Random photos from Dec. 24 here and in Midtown and a little bit of the UES

Meanwhile, a little closer to home...

Gifts that weren't given or received this Dec. 25

At Duane Reade. Maybe next year Tom!

The Kids are Alright

1998. Coney Island High. Joey Ramone and the Dictators.

My mind is going. I can feel it

I can't help myself. Seventh Street at First Avenue.



What the liar said earlier:
This is the last post related to a King-of-the-Hill beheading or vandalism -- unless somebody does something really clever or cruel (or more cruel)

Confirmed! Robin Raj moving from corner to 114 Third Ave.

The Robin Raj bodega is preparing to move two doors down to 114 Third Ave., the site of the former Grace and Hope Mission. Their soon-to-be-former site on the corner of 14th Street and Third Avenue is up for grabs. Perhaps a nice shiny tower to keep in line with the neighborhood?

Slow news day in Kansas City?

The Kansas City Star today picked up that Times wire service article on cocktail geeks of the LES that we mentioned Dec. 3.

The Star's headline: Amateur cocktail connoisseurs form brotherhood over ice.

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning Edition

Some news of interest from this week...in case you've been traveling...

The Times concludes its Then/Now series with shots of Times Square (New York Times)

Everything on the Coney Island boardwalk is for lease -- including Ruby's (Curbed)

Jefferson Market to live again? (Flaming Pablum)

The gas station at the end of the world (East of Bowery)

Appreciating Joe Jr.'s (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

More destruction on Ludlow Street (BoweryBoogie)

Marking the sixth anniversary of Joe Strummer's death (Stupefaction)

At the Blarney Cove! (Greenwich Village Daily Photo)

Founder of the East Village History Project can no longer afford to live in the neighborhood

The Times has a nice piece today on the East Village Trivia Night held at the Bowery Poetry Club this past Tuesday. As the paper reports:

“Who was born there? Who died there? Who was shot there?” said the organizer of the event, Eric Ferrara. “We’re interested in everything that’s notable and not so notable.”

Indeed, even before the neighborhood trivia contest began, there was much discussion over the little matter of what to call the neighborhood.

Although contemporary maps generally refer to the area of the East Side between 14th Street and Houston Street as the East Village and reserve the Lower East Side label for the neighborhood south of Houston, most older maps call the entire area the Lower East Side. Some old-timers eschew the East Village name as an aspirational invention of real estate interests trying to pump up property values.

“I use East Village professionally because it is what people know today,” Mr. Ferrara said. “But with family and comrades we still call it the Lower East Side.”

Ferrara grew up on Suffolk Street and is a fourth-generation Lower East Sider. He and some like-minded residents started the East Village History Project in 2001. (Their mission: raise the public's awareness of the East Village/Lower East Side's historic significance and influence in world history.)

The article ends on a rather sad note...it's a shame that a lifelong resident and passionate advocate for the area has to now live elsewhere...

Mr. Ferrara said that he does not reflexively oppose gentrification, but lamented that he had recently moved across the East River to Brooklyn after being evicted from a rent-stabilized apartment on East Third Street.

“I can’t even afford to live in my own neighborhood anymore,” he said.

This is the last post related to a King-of-the-Hill beheading or vandalism -- unless somebody does something really clever or cruel (or more cruel)

Houston and Avenue B.

Previously on EV Grieve.

How's the coffee at Ost Café? Dunno yet!

On Tuesday, I went to check out Ost Café, the new Eastern European coffee shop that opened Dec. 20 on the corner of 12th Street and Avenue A. See what was what. Sample the coffee. Support locally owned places. Etc.



Uh. Guess I need to go back next week...Does it seem a little weird to open for three days then close for the next six days...?

More love in the media for Love Saves the Day

[Photo by Vivi via Picasa.]

Since Jeremiah broke the story Dec. 2 of Love Saves the Day's apparent demise, there has been no shortage of affection for kitsch central at Seventh Street and Second Avenue:

From Lily Koppel's feature in the Times yesterday:

It opened 42 years ago, in a time known by some as the Age of Aquarius, in a Manhattan neighborhood that was a hippie haven. It endured as a psychedelic oasis even as the hippies disappeared and the neighborhood, the East Village, was transformed into a pricier and less scruffy place by the real estate boom that washed across many parts of New York City.

Meanwhile, in The Villager this week, Dottie Wilson has an essay on the store:

LSD, located on the same block of Second Ave. as Gem Spa, B&H Dairy, The Orpheum, Stage Deli and Toy Tokyo, now has a new sign on its door, and it isn’t amusing. It’s an ugly announcement about the departure of yet another special facet of the East Village.

And!

But how ironic and horrible that this unique “real estate” will most likely end up symbolizing a really bad acid trip when a Duane Reade or the equivalent no doubt occupies the space.

Cemusa finally runs a relevant ad

Avenue C near Sixth Street. The ads are usually something ingenious like...



Meanwhile. Heh. That looks like it might hurt! Avenue A near St. Mark's.