BROOKLYN READING WORKS

YOU MISSED A GREAT READING

Okay, so it was the seventh game of the playoffs and it was do or die for the Mets, Whatever. If you didn’t come to last night’s BROOKLYN READING WORKS: IT WAS YOUR LOSS. Leora Skolkin Smith wowed the audience with her lyrical, sensorial writing about pre-1963 Jerusalem from her book, EDGES: O JERUSALEM, O PALESTINE And Richard Grayson read a great story called, THE LOST MOVIE THEATERS OF SOUTHEASTERN BROOKLYN & ROCKAWAY BEACH.

But on November 19, you can make it up to yourself. Come hear:

Elissa Schappell, author of USE ME, a finalist for the Pen/Hemingwa award, and  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, Oyex Review, Georgetown Review. She was a finalist for the 2005 Ann Stanford Prize. 

Darcy Steinke, author of SUICIDE BLONDE (chosen as a New York Times notable book of the year), UP FROM THE WATER and JESUS SAVES will read from her new book. 

Still, you missed a great reading. So here’s an excerpt from Grayson’s piece, which is from his collection of stories AND TO THINK HE KISSED HIM ON LORIMAR STREET (available at Lulu).

The Rugby

On Utica Avenue near Church Avenue, just blocks from our first apartment, the Rugby was the theater of my early childhood. When I was three, my mother took me to see my first film here. That weekday matinee of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers left me with one memory: a row of giant men so happy that they couldn’t stop dancing. 

My brother and I would spend Saturday mornings lining up under the Rugby’s  marquee with its unique saw-toothed top. During the scene in West Side Story where Rita Moreno slowly put on her stockings, Marc turned to me and said, “That’s sexy.” He was about seven.

By the time I was in college, the Rugby was showing porn films – a sure sign of impending death for one of “the nabes,” what my family called neighborhood theaters. One Saturday night, when neither of us had a date and we had nothing better to do, Elise and I decided to see a triple-X feature at the Rugby. It had been her first movie theater too, the one where she’d watched Elvis movies like Blue Hawaii.

Continue reading YOU MISSED A GREAT READING →

Postcard from the Slope

EMAIL FROM PETE SEEGER: END THE WAR NOW

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I did a doubletake when I saw this email from Pete Seeger in my inbox. Here it is, a heartfelt anti-war letter from a legend who feels like an old, dear friend.

Protest music has been around for thousands of years. It just leaks out every so often and helps make history.

A group of young people and not-so-young people have gotten together to
sing one of my songs that I wrote around 1965 about the Vietnam War.
And they’ve done what I did a few years ago; they’re singing it about
the situation in Iraq. "Bring ’em Home!"

You can watch them singing and share it with your friends right here:


http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/bringthemhome/

What they are saying is we need to send the politicians a message in a
language they understand: election day votes. Here in New York, voting on the Working Families line is the best way to tell the politicians, bring them home, bring them home.

We’re in a very dangerous situation. The problems in the Middle East
are not going away — they’re getting worse. Churchill said, anybody who
thinks, when they get into a war, that they know what’s going to
happen, is fooling themselves. With all the power that the American
military establishment has, they still cannot predict all the things
that are going to happen.

To quote Martin Luther King, the weakness of violence is that it always
creates more violence. Darkness cannot drive out darkness. Only light
can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.

That’s the message at the end of the song, "the world needs
teachers, books and schools . . . And learning a few universal rules."
I’m glad they left that verse in.

Watch the video and then pass it on:


http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/bringthemhome/

There’s a saying from William James a young friend painted on my
barn. It goes: "I am done with great things and big things, great
institutions and big success, and I am for all those tiny invisible
molecular moral forces that work from individual to individual . . .
like so many rootlets, or like the capillary oozing of water, which, if
given time, will rend the hardest monuments of pride."

Apply this to the current situation: Take this email and forward it
to your friends and family. Technology will save us if it doesn’t wipe
us out first.

We need to spread this message. Back in the sixties, I’d go from
college to college to college singing songs. That’s how folk songs were
shared. Sure, some person who thought it was an unpatriotic song might
boo, but a few seconds later he’d be drowned out by a few thousands
voices who started cheering enthusiastically. Made the poor guy start
thinking.

Change comes through small organizations. You divide up the jobs:
Some people sing bass, some sing soprano. Some copy the sheet music,
others drive and pick up those who ride the subway. You take small
steps. They all add up.

Take a small step today. Here’s your part: Tell your family and your
friends about what we can do to send a message to the politicians to
bring our troops home. And then vote on election day.

The very worst thing is for people to say: "My vote doesn’t count. So
why bother to vote at all?" Our votes do count. And if we vote to bring
the troops home, they count even more.

Let’s bring them home:


http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/bringthemhome/

In solidarity,

Pete Seeger

 

BROOKLYN READING WORKS

TONIGHT TONIGHT TONIGHT: BROOKLYN READING WORKS

108109043_8c0383ceec_mShould be a great show: Richard Grayson, author of, AND TO THINK HE KISSED HIM ON LORMER STREET and Leora Skolkin-Smith, author of EDGES: O ISRAEL, O PALESTINE will read.

8 p.m. at the Old Stone House. Fifth Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets in Park Slope. For info and directions: www.theoldstonehouse.org or www.brooklynreadingworks.com

$5.00. Refreshments and books to buy.

review from Kirkus Discoveries, April 13, 2006:

REVIEW OF GRAYSON’S short story collection by Kirkus Discoveries:

The dynamic Brooklyn cityscape serves as the backdrop in this beguiling collection of short stories.

Grayson’s tenth volume of fiction introduces a multicultural multitude
of characters, including a teen lesbian from Uzbekistan who works as a
Brooklyn Cyclones hot-dog mascot and a gay black student whose
Pakistani roommate’s pet monkey helps him find acceptance on a mildly
homophobic campus. Most, though, are slight variations on the
quasi-autobiographical persona of a middle-aged white man reminiscing
about the friends, families, lovers and locales that have populated his
life. Grayson often constructs his loose, episodic narratives with a
pop-culture scaffolding, as in “Seven Sitcoms,” in which the narrator
meditates on his relationship with his family’s black housekeeper
through a commentary on the racial and class stereotypes of early TV
sitcoms; and “1001 Ways to Defeat Green Arrow,” a reconstruction of a
love affair between a man and his much younger stepbrother, paired with
a hilarious exegesis of a comic-book hero in decline. In other stories,
like “Branch Libraries of Southeastern Brooklyn” and “The Lost Movie
Theaters of Southeastern Brooklyn and Rockaway Beach,” the author maps
out memories against the geography of his beloved Brooklyn, with
excursions to Los Angeles and South Florida. Grayson’s low-key,
conversational prose is injected with flashes of wry wit (“I live in a
neighborhood where neighbors notice my lack of body art”), but some of
the slighter pieces are no more than droll shaggy-dog stories. The more
substantial ones, however, like “Conselyea Street,” about a gay man
with a younger Japanese lover reflecting on his Williamsburg
neighborhood’s demographic transitions—from Italian to Hispanic to
hipster to yuppie—fuse vivid characters with a keen sense of place and
cultural specificity.

A funny, odd, somehow familiar and fully convincing fictional world.

Civics and Urban Life

BROWNSTONER IN THE VILLAGE VOICE: YAY JOHN

John Brownstoner and his websites were called BEST EMERGING WEB EMPIRE in the Village Voice’s Best of NYC issue. Who can forget John’s disguise at the First Annual Brooklyn Blog Fest. Here’s what the VV had to say:

For all you suckers who think you have to ditch
your responsibilities and move to a monk’s cell in order to realize
your dreams, consider the case of "Jon Brownstoner." The lonely force behind Brownstoner Media
has started four websites since October 2004, two of them indispensable
to Brooklyn. Meanwhile, he’s been holding down a job in the canyons of
New York finance and sharing in the raising of his two small kids.
Sleep? Ha. Sleep is for people who don’t know how to set up a new-media
venture. Sometime next year, he hopes to become self-employed, on his
own terms. For now, he can’t reveal his identity for fear of getting
fired. So he just keeps working on his projects whenever and however he
can. The earliest and oldest of his websites, brownstoner.com, draws
60,000 unique visitors a month with its mixture of news and debate on
real estate developments, neighborhood issues, and renovations. The
latest, the news blog brooklynrecord.com, kicked off in April with a
paid employee; its monthly draw is now about 20,000 readers. Along the
way, he launched a Wall Street blog, underthecounter.net, and he
unleashed the full cattiness of real estate agents with the now much
curtailed brokerate.com. Brownstoner says he’s been surprised by the
range of people cruising through his flagship sites, just as he was
surprised by the viciousness of the brokers. "I overestimated the human
spirit," he says. Don’t underestimate him, though; watch for this guy
to go big in 2007. (Laura Conaway)


WNYC

POETS IN BAGHDAD

Anne Garrels had a story this morning on NPR about poets in Baghdad:

A Shiite from the slums of Sadr City, where he lives in two cramped
rooms with several other family members, Hussein writes about a
homeland that is on the verge of disintegrating. His poetry is at once
a eulogy for Iraq, and a call for its salvation:

Peace for you, oh land of civilization, our vow is to you and will forever be, till the last breath.

Hussein’s poetry is laced with grief.

"Even if we want to write love poems, we would be fooling ourselves, because sadness haunts everything," he says.

Another poet, Sadiq Hattab, finds consolation in his imagination:

To escape from this troubled reality, the reality of explosions, if only for a few hours.

Civics and Urban Life

IT WAS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME: PARENTS DELAY KINDERGARTEN…

Trying to get an edge, NYC parents are waiting until their children turn six to send them to kindergarten. This from today’s New York Times.

He has a lot more self-confidence if he tends to be the older one,”
said his mother, Charlotte, 37. “I wanted him to have an easier time.”

Jack
acquired his confidence and abilities thanks to an extra year of
preschool, or perhaps simply an extra year of life. He is not alone:
From Bronxville, where he lives, to Manhattan and beyond, parents are
strategizing more than ever to keep their children out of kindergarten
until they are nearly, or already, 6 years old.

Children who turn
5 even in June or earlier are sometimes considered not ready for
kindergarten these days, as parents harbor an almost Darwinian desire
to ensure that their own child is not the runt of the class. Although a
spate of literature in the last few years about boys’ academic
difficulties helped prompt some parents to hold their sons back a year,
girls, too, are being held back. Yet research on whether the extra year
helps is inconclusive.

Fueled by the increasingly rigorous nature
of kindergarten and a generation of parents intent on giving their
children every edge, the practice is flourishing in New York City
private schools and suburban public schools. A crop of 5-year-olds in
nursery school and kindergartners pushing 7 are among the most striking
results.

“These summer boys have now evolved to including
girls and going back as far as March,” said Dana Haddad, admissions
director at the Claremont Preparatory School, in Lower Manhattan,
referring to children who turned 5 in those months but stayed in
nursery school. “It’s become a huge epidemic.” In some corners, the
decision of when to enroll a child in kindergarten has mushroomed from
a non-issue into an agonizing choice, as anxiety-generating as, well,
the private school kindergarten admissions process itself.

“It’s
kind of crazy to hold them back,” said Jessica Siegel, 40, whose
daughter, Mirit Skeen is back for another year at Montclair Community
Pre-K in New Jersey, although she turned 5 in late August and the
public school cutoff there for kindergarten is Oct. 1. “Someone’s going
to be the youngest. Someone’s going to be the smallest.”

Ms.
Siegel and her husband considered the decision for months, waiting
until the week before public school started before making it final in
case Mirit “suddenly had some kind of huge emotional shift.”

“I
felt like her whole experience is about being the smallest and the
youngest, and I wanted to change that experience for her,” Ms. Siegel
said, adding, “The more people do it, the more people do it — partially
because you don’t want yours to be the last.”

To stave off
preschool fatigue, some city parents send their children to public
school kindergarten for a year, hoping to transfer them to a private
kindergarten the next year. Columbus Park West Nursery School on the
Upper West Side is considering opening a “junior kindergarten” to
accommodate children who in the past would simply have headed for the
real thing.

In the New York City private school world,
demographics play a role. Because so many children have applied for
kindergarten slots in recent years, schools can be picky. While most
city private schools maintain an official policy that kindergartners
must turn 5 by Sept. 1, many routinely ask children born in August,
July, and in some cases June to wait a year. Nursery school directors,
mindful of the trend, may also encourage immature 5-year-olds to wait.

WNYC

OCTOBER WILL BE THE DEADLIEST MONTH FOR AMERICANS IN IRAQ.

Last week we heard that the death toll in the Iraq War may be as high as 600,000 people. And now it looks like October may be the deadliest month yet.

Ten more American soldiers were killed in Iraq in the past 24 hours, raising the death
toll for October to 69. The Muslim season of Ramadan has been violent
in each of the four years U.S. troops have been in Iraq. We never hear the daily Iraqi civilian death toll but we can only imagine…

From NPR:

But
this year, as American troops get more involved in the struggle for
control of Baghdad, they are increasingly caught in a crossfire between
Shiite and Sunni militias gunning for one another.

The
deadliest month for American troops in the war was November of 2004,
when 137 died, most of them fighting to recapture Falluja.

But
as a more complex battle rages within the Iraqi capital, military
analyst John Pike says October may see casualties again approaching
that level.

"October, at the rate we’re at now," Pike
says, "it looks like there will be well over 100 Americans killed in
action and well over one-thousand wounded this month."

Continue reading OCTOBER WILL BE THE DEADLIEST MONTH FOR AMERICANS IN IRAQ. →

Civics and Urban Life

IS NIGHT AND DAY CLOSING?

1 Comment

I still don’t believe it. Some OTBKB readers wrote in to say that Night and Day is closed. Reader Bob says, "Biscuit is moving in. Mmmmmmm BBQ!

I called over there yesterday and I heard Robin Hirsh’s theatrical voice on the message. There was  nothing about the restaurant being closed. But at the end he did say cryptically: "We’ve been having some problems with Con Edison."

Is Night and Day doing a BBQ thing? I can imagine that two pros like Robin and his partner would close up this soon. They only opened a year ago.

The club was really shaping up to be quite the cultural center with music, literature, theater, art, comedy and MORE.

And I liked the food at N&D.  ANYONE KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON?

Other Bloggers

DESIGN*SPONGE IN TIME OUT NEW YORK: GO GRACE

Grace Bonney of Design*Sponge and John Brownstoner were both mentioned in the mainstream media today. Grace in Time Out New York’s current design issue and John chosen as Best Emerging Web Empire in the Village Voice’s Best of New York issue. Here’s Grace’s piece in Time Out:

When it comes to style, New Yorkers like theirs with an edge.
Whether it’s lighting grenade-shaped candles (courtesy of New Yorker
Piet Houtenbos) or relaxing in an armchair covered in graffiti-laden
fabric, we favor design that is innovative and thought provoking. Over
the past few years, city designers have been making the old new again
by adding unexpected details.

Designers and studios like Sarah Cihat, Lite Brite Neon, Jason
Miller and even the late Stephen Sprouse have taken NYC attitude and
expressed it through furniture and products that put a new spin on
traditional or established elements

rehabilitated dishware, which layers new designs (skulls,
astronauts, horses and pinup girls) over plates found at thrift shops,
has been one of the most successful examples of this trend. Along with
Miller (who single-handedly converted deer antlers from redneck chic to
hipster staple) and dozens of other like-minded designers, Cihat has
developed a style that’s uniquely Gotham: It’s layered and it’s almost
messy, but it always makes you think.

What I love so much about New York is that a city this big and full
of life isn’t content to follow any one trend or group of designers.
While many of us favor the modern rehab aesthetic (often referred to as
Brooklyn Design), a number of locals are looking to the likes of Matt
Gagnon, Scrapile, Iannone Sanderson, MIO, Uhuru Design and Rhubarb
Décor for vanguard home looks that are -eco-friendly.

The emphasis on designs that reduce, reuse and recycle is big
throughout the country, but here it is practiced in a way that is
technologically advanced—and utterly fresh. The popularity of
Scrapile’s reclaimed-wood designs, Sanderson’s green furniture and
MIO’s line of earth-friendly wall tiles speaks to that fact that New
Yorkers appreciate earth-aware design but don’t want to sacrifice style
in their homes. These pieces easily blend into a modern New York
apartment without standing out like a sore green thumb.

So whether it’s eco-conscious design or updates on modern classics,
this city stands apart for its ability to accommodate and appreciate
multiple trends, styles and designs while holding true to an overall
aesthetic that’s innovative and unexpected. Trends and designers may
come and go, but style in New York will always be about celebrating
that which is new and provocative.— Grace Bonney

Grace Bonney is the founder of the design*sponge

Civics and Urban Life

HOTELS A GO GO

It’s hotels a go-go in Brooklyn these days. This from Gowanus Lounge (Gowanuslounge.blogspot.com):

The new 106-room Comfort Inn, which is at 279 Butler Street, won’t be for the faint-hearted tourist, as it’s located on a pretty bleak (even to us) industrial block in Gowanus. Its closest neighbors in terms of residential real estate are the Gowanus Houses and Wyckoff Gardens. On the other hand, if you’re looking for gritty Gowanus cool, the Comfort Inn is going to have your name written all over it. We’re going to guess that rooms facing south should offer some nice Gowanus views, as the hotel is very close to the terminus of the canal and the pumping station that keeps “fresh” water flowing into it.

Civics and Urban Life

EMAIL FROM BROKEN ANGEL: IT GAVE US A SPARK OF HOPE

18ange_ca0600_3
I found this in my inbox today from Christopher Wood, the son of Arthur and Cindy Wood, the owners and creators of Broken Angel. -OTBKB

Sadly 10/10/06 at 1pm Broken Angel caught fire by natural causes. No one was hurt and minimal damage was done. Many thanks to the FDNY for quicky putting out the fire. Any contributions are welcome addressed to Arthur Wood,  4 Downing St , Brooklyn  NY 11238 , to help us rebuild. Thank you Brooklyn for all of your support.

UPDATE:  I am Christopher Wood, son of Arthur (age 75)and Cindy Wood (age 65) the owners and creators of Broken Angel, . The New Yor City Building department is attempting to remove my parents from their home of 30 years, unless we immediately get an architect or engineer to bring the building to NYC  codes. We do not have the money to do this. If there is anyone out there who is qualified and willing to work Pro Bono we desperately need the help, contributions are also welcome.

You can contact my father. Arthur Wood at 4 Downing St , Brooklyn ,  NY 11238 . Also we appeal to David Chappelle and Michel Gondry.Our home became the backdrop for your wonderful concert film, please help us to save it now.
 
My parents, Arthur and Cynthia Wood have been living in fear of the building department after a threat this week to throw them out on to the street without even  their family possessions or artwork, and  destroy their home of 30 years "Broken Angel".

Last night someone placed a  broken angel statue in front of my parent’s door at 4 Downing  Street . http://www.flickr.com/photos/onebadapple Thank you to the anonymous donor, it meant the world to me and my parents as it gave us a spark of hope.
 
Many of you wonder what the hell my parents are doing with that building. They always were building an outline of a dream, a building that was different from the usual architecture of today. They did this while never having enough money to complete their dream. But that didn’t stop them from using found or discarded objects that we throw away ever day like the glass bottles that they used to create a stained glass windows. http://www.flickr.com/photos/onebadapple/sets  This is the interior and exterior of Broken Angel.

My name is Christopher Wood,  I  have worked  for B&H Art in Architecture (web site here http://www.bandhartinarch.com/) for the past 4 years. I am a  stone carver and have restored such landmarks such as the Cloisters Museum , Metropolitan Museum of Art , and Grace Church in Manhattan

My parents and I would love to give back to the community of Brooklyn and turn Broken Angel into a nonprofit foundation for music and the arts which would include a school and museum. There are also complete building plans drawn up by my father in which the first page can viewed at  http://www.flickr.com/photos/onebadapple/168044712/in/set-127493  But we need help from you, the residents of New York City . 
 
All of your comments and ideas are welcome
Donations can be sent to Arthur Wood at
4 Downing street Brooklyn , New   York 11238         
 
I am at work on a web site with friends of Broken Angel to accept PayPal donations 

Civics and Urban Life

BROOKLYN READING WORKS: DYNAMIC BROOKLYN CITYSCAPE

108109043_8c0383ceec_m
This week’s Brooklyn Reading Works at the Old Stone House on Fifth Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets at 8 p.m. on Thursday, October 19th.

Richard Grayson will read from his collection of short stories called, AND TO THINK HE KISSED HIM ON LORIMER STREET.

Leora Skolkin-Smith, author of EDGE: O ISRAEL, O PALESTINE, will also read.

Here’s what Kirkus Discoveries had to say:

"The dynamic Brooklyn cityscape serves as the backdrop in this beguiling collection of short stories. Grayson’s tenth volume of fiction introduces a multicultural multitude of characters, including a teen lesbian from Uzbekistan who works as a Brooklyn Cyclones hot-dog mascot and a gay black student whose Pakistani roommate’s pet monkey helps him find acceptance on a mildly homophobic campus.

In other stories, like ‘Branch Libraries of Southeastern Brooklyn’ and ‘The Lost Movie Theaters of Southeastern Brooklyn and Rockaway Beach,’ the author maps out memories against the geography of his beloved Brooklyn, with excursions to Los Angeles and South Florida. Grayson’s low-key, conversational prose is injected with flashes of wry wit…A funny, odd, somehow familiar and fully convincing fictional world." – Kirkus Discoveries, 4/13/06

Civics and Urban Life

PARK SLOPE NOVELIST MAKES MOVIES: MORE SCREENINGS

Thelimboroom_web
Park Slope Writer Jill Eisenstadt and her sister, filmmaker Debra Eisenstadt have made a film and it’s called THE LIMBO ROOM.

THE LIMBO ROOM has been invited to 
The Avignon/New York Film Festival
www.avignonfilmfest.com

screening  at Hunter College:   
Kaye Playhouse  at 6:15pm on Saturday, NOVEMBER 18.

There are other screenings of THE LIMBO ROOM

Oct. 29th @ 8pm at TRIBECA CINEMAS (Vision  Fest)

Nov. 17th @ 7pm – THE MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (part of THE  QUEENS FILM FEST)

 

STUFF AND THINGS

GOWANUS ARTISTS STUDIO TOUR: THIS WEEKEND

Laden_jenny
This weekend is the 10th Annual Gowanus Artists Studio Tour. The Tour, which
began in 1997 includes 120 artists will open their studios near the Gowanus Canal; between Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill,
and Boerum Hill. The Tour is free and open to the public.

Saturday, October 21 and Sunday, October 22, 1pm-6pm
Free

For a map, names of artists and more informtation: :  Annual Gowanus Artists Studio Tour

Civics and Urban Life

REMINDER: GET YOUR TIX FOR LOUIS AND CAPATHIA AT JOE’S PUB

Get your TIX for the Louis and Capathia show at Joe’s Pub, where they’ll be performing the premiere of Southside Songs.

Both from Brooklyn: he’s an award-winning composer. She’s on Broadway in the new Martin Short musical. Tickets available at The Public Theater box office or By phone at 212-967-7555 Joe’s Pub Tickets.                                                                           
                                                                                                                                                                              
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
                         
                                                 

New York 1

TWO MEN CHARGED WITH MURDER IN BIAS CRIME

THIS FROM NY1:

Two men were charged Monday with second degree murder in an alleged
bias attack in Brooklyn last Sunday that claimed the life of a
28-year-old man.

Michael Sandy died Friday after doctors took him off life support.

The men are accused of luring the victim, Michael Sandy, over the
Internet to an isolated parking lot near Sheepshead Bay with a promise
of a sexual encounter, and then attacking him when he arrived.

The confrontation led him to run onto the Belt Parkway, where he was hit by a car.

Other Bloggers

SAY AMEN SOMEBODY: RABBI ANDY ON THE INTER-FAITH ANTI-WAR SERVICE LAST WEEK

Here’s something from Rabbi Andy Bachman’s blog about the interfaith, anti-war service at a Brown Memorial Baptist Church in Fort Greene.

Growing up in Milwaukee, I always admired that the rabbi and cantor
of one of our Reform synagogues had an exchange with an African
American church in the city that consisted of the rabbi preaching and
the cantor singing in the church on Sunday a year with the pastor and
choir of the church doing the same in the synagogue on a different
Friday.

Last week, at the invitation of my new friend Rev.
Daniel Meeter of Old First Reformed Church, I was a guest at Brown
Memorial Baptist Church in Fort Greene for an ecumenical anti-war
religious rally. There was Jewish (moi) Christian and Muslim
representation in the pulpit that night. I was invited to give a
“meditation” on Psalm 24 which was a terrific honor.

I can’t
emphasize enough the importance of these gatherings in this day and
age. I know interfaith services are an “old idea” in American religious
life but you know what? We could use a few more of them these days. We
need the mileage we get out of them for building a more tolerant and
open society.

I had to run out after preaching–we had a board
meeting at Shul–so I couldn’t hear everyone, unfortunately. But if I
may share a word about my own experience of speaking from the pulpit in
a context in which there is every expectation of “call and response,”
allow that word to be EXCELLENT.

Jews: you are put on
warning. I want more responses, more amens, more “that’s right, Rabbi,”
from you all on Shabbos because I’m liking the feel of that. It
enlivens the inspirational moments of preaching and brings Sinai down
to earth in a way I had never quite experienced before.

Civics and Urban Life

BROOKLYN READING WORKS: LEORA SKOLKIN SMITH, RICHARD GRAYSON

8 p.m. OCTOBER 19, 2006 at The Old Stone House on Fifth Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets. 

It’s a good one:

LEORA SKOLKIN-SMITH will read from her book, “EDGES: O PALESTINE, O ISRAEL” published by “Glad Day Books” "Edges is an elegantly written,  quite moving novel that has a lot to say about love, identity, history and the meaning of nationality. The book is worth reading alone for its superb language, but it is gripping and unforgettable as well in its story telling and evocation of place and emotions. It is a wonderful novel by an author with a quite accomplished voice and style, one well deserving a wide and receptive audience. —
    Oscar Hijuelos, author of Pulitzer-prize winning novel, "The Mambo King Sings Songs of Love"

RICHARD GRAYSON reads from his new collection of short stories, "AND TO THINK HE KISSD HIM ON LORIMER STREET AND OTHER STORIES."

Civics and Urban Life

THE CASE AGAINST HOMEWORK AT BARNES AND NOBLE TONIGHT

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The authors of The Case Against Homework, Park Slope writers, Nancy Kalish and Sarah Bennett Holmes. will be at Barnes and Noble on Seventh Avenue at 6th Street tonight at 7:30 p.m.  Here’s what people are saying about this ground breaking book:

"Parents of America, unite! You have nothing to lose but your frustration. The Case Against Homework is an important book that takes on the 500-pound gorilla—homework overload—long ignored by educational policy makers. Every parent of a school-age child should buy it and follow the authors’ excellent advice in order to protect their children from an educational system gone haywire.” —Dan Kindlon, Ph.D., author of Raising Cain, Too Much of a Good Thing, and Alpha Girls

“A wonderful book that is not just about homework but about the sadness and futility of turning children into drudges who learn—if one can call it learning—without passion, without love, and without gaining independence. Every educator, every politician, and every parent should read this book and take it to heart.” —Mary Leonhardt, author of 99 Ways to Help Your Kids Love Reading

“Most parents have experienced the negative effects of homework on family harmony, family time, and play time, but they accept it as a necessary evil. Bennett and Kalish reveal that the homework emperor has no clothes; there is no good evidence to support piling on homework, especially in the younger grades. They  follow through with practical advice for managing homework meltdowns, negotiating with teachers, and advocating for policy changes.” —Lawrence Cohen, Ph.D., author of Playful Parenting

“The Case Against Homework sends a critical message about how to improve the health and well-being of our children by cutting back on busy work and focusing on meaningful assignments, a good night’s sleep, and the value of free, unfettered play time.” —Denise Clark Pope, author of Doing School,  Stanford School of Education lecturer, and founder of SOS: Stressed Out Students

“Bravo to Bennett and Kalish for having the courage to say what many of us know to be true! This book serves as an indispensable tool for parents who want to get serious about changing homework practices in their schools.” —Etta Kralovec, associate professor of teacher education, University of Arizona South, and coauthor of The End of Homework

“This very important book makes a powerful case that excessive homework is hurting family life and children’s full development. What’s more, the book does something that is very rare: It gives parents solid practical advice on how they can deal with teachers and schools to produce significant change. The authors care deeply about children and have a special understanding of what children and childhood are all about.” —William Crain, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the City College of New York and author of Reclaiming Ch

Civics and Urban Life

CAROUSEL IN DUMBO

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Jane Walentas, wife of DUMBO real estate mega developer, David Walentas, purchased a
1922 carousel at an auction in 1984. After years of restoration
work on the 48 carved horses, the carousel was  unveiled
during the DUMBO Festival this past weekend (pictured at left).

It wasn’t open for the public to take rides. That’s all I know because I can’t get onto Gowanus Lounge today — there seems to be a technical glitch over there and I’m thinking it’s connected to all the video he’s got.

I found this picture at FLICKR

Robert, what’s up at Gowanus Lounge? Anyone know more about the carousel?

New York Daily News

US POPULATION SET TO HIT 300 MILLION TOMORROW

The US population is set to hit the 300 Million mark tomorrow at 7:46 a.m. Here’s the story from the New York Daily News.

No one, of course, knows for certain who that baby will be, but all eyes will be on the clock in New York delivery rooms.

"There will be an extra sentiment of excitement in the air as we watch
to see if we are the lucky ones who happen to usher in that 300
millionth individual," said Dr.George Mussalli, chairman of the
department of obstetrics and gynecology at St. Vincent’s Hospital
Manhattan.

Still, the baby likely to claim the distinction will be a Latino boy in
Los Angeles County, said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings
Institution.

Half the growth in the U.S. is among Hispanics, and within that group,
most of the increase is in Los Angeles County, Frey said. More boys are
born each year than girls, he added.

"We’re coming back to a new American melting pot. We’ll infuse our
population with people whose parents are from Latin America, from Asia,
who are going to change the mix," Frey said.

As it did in 1967, when the U.S. population reached 200 million, the
new high has ushered in warnings that producing too many people will
have drastic consequences.

Thirty-nine years ago, forecasters predicted mass starvation.

Today, they warn that land is being developed twice as fast as the
population is growing, especially in Southern and Western states with
vulnerable ecosystems, according to a recent report by the Center for
Environment and Population.

Tomorrow’s projection stems from the expectation that one person will
be born every seven seconds and one will die every 13 seconds.
Immigration adds one person every 31 seconds.

Do the math, and the U.S. population grows by one person every 11 seconds, according to the census formula.

The U.S. population will clock in at 400million in 2043, Frey said.

The census population clock is at:

www.census.gov/population/www/popclockus.html

Civics and Urban Life

DOES ANYONE KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THIS?

I got this in my in-box:

In the 70’s a major explosion and fire happened in Sheepshead Bay , East 16 Street  Avenue U. Many died in that event. I’m trying to help a woman who lost her husband in that fire.
I’m looking for the exact date of the fire and a list of those killed that day. I would be greatful for any help you could give. Please send info to: amcgee3478@earthlink.net

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

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