Fat Cat Gallery
You can click over to my hometown paper to click though the photo gallery of the president's visit to town Thursday ... or the gallery of the FATTEST CATS IN TOWN.
- posted by Amy @ 3/04/2004 11:07:00 PM

 

A Few of My Favorite Things
Charlie at Manhattan User's Guide asked a few NYC bloggers to name their 10 favorite people, places or things about New York. Part I ran yesterday, and Part II appears today. (You can find my list in Part II.)
- posted by Amy @ 3/04/2004 06:45:00 PM

 

Blogging: Better than Bra Burning
I'm going to link to this story in the NY Daily News, but only if you promise to make distracting humming noises while reading over the line that says women bloggers find "the ability to write uncensored thoughts to the masses more liberating than a 1970s bra-burning parade."

It's written by Rick Bruner, a guy I know because he worked with some of my Prague co-workers after our paper folded and they traveled to Budapest for new publishing ventures. (And I moved to Gilroy, Calif. to cover city hall for a daily. Go figure.) I get my own paragraph in Bruner's story.
- posted by Amy @ 3/04/2004 08:08:00 AM

 

Hometown News
The president will be in my hometown tomorrow. (Invitation only.) And, check this out: the Bakersfield Californian election blog. Looks like they started Feb. 9 and the latest post is from 12:32 this morning. Nice going.
- posted by Amy @ 3/03/2004 08:44:00 AM

 

Gizmodo vs. Engadget
Peter Rojas, who has been the editor at Gizmodo since it was launched by the Nick Denton blog-media empire, has jumped ship to start a surprisingly similar enterprise called engadget. The site, which launched yesterday, is backed by Denton nemesis Jason McCabe Calacanis. You think that was an amicable departure?
- posted by Amy @ 3/03/2004 08:29:00 AM

 

Trade Center Plans
I finally went down to the Winter Garden this week to have a look at the model for the trade center project. I'm now more confused than I was before I took a look. It looks like the architects already assumed the Deutsche Bank building would be torn down - though that was only announced last week - and other buildings still standing look like maybe they're coming down, too. Also, it seems very weird looking at cars driving through the site, as they've proposed with Greenwich Street, and just this week, city planners said they want even more roads through the site. And another thing I should have realized before now, even though the plans will likely respect the footprints of the two towers, about four new skyscrapers will go up into what is now that huge gaping space -- and all along I've held that the size of the empty space goes a long way in expressing how much was lost. Imagining new tall buildings within the perimeter is unsettling.
- posted by Amy @ 3/03/2004 08:08:00 AM

 

Two Election Notes
Having voted only in California and New York in my lifetime, I'm not sure which state is out of the ordinary in their voter education system. In California, voters always get very detailed guides in the mail before each election, showing exactly what their ballot will look like, with pros and cons for each proposition or measure, as well as the location of their polling place.

In the five years I've lived in New York, I think I've gotten something close to that twice. For this election yesterday, not even a single flyer with campaign news hit my mailbox. I just hoped my election place hadn't moved, since I learned last time that it's basically a crapshoot. ... I don't think I should even get started on my NY ballot, which allowed voters to flip the lever for Kerry and any another candidate's delegates -- because Kerry's didn't have any who qualified for the ballot here. Is there logic to that?

My other election note also has a New York/California angle. I usually leave the radio tuned to the BBC overnight, but the show didn't air last night so the station could play a two-hour long live program (from KQED) strictly on the California election results. Very funny to listen to them whine about how the East Coast media declared Kerry the big winner for the day even before the polls closed in California, causing an ever lower voter turnout in California. (As if any Democrat's presidential vote really counted yesterday??) ... Besides that Arnold election a few months ago, this was the only other time in the past few years I've seen New York media pretend to care much about California politics.
- posted by Amy @ 3/03/2004 07:32:00 AM

 

Free Buffet in Manhattan
Oh, do I have some food news here: The free happy hour buffet -- the staple of my college culinary experience -- can actually be found in Manhattan.

SouthwestNY, a restaurant and bar that faces the marina behind the Winter Garden at the World Financial Center, has a free buffet from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. -- but only on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. Granted, it was only a French-bread type pizza, but it was indeed free. Beware of the margaritas though -- they're absurdly potent.

The place has huge windows looking out at the Hudson and apparently in the summer they do outdoor seating as well; the bartender said they can seat 700 outside by the water.
- posted by Amy @ 3/02/2004 08:48:00 AM

 

E-mail Spam on the Treo
Very disturbed about this. My opening greeting on my Sprint Treo 600 today was a notice that I received e-mail spam at 3:26 a.m.

New Text message From Email gateway huy447@netzero.net Subject: want a supermodel body? Trim 2 sizes in one month! This new pill REALLY WORKS! CALL (800) 4947185

- posted by Amy @ 3/02/2004 08:27:00 AM

 

Monday Morning Catch-Up
The unemployment rate for black men in NYC is 48 percent. (Story in Amsterdam News; link via Gotham Gazette.)

As of today, the Roosevelt Island tram is no longer accepting subway tokens. (AP story via Newsday.) We took the tram in January and were giddy to find they were still selling tokens although the rest of the city's transit had switched to Metrocards.

The 40-story Deutsche Bank building will be torn down at Ground Zero. In this picture I took Saturday afternoon, you can see it still covered in black netting just on the south edge of the trade center site.
- posted by Amy @ 3/01/2004 08:13:00 AM

 

Oscar Hates Mobloggers
Too funny. Emmanuelle was among the media folk covering the red carpet arrivals at the Oscars tonight and security told her to stop moblogging. All those TV cameras were perfectly fine, but apparently camera phones are dangerous.
- posted by Amy @ 2/29/2004 11:05:00 PM

 

Creepy Coney Island
Coney Island is weird. And not particularly in a good way. It has that awesome boardwalk, a historic roller coaster, a minor-league baseball team, a stellar sandy beach even by California standards -- yet it's still creepy.

The first time I went out there was a few years ago when my parents came for a visit. Among the memorable things we saw was a guy beating up his girlfriend, who kept running back to him begging his forgiveness. About 40 feet away, five or so cops stood in a group chatting, completely ignoring the violence.

This past Friday, I took the new B train from my Park Slope neighborhood out to the end of the line at Brighton Beach. My original plan was to ride the entire route of the B train, but I didn't have enough time and hadn't yet picked enough interesting stops along the way. So that's for another day.

Friday turned out to be maybe the most gorgeous warm and sunny day we've had all winter. I took the B from 7th Avenue and Flatbush, arriving at the last stop about 30 minutes later. I headed over for some lunch at Cafe Glechik on the recommendation of Alex Zucker, who makes his living translating novels from Czech to English. Alex, I assume, has a much easier time ordering from the menu here. The thing about Brighton Beach - this cafe included - is that English is an afterthought. Nearly everything is in Russian -- the newspapers, the signs, the menus. I ordered soup and some water, just tap water.

"We don't have tap water, only spring." - waiter

He brought me a plastic bottle of Poland Spring water. I thought he was maybe making fun of me until I went to pay the bill and it was clear he only knew a few words of English. "Tap" obviously wasn't one of them. The soup, by the way - vegetable with chicken meatballs - was quite good.

I walked a couple blocks over to the beach, finding the boardwalk to Coney Island nearly empty except for several hundred old Russian women (and a few men) sitting on the benches or walking slowly. Many of them were on cell phones. They were mostly overdressed -- with long floor-length fur coats and fur caps with ear flaps. It must have been close to 60 degrees outside and a blinding-bright sun.

The boardwalk stretches from Brighton Beach along to Coney Island, with retirement homes, parks, restaurants and some shops along the way. (Though most everything was closed when I was there.) Everything looks past its prime. I pass one park with basketball courts and it's crowded entirely with blacks. Shortly after that I reach another park with squash courts - packed entirely with whites.

As I pass the New York Aquarium, two big guys fitting every Brooklyn stereotype you know come up behind me. One's walking, the other's jogging at a very slow, labored pace. As they come up behind me -- "jogging" but still way too close considering the boardwalk's nearly empty, I hear the one guy is pontificating on Haitian politics.

"Most of those Haitians are homosexuals and they carry AIDS. I bet you didn't know that." - creepy Brooklyn guy

I stop and the guys nearly bump into me - they're that close on my heels.

I walk across the sand down to the water. I've always had a hard time going to a beach and not sticking my feet in the water - so I take off my boots and socks and foolishly let the icy Atlantic shock some sense into me.

Finally I'm down at the amusement park - all closed of course - to take a look at The Cyclone, big barking Rottweilers, frightened cats and carneys who offered to take me on a free ride if I came back later. Then I find "Shoot The Freak."

A mere two storefronts down from the famous Nathan's hot dog stand on the boardwalk, some enterprising soul has used a polluted vacant lot to build a Midway-style paintball shooting gallery with "live human targets."

Shoot the Freak
How Much
5 shots $3.00
15 shots $5.00
35 shots $10.00
75 shots $20.00

Down in the lot below the boardwalk trash is strewn all over the place: a rusted, metal storage drum, bricks, a giant pink Elmo-type doll, busted chairs, milk crates, piles of concrete rubble left over from the building that formerly occupied the site. The walls on both sides and the back are spray painted with graffiti and advertisements for the game. The place was totally empty when I was there, though it was clear the "Shoot the Freak" sign draped across the front of the lot had been hung recently. (I Googled "Shoot the Freak" when I got home and found that Newsday did a story on it in July. There's also a better picture of the game in action from local photographer PicPatrol.)

I walk down Stillwell Avenue and have a cheesedog at the big Nathan's location that stays open year-round. There are two cops in the line next to me and one's on his cell phone taking orders from his buddies, I'm getting my food and they're finally done with their order and ask the woman behind the register if they can get a discount for that. "No," she says and laughs at them.

The Coney Island subway station is closed for renovation until Spring, so I queue up for the bus to take me back to Brighton Beach. There are a bunch of people standing there, including an old Salty Dog-looking guy in shorts, sneakers, tall socks and a cap. He's probably in his 60s and everything about him says retired sailor. About a dozen of us are waiting to get on the B68 bus and up walks this guy in his late 20s -- fitting yet another stereotype -- with two women in their 50s. One is clearly his mother and he's trying to get her to the F train as we all come to hear.

"This goes to Brighton Beach," Salty Dog offers to the loud guy.

"All these people are stupid!," yells the crazed twenty-something. "Make up your mind!," he now yells -- at his mother. "Why are you so stupid?"

Salty Dog turns to him and says: "This no longer goes to the F train. They changed it. it goes to Brighton Beach."

Crazed guy grabs his mom and leads her away and yells at her again: "Don't listen to him. He's a fuckin' narc!"

Finally I'm getting on the bus myself, and I want to make sure the bus is indeed going to Brighton Beach, where you can get the Q or the brand-new B line, which has only been in service since Sunday. Apparently it's even too new for my MTA bus driver.

Me: Does this go to the B?
Bus driver: No.
Me: The Q?
Bus Driver: Yes.

Indeed a few minutes later it did stop at the Brighton Beach B/Q stop and I was home half an hour later.
- posted by Amy @ 2/29/2004 09:19:00 AM