During a Sunday afternoon stroll in Astoria, I came across this relatively new store. Nook ‘N Crannie is a Betel furniture store and a non-profit, which gives a percentage of its income to programs helping drug addicts. In addition to serving a good purpose, this store has some beautiful antique and unique furniture at ridiculously good prices. Hand-carved bookcases, chairs from the 1800’s, antique artwork. If you have room for these beautiful pieces (some are quite large), it’s a perfect place to find interesting and affordable furniture.

Early last week my good friend John was riding his bike home from a friend’s house. As he was crossing through an intersection with the right of way, a large black SUV accelerated directly into his path, smashing into him. He was thrown into the intersection, where cars had to skid to avoid running him over. As John lay in the street, his bike broken and mangled, the neighbors and residents of the Bed-Stuy community he lives in came to his aid.
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It’s Friday night in New York. Summer in the city. What to do? Shit, we need toilet paper! Starting off the night all classy like I head to my favorite closest bodega. Not the expensive one with the organic foods that are way overpriced, but the one with the cockroaches and dudes cutting watermelon out front. In I go. A touch of root beer, some fizzy water, some Reese’s pieces. Chip selection time. As I round the aisle to the chips I see a woman staring at the floor. She’s probably mid thirties, sweatshirt, ratty shorts, blond big curly hair. I follow her eyes to the floor, and there it is. A single can of cat food. She is staring at the can as if deciding whether it would be worth it to bend her knees and just pick it up. A few things rest in her arms, a small plastic bag, 2 or 3 cans of cat food. Nothing seems to be preventing her from simply picking it up. She spots me staring and says “Excuse me, would you mind picking that up for me?” I hesitate for a moment but a few scenarios of why she can’t bend her knees go through my mind so I oblige. As I am handing her the can she says to me, as calm, cool, and collected as she can “Thanks, I’m reaaaaaaaaaally drunk right now.”

Ahh, stay classy, cockroach bodega.

To celebrate the first day of decent weather in a while, we went to the rooftop bar at The Delancey. Located in the Lower East Side, this bar has a dim, candle-lit interior and an awesome rooftop garden. I’d been to it once before to see one of their frequent music events, but it was chilly then and not a great time to appreciate the coolness of the garden.

A koi pond and fountain with frog statues makes this space unexpected and unique. The walls are filled with plants and a couple palm trees add a tropical feel. It’s a gorgeous spot for a drink on a summer night.

As many fashion district lovers know; there are only few things available to really do in that immediate area. One of them is scoping out secret sales filled with designer goods. The other is the Chashama (or mirror) gallery located at 266 W. 37th Street.

The current installation there is a performance art piece based in comedy and shock & awe tactics. As the artist Kanene Holder whom I had the privilege of speaking with earlier today says on her MySpace page:

C.T.B.O.B.C.C.B. pays homage to Buckwheat (BKWT) via a self-muzzled/pantomiming character who navigates a racist cauldron of images while staring into circus mirrors for glimpses and reconfirmations of reality, by repetitively applying and removing black-face makeup.

Check it out while you can…

Hipsters now eat baby food in order to remain skinny.

Hipsters are who again? I still don’t understand. While in college I thought they were the kids that listened to indie rock and by that definition I would have been a hipster. Then I thought it was only those kids that listened to emo. But now they seem to be this bastardized cult of non-native New Yorkers around the world who want badly TO BE or TO BE MADE in Brooklyn.

But now it seems as though hipsters are the class of people that will do anything to get attention.

I recently went to an event hosted at Punch Bar and Grill in Flatiron. The event, an open bar affair, was hosted by an open-source start-up called Bug Labs and packed with a combination of people - some coming to see the hardware, some coming to drink the booze. As I told a Bug Labs employee, I was there for a little of both.

The venue is a cool location, a wine bar serving over 400 wines. The event took place upstairs, a space with modern and interesting decor, one wall covered in vines that look so sturdy you could almost climb them. The downstairs was open to the outdoors, looking like a great place for some wine and dinner.

I enjoyed the display of this new open-source hardware, a very cool idea. And I enjoyed the wine. I’d love to come back to this bar another time, maybe when it’s less crowded with programmers and booze-moochers.

So this past weekend marked my crossing of the threshold into a new decade of life… And as such, it involved much celebration and shenanigans all over the city. Yes, it’s taken me until Wednesday to be able to make an attempt at processing and posting about it. What can I say. I’ve come to espouse the theory that one should exit one’s thirtieth birthday celebrations feeling at least twice that age. And boy did I.

What’s that you say? I don’t look a day over 21? You’re sweet. Funnily enough, I got carded at our first stop on Friday night. Some little dive in the East Village–I don’t remember the name. Our first destination was meant to be Death & Company, but since we got there a few minutes before they opened, we ducked into a little place a few doors down, closer to Avenue A. The blond bartender was sweet. If you know who I mean, give her a kiss for me.

So after a drink there (jack and coke for me) it was over to Death & Co. for a much different cocktail experience. Man is that place great. I can’t recommend it highly enough. Definitely the kind of place to take out-of-towners for a fun NYC experience. Don’t get me wrong, the drinks are expensive and in many cases ridiculously involved to create–not the place to go for cheap and sloppy bender. But that’s just it: the bartenders (mixologists?) take their craft very seriously. The ingredients are all incredibly fresh, and the attention to detail is insane. My drink was made with three different types of ice! I’m sure some people would find it a little affected, but I think it has its charms. The whole experience reminded me a little of Milk & Honey, but bigger, less pretentious, more comfortable, and yes, with fewer weird affectations. (You actually get a menu, and it has prices on it!) And the drinks were delicious.

And so it was a nice beginning to my birthday weekend. Stay tuned for details on the 72 hours that followed.

I love fried green tomatoes. Unfortunately you can’t get green tomatoes year-round. So when a friend I was visiting in the country offered me a few dozen green tomatoes to lessen her overly abundant harvest I immediately said yes, knowing that I could easily can the tomatoes so that I could have green tomatoes even in the heart of winter. All I need is mason jars. In the south, where I grew up, this is a simple quest. At this time of year especially every grocery store has them in abundance so that people can deal with the produce from their gardens. Now, I know that New Yorkers don’t have gardens and so aren’t really in a position to can vegetables at home, but I figured that SOMEONE would have mason jars to sell me. So far though, after two days of seeking I’m turning up empty. None of my local grocery stores, Bed, Bath and Beyond, K-Mart, Target, or even William Sonoma have them. It’s times like this when I realize how far apart my rural roots and my current life are.

All the while my tomatoes sit and ripen and soon won’t be suitable for what I wanted them for in the first place.

This morning, as I emerged out of City Hall Park, I noticed that the Woolworth building no longer had scaffolding near its front and side enterances. This small detail blew my spatial and visual mind. I had grown so used to the scaffolding, that the building no longer looked the same. I will be adjusting for days.