Who wants to go for a ride in the cellulite reduction treatment car?

On Spring and Mulberry. And it just fits by a hair in that parking spot.

Ice capades at Cooper Square Hotel

The last, oh, three or four times that I've walked by this service entrance to the Cooper Square Hotel...there are bags of ice just sitting there...melting.

When an enormous town house just won't do

From the Times today:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s town house at 17 East 79th Street is the epitome of Upper East Side elegance: five stories of flawless Beaux-Arts limestone with 7,500 square feet of exquisite living space, all within steps of Central Park.

But for the mayor, it seems, the house has been a bit cramped.

Over the past two decades, in transactions that have gone all but unnoticed, Mr. Bloomberg has been buying up space in the building next door, knocking down walls and combining two entire floors along the way. He now owns four of the six apartments at 19 East 79th Street, a white 1880 neo-Grec co-op town house.

Blood for coffee

Measuring Tempo

So there are new ads on the bus shelter at Third Avenue between 13th Street and 14th Street for this HIGH-TECH wonder of a living space, Tempo. Interestingly enough, these ads are almost right outside the kind-of-stodgy-now-by-comparison One Ten 3rd high rise by the Toll Brothers...



Here's what the residence would look like if you had a photo of it on your knock-off iPod...




Anyway, a little later I was on 23rd Street and Second Avenue...For some reason I thought Tempo was a little further along...




P.S. An image from the Tempo Web site....

A work permit at Ryan's Irish Pub

There's now a work permit in the window of Ryan's Irish Pub on Second Avenue near Ninth Street. (One wasn't visible when the place first closed earlier this month.) I had been told by a reliable source that this closure was only temporary. You can click on the photo for a better view...looks as if they're remodeling the restrooms and reconfiguring the stairs. No change of occupancy.



Previously on EV Grieve:
Ryan's Irish Pub (temporarily) closed

Noted

Along East Ninth Street.

Flower bounty

On Madison Avenue in the 30s.

Why the Bowery will be "Ugly" today

Fliers were on the Bowery near the Bowery Hotel.

The Bourdainster blogs about "Disappearing Manhattan"

The Bourdainster blogs about tonight's episode of "No Reservations"...

We're calling Monday night's show "DISAPPEARING MANHATTAN," but this is not to suggest that Katz's Deli, or Keen's, or Russ & Daughters are going to fade away anytime soon (if ever). What I am saying with this "Special" episode is that these are exactly the kind of old school, hometown places I love; uniquely New York institutions who have survived the brutal caprices of style and changing tastes -- and are still worth going out of your way to patronize. Let me make this clear: "Old" does not necessarily mean "good." Just cause it's a "New York institution" doesn't mean you want to eat there. If it did, New Yorkers might actually eat at Tavern On The Green -- and Luchows would still be open.

Previously on EV Grieve:
"No Reservations" at Sophie's

Joe Strummer gets a new look, skyline

On the side of Niagra on Seventh Street and Avenue A. Joe Strummer's mural, which went up in 2003, gets an update.

Before:


After:


And in case you've never seen the making of the wall...here's the cover of "Redemption Song" by Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros...



[Before photo via Union Song]

Extra Place is getting prepped for pavement

Extra Place is getting paved. Here's the flier telling residents....



"Keep your windows in the closed position"?



Previously on EV Grieve:
Looking at Extra Place

The Chocolate Wars (well, not at all, but we needed something that sounds CONTROVERSIAL)

Scaffolding finally comes down at Third Avenue and 13th Street

This scaffolding was up for at least two years.





Last spring, Cafe Deville and Cosmic Cantina were named two of the worst outdoor tables at Eater. (Be sure to read comment No. 11.)

(Bottom photo via Eater)

Previously on EV Grieve:
But of course!

Sleepless in Stuy Town: Welcome to "Noise Town"

The good people behind stuyvesant town's lux living made note of the flier (to the right) at First Avenue and 20th Street. Sounds like a nightmare, not to be corny.

A note on the women's room at Milano's

On Houston near Mulberry.

Open to interpretation

On the Bowery. Near Fourth Street.

That scene from "Revolutionary Road" filmed in the East Village

I finally got around to watching the (cough) promo copy of "Revolutionary Road" that a friend passed along...(Been also meaning to read the book by Richard Yates)...I was curious about the film, which is up for three Academy Awards tonight.

As you may recall, a scene for the movie was filmed inside 295 E. Eighth St. at Avenue B back in June 2007. The production hogged up good chunks of Avenue B between Sixth Street and 10th Street. Plus the north side of Seventh Street between Avenue A and Avenue C. Anyway, I wrote about all this here.



The scene they filmed in the neighborhood is in the very beginning...the exterior shot is of another building in the neighborhood, not 295 E. Eighth Street...



The scene is where Kate and Leo first meet...




Oh, and for the record, I didn't care much for the film.

Looking at "The French Connection"

"The French Connection" won five Academy Awards, including for Best Picture and Best Actor (Gene Hackman). In honor of the 1971 classic's Blu-ray release on Tuesday, the Post spoke to director William Friedkin about making the movie on the sly in NYC. The Post included a chart showing some of the locations...(click the image to enlarge)



The bowery boys had some nice observations on this classic when it played during the summer of 2007 at the Film Forum.

"I wouldn't be able to do any of these things without the bus"

The Daily News has a brief on the M8 protest yesterday. Anyone go to the event?

More than 100 bus riders urged the MTA Saturday to keep the crosstown M8 rolling, calling it the "lifeline" of Greenwich Village.

"I take it to my senior center, I take it to go shopping, I take it to the theater," said Teresa Hommel, a 64-year-old East Villager who has trouble walking. "I wouldn't be able to do any of these things without the bus."

The MTA plans to scrap service on the M8 and several other bus routes in order to help plug a $1.2 billion budget deficit. It links the East Village to the West Village.

What's doing in San Francisco?

This Page 1 article in the San Francisco Chronicle today caught my attention...:

It's one of the seediest stretches in San Francisco, filled with homeless people slumped against vacant storefronts, the stench of urine, graffiti, drugs and crime. Many maps and travel books explicitly warn tourists to stay away.

But the three blocks of Taylor Street just north of Market Street would become an arts district -- some say akin to New York City's SoHo, which became an area of cheap artists' lofts and studios in the 1960s and '70s -- under a plan being cobbled together by city officials, landlords, artists and Tenderloin-area nonprofit workers.

The transformation gets under way today with the groundbreaking of Gray Area Foundation for the Arts, which is taking over a vacant 4,000-square-foot building that once was a porn theater. The old marquee on the building reads "Art Theatres," apparently a euphemism that also foreshadowed its future use.

And later:

The North of Market Neighborhood Improvement Corp. is one of the nonprofits involved with remaking Taylor Street. With city funds, it hired a new director, Elvin Padilla, who has 20 years of experience infusing the arts into low-income communities.

He said artists moving into a neighborhood can scare low-income residents who fear gentrification. But if done right, he said, the improvement can make a neighborhood safer without driving out residents.

"The arts can be an effective way to address tension and conflicts and empower neighborhoods that are going through stress," he said. "The arts can be a common denominator for many different people in terms of race, class, socioeconomics, the whole thing."

For further reading:
The Lower East Side: There goes the neighborhood

[Photo of the liquor store by Brant Ward/Chronicle...the store is being replaced by a cafe]