by Yori Yanover
The Grand Street News is out with this review by our friend, C. Menegakos, offering the last (but not final) word on Whole Foods.
“A little piece of my soul died the first time I stepped into the spanking new Whole Foods Bowery,” confesses C., “But by the seventh trip I’d pretty much learned to live with the void.”
He poses the obvious question: So why, in a neighborhood with some of the world’s best options for eating out, would you want to sustain yourself in a supermarket?
Which he answers: One: Even though it’s packed, there’s lots and lots of room, and you can stay all day. Two: It’s pretty cheap, especially with the no-tipping policy ruthlessly enforced. Oh, and Three: The food’s perfectly fine.
I liked particularly his punchline paragraph: “As to pizzas, latkes, roast chicken, tsimmes, ropa vieja and palak paneer: If you live on the Lower East Side and getting these at WF, there’s really nothing to discuss.”

by Tibi Z. Singer
Braced against the slicing wind, they chanted against the ousting of their founding principal, the feared and revered Celenia Chévere, and grieved for the motto she once posted outside her office door: A public school with a private-school mission. The sign dripped with hubris, but it had wooed the striving classes well. Since the troubled birth of New Explorations Into Science, Technology & Math, in 2001, its parents had tithed body and soul and disposable income—for their children, to be sure, but also for the urban impossibility: a truly great public school. In NEST they’d found a hothouse with record test scores, free of the usual tawdry concessions—sardined classes, peeling paint, creeping illiteracy.

by Tibi Z. Singer
“You can’t kill the Living Theatre. The legend ary experimental theater company, founded more than a half a century ago by the late Julian Beck and his wife, Judith Malina, has found itself a new permanent home on the Lower East Side,” writes Frank Scheck in today’s NY Post. Down here is where the Living Theater is presenting a revival of their landmark drama “The Brig,” the harrowing 1963 play about a U.S. Marine Corps prison that, sadly enough, is still timely. The play is set in a Marine Corps prison, with tense facial expressions and sudden outbursts of brutality supplanting dialogue.

by Yori Yanover
Our neighbor and frequent contributor to this blog, Pat Arnow, has published a poignant piece in this month’s Fair magazine. It has little to do directly with the LES, so the hook has to be the author. Anyway, the piece is sobering. Pat writes:
Throughout the Iraq War, media have rarely shown images of U.S. battlefield casualties, almost never with visible pain or blood. Such restraint provides tacit support for the war. Vietnam showed us that images of the suffering of U.S. troops foster protest.
Now publication of pictures of casualties violates new media ground rules for Iraq from the Department of Defense. The regulation states, “Names, video, identifiable written/oral descriptions or identifiable photographs of wounded service members will not be released without service member’s prior written consent”—which seems absurdly unlikely. In addition, the rule mandates, “In respect for family members, names or images clearly identifying individuals ‘killed in action’ will not be released. Names of KIAs may be released 24 hours after Next of Kin have been notified.”

by Yori Yanover
It’s springtime, 2007, one year and a half away from the promised completion of the promenade, infamously condemned in 2001 by Rudi (Vote for me, I got blown up by Arabs) Giuliani. Back in 2005 I interviewed Council Member Alan Gerson who said we’d be making tashlich in the park again the following Rosh Hashanah (that’s when Jews cast their sins in the river, don’t ask). Later we were told that, Gerson’s aspirations notwithstanding, we’re going to get our promenade back come the fall of 2008. But judging by the degree of progress they’ve been making on the rebuilding, with the machinery standing at the 10th Street park the whole winter, I’m thinking tashlich is still a long ways away.

by Don Cruise
Blackouts and brownouts are likely this summer and will become more frequent in the future. Many will recall the 10-day power outage in Queens last summer. On Aug. 2, the day after the Queens incident was resolved, Con Ed pumped its all-time highest power send-out of 277,417 megawatts. According to the utility, it delivers 20 percent more power than it did 10 years ago and demand grows 1 percent to 1.5 percent each year. To keep up, Con Ed has invested $1.4 billion this year in reinforcing the electrical system in preparation for summer, says Con Ed spokesperson Chris Olert.
“We are very concerned,” adds Tesh Durvasula, COO and EVP of NYC-Connect, a collocation facility in the Chelsea section of Manhattan that hosts servers for a dozen Wall Street firms. “It’s getting worse every year,” he says. “Now the grids are in such high use that we’re seeing surges in the grid on a weekly basis.” Durvasula explains that he tracks the surges with monitoring equipment in NYC-Connect’s facility.

by Tibi Z. Singer
“If you’re a fan of Frank Miller, Art Spiegelman, Robert Crumb, or any other artist of “adult” graphic novels, you probably already know who Will Eisner is,” writes Joel Keller in the Huffington Post. “But for those of us who aren’t comic book fanatics, Eisner’s story is still pretty fascinating, from his youth as part of a lower-class Jewish family in New York to his constant innovations in the comic arts. His story is told in Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday.”
Via a series of interviews with Eisner, who died in 2005, his wife Ann, and a number of his colleagues, a picture is painted of a man who always wanted to draw, even when he was growing up poor on the Lower East Side and other parts of New York City. But he had the wherewithal to know that comics were as much as business as an art. So, while he was in his twenties, he co-founded the Eisner & Iger, a company that had a stable of young artists crank out material for pulp magazines…

by Jacob Goldman We have 3 open houses this Sunday, from 1-3pm, featuring apartments in the Hillman and East River cooperatives. If Sunday is not convenient for you, please give us a call to schedule a private appointment. You can reach us as 212-388-1115 (x100 or x101).
	Elevated Design, Excellent Execution! Grand & Columbia (Hillman) #H22253 Open House Sunday Apr 29, 1pm-3pm. 530 Grand St (cr. Columbia) #F1C Doris Elpin 212-388-1115 x101	1 bed 1 bath 620 s.f.	$445,000 Maint. $435
	Come on In and Stay Awhile! Grand & Madison (East River) #E44463 Open House Sunday Apr 29, 1pm-3pm. 577 Grand St. (cr. Madison) #F1701 Doris Elpin 212-388-1115 x101	1 bed 1 bath 800 s.f.	$499,000 Maint. $500
	Kick it Up a Notch! Grand & Willet (Hillman) #H22251 Open House Sunday Apr 29, 1pm-3pm. 500 Grand St (cr. Willett) #A6B Doris Elpin 212-388-1115 x101	2 bed 1 bath 1000 s.f.	$615,000 Maint. $745

by Tibi Z. Singer
Any bike rider knows taking Houston Street is the most suicidal thing you can do in Manhattan when the Empire State Building is closed. It’s believed by many drivers to be a kind of highway inside the city (Robert Moses dreams coming true unexpectedly). Most bike accidents - and deaths - happen on Houston. So why is there no bike lane on Houston Street? Dept. of Transportation says: Because it’s too dangerous. Instead D.O.T. devised an alternate route that runs eastbound on Clarkson, Carmine and Bleecker Sts. and westbound on Bowery, Prince and Charlton Sts. Ellen Belcher, of the bicycling organization Time’s Up!, said the hazards make a Houston St. bike lane all the more necessary. “I think the community board must demand — demand — a separated bike lane on Houston St,” she said. Belcher mentioned three bicyclists killed by trucks on Houston St. just in the last two years.

[ May 5, 2007; 7:30 am; ] On Saturday, May 5, 2007, the Shorewalkers will hold their 22nd annual Great Saunter—a 32-mile walk around Manhattan’s rim. The pace is steady, but not fast. Most of the route is fairly flat. We keep to the waterside as much as possible. There is no rain date; we will go rain or shine. 

 

7:30 A.M. […]

by Tibi Z. Singer
Gosh, how will the News ever top this one? My strings are pulled so tight at this point, you can play on me a pizzicato version of Annie Get Your Gun… Anyway, the story is sad, but pales in comparison with the production values. The mother of aspiring actress Nicole duFresne yesterday dramatically blasted a lenient six-year prison sentence for a teenage girl who instigated the lower East Side mugging that led to her daughter’s murder.

[ April 27, 2007; 7:00 pm; ]

180 Stanton Street
Stanton Street Shul
P.O. Box 1008
New York, NY 10002

Rabbi Yossi Pollak
Phone: 917-439-8681

Shul:212-533-4122
Web: www.stantonstreetshul.com
E-mail:teshuvah@stantonstreetshul.com

Shabbat Begins (Candlelighting) @ 7:29 PM

Havdallah is @ 8:32 PM

�
Please join us this Shabbat Acharei Mot-Kedoshim.

Please join us Friday @ 7:00 PM.   We will daven Mincha followed by a Carlebach Kabbalat Shabbat.   Please join us for a lively davening.  Please note […]

[ April 28, 2007; 8:00 pm; ] Saturday, April 28, 2007

8:00 PM

Mazer Theater

197 East Broadway
New York, New York
40.7141, -73.9882

Category
Performing Arts
Description
Don’t miss our New York premier! 

About Yackagdayou, Brateslayou
Formed at a secular Jewish socialist summer camp in 1943, “Yackagdayou Brateslayou” has remained intact for over 60 years as a cohesive Jewish community, extended family, and activist circle. The play, Yackagdayou, Brateslayou […]

by Susan LaRosa
Henry Street Settlement is offering full camp scholarships to children from the Lower East Side to attend its sleep-away camp, Camp Ralph and Rose Hittman. The scholarships are made possible by a special grant Henry Street recently received will be given on a first-come, first-served basis.
Camp Hittman has three two-week sessions, although campers, especially those new to sleep-away camp, have the option to attend for just one week. Camp sessions are as follows: Session One, July 1st – July 14th, ages 8 to 10; Session Two, July 17th – July 30th, ages 10 to 12; and Session Three, August 4th –August 17th, ages 11 to 13.
For more information on summer camp opportunities at Henry Street Settlement, please contact Sonia Allen at 212-254-3100 extension 214.

by Yori Yanover
This guy was rolling next to us on the Williamsburg Bridge, going into Delancey Street the other day. He was towing a seriously damaged carcass of a Jaguar or a Lancia, something from a good family, and his windows were covered with those eager and friendly invites, punched with “Talk to me” and “Who knows.” Who can resist this much human willingness to communicate?

by Yori Yanover
There aren’t as many of them right now, or maybe I’m wrong and that’s how many we had originally. Instead of wood these are all metal, which can be tough on the tush. Also, they’re drenched with morning dew as late as 9 AM, which poses a problem if you use them for stretching – it’s unpleasant and your foot can slip.

Terry Baum

by Tibi Z. Singer
Simon Hammerstein is wary of interviews; he doesn’t want his new nightspot to get the wrong label, or put in the wrong box, as it were.
Sure, when it officially opens this spring, the Box will be in hipster territory down on Chrystie Street on the Lower East Side. And yes, there will be food, drinks and beautiful people (the preopening private parties featured Hammerstein’s business partners and buddies like Jude Law and Josh Lucas) late into the night, but don’t jump to conclusions.
“It is not a club, there is no dance floor,” emphasizes this Off Off Broadway director. “This is a theater.”
But this 5,000-square-foot space is not a traditional theater that his grandfather, the legendary musical writer Oscar Hammerstein II, would recognize; nor is it something his great-great-grandfather, opera impresario and uptown theater builder Oscar Hammerstein I, would have gone for.
The Box, 189 Chrystie St bet. Stanton and Rivington, (212) 982-9301

Terry Baum

by Tibi Z. Singer
BIMA-NY and the Stanton Street Synagogue present a staged reading and the New York premiere of Terry Baum’s play, Divide the Living Child. Set in Amsterdam in 1943, this powerful play tells the story of a Jewish mother and daughter who are offered refuge by a devout Christian woman. All seems well at first, but the suspicions of neighbors and the desire to “save a young girl’s soul” transform this sanctuary into a setting just as dangerous as the home they left behind.
Wed. 4/25, 7:15 PM, Abrons Arts Center, 466 Grand Street.