Bounce Deuce now sporting plywood

And I hope they get that Stop Work Order cleared up from 1995.

Previously.

Whole Earth Bakery and Kitchen still closed for renovations

Whole Earth Bakery and Kitchen, which has operated at 130 St. Mark's Place since 1991, closed last Friday for renovations. The shop was expected to reopen yesterday. However, a walk by yesterday afternoon revealed that the renovations continue...



Please reopen soon...

Whole Earth Bakery and Kitchen got its start in 1978 on Spring Street.

Things that we found on the street

On 13th Street near Avenue B. And where is disc 1?

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning Edition

Rush Week in the EV? (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Karate Boogaloo reviews the new Arthur Kane book (Stupefaction)

An EL of a good time (This Ain't the Summer of Love)

TGIF to Union Square fallout. Per an Eater commenter: "I am going to run a $1 shuttle bus between TGI Friday's and Superdive starting at 8pm on Thursdays and Fridays" (Eater)

There will be none of that "discharge of fecal matter" business in this pool! (Curbed)

Jack Shafer debunks the summer's big "trends" stories. Like beer guts on hipsters! "Usually when something is called hip, a top hipster can be found embracing it. But Trebay names no leader of potbelly hipness and uncovers no evidence of hip potbellies in the cinema, the stage, the concert hall, the night club, or elsewhere. It's just these random guts strolling around New York. You might as well say argyle socks are hip." (Slate)

StuyTown thong update (StuyTown Lux Living)

Phil Mushnick: "Every time I hear/read a team or MLB exec rationalize ticket prices as in-line with Broadway show tickets I want to retch. How many Broadway shows have two-hour rain delays? How many matinees are switched to Sunday nights? On Broadway a losing streak closes the show. How many shows would survive if the cast were shut out, 12-0, the script re-written every day and the stars intentionally walked?" (New York Post)

And over at the New York Nobody Sings, Cheetah Chrome gives a guitar lesson:

The last house on the block

On this block in East Harlem, one house remains on the east side of Lexington Avenue between 117th and 118th Streets. I noticed it earlier this summer on a day that I was tooling around town in a rental car.

A search on Google Maps shows that two houses were still standing as of one year ago.




Now, only 1889 Lexington Ave. remains. And there's construction going on behind it and next to it.




Next door, there are 29 residential units -- with a community space on the ground floor -- under construction. It's sponsored by the Bluestone Organization and Hope Community, Inc.

Meanwhile, the lone house remains. I'm curious about its fate. And its history. (I did find the Certificate of Occupancy dating Nov. 12, 1953.)




Rooms are available for rent.



Related:
Activists Arrested After Occupying East Harlem Lot (The New York Times)

Cops Stop Occupation of JPMorgan Chase's Vacant Lot, Arrest 9 or More (The Village Voice)

Developer Bows Out of East Harlem Megaproject (Curbed)

Looking at The New Yorker's Bloomy extravaganza

Ben McGrath profiles King Bloomberg in this week's New Yorker.

It's epic. Here's how it starts:

Michael Bloomberg has never been the sort of public speaker who makes people faint in his presence. He talks too quickly, mispronounces words, and has a weakness for self-referential jokes, at which he smirks readily, like a boy who knows that his mother approves.

McGrath's piece is roughly 10,000 words, so.... here are just a few interesting passages.

Bloomberg took office during a recession, and quickly established himself as a bold and decisive fiscal manager, ultimately demonstrating, as his friend Mitchell Moss, an urban-planning professor at N.Y.U., says, that New York was “open for business after 9/11.” As the economy recovered, Bloomberg set about trying to transform the city, on a scale not seen since the days of Robert Moses. “I think if you look, we’ve done more in the last seven years than — I don’t know if it’s fair to say more than Moses did, but I hope history will show the things we did made a lot more sense,” Bloomberg told me. “You know, Moses did some things that turned out not to be great: cutting us off from the waterfront, putting roads all along the water.” The Bloomberg model, under the direction of Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff and Amanda Burden, the City Planning Commissioner, was based to a large extent on undoing the Moses legacy: rezoning for commercial and residential use large tracts of waterfront property that had once been the province of industry.

Later on, a City Hall reporter offers:

“If he weren’t sometimes such a dick, it would be an unbearable beat.”

Illustration: Gerald Scarfe

New York's Neighborhood Watch

From this week's New York magazine:



Previously on EV Grieve:
Observations from last night's noisy bars meeting

For further reading:
Stop the SuperNoise - Community Meeting (Blah Blog Blah)

Noted

Oops. Meant to post the ongoing weekend recap yesterday morning...

Dumpster of the day

An EV Grieve reader sent along this combo special on Second Street between Avenue A and First Avenue.

What Koi needs on the Bowery

Fresh graffiti on the old Koi notice on the Bowery. And the second part is difficult to make out. Soporific?



Previous Koi coverage on EV Grieve.

Fall?

At the start of every summer, I always say that I'll go see one of the HBO Bryant Park Summer Film Festival films. But I never do it. Afraid I'll start throwing picnic baskets. And tonight is the last one for the summer of 2009. Just as well. It's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." I'd be lost: I haven't seen the first two. (Boo! Hiss!)

And now I see New York has its annual Fall Fashion issue. Fall? I'd like a do-over on June, please. And I'd like to go see "Dog Day Afternoon" on July 6.

6:20 and I'm finally reading the Times

Did you see the lead to the piece in the Times today titled, City’s Poor Still Distrust Banks?:

In 1986, when the Lower East Side had just one bank in a 100-square block area...

Today, despite a bank branch on seemingly every corner throughout the city, the article notes:

In Manhattan, long the world’s banking capital, 12 percent of households still do not have a bank account... 91,100 Manhattan households feel more comfortable hiding their savings in closets, in pillows — even in brown paper lunch bags. They rely on check-cashers and corner bodegas for cash and post offices for money orders, even as banks are more accessible than ever: the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation reports 682 banks in the borough in 2008, compared with 521 in 2004 — a more than 30 percent increase.

Who will be the next tenant for the former CBGB Gallery?

As Racked reported, the Morrison Hotel on the Bowery -- former site of the CBGB Gallery -- is moving...



...and the "for lease" signs are up now...



Have you read the listing for the property?

It's good. Real good.

With 25 feet of frontage and up to 8,800 square feet of retail space available, 313-315 Bowery offers a unique opportunity to be a part of the resurgent development in the Bowery neighborhood. The hotel, residential and retail developments surrounding the old CBGB space provide extraordinary exposure for this opportunity in one of the city’s distinctive cultural landmarks.

Features
• 25 feet of frontage on Bowery
• 2 blocks away from Manhattan’s largest Whole Foods Market
• Former location of the world renowned CBGB
• Adjacent to over 700 new luxury rental units in AvalonBay Development
• Next to highly successful John Varvatos 315 Bowery boutique, opened Spring 2008

Coming soon: A gourmet deli to go with your karaoke on St. Mark's Place

I wondered how the karaoke joint on St. Marks's at the former home of Mondo Kim's would fill up all that space...



According to plans on the door, we may be in for a gourmet deli.



Seems to make sense. There's already another karaoke place across the street... might as well have another gourmet deli like the one across the street to match...

Previously on EV Grieve:
Karaoke taking over Mondo Kim's space

New world order for Avenue C?

Just posting a, uh, post that I did for Curbed last week.



For sale signs went up [last] week at the Lower Manhattan Congregation Jehovah's Witness at 67 Avenue C near East 5th Street. According to the Massey Knakal listing for the property, the space "is ideal for a user, investor or developer and will be delivered vacant." Indeed; asking $2.2 million.

A note for the ATM thief

Outside Nino's on St. Mark's and Avenue A.

A note for the people on the terrace tossing sandals and doing things that "should be done in private"

Noticed a sign on door yesterday morning for residents of 151 E. Third St. at Avenue A.



And what did it say?

One less reason for Sarah Jessica Parker to visit the EV

MoMo FaLana is leaving its corner digs on Avenue A and Third Street in a few weeks. SJP apparently shopped here once or something. And wore a coat from here on SATC. (Examiner)

Panache Cafe now open minus the Megan Fox

Looks to have a Moroccan theme...




I was hoping they'd leave up the newspaper with the Megan Fox feature.



Previously on EV Grieve:
Avenue B to get a little Panache

Cops investigating Avenue C shooting

Not much information is known just yet about a 25-year-old man who was shot while walking out of a bodega on Avenue C near 10th Street this morning. The victim was taken to Bellevue. (NY1, WCBS, The Lo-Down)

So true. Funny how it seems.

At the Seventh Street block party yesterday between Avenue A and First Avenue.

Cindy Adams takes on the inconveniences and unpleasantries of having to ride in elevators with commoners

What a hassle!

Take residential buildings where tenants have no in-house washer and dryer. Residents must schlep laundry to the basement washroom or nearest Laundromat. I understand they don't wish to be dirty neighbors but can't they cover their menfolks' unwashed BVDs? Tuck their own bra straps inside the basket? Under the box of Ivory? Those who are big-busted or cosmetically enhanced could invest in Ivory's economy-size box.

Food delivery is another thing. The pizza guy coming up. The Chinese-food delivery boy. Always nice to have the aroma of subgum wafting to the roof. And can we talk about the sweaty bicycle rider who gets in with his helmet, leg clamps, wheel chain -- and does NOT look like Lance Armstrong?

In buildings minus a service elevator, one must occasionally cool one's designer heels as deliverymen load cartons of toilet paper, Pampers and oranges that always roll out of their brown-paper bags into the lift. Everyone stares into the bags thinking, "Hmmm, chuck steak instead of T-bone. Apartment 46K's having money trouble."

Previously.

Noted

Been so busy eating sausage-biscuits-and-gravy pizza and deep-fried mac-and-cheese, I forgot to note this Times trends piece from Thursday.

In truth this get-up was pretty much the unvarying male uniform last summer also, but this year an unexpected element has been added to the look, and that is a burgeoning potbelly one might term the Ralph Kramden.

Too pronounced to be blamed on the slouchy cut of a T-shirt, too modest in size to be termed a proper beer gut, developed too young to come under the heading of a paunch, the Ralph Kramden is everywhere to be seen lately, or at least it is in the vicinity of the Brooklyn Flea in Fort Greene, the McCarren Park Greenmarket and pretty much any place one is apt to encounter fans of Grizzly Bear.

What the trucker cap and wallet chain were to hipsters of a moment ago, the Kramden is to what my colleague Mike Albo refers to as the “coolios” of now. Leading with a belly is a male privilege of long standing, of course, a symbol of prosperity in most cultures and of freedom from anxieties about body image that have plagued women since Eve

.

"Bad Lieutenant" screening tonight to benefit Cinema Nolita

BoweryBoogie has been all over the sad story of Cinema Nolita on Elizabeth Street. [Oops! That's Mulberry!]

As Bryan Waterman notes:

Cinema Nolita is one of the last of a dying breed: a video store that not only still stocks plenty of VHS tapes (much to the delight of my 13-year-old daughter, who has a huge case of technological nostalgia) but has a large and varied DVD collection that leans toward classics and foreign while still covering all the requisite new release bases. Perhaps even more importantly, it's the kind of store where knowledgable employees remember your name and call up your membership before you get to the counter, and where they remember your rental history and taste and may even warn you away from a turkey...

Bryan says they need about $8,000 to cover expenses to keep going.

To help!

Anthology Film Archives is hosting a benefit screening, TONIGHT at 10 of EV Grieve favorite -- Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant" starring Harvey Keitel. Ferrara will be there for a Q-and-A and discussion after the movie.

Maybe you can ask about this scene!

The Lieutenant: [to Jesus Christ] Mutt! You got something that you want to say to me? You fuck! You ratfuck, you ratfuck! Here's your... What? Say something, I know you're just standing there. What am I gonna do? You gotta say something! Something! You fuck, you fucking stand there and you want me to do every fucking thing! Where were you? Where the fuck are you? Where were you? Where the hell were you? I... I... I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! I'm sorry! I did so many bad things. I'm sorry. I tried to do... I try to do the right thing, but I'm weak, I'm too fucking weak. I need you to help me! Help me! I need you to help me! Forgive me! Forgive me! Forgive me, please! Forgive me, father!

Anyway! On Monday night, there's a musical benefit, featuring the Beets, the Virgins and an Animal Collective DJ at Santos Party House. More details over at Patell and Waterman's History of New York.

I'd like to find that weasel who threw in the dime

The last "Note from EV Grieve" that EV Grieve will leave (today anyway)

The guest-blogging stint at Curbed winds down today....and so, a few of the things that I contributed this past week...



Sign of the Times, Bowery Edition (per Curbed commenters, the above flier is a stupid contest for Daffy's...)

Arrested Development: Weeds Sprouting Near Seaport

Downtown Bargain Hunter

Fringe spots

Noho #2: 25 Great Jones Hotel & Spa Grows, Gradually

East Village Noise Wars Update: Heroin Chic!

Construction Watch: 38 Delancey Grasps Towards the Light

Dining in the Dark

Cooper Union Scrubbed Anew

Scarano-on-the-Bowery Gets Its Gilded (Parking) Gates

As CHARAS Turns: Rebranded PS64 Up For Grabs on Ave. B

2 Fifth Follow-Up, Novgratz'd on E. 4th!

Meanwhile in the East Village

Many thanks to Lockhart Steele and Curbed for the invitation...

Mid-1980s East Village via Flickr

I came across the photography of Cactusbones on Flickr. She has plenty of LES/East Village urban landscape photos from her time here in the mid-1980s.

Her photos include:


Life Cafe



An abandoned lot on Seventh Street between Avenue B and Avenue C



Looking north on Avenue C at Seventh Street



And for grins, I tried to line up the same shot today



Thanks to Cactusbones for permission to post these photos. She has more here.

This is just cruel

Who could discard this big lug? Those eyes! I swear they were filled with tears when I walked by and exploited him/her by taking photos.



On 10th Street between Avenue A and First Avenue.

P.S.

Did you ever see "Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla"?



It really sucks.

New shrubs for the Cooper Square Hotel

To help block out the noise? (Ha.) Or protect partygoers from the commoners on the street?