Flaming Pablum

Stuff You Might Have Missed

It was another long week, so here's a look at some items of interest that might have dipped below your radar...

Hunter-Gatherer exhumes the mighty Zodiac Mindwarp.

Hot Johnny screams about the recession.

EV Grieve gets the scoop on the entirely needless and logic-immolating new frozen yogurt place on St. Marks Place. Seriously, how many more of these joints does one neighborhood actually need?

Mackenzie looks at some new, official and largely stupid additions to the English language.

Keep your eyes peeled for naked bicyclists today.

Did you know that there are at least 138 unfinished developments around town? We're looking more and more like Bangkok every day.

No longer planned to become a luxury hotel, is the fabled and fearsome Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital now slated to become a nursing home?

The New Commandments of Music 2.0?

And lastly, I was chatting with a friend of mine and fellow parent yesterday afternoon on University Place and the topic of the new fountain in Washington Square Park came up. As I mentioned back on this post, I've recanted my earlier condemnation of the original plan to remodel the park in question. The newly refurbished park is indeed a thing of beauty and splendor (for now, at least). The fountain, however, had both of us scratching our heads. Both my kids and his had played in the water during its opening week, but both of us had since decided that it probably wasn't a good idea to keep letting that happen. That hasn't stopped lots of other people -- young and old -- from basically bathing in the fountain as if it was a public pool. My friend said that earlier this week, he'd approached a park attendant to ask how often the water was changed in the fountain. To hear my friend recount it, the attendant looked back at him incredulously. "Changed?" he chuckled. Evidently, apart from some rudimentary chlorination, the water in the Washington Square Park fountain isn't replenished more than once a season. I don't mean to sound alarmist, but you may want to consider that before strapping on your Speedos and letting your toddler splash around in it.

Only in NYC

Stepped out this afternoon to hit my local deli and found myself standing behind a gent in a sleeveless t-shirt, sporting a child's backpack. The backpack in question was fashioned to look like Thumper from "Bambi." Closer scrutiny revealed some modifications to the original beloved Disney character. This Thumper was wearing studded-bondage gear and a cock ring around a disproportionately vast phallus. I took the below pic with my phone. It's a little fuzzy, but you'll get the basic idea.

School's Out

As mentioned here, today was the last day of school for m'kids. So without further ado...

A Farewell to Kings

As I'm prone to laboriously pointing out, I'm a native New Yorker. That said, I didn't grow up downtown. While I may have spent a major swathe of my adolescence onward traipsing around lower Manhattan's then-thriving network of record stores in the 1980s, I officially resided on the comparatively somnambulistic Upper East Side. As a small child, I certainly knew "downtown" existed, but only in the most abstract of ways. In the late 70's, Manhattan seemed like an unfathomably vast and endless place. In any case, I spotted something yesterday evening that took me right back to my small years as a native Manhattanite.

I've lived just off of University Place in one capacity or another since 1996, but I'd spent time on it long before that. It formerly acted as the major artery into the Village for me. But the first time I set foot on the avenue in question probably dates back about thirty-someodd years ago. I can't recall all of the specific circumstances, but I vividly remember a family excursion downtown. I was probably seven years old at the time, or possibly even younger. If memory serves, my parents, my sister and I all got in a cab to visit a specific antiques outlet on University Place. This strip used to be peppered with them. There are still a few left, but they're fewer and further between these days. Anyway, we all piled into a taxi and off we went.

Our cab pulled up to the southwest corner of 11th street & University. Sitting closest to the corner-side door, I instinctively opened it while my step-father was paying the cabbie. Right as I was about to climb out of the car, an elderly lady appeared out of nowhere and slammed the door shut, narrowly missing me. My step-father got out and rounded the car, inevitably making some sort of "What the hell's wrong with you?" statement. In short order, it was obvious that this lady wasn't dealing with a full deck, and a high-volume exchange ensued. She started ranting that the cab door was irresponsibly blocking foot traffic on the sidewalk. My step-father loudly shouted over her that she'd very nearly amputated my leg. The debate was going nowhere fast. I believe my mother tried unsuccessfully to shoe my step-father away, capably recognizing the futility of this confrontation. My step-father, however, was still incensed. In an ill-considered moment, he grabbed the lady's elbow, presumably for the purposes of making an emphatic point. Instantly, she whipped out a pencil and started banging it on the metal light pole. She also started yelling "HELP, I'M BEING RAPED!" at the top of her lungs. Suffice it to say, it was not a good scene.

At this point, my step-father finally gave up and we left the corner with the elderly woman carrying on her clarion call and frantic pencil-banging. Shaken and quite confused, I was taken by the hand and we all entered an antiques outlet across the street (I believe my parents were searching for a certain armoire or something). That store was Kings.

I don't think I ever set foot in Kings after that. I had no real reason to, honestly. I'm not much of an antique fan anyway, or at least not of the variety that were on display there. Were I searching for a needlessly baroque chandelier, it'd probably have been the place I'd have hit first. But yesterday evening, I looked up and noticed that Kings was empty with a big "space available" sign in its window. I'm sure it'll soon be a bank or a massive frozen yoghurt emporium or yet another chain drugstore soon. While I wasn't a Kings shopper, I loved that it was still around as an old neighborhood fixture. But now it's gone, along with another tiny piece of my childhood.

One Last Time?

Today was my kids' penultimate day of school. Effectively this means that after tomorrow, we shan't be doing our twice-daily trek through the East Village anymore. For the last nine months, my wife has been undertaking that twenty-five minute expedition through those decidedly stroller-phobic streets. When I started my sabbatical from the office in March, I took over the task. Being a Brit, Peg hadn't spent a great amount of time in that neck of the city, thus doesn't quite share my affinity for it. Having spent a large portion of my teens and twenties exploring the neighborhood (then a decidedly different place), I haven't minded the trips so much. Either way, I doubt either of us will miss the regular sneers from the crusties, hipsters and sullen teenagers in meticulously-weathered t-shirts that extol the merits of long-since defunct hardcore bands. Evidently, the mere sight of our stroller sullied their bohemian fantasyland, when the truth of the matter is that this neck of the woods sadly stopped being that sort of place a long, long time ago.

In any case, while my wife will probably never willingly set foot east of Third Avenue again (our kids are going to a different school next year), I'm positive I'll be back there, albeit in a much less frequent capacity. As such, after I dropped Charlotte off today, I decided another picture-taking stroll was in order. Herewith the fruits of that stroll.

A quick word about the above shot. Banana Fish Zero was a band in the 90's that was fronted by a friend of mine from college named John. They were originally called Bananafish -- a J.D. Salinger homage -- until some legal problems forced them to change the name. They put out a couple of discs and were a regular fixture on the live circuit for a while. I haven't seen hide nor hair of John in quite some time now. As far as I know, the band has long-since broken up (I think John's formed a new ensemble since then). I just love the fact that his old stickers can still be found.

I originally wasn't going to include the above pic, but it's a tiny patch of street that never fails to make my two kids giggle like hyaenas, so I figured I might as well put it up. Imagine the scenario: you're strolling along Fifth street in the East Village and you suddenly come across a fresh, virginal square of wet concrete. Pulled by the familiar urge to leave your mark, you grab the nearest pointy implement and scrawl something in the slowly-hardening pavement. It happened to me one drunken evening in 1996 on the corner of East 12th street & B'way in front of the Strand bookstore (I carved out "Kiss Rules" -- you can still faintly make it out today). In this instance, the anonymous party saw fit to simply spell out the word "POOP." The mind reels as to the reasons why.

Lastly, I thought I'd include the photo below to underscore the point that while I'm fascinated by certain graffiti and street art, it's not always a good thing. On the way to school this morning, I noticed that someone had painted (in rather large, white, dripping block letters) "THANKS, BITCHES & PRICKS!" on the facade of the block-wide public school between 6th and 7th streets and Avenue B. I found that to be somewhat profoundly sad. Later on that morning, I passed by again, finding this poor school attendant painstakingly removing it.

Another Satisfied Tourist Expresses Himself

...on St. Luke's Place

Smoke'em If Ya Got'em

Alright, I know I'm a douchecake for posting this picture for your amusement, being that the signage in question (on a restaurant window on Spring Street just west of Hudson) was inarguably penned by an individual for whom English is a second (or possibly third) language, but really..... sigarettes?

Song of the Day Week Last Couple of Months

All together now....

One Year Later & the Terminal Emerald

Exactly one year ago today, I noticed that my favorite neighborhood restaurant, Col Legno, had closed its doors for good. In the ensuing year, the space at 231 East 9th Street has been subsumed by the Japanese restaurant next door. The exterior of what was Col Legno now looks a bit like a bondage palace (yeah, like any of those are left in Manhattan either). In any case, I actually ran into Chris from Col Legno about a week ago. Since leaving 9th street, he's since gone onto take over WXOU Radio in the West Village (across the way from the White Horse Tavern). How the transition from commandeering a quiet, neighborhood Italian restaurant to a popular, oft-crowded bar is going is a question I didn't get to ask him, but I'm planning on swinging by to check out his progress at some point. WXOU is a fine bar (with a decent jukebox), but it has a tendency to fill-up on the weekends.

Being a father of two small children, I don't really get to spend a great deal of time in bars anymore, but being that we were just discussing another one on the West Side, I was disappointed to recently learn that the old Emerald Inn on the far end of Spring Street just renovated its interior. While the bar itself was never anything special (part of its charm), I hold it particularly dear as it features prominently in my oft-cited favorite film of all time, Martin Scorsese's "After Hours." The Emerald Inn acted as the location of the "The Terminal Bar," wherein protagonist Griffin Dunne seeks temporary shelter from the rainy, Kafkaesque nightmare he's ensnared himself in. Back in the day, so to speak, the interior of the bar looked like a run-of-the-mill dive. When I briefly stopped in there a couple of weeks ago with some friends, we were shocked to find the insides re-modeled to look like a cocktail lounge rife with ersatz-swank. I realize it's naive of me to expect places like the Emerald Inn to remain preserved like a mosquito in amber, but I was bummed to find it changed all the same (see also Smith's Bar in Hell's Kitchen). I suppose, however, that I should take a little bit of comfort in the fact that it's still there.

The Emerald Inn today (photo courtesy of Greenwich Village Daily Photo):

And circa "After Hours"....

It's Friday! Here's More Stuff You Might Have Missed

Glen E. Friedman shares unpublished, vintage Danzig pics (featuring the incomparable Chuck Biscuits on drums).

Cubic Zirconia says "Fuck Work!"

Jeremiah Moss declares Times Square "already too dead to die!"

Copyranter gets incredulous at the ironic Kleenex Tree.

The Museum of Modern Art gets ready to celebrate Punk Rock, albeit in a stuffy, wordy, pompous and needlessly analytical way.

Donna Karan of DKNY fame making too much DKNOISE for her West Village neighbors. Gunplay to follow?

Slum Goddess goes to the Mars Bar Art Show.

Best Recession Ever decries "funemployment" as an expression utilized by fatuous San Fran douchecakes.

And finally, Stiv Bator died nineteen years ago yesterday. Pour one out for the original Dead Boy.