"It was a douchefest much like last year's"

Every year I'm offered to tickets to go to the Belmont Stakes, every year I politely decline. And every year I'm so happy that I declined.

And yesterday? Gawker's Richard Blakely had this report last night:

"I had the great misfortune of going to The Belmont Stakes today. It was a douchefest much like last year's. I waited in a long line to use the restroom for about 30 or so minutes and when I finally got to the front I overheard someone say, 'Hey look at that guy, he can't wait and he's just pissing in the trash bin." Just then someone else corrected him and said, 'Oh no, the bathrooms in the entire complex are out, this is the line to piss in the trash can.' It was at that point that the place started to look more like the convention center after Katrina.

Ugh. The Times had this to report:

The scorching heat at Belmont Park on Saturday took its toll on everyone — the jockeys, the horses, the fans, and perhaps more than anyone else, the people waiting in line for the restrooms.
The temperature was 96 degrees at its peak and Belmont seemed to be unprepared for the demand for water. John Lee, the director of communications for New York Racing Association, said that the water had to be shut off in places and the pressure was lowered everywhere else to help conserve it.
“The problem didn’t come to light until there was extremely high usage,” he said.
Women began using men’s restrooms and lines went more than 50 sweating, complaining people deep.

Gawker commenter MrInBetween had this to say:

I pissed in a barrel after a 20 minute wait ... On the way out of that shit-box, a drunken frat boy . . . stepped on my foot, then told me to "fuck off." I had to be restrained from ripping his head off. I wish I had; it would have redeemed the day.

Blakely also posted this comment:

And this photo pretty much summed up the entire day...

Plus, of course, Big Brown lost.

And we still may be losing the OTBs.

"Every year since I've arrived there have been people crying that it was not like it was before"

That's Florent Morellet, owner of the soon-to-close Florent, in a Q-and-A in today's Post.

An excerpt:

Some people blame "Sex and the City" for the gentrification of the area.

I totally disagree. These are societal changes. We love to simplify things as humans and put labels on things. So the 18th century in France was Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI and a couple of writers. You put some people in charge of some periods. They say I made the meat market. I could have died from the whooping cough at age 5 - which I almost did - and I don't think it would have made a difference in the [area]. Some people put [the gentrification] on Pastis, some people put it on Jeffrey opening, other people put it on the Gansevoort Hotel. It's all of us. Every year since I've arrived there have been people crying that it was not like it was before.

But has it changed for the better?

Let me tell you, in the early '90s, the neighborhood really was so scary with the crack epidemic. The people who feel nostalgic were not coming then. That was the year we actually lost money. I think people don't remember. We had to leave the restaurant in groups of three because almost all of us got mugged. Memory is a beautiful thing and it's totally influenced by emotions - mine as much as anyone's.

Breaking, exclusive: It's hot out

Today's high: 94

Meanwhile, just 12 days until summer! Let's celebrate.

"I remember seeing Dylan in the Village..."

I kind of dread the day I hear that and the (presumably young and dumb) person isn't referring to Bob.

“When I go out my door now, I don’t see anyone I know. I see the loss of a community.”

[Image by Clayton Patterson]

The new issue of The Brooklyn Rail has a great feature on Clayton Patterson, the artist and documentarian who has been chronicling the changes in the Lower East Side since he first set up shop here in the early 1980s. Some of his 100,000 photos and 10,000 hours worth of footage went into Captured, which debuts Friday at The Rooftop Film Festival. "The film is as much a biopic of the neighborhood as it is a portrait of Patterson himself," according to the article by Jericho Parms

Here's an excerpt from the article:

When the Lower East Side took hold of Clayton Patterson, it never let go. He speaks of it as “a magic crucible that everything else would come out of.” In the last decade, he believes, he’s seen the end of that era as soaring real estate prices have begun to empty the village of its artists, bohemians, radicals and immigrants.
“When I go out my door now, I don’t see anyone I know. I see the loss of a community.” Patterson notes the changes—the cranky old tailor is gone, a trendy café bar bought out the Latino grocery on the corner. Still, there is a good chance that any person that walked the streets or attended an event in “the deep pool that is the Lower East Side” in the past two decades can be found somewhere in the Clayton Patterson archives. And, in that sense, they will live on forever.

Here's a trailer for the film:



Here's an article on Patterson from the Times.

Angie's got a three-floor gun

Happy Belmont Stakes Day (and so long OTB?)

Affirmed vs. Alydar -- best rivalry in sports history? And how about that 1978 Belmont Stakes race in the video above? Best ever?

Meanwhile, head to your local OTB parlor today to make your bet(s). The parlors are expected to close June 15. In fact, more than 1,000 OTB workers were just sent their pink slips. As the Times put it in a Feb. 22 feature: If OTB Goes, So Would a Relic of a Grittier City

Previously on EV Grieve:
So long, OTB (and happy Derby day)

Bonus:
A photo taken outside the OTB in Chinatown by Alison Grippo (via Flickr)

Weekend getaway

Let's take a trip back to Coney Island in the 1940s...

Bring it on (aka GOP Hard)

The Battle of the Bowery continues...On Page Six. Yesterday, we learned the New York Young Republican Club held a monthly social event at the Bowery Wine Company, which Bruce Willis has something to do with. In response to comments made by John Penley in April, one young GOPper told Page Six, "Needless to say, we're going to fill his neighborhood whether he likes it or not. We're coming with briefcases and BlackBerrys in hand to stake our claim."

And today?

The Bowery turf war between yuppie Republicans and local lefties will resume next Friday, when East Village gadfly John Penley will lead a demonstration in front of the Bowery Wine Co. with the Rev. Frank Morales of St. Mark's Church. Besides protesting "right-wing Republicans [a reference to Bruce Willis] opening yuppie wine bars in our neighborhood," as Penley put it, the rabble-rousers will blast the court decision allowing the owner of the tenement at 47 E. Third St. to evict his tenants so he can use the building as a one-family mansion. The New York Young Republican Club, which just held its monthly social at the Bowery Wine Co., is invited to counter-demonstrate - but, Penley told Page Six, "they have to show up in suits carrying briefcases so we can tell them apart."

Anyone know what time the demonstration will take place next Friday...?

Earlier on EV Grieve:

"We want to show our opposition to right-wing Republicans opening yuppie wine bars in our neighborhood"

The Lower East Side: There goes the neighborhood

That's the headline for the May 28, 1984, New York magazine cover story that I recently came across. The piece begins in the early 1980s with the rotting hulk of the Christodora and the young man eager to own it, Harry Skydell.

Skydell's enthusiasm was indeed mysterious. The sixteen-story building he wanted to buy, on Avenue B facing Tompkins Square Park, was surrounded by burned-out buildings that crawled with pushers and junkies. It was boarded up, ripped out, and flooded...Early in the seventies, the city had put up the Christodora up for auction and nobody bid.

The building was eventually sold in 1975 for $62,500. (Last I saw, two-bedroom units there -- roughly 1,100 square feet -- average $1.6 million or so. Of course, they're rarely available.)

The article talks about the influx of chain stores, art galleries and chic cafes. "And real-estate values are exploding" as a result. Said one longtime resident on the changes: "I've lived in my rent-controlled apartment for years and pay $115 a month. I live on the Lower East Side. The young kids who just moved in upstairs and pay $700 a month for the same space -- they live in the East Village."

There are so many interesting passages in the article by Craig Unger that I'd end up excerpting the whole thing. So it's below. You can click on each image to read it. Meanwhile, what do you think would be the headline for this story today?