Erin Behan: May 2005 Archives

When she  wants a pool boy, but only has a terrace. Necessity is the mother of invention:  The terrace boy is wanted on Craigslist.

NEED TERRACE BOY TODAY TO HELP ME - w4m

Reply to: anon-76041160@craigslist.org
Date: 2005-05-30, 11:44AM EDT

I am just a nice lady on the upper west side who needs some assistance on her terrace and with laundry today. Can not pay. Anyone interested?
I am sort of pretty to look at.

•  no --  it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
  

76041160

Today: Suspect in Florida death atop Atlanta crane

June 2001: Atlanta crane standoff ends in hanging death

April 1999: Crane operator in good condition after dramatic Atlanta helicopter rescue

  Small New York apartments deserve small condiments. Makes perfect sense.

So I have drinks at the Stanton Social bar last night (I know, I know). I get two $10 drinks and the bill comes, which I pay with my credit card. After signing, I notice the bill is for $22. I ask the bartender why $22? He says "that's for tax." Now, I know tax is 8.625 percent, so I say, "That's not the right about of tax." And he says "That's just how we do it here. We round up." Round UP? The most laughable thing I've ever heard. So I call the manager today, explain my problem. He says that yes, they do indeed round up on tax. I very politely insist that's not right. And he says if I want to come down to collect the difference, he'll give it to me (which is admittedly only 28 cents, but over time and many customers, that could be a lot of money). I say, no, I want it put back on my credit card. And I politely tell him again it doesn't seem right to overcharge everyone. He tells me that's my problem and then HANGS UP on me! Does anyone know if this is a reportable offense (no, not the asshole attitude, the overcharging of tax). I mean, why not just make the drink $11 if that's what you want to charge people?!?

Silly, silly me. I thought I could just waltz right into the Apple store, wait in an abnormally long line, and get a new ipod. O dear me, no. Turns out spots at Apple's genius bar (it doesn't take a genius to figure out that this thing is broken, I might add) start going at 6am on the website and are usually gone by 10am. Although for an extra $99 (!) , you can reserve a spot up to seven days in advance. Does this seem wrong to anyone? Apple, I love you dearly, but OPEN UP ANOTHER FREAKIN' STORE IN MANHATTAN! It just doesn't seem right that I have to wake up early just so you can replace my lemon of an ipod.

So I finally got around to checking out the weekend Red Hook Latin food fair on what I'm pretty sure was Bay Street, between Clinton and Court streets. The food was great and cheap. Of course, we were pegged as total gringos. My sister, who is fluent, surprised a tamale vendor by ordering in rapid-fire Spanish, thus making it clear that she understood all the gringa jokes they had just been making about her, which caused everyone in line to chuckle. My husband got called "blondie," and I was whisked through another line, in what I think was a move to get me in and out as quickly as possible. Still, it's a good experience to be an outsider, and the food was fabulous. The tamale ($3) was the sweetest and creamiest I've tasted. My personal favorite was a beef "burrito" ($4) that was topped with radishes, guacamole, sour cream, salsa verde, lettuce and a slow-burn salsa. My husband liked the well-seasoned pork burrito, also topped with lettuce, salsa verde and guacamole ($5), but we all agreed that you could eat just about anything off a freshly made tortilla slathered in melted cheese and it'd taste pretty damn good.  We all bought from different vendors to mix it up, but I don't think there's a bad one among the bunch. We also sampled the grilled corn, with salt and lime, and may or may not have been charged inflated prices at $2 an ear. (And we didn't even get to the yummy looking ceviche.) A highly recommended trip; we will be back.

For more great Latin food in Red Hook and a *killer* mole, try El Huipil on Sullivan Street, between Van Brunt and Conover streets. Phone (718) 855-4548. Hours: Mon-Thu 11am-8pm, Fri-Sat 11am-10pm, Sun 12pm-8pm. Buen provecho.

Thank goodness for AppleCare. My ipod of five months has eaten itself (metaphorically, of course, although the sound it's making is rather like the crisp crunching that only comes when biting on a truly fresh Granny Smith). Tomorrow I'll take it into Apple Soho, where I'm assuming they will give me a new one. Any one else have an ipod self-destruct in such a short period of time?

Yes, 'tis true. We are packing up all of our belongings and moving a block and a half closer to the Carroll Street Station.  What prompted this craziness? The lust for outdoor space, which we will have in the shape of a lovely garden in a few short weeks.  And our sign from God came this morning in the form of a  free-for-the-taking Weber charcoal  grill that's now in our current apartment's hallway (thank you friendly people on Nelson Street). It needs a little TLC, but I can almost taste the burgers, shish kebobs and grilled shrimp. 

The one downside was having to use (or rather pay) a broker. While we saw plenty of nice one-bedroom by owner apartments for rent in the neighborhood, very few, if any of them, had a private outdoor space. It seems the brokers have a stranglehold on the prime spots.  We managed to find a broker who agreed to one-month's rent as a fee, but some held firm on their 12 percent, which left our mouths gaping when we did the math.  At most, our broker spent two hours showing us the place, meeting with us and the owner and then copying the lease and having it signed, which roughly translates into about $900 an hour. Not bad for a few hours of work. Now, I realize that she may have showed the apartment to other people who declined, but how hard is it to rent a good apartment in this city? Considering it seems the average shelf-life of a place on Craig's List is one week, it can't be that hard. Thankfully, she was nice enough and handled the landlord well enough that we didn't feel as if we were being taken, even when we went to see the place in her brand-new BMW 5 series.

Check out Sugar Bush Squirrel's website. This squirrel does it all, including an attempt at bringing the evil Bin Laden to justice. (Thanks to my brown-haired doppelganger for this lovely link.)

Check out the rocking Brooklyn band My Victoria at Sin-e Friday night. (And not just because the guitarist is my sister's boyfriend.)  It's $8 for five bands: North Elementary 8pm, Nassaua 9pm, Track Rabbit (ex-Jets to Brazil) 10pm, Balthus 11pm and My Victoria at midnight.

I try to keep this blog as politics-free as possible. But every once in a while, something happens politically that I have to post about. I have two related items today. The first is an article in The Nation (via Wonkette) about Dr. Hager, the Bush administration appointee to the Advisory Committee for Reproductive Health Drugs in the Food and Drug Administration. Dr. Hager has drawn some flack for a suggestion in his book, "Stress and the Woman's Body," that women rely on the grace of God when they are having PMS. Christian or not, every man in his right mind knows that this is an utterance that automatically results in a swift but purposeful kick to that sensitive area between his thighs. More serious, though, are new accusations by Dr. Hager's former wife, Linda Carruth Davis (co-author of the book). She claims that he sexually and emotionally abused her during their marriage, which sounds far from the family-values ideal. It's a worthwhile read for anyone interested in women's rights.

Ahh spring. It looks better at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. The cherry trees are peaking, the grass is green and the birds are preening. (Click on the pics for bigger photos.)

Brooklyn-based Vaginity plays this Saturday night at the Octopus in Brooklyn. The bad-ass band is joined by the Darling Robots, who will be doing readings. The theme is A Wake for PacMan. Other entertainment includes The Battlecats, Gavin Kroeber, Kimmy Gatewood, DJ Peter Hale and Jason Baker. Admission is free. And booze is reportedly cheap.

without cats in sombreros.

Thanks to Kendra for the excellent sombrero. Thanks to Sebastian and Winston for their moderate patience.

So in a fit of experimentation, I tried New York Magazine's reproduction of Tia Pol's strange asparagus and shrimp recipe (that you cook in a paper bag). Quite tasty and really not that hard. Plus, how cool is it to use a stapler--on purpose--in your cooking? The best was walking into a bodega and asking them for just a paper bag. Other strange things people do with asparagus: skirt,  beetle, glass, hat.

Thanks to my sis for pointing out this lovely Look Book specimen in New York Magazine. It's worth the click, if only to find the answer to the question that's been on everyone's minds: What, exactly, is active rock?

Cool event going on at the Brooklyn Museum on Saturday, May 7, at 8pm. Early hip-hop pioneer Fab 5 Freddy is giving a talk at the museum, connecting Basquiat's art with the 80s New York music scene. Tickets are free and available for pickup at 7pm. I checked out the exhibit this weekend, and it's worth the price of admission (which is negotiable since the Brooklyn Museum is a pay-what-you-wish museum).

It only takes one naive weekend jaunt to Century 21 in lower Manhattan to say "never again," at least not on a weekend. The savings at that store simply is not worth the loss of sanity. However, there is a Century 21 in Brooklyn, and in comparison, it is a pleasure. Though it's usually crowded, it's rarely packed, and the checkout lines move. If you catch a new shipment, you can score designer jeans for about about $50. While I always scan the dress section, the store seems to do better with casual street wear than super designer duds (although I did see a ridiculous Prada smock that was a couple hundred dollars on Saturday).  And you'll appreciate the speed at which everyone tries on clothing in the communal dressing room--something to do with one's ass being up for public display. As well, the women's shoe selection goes on for rows and rows and rows and makes DSW shoe stock look like the crap that it is. A big bonus: It's super close to the R at 86th Street.

On our last trip, we tried 86 Noodles at the corner of 4th and 86th Street.  It's way better than any Chinese food I've had in Carroll Gardens. For total post-shopping coma, order up a couple of dim sum favorites and think about sharing a main dish--the portions are generous. We tried the  steamed little juicy buns with pork, pan fried noodles with veggies and the beef chow fun, all very nice.

Kitten War: kind of like hot or not, only with kittens (thanks for sending, Becky). Speaking of hotornot, it's been ages since I've checked it out. But it's still going, and the pictures are just as scary as ever.