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.

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?

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).

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.

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.

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/

May Day is May 1 and refers to any of several holidays celebrated on this day. May 1 was a traditional summer holiday in many pre-Christian European pagan cultures, and many elements of these holidays are still celebrated on May 1 today, such as the Maypole.
While February 1 was the first day of Spring, May 1 was the first day
of summer: hence, the summer solstice on June 25 (now the 22nd) was
"midsummer."

In the Roman Catholic tradition, May is observed as Mary’s month,
and May Day is usually a celebration of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In
this connection, Mary’s head (in works of art, school skits, etc.) will
often be adorned with flowers. Another May Day tradition (fading in
popularity since the late 20th century) is the giving of May baskets,
small baskets of candy and/or flowers, usually left anonymously on
neighbors’ doorsteps.

In the United States, May Day is officially observed as Loyalty Day.

May Day also refers to various socialist and labor movement celebrations conducted on May 1, unrelated to the traditional celebrations to commemorate the Haymarket martyrs of 1886 and the international socialist movement generally. The latter event is an important holiday in Communist and Socialist countries.

In recent years, London based group the Space Hijackers have held events on May Day. These include Mayday Anarchists vs Members of Parliament Cricket in 2005, and a Police Victory Party in 2006. In 2007 the group planned a "Suited and Booted" [1] party in the City of London, the financial centre of London.

In addition, May Day in the United States is commonly regarded — at
least by certain groups — as a commemoration of the execution of the Haymarket martyrs who were arrested after the Haymarket Riot of 1886 in Chicago, Illinois, which occurred on May 4, but was the culmination of labor unrest which began on May 1. The date consequently became established as an anarchist and socialist holiday during the 20th century, and in these circles it is often known as International Workers’ Day or Labour Day. In this form, May Day has become an international celebration of the social and economic achievements of the working class and labor movement.

The earliest May Day celebrations appeared in pre-Christian Europe, as in the Celtic celebration of Beltane, and the Walpurgis Night of the Germanic
countries. Although the pagan-oriented celebrations faded as Europe
became Christianised, a more secular version of the holiday continued
to be observed in the schools and churches of Europe well into the 20th
century. In this form, May Day may be best known for its tradition of
dancing the Maypole and crowning of the Queen of the May. Today many Neopagans, especially Wiccans, celebrate reconstructed versions of the old pagan holidays on May 1

Save the Underground Railroad
May 1: Duffield St. Hearing

City Hall

10AM, Press Conference on the City Hall steps with Councilmembers
  and supporters of the Duffield Street owners.

11AM, Hearing

Come out for the hearing to help save the Duffield St. homes from
seizure by eminent domain. The City is planning to condemn 227 and 233
Duffield Street to build more parking in Downtown Brooklyn, despite
evidence that these historial homes were part of the Underground
Railroad network and that the firm hired to evaluate these claims,
AKRF, lied and withheld evidence.

AKRF is the same firm that wrote the Atlantic Yards Environmental
Impact Statement, which dozens of neighborhood advocacy and
public-interest groups found to be flawed and incomplete.

The hearing is being held by the NY City Council’s Landmarks
Subcomittee, chaired by Councilman Leroy Comrie, and will cover the
AKRF’s report on the Underground Railroad findings.

More information can be found here: http://nyprotest.flactivist.org/?p=7262.

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."

Does anyone know the whereabouts of Andy, whose fruit truck was on the corner of President Street? He and it are a veritable landmark. I am pretty sure I saw his truck a few weeks ago.

One reader thinks he’s retired from his corner this year because of a health concern. That’s what a school crossing guard told her.

"He’s been an important figure for my daughter, now seven, having provided some solace in the wake of her own grandfather’s death when she was four.

"Now she’s distraught at the thought of not seeing him again and wants to write him a letter. But we don’t even know his last name. Would a business like his require a license, and could he be traceable that way?"

This reader thought that the readres of Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn might be able to help.