about learning. Learning helps us refresh, do better at work or home; expand horizons and, therefore, enhance freedom and choices.

Learning provides the savory pleasure of understanding our world, our neighborhood, maybe ourselves.

HERE is the Second Question:

2. How would you describe your recent learning?

–Haven’t learned a new subject in the last year (0 points)

–I’m focused exclusively on what I know (1 point)

–I read or search widely beyond my basics (2 points)

–I take courses outside my basics (3 points)

–I teach others (4 points)

The Park Slope Halloween Parade, sponsored by the Park Slope Civic Council, is still the wonderful event it has always been.

On Wednesday, October 31, the parade starts at 6:30 pm at 7th Avenue
and 12th Street and proceeds  to Union Street.

Participants may join
the parade at any point along the route. The usual Parade bands –
Paprika and The Eternal Buzz Brass Band will be on hand.

Today would have been artist Jamie Livingston’s 50th birthday. It is also the 10th anniversary of his death. The following was written by his friend Risa Mickenberg in 1997. An exhibit of Jamie’s 6.600 Photos-of-the-Day is on view at Bard College through October 27th, 2007. A web site of all the photo’s will be rolled out shortly.

It’s
strange for someone to leave behind a record of every day of their
life. Or to obsessively follow a project whose only perfect completion
ends with their death.

Our work is always ahead of us. It
starts when we are born and it ends when we die – this work of seeing,
touching and affecting the world.

Jamie spread this collection out every year and examined it – reviewed it.

Our
lives are a flood of images and we are collectors who keep a strange
assortment of images: moments of extreme emotion, pain, beauty, and
fear stand out. Events we’re taught to remember: weddings, graduations,
births, deaths.

Then there are the millions of images that we
can’t shake out of our heads, that come to us at strange times – things
we can’t remember why we remember: the gold threads in an old stereo
speaker, the way the light hit a thousand cars in a parking lot by the
water, the face of a stranger in a restaurant, a friend standing in a
pool – you can’t remember where, slapping the water with the flat of
her hand.

Memory is a sieve that holds curious things. A life is a trail of strange, colorful memories.

Jamie’s
Photo-of-the-Day works like a life. A still moment from every day for
years. Remains of the day, immortalized. It is a selection: what we
choose to remember, what we add to our collection of days.

There was no set time of day.  It was when the mood struck: this is what I will take.

It’s an accumulation, a collection, a life’s work.

Risa Mickenberg wrote this soon after Jamie’s death in 1997. She is a writer and a member of the band,  Jesus H Christ & The 4 Hornsmen of the Apocalypse.

A photographer working on a project called Out My Window contacted OTBKB in the hopes of finding more great places to take her photos.

This project is a series of
portraits in private spaces set against the view which reveals the
transformation of New York’s landscape.  The photographs will look at
how the landscape of 2007 is vastly different than the landscape that
preceded it, and how different that landscape will become.

The series will take me throughout New York’s five boroughs, to New
Jersey, and even to houseboats on the Hudson in order to photograph a
diverse set of people who live with the most interesting views of New
York. By "interesting," I do not mean to limit my search to the
classically beautiful view, although those could very well be included.

My photographs will include views made interesting by imposing
implementations of change—views obstructed by construction or
transformed by September 11th or interrupted by repurposing projects
(such as Columbia University’s migration into West Harlem.)

Please take a look at the project’s blog: 
http://outmywindownyc.blogspot.com/
I am hoping you will help me spread the word about this project so as
to find people who have interesting views.  Will you consider writing a
post about this project and/or adding the project’s blog to you links
section?  Any press would be greatly appreciated! 

Guest blogger, Jill Di Donato, believes that anxiety can get in the way of a child’s success in school. To help remedy this, she runs a private practice in Brooklyn Heights
that caters to Brooklyn families looking to enrich their children’s
education and overall approach to learning.

With subject tutoring, test prep, writing workshops and academic advocacy, Jill works closely with teachers,
therapists, and school administrators. Interestingly, her approach incorporates not just academics but creative arts, and a mind-body connection.

Tune in to OTBKB for a continuing discussion by Jill of school anxiety in the digital
age, plus tips on how to effectively manage the challenges of schooling
in the city. 

NYC is home to some of the most progressive private schools and world-renown public schools, those in the know call, “magnets.” Competition is thick, as thousands of kids vie for a handful of coveted spots.

This weekend, scores of students will take the Specialized High School Exam. As parents, teachers, and educators, how can we build skills in our kids without bombarding them with demands?

When does ambition turn into anxiety, and when does it become a problem?

Given the climate of our fast-paced world, the term anxiety is thrown around a lot, especially when it comes to kids and the classroom. Do our high-tech advances add to the pressure?

Today’s students are flooded with sensory overload. Between the Myspace profiles, IM’s, and PSP’s, kids are carving out identities that are digitally heightened and amplified online. Such a saturation of stimuli might be especially distracting to kids already prone to anxiety. How can innovative technology enhance, not detract from the learning process?

For more information or to schedule an appointment with Jill you can reach her at academicadvocate(at)gmail.(dotcom)

Here’s a whole lot of information about Halloween in Brooklyn. There’s stuff happening all over the place. Thanks to the folks at A Child Grows in Brooklyn.

Are you stressed out and juggling too many balls in the air? Are you looking for a sense of calm? Do you feel like you need to tap into deep sources of energy, motivation, and talent?

Have no Fear, Clever Doc is here with some questions for you about the way that you are living your life. And maybe some suggestions about how to slow down and smell the roses.

Clever Doc is a good friend of OTBKB. Her real name is Linda Hawes Clever, MD, MACP. An internist, she is the founder of an organization called Renew. She is also an occupational health specialist with a national reputation for activism and for professional and community service.

Galvanized by the growing exhaustion she observed among fellow health professionals and inspired by the work of John W. Gardner, founder of Common Cause and former Secretary of Health, Education & Welfare, Dr. Clever and colleagues formally launched RENEW in 2000.

Clever Doc wants to know: Is your daily whirl really just a whirrr of "doing something"? What about being effective? What about having some meaning and purpose? What about joy?

And what about when life delivers a knockout punch?

    I had a busy, busy, busy but manageable life awhile back, Then my parents died, our home was burglarized, cutbacks evaporated two jobs that I loved, and my husband needed life saving surgery. All in 18 months.   

    Eventually, I surfaced, looked around, and saw that I wasn’t the only one wondering how to do it all or, if not “all”, how to decide what to do and how to do it well.

    Many of us, whether 20- somethings or 40, 60, 80-somethings, wonder how to make it over the long haul. We have plenty to accomplish; plenty of reason to be creative, enthusiastic, focused; plenty of need to be resilient.  But how?

    Over years of learning and listening to groups that engage in “renewing,” I’ve found that a four-step process can get things rolling again.

    Step one starts today: Wake up and smell the coffee (at Connecticutt Muffin, Gorilla, or wherever else you go). Begin to notice how the people you care about are doing and feeling.

    Then ask yourself the first of ten questions. A new one will be rolled out every few days. Let them be an alarm clock.

    Keep track of your answers and your score. Leave comments here.

    THE FIRST QUESTION IS THIS:
    1.    How many times did you really laugh yesterday?
    0 (0 points)
    1 – 2 (1 point)
    3 – 4 (2 points)
    5 – 6 (3 points)                           
    6 + (4 points)

This from New York 1:

Five people were hospitalized Tuesday after a car jumped a curb at a Brooklyn bus stop.

The crash happened in front of Borough Hall on Court Street at around 1:30 Tuesday afternoon.

Police say the driver only had a learner’s permit and was left
alone temporarily by a person with a license. The accident happened
when the person with the permit was asked to move the car.

Witnesses described a chaotic scene.

"She just started backing up and she couldn’t control the car so
she backed into a BMW,” said one witness. “She just started to put the
gear in drive, she started driving, and she hit a pedestrian."

As of Tuesday night, the police had not yet announced charges in the case and say all five victims have non-life-

This from the Daily News:

On Tuesday, Puppetry Art Theatre’s Timothy Young uninvited dancers from
Scores who had signed on as volunteers for Saturday’s second annual
Haunted Halloween Carnival Benefit at Middle School 51 in Brooklyn.

Young
said he asked the strippers to stay away because he was afraid the Park
Slope school would cancel on him or sponsors would back out.

"It
was a small, insignificant part of the event," Young said. "I uninvited
them because I don’t want to compromise the event, the organization or
the school."

Young’s group is raising money for its work in
shelters, and volunteers were to help with a special pizza party and
costume giveaway for 300 homeless and hospitalized children the group
works with.

MS51 Principal Lenore Berner asked that the strippers
be excluded from the festivities, said Department of Education
spokesman David Cantor.

"It is not a school event," he said.
"Because many children will attend, however, the benefit is not an
appropriate venue for volunteers identified as adult dancers."

In
addition to dancers, Scores bartenders and office workers had planned
to attend, said Elda Auerbach, who does promotions for the club. Now no
one is going.

"I don’t want the charity to get hurt," she said yesterday.

The
revoked invitations came after yesterday’s Daily News reported that the
strippers had been invited. They were not planning to wear
inappropriate outfits – instead coming as fully dressed witches or
sorcerers.

Sitting in my Brooklyn dining room, I hear news on WNYC that wild fires continue to burn their way through Southern California.  500,000 have been evacuated from their homes, the largest evacuation in California history.

The Santa Ana winds are partly to blame.

The Santa Ana winds with their hurricane like speeds, the weather, and the dryness brought on by drought have conspired to make this a devastating natural tragedy the likes of which LA has never seen.

Joan Dideon wrote about the Santa Ana winds in her magnificent book of essays, "Slouching Toward Bethlehem." If it’s not in this collection, please let me know. Here’s an excerpt.

"There is something uneasy in the Los Angeles air this afternoon, some unnatural stillness, some tension.  What it means is that tonight a Santa Ana will begin to blow, a hot wind from the northeast whining down through the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes, blowing up sand storms out along Route 66, drying the hills and the nerves to flash point.  For a few days now we will see smoke back in the canyons, and hear sirens in the night.  I have neither heard nor read that a Santa Ana is due, but I know it, and almost everyone I have seen today knows it too.  We know it because we feel it.  The baby frets.  The maid sulks.  I rekindle a waning argument with the telephone company, then cut my losses and lie down, given over to whatever it is in the air.  To live with the Santa Ana is to accept, consciously or unconsciously, a deeply mechanistic view of human behavior.

"I recall being told, when I first moved to Los Angeles and was living on an isolated beach, that the Indians would throw themselves into the sea when the bad wind blew.  I could see why.  The Pacific turned ominously glossy during a Santa Ana period, and one woke in the night troubled not only by the peacocks screaming in the olive trees but by the eerie absence of surf.  The heat was surreal.  The sky had a yellow cast, the kind of light sometimes called "earthquake weather."  My only neighbor would not come out of her house for days, and there were no lights at night, and her husband roamed the place with a machete.  One day he would tell me that he had heard a trespasser, the next a rattlesnake.

"Easterners commonly complain that there is no "weather" at all in Southern California, that the days and the seasons slip by relentlessly, numbingly bland.  That is quite misleading.  In fact the climate is characterized by infrequent but violent extremes:  two periods of torrential subtropical rains which continue for weeks and wash out the hills and send subdivisions sliding toward the sea; about twenty scattered days a year of the Santa Ana, which, with its incendiary dryness, invariably means fire.  At the first prediction of a Santa Ana, the Forest Service flies men and equipment from northern California into the southern forests, and the Los Angeles Fire Department cancels its ordinary non-firefighting routines.  The Santa Ana caused Malibu to burn as it did in 1956, and Bel Air in 1961, and Santa Barbara in 1964.  In the winter of 1966-67 eleven men were killed fighting a Santa Ana fire that spread through the San Gabriel Mountains…"

Was it just last year that Patti Smith performed an impromptu concert at the opening of the Brooklyn Museum’s Annie Lebowitz show?

Was that really just a year ago? Seems like ages ago.

Well OTBKB decided not to go to the opening (her loss big time). Luckily Brooklyn Beat was there and he wrote a nice piece about it. And then he started a blog called, Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn.

It was just a year ago that I attended a member’s opening at the
Brooklyn Museum and caught Patti Smith and band perform live. It was so
cool, bringing so much art and excitement together, that I had to do
something with it, which led me to write about the evening. I had
become familiar with Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn and on a whim, sent
the report there. Fortunately for me, Louise Crawford of Only the Blog
Knows Brooklyn. com immediately responded to my story and posted it. I
was hooked.

Blogging has the immediacy of electronic journalism but,
since it is essentially a literary, or at least largely word-based
medium, it demands some reflection. All of that works for me. I wrote a
number of posts for OTBKB, and had stuff picked up by other blogs as
well, which is a unique experience to see your stuff out there and
wonder how it got picked up. People have many reasons to blog. I see
that some folks bring a strong current of interest in neighborhoods and
commerce, with a particular focus on real estate and development issues
and the like. Others focus on aspects of their world, however minute,
and manage to impart meaning. Blogging seems like an open book, and the
bottom line is whatever works for you.

Hepcat talked to the great Volvo expert, Lorenzutti on Douglas Street, and now thinks that Goldie can be saved. Lorenzutti says that the car just needs a new gasket and he can do the work.

What that means is that we are having the car towed from Ft. Lee, New Jersey to Douglas Street at a cost of $275 plus tolls and tax.

Then we’ll see what Lorenzutti can do. If it’s super expensive we will probably pass.

Hepcat is quite agitated about all of this. He’s not sure if he wants to THROW more money into this 20-year-old car. Goldie has been an incredibly reliable, great car for the ten years that we’ve owned her.

I first saw her driving down Greene Street in SoHo with her old owner with a For Sale sign on the window. I ran after her and at the stoplight told the owners that we were interested.

A few days later, Hepcat took a bus to southern New Jersey and picked up the car from the owners.

It’s been ten good years with Goldie. Hepcat and Teen Spirit drove her cross country country in the summer of 2001. And what an adventure it was: they drove Goldie to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Falling Water, the Warhol Museum, the St. Louis Arch, Denver, Colorado, the Salt Flats in Nevada and the beach at San Francisco and many other places in between.

Hepcat’s mother and sister drove the car east a few weeks after 9/11. Because of the New York plates, they were cheered all the way across the country.

But she seems to be on her last wheels now.

It may be time for a new car. Not a new new car, of course. Hepcat only buys used cars. But something a bit more up to date.

What cars do you like?

The Daily News reports that Mark Morris Dance Group offers dance classes for those with Parkinson’s Disease. Here’s a quote from the article:

Over the next 75 minutes, teachers Leventhal, John Heginbotham and Misty Owens got their dance students out of their chairs and put them through their paces. There were demi-pliés at ballet barres, modern dance and tap steps, and marches across the studio floor to the strains of “Seventy-Six Trombones.” The group also did moves from the company’s own repertoire.

New York Metro reports that there was a vigil attended by 100 people for Craig Murphy, the cyclist who was killed last Thursday night.

More than a hundred people lit candles and walked in silence along Union Avenue Sunday night to remember the life and commemorate the tragic death of Craig Murphey, a 26-year-old man who was killed when his bicycle collided with a truck last week.

Murphey, who worked with the West Harlem Action Network Against Poverty and founded a scheme to bring fresh produce to low income communities, was remembered as “iconic” and “unique” by his friends.
“He always put people ahead of himself,” said friend Greg Bersnitz. “People often talk about doing that. But he lived it.”

Following the procession, Murphey’s friends gathered around a ghost bike memorial at Ten Eyck Street and Union Avenue, near where he was killed. They laid candles and flowers and told stories about Murphey’s life — frequently bursting into laughter followed by tears.

A Brooklyn Life had this report from the Cobble Hill Cinema:

We saw the 8 p.m. showing of Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited at Cobble Hill. When we exited the theater there was a verrrrrry long line waiting to get into the 10 p.m. showing. If a survey of the entire U.S. were to be conducted, I predict that Cobble Hill would come out as the most friendly Wes Anderson neighborhood in the country.

Read Seeing Green on the tragic deaths of two bikers last Thursday.

“Since then it appears that the issue was not as clear; maybe he was not going the wrong way at all. Mea culpa on this level. Certainly one respondent to my comment on OTBKB did not agree with me:

in any case the point being made by transportation alternatives, that we need more protected bike lanes, remains valid. and chandru, while i agree that there are many cyclists out there who endanger themselves with their riding habits, your “no-helmet” stance will always make you vulnerable to such accusations. regardless of whether the driver or the cyclist was “at fault”, one of them is dead. he was someone’s son, someone’s brother, many people’s friend, and he was only 26 years old. that is deserving of outrage.

In defense, firstly, I did not mean to minimize the tradegy of the accident, but an objective look at the cause requires you to not assume the vehicle was automatically at fault.

As one who cycles a lot and grew up cycling in India (if you can cycle there, you can cycle anywhere,) my point, which got lost, is that if (as I often do) you travel the wrong way on a street, it’s your responsibility to watch out for traffic that has the right of way. I often stop completely if I see a vehicle which, in my judgment, is not going to be respectful of my space. While my comment may seem intemperate, it was also a response to the many comments (say, on streetsblog)which suggest that any accident is always the vehicle’s fault. Many cyclists commenting there also exhibit a level of entitlement (especially towards pedestrians) which I am sure makes it easier for them to see slights in every vehicular move. Many also talk about doing 15-20mph on Manhattan streets; this is close to being suicidal by anyone. Bikes just do not have the stopping power and margin of safety that makes them safe at this speed in traffic, bike lane or no.

Fostering a us-vs-them attitude does no one any good.”

From AM New York:

Two Brooklyn bicyclists were killed in separate incidents within two hours early Thursday morning.

In the first case, a man was struck and killed by a gasoline-delivery truck on Union Avenue in Williamsburg. The truck was turning onto Ten Eyck Street shortly after 4 a.m. when it hit the cyclist, who police said was trying to pass the truck and had been riding on the wrong side of the street. No charges were filed again the driver.

About two hours later, another man was riding his bicycle in Bedford-Stuyvesant and was hit by a white van at the intersection of Utica Avenue and Fulton Street. Police determined the driver of the van, Alfred Taylor, 41, of Brooklyn, had been speeding. He was arrested and charged with criminally negligent homicide.

Police were withholding the names of cyclists pending notification of family.

“We are stunned and outraged to learn that two cyclists were killed within the span of hours,” said Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives. “Protected street space for cyclists is the surest way to make biking safe. The city must continue to work tirelessly to provide bicyclists with the protections necessary to ensure safe travel.”

Here’s this week’s Smartmom from the award-winning Brooklyn Paper. It was written before Dan and Serena’s date. Last week, He too her slumming to a bar with a pool table in Brooklyn. She LOVED it.

Close your ears. Smartmom is about to admit something that may shock you.

She and the Oh So Feisty One were big fans of “The O.C.,” the now-cancelled nighttime soap opera about a group of Orange County teenagers and their families.

Last year, lying on the green leather couch on Thursday nights watching a cast of sexy actors including, Peter Gallagher (swoon), Adam Brody (tepid swoon), Benjamin McKenzie (triple swoon), Rachel Bilson and Micha Barton, was a high point of their week — and a great time for mother-daughter bonding and beyatching.

Some parents might think “The O.C.” a strange show to watch with a 10-year-old. And Smartmom would have to agree. Teen sex, drugs, and nasty behavior are woven into just about every episode.
But hey, it offered Smartmom many opportunities for OSFO-appropriate sex and drug education.

“Too much information,” OSFO would say when Smartmom went into too much detail about …

While the show may not be recommended viewing for a 10-year-old, Smartmom knows quite a few Park Slope moms, who make time for shows like “The O.C.,” “Gossip Girl” and “Desperate Housewives.”

Seventh Avenue Mom told Smartmom: “I can’t watch TV anymore and the news is so depressing.” She explained that shows like “The O.C.” are a nice break from real life — and the reality of current events.

When the show was cancelled, Smartmom and OSFO pined. In the weeks after, they even rented DVDs of the first two seasons.

So when they heard that Josh Schwartz, the creator of “The O.C.” was working on a new series, sort of an “O.C.” about the Upper East Side private-school crowd, they were, to say the least, ecstatic.

Last summer was not really a summer so much as a countdown until the beginning of “Gossip Girl” or “GG” as OSFO likes to call it.

Finally, on Sept. 19, “GG” made its debut. Sad to say, the first episode did not deliver the goods. They found themselves wishing that the writers had just transported Ryan, Marissa, Kirsten, Sandy and Seth to the Upper East Side. It was hard to get used to a bunch of new, good-looking actors bopping around the city in yellow cabs rather than going to the beach in swanky sports cars.

Smartmom is glad to report, however, that by episode three, she and OSFO are beginning to grow attached to the upper-crusty, Upper East Siders. They love the fact that the show’s unseen narrator is a blogger. (Dumb Editor note: Bloggers?! How about a show about cool, hip, sexy young newspaper editors? After all, TV is fantasyland anyway.)

But even more fun is that the coolest characters, Dan and his sister, take the subway to school and they don’t fit in.

And they live in Brooklyn.

Supposedly “middle class,” Dan and his family live in groovy Williamsburg. His dad, a former rocker, now owns a trendy art gallery and sends his kids to the best private school his new money can buy.

Dan’s dad, who is handsome in a New York artist sort of way, also has tons of back-story with the mother of Serena, the show’s social butterfly. Her mom is a snotty beyatch who was once a rock groupie.

Best of all is the show’s depiction of Dan’s Brooklyn lifestyle. The sprawling loft he lives in with his family has brick walls, art haphazardly hung, electric guitars and furniture from Design Within Reach and West Elm. It looks just like Smartmom’s apartment except she doesn’t live in a million-dollar loft (and can’t afford Design Within Reach).

Of course, Dan’s family isn’t really middle class, they’re just FUNKY Brooklyn folk with more than enough moolah.

Brooklyn Dan is the coolest, smartest, and most ethical character in the show (sort of the Seth of this show in “O.C.”-speak). Unlike the rich, Manhattan kids, who go to the best colleges on the legacy plan, he really reads books and THINKS.

Yay, Brooklyn.

“Gossip Girl” has class warfare up the wazoo as Dan is often picked on for his outer-borough roots.

Therein lies the biggest irony of all: the show is being filmed in Brooklyn Heights (a poor man’s Upper East Side) and DUMBO (a rich man’s Williamsburg).

Last week’s episode used Packer Collegiate, on Montague Street, as a stand in for the private school the kids attend. A snooty cocktail party scene was also filmed there (it looks really nice by the way).

So, who says Brooklyn ain’t as classy as the Upper East Side? The only prominent Manhattan location one week was the Bethesda Fountain in Central Park.

Addictive script. Class warfare. Silly, sexy characters and a Brooklyn subplot. What’s not to love?

So you better not call Smartmom or OSFO on Wednesday nights between 9 and 10 pm. They’ll be watching “Gossip Girl” and they don’t want to miss a minute of it

This from NY 1:

City school officials insist the original principal of a Brooklyn Arabic school will not get her job back.

Debbie Almontaser has said she would sue the Department of Education to be reinstated as head of the Khalil Gibran International Academy.

Almontaser says the city forced her to resign in August, after controversy erupted over her non-condemnation of t-shirts with the word “intifada.” Intifada is widely associated with the Palestinian uprising against Israel.

Almontaser said Tuesday that she would re-apply for her job. But a spokesman for Chancellor Joel Klein says Almontaser will not be eligible, though she remains a DOE employee.

He says 25 people have applied for the position, which is being filled on an interim basis.

I got this from a woman I met while helping to plan Stoopendous, a celebration of the summer solstice in Park Slope. She’s one cool lady and she’s involved in so much good work in Park Slope.

I am passing on this information about a fabulous pre-holiday party right here in the Slope,
at which we have a chance to get together, have great fun, help a great cause and chill out
for a couple of hours at a very reasonable price. Please Check it Out
As many of you know, I work part-time for a small nonprofit, Neighbors Helping Neighbors, as a Homeownership Counselor. We do homeownership education/counseling and tenant advocacy to primarily low-moderate income clients. Most of our tenant clients are very low-income immigrants living in Sunset Park , Brooklyn , our home-base. Our homeownership program serves clients in all five boroughs.
We are planning our First Annual Benefit Bash at Union Hall, the kick-off to our annual appeal. The event will be on Monday, November 5 from 6:30-9:00pm… and I’d like to invite you all to attend! For the $45 ticket price, guests will enjoy:

Union Hall, closed off to the public until 9:00pm!

Complimentary beer, wine, hors d’oeuvres!

A silent auction with cool items like a new mountain bike, two nights at the Bellagio in Vegas, Liz Claiborne packages, and original artwork! Get some impressive items at great prices, with all proceeds going to charity!

Performances by three talented artists/bands:

Tracy Bonham, who has performed and toured with The Blue Man Group and whose Grammy nominated debut album The Burdens of Being Upright went Gold.

One Ring Zero, who The Boston Globe writes “have not only embraced their ‘lit rock’ reputation but seem primed to become the movement’s indisputable kings.”

Takka Takka, designated ‘a band on the edge’ by Rolling Stone, and called ‘a reason to love New York ‘ by New York Magazine.

I would love to see you there to share a good time together with all proceeds going to support NHN’s important tenant and homeownership work.
To purchase tickets and view this event information, click here. If you are unable to attend, I hope you’ll consider making a small donation. Click here to donate to NHN.

This from NY 1:

A Brooklyn fire house celebrated 100 years of service Thursday.

The fire commissioner and chief of the department joined the members of Ladder Company 122 in Park Slope to celebrate the centennial and to honor its firefighters past and present.

A wall of tribute was unveiled during the ceremony, which includes the names of every firefighter that has worked there.

“It’s great day here,” said FDNY Captain Peter Maglione. “It was an honor to work here. I liked working here.”

“It’s a true honor for us to look up everybody that worked here, and to see how it came out,” said Donald Campbell of the FDNY. “It came out so beautiful.”

Ladder Company 122 is housed in one of the oldest continuously operated firehouses in the city.

Last Tuesday morning, three bloggers and one grizzled print editor met at the BCAT studios for what moderator Gersh Kuntzman is calling a smackdown and OTBKB would call a taping of BCAT’s “Reporter Roundtable.”

Probably the most surprising news was the show’s new set. Four leather chairs. Luckily, I wore nice shoes. Truth is, I was expecting to sit behind a desk like the last time I was on a BCAT show.

Pre-show, the three bloggers compared notes about working methods and daily schedules.

The show itself was a mixed bag of conversation about newsapers vs. blogging, development in Williamsburg, and the fate of the NYC real estate bubble. Gersh is a lively and fun moderator and Brownstoner and Gowanus Lounge are both very articulate and comfortable in front of the camera.

I revealed on the show that I lived on North 6th Street in 1984.

“Whoa. You were quite a pioneer,” Gersh said. “Why’d you leave?”

I broke up with the boyfriend I was living with.

The show first airs on Friday, Oct. 19 at 9 pm and is repeated on Monday, Oct. 22 at 1 pm; Tuesday, Oct. 23 at 1:30 and 9:30 pm; and Thursday, Oct. 25 at 2 and 10 pm.

BCAT appears on channel 56 for Time-Warner customers and channel 69 for Cablevision subscribers.

Old First Church has a very difficult situation on its hands. It is the homeless men who live on Old First’s steps.

Pastor Daniel Meeter of Old First Church has a post on his blog about these men. He wants to share with the community who they are and why the church has decided, reluctantly, to let them stay there.

In many ways, Pastor Meeter is at the end of his rope about this. “We chased them away every morning. They came back every night. We threw out their stuff. They found new stuff. Only now they started getting even more hostile, to us and to other passersby. We finally found that we couldn’t beat them, and the only thing was to try to control it. Yes, they beat us.”

While they cause him a great deal of trouble and anger, Meeter concludes that these men “remain human beings, images of God, and they need to be treated with respect.”

At the same time, Meeter recognizes that the church belongs to the community and that the church has the responsiblity to be a good neighbor. These men scare kids, make lewd comments at women and passersby.

The situation is forcing Pastor Meeter and the community to look deeply within and figure out what is the right thing to do.

“It is a grief, and we’re at our wits end,” writes Meeter. “We have been unable to find any solution. In a strange way, the three of them are in control. Robert, Will, and Franklin

“They have names. They have souls. They belong to our community. They tell us something about ourselves.

Here’s an excerpt from his Pastor Meeter’s post on Old First Blog:

They have names. They have souls. They belong to our community. They tell us something about ourselves.

Their names are Robert Royster, Will Franklin, and Frank. They cause me a great deal of trouble, and lots of anger from our neighbors, and I do wish they would go away, but, whatever else, they remain human beings, images of God, and they need to be treated with respect.

People keep asking why don’t we get rid of them. We can’t. We’ve tried. Believe me, we have tried. They have abused our hospitality, they piss on our building, they leave food around, they leave garbage all over, they play their radio at great volumes (God forgive me, I have had to resort to theft against them to deal with that one). They are a pain in the neck. But we will not treat them as less than human beings.

We have tried to get rid of them. We’ve discovered the hard way that we can’t do it, we can’t beat them. Whenever I chase them away, they just wait an hour, two hours, and they come back. I go home at night, and they come back. No matter what we do or say, they come back.

I will confess a strong desire inside myself to just let them be. It’s Jesus’ church, not mine, not ours, and the New Testament is very clear about our hospitality to the poor. “The poor you will always have with you.” The parable of Lazarus. Etc. You get the point. And there is no asterix pointing to a codicil that says, “the nice poor.”

But at the same time I recognize we belong to a community, and the church has the responsiblity to be a good neighbor, and if the guys scare the kids, and make lewd comments at women and passersby, and if they leave food scraps around for vermin to get at, etc. etc., then, well, I know that the church has to be a good neighbor. So we decided this last July that they absolutely had to go. We tried to get rid of them. As I said, we couldn’t…

READ THE REST AT OLD FIRST BLOG

Brooklyn Reading Works presents poets Phillis Levin, Andrea Baker, Patricia Spears Jones, and Tom Sleigh featured in the book, Broken Land: Poems of Brooklyn. The Old Stone House at Fifth Avenue and 3rd Street. at 8 p.m. $5. donation. Includes light refreshments.

Brooklyn, crouching forever in the shadow of Manhattan, is perhaps best known for a certain bridge or for the world-renowned tackiness of Coney Island. When it comes to literary history, Brooklyn can also seem dwarfed by its sister borough-until you take a closer look. As unlikely as it may sound, for more than two centuries Brooklyn has inspired poets and poetry. Although there are plenty of poetry anthologies devoted to specific regions of the United States, Broken Land is the first to focus exclusively on verse that celebrates Brooklyn. And what remarkable verse it is.

Edited by poets Julia Spicher Kasdorf and Michael Tyrell, this collection of 135 notable poems reveals the many cultural, ethnic, aesthetic, and religious traditions that have accorded Brooklyn its enduring place in the American psyche. Dazzling in its selections, Broken Land offers poetry from the colonial period to the present, including contributions from the American poets most closely associated with Brooklyn-Walt Whitman, Hart Crane, and Marianne Moore-as well as memorable poems from Elizabeth Bishop, Allen Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, George Oppen, and Charles Reznikoff. Also included are a wide range of contemporary works from both established and emerging poets: Derek Walcott, Galway Kinnell, C.K. Williams, Amy Clampitt, Martin Espada, Lisa Jarnot, Marilyn Hacker, Tom Sleigh, D. Nurkse, Donna Masini, Michael S. Harper, Noelle Kocot, Joshua Beckman, and many others.

With its expansive array of poetic styles and voices, Broken Land mirrors the borough’s diversity, toughness, and surprising beauty. The requirements for inclusion in this volume were simple: excellent poems that pay tribute in some way to the land that Dutch settlers, translating from the Algonquin, called “Gebroken landt.” But it is the phrase emblazoned on borough billboards that best serves to entice readers into entering this book: “Welcome to Brooklyn, Like No Other Place in the World.”

Go to McBrooklyn and read about the death of a MCI Worldcom public telephone and bottles in the trees at Metrotech.

But for my money, his piece about what remains of Schrafft’s on Fulton Street takes the cake. My sister and I lunched at a Madison Avenue Schrafft’s every Saturday with my grandmother. Hot Butterscotch Sundae. Thanks for the memories, McBrooklyn.

There was a time when everybody ate at Schrafft’s.

Schrafft’s was known for wholesome, all-American fare, served by fresh-faced Irish waitresses. Mothers and children ate there; so did movie stars. Schrafft’s restaurants were located in high-end shopping districts, like Fulton Street in Downtown Brooklyn…

Read more at McBrooklyn.

Kane’s record release party is turning into quite a line-up of local teen singer/songwriters.

Kane, one of the members of the blues duo, Dulaney Banks, has come out with an album of his original songs. I haven’t heard it yet but my expectations are sky high based on his excellent guitar and vocal work with Dulaney Banks. Here are the deets:

October, 19 2007 at Rocky Sullivan’s of Red Hook
34 Van Dyke st. (corner of Dwight st), Brooklyn, New York 11231
Cost :

DEMO RELEASE/SINGER SONGWRITER SHOWCASE, feat: Jonathan Edelstein, Tola Brennan, Joe Endozo, Matt Feldman, Henry Crawford, Window Sign Language, Josh Weidmann, Kane.

Hear Kane’s music here.

Luna Park Gazette is the host of this Sunday’s blogfest. Here’s his shout-out. I took it off of LPG. The picture makes me laugh.

All right, all you Kings County bloggers, it’s time to come out from behind the keyboard and face the world. Or at least one part of it.

On Sunday, Oct. 21, I will be hosting Blogade, a monthly meeting of Brooklyn bloggers in beautiful downtown Bay Ridge. (I don’t if it’s really downtown, but I like how that sounds.)

This is my first time hosting one of these events, so naturally I’m a nervous wreck. The bloggers group has its own web page, but we want to reach out to all bloggers in Brooklyn.

The Who: You. That is, you, if you blog in Brooklyn.

The Where: Omonia Cafe, 7612 Third Avenue, Brooklyn, NY. For about 8 bucks you get a delicious pastry and a damn good cup of coffee.

The When: 1 p.m. to about 4 p.m.

The Why: Meet, greet, mingle, schmooze, kibbutz, and sound off about your blog or anything else that might be bugging you.

This is a great group of people and it is diverse as hell. I’ve traveled to parts of my borough that I never would have dreamed of going–and I’m so glad I did.

But we need more: We need you.

So shoot me an e-mail and tell me about you and your blog. Tell me what part of Brooklyn you’re from and please include your blog’s URL.

Please note: if there are any changes to the above plan, I will post a notice and contact everybody by e-mail.

What can I say, people? That’s just the kind of guy I am.

I wish you all peace, love, kindness, and plenty of cream cheese.

This from NY 1:

The founder and former principal of the city’s new Arab language and
culture school announced Tuesday evening that she is suing the
Department of Education and re-applying for her job.

Debbie Almontaser resigned in August under criticism for not
condemning the use of the word intifada on t-shirts. Intifada is an
Arabic term commonly used to refer to the Palestinan uprising against
Israel.

However, now she says the DOE violated her Constitutional rights by
basically forcing her to resign and turned its back on her when the
controversy got heated.

"In fact, they should have said that the attacks against me are utterly baseless," said Almontaser.

Some of the school’s planning committee, religious leaders, and local lawmakers came out to support Almontaser.

“Everyone has a right to free speech,” said City Councilman John
Liu. “The DOE and this administration acted totally irresponsibly and
violated the trust placed in them in what they allowed to happen to
Debbie Almontasser.

Brooklyn State Assemblyman Dov Hikind was one of those who
protested the school since the beginning. He dismissed Almontaser’s
application, saying her resignation should stand.

“She decided to resign,” he said. “Whether she did it on her own,
or was encouraged by the administration in the city to do that, it was
a good thing that she left.”

Almontaser says she’s the most qualified educator to run the
school. The DOE says that it will not consider her application,
although there is an active search for a new principal.

A spokesperson for the DOE also says that Almonster is currently an employee of the DOE who is being paid about $120,000 a year.

Khalil Gibran International Academy in Brooklyn opened its doors to 55 students this September.

What a story. And Brooklyn Paper has bragging rights. The story spread from coast to coast.  A summons for chalk drawings on a Brooklyn stoop? Come on.

A 6-year-old Park Slope girl is facing a $300 fine from the city for
doing what city kids have been doing for decades: drawing a pretty
picture with common sidewalk chalk.

Obviously not all of Natalie
Shea’s 10th Street neighbors thought her blue chalk splotch was her
best work — a neighbor called 311 to report the “graffiti,” and the
Department of Sanitation quickly sent a standard letter to Natalie’s
mom, Jen Pepperman.

Can somebody stop these bureaucrats before they Kafka again?

“PLEASE
REMOVE THE GRAFFITI FROM YOUR PROPERTY,” the Sanitation Department
warning letter read. “FAILURE TO COMPLY … MAY RESULT IN ENFORCEMENT
ACTION AGAINST YOU.”