[Updated] Street fair! Street fair! Street fair!

Today's street fair festival is on Third Avenue from East 14th Street on down to East Sixth Street (we think!)...

...vendors were just setting up when we walked through around an entirely too early hour.

With the Dance Parade and the Ukrainian Festival, traffic should be nice and snarly...

Updated: Noon

An aerial view via @AndrewPettit ...

Street fair! Street fair! Street fair! (plus, Bouncy Castle!)

Woo! Street fair season is heating up ...

And look — two butterflies on the M15 sign. (And what does that mean when two butterflies land on an M15 street fair notice? You won't catch a cold all summer?)

Just before 9, workers were setting up starting at East 14th Street, heading down south to Cape May County maybe Fifth Street. Or Sixth? I didn't walk down to see.

There are balloon arrangements...

...and the usual variety of food stands...

... and entertainment...

Bouncy castle! Bouncy castle!

Street fair!

On Cooper Square today... oh, how I missed the naked mannequins and charbroiled sizzlin' chicken...






And Cooper Square Hotel guests get this street fair as an added bonus for staying here this weekend...



If you're away, then don't fret... the same vendors will be here 458 more times by summer's end...

At the Loisaida Festival, May 25

Several of us were watching the couple passionately kissing by the port-o-potties.





Bonus: Part of the live entertainment

Third Avenue, 7:47 a.m., May 24

[And warning: Street festival on Third Avenue today!]

It has begun

Looks as if street festival season has started up again...Third Avenue between 14th Street and, I'm guessing, 23rd Street was closed off last Saturday. Counted seven of them taking place in Manhattan this coming weekend. (That's SEVEN opportunities to buy four Gap T-shirts for $10 Or bags of tube socks! Or quickie back rubs!) Do these offer any benefit to the local community? I've never heard anyone actually say they look forward to a street festival -- or even admit actually going to one. I'm all for things to bring the community together (such as the various rummage and porch sales different blocks have), but just not the street fairs that seem to peddle the same crap weekend after weekend throughout the spring and summer.