Tuesday, July 5, 2022

Puff & Puff Convenience debuts on Avenue C

The neighborhood's latest smoke shop is at 153 Avenue C... where Puff & Puff Convenience is now up and smoking running here between Ninth Street and 10th Street.

P&P takes the space over from F&M Slice Pizza, which shuttered in March 2021 after 10 years of budget slices.

4.5 years later: A tenant for the former Noho Star space on Bleecker and Lafayette

There's finally a retail tenant for 330 Lafayette on the SW corner of Bleecker ... the storefront has been vacant since the end of 2017.

Slowear, the Italian clothing and accessories brand, opened its second NYC location here last week. 

Per the Slowear Instagram account: "The store hosts the latest generation technologies, the finest selection of garments and accessories for the men's wardrobe and a cosmetic area."
Noho Star, the low-key restaurant that attracted a few bold-faced names (Wallace Shawn! Lauren Hutton!), closed in this space on New Year's Eve 2017 after 32 years in business.

Slowear isn't the only luxury line to replace a neighborhood spot on the block. Bleecker Street Bar wasn't offered a lease extension after 30 years at Bleecker and Crosby. The bar closed in August 2020, though they will return around the corner on Broadway this fall.

In its place...  the New York flagship store for Sabah opened back in the spring and offers high-end leather Turkish slippers and other accessories... 

Monday, July 4, 2022

Monday's parting shot

Thanks to the reader for the rooftop shot tonight (July 4!) ...

Flashback Friday: 'Touchez Pas Au Grisbi' in Tompkins Square Park

Photos by Daniel Efram

This past Friday night, the 2022 Films on the Green series came to Tompkins Square Park with a free screening of "Touchez Pas Au Grisbi, a 1954 French-Italian crime drama starring Jean Gabin, Jeanne Moreau and Lino Ventura.

EVG regular Daniel Efram shared a few images from this welcome summer-in-the-city event, where "a delicate breeze pierced the humidity," he wrote
This was the only Tompkins screening this time around... but upcoming nearby...

• July 8, Seward Park  "Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress" by Dai Sijie (2002) 

• July 15, Seward Park  "The Class" by Laurent Cantet (2008) 

Find the whole schedule here.  

Monday's opening shot

Dueling baby car seats await you this morning at the Avenue A-St. Mark's Place entrance to Tompkins Square Park... photo by Steven...

Sunday, July 3, 2022

[Updating] Report of a gas explosion at La Mia Pizza on 4th Avenue

One person reportedly sustained a minor injury following a gas explosion this afternoon at La Mia Pizza, 124 Fourth Ave. between 12th Street and 13th Street.
The FDNY responded to the call at 3:22... ... and issued the "under control" 22 minutes later. The front windows of the restaurant, which opened here in September 2020, were blown out during the explosion. It wasn't immediately known who was injured — an employee, patron or passerby. 

Will update when more information becomes available.

Updated 6:05 p.m. 

Here's part of ABC 7's report
First responders detected gas and called ConEd who dispatched a crew to help search for the source inside the 20-floor building. As they were searching an explosion happened in the kitchen of the restaurant while FDNY and ConEd employees were inside. 

The explosion didn't cause a fire and was contained to the kitchen, according to the FDNY. 

One ConEd employee sustained minor injuries but refused transportation to the hospital. 
Thank you to the EVG reader for the top photo.

Week in Grieview

Posts this past week included (with a photo along Second Street) ... 

• Parking removed on sections of Avenues A and D; curbside bus lanes set for M14 service (Wednesday

• RIP Lisa Martin (Thursday)

• Hoop dreams: A memorial for Jesse Parrilla (Friday

• Lord Kitty fell from a window and needs surgery (Saturday

• The Gallery Watch Q&A: Kevin Sabo on ‘Kimberly Pepperoni’s Closet’ (Thursday)

• Treetops tops off on 2nd Avenue; signage arrives (Monday

• Openings: Sacco on 11th Street (Thursday) ... Cafe Joah on Avenue A (Tuesday

• Police searching for suspect who burglarized a storage room on Avenue B (Saturday

• A visit with Wolfie, a talented emerging outsider artist — and rabbit (Tuesday

• City pools open with limited staffing (Tuesday

• More burgers for the former Black Iron Burger on 5th Street (Thursday

• Compilation Coffee coming to St. Mark’s Place (Monday)

• Brooklyn Roasting Company opens a cafe inside the Strand (Monday

• ‘American Horror Story’ brings the porn and 1980s mobiles to 9th Street (Friday)

• Let the wheatpaste battle BEGIN! (Wednesday

• A new Korean concept for the Oiji space on 1st Avenue (Wednesday

• Raclette reopens (Monday)

• Blank Street continues East Village expansion with outpost on 1st Avenue (Tuesday

... and we had a @Culture.20 sighting on Second Avenue ... photo by Derek Berg...
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Reader report: FDNY truck collides with vehicle on 10th Street and Avenue C

Several EVG readers shared info from a Citizen post yesterday ... in which an FDNY truck collided with a car, sending the vehicle into the sidewalk bridge on the NE corner of 10th Street and Avenue C.
There weren't many details about the collision, except that the vehicle took down the light pole on the corner.
There weren't any reports of injuries. Will update if/when more information is available. 

Top image via Citizen

Noted

Someone left a message on this stump at the entrance to Tompkins Square Park at Seventh Street and Avenue A...
"Jesus is coming. Look busy." 

 OK! Doing laundry.

The tree came down on May 7.

Sunday's opening shot

Have a yabba dabba doo time with this new stone-age Basquiat wheatpaste on the Bowery and Houston... courtesy of DeGrupo ...

Saturday, July 2, 2022

Saturday's parting shot

Today on Seventh Street via Derek Berg...

[Updated] Lord Kitty fell from a window and needs surgery

Updated: Sadly, the fall was too intense and Lord was unable to breathe on her own. She was put to sleep. Per Lindsay: "So thank you all for your kindness, for your help, for raising awareness I cannot tell you how much it meant to me, to us ..."

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East Village resident Lindsay Flora came home last evening to discover that Lord, her nearly 9-year-old cat, whom she rescued as a kitten, fell from a fourth-floor window.

Lord survived the fall, “but we had to take her to the emergency vet immediately. Due to the extremity of the fall and the need for the x-rays, overnight stays, medicine, and her having a broken hip, plus some internal organ issues, it’s a lot, and we have her staying overnight a few nights to stabilize.” 

Lindsay launched a GoFundMe to help her pay for Lord’s medical expenses. 

“I’m not sure I can put into words how much she means to me, but she is my best friend, my baby, the absolute love of my life,” she wrote. 

Find the link here.

Police searching for suspect who burglarized a storage room on Avenue B

The NYPD has just released information about a suspect they say burglarized a storage room on Avenue B and took $26,000 in merchandise. 

According to the police, the incident occurred at 4:25 a.m. on June 11 at 23 Avenue B, which is between Second Street and Third Street. As previously reported, workers added two new floors and combined the two four-story structures here.

The police report does not mention the name of the business... the lone one being Gas on Deck, a recreational marijuana dispensary and accessories shop.

There is a $3,500 reward for information about this theft...

 

Now the bus knows what it's like to wait for a lift

The stricken M14A bus that blew out a tire on Avenue A yesterday was still waiting for a tow this morning.

The heavy-duty tow-truck was spotted between 10th Street and 11th Street ... and blocking the bus stop outside Tompkins Square Bagels...
The blowout occurred around 4 p.m. yesterday just south of 13th Street. Witnesses said it was loud as hell. There weren't any reports of injuries. 

And coincidentally, "Blow Out," Brian De Palma's excellent 1981 thriller with John Travolta, Nancy Allen and a menacing John Lithgow, is playing tonight (July 2 as well as July 4 and July 8) at Metrograph on Ludlow Street.


 

Friday, July 1, 2022

'American Horror Story' brings the porn and 1980s mobiles to 9th Street

Top photo by DP; the rest by Steven 

Film crews for a TV series with the code name "Bandana" (aka "American Horror Story," season 11) are filming on Ninth Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue (and along Avenue A and elsewhere) this evening. 

And the liberal Hollywood perverts have converted a storefront on the block is now a "video peeps" shop...
There are also some cars that your friend's older brother drove in high school...

Blow out on Avenue A

Photos by Steven 

The Fourth of July came early this afternoon on Avenue A just south of 13th Street ... when a tire on an M14 bus blew out, causing a roar that several EVG readers described as sounding like an explosion...
There weren't any reports of injuries, just a few frazzled nerves and a line at the next stop on A...

Feel the need, the need for 'Speeding'

 

Household Name, the third record from Brooklyn's Momma, is out today. (Per Pitchfork: a "cheeky spin on Gen-X slacker rock.") 

The video here is for "Speeding 72."

And you can catch Momma live next month in support of Snail Mail.

How to stay cool while being dive-bombed by a blue jay in Tompkins Square Park

Photos by Steven 

Featuring Christo, one of the resident red-tailed hawks in Tompkins Square Park... basically, you act like, What blue jay... 

Hoop dreams: A memorial for Jesse Parrilla

Photos by Gebhard 

Tuesday was Jesse Day on the basketball courts in Tompkins Square Park... as friends and community members gathered to celebrate the life of Jesse Parrilla, the local hoops star who was said to be an innocent bystander in a gang feud this spring. 

Parrilla, who lived with his mother on 12th Street between Avenue A and First Avenue, and his longtime friend Nikki Huang were reportedly kidnapped and killed in May "in a series of retaliatory shootings" involving a stolen purse. (Previously.) 

Parrilla, 22, played basketball for a season upstate at Genesee Community College. In Tompkins Square Park, there were basketball games and remembrances of someone who is gone too soon...

Films on the Green presents 'Touchez Pas Au Grisbi' tonight in Tompkins Square Park

The 2022 Films on the Green series comes to Tompkins Square Park tonight (July 1).

This year's theme is "From Page to Screen," spotlighting 12 literary adaptations. Our screening: "Touchez Pas Au Grisbi, a 1954 French-Italian crime film directed by Jacques Becker and starring Jean Gabin, Jeanne Moreau and Lino Ventura ... and based on a novel by Albert Simonin.

The plot!
After pulling off their "retirement job," 50 million in gold bars, aging criminals Max and Henri think they can give up the game. But when Henri's girlfriend tells the drug dealer Angelo about the loot, violence erupts. Angelo kidnaps the old crook and asks Max for the "grisbi' as ransom...
The trailer!

   

The film will start (roughly) around 8:30 in the center of the Park (where the bands play).

Films on the Green is produced annually in New York City parks by Villa Albertine, the French Embassy and FACE Foundation. 

After a year off in 2020, the series returned with a hybrid event last summer, though there weren't any events in Tompkins.