Peter Seeger, Gloria Steinem and others have emialed me about the Working Famiies Party. Remember VOTE ROW E ON TUESDAY.

Pete Seeger has recorded a special election message for you.
It’s 38 seconds long, and it’ll make you smile. Please take a moment to
listen to it, and if you agree with his message then forward this email to everyone you know.

You can hear Pete’s message at:

http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/countonme/seeger.html

See who else is voting Working Families and why at:

http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/countonme/endorsements.html

Vote Working Families!

Sam Williams, Bertha Lewis, and Bob Master

WFP Co-Chairs

Dan Cantor

WFP Executive Director

http://wfpjournal.blogspot.com/

http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/

P.S. Check out our election event calendar and add election events at
http://freecal.brownbearsw.com/WFP

I found this on the New York Road Runner’s site: The big day is on Sunday. The runners run down Fourth Avenue…

ONE RACE: 37,000 STORIES
        [Watch]
        [Read the Stories]

Follow all the action of Race Week right here. [Gallery]

Have You Read Your Daily Tip? [Daily Tip #29 ]

Get official ING New York City Marathon 2006 gear now! [Store]

Our spectator guide is the insider’s way to watch the marathon. [Spectator Guide]

Race Day Tracker will be available on November 5

On the ING New York City Marathon website, there have been daily tips for runner’s in training. Here’s today’s tip.

Last Minute Pick-Me-Ups

We’ve
already told you what not to do in these last days before the ING New
York City Marathon: no long walks through famous museums, no
experimenting with new shoes or energy gels, and don’t even think about
indulging in a new and exciting ethnic cuisine! But if you’re looking
for something to do during these last pre-marathon days, look no
farther than the ING New York City Marathon Health and Fitness Expo.

Advice for your last run before the marathon on Sunday from the ING NYC Marathon website.

In this final week before the ING New York City Marathon 2006, you
should run no more than 15 or 20 miles all together, not including the
race, and take one or two days off completely. When you choose to do
your last run before the marathon is a matter of personal preference.
Some runners feel looser and more confident if they run the day before
the race, others find taking that day off gets them to the starting
line with maximum energy. Just make certain that you last run is as
planned and deliberate as all the training that has come before it.
Here’s how your last run can serve as the perfect cap to your months of
training.

Keep it positive. The last
run serves a few purposes, mostly mental. It can help you physically to
work out the kinks of waiting, and mentally to reconnect with your
inner runner. The final run warms up your muscles, says coach Mike
Keohane, but it also gives you a chance to soak in some of ambiance of
New York during race week. “Run a little of the course at the lower end
of Central Park—it’s exciting to see the banners up on the lampposts,”
he says.

Karen Zukowski sent me information about her beautiful new book, CREATING THE ARTFUL HOME: the Aesthetic Movement.

This book is the first in-depth look at late 19th century American home design and its cultural context. Average housewives transformed the radical premise of the Aesthetic Movement — art for art’s sake — into beautiful, nurturing homes. They believed that artful homes made people better, families happier and society stronger.

You can purchase the book HERE.

Yesterday, the city unveiled crosswalk signals that count down the
seconds before the light changes.

In addition to the traditional dual display — a person walking and a
raised hand — the new signals contain timers that display the number of
seconds before the raised hand stops flashing and stays steady.

The signals will be
used at five intersections — one in each borough — in a six-month pilot
project. If the project is shown to improve safety, many of the more
than 100,000 pedestrian signals citywide could eventually be replaced
with the countdown signals.

Cities including Albany, Baltimore, Boston, Detroit, Las
Vegas and Washington use them, as well as smaller cities and towns. But
in New York City, crossing the street is no simple matter.

They’ve got them in San Francisco, too and they work beautifully there.

Standing
yesterday on a sidewalk at Kings Highway and Coney Island Avenue in
Brooklyn, where one of the first five signals had been installed, Mayor
Michael R. Bloomberg
said, “It would take a world-class psychologist to understand and
describe the way New Yorkers cross busy intersections such as this one.”

At the Brooklyn intersection, pedestrians have 18
seconds. The length of time to cross — which is based on street width
and traffic activity — is not changing at those intersections.

The Mayor said: “We hope the countdown will
cause people who haven’t stepped off the curb to think twice before
doing so, and also reassure those who are already in the crosswalk that
they don’t need to panic, but should consider picking up the pace."

Yeah, right.

The four other intersections
with the new signals are Southern Boulevard and East 149th Street in
the Bronx; Avenue of the Americas and West Eighth Street in Manhattan;
Hillside Avenue and 179th Place in Queens; and Hylan Boulevard and New
Dorp Lane in Staten Island.

THREE GREAT WRITERS YOU WON’T WANT TO MISS ON NOVEMBER 16, 2006 at 8 p.m.

ELISSA SCHAPPELL, ILENE STARGER and DARCEY STEINKE

Elissa Schappell is the author of USE ME, which was nominated for a
Pen/Hemingway award. She is co-editor with Jenny Offill of THE FRIEND WHO GOT AWAY and the forthcoming MONEY CHANGES EVERTYTHING. The  co-founder of TIN HOUSE with Rob Spillman and Win McCormick, Elissa also writes the HOT
TYPE column in Vanity Fair.

Ilene Starger, is a poet whose work has appeared in
Bayou, Oyez Review, Georgetown Review, and numerous other magazines.
She was a finalist for the 2005 Ann Stanford Prize.

Darcey Steinke is the author of SUICIDE BLONDE (chosen as a New York Times notable book of the year), UP FROM THE WATER and JESUS SAVES.

BROOKLYN READING WORKS  at the Old Stone House. Fiction. Non-Fiction. Memoir. Poetry. Drama. Curated by LOUISE G. CRAWFORD Go here for a map and directions to the Old Stone House.
The Old stone House is located in JJ Byrne Park on Fifth Avenue between
3rd and 4th Street. 8 p.m. $5.00 includes light refreshments. Books are
sold at all readings.

Parents with babies, toddlers, young children, and even older children won’t want to miss CHOCOLATE CHIP MUSIC at the Old First Reformed Church on Saturday.

Local piano and flute teacher and kid’s music dynamo, Helen Richman, put together this series of fun, informative, and entertaining concerts for kids.

What:  How DOES an Elephant Dance?  Featuring Classical Violin and Piano works with area
professional and student dancers

Where:  Old First Reformed Church; Lower Hall; 126 7th Ave. at the corner of Carroll St. in Park Slope, Brooklyn

When:  This Saturday, November 4th at 10 and 11:30 a.m.

Tickets:  $5 each at the door (free for babies under one)– available 30 minutes prior to concert start times

More information available on our website:  www.chocolatechipmusic.org
By email at: info@chocolatechipmusic.org or by phoning (718) 638-8300.

We hope to see you Saturday!

Look what’s happening next week:

GREEN BROOKLYN 2006:  The Sustainable City
Date: Thursday, November 9th, 11:30 am – 5:30 pm
Location: Borough Hall (209 Joralemon Street Brooklyn, NY)
Directions: Take the M/R Train to Court Steet, or the 2/3/4/5 Train to
Borough Hall

Brooklyn Center for the Urban Environment is excited to present the
2006 Green Brooklyn Conference: The Sustainable City, sponsored by
Consolidated Edison. With keynote speakers, discussion panels, hands-on
workshops, and exhibitor tables; the conference will bring new energy
and excitement to discourse on the built and natural environments and
how to transform Brooklyn and all of New York into a more sustainable
city. Keynote speakers include: Jeffrey Hollender (CEO of Seventh
Generation) and Matthew Berman (Winner of Global Green USA Sustainable
Design Competition for New Orleans and co-founder of workshop/apd
architecture studio).

   The moderated discussion panels are entitled, "The Built Environment:
Sustainable Development for the 21st Century" and "The Natural
Environment: Conservation, Energy and Sustainable Food for a Cleaner
Greener Environment." Workshop topics are: Transportation Alternatives
and Worms: Turning Waste to Wonder. Panelists and Exhibitors will
include representatives from: Council on the Environment of NYC, NYC
Office of Sustainable Design, NYSERDA, Earth Pledge, Slow Food USA,
Bettencourt Green Building Supplies, Jonathan Rose Companies, Green
Maps, Food Change, Sustainable South Bronx, and many more. Product
donors include: 3R Living, Annie’s Homegrown, Equal Exchange, Keeper
Springs, and more.

   Admission is FREE.

He was in London. This from New York 1:

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz is in London this week to
encourage tourists to include a trip to Brooklyn on their New York
itinerary.

Markowitz will sell the land of fish and chips on Brooklyn’s great
fare and trumpet the borough’s museums, parks and diverse
neighborhoods.

He will meet with the London deputy mayor to share common successes and challenges.

He will also be doing a little touring. He’s been invited to attend
"Evita" at the Adelphi Theatre and also attend a New York wine tasting
event.

Posted on Chowhound:

Just walked by the former Night & Day and noticed they had put
up the "Biscuit BBQ" sign and there was a notice saying they’re opening
for dinner tonight (Oct. 30th). Also included in the notice was a
lengthy explanation of why Night & Day was converting to Biscuit –
I can’t remember all of it but it basically said that they went through
several "self-important" chefs before hiring Cohen and seemed to
suggest that maybe he persuaded them to go the BBQ route since N&D
had never really turned the corner (to profitability presumably).
Anyway, looking forward to the reviews!

A groundbreaking for junior golf center in Dyker Heights. This from New York 1:

Local school children and avid golfer Mayor Michael Bloomberg were
on hand to break ground on the new project Wednesday. By next year at
this time, Dyker Beach Park in Brooklyn will be home to the first ever
public junior golf center in the city and in the nation.

“This is a great investment in our city’s future because for years
to come it’s going to help young New Yorkers develop their love for the
game and their sportsmanship,” said Bloomberg.

The 11.8 acre space will hold a six-hole golf course, driving
range, and practice facility with free golf instruction. A clubhouse
featuring a classroom learning center and an outdoor seating area will
also be in store.

“We now have a lot of kids that can really play the game,” said
City Parks Foundation Sports Director Mike Silverman. “We decided if we
could find a piece of land in New York that was available and free, we
would try to build a facility just for kids.”

“Ever since Tiger Woods hit the scene, every city kid wants to
learn and play golf so this is meeting the need and it teaches them a
great sport for life,” said David Rivel, executive director of City
Parks Foundation. “And even if they don’t become great golfers, they
will become comfortable on the course and learn about etiquette and
sportsmanship.”

The $6 million Junior Golf Center is expected to be completed and
open to the public in September of 2007 and avid junior golfers are
already anxious to give this new course a try.

“I think it would be really great because I think we can now
practice during the whole year,” said Jessica Plotnikov, a golfer. “And
we don’t have to travel anywhere and it’s really close.

“It’s an active sport that kids like and they want to join it,”
added another young golfer, Elijah Broderick. “It’s a good idea for
them to build this place.

The City Parks Foundation has been sponsoring free golf programs
for kids since 1999. Come next fall, there will be a new place for kids
from ages five to 17 to swing away.

-Michelle Yu

For those who can’t make it to either of their shows at Joe’s Pub on Sundays November 5th and 12th, you can buy Capapthia Jenkins and Louis Rosen’s new CD, South Side Stories (Rose Cap Records) at Community Bookstore on Seventh Avenue. It’s got all my favorite songs on it: the first cut is worth the CD price alone: Lucky, Lucky Girl

To My
Brooklyn Friends,

 

Just wanted to let everyone know who’s interested that Catherine at the
Community Bookstore on 7th Avenue is generously stepping in and filling the void
left by the closing of the music store, Sound Tracks, and is now selling the new
CD that Capathia Jenkins and I just released, SOUTH SIDE STORIES. And of course, Capathia (another
Park Sloper) and I are very grateful for her support.

 

If you prefer to shop online, the CD will continue to be available at
http://cdbaby.com/cd/jenkinsrosen;
or
for those who don’t use a computer, at 1 800 BUY MY CD (1 800 289 6923),

 

By the way, for those who like to read what critics have to say, we just
picked up our first review for our current Joe’s Pub engagement from Jeremy
Gerard at BloombergNews.com—its Arts section comes under the heading of
"Muse"–and we’re delighted that he loved the show and the new songs.

 

Best Regards,

Louie

Did you see that guy dressed as Elvis Preslety in a red jumpsuit. It was City Councilman David Yasky.

No sign of Marty Markowitz at the parade.

Paprika, as always, played their percussive hearts out at the head of the parade.

Blinking devil ears were the hot $5 dollar item.

Funniest: The Devil in a Blue Dress (our friend and neighbor outdid himself).

OSFO added devil ears to her princess costume = devilish princess.

Was there more dancing than usual? I thought so.

Those skaters with the white masks, black robes, and long, extending arms were no where to be found.

Creative costume: Two girls: one washer and one dryer.

In a similar vein: Friend of OSFO dressed up as a box of Ritz crackers.

Best family costume: A leprachan holding a pot of gold; the baby as the gold, mom as the rainbow.

Best sandwich board costume: "Got kids into middle school and high school. Finaly have time but no energy left. Sorry no costume."

No Brooklyn Brides or Brooklyn Angels. Overall, the parade was low on architectural or anti-development costumes.

Razor Apple had this photo of Fort Green’s big rock all dressed up for Halloween. How cute.

This from New York 1:

Just days after fire gutted through
a Brooklyn church, parishioners gathered for Sunday mass. NY1’s Amanda
Farinacci was there and filed the following report.

Calling it God’s mission, some two dozen parishioners showed up for
mass at the Iglesia Presbyterian Memorial Church, only two days after a
fire burned through its doors.

“It was definitely a great devastation, but we’re hopeful that
everything is going to be restored and we’re still going to be coming
here and serving God the way we’re supposed to, so we’re happy about
that,” said parishioner Judy Reyes.

A three-alarm fire tore through the 125-year-old Park Slope Church
Friday, gutting its rectory and a community space used for day care and
local events. No one was inside during the early morning fire, but the
flames left the beloved church, home to hundreds of Hispanics in the
community, in ruins. Fire officials have ruled the fire an accident,
possibly a problem with the heating system.

Church organizers now say they believe in miracles, because two
irreplaceable Tiffany stained glass windows were undamaged in the fire
and a glass case holding the gifts of the communion went untouched.

“When we walked in the building, even the glass was out of smoke,
nothing has happened in that area, and God has preserved that because
it’s holy and to anoint the people,” said Pedro Montalvo of Iglesia
Presbyterian Church.

The church is classified as a landmark by the city Department of
Buildings. Organizers say the fire has taught them to appreciate the
historic building, and inspired them to expand its mission of serving
God and the community:

“We have so many plans for the future and god is going to use this
to help us obtain those goals and objectives that we have,” said Anna
Davila, who has been a parishioner of the church for 10 years.

Insurance appraisers are expected at the church this week to assess
the damage. Meanwhile, the church will keep to its normal mass
schedule, believing nothing can keep its parishioners from attending
services.

– Amanda Farinacci
            
            
       
   
 
 

This was Halloween last year.
   
   
      

 Halloween
morning, the kids popped out of bed early, ready for their breakfast
candy. "Stop stealing from the trick or treat bowl. That’s for later,"
Hepcat bellowed. Even Teen Spirit, who is historically difficult to
rouse in the morning, was up and ready for high school in record time,
his pockets stuffed with Hershey’s kisses.

The Oh So Feisty One
packed her cowgirl chaps in her pink backpack. "Just in case my teacher
lets us put on our costumes." This was unlikely because her school
prohibits any recognition of Halloween in sensitivity to the children
whose religious beliefs prevent them from participating.

Smartmom
tried to get some work done Monday but by 2 p.m, she
surrendered to the reality that Monday afternoon and evening were for
one thing and one thing only: Halloween.

First crisis of the day
was the case of the missing cowboy hat: OSFO searched the apartment
high and low. Smartmom finally unearthed it underneath Teen Spirit’s
bed.

Second crisis: Teen Spirit needed a shirt for his impromptu
pirate costume. "You can wear this black shirt of Dad’s." Smartmom told
him. "No he can’t," Hepcat screamed from the living room. "That’s my
special shirt."

"it’s alright, mom," Teen Spirit told Smartmom ever-attentive to Hepcat’s  moods.

They
did manage to find a billowy white shirt in the closet. Teen Spirit
strapped on his belt, plastic sword, and the pirate hat he’d purchased
at Rite Aid, ready to join a band of roving teenage pirates who were
waiting downstairs.

Aargh.

Trick or Treating on Seventh
Avenue, OSFO was, characteristically, driven to procure as much candy
as she could possibly fit into her shopping bag. They were joined by
Ducky, Groovy Aunt’s newly adopted one-year-old daughter from Russia,
who was dressed in a zip-up bunny costume with little paw gloves and a
cloth carrot.

Her first Halloween ever – god knows what Ducky
was thinking. Big brown eyes open wide, she inhaled the crazy costumed
scene from her stoller.

The group went back to Groovy Aunt’s
for some apartment-building style trick or treating. Volume is what
that’s all about. "Let’s see," OSFO calculated. "They’ve got six floors
and eight apartments on each floor…”

OSFO hasn’t learned her multiplication tables yet, but still, that’s a lot of candy.

Third Crisis: OSFO developed Halloween fatigue mixed with an acute case of "not being the center of attention."

That
darn baby in that darn bunny suit: Ducky was sucking all the attention
out of the room with a straw. OSFO ripped off her cowgirl chaps and
flung her Payless cowgirl boots across the living room and staged a a
world-class snitsky. Arms tightly crossed, she faced a wall and snarled. The only remedy: a large does of alone time.

Rejuvenated
by a few minutes of quiet and three mini Twix bars, OSFO was ready for
a little trick or treating and the Halloween parade. "The houses with
the Jack-O-lanterns are the ones with the candy," she said with the
assuredness of a seasoned navigator. Racing up and down the brownstone
stoops, she rang on door bells and filled her bag with more candy.

Crisis
number four: By the time they got to the parade, it was over. The
streets were filled with teenagers. Teen Spirit was spotted in front of
Starbucks with a can of shaving cream – horror of horrors. Strange to
say, with all her worries about sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll, Smartmom
never once imagined he’d be a shaving cream trickster.

Live and learn. Hepcat trailed Teen Spirit and the teenage pirates to Barnes and Noble and insisted that he be home by nine.

Before
bedtime, OSFO weighed her Halloween treat bag on the bathroom scale:
"I’ve got five pounds of candy. Don’t anybody touch it," she screamed
and then proceeded to stash it in her secret hide-a-way.

Halloween
Crisis number five: The day after Halloween, Teen Spirit couldn’t keep
his eyes open during English class. He fell asleep on his desk.
Smartmom hopes he didn’t snore. Now that would be very distracting.

How was your Halloween?

–Posted November 2005

Picture from flickr

They found this big rock in Fort Greene while digging a sewer line on Vanderbilt Avenue. Here’s the story from the New York Times and a great pix by Richard Termine!

New York Times: The rock is jagged, seven feet tall, very roughly nose-shaped, and covered with a fine, tawny dust. A contractor digging a sewer line yanked it out of the street bed on Tuesday and plunked it down at the curbside near Park Avenue.

Since then, life on Vanderbilt Avenue has been subtly transformed. Adults study the rock. Children trace shapes in its dusty face. Its gravitational force seems to have slowed life a notch. For those who have come to love the rock, it is a reminder that under the crust of the city lies the entire planet.

“It’s really kind of a visceral thing,” said Christopher P. Moore, a member of the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission who lives up the block from the rock. “You feel rocks, you feel the earth.”

Susan Raskin came home from work on Tuesday to find her dog barking at the rock in front of her house. Her cat seemed spooked by it, too. Ms. Raskin, a children’s social worker, was not scared. She thought the rock was one of the most lovely things she had ever seen.

“Maybe it wouldn’t be a big deal if I lived in Colorado and there were mountains,” she said yesterday morning as she stood beaming at the rock. “But I live here. This is a big thing.”

That it is, said the man who brought up the rock in the maw of his big yellow excavator.

“It weighs about 10 tons,” said the equipment operator, a scruffy man in a green sweatshirt named John, who declined to give his last name because of possible union difficulties. “I had to break the street a little wider to dig it out.”

Ann L. Buttenwieser, a former Parks Department
official, had the great idea 25 years ago of putting a swimming pool
on a barge and mooring it somewhere in the city’s 578 miles of
waterfront. Yesterday it became a reality. This from the New York Times.

Standing in a
terrace garden in Lower Manhattan yesterday, Ms. Buttenwieser watched
the Floating Lady float by after it glided under the Verrazano-Narrows
Bridge and past Governors Island. It is now more pool than cargo
hauler, but it is still not quite ready for its next life as a
destination for dog-paddling, backstroking New Yorkers.

It still
has to sidle into Pier 2 in Brooklyn Bridge Park, where the last of the
pipes and wires will be connected. And one more thing — it must be
filled with fresh water. It arrived full of rainwater from storms it
sailed through on the way north from the Louisiana shipyard where its
makeover began.

The pool is 25 meters long, or half the length
of an Olympic-size pool. For swimmers who never learned the metric
system, that works out to just over 82 feet. It will have seven lanes
and be four feet deep. Also on board will be dressing rooms with
bright-colored tops that look like outsize Legos.

It will not
stay at Pier 2 once the work is finished. The Parks Department, which
will operate it, has yet to decide exactly where it will go.

Ms.
Buttenwieser was excited as the Floating Lady passed yesterday. “It’s
like having a baby,” she said, “but there you only have to wait nine
months.”

Ms. Buttenwieser, 70, was so committed to the idea of
floating pools that she started a nonprofit organization, the Neptune
Foundation, to make them a reality. So far, the foundation has raised
$3 million of the Floating Lady’s $4 million construction cost.

Yes,
she was a swimmer in college, but her goal was to draw people to the
city’s underused waterfront. To design the pool she recruited Jonathan
Kirschenfeld, an architect who once designed a floating theater. (It
was never built, he said.)

As they explain it, wherever the
Floating Lady ends up, it will be attached to four uprights that will
hold it in place, sort of.

“If a fast ferry comes by and there
is a certain amount of wake, it will go up and down,” Ms. Buttenwieser
said. But it will not tilt much — seasickness is not expected to be a
problem on the Floating Lady — and the uprights will keep the Floating
Lady from drifting away from its pier.

Her idea for a floating
pool came along before the city turned a retired Staten Island ferry
boat into a jail. There has been talk of floating bus depots, floating
apartment buildings off Staten Island, floating lofts for artists off
Harlem.

“From the city’s point of view, the floating pool concept
is a very good one,” said the parks commissioner, Adrian Benepe.
“Building swimming pools is very, very expensive. And outdoor swimming
pools, they have a short life in the summer, and you have to find lots
of land for them, which can mean taking over park land that’s used for
something else. So a floating pool is an ideal solution.”

Today, on closing day at the Prospect Park Carousel, we all took a ride on the merry-go-round horses.

–Maybe it was because it was the last day or

–maybe it was because I hadn’t been there in at least five years or

–maybe it was silver haired man has been running it for as long as I’ve been bringing one of my children to the carousel (since 1991 with Teen Spirit, since 1998 with OSFO) or

–maybe it was the nostalgic music of the caliope or

–maybe it was the dead leaves falling all around or

–maybe it was my childhood memories of Sundays at the Central Park carousel or

–maybe it was because I was there with my sister, OSFO, and Ducky

but I had a very melancholic ride on the carousel today. I went into a kind of spinning revery thinking of times gone by and all the rides we’ve had together on that carousel and how quickly they/we/us have grown up.

It was a real Joni Mitchell moment. "And the seasons they go round and round and the painted ponies go up and down We’re captive on a carousel of time.."

"The Circle Game" not withstanding, it was a sort of blissed out melancholy if you know what I mean. I wanted to close my eyes and stay in it for as long as I could.

But the ride only lasted about five minutes.

NOVEMBER 5 and NOVEMBER 12 at 7 p.m. BROOKLYN’S OWN, CAPATHIA JENKINS AND LOUIS ROSEN AT JOE’S PUB

The team of outstanding Broadway vocalist CAPATHIA JENKINS and award-winning songwriter/performer LOUIS ROSEN returns to Joe’s Pub with their new band for three exciting concerts to celebrate the launch of their debut CD, SOUTH SIDE STORIES, a suite of songs of youth, coming of age and experience. The concerts will also include selections from the acclaimed TWELVE SONGS on poems by Maya Angelou, which debuted at Joe’s Pub last year in two sold-out concerts; and a preview from Rosen’s newest work for Ms. Jenkins, GIOVANNI SONGS, with words by the acclaimed poet Nikki Giovanni.

Ms. Jenkins’ is currently appearing on Broadway in "Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me," and has also been seen in "Caroline, Or Change," "The Civil War," and Bacharach and David’s "The Look of Love." Louis Rosen’s songs and theater music have been performed in concert halls, cabarets and theaters in New York and around the country. He was recently awarded a 2005-2006 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in Music Composition.

"Something quite magical can happen when a composer has a specific voice to serve as his muse. Consider the case of Louis Rosen, the Chicago-bred, now New York-based songwriter, and his songbird of choice, Capathia Jenkins…performing songs set to the poetry of Maya Angelou…and Rosen’s nostalgic, romantic, guilt-laced, emotionally charged song cycle, South Side Stories” – Chicago Sun-Times

and many, many more Iraqis. October was the 4th deadliest month since the war started.

Moveon.org wants to remind democratic voters that there are only 8DAYS left to win back Congress! You can sign up to make calls!

This year, victory will come down to voter turnout. We’ve found the Democratic-leaning people who often don’t vote in mid-term elections like this one. If we can just get these “unlikely voters” to vote, they’ll provide a winning margin in a whole bunch of races.

Over 30 races are in a dead heat – margins of a few thousand or few hundred votes.  We’ve tested these calls, and we know they work – the people we talk to are much more likely to turn out.  Your calls could tip the balance – but we’re in a daily struggle to make sure we’re reaching more voters than the Republicans’ infamous turnout program. Can you help? ATTEND A PHONE PARTY!

TAKE A TOUR of the Atlantic Yards footprint with Norman Oder of Atlantic Yards Report, who writes the best  journalism being writting about the yards bar none. He also runs NY Like a Native. Tours for the Curious.

This extensive tour will be offered on Saturday, November 4, at 1:30 p.m. The cost is $15/person. The rain date is Sunday November 12 at 1:30 p.m. Given that Mr. Oder does not give Atlantic Yards thumbnail treatment, the tour will last 2-2.5 hours. Meet up point is the Williamsburgh Savings Bank, Hanson Place at Flatbush Avenue. More information is available in Mr. Oder’s post about the walking tour or by clicking here for his New York Like a Native tours site.

SATURDAY FORECAST: Very windy. Heavy rain early. Drying out in the afternoon. Wind gusts could cause power outages and down trees.
Sunrise 7:21   Sunset  5:57
Record high 83,1919
Record low 29,1979.

Here’s this week’s Smartmom from the Brooklyn Papers 
 

Smartmom is mad as hell and she’s not going to take it anymore. You
should not send your kid to school if he’s throwing up or has diarrhea!

Sounds reasonable, huh? But the old Conventional Wisdom has been
turned upside-down, thanks to the insane competition to get into a good
middle school.

Last week, another parent told Smartmom’s friend, Lawyer Mom, that
it’s better to send her fourth-grader to school sick and then pick him
or her up later than risk too many absences on the child’s elementary
school record.

See, fourth grade is the year that matters for middle school
admissions and middle school admissions people look at testscores,
grades, absences and lateness.

And all things being equal, absence and lateness are the deal-breakers.

These middle schools don’t want the kids with the lousy alarm clock,
slacker parents, or compromised immune system. They want the kids whose
parents are stupid enough to send them to school when they’re sick.

Yeah, that’s the ticket.

Wouldn’t you know it, just days after this disturbing conversation
with her friend, Lawyer Mom’s son woke up with a stomachache,
accompanied by diarrhea, cramps, the works.

“Mommy, I can’t go to school,” came the young man’s voice from the bathroom.

Lawyer Mom’s body pulsed with worry as she heard her friend’s voice
echoing in her head: Send him to school. Send him to school. You can
always get him later after the teacher has taken attendance. Then he
can make his exit. But whatever you do: send him to school.

“Look,” she told her 9-year-old son through the bathroom door.
“You’re not going to die. Go for a couple of hours. If it gets really
bad, I’ll come pick you up.”

O righteous parent who does what is best for her child! Lawyer Mom
knew that, diarrhea or no diarrhea, she was investing in her child’s
future. Harvard, Yale, Upper Carroll Middle School. Visions of Phi Beta
Kappa were dancing in her head.

So what if he was coming down with a stomach virus? The present moment no longer exists: it’s all about the great big future.

Sure enough, the nurse called at 10:30 am. “I threw up,” he told his mother over the phone.

Lawyer Mom ran over the school (she lives a block away) and picked
up her son. She apologized profusely to him. Luckily, he’s an
easy-going guy. He didn’t mind too much that his mother had sacrificed
his health, his comfort, and the health of the other school children
for middle school.

Later, Lawyer Mom emailed her son’s teacher and told her what
happened. The teacher emailed back: “That’s the silliest thing I’ve
ever heard. He doesn’t have excessive absences. You’ll get other kids
sick.”

But what does that teacher know? She’s not the one choosing between
the 90-percent on-time student and the 89-percent on-time student.

Smartmom herself heard the head admissions honcho at High School for
Telecommunication Arts and Technology tell a group of parents point
blank that, because the school had many more applicants than it can
handle, she checks the number of lates that the child got in seventh
grade.

If there are more than 10, she said, she just scratches the name off the list. “Lateness is a big deal around here,” she said.

It’s no wonder parents are in a tizzy about these things.
Tizzies-R-Us. Last week, the New York Times revealed that parents are
holding their children back until they are 6-years-old for kindergarten
in order to give them an edge over their classmates.

What about a 12-year old kindergartner? Now, they’d definitely have
an edge over their classmates. Why not hold the kids until they’re 14
or 15, and let those teachers deal with adolescent angst. And no,
kiddo, you can’t work on your MySpace page during Choice Time.

Perhaps Smartmom is a bit sensitive on the topic because OSFO is not an early riser.

“If you don’t get moving, girlie,” Smartmom told her the other day,
“you’re not going to get into the middle school of your choice.”

“I care more about my sleep than middle school,” OSFO said pulling her blanket over her head.

“Okay,” Smartmom said trying not to go ballistic. “So if you get into a terrible middle school, don’t blame me.”

Smartmom could not believe what she was saying. But she couldn’t
stop herself: “I will not defend you when they ask me why you were five
minutes late more than 10 times.”

The OSFO stormed out of her bed, got dressed, and kept her hair
styling to a quick six, seven, eight (“Would you finish, already?”),
nine minutes.

Thankfully, they got to the schoolyard just in time. The OSFO
wouldn’t even look at her when she said goodbye. “I love you,” Smartmom
whispered but she was gone.

Smartmom felt ashamed of herself and terrible for the things she had
said to her terrific little girl, who, she hoped, wasn’t now completely
traumatized and afraid about middle school like her mother.

And fear is what it’s all about: fear of failing, of not having
enough; of not adequately preparing one’s children for the free market
economy that we live in; fear that they won’t measure up.

Mostly, Smartmom is afraid that she has succumbed to the real parent
trap: trying to do the right thing for your kid without really thinking
deeply about what the right thing is.

Later that day, Smartmom apologized to OSFO. “Good, maybe I won’t
have to hear about middle school first thing in the morning.” OSFO said
still smarting from what Smartmom had said.

Smartmom promised she’d never bring up the topic again. But she knew
she was lying. It was as inevitable as the occasional stomachache, a
bout of diarrhea, or parents behaving badly.

Thanks to Pastor Daniel Meeter, of Old First Church, who looked up 45 Montgomery in Francis Morrone’s gem of a book, "An Architectural Guidebook to
Brooklyn" (available at Community Bookstore — it used to be right on the front counter). Morrone has done follow up books about NYC and Philadelphia.

45 Montgomery Place was built 1898-99 by Babb, Cook, and Willard, the same
architects who went on to build the Carnegie Mansion on Fifth Avenue
and 91st Street in New York City. 45 Montgomery is French Renaissance style,
with rusticated granite base, a broad porch, limestone parlor floor,
and limestone-trimmed red brick above. "The most beautiful thing here
is the entrance with its elaborate consoles and superb central
cartouche."

Does everyone know about Francis Morrone: Go to his web site for more about this architectural historian/critic/wonderkind/city tour guide/general smart fellow. This weekend he is doing a tour of Midwood.

Fonda of Zuzu’s Petals had this priceless recollection to add. Even if it’s not the right house it’s a great story.

I think that house on Montgomery Place was the one owned by Cyril Golodner who, with her husband, raised their family there. I met Cyril
quite a while ago, right after her husband passed away. Her daughter
from way out of town had ordered flowers from me for Mothers Day and Cyril made her way down to the shop to tell me…in a really unpleasant
way…. just how much she didn’t like them.

I don’t know how i did it
but instead of getting all defensive and bent out of shape, I was able
to see how lonely she was and whatever i did, she left smiling. Over
the next 10 years we became pretty familiar. She’d come to the shop and
ask me to fill a small vase when one of her kids was coming to visit.

We
always had long conversations while I put the flowers together. She was
smart, funny, tough. I liked her alot. When she decided to put the
house on the market we had a long talk about how that felt for
her…..hard, and sad.

I heard she died recently. She’d moved away and
lost touch. S i am thinking of her right now and can just see her face
and hear that bark of a laugh she had….

"6 million plus". yeah…you
go girl."

If it’s not cyril’s house then, gilda ratner it…."never mind"

Everyone’s got the story. CONEY ISLAND: AS REDEVELOPMENT BEGINS: MANY RIDES MAY NOT BE AROUND NEXT SUMMER! Gowanus Lounge has a major wrap up today of all the blog coverage. This from the Daily News:

Close the Zipper and shoo the Spider.

Those amusement rides – along with go-carts, batting cages and carny
games – have been ordered out of a Coney Island site as redevelopment
begins.

"Everybody’s heartbroken," said Eddie Miranda, who has owned the W.
12th St. rides, including the Zipper and the Spider, for eight years.
"We were all hoping for one more season."

Eight renters received notice last week from their properties’ new
owner, developer Thor Equities, telling them to be out when their
leases expire Dec. 31.

Six tenants are in the Henderson Building on Stillwell Ave., a
turn-of-the century structure that once housed a dance hall and hotel.
The other two are are along W. 12th St. and Stillwell Ave. Combined,
they operate more than a dozen businesses.

"This means a lot because I’ve been here for so long," said Maritza
Suriano, the owner of a souvenir shop in the Henderson Building for 20
years. "For them to throw us out, it shouldn’t be like this."

But Thor Equities says the move is just the first step in a $1.5
billion plan to revitalize the famed Brooklyn waterfront neighborhood.

The redevelopment plan calls for a new promenade on Stillwell Ave.
along with residential, entertainment and amusement components, Thor
Equities spokesman Lee Silberstein said.

"The effort to transform Coney Island and recapture its past glory
involves the demolition of a number of existing structures,"
Silberstein said. "Therefore, to allow the new development to proceed
in a timely manner, occupancy agreements with some of the tenants are
not being renewed."