I was out having dinner the other night in Manhattan when a super awesome diner reared his drunk head. My wife and I were sitting down to enjoy our meal and became aware of a “situation” at a near by table. It seemed drunky crow, old man booze hound was getting into an argument with, what was later to be determined as, his ex wife. Sweet. There is fairly constant uncomfortable arguing going on when old man awesome starts arguing that yes, in fact, he does have a trust fund. This is met with stern opposition from his plastic surgery laden ex. Clearly, she believed his trust fund was not a reality. We went back to our meal. When their check came it was discovered that although Mr. Super Awesome had yakked his first coarse of veal scallopini onto his plate, his ex was certain that he had not finished his rather expensive fish entree. Therefore he shouldn’t have to pay for it. I mean this is a logical thought right? I didn’t finish it, so I don’t have to pay for it. Clearly having a trust fund entitles one to many things, like this nice restaurant perk! At this point the restaurant staff is keen on getting this inebriated couple out of their establishment. On their way out, Mr. and Ex Mrs. Awesome share a private moment where they play tug of war with their umbrella. Isn’t love (and large amounts of booze, trust fund money, and awesomeness) grand? Sometimes I get the feeling that some New Yorkers feel very entitled to things. Often it is something that they assume they deserve and act very rude when confronted with the idea that they do not.

Starting yesterday the city got scared about the impending Snowpocalypse. Schools were preemptively closed. Many businesses decided to not open. The Trader Joes on 14th st. had a line wrapping around its aisles twice instead of the normal once. You’d think they had predicted the biggest winter storm in the last 50 years or something. What was the real forecast? 12″-18″. Really? I was expecting at least 4 feet everyday for a week with all the hubbub associated with the storm. If I am not mistaken we don’t live in Texas, right? I mean c’mon, my bank closed at Noon today, America’s most convenient bank my ass. One day of snow should not render the whole city shut down. Snow sucks for a lot of reasons but to shut down business in a North Eastern city that has 4 seasons and a historically cold and wet winter? I am ashamed of you NYC. I would have expected a big finger to the sky, but instead we got snowmen on the sidewalk.

Tonight I’m venturing over to the Renwick Gallery for the opening of an artistic collaboration that I am very excited about: that of Genesis Breyer P-Orridge and Daniel Albrigo, entitled Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is… A Love Story. Daniel is a tattoo artist based out of my favorite NYC tattoo shops, NY & Brooklyn Adorned, and Genesis is best known for his music and performance in Throbbing Gristle (who recently toured, with a stop in Brooklyn) and Psychic TV.

As our friend Marisa over at Needles and Sins writes:

Genesis and h/er late wife and other half, Lady Jaye Breyer, began a project in 1993 to transcend “body-based genders- and socially imposed identities,” thereby creating Breyer P-Orridge. Maxwell G. Graham sums it in the exhibition’s release: “…their two identities were merged through plastic surgery, hormone therapy, cross dressing and altered behavior in an effort to deconstruct the fiction of the self, each moving to resemble the other. Breyer P-Orridge, the cross-pollinated name of this endeavor, has continued even after Lady Jaye’s untimely death in 2007.”

In tribute to Lady Jaye, Daniel and Genesis join to tell a love story in painting, sculpture, photo-works, assemblage and jewelry.

The show and title is derived from the set of solid gold teeth that Genesis had installed to replace all of he/r original teeth. There are paintings documenting the casting process, as well as portraits of Genesis by Albrigo, sculptural objects, assemblages, and jewelry.  I’m fascinated by this collaboration, not only due to my interest in art that’s a little outside the mainstream, but also due to the great love that motivated the project.

The opening is tonight from 6-8 PM at the Renwick Gallery in SoHo, located at 45 Renwick Street between Spring & Watts. There will also be a closing reception on February 22nd.

Every year that I’ve lived in NYC, I’ve seen these coat drive ads and occasionally donated a coat. This year, after looking through my closet and marveling at the number of coats I don’t need, I decided to not only donate a coat, but run my own coat drive in my building.

If you have coats to donate to the New York Cares coat drive, you can do so at public donation sites around the city – just plug in your ZIP code to find the closest one. Or, you can host your own coat drive by registering on the New York Cares site. Registering doesn’t make your coat drive location public, it just lets the New York Cares people know that you’re hosting one. Once the drive is over, you deliver the coats to their Manhattan warehouse. Simple, and gets warm coats to people in NYC who need them.

New York Cares also has a blog, which is currently covering the coat drive, but also has information on other ways to volunteer and give back to the community. Do you volunteer with New York Cares or another NYC organization? Tell us about it in the comments.

As most people know, especially those living and playing on the Upper East Side, 2nd Avenue is a total disaster right now and will probably only get worse. But this is for a VERY GOOD reason, so I’m not complaining. The construction of the 2nd Avenue subway line, which still has a long way to go before it is even operational, is currently underway.

But what is even more important right now is supporting the businesses that are suffering because of the construction. Many 2nd avenue restaurants & retailers have been put out of business because foot traffic has come to a crashing halt. Restaurants have lost their sidewalk space so there goes their summer crowd. Often there is no indication a business exist anymore. So, if you happen to live or play on the UES, I urge you to support your 2nd Avenue Business.

As we’ve mentioned before, writing for Metblogs is completely amazing. It will make you charming, famous, and good looking. It slices, dices, and makes julienne fries. When you write for Metblogs, you instantly gain superhuman strength and the ability to fly.

Though it’s entirely possible that the above things are true, we don’t actually guarantee them. However, Metblogs is a pretty fun place to write. It’s the largest network of locally focused blogs on the web, covering almost 60 cities around the world, and we’re looking to add a few new bloggers/writers/authors (or whatever you want your title to be, except King of the World) to this fine site. If you wanna know more about us, check out this wikipedia entry but even reading that is not a requirement. If you wanna write for us, here’s the scoop:

• All author positions are volunteer. That means you don’t get paid.
• You must live or work in (or very near, and spend a lot of time in) the city you plan to write about.
• Anything you post must relate to the city somehow. That means you shouldn’t post a movie review, but talking about going to see a movie at a local theater is fine.
• There’s no requirement for how much you can or should write, but we ask that if we set you up as an author you make about 3 posts a week.
• You can post about things you love, you can post about things you hate. You can even drop f-bombs. It’s entirely up to you.

Additionally, because of our global network, there are plenty of options for things you write to be read by people all over the world. New posts are posted on both our local Twitter account and the Metblogs network Twitter account. Interested? Want more details? Post a comment and we’ll be in touch!

I am not a fan of the touch-screen televisions present in NYC taxis. They’ve been there for a couple of years now, and fortunately have an “off” button so you don’t have to listen to the incessant yammering of people trying to get you to watch their shows or buy their crap (I get enough of that if I turn on the tv in my own home, thankyouverymuch). However, occasionally I have had the misfortune to get into a taxi in which the off button does not work. Since the button is on a touchscreen, I don’t know if it’s that so many people have touched the off button area that it has become worn out, or because the software is crappy*.

But every so often I get into a taxi that has something this on the screen, and it makes me giggle a little.

*After seeing what’s onscreen in the photo, I have reason to suspect the latter.

Taxi TV fail

In case you have been lucky enough to avoid the seemingly incessant local political ads that seem to be everywhere right now, tomorrow, November 3rd, is Election Day. If you want to make sure you’re informed about your local candidates, you can start here to view the list of candidates.

Of course, the biggest kerfuffle has been around Mayor Bloomberg and his decision to seek a third term. He got the city law changed so that he could run for a third term, which had previously been disallowed. His challenger, City Comptroller Bill Thompson, graciously neglected to mention that whole thing in his political ads. No attack ads from anyone!

According to Reuters, Bloomberg is currently leading in the polls, but this is NYC, people. You never know what could happen. You could all write me in as mayor for a surprise upset. I can’t wait to see that reported on NY1.

To find your polling place, go to the NYC Board of Elections Poll Site Locator and plug in your info. Polls are open from 6 AM to 9 PM.

I am a vegetarian. I have been for at least the last 7 years. I have often said that I would eat meat if I were the one to hunt and kill an animal with the purpose of eating it and using its parts. I wont get into my political reasons too deeply in this post, but I am more against the meat industry than meat itself. Living in a city like New York has taught me that there are a diverse amount of eating preferences. I have met fat heavily tattooed raw vegans, skinny baconholics, and friendly pescatarians. Unfortunately living in this city gives little opportunity to hunt. I’m sure pigeon is a delicacy somewhere, I’ll pass. I was reminded of my thoughts on hunting my own food from a recent blog post my wife showed me by her friend Keith.

I left NYC on August 25th. I don’t intend to come back. 18 years of my life were spent here. The 18 that counted the most in forming who I am today. The decision came not because of the economy (I was employed) or anything else but my decision to follow my heart and the one I truly LOVE to India.

My journey is not the first of its kind. I’ve found that New York City provides an excellent ground for seekers of the spiritual variety. It is the only place on the planet where acceptance is not just a concept but a daily practice. I’m sure a lot of shady things happen in the underground, but that’s just the nature of humans. I’ve found that NYC has heart, love, genuine kindness. . . whereas most of other portions of America serve up a plastic flight-attendant smile.

Anyhow folks, I’m here in Mumbai, I tweet regularly and blog as well. I’m sure I’ll see a lot, experience a lot and definitely will be back to NYC, but for now, I’m gone. So long.

Bloomberg tucking into a slice of pizza. Image copyrights Mary DiBiase Blaich for The New York Times

The NYTimes has a front page (web) article on the eating habits of Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Now this would be a waste of valuable e-newsprint, one may say. However the article brings into sharp contrast the positive motions the Mayor brings into the realm of public health, while at the same time having a completely different set of personal standards.

The article talks about the Mayor’s affinity for (of all things) salt.

Mr. Bloomberg, 67, likes his popcorn so salty that it burns others’ lips. (At Gracie Mansion, the cooks deliver it to him with a salt shaker.) He sprinkles so much salt on his morning bagel “that it’s like a pretzel,” said the manager at Viand, a Greek diner near Mr. Bloomberg’s Upper East Side town house.

This is while the city wages a battle against sodium. There are directives in place recommending restaurants reduce salt consumption by 20 %.

Some may raise a stink about the so-called “double standards” from the Mayor. And in this election season, I would not be surprised if it does. However what the Mayor in his own personal time is no one else’s business.

Even with all the excesses of salt, bacon and what not, the Mayor, at 67, weighs what he did in his college days. How many people can claim to do that. ?

I think the real story here is that he indulges in “sinful” eating but also exercises self-discipline by exercising and balancing his food intake on other days.

The only thing that irks me is salt on a bagel. That leaves a bad taste in my mouth :)

I was recently in Chicago and ate a lot of deep dish pizza. This is something Chicago is known for and I, a pizza fanatic, was fully aware of. After eating some deep dish at a friends home one night he asked how it compared to NY thin crust. I had to admit to him that the deep dish was unique and amazing and I loved it. Then I had to tell him that it didn’t compare in my mind to the coal fired brick oven pizzas made in NY. What can I say, I’m an East Coast kind of guy. NY pizza is king in my eyes, the crisp crust and fresh ingredients that you taste with all the lush flavors they hold. What about you? Don’t be shy, tell us how you really feel.

You’ve no doubt by now noticed that the sites got a bit of a re-design and some things got changed around last week. We wanted to highlight two changes to make sure everyone knows what changed.

The first and biggest is COMMENTS! Registration is no longer required to post a comment on any post. Of course if you already have an account you can still login to ensure your comments are attributed to you, but those who don’t can now post a comment without any long term commitment. Also, on the right you can see some of the recent comments so you’ll always know what the active discussions are. This was the most requested thing we’ve heard from people since our last redesign and we’re excited to see where it leads.

The next change is also something that was heavily requested, and that is a change to the ADS on the sites. You’ll immediately notice fewer of them, but what might not be as obvious is those smaller square ones to the right are specific to this city only and are being sold for a flat rate for a period of time rather than a confusing CPM/traffic/network model. Depending on the city, these range from $7-$175 for a full week. If you purchase one, during that time your ad will be the only one in that spot and will show on every page. We set these up both to make it easier for smaller local businesses to get their ads on our site, and also to help us bring in ads that relate better to our local audiences. Also, keeping these sites online is expensive and every little bit helps.

There are a bunch of other things we changed but we’ll leave those to you to investigate and take advantage of. Hope you like it, and we look forward to seeing you in the comments!!

Love,
The folks at MBHQ

If you compare the number of people that are homeless in NYC v. Mumbai, the latter wins by millions. If you compare the number of slums - like straight up slums with tin foil and cardboard for roofs, again, Mumbai is the winner. The same goes for the number of vehicles on the roads, the different types of pollution sources and the amount of public transportation available. Mumbai, if looked at from a straight up infrastructure and numbers basis, should be a thousand times dirtier than New York City.

But after landing at Sahara international airport on May 2nd this time around, I’ve found that Mumbai is much cleaner now than it ever was before. They have implemented several garbage cans along the roads for cleanups. I even saw a NYC-styled garbage truck which for some reason got me really happy and homesick for a brief second.

India’s cleaning up everywhere. Mumbai seems to be one of the primary cities taking this initiative personally. There are several hundreds of billboards around the city reminding Mumbaikers to keep their city clean. I actually partook in one of these projects today. My friend has a graphic design studio here and she uses old CD-Roms to write anti-littering campaigns. Then she sticks them on the back of rickshaw drivers’ seats so that each rider can have the message delivered. I posted one of these today. It was awesome.

Mumbai’s done an excellent job in cleaning up and the smell that I once associated with this heavily populated city is also leaving slowly. It seems as though it’s time to move here, but then again real estate in Mumbai is the 5th most expensive in the world.

If you happen to be in midtown this weekend and see some art walking down the street, don’t be alarmed! The art is in the form of tattoos, and the wearers are probably in town to attend the NYC Tattoo Convention at the Roseland Ballroom. This is approximately the one millionth year that the NYC convention has been at Roseland, and it’s always a good time, even if you just go there for people-watching. Lots of amazing artists, both local and from all over the world, come to this convention, some of whom you’d have to travel a very long way to see otherwise. Some of my favorites include New York Adorned’s Chris O’Donnell (just around the corner in Brooklyn) and Dan DiMattia of Calypso Tattoo (usually very far away in Liège, Belgium). There are also plenty of piercers on hand if you want to acquire a new hole or some new jewelry for an existing one, and several companies selling tattoo-themed wares such as Lucky Girl Handbags. I’ll be heading over to the convention sometime this weekend, probably hovering somewhere near the Lucky Girl booth trying not to drool on their handbags. (What? They’re very nice.)

The NYC Tattoo Convention is this Friday, May 16 through Sunday, May 18th at Roseland Ballroom on 52nd Street, just west of Broadway. Hours and ticket info are on their website. See you there!

I am not facing the shopping and tourist crush in Manhattan right now, cause I am back in Pittsburgh. London has taken the step of having several car free shopping days in it's busiest shopping district and so far it seems like a huge success.

"The one million shoppers who turned out on Saturday were entertained by choirs, acrobats, giant illuminations and a performance of the Snowman. A fireworks display finished off the event. Mr Tyrrell said: "There were no problems with the roads closures, everything went really smoothly.

"The day was about giving something back to the shoppers and we would love to see many more car- free days, and not just at Christmas."

Under current rules, two car-free days are allowed each year but the New West End Company wants to increase it to three or more.

Really this isn't the time to be mad at the tourists who are showing us their wide eyed love and dropping serious cash. The big problem is that at this time of year, the sidewalks are not close to meeting demand.

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Maybe it's because I'm listening to Enrico Caruso while browsing Parisian Webzines. Maybe it's because subconsciously I'm fed up with the MTA and its inability to have trains running properly in all boroughs. Maybe it's both.

But Parisians have been renting free bicycles (link is in French) around their city as a way to increase access, reduce crowding, and above all be environmentally friendly (link in English).

While we do have millions of more people than Paris ever will, a small roll out could be the most effective. Provide bicycles in the city's most traffic prone neighborhoods. Promote friendly bicycle paths and create car-free zones all over the city. It's a lot better than having everyone throw down $8 and still be in a heap load of traffic once they've paid.

I'm full of ideas people, so start executing.

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Copyrights Bebeto Matthews/Associated Press via NYTimes.com

Commuters hitting the subway stations in Brooklyn Queens and the Bronx were taken aback to learn that the subway system has been crippled due to the torrential downpour last night.

As of 7 a.m., the MTA was reporting no R Train subway service between the Canal Street Station and the DeKalb Avenue Station due to flooding at the Lawrence Street and the Canal Street Stations.

Due to flooding at the Times Square-42nd Street Station, shuttle service was unavailable between Grand Central-42nd Street Station and the Times Square-42nd Street Station. [link]

Most major lines are out in some or the other section of their route.

The MTA website was inundated with people trying to get the latest updates. Due to the overload their website went down at 8:09 am.

Traffic is a nightmare in the boroughs leading to the bridges to get into Manhattan. From my home in Clinton Hill it was a parking lot scenario on all streets leading upto the Manhattan Bridge. Thank God for my motorcycle which allowed me to zip past cars.

Surprisingly the traffic in the city is better than normal. This would be a wonderful case study for the congestion pricing initiative.

So, if you are at office wondering where your colleagues are, now you know

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(irina on Aug 8, 2007 11:21 AM) yeah my colleagues are stuck at 42nd st!

(Remi on Aug 8, 2007 12:13 PM) THis is why we should just take the day off and browse thru real estate sites to find a place closer to work. Here's me doing that: www.havens-of-manhattan.com