And how was your morning?

A photo from Shawn Chittle this morning on East 11th Street at Avenue A...

Also, a Facebook friend asked, "Did anyone hear those series of mini-blasts and rumbles in the E. Village starting around 7:45 a.m?" This was roughly in the northern stretch of Avenue B.

And an observation from an early-morning walk ...

More people sleeping around Tompkins Square Park this a.m. than people jogging around it.

— evgrieve (@evgrieve) October 22, 2012

21 E. First St. comes into view

Noticeable progress to note at the former stretch of 9-17 Second Avenue at East First Street...

Windows!

Soon enough, Mars Bar will return to the new retail space on the corner and... OK, but a handful of residents who lived in the building are getting the chance to come back and pay $10 for one of the apartments in the 12-story complex, as previously reported.

City wants you to remove your bike — or at least what's left of it

Back in June, WNYC listeners submitted hundreds of photos of abandoned bicycles around the city ... As Alex Goldmark reported:

But most of them will not be removed by the city. ... The life cycle of a bike left to rot on NYC streets is long, and intentionally so. The complaint process is as clunky as the cast off bikes themselves and the criteria for removal is stiffer than the U-lock holding this pilfered cruiser to a bike rack on Bleecker Street.

The first obstacle is that what you consider an abandoned nuisance taking up your prime bike parking is property to someone else. Most bikes reported to the city as abandoned aren’t abandoned enough to be removed.

Anyway, in the last 7-10 days... I've noticed a handful of locked bike parts tagged as part of a "derelict bicycle removal program" ... (and dated 10/13)...

It doesn't appear to be a neighborhood-wide program... I noticed the tagged bikes on a few side streets between Avenue B and Avenue D... (and one on Avenue C) ... the top photo of two fairly broken-abandoned bikes by Cooper Union weren't tagged, for instance.

Anyway, fair warning in case you left a wheel locked up on East Ninth Street and Avenue C... oh, and have you noticed any tagged bikes on your block? Just wanted to get a feel for how widespread program is...

Backhoe Beamer joins ranks of classic neighborhood cars

You may have seen this yesterday... photos which are now going viral or something... The Backhoe Beamer...

[ Via @DicksCottons]

Anyway, it now joins an elite group of historic neighborhood cars...

• Icicle Audi

[Photo/Steve Sandberg]

• EV Lambo

[Goggla]

• The Rent is Too Damn High Mobile

Checking in on the Standard East Village plywood grafitti

The plywooding of the Standard East Village for its renovations finished up early last week... We wondered how long before someone tagged the wood... We noticed one little squiggle on the East Fifth Street side on Wednesday...

...and by Saturday...

The previous regime here at the Cooper Square Hotel was pretty speedy when it came to removing any tags, though that was on a permanent fence and not just construction plywood... The Cooper Square folks also commissioned four graffiti artists for that mural project on the hotel's south side...

Union Market update: 'Inching ahead, day by day'

A few readers have noted that workers have been stocking the shelves at the incoming Union Market on Avenue A and East Houston with some non-perishable items... Originally, we heard that the opening date was ... today.

However, in a few sort of recent tweets about an opening date in the East Village, Union Market's tweeters wrote: "Looks like 3 - 4 weeks! Inching ahead, day by day." ... (which is not part of a lyric from "Godspell.")

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 ...

EV Grieve Eatery Etc.: Angelina Cafe reopens tonight; Turkish fast food bows out of East Ninth

Back in May, we reported that Angelina Cafe was moving across Avenue A to No. 37 . .. RyanAvenueA says that they will start food service tonight ...

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Cigkoftem, a Turkish vegetarian fast-food chain founded in 1993, opened its first U.S. location on East Ninth Street back in January ... as we first noted here. In any event, it closed some time in the past two weeks... and the space is for rent...

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We happened to be on University Place this past weekend ... and noticed that University Restaurant at East 12th Street was still fairly intact ...

... the diner shuttered after 60 years of continuous service on Sept. 19. The "for rent" sign puts the rent at $39,000 per month...

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Starting today, Brooklyn Flea is hooking up with Whole Foods Bowery for a new, rotating restaurant, as Fork in the Road pointed out on Oct. 10.

Per the signage out front, the Mexican sandwiches and tacos from Cemita's are up first...

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And Table Verta opened Thursday on East Seventh Street (at the former Taureau) ... Per the sign on the door, it's BYOB for now... Plus, cash only until they have Internet access.

Everyone enjoys takeout near Tompkins Square Park

Photo by Bobby Williams. Previously.

Rejected headlines:
For the birds

So long, Freaks

A worker painted over the former Vampire Freaks sign today on Avenue A near East 12th Street... where people involved with I Coppi will be opening a new venture, as first noted last Monday...

Headline and photo via EVG contributor Shawn Chittle ...