Emmett McCarthy, Project Runway star's store on Elizabeth Street

Liz Christy Garden: The Beauty and the Bounty of this garden that survived the tsunami of development

http://www.lizchristygarden.org/

Visit  their site and learn more about this enduring oasis.  This was the first community garden in NYC founded in 1973.

  

I am one of many that wrote the mayor to save this East Village gem at Houston and the Bowery when the development threatened to crush it.  This garden has a history and it survived the tsunami but visit the site to learn more and even better visit the garden.  I think they always are looking for volunteers.

To appreciate the bounty and beauty beautiful, click on the photo and make it bigger. You can see the beautiful flowers in the basket on the bicycle, the passionate intense gaze of this concerned person and the beautiful garden that endures despite being made smaller by the crushing new development.  In this city gardens and people that tend to them are heroic because we need respite and we need nature's best resource to fight pollution and that are trees,  nature's green.  The future of New York City may require rooftops filled with solar power panels and as much greenery as possible.

one of our characters, always kind to me

One of our East Village characters was not feeling photogenic when I snapped his picture but as always he was very kind to me .   I can't imagine Tompkins Square Park with out him.  I was in Times Square with my Dad and we bumped in  to my pal and he got a job handing out flyers for Dangerfield's so I went.  I asked an older man to accompany being the shy wall flower I am but made it clear "just friends!" and we did have fun.  How funny that I bumped in to a Tompkins Square Park character in Times Square and he gets me to go to a comedy club on the Upper East Side that I had never been to in all the years I have lived here.

*I put "always kind to me" in bold because I am touched that he is consistently kind to me and he clearly challenges which I do not ask him about...just touched that he manages to be always be kind.

Cube at Astor Place being tended to by Parks Dept.

Girl Props, Soho NYC, their car, their store

America's Most Wanted has the details of the capture of Tina Negron's murderer

I woke up, it is the middle of the night, 3:52 AM so I decided to visit www.AMW.com American's Most Wanted updates their website so you click on his picture and the tab above it that says captured. I read the piece and it mentions my precinct of the last 20 years the 9th Precinct that worked with U.S. Marshals and fellow police officers in Florida and truly the power of AMW's coverage was amazing and the people that made the calls, the people that took the calls. How ironic AMW reports the found him sleeping like a baby.

Brooklyn Matters, a must see

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HtelGYe1p6I


www.developdontdestroy.org sent this along with their update.

Supreme Court petitioned to hear eminent domain appeal

Here is an excerpt from Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn on their petition...... after my mini rant: you can also go to www.developdontdestroy.org and read more. I support their struggle and the same with the community fighting Colubmia University's eminent domain abuse

(My mini rant on mega student housing. I continue to say NYU doesn't need to abuse eminent domain and in the East Village, NYU is a mega vulture that waits for buildings to empty, to supersize if they can get away with it.    NYU mega dormed the East Village to death and joining NYU is the New School, Cooper Union, SVA, and NY LAW all with  supersized  student housing as evictions continue to rise.  Eminent domain abuse not required in the East Village.)

Develop don't Destroy Brooklyn:
"We've always suspected that it might take the highest court in the land to see that the use of eminent domain for Atlantic Yards is not a public use, and thus violates the Fifth Amendment of the US Constitution. Now that has come to pass.

Late yesterday 11 homeowners, business owners and renters with property in the proposed Atlantic Yards footprint filed a petition asking the Supreme Court of the United States to hear their eminent domain appeal, which was dismissed on February 1 by the Second Circuit Court. The petition provides the Court with an important opportunity to address the appropriate constitutional limits on the government's power to seize private homes for the benefit of powerful real estate developers like Bruce Ratner.

Given the mammoth scale and footprint of the project, Atlantic Yards is dependent on the use of eminent domain; it cannot be built unless Ratner succeeds in wresting the properties from the plaintiffs. Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards project relies on a violation of their constitutional rights.

That's where you come in. At every new stage in this fight, we've asked for your support, and you have responded, selflessly and generously, in what has been and continues to be a long legal battle and a long community fight.

We are asking again now because the need for your financial support is so immediate and critical. As the courageous plaintiffs fight to save their homes and businesses, and step up the federal ladder to ask the highest court in the United States to hear their case, it is incumbent upon the community to do its share, and support their defense of their rights.

If you have already contributed to our legal efforts, this is the time to consider doing so again. And if you haven't yet had the opportunity to help, it's easy to get started. You can make a secure, fully tax-deductible, online contribution today at: www.dddb.net/php/donate.php

Or you can mail your contribution to:
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
121 5th Avenue, PMB #150
Brooklyn, New York 11217

The filing of this excellently argued petition with the Supreme Court of the United States is funded almost entirely by people like you, through grassroots contributions from the community. Thousands of individuals have made donations, but the potential for success in these court challenges continues to hinge on your generous support.

Please be generous.
Legal fees for the suit's stellar constitutional attorneys amount to over $300/hour.
Thank you! "
--------------------------

Washington Square Park's Fences out the people of this city for "improvements" that will benefit NYU's real estate yet the City's budget is bust

NYU is the number one real estate magnate and not for profit and NYU benefit's the most from this "picture perfect" improvement the community said "NO!" to.  NYU also happens to own the majority of real estate surrounding the park and immediate area and the use the historic Washington Square Arch as their logo but since their tear down historic sites like Poe House and St. Ann's; NYU's logo should be the NYU Palladium dorm with a dollar bill so they can still use President George Washington's image and convey what is really important to NYU, yes a mega dorm with a dollar bill should be NYU's logo.

If only we could make them pay real estate taxes.  Could you imagine what the taxes would be each year if NYU was not "not for profit"?

Flowers -- West Village "old New York"

In memory, Derek Lake, 23 years old, one of a series of "ghost bicycles" or memorial bicycles

This memorial is for Derek Lake, 23 years old and here is the link for The New York Times article to read his tragic story. This bicycle memorial is haunting especially with the Tibetan prayer flags. This article also touches on the high numbers of deaths like this there were.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/27/nyregion/27bike.html

Fire Patrol closed, congrats mayor, you even made a ghost homeless, 84 West 3rd Street

This is across the street from what 'was' the Poe House,  part of historic New York,  New York University destroyed in the name of progress.  (Go to the blog search engine and type in St. Ann's Church to see NYU's latest destruction of a historic site in the name of higher education.)

After 9-11 the mayor closed our firehouses which for me were "living" functional memorials and I had a letter published in The New York Times that stated closing the firehouses after 9-11 is tantamount to saying you don't have money to fly the troops back from Iraq.  I also do not understand how the mayor could close firehouses when he pushed this tsunami of mega development which means a higher population so you would think he would want to keep these living memorials open and have more firehouses.

You can see the memorial sign for  Patrolman Keith Roma who died Sept. 11, 2001.

This breath taking building from 1906, is also known for being the home of the ghost of Patrolman Schwartz.   I had this info in a book which  I had to throw the  out.  I was under duress and I threw out as many books as I could after carrying out about 25 years and hundreds of pounds (who needs a gym)  worth of books that I sold or gave away.  Sad but I remember he was broken hearted....anyway his ghost found solace in this stunning old house and mayor Bloomberg made even a ghost homeless although many just say anyone who is not rich is unwelcome in Manhattan thanks to the Bloomberg administration.  It is for you to decide.

I really question my move and my desire to stay so close -- more and more I question why not move out of New York all together...but for now I stay...I just have not adjusted to this "new New York" post 9-11 that is hideous and built on "old" New York's dilapidated infrastructure.

I found this FYI from The New York Times from 1999 and since entire buildings, neighborhoods and people disappear I decided to copy and paste this....

F.Y.I
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By MICHAEL GOLDMAN
Published: February 14, 1999

Firehouse Apparition
Q. I've read of a haunted firehouse in the West Village. What's the story?


A. If you're referring to the firehouse at 84 West Third Street, it's actually Fire Patrol House 2. The Fire Patrol, established in 1839 by the New York Board of Fire Underwriters, resembles the city's Fire Department. But the Fire Patrol is primarily responsible for protecting property in commercial buildings, not fighting fires. The West Third Street house was built in 1906, across the street from where Edgar Allen Poe wrote ''The Raven,'' and is one of the last three patrol houses in the city.

As for the ghost, ''that's Patrolman Schwartz,'' said Bill Tobin, 62, the patrol's oldest member and keeper of its lore. Mr. Tobin said Patrolman Schwartz worked in the house in the 1930's. He is said to have hanged himself from a sturdy rafter at the top of the four-story building after learning of his wife's infidelity. A psychic who ''read'' the building explained that the patrolman's ghost has remained in the building since, searching desperately for ''something left behind,'' Mr. Tobin said.

Several patrolmen have reported encounters in which the apparition, dressed in a firefighting uniform of the 30's, appears and disappears suddenly, moves objects and even taps the patrolmen on the hands as they walk down the building's narrow, winding metal staircase.

Some, including the commander, Capt. Walter Reimuller, don't buy the ghost story. As Mr. Tobin took a drag on a cigarette that was more filter than tobacco, he prepared an answer to the skeptics. ''You'll see him one day,'' he said. ''He'll touch you.''

NYC Marble Cemetery 2nd Street

Eat Me, an eatery's focus purely on the pleasure of culinary consumption

Village Mingala, Burmese Cuisine, "Free Burma!"

This poster in the window of Village Mingala is to draw attention to the urgent and on going struggle and suffering of the the Burmese people under an oppressive regime.

Village Mingala, Burmese Cuisine  212-529-3656

21 East 7th Street

p.s. the correct term now I think instead of Burma is Myanmar

Basketball on Houston Street

St. George Church is next door to the hideous new Cooper Aquarium being built aka Studio which many do not welcome

http://www.brama.com/stgeorge/

Українська Католицька Церква Св. Юра
St. George Ukrainian Catholic Church
30 East 7th Street · New York, NY 10003

Katz's Deli, Katz's remains for now, images of the old neighborhood

Babeland on Rivington Street

Battery signs are Babeland's logo and this store for me is about women's empowerment but everybody is welcome and can get their batteries charged.  (The batteries charged is a joke.)

Hyrdant missing it's cap

Spring has sprung NYC style behind bars--every park flower seems to have a fence

Sock Man St. Marks (ps coolest socks are behind the counter so go inside and take a look!)

If you click on this photo and look at the  facade over the pink sock man sign you will see another bearded face. Visitors of my blog know I love "face facades", enjoy before they "are improved" and made into mirrored aquariums with invisible "you are not welcome signs!"

Cara Cas to Go 91 East 7th Street, A-10 for me please!

Yummmmmmmmmmy, Venezuelan Homemade Arepas, 212-228-5062

A-10 and the home made soup toooooooo, mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!

I'll take the spicy creamy sauce too.   

Suzannah B. Troy paperback book buying frenzy at St. Marks Books Store which ain't on St. Marks Place anymore

No, don't do it...You have no room for these books!  I know, I know, I will give them away too!

Tina Negron's murderer BUSTED!!!

Just walked up the stairs of the subway and called a friend and got the news from him. So glad he is off the streets and cannot harm anyone else.

Thanks to America's Most Wanted and to every person involved who DARED TO CARE rather than have a defeatist attitude why bother.

THANK YOU!!!!!!!