

Previously on EV Grieve:
Storm damage on Avenue B
"It's as if a tornado blew in from Cape Cod and deposited a beach house onto the East Village. Perched on the roof of a four-story brick apartment building is a shingled cottage, complete with bay windows and a weathervane-topped cupola. The owner calls it 'Up-Upon-It' (a joking reference to friends with cottages in Sagaponack), and rumors abound that it is surrounded with sand and lawn chairs."
You probably recognize the image on our cover and homepage this week — and that was the point.
Some crazy drunk guy attacked me on Wall Street late at night. He threw a punch at me so I punched him down to the ground in self defense. He followed me back to my building and attacked me again inside, which is caught on tape. I used BJJ to neutralize him until the police came. There are about 6 seconds missing due to the apartment building's crappy copying where I ground and pounded him. Very bloody, but you can't see it from the video. Big shout out to Anderson's Martial Arts Academy in NYC where I train! Compared to my training partners, this guy was easy pickins'. FYI, I'm 5'6'' 180 lbs and this guy was like 6 foot and 210 lbs. In addition to being an MMA enthusiast, I'm also an attorney. Bad luck for him.
It is the oldest public non-sectarian cemetery in New York City. Most of the 2,070 interments took place between 1830 and 1870; the last was in 1937. All burials are in 156 below-ground vaults made of solid white Tuckahoe marble. Although there are no gravestones, the names of the original owners are on plaques in the surrounding walls. Their descendants may still be buried here.
The party was in the 21st floor suite. As far as hotel suites go it was nothing, and let me tell you I've seen a lot of them in lots of cities. Except for the view it was pretty vanilla. They took out the furniture so maybe with furniture it might be better, but really... The giant wraparound deck had no cover from the sun/rain, nor was there furniture out there either (again, maybe for the party they took it out.)
De rigeur slidy wood floors, big windows, very plain "minimalist" I suppose but to me it looks forlorn. The one couch was so wide you coudn't sit back without putting all your legs on it, which is not a good look at a party. I was the only one sitting/perching.
Tiny elevators with a very very long wait. In fact, they mixed the guests in with the party goers so the people who were paying hotel guests couldn't get to their rooms in a reasonable amount of time.
An elevator load of party goers had an argument with one worker when we couldn't get to the 21st floor via elevator, and then they wouldn't let us up the stairs from the 20th floor. He accused us of wanting to sneak in - this to a group of fairly middle aged people in business clothes. Ha! He threatened to call security. I begged him to call security. A handiman we ran into fixed the elevator to bring us up.
When I was leaving there were a few young people hanging around the front desperately trying to get in, and the bouncer wouldn't let them through. There was absolutely nothing for them inside, but they sure thought they were missing something, only because they weren't allowed in.
We are postponing the application until fall. We're expanding more quickly than we had anticipated in different areas -- wholesale and catering, for example -- and need to concentrate on those for the moment. But we will pursue in the fall.
"We want to make it a place that both reflects the old New York and the new New York and the community within which it sits, which is Queens," said Bob Blakeman of PS&S Design, the project's architect.
Some 1,200 video slots could be open by April. All 4,550 machines would be running by November 2010, officials said.
A 300-room hotel, garage, racing museum, shops, restaurants and 2,500-seat entertainment center would be done in 2012.
The group's plan would give the state $101 million upfront.
SL Green Realty Corp. partnered with Hard Rock to draft a rival plan that includes a 425-seat buffet and eight-station food court.