Tompkins Square Park rats now famous in Seattle!

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has picked the AP story about the TSP Ratstravaganza!

Tompkins Square Park rats now enjoying citywide recognition

Well, both the Post and NBC New York have just checked in with reports about what Bob Arihood has dubbed "the TSP Ratstravaganza."

As The Villager reported last week, concerned parents have formed the Tompkins Square Park & Playgrounds Parents’ Association after lots of rats have been spotted in the recently renovated, $1.5 million playground off Ninth Street and Avenue A.

Here's the Post article. Here's the WNBC clip.

Oh, and I should mention that Park officials can't use poison to kill the rats... they need to protect Tommy/Evie/whateverItsNameIs, the red-tailed hawk.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Parents group upset about number of rats in Tompkins Square Park (32 comments)

Move into 7 Second Ave., next door to 'the imminent carnage'

EV Grieve reader Bayou passes along a link to a co-op studio for sale at 7 Second Ave. (You can read the listing here.) It's a pretty typical listing. Of course, the buildings next door up to First Street, including the former homes of Joe's Locksmith and Mars Bar, will soon be demolished to make way for a 12-story luxury high rise with 65 units.

This isn't noted in the listing.

Asks Bayou, "Wonder if they'll mention the imminent carnage at the open houses."

[Curbed]

The man in the window at 9 Second Ave.

On Saturday, I was walking on Second Avenue when I noticed a man standing in the window upstairs at 9 Second Ave. (aka 7 1/2 Second Ave.). Not a big deal, except I thought that everyone had already moved out in advance of the demolition.

I circled around and took better look... He seemed to be intently staring out the window, perhaps taking in the view one last time...

Heh. Well! Perhaps the mannequin has been there and I just never noticed it... or maybe someone placed it there upon moving out. Maybe give the construction workers pause.

East Village to get a taste of Upstate

Last evening, Goggla noticed the new restaurant on First Avenue called Upstate. And, in a really soft launch, the restaurant appeared to be open last night...

In recent years, the space was home to Permanent Brunch/Permanent Brunch & Burger/Steak Shoppe.

Earlier this month, The Observer noted that owner Shane Covey used to work at the 10-year-old Flatiron seafood restaurant Shaffer City, which closed last September. Upstate will serve oysters, meats, cheeses and craft beer.

Workers paint over the Russo's mural on 11th Street

Last Monday, we pointed out the arrival of a sidewalk shed outside Something Sweet on the corner of First Avenue and East 11th Street...

And, let's awkwardly quote ourselves.... "As long as no one gets any funny ideas about painting over the Russo's mural on the 11th Street side..."

[2nd Russo's image via]

That's right! And this past weekend... checking in on the painting progress.

...and yesterday...

Ugh.

The store was founded in 1904. I don't know how long the mural has been here... Could workers have spared it? Not such a crazy concept. The pigs were actually saved on Second Avenue. Regardless, just one more familiar site in the neighborhood that has disappeared...

Lucy's is closed until Aug. 12 (smiley face)

A reader just asked yesterday morning what was going on with Lucy's on Avenue A. Seemed like the place has been closed the last few days. And no note, like usual.

However! A note appeared yesterday.... Lucy is on holiday again...

Also, this note doesn't quite stack up against previous closed notes...

Exclusive: First look inside Sidewalk's new kitchen

Oh, OK. It's not really an exclusive. Anyone who walked by here on Sixth Street the last few nights probably got a look at Sidewalk's renovated kitchen. Anyway, as we reported a few weeks ago, Sidewalk hopes to reopen by Aug. 5.

Beatbox Kid Lucky on Astor Place today

[Bobby Williams]

[John Marshall Mantel]

East Village post offices spared from possible closure

[Photo via Forgotten NY]

This morning, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe released a "post office study" of nearly 3,700 potential closings in the United States. Despite the massive list, it appears that the Tompkins Square branch on East Third Street between Avenue B and Avenue C has been spared. Its name was not among those that the USPS may shutter to ease the agency's humongous deficit. (The full list is here.) There had been some neighborhood gossip that this small branch may go.

Meanwhile, the other local branches on 14th Street and Fourth Avenue are also not on the closure list.

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning Edition

Photo in front of the Ottendorfer Library on Second Avenue this morning by John Marshall Mantel

The building housing the incoming IHOP on East 14th Street once was a notorious house of smut (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Attorney Street next for more luxification? (BoweryBoogie)

NYU donates furniture (and trash) to new Cooper Square tenant (Runnin' Scared)

Remembering the The Tompkins Square Communist Rally of 1877 (Off the Grid)

A bed-bug infested mattress spotted on Orchard Street (The Lo-Down)

MTA's new $1 MetroCard fee coming soon (Gothamist)

Fire at Yorkville's old-school Hungarian Meat Market (Lost City)

With the Shake Shack Monster coming, will this mean bad news for the Oyster Bar? (Grub Street)

Stalled tractor-trailer clogging up St. Mark's Place entrance

A reader notes that this tractor-trailer has crapped out while making a turn off Third Avenue/Cooper Square onto St. Mark's Place...

The reader says the M8 buses are currently being diverted.