Zoltar can see clearly now, the tags are gone

Last Saturday!



This Saturday!



It’s gonna be a bright (bright), bright (bright)
Sun-Shiny day.

H/T Johnny Nash

Zoltar awaits a service call; fortunes, wisdom on hold

Lousy news here outside Gem Spa…



Photos by Bobby Williams

Please show some love for Zoltar too

Outside Gem Spa … via EVG contributor Derek Berg

Can't we just enjoy Halloween first?

At Gem Spa today.

Gem Spa stunner: Zoltar now has Key Master competition; doomsday predicted

In a sad and shocking power play that has reverberated throughout the neighborhood, Zoltar now has a game-of-chance companion in the form of Key Blaster outside Gem Spa.



Stunned passersby were naturally stunned to see that Zoltar was no longer the only game in town, or at least here on Second Avenue at St. Mark's Place.

"This is like really fucked up and stuff," said EVG reader Jim, who asked that his first name not be used in association with this post mostly because he was swearing. "First, they put the Lottery thing [Play Center] next to Zoltar. Then there is the display of like those Kardashian mags Us Weekly and OK! Are they purposefully trying to take away business from Zoltar?"

As for Key Master, a so-called "prize merchandising game," contestants compete to win such prizes as Macy's Gift Cards, iPhones, iPods [Ed note: Do they still make these?] and iPod Minis [Ed note: Do they still make these?].



You may also win presumably real $100 bills [Ed note: Do they still make these?] ... which might be a bad idea to have on display considering what some roughnecks with skateboards have done here in the past...



In case you've never been on a cruise ship, here's how Key Master works: You use a joystick for horizontal movement and a large button for the vertical alignment. Then! You manipulate a "key" so that it lines up perfectly with a "lock" holding a prize. If you successfully guide the key into the lock, then you win the prize. (OK, I just totally lifted that from this fellow's blog.)

A tutorial. (God, whatever you do — turn down the volume!)



Takeaway: Key Master is dumb! Long live Zoltar!

Step right up....

A good day for Zoltar ... though he did pick UMass to cover the spread against Wisconsin.

Photo by Bobby Williams.

Zoltar's cozy new arrangement

Well, what do we have here outside Gem Spa...? A New York Lottery "Play Center" is now stationed directly next to Zoltar... picking lottery numbers adjacent to the Great One who tells fortunes and accurately predicts the future? We're guessing Zoltar's daily income is about to go through the box.

At Gem Spa this morning

At 8:30 or so this morning... LES Jewels is passed out in front of Gem Spa.

A man walks up, looks at Jewels and says "It's Harry. Harry Hippie."

He leans down. "Harry. Harry! HARRY! HARRY HIPPIE."

Jewels doesn't move.

"Harry Hippie."

The man moves on, and explains to the hat crew outside Gem Spa that the person on the sidewalk is Harry Hippie. Harry, he says, has been working a lot lately and is tired.

The man, who is wearing headphones and listening to loud music, keeps walking west on St. Mark's.

"Harry Hippie" he says one last time, shaking his head.

He then stops a group of tourists who look to be in their 60s and tells them that he is from Ireland and Scotland. The group looks confused and continues walking.

(Shh! Zoltar is working again)

Be gentle.

And I took a Vine of him TALKING LOUDLY this morning right here.

Doomed DOOMED

Officially at a loss now here outside Gem Spa.

What the hell, Zoltar?

What's this outside Gem Spa? Wait why is.... AHhhhhhhh!



Just when we thought Zoltar was back in business after the unfortunate skateboard bashing... As Bobby Williams discovered, Zoltar is back on the DL alongside Jeter, Granderson, Teixeira ... everyone on the Knicks older than 38 and taller than 6-8 ...

The magic is back: Zoltar feeling like a glass act once more!

Yes! Workers fixed up Zoltar today outside Gem Spa ... after his front panel was bashed by a skateboard this past Friday... thanks to Marjorie Ingall for the photo. Can a great deal of good fortune be ahead?

Earlier today ... looking so vulnerable...


[Bobby Williams]

Previously on EV Grieve:
Breaking! Breaking! Zoltar is broken! Broken!

Zoltar, among the hats

Zoltar late this afternoon, waiting for team Zoltar to repair his broken glass (and heart).

Photo by Bobby Williams.

Sunday morning with Zoltar

Zoltar watching 2nd Avenue traffic pass by.... vine.co/v/br0U3DezEdL

— evgrieve (@evgrieve) February 17, 2013

Previously.

Gem Spa in 2001 and 2012: Your Face on a Sticker vs Zoltar

Via our friends James and Karla Murray...

And sadly, Voltar stopped working some time in the last 24 hours... so fragile! Second time now in the past week ...

Why couldn't Zoltar foretell this development?

A readers passes along this unfortunate bit of news from outside Gem Spa tonight...

Get well soon, old friend... Plus, we need you — the Breeders' Cup is coming up...

Zoltar is the greatest thing to happen to St. Mark's Place since ______________?

[Submitted by an EVG reader, Zoltar fan]

Zoltar, the all wise and knowing fortune teller, arrived at Gem Spa on St. Mark's Place and Second Avenue on Sept. 23. Since then, it's all everyone a few people can talk about.

Have you been by?

Don't get too close.



That's the one thing. Get too close to Zoltar and he starts hitting you up. By the time I got to Gem Spa on this day, five people along here had already asked me for change, cigarettes or directions to Little Italy.

A few things to make your Zoltar Experience more pleasant.

1) Zoltar only accepts $1 bills. So no quarters or $2 bills in the well-marked $1 slot.

2) Despite the sign, the ATM is not inside Zoltar's box.

This is one reason why I hate 7-Eleven opening on St. Mark's Place

The proximity to Gem Spa.

EV Grieve reader x said this Wednesday: "Woe to the Gem Spa! Will Slurpees and Big Gulps ever replace the egg cream?!?"

Something to think about as the city continues to change, and not always for the better... Earlier this year, we saw the hysteria that accompanied the false report that the Gem Spa had closed.

How much (or little) do you think 7-Eleven might hurt Gem Spa's business? I imagine 7-Eleven will pick off some tourists who want water or sodas... and see the familiar sign. And from people who might have grown up with a 7-Eleven and find the food comforting or kitschy ...

The Daily News checks in today with a piece on the 7-Eleven opening here. Per the article:

"This is not part of what our local community storefronts are," said Gary Steinkohl, who has lived on E. Ninth St. for 25 years and was adamant the chain store would "absolutely not" fit in.

St. Marks has gone from "some alternative lifestyle, anything goes, place to a more mainstream, citified street that's almost like any other," he added.

A 7-Eleven spokesperson told the paper that: "We would not open a store we didn't think would be of convenience to the neighborhood. We typically franchise a store to someone who lives close by, and we want franchisees to become a contributing part of their store’s community."

Meanwhile, I was reading an article in The Oregonian from last Thursday about 7-Eleven's march through the Portland metro area — 15 new locations are in the works. (The article points out that 7-Elevens are opening up practically on top of each other there.)

And how are the locals taking it?

"Since December, Portland residents with concerns about increased alcohol sales and corporations draining profits from mom-and-pop stores have been demonstrating and hand wringing about 7-Eleven."

And elsewhere. In Los Angeles, 7-Eleven plans to open 600 new stores across the region.

Knowing next to nothing about 7-Eleven's history... I checked out the chain's history page on the 7-Eleven website ... the store's beginnings are traced to 1927 in Texas... and, in 1946, they adopted the 7-Eleven name.

Per the website: "As convenience stores grew in the 1950s, the retail outlets then served as the 'mom-and-pop' neighborhood grocery store, the 'ice-house,' the dairy store, the supermarket and the delicatessen all in one location."

And there you have it...

Previously on EV Grieve:
7-Eleven continues to feast on the East Village; next up, St. Mark's Place

A quick East Village 7-Eleven inventory

P.S.

And have you seen the hand-painted signs that V.H. McKenzie created for Tompkins Square Bagels...? They've been up in the shop now the past six or so weeks... Read more about them here.

Police searching for armed robbery suspect who held up Gem Spa

On a more serious note, as DNAinfo reports, the NYPD is looking for the above suspect who has held up various stores in Murray Hill, the West Village... and on Oct. 6, he allegedly robbed Gem Spa on Second Avenue and St. Mark's Place at 3 a.m.

Per DNAinfo, "The suspect, described as a heavy-set man between the ages of 25 - 40 years old, allegedly entered five businesses over the past two months armed with a gun, before demanding cash and fleeing on foot."

Throwing punches outside Gem Spa

I usually don't pay much attention to that Boxer game here at Gem Spa on Second Avenue and St. Mark's Place... it's usually hidden behind displays of hats and sunglasses during most of the times that I pass by...



But not always!




Is this really a good idea to let people get worked up and pay to throw some punches...? Or is this actually a good idea because any drunken aggression may be taken out on the machine? Dr. Grieve is now in session.