The summer of pink shirts

Fall is here. And maybe it couldn't have arrived at a better time. Back at the beginning of the summer, I wrote a post about a man who walked into the Mars Bar wearing a green shirt with a pink sweater wrapped around his shoulders.



There was some mock horror on our behalf. But it seemed to represent a trend: The entire East Village was fair game to any type of interloper. In any kind of shirt. All summer long.



In the days that followed, I started seeing more and more men in the neighborhood wearing pink shirts.



So I kept tabs.



In one week, I spotted 34 men wearing pink shirts out and about -- drinking at bars, waiting in line for pizza, walking across the Bowery.



Now I don't care what anyone wears. You like pink? That's fine.



What I do mind is the sense of entitlement that seems to come with the person wearing the pink shirt. At least from the people I saw wearing them. Like, that rather serene late afternoon at Manitoba's. Suddenly, the door pops open and eight men walk in, like some kind of SWAT team on a recovery mission. The leader, wearing a pink Oxford cloth, shirt snaps his fingers and shouts to his friend, seriously, "Juke, bro." (Luckily, given the jukebox at Manitoba's, not a lot of damage can be done.) In the next 30 minutes or so during the entertaining reign of terror, the men comfortably arranged themselves around the bar, even doing a round of Irish car bombs. They didn't tip much for all the trouble.

Another night, several people were waiting in a checkout lane at Key. The woman at the cashier was having problems with her food stamps. Something was wrong with her EBT card. She looked embarrassed. And it didn't help that the fellow in line directly behind made it very clear that he was annoyed with having to wait for this, this peasant. He sighed loudly. With a theatrical swoop of his arm, he'd check his watch. And he was wearing a pink dress shirt with his jeans.

So why so many pink shirts? Perhaps the shirts are just a mere prop for the ladies. In this thoughtful listicle in the Post from the summer, we're told how to score a hookup in the Hamptons.



Advice No. 3. Wear a bright pink shirt. "It's like an aphrodisiac for women in the Hamptons."



One night, I ran into a friend out and about. She was meeting a friend -- who turned up in a pink polo shirt. He was a dick. I asked him why he wore pink. He said that it showed off his tan better than a white shirt -- and that it didn't show the dirt as much.



Anyway, soon enough, everywhere I turned, pink shirts.

Pink.

Pink.

Pink.

Pink.

Pink.

Pink.

Pink.

I don't have any answers. But is there someone to blame for this trend?



Anyone?

Posts that I never got around to posting: rats in Toyota East Children's Learning Garden

On 11th Street near Avenue B.

Dumpster of the day

On 12th Street between Avenue A and First Avenue.

Your chance to buy two historic townhouses on East 10th Street -- or create Central Village's first single-family mansion!

It's easy to like the tree-lined 10th Street between Second Avenue and Third Avenue -- right in the heart of the St. Mark's Historic District... oh those handsome single-family Anglo-Italianate townhouses!

And now not one but TWO of them can be yours...



...for $12.9 million... both 123 E. 10th St. and 125 E. 10th St. are on the market. (The owner had been selling them. Now Leslie Garfield & Co. is doing the honors... A little description...

Located on a serene tree-lined residential street in the heart of the St. Mark’s Historic District, this pair of exceptionally handsome single-family Anglo-Italianate townhouses [Oh, there's where I picked up that term earlier!], rises four stories above rusticated stone “English basements.” The front parlor windows extend to the floor and open onto an ornamental cast-iron balcony that runs across the twin buildings’ brick façade, unchanged since built in 1854. Pass through the round-arch entryway of each house and you are in a world apart. Each is light and airy with beautifully detailed moldings and mantelpieces; there is a total of eighteen (18) fireplaces and in the rear, a shared idyllic garden. Bring your architect to create the Central Village’s first 28’-wide single-family mansion. Also available individually for $6,475,000 each.

Paws for effect

The deathwatch continues on Avenue A near 12th Street ... at the site of Chico's former spay/neuter mural... The outline for the NBA video game ad going up here is slightly visible... at the bottom of the mural, there's a lone reminder of the cats and dogs who once roamed this wall...



...a single set of paws...



Previously on EV Grieve:
Chico's Avenue A mural neutered

Related:
Our friend over at Cat Sitter in the City has more thoughts on the mural... and a few better shots of how it looked...

What's doing in Texas?: Dallas getting a Cooper Square academic building lookalike

Thom Mayne, head of the renowned Morphosis architectural office in Santa Monica, Calif., is designing the new the Perot Museum of Nature and Science north of downtown Dallas. And it may look familiar to those of us hereabouts. As Metropolis notes:

[I]t’s safe to say that the Perot Museum bears resemblance to another recently completed Morphosis project: 41 Cooper Square, located in New York’s East Village. That structure, also a distorted cube, also featuring a large central atrium, was praised by critics when it opened earlier this year, and has generally received a warm welcome by New Yorkers. Moreover, the Cooper Union building, as an academic facility that engages with its architectural neighbors and encourages street-level interaction, has been heralded as a civic achievement in a neighborhood that has been the site of particular contentiousness in its recent history.

Related:
Cooper Union Building is East Village's Newest Thrill Ride! (Curbed)

Noted

Jay-Z video shoot in Manhattan needs female models (Downtown Manhattan)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2009-09-21, 5:59AM EDT
Reply to: models@emanagementatl.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


*THIS CASTING IS TO ONLY BE POSTED ON CRAIGSLIST AND NOWHERE ELSE*
WE ARE LOOKING FOR FEMALE MODELS OF ALL SHAPES, SIZES, AND RACES TO REPRESENT WHAT NYC IS ABOUT FOR A SHOOT THIS FRIDAY SEPT 25TH. ALL INTERESTED FEMALE MODELS MAY SUBMIT IMAGES, STATS AND MEASUREMENTS TO MODELS@EMANAGEMENTATL.COM PAY FOR THIS SHOOT IS $500

Oh, 123 Third Ave. does have a Web site...

Oh, lordy somehow I missed this... I only noticed the phone number... so when we can finally read about the faboo amenities coming to this skyscraping condo at 14th Street and Third Avenue...And what's on the site?



Not much yet!



So the sales office opens later this fall... and you can register now for the "priority list." Priority over what unit you want overlooking an NYU dorm?

Lost cats

It has been pointed out over at New York Shitty that it seems to be the season for lost cats...Indeed, I've lost track of how many lost cat fliers I've seen of late...here are three that I took pictures of this past week...

Photo EXCLUSIVE: Where a window used to be at the KFC on 14th Street and Second Avenue

As my exclusive exclusively noted earlier today, something crashed through the window here at KFC. As our eyewitness's friend exclusively told us: The window on the 14th side "was smashed in, and the furniture, etc. was smashed to smithereens like a car had driven through the window. Anyway, there wasn't any police tape or anything blocking off the area ... "

And here is that first photo, in which I won exclusive bidding rights over Poultry magazine.



And we still don't have any idea of what happened. And they were open for business.

Crash at KFC?

We heard that there was an accident at the KFC on 14th Street and Second Avenue earlier today. No reports of injuries. The restaurant was also likely closed at the time. According to the tipster, the window on the 14th side "was smashed in, and the furniture, etc. was smashed to smithereens like a car had driven through the window. Anyway, there wasn't any police tape or anything blocking off the area ... "

Photos anyone?

Report: Homicide on Avenue C

Over the weekend, several credible, non-law-enforcement sources confirmed that someone was killed late Thursday night/early Friday morning in an apartment on Avenue C between Eighth Street and Ninth Street. One source close to to the scene noted: "None of the major news outlets have reported it, but it certainly happened. I saw the [medical examiner] outside for a few hours on Friday morning and have heard that it happened in an apartment and was sex related."

The Post reports on the homicide in today's NYPD Daily Blotter:

A New Jersey man strangled his gay lover with a rope in the victim's Alphabet City apartment, police sources said yesterday.

Davawn Robinson, 22, of Paterson, NJ, allegedly wrapped the rope around the neck and wrist of Edgard Mercado, 39, in Mercado's apartment on Avenue C near East Eighth Street at 4 a.m. Friday.

Authorities found Mercado's body face up on the floor of his bedroom. Robinson had fled, police said, but was arrested the next day on murder charges.

New bar/restaurant for lower Avenue B?

The for rent signs are down at 16 Avenue B at Second Street...



...and I was told by a worker on the scene that the wall between the two vacant storefronts at 14 Avenue B and 16 Avenue B will be torn down... and the spaces will be combined...but for what?



14 Avenue B was on the docket for last week's CB3 liquor licensing meeting, but they were scratched from the agenda...

23. Corp to be Formed (currently Butterfly, Butterfly), 14 Ave B (trans/op)

The current liquor license for 14 Avenue B is inactive.

Previously on EV Grieve:
There are more than 20 empty storefronts along Avenue B

Chico's Avenue A mural neutered

Over the weekend, Chico's "spay/neuter" mural on Avenue A near 11th Street...



...got painted over...






One of the painters said they were putting up an ad for an NBA video game...

Previously on EV Grieve:
What's going on with the playground at Mary Help of Christians?

Does the new Cooper Union building have a renter? (Plus, food cart!)

The "store for rent" signs are gone from in front of the new Cooper Union buidling...and the windows along Cooper Square have been papered over...so, has a retail client been secured for this spot? What could it be?



The first "for rent" ads stipulated "non cooking food." Which leaves open the possibility of FroYo. You don't cook that, right? Just pour it out of a bag?

Speaking of food!

For some reason I know that "House" premieres tonight

Noted

At Seventh Street and First Avenue.

Noted

The Giants are playing the Cowboys now on NBC... the game is on in the background. The new Cowboys Stadium cost $1.2 billion. NBC compared it to the Roman Coliseum. NBC also captured Cowboys owner Jerry Jones....

Car plows into ConEd gates on Avenue D

Just after 5 this evening, a car crashed into the ConEd fence at the dead end of Avenue D at 12th Street.




There were several accounts of what happened. One tipster noted that the car had been driving north on Avenue D with its hazards on before crashing into the fence. On the scene, one witness thought the car had clipped a van before coming to a halt at the fence. Yet someone else thought the driver simply made a mistake and kept going straight at the dead end.



In any event, nothing really sinister afoot here. The woman driving the car was in a great deal of discomfort. She was simply visiting her mother who lives nearby.

Lunch with a bunch of liars

Liars Picnic. Part of Conflux 2009.