Gersh Kuntzman is the editor of The Brooklyn Paper, and he has done an excellent job of just plain turning that paper on. We all want to read it every week. It’s got vigor and color and lots of local news. The paper’s coverage of the Atlantic Yards scandal has been pivotal and courageous. If the paper gets a little racy and edgy, well, we can bear it.

And as he would say at this point: “Uhoh. What’s the matter.”

Here it is: I have been very unhappy at The Brooklyn Paper’s slant in covering the controversies over the Kahlil Gibran International Academy and its future principal, Ms. Debbie Almontaser. It’s not that any of the information reported is wrong. My problem is with the way it’s pitched, the tone of the headlines, the rather sensationalist vocabulary, and the continued connection of two discrete issues: the school’s mission and the school’s location at PS 282.

The May 12 edition, for example, calls the recent events a “debacle”. That’s what I mean by slant and pitch. Well. I rather think it’s not a debacle but the opposite: a heroic achievement against great odds.

Disclosure: I am a member of the school’s advisory council (along with other pastors, rabbis, and imams). So I am hardly without interest in the matter. READ MORE AT OLD FIRST BLOG

Lucas sent a comment to OTBKB this morning. Here it is:

My name is Lucas (no relation to the Luke mentioned above, other than
we are neighbors) and I live in the top apartment of the building.

Regardless of how it was started and what will happen to the Pizza
Plus, I would just like people to be aware that our landlord and his
insurance company are seriously telling us to stay in a shelter and
have given us no information at all about what to do or when and if we
can move back in or access our things.

The insurance guy, “Harold,” who
would not give me his company name over the phone, is even telling us
that for two weeks we are not to touch anything and when asked about
when cleanup efforts might begin, “It’ll happen when it happens.”

Fortunately, it seems we all have places to stay and great support from
our friends or family for the time being but the landlord and his
insurance are not fulfilling their obligation in any way to take care
of the displaced tenants. I

If they have not, I would recommend that Luke
and the other tenants in his apartment contact the Red Cross as they have
been extremely responsive and helpful in terms of emergency resources
and advice.

For those of you wondering what’s going in on Garfield east of Seventh Avenue I have The Answer (thanks for the pix and the info to Gowanus Lounge). It’s a new Korean restaurant
called MOIM. I happen to love Korean food.

It will be the first Korean restaurant in Park Slope, I think.

I hope they have:

photo: Kate Rockwood

Bibimbap, a tasty dish with white rice, sauteed veggies (meat or tofu optional) occasional egg and chili pepper
paste get mixed together. There’s also  dolsot bibimbap,
the same dish served in a heated stone bowl that’s been coated with
sesame oil so that the outer layer of rice crisps into a golden brown.
We’ve dipped our spoon in a few of the best.

The Brooklyn Repertory Opera will perform Mozart and Da Ponte’s sublime comic masterpiece, "Cosi fan Tutte," at the Brooklyn Lyceum in Park Slope on: Saturday afternoons (2PM),
June 2 and 9; and Sunday afternoons (3PM), June 17 and 24.

Steve Vasta conducts with the Hellgate Harmonie Orchestra.

These performances will be very accessible, immediate and affordable as close to opera in a chamber music setting as you can get. The audience will sithe audience will sit practically amidst the action. Children will wonder at the incredible voices and the vast array of instruments.

Should  be great fun and appropriate for all ages.
Tickets: $20; students and seniors: $10. 
Because of the intimate space, seating is limited!
To order tickets:
Brooklyn Lyceum – www.brooklynlyceum.com- Tel:
866-GOWANUS
For more information:
Brooklyn Repertory Opera – www.bropera.org
Hellgate Harmonie – www.hellgateharmonie.com

Luke got in touch this morning to thank me for posting about him. He’s one of the tenents whose apartment was destroyed. He lost everything. He’s only 19 years old and it sounds like he’s really struggling. In my reply I asked him to be specific about what he needs. I will post a wish list here as soon as he gets back to me. Here’s what Luke had to say this morning:

I wanted to make sure you knew some other tenants were struggling too,
i met a guy named mike who was above my room. He’s having a hard time, our rooms were the ones that got destroyed the most.

Mike, please get in touch, too. Email: Louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Luke is the name of one of the tenents who  lost everything in the Pizza Plus fire. He sent me a note this morning. I found his  My Space page and listened to his music and see that he has an album out called "After Dark."

Thank you Luke for getting in touch. Please send me your email. For now, if anyone wants to donate to the Help Luke Fund or knows of ways to help him out, email me: louise_crawford@yahoo.com.  Here’s some info about Luke from his My Space page.

"I am 19 years old and moved to New York from the deep woods
& shallow waters of Brunswick, Maine in August, 2006, staying on
his brother’s couch deep inside the upper burroughs, before moving into
the darkness of the Charlie Pineapple Theater Company on North 8th, an
abandoned theater loft in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. He’s since left for
higher ground and has been living in and around Brooklyn ever since."

Here is an excerpt from the email he sent me this morning.

"I am the writer/songwriter who lost all his stuff in the fire,
unfortunately it was not backed up, and I am homeless now.

It is a
shame because our landlord has refused to help out in any way, telling
me to "go to the Red Cross." I have gone back to the apartment a couple
times but don’t feel like going back anymore, (my room is literally a
bunch of rubble, I can see through the floor to Pizza Plus).

It is a
shame that the Park Slope community doesn’t know who I am, as I feel
for Pizza Plus and they’re lapse in business that results, but as you
said, there was no renter’s insurance to our apartment, and where Pizza {lus can rebuild – I am left with everything destroyed and no clue what
to do. as far as I know, without the ability to hire a lawyer I am
simply left struggling to find places to stay.

I do not want to go to
homeless shelters, because I hear they’re dangerous – for now I am
bouncing around, but I hope people take heed of renter’s insurance…"

This too is from last year:

Walking out of Possibilities, that chotchka and card emporium on Seventh Avenue, I saw a father and son walking in.

"This is a woman’s store," the father said.

"It is?" the boy asked.

"Yes, my son. You see there are only women in here…"

The sexist implications aside.  I knew
that the two of them were about to embark on an important mission:
buying a  Mother’s Day gift.

Ah, the pressure. The agony. The thump thump thump heart beating anxiety to locate a perfect gift for mom.

As you can imagine, Mother’s Day is a big deal around here. On
Saturday, hordes of fathers with children will make the pilgrammage
to
the Clay Pot, which will be filled to the gills with clueless
men and kids struggling to find the perfect gift.

More than once, when shopping for a gift for my mother, I’ve been
tempted to steer a particularly clueless man toward what I knew would
be a more appropriate gift. But I resisted. It was not my place. If I
did, however, run into a friend’s husband, I might make a small
suggestion. But hey, it was all in the name of friendship and karma
(and she could thank me later for the Lisa Jenks necklace).

While there are now more good stores to choose from (Living on
Seventh, Loom, Bird, Nest) on Seventh Avenue. And too, too
many places to name on Fifth Avenue (Diane Kane, Matter, Flirt, Cog and
Wheel, Eidolan and on and on…), the Clay Pot is still, symbolically,
the destination of choice, the holy grail of Mother’s Day gifts.

For one thing, they have a comprehensive selection of the best in
contemporary jewelry design (at a variety of price points) and they
feature an eminently tasteful selection of the best in contemporary
home and gift items. As they say on their web site:

"The Clay Pot was established in 1969 as an urban ceramics
studio by Robert and Sally Silberberg. Thirty-five years ago Park Slope
was hardly the enclave for young professional families it is today, but
it was always a neighborhood, and The Clay Pot is essentially a
neighborhood store. Joined by their daughter Tara in 1990, the store
now reflects her passion for jewelry and has developed into a
nationally recognized source for America’s premier jewelry designers."

Plus, they make it so easy for men to find a gift that will make
their wives swoon. The window is chock full of great ideas, as is the
store itself. But more importantly, their long-time employees are the
best at giving advice on gifts at every price range and style. They ask
all the right questions (price, personal style of the recipient, likes
and dislikes) and take the time to work with you. From hand crafted,
simple and tasteful, high design or even something a little Blink,
there’s something for everyone’s taste.

That brown Clay Pot gift box with a black ribbon is the de-facto
Park Slope equivalent of the blue Tiffany box. To many a woman it means
that her husband has done his job, that he’s reached to the sky and
pulled down a star. Good work.

Some men even venture into the vaulted and expensive wedding ring
department. Oooooooh. Now that’s a guy who really knows how to buy a
gift.

|

This was written in 2005:  My sister flies to Russia next Saturday to meet her daughter, Sonya. Svetlana was her given name and what they call her at the orphanage.
But Sonya Rose is the name my sister and her husband have chosen for
her. 

Ducky is her nickname around our house.  The Oh So Feisty One came up with
that. The only picture we have of Sonya is one taken when she was five
months old and she was swaddled within an inch of her life in a blue
receiving blanket with little ducks on it.

So Ducky it is. I wonder if it will stick?

Today we spent this day before Mother’s Day at Target getting the
remaining items on the list of things that adoptive parents must bring
to the orphanage. This includes new baby and toddler clothes for the
other children, art supplies, educational toys, and gifts for the
caregivers.

My sister picked out a cute outfit for Sonya, a host of drugstore
items, rice cereal, soy based formula and a baby book where she can
document everything about their life together. After much ado, I
selected two board books for her. "The Wheels on the Bus" and "Daddy
Kisses,"which begins "Daddy wolf gives his pup a kiss on the nose."

It was a surreal day. A sweet one, really. Pushing a big red
shopping cart around Target knowing that in just one week my sister
will be with her nine month old baby. What a long road it has been
through infertility, medical prodedures and the arduous process of
international adoption.

Unfortunately, next week is not the end of the road. They will have
to return to Russia in early July to pick up their Sonya and bring her
home. It’s all part of the adoption game. One can’t help but wish that
they could swoop her out of the orphanage next week and bring her home
to Brooklyn. But they can’t.
I can’t wait to give my sister her first Mother’s Day gift tomorrow.
Even if she has never met her daughter who is thousands of miles away,
she is already a mother full of love and attention for her little
girl.

Happy Mother’s Day, sis.

Note: Ducky lights up the world with her smile. She will be three in August. My sister is now a seasoned mom with her red-headed wonder.

I just got this note from a Pizza Plus customer. Seems that she’s one of the few who saw the story of the Brooklyn Blogfest on WNBC. She also had this to say:

Saw you on NBC last night! We also read your piece on Pizza Plus just now. My kids and I are very fond of Pizza Plus and Roz’s kindness to us whenever we go in means a lot. Do you know how we can contact them or send a note of encouragement? The kids want to offer a (very) small contribution, but I’m not sure how far it will go toward the employee fund.

To those who want to help or get in touch, please email me: louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Found this on Park Slope Parents. And then another friend sent it to me:

Can’t believe I’m adding another comment to the Maggie
Moo’s thread
but I can’t help myself. My husband and I crack up over the
"punk
rockers" who hang out in front of Maggie Moos in the warm months.
We
like to imagine them talking to eachother on the phone "Dude,
we’re
meeting at the Moos at 9:00", really wanting to say "meet us
at
Pino’s" but knowing too well that the boys at Pinos would
tolerate
their presence for all of five minutes before rolling up their
sleeves
and politely (ahem) asking them to move along. So Maggie Moos it
is.
I guess with the real estate prices being what they are, I
shouldn’t
be surprised that an ice cream joint with a giant cow waving in
front
of it passing out coupons is about as edgy as it’s going to get
for
the tough crowd in this nabe.

Joey Ramone would not be
impressed.

I just got wind of the fact that Baby Bird (428 Seventh Ave between 14th and 15th Sts is closing). Time Out Kids sent me a link to their blog: Cry it Out.  Doesn’t suprise me. It was a very expensive, very high-end children’s shop. I never thought they’d make it here. But the real reason is that they lost their lease:

“They were tripling my rent and I just couldn’t afford
it,” the owner told Time Out Kids. . “Plus, right now I only have half the commercial space
in the building, and the new owner wants the tenant to lease the whole
space.”

Youi will, however, be able to find the goods online. Shopbabybird.com
is coming soon. Needless to say, Baby Bird is having a huge sale.

Kahlil Gibran International Academy, the city’s first Arabic language school, has found a temporary home in the building that houses Math and Science Exploratory School, one of hottest local middle schools, and the Brooklyn High School for the Arts.

The two schools will have to share common spaces like their cafeteria and may have to give up three classrooms.

Plans to put the Gibran Academy inside P.S. 282 in Park Slope were scrapped after parents said there would not be enough room.

Is there anyone out there who is a podcaster or a sound recordist who could record the blogfest? on Thursday night at 8 p.m.

Please let me know by commenting or sending an email to: louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Neighborhood powerhouse Kim Maier may be one of the most important people in Park Slope. As director of The Old Stone House, she’s responsible for turning that small museum into a hotbed of  cultural and educational events. Her Summer Arts Festival, about to begin its second season, brings movies, Shakespeare and blues to JJ Byrne Park.

Kim’s a mover and a shaker all right. An active PTA member at MS 51 and PS 321 (at one time) she knows everybody and is a great connector of people and ideas.

Know Kim. Know Park Slope.

Now Kim is teaming up with Mindy Goldstein, another neigborhood powerhouse, people connector and advocate for special needs children, to host a BBQ for city councilmember, Bill DiBlasio. There is no minimum contribution to attend, but attendees are asked to bring their check books and use them. They sent this email this morning…

Mindy Goldstein & Kim Maier invite you to join them at a Barbeque for Bill
Sunday, May 20, 2007
5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

For more information and to RSVP by May 16 contact Kim at 718-788-1281 or email her at kmaier@sprynet.com

About Councilman Bill deBlasio:

Bill deBlasio was elected to the New York City Council in 2001, and overwhelmingly re-elected in 2003 and 2005. He has been a terrific supporter of education and parks, much to the benefit of our community. Please join us to help support Bill as he begins planning for 2009.

OTBKB delivered a guest lecture at Baruch College about neighborhood blogging to two classes of undergraduate journalism majors.

She has this to report: the students were very interested and they asked good questions. Quite a few seemed to have personal blogs. Some even asked about advertising and building a readership. Many seemed to appreciate the interactive aspect of blogging and enjoy commenting on their classmate’s blog posts.

These classes, of mostly black and hispanic college students, have been developing a class blog. Students are required to post from their neighborhoods all over the city.

OTBKB’s prognosis: look out for a whole bunch of interesting neighborhood blogs from neighborhoods that are now underepresented by blogging. These bright and very engaged kids have great stories to tell and are learning how to tell them. It may be a while because these kids are busy with course work and college life. But in the future…

Professor Bridgett Davis, a Park Slope resident and PS 321 parent, was recently honored for "excellence in education"  by the New York
Association of Black Journalists. She invited OTBKB to come to the college after overhearing her discuss blogging with Bklynmama at Sweet Melissa’s in Park Slope. Clearly, she is excited by the challenge of introducing blogging to her students.

Professor Davis and her colleagues are trying to instill journalistic principles of ethics and credibility into the blogging process. They understand that blogs and citizen blogging are the wave of the future. But they want to insure that it’s not at the expense of journalistic professionalism and craft.

I’m not sure if their class blog is open to the public. I will find out and let you know.

Streetsblog is covering the continuing drama about the 9th Street’s proposed bike lane. There’s there’s even a video of an executive member of Community Board 6 who is dead set against a bike lane over there.

"First off, please accept my apologies for continuing to torture you
with the intensely parochial drama taking place on Park Slope’s 9th
Street. I justify all of this coverage by imagining that this story may
be useful for advocates working towards Livable Streets goals in other
neighborhoods.

For those who are just coming in to the story, a few weeks ago the Department of Transportation put forward a thoughtful, responsive and well-designed "Road Diet" plan
for Park Slope’s dangerous, crash-prone 9th Street. Sadly, a rather
well organized group of residents led by a Community Board 6 executive
committee member named Robert Levine has set out to kill the plan (or,
at least, get rid of the bike lane portion of it)."

A message from Stephen and Mookie, parents of Toby who has neuroblastoma. For ways that you can help, go to their blog.

hello everyone, we are back in the hospital since friday evening,
because of a fever and slowly readjusting to life on the inside. friday
at home was actually lovely… stephen built a lego train track that
enticed toby to play on the rug for the first time in many days. saba
was able to elicit some belly laughs and randy came over for some quick
songs. but then it was back to mskcc and admission through the urgent
care center where toby was immediately hooked up to iv antibiotics to
treat a possible infection.

while we were waiting for a bed to
open up on the 9th floor we found a roll of medical tape and toby taped
up his hospital bed from side to side. one of the nurses also brought
in a small craft kit with four tiny paint pots and a white plastic
fish. we covered toby’s lap with a sheet and he jackson-pollacked the
fish with interest and intent.

stephen also discovered that his
itunes stash on the computer is a great distraction for toby. since
that night mommy and daddy have danced around toby’s bed to booker t
while toby grooves lying down. it’s a new activity, one born of our new
reality. so far it works amazingly well.

toby spends most of his
days in bed, with short forays to the playroom and around the ward. we
want him to be up and about as much as possible, but he tires quickly.
so we’re trying to come up with ways to make the hospital interesting
beyond the constant beckoning call of tv. over the weekend toby did his
"homework" on the computer, typing pages of letters, increasing the
font size and cycling through the pages like a stop-motion animation.

so
we’re in until toby’s absolute neutrophil count rises to 500, which may
take a few days. i hope that we’ll have a tiny window to return home
before his next cycle of chemo starts. we are currently at day 14, with
the next treatment scheduled to start on or about day 21. however, the
protocol is aggressive, so if the docs deem he is ready to start before
day 21, we will.

toby has now lost 8 lbs, down to 36 lbs. for
the last few days his mouth and throat were filled with sores (a side
effect of chemo) so he was unable to eat much of anything. the
nutrition staff suggests liquid foods during this time, but toby tanked
out on icecream and jello pretty quickly. yesterday out of the blue he
announced that he wanted chips and stephen ran out to get cheetos,
pringles, anything with taste and salt. i couldn’t believe that his
poor swollen mouth could handle those intense flavors but he relished
the jolt of flavor. last night he actually ate 4 small bites of pizza,
so we might have a few days of real eating before the 2nd cycle.

toby
still looks beautiful, with his new short cut and lingering suntan from
jamaica. he is the most delicious little boy. the long road ahead seems
cruel and unfair. we try to take it day by day. my tears are short,
fierce and usually come in the early morning, at the moments between
sleep and wakefulness, when i remember our old life and am confronted
with the new.

uncle greg drove all the way from
michigan, arriving late on saturday night after a detour to queens. we
are so grateful to have him here for the week. yoni is doing okay, very
busy with sports on the weekends and school the rest of the time.
yesterday we had a normal dinner together and right now he’s sitting
next to me having breakfast.

a totally inadequate thank you to
all of you for your continued and amazing support and love. the food,
visits, words, errands, energy, gifts and prayers are so, so important
to us. we have just started on this journey together.

Toby has  neuroblastoma, a very serious illness. He lives in park Slope with his parents and they are reaching out to the community for help in finding a new place to live. Visit their website for more information and ways you can be of help.

Neuroblastoma is a relatively rare cancer of
the sympathetic nervous system — a nerve network that carries messages
from the brain throughout the body. Each year about 600 children in the
United States will develop neuroblastoma. Generally developing in young
children, it accounts for half of all malignancies in infants. These
solid tumors, which take the form of a lump or mass, commonly begin in
one of the adrenal glands, though they can also develop in nerve
tissues in the neck, chest, abdomen, or pelvis. The adrenal glands,
located above the kidneys, are specialized glands that release
hormones which maintain blood pressure and respond to stress.

Toby’s family needs to find a new apartment to live in. They can’t stay in their current apartment due to environmental factors that are dangerous to Toby. Email louise_crawford@yahoo.com or leave a comment and I will get info to them. There  are links on Toby’s website about ways that you can help Toby.

Toby made it home earlier this week. Initially, the transition back to home was a difficult one. Toby was particularly fussy, but today he had a better day. He showed shades of himself, playing on the carpet & engaging those around him.

This evening Toby was readmitted to Sloan because of a fever. As expected, his blood "counts" have bottomed out. Toby’s white blood cells & his ANC are zero, & for this reason, he’s unable to mount a significant response to infection (i.e., fever) & needs i.v. antibiotics.

Tomorrow, Toby’s saba & savta (grandparents) return to Israel. They provided moral support, cooked, cleaned, & shopped. They will surely be missed. Greg, Toby’s uncle, arrives tomorrow for the week.

On the homefront, Mooki & Stephen are still searching for a new apartment. If any of you have any news or suggestions, please let Mooki & Stephen know.

Finally, Fran, Heather, & Carie met today to make sure that everyone’s efforts to help out are maximized & coordinated.

Thank you all.

Planners are hard at work organizing Stoopendous, another great event from the Park Slope Civic Council, the folks that bring you the Halloween Parade and the House Tour.

In the days and weeks ahead, be on the lookout for flyers, postcards, and posters about Stoopendous, celebration of the summer solstice in Park Slope on Saturday June 23, 2007

Stay tuned for the launch of Stoopendous.org, where there will be lots of how-to information about making Stoopendous happen on your block.

There will also be  information about the event at the Park Slope Civic Council’s table at Seventh Heaven.

Celebrate the beginning of summer with your neighbors and friends on the stoops and sidewalks of Park Slope.

Mark the day with a simple, fun event on your block or in your building. Morning, afternoon, or evening: whatever time works for you. Plan a stoop sale, a BBQ, a hopscotch tournament, a solstice teach-in, a talent show, an art activity, a sidewalk café.

At sundown (8:31 p.m.) join the All-Slope-Solstice Shout-Out, a chance to make a lot of joyful noise. Blow a kazoo, a whistle, bang on some pots and pans, or play an instrument.
.
For how-to information, contact Louise Crawford at 718-857-5842 or louisecrawford@gmail.com

The new Ikea in Red Hook is set to open next year. The new Ikea in Red Hook will open sometime next year. And there may be more big box stores a-coming. The Brooklyn Paper reports that Bed, Bath  & Beyond (which we call Bed, Bath & Bananas) may be considering part of the Ikea site an become the site of a mixed use development that would include
retail.

Rosewater, one of the top restaurants in Park Slope, finally has a website.

Finally.
Yes, it took a long time. As our dear friend Bruce told us when
informed of the imminent launch, "Oh, wow. Welcome to the Nineties!"
Love ya, Bruce.

The site isn’t 100% complete and may never be.
Our restaurant is an ever-evolving project and the website will be,
too. Changes in season bring change at the restaurant and it will bring
change to the site, as well.

Our menus and wine lists will be
updated at least twice a week, and you can check for upcoming events
between newsletters. We hope you like the site and that you find it
useful. You’ve certainly waited long enough for it!

Gowanus Lounge has a list of the Brooklyn street fairs. Here are the dates. Check GL for analysis.

May 6—Court Street Fair,

Sponsored by the Gowanus Canal Community Development Corporation
(GCCDC) on Court Street between President and West 9th Streets. 10AM-6PM

May 20—Fifth Avenue Fair. Fifth Avenue between Flatbush Avenue and 14th Street.

June 9—Brooklyn Pride Street Fair. Prospect Park West between 9th and 15th Streets.

June 17—Seventh Avenue "Seventh Heaven" Street Fair. 7th Avenue between Flatbush Avenue and 15th Street.

June 24—Smith Street Fair. Presented by the South Brooklyn Local Development Corporation on Smith Street between Bergen and Union Streets.

September 30–The 33rd Annual Atlantic Antic on Atlantic Avenu

It seems that Con Edison is using car service drivers to guard people and pets from high voltage spots — like fences and manhole covers — around the city. So many hot spots have been discovered that Con Edison doesn’t have enough trucks to do it themselves.

And it happened right here on Third Street last week. One of the limestone buildings between 6th and 7th Avenues was discovered to have dangerous high voltage spots on their fence. Con Edison put cones around the building and had a livery driver parked there for two days. The black town car had an orange cone on its roof.

A Con Edison crew came with a crane and hooked up wires through the trees and down into their basement to ground the streetlights. That supposedly stopped the fence from being electrified. It grounded it (pictures from NWDP to come).

The use of livery drivers is, obviously, causing some controversy in the news today.

Park Slope artist and OTBKB friend,  Shawn Dulaney, is having a show of her new work called WATERFALLS, at the Lee Weber Gallery in Scarsdale on Friday May 11th from 6-8 p.m. Location: Lee Webter Gallery: 17 Boniface Circle. For directions, call the gallery:

I love her work and this looks like an AWESOME group of painting. She has exhibited her work nationally for
more than two decades, including important venues in New York, Santa
Fe, California, Pennsylvania and Colorado.

From The New York Times (Sunday, April 27, 2003):
"Stylistically, the paintings are a cross between the atmospherically
intense seascape paintings of J.M.W. Turner, and the impulsive,
intuitive abstractions of Cy Twombly. One distinct characteristic of
Ms. Dulaney’s work is the use of poetry; enigmatic words inscribed
directly into the wet acrylic paint. A soupy, drippy texture to the
acrylic paint characterizes all these works. The exquisitely painted
surfaces of all are a pleasure to see."

In
her paintings, Dulaney places pigment in acrylic medium and employs
several layers of transparent glazes to achieve a rich translucency
that enables the viewer to see colors through each other. This has
prompted at least one writer to note that Dulaney’s work relates most
closely to the "Mark Rothko branch" of Abstract Expressionism.

Shawn
Dulaney studied at Mills College (Oakland, CA), the Berkshire College
of Art (Maidenhead, England), Stanford University Studies Center in
Britain (Maidenhead, England), and the New School of Art (Toronto,
Canada).

A faithful reader of OTBKB needs a new place to live. She is losing the brownstone rental apartment she has been living in for 14 years because the landlords want it back for their son.

Does anyone know a landlord or brownstone owner who is looking for  the ideal tenant (quiet English professor away many weekends and summer; excellent references.  She’s a Park Slope Food Coop member, too.

Please email: louise_crawford@yahoo.com if you know anything. Ms. English Professor, please write us your price range. Also, how many rooms do you need?

Upstream
Media, Inc. will provide middle- and high-school students with the
resources, guidance, and support to develop their own news-based blogs,
podcasts, and videocasts. Located in a storefront, the program will
offer a comfortable environment in which teenagers can discuss
politics, the media, and the local, national, and international issues
that will inform their programming.

Hands-on training and workshops
with professional journalists and media producers will teach teens how
to do their own research and investigative reporting, conduct
interviews, write and edit articles and commentary, and produce
original audio and video programming for on-line posting.

There’s a meeting on Sunday May 6th. Spread the word if you know middle and high-schoolers who might be interested. For more information about the meeting and to find out more about getting involved with Upstream Media, contact: susanbanta@upstreammedia.org or call: 917-865-5537.

The Second Street Cafe, the Slope’s beloved Seventh Avenue cafe/restaurant, is going to be closed for three weeks. After nearly ten years on the job, they’ve decided to make some changes to the decor.

We’ve always liked the decor in there. But change is good. We do love that the back wall and ceiling of the cafe are covered with crayon table drawings by patrons (part of the ceiling pictured left).

What’s going to happen to all of that? I’m not saying we need to mount a campaign to save those pictures.

I’m just saying. 

June 9th and 10th:

ArtWalk07 is Brooklyn’s free festival of arts, featuring over 175 artists, open studio
tours, exhibitions, a range of colorful public art projects, special events
and extensive retail participation spanning historic Brooklyn neighborhoods.

Get to know established and emerging artists as they open their private
studios to the public; enjoy the diverse and thriving local businesses on
and around Atlantic Avenue.

ArtWalk is Free and Open to the Public

Area restaurants and bars feature ArtWalk drink and meal specials all
weekend.  Highlights include workshops & artist-led demonstrations, music,
performance, artist receptions, and closing event.

DATES:
Saturday and Sunday, June 9 & 10, 2007
Hours: 1:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. both days
   
WHERE:
On Atlantic Avenue – Spanning Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill,
and Downtown Brooklyn neighborhoods.

WHY:
ArtWalk was founded to provide vibrant public art, art programming, and
cultural events for the artist and local community.  This affords
opportunities for creators in all disciplines to show and sell work
independently and brings a new dimension rich with arts and culture to the
more than 30-year tradition of Atlantic Avenue street fairs.  It is our
mission to actively promote and serve the communities of vibrant artists
unique local businesses of Brooklyn in an effort to preserve the character
of this historic cultural corridor.

If you are pregnant, thinking of becoming pregnant or just interested in the controversial debate between at-home birth and hospital births, you must see this incredible new documenatry called The Business of Being Born, which is playing at the Tribeca Film Festival (see below for the two remaining show times) and will hopefully be released very soon.  Directed by Abby Epstein and produced by Ricki Lake (yeah that Ricki Lake. She’s a home-birth activist now), the film is a major EYE OPENER.

I saw it last night at the film festival with a friend who is reviewing it for Mothering Magazine. I didn’t know what to expect. But I laughed. I cried. I was dumbfounded at the way the medical profession has manipulated women into thinking that their birth experience must be highly medicalized.

The rate of caserean sections in this country is through the roof. In many countries, women give birth at home and they don’t have nearly the infant or maternal mortality rate that we do. In this case, maybe less is more.

The fim graphically shows a variety of homebirths and hospital births. It also has interesting interviews with birth experts like Michael Odent, Ina May, author of Spiritual Midwifery, a medical anthropologist and numerous doctors and mid-wives.

The homebirths are amazing, amazing to see. Very moving, very beautiful. It made me sad to see how far we have come from experiencing the magic of birth, the beginning of life the way it’s been done for millions of years.

A pregnant woman at the screening said that the film changed her mind. She wants to investigate the possibility of giving birth at home. The film even shows a home birth that goes awry. The mother is transferred to a hospital quickly and gives birth there.

This morning, I ran into a woman who was at the screening on Seventh Avenue and she
said she wished she could do her births over again – after seeing the
movie.

Even those who don’t opt for a home birth will be inspired to investigate a midwife group like the Birthing Center at Roosevelt Hospital, which is featured in the film as well.

Actress and former talk show host Ricki Lake spoke to the Huffington Post, which I reprint here.

Why did you want to produce this film?
I
wanted to make this movie after my two very different birth experiences
with my children. I felt like I had an opportunity to explore and
question birthing practices in this country and perhaps be an advocate
for mothers’ rights and better maternity care.

How did your personal birth experiences influence you?
After
the birth of my sons, particularly my home birth with my second son, I
thought I wanted to become a midwife. Then I looked at all the years of
schooling and training that I would have to do and felt that the time
could be better spent doing a documentary on the subject of birth.

How intimate does the film get?
I am naked at 195 pounds giving birth in my own bathtub. It can’t get any more intimate than that!

What do you hope people take away from the film?
A
lot! I hope this film educates people and empowers them to really know
their choices in childbirth. We do not want to make any woman feel bad
about the outcome of her birth, or the choices she made (or will make).

Did you videotape personal birth experiences at the time?
As
previously referenced, yes I did. For the record, I never filmed my
birth with the goal of showing it to anyone, let alone the general
public. I simply wanted it documented for me.

Other than your film, what are your plans for Tribeca?
I
am thrilled to be in New York for most of the festival and I am very
excited to take part in everything I can. I will be attending all of
the screenings of The Business of Being Born, and I will be doing a
Q&A after every screening.

Source: The Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ricki-lake/ricki-lake-on-the-bus_b_46002.html

Dates and Showtimes at the Tribeca Film Festival:
Sun, Apr 29, 7:00pmClearview Chelsea West Theater 2
Mon, Apr 30, 6:30pmAMC Kips Bay Theater 13
Thu, May 3, 9:45pmAMC Kips Bay Theater 14
Fri, May 4, 5:00pmAMC Village VII Theater 1

Please visit the festival online to purchase tickets.
http://www.tribecafilmfestival.org/

Have you ever visited DDDB.com thinking it was the URL of Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn (DDDB). Develop Don’t Destroy is DDDB.net. Here’s what’s at DDDB.com

"Drag
  Device Data Base is an essential reference book for anyone who thinks
  seriously about heavy weather, gales and storms. For too long an area where
  serious discussion has taken the form of anecdotes, rumors, wild speculation,
  or entrenched arguments, this very significant segment of offshore seamanship
  has begged for systematic analysis. Victor Shane has provided it here."