Governors Island on a Saturday

Generally I am pretty good with electronics. I know how to program the DVR and VCR, I can set the alarm clock, program the GPS and generally care for my computer, modem, virus scan etc. However, I got a new camera and it is just confounding me. My whole life of filme consisted of manual cameras, and I've never had auto-anything on a camera. But with digital it just doesn't work that way. Light meters? Bah!

So yesterday I thought I was getting some great shots at Governor's Island, when in fact it turns out I had, at some point during the day when I thought I was changing the aperture, instead I had accidentally adjusted the light compensation to overexpose everything. When you are out in the bright sun, it is impossible to see on the tiny little screen that things aren't working properly.

In fact I did notice that the camera was telling me about a lot of overexposed skies, but I thought it was because of how bright it was compared to the main subject. I can't tell the difference between normal variations and significant ones. Lesson learned.

What is most screwy about this adjustment is that the camera remembers it forever, even after it is shut off and/or other dials are moved around. Sigh...
















Any suggestions on avoiding such disasters are appreciated.

Al Diwan, A Sad Story

I can't really believe that I feel bad for bar owners in this town, but it happened to me, so it could happen to you too.

Last night I passed by the North East Village of Avenue A and saw the 4 main bars totally packed, overflowing - Drop Off Service, Destination, Common Ground and SuperDive. And right in the midst of these 4 noisy crowded places is Al Diwan. It is a rather large establishment with a bar and tables for dinner. It was completely empty, with the staff standing outside, staring wistfully across the street at the crowds they can't seem to attract. I felt really bad for them, making no money while the other guys are just cleaning up. Habibi, which is adjacent to SuperDive was also empty save for 2 people at the bar.

Is this the end of the middle eastern extravaganza, or did it never take off to begin with? I have no idea.

In other bar related news, on Saturday night I counted how many people were standing in front of bars on Avenue A at around midnight. Each bar (this time including Habibi) in the North East Village portion of Avenue A had about 25 people on the sidewalk, totalling around 150 people on the street from 12th-14th Street.

Holy Crap

One more reason to avoid Brooklyn.

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Minutes Before the Downpour

Kehila Kedosha Janina

Burmese Water Festival

Lower East Side on a Sunday

Queens Pow Wow

The Queens County Farm hosted the annual Thunderbird Pow Wow this weekend. It was very, very hot with very little shade and not a breeze to be found, and the dancers were wearing very, very heavy clothes made primarily of leather. It was a little painful to watch, but wonderful and beautiful if you can hold off on the empathy.

A Very High Door and Two Nice Signs

The front door to this Greenwich Street building is six feet off the ground with no stairs, and no visible way to enter the building. It's a West Village Mystery.


Two excellent signs. Dapper Dans, however, is now an art gallery. Sigh...

Filenes Basement's Last Days?

It looks like Filene's Basement is nearing its end. I went in last week when I had a few minutes before a doctor appointment at the Beth Israel Union Square Megaplex and found empty aisles. I intended to ask a salesperson about it, but it just seemed too depressing.

According to The Villager, a discount version of Nordstroms will open up in the Virgin Megastore space, and Best Buy will be replacing Circuit City. But no mention of Filenes Basement, which takes up 3 floors overlooking Union Square.

1979 in Cape Cod

In 1979 I went on a bike trip in Cape Cod with the very much missed AYH (American Youth Hostel) organization that used to be headquartered on Spring Street. A friend of mine is going to Canada on a bike trip and was talking about taking one shirt and a pair of socks and fastening them to the back of his bike. I told him I would find my old saddle bags and loan them to him so he could also bring an extra pair of shorts.

My mother found the bag, which is now 30 years old and smells of a lovely combination of cigarette smoke and cats. I hope the Febreze helps. Inside the bags were a treasure trove of artifacts from 1979 Cape Cod. The added bonus was the AYH pass with the photo of me in giant glasses, and a Jimmy Page photo in the background taped to my wall.

Overpriced Pizza Joint Closes, Sadness Ensues

While I am no fan of overpriced anything, especially pizza in the capital of the world's best pizza, I am really sad to know that the $18 pizza (per serving) is no longer viable in the East Village. Una Pizza Napoletano is closing.

For some reason, this particular upscale pizza joint was something special. With only 4 choices on the menu, open from 5pm til the dough runs out and only on Thursdays through Sundays, the tattooed man who stood in the back throwing dough seemed like an ass. I never spoke to him, so truly he might have been a very nice person, but the exclusivity of the "rules" seemed a trite pretentious. The pizza, however, was divine. As thin crusted as they come, with very fresh and very tasty cheese and tomatoes, it was pretty much the perfect pizza.

I will miss this place, where we took out of towners for the pizza of a lifetime, and had romantic dinners when we felt like splurging. There really is nothing like it.

Stop the SuperNoise - Please Help

A new bar, SuperDive that has recently opened on Avenue A between 12th & 13th Street and has caused quite a stir in the blogosphere. I went in there a couple weeks ago and experienced a hot, sweaty, stinky bar of the kind regular people avoid. Young girls in extremely short skirts and their beefy boyfriends, however, seem to like drinking from kegs at their table, and also while hanging upside down, which is what I witnessed.

The main problem is how drunk the people who go there are when they depart. They stand outside and scream at each other as though they are all hard of hearing even though they are way too young for such problems, or the upside down drinking is stuck in their ears. I can hear this drama, most loudly on Friday and Saturday nights, from way around the block. Seriously. They aren't even on my block and I can hear them around the corner and up 76 steps.

There are already several bars within one block and SuperDive adds to the incredible noise and street drunkeness that already is out of control. It is located directly next door to Habibi, and close by there is Destination, Drop off Service (sigh I miss the laundry that was there), Common Ground, Planet Rose and some others on E13th Street but I don't know the names.

The legal/technical problem with SuperDive is that they never applied for their liquor license in the same way that everybody else is required - by going before the Community Board and describing their intentions. New applicants are required to get signatures from people who live in the immediate area where the bar will be located, to prove that they are a welcome addition to the block.

Instead, the owner closed down the former place, a book shop that had a liquor license, and who were quiet and upstanding members of the community, and reopened a few months later as SuperDive, using the same liquor license that the book shop had, becoming the frat party go to joint in the East Village.

I wrote to our Community Board and asked, "what's up with that?" The answer was that I am not the first to complain, and they are in the process of putting together a report for the State Liquor Authority.

WHAT CAN YOU DO?
You can write a letter detailing your concern for their not having properly applied for their liquor license through the Community Board and not giving the neighbors a chance to comment on their application. Also include your experience with the noise and any other concerns you may have about this establishment, and mail it to:

Woody Pascal
Chief Executive Officer
State Liquor Authority
80 South Swan Street, Suite 900
Albany, NY 12210

• Cc: Susan Stetzer, Community Board 3 District Manager
  
• Rosie Mendez, City Council Member, District 2
• Scott Stringer, Manhattan Borough President
• Daniel Squadron, State Senator
  
• Brian Kavanaugh, State Assembly Member

Related Reading:
Eater's Live Blog from SuperDive
UrbanDaddy
Gastrochic
Yelp reviews
EV Grieve