Won’t you please come join us tonight for some drinks and what is sure to be some lively conversation about New York?

Here

My friend Rebecca met me for an afternoon beer and pulled out a plain brown box adorned with little more than a mail order address label. She opened it to reveal a pair of gold and rhinestone hoop earrings with a tiny white tennis player perched in one and a muscle man type guy in the other. They came from the soon-to-be-closed Nolita shop of Charles Elkaim that she had been visiting since she was a little kid. In a rare moment of follow-through I found my way to the store last Sunday. The interior is lined floor to ceiling with miniatures, jewelry, stickers, and other assorted objets d’kitsch, all being liquidated by Charles and his wife with the kind of down to earth charm. Even as I overheard Charles tell a customer that they close next week his voice was totally free from the bitterness one might expect from an old-timer who is watching the mallification of those parts first hand. It’s like old-fashioned New York Zen.
You’ve got a few days left. This is a can’t-miss in my book, a glimpse at the end of a New York era.
Charles Place
(212)-966-7302
234 Mulberry between Prince and Spring

While some people would go as far away as possible from the City for this long weekend, there sure are people who would feel like falling off from the edge of the planet if they ever had to go out of the City. One of my favorite quote overheard in New York is (pretend dismisal tone) “No, New Jersey doesn’t have subway” ;). But hey, you still can have outdoor fun in the City. Did you know that NYC Park Rangers gives lessons on bouldering in Central Park? I’d been in one of those and it was a great fun! And there is Inwood Hill State Park at 218th and Broadway to have your feet do some “real” hiking in “real” forest right in the City (yeah, Manhattan ends at 96th but…)! The Inwood Hill Park borders around Hudson so it’s nice place to go even if you don’t want to sweat out. For additional amusement you might also want to pick some geocaching in this park. And If you don’t like all these freebies check out great rock climbing wall at Chelsea Piers (though NJ still keeps the record of largest one). And of course if you don’t get enough of it, there is more challanges awaiting you in the City.

Know of more “outdoors” in the City? Let us know in the comments!

My friend, recently returned to New York for a brief stint between college and everything else, is a serial monogamist. However, she also has an incredible history of cheating on her boyfriends. Of course, I love her and don’t judge her, but after a recent incident I had to posit, “Honey, do you think you should maybe just be SINGLE for a while?” She pondered this a moment before concluding (and this is why we love this girl), “I think its something about this city … I only cheat on my boyfriends here in New York.”

Initially I was skeptical, but the odds were stacked in her favor: she leaves the city for vacation or college, and she finds herself in monogamous, cohabitative, committed bliss; she comes back to the city for a week and suddenly she’s shacked up with someone new. And its not just her, either; a friend of mine at college was literally engaged (everything but the ring, thank goodness) when she returned to the city and found herself in bed with a guy who had almost cartoonishly screwed her over years before.

So what is it about this city that encourages infidelity ? My monogamista thought there were just too many options; too many people to meet, too many things to do, too many ways to forget yourself. At school, we talk about a Dartmouth bubble up, meaning that the students at the insulated liberal arts college forget the rules and consequences of reality in order to engage in wacky, socially destructive fun without worry.

So I ask yous, Is there a New York bubble?

..The more they stay the same, as the adage goes.

Recently, I was invited to lunch down by my old high school, the famous Stuyvesant High School that I’ve probably mentioned before. Arriving uncharecteristically early, I had some time to amble down the blocks I frequented as a youth (ha! because I’m such an old coot now) and reflected on the time that had passed. Wandering, I saw the effects of the city’s efforts to rejuvenate the area after September 11th: there’s a Baluchi’s where … well, something was there before, and the crappy diner where we used to split matzoh ball soup because it was the cheapest thing on the menu is still crappy, but much shinier. But I was most nostalgic seeing the students: the seniors, wearing hats, sweatpants and sweatshirts of their college-to-be, despite the unseasonable warmth; the upperclassmen girls looking slovenly despite the hour I know they spent getting dressed; the underclassmen boys rambling down the block, still looking like middle-schoolers; the underclassmen girls, walking with arms linked. Heaven knows why, but it all just reminded me of why I love New York the most.

LIRR Weekend Hell

I think I have learned an important lesson about traveling to NYC from LI on the weekends

Over the next few weekends there’s a really cool event in NYC I definitely plan on checking out. Red Dive

In New York, pedestrians rule, and that is as it should be. When we cross the street, in mighty droves of thirty and forty at a time, the drivers know to stand down. Unlike in small cities and suburbs, they can’t just bear down on the walking folk, while making that right turn, and expect us to recede back to the sidewalk. We’re moving as a pack, and they have to stop.

In midtown Manhattan, almost every driver understands this. When drivers block the box, and the walk sign says Walk, they have to sit there, humiliated, blocking traffic, while we walk around their steaming behemoth, because it is our turn. It’s a terrific feeling to know that at least in Manhattan, walkers usually get the respect (albeit grudging), they deserve.

Usually this uneasy rhythm between walkers and drivers works as an organic people mover. There are always exceptions.
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The NYC Metroblogging authors are meeting up this week and you