What is wrong with this picture?

Transformer

For some reason I never noticed this Lou Reed street art on Attorney Street...

What will we do until Sept. 10?

Lucy told us that she'd be leaving for Poland for several weeks. Still. Anyway, here are a few shots -- drinking, playing with a camera -- to hold us over until Sept. 10. Avenue A between Ninth and 10th Street.

Iggy's is apparently open

There were balloons and people inside, according to a tipster. Maybe even free slices? And how was the pizza? "I wasn't hungry."

Anyone else try the pizza?

For further reading:
Five Rose's Pizza: Vanishing (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Five Roses’ Krystyna Says “I’ll Be Back” (Hunter-Gatherer)

Teneleven closed for remodeling: "Fret not ye lushes"

I've never written about Teneleven, 171 Avenue C between 10th Street and 11th Street. I like what they do here, using their space to showcase the work of local artists, photographers, musicians, etc. I hope that they do reopen soon, as promised.

A Cure for this location?

Cure closed up a few weeks back...And now, the space is being renovated....




...people working on the old Cure said this spot will become a coffee shop/small plates place...they're looking to open in the next six weeks. Perhaps they can break the cycle here — three places in quick succession.



Previously on EV Grieve:
No more Cure

Noted

Ciao Ballaro?

Ballaro, a "caffe prosciutteria" that opened in late April on Second Avenue between Fourth Street and Fifth Street, hasn't been open the last few days and nights. And no one answers the phone.

BBQ/TKettle closed

The Korean-based BBQ Chicken chain at 26 St. Mark's Place that shares space with TKettle....



...is temporarily closed....reliable sources said that they need to get their permits in order.

Stop work order at Upright Citizens Brigade space

Totes the fault of the cargo shorts!1!111!!! (Read the comments.)

Cafe DeVille closed for the rest of the month

And keeping this restaurant theme going...Cafe DeVille on Third Avenue at 13th Street is closed for a holiday the rest of the month.



Hmm, OK...it's one thing for a mom-and-pop shop to close for a few weeks, but a fairly large place like this that employs so many people...?

Are New Yorkers addicted to luxury?

The Post takes a look at the new David Barton gym on Astor Place.

Throughout the day, a Ramones- and Bowie-filled soundtrack supports Barton's notion that his swanky $5 million gym will reflect the East Village's trademark punk and glam-rock spirit.

Trend?!

Indeed, the whole city's suddenly a nightclub. Not to be outdone, a huge trilevel Crunch half a block south of Barton's new gym offers an ear-splitting Tuesday-night deejay party and has a counter serving protein shakes and $4-plus iced coffees. There's also a Midtown Equinox, housing a deli-style takeout kitchen, and Rockefeller Center's Sports Club/LA, which has a sit-down restaurant, a bar and a sidewalk café.

"The mainstream offering doesn't cut it for some people anymore," says Barton.

And it isn't just gyms. Local entrepreneurs are giving Manhattan what it wants -- and Manhattan apparently wants everything in one place.

Hmm.

So what's the deal with this town? Is it an addiction to luxury -- or just ADD? According to Barton, it's all about choices.

"There are a lot of different people around and different gyms to service them," he says. Locals who complained about the closing of the enormous Barnes & Noble formerly occupying this space might note: While a bookstore is very East Village in theory, a 700-plus-store national chain that displaces ma and pa bookstores is not.

"You don't even shop in stores anymore," says Barton, suggesting online retailers that are hurting bookstores have made gyms "the new town square."

The downside for old-school New Yorkers is that such things tend to come off a little more new Times Square. Perhaps those of us wishing to exercise to the beat of our own drum, or bowl with the lights on, should consider moving to Arkansas? Fat chance. The sushi there sucks -- and just try getting it delivered after midnight.

For further reading:
No pecs, no sex (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

"Once a building is gone, it is gone forever"

The Wall Street Journal excerpts David Freeland's book, "Automats, Taxi Dances, and Vaudeville," released Aug. 1 in paperback. And here's an excerpt of the excerpt.

Almost anyone who has written about New York has pointed out how it lives in a perpetual state of renewal: built, torn down, and rebuilt in an endless cycle. This is not a process exclusive to New York: it has occurred on the South Side of Chicago, in the area surrounding Memphis’s Beale Street, in Miami, and in other cities throughout the United States. But in New York — and particularly Manhattan — the rate of change seems intensified.

And...

Manhattanites have often seemed remorseful at having ignored their physical history, having treated it so callously. At the same time they have sought to accept change as an inescapable element of life in the metropolis. "In Downtown: My Manhattan" (2004), Pete Hamill writes poignantly of this experience:

The New York version of nostalgia is not simply about lost buildings or their presence in the youth of the individuals who lived with them. It involves an almost fatalistic acceptance of the permanent presence of loss. Nothing will ever stay the same . . . Irreversible change happens so often in New York that the experience affects character itself.

But we never make total peace with the destruction of architecture. As evidenced by the popularity of Web sites such as forgotten-ny.com and vanishingnewyork.blogspot.com, our anxiety has grown in recent years, as more and more of the city we know has been replaced with new construction. The elegiac posts on these sites indicate that the process of coming to terms with architectural loss occurs in stages: first shock that something beautiful could have been destroyed; then resignation; and, finally, determination to appreciate the treasures that remain. If, as Hamill suggests, we approach loss with a fatalistic perspective, it is because we understand the irreversibility of destruction. Once a building is gone, it is gone forever.

I'm in a time zone

I also posted this at a new site that I'm part of: The New York Nobody Sings.