Astoria is the new Brooklyn!

Got a friend who lives here and was checking it out and darn, Astoria is cool! Makes me think about giving up my Manhattan digs! It's only about 15 minutes to Grand Central and there's a hecka cool things. And, it's freakin' cheap! From restaurants to food to rent! Hmm, maybe I shouldn't tell you all about this??? Okay, I will!

Tonight there's a happy hour (in the decidedly un-happy hour of 8 to 9). C'mon, that's a prime drinking hour. Ain't nobody doin' happy hour then. Go to: Viking's Dungeon, 35-55 33rd St.

And at the Bohemian Hall & Garden this weekend it's the Czech and Slovak Festival. Hurrah! Performances by:

Pajtashi
Dance Group Limbora
Pilsner Brass Band
Josef Ivaska
Sokol Gymnastics

There's also a raffle, a mess o' beer and specialities from their Czech kitchen.

Saturday May 29th & Sunday May 30th
Bohemian Hall & Garden
29-19 24th Avenue
Astoria
Subway N or W to Astoria Boulevard (second to last stop). Walk 1 block to the intersection of 24th Avenue and 31st Street.

Pinchbottom Burlesque

You may think burlesque ain't nuthin' but a bunch o' naked ladies but Pinchbottom is so much more! Yes, there are semi-clad women (and occasionally Tigger the bear, I mean man.) But each show is totally unique and entertaining. Heck even if you don't like burlesque you will enjoy their stuff!

They're playing in Coney Island tonite. Check it out!

May 27th / 9:00 pm
THE JAZZ STRIPPER
Burlesque At The Beach
1208 Surf Ave.
Coney Island, Brooklyn
$10

The Happiness Project

Bryant Park's summer reading series is at it again! Today Gretchen Rubin reads from her book, The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun, a memoir on her time spent doing all of the above. (Well, basically trying to live right.) Hmm, I think I have to check out this book!

Here's info on the book from Gretchen's web site:

In The Happiness Project, Gretchen Rubin weaves together philosophy, scientific research, history, analysis, and real-life experiences. Filled with practical advice, sharp insight, charm, and humor, The Happiness Project manages to be illuminating yet entertaining, profound yet compulsively readable. Rubin’s passion for her subject jumps off the page, and reading a few chapters will inspire you to start your own happiness project.

May 26th / 12:30 pm
Bryant Park, Reading Room
Between the back of the NYPL & 6th Avenue. Be on the lookout for the burgundy and white umbrellas.
Free!

I Need Your Skull

MF Gallery, is one of my favorite galleries and I look forward to their Art Toys exhibit every year. (Lots of scary stuff!) For this exhibit they asked 30 artists to come up with works integrating skulls. I can't wait! The money from this exhibit will be used to build a huge skull on the facade of the building. Skull on!



March 22nd / 7 pm
MF Gallery
213 Bond St., Brooklyn
Free

Rooftop Films: Hopelessly Devoted

Romantic short films about the sacrifices and struggles we all endure for love, including an Absolut vodka sponsored short by Spike Jonze.(See photo.) Doors open at 8 pm and live music is at 8:30. First 500 people get free Vitamin Water and Radeberger beer at the after-party for free money afterwards.

New Design High School (Open Road Rooftop)
350 Grand St.
F, J, M, Z to Delancey Street / Essex Street
B, D, Q to Grand Street.
$10 online or at the door

Ramp it Up!

This exhibition at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian explores the Native skateboard movement. The exhibit has rare photographs and films of Native skaters and skatedecks with graphics like medicine wheels and eagle feathers, etc. And there's even a skateboard company, Jim Murphy's Wounded Knee Skateboards, in Queens own by Jim Murphy of Lenni Lenape descent.

The museum is pretty cool as it's in this big 'ole fancy building and of course there are other exhibits as well. HIDE: Skin as Material and Metaphor and A Song for the Horse Nation which presents the influence of horses on American Indian tribes as well as pieces from the museum's collection to inagurate the new Diker Pavillion for Native Arts and Culture. And since this is a Smithsonian, it's free! (My favorite kind of museum!) Check it out this weekend when you're down in Battery Park enjoying the rays!

National Museum of the American Indian
George Gustav Hey Center
Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House
One Bowling Green
4/5 to Bowling Green

The Big Lebowski Store

Calling all the Big L fans! There's a Lebowski store in the Village. Who knew? The guy who owns it apparently mans the store in a t-shirt, pajama pants, robe (of course) and flip flops. There's a selection of Big Lebowski themed shirts and other stuff from comic books and movies. Write your favorite Lebowski quote on the dry erase boards on the wall. Honestly, I don't know how he stays in business but guess he's just goin' with the flow. It's a good film but I never understood the utterly messianic following this movie gets, but, it must be a guy thing.

The Lost World
215 Thompson St (Bleecker & 3rd St.)
212-388-1466
A, C, E, B, D, F, V / W. 4th St.
1 / Houston St.
R, W, / Prince St.

Shake Shack!

Shake Shack goin' to the Shake Shack! Well, actually I went, to the one in Madision Square Park. My co-workers and I figured the line wouldn't be that long since it was kind of cold and cloudy. You can check how long the wait is on their web site. Go to http://www.shakeshacknyc.com/ and then click on Shack Cam. It didn't look so bad so off we went. Just as we're getting closer to the line all these people started converging and getting on line. The natural New Yorker in me started walking faster but about 15 people got there just before we did. Gosh dang it!
But as we were waiting things picked up and the sun came out. I had three shake shack virgins with me and since the weather was clearing up we decided to eat in the park instead of taking it back to the office. I placed my order for a Shack Burger and a Caramel Shake and in the ten minutes it took for it to come out, the sun had gone it. I repeat, Gosh dang it. So we all sat outside kind of freezing our butts off since we all got shakes.
Anyway, don't mean to scare you from the Shack. It's got AWESOME burgers and shakes. Gotta go back on Saturday 'cause their custard of the day is Red Velvet Cake. Yum!!

Shack Shack
Southeast corner of Madison Square Park
(Madison and 23rd St.)

Upper West Side
366 Columbus Ave. (@ 77th St.)

Citfield
12301 Roosevelt Ave., Flushing

Upper East Side and the Theatre District locations opening this Summer!

Ocho Loco! 8 cent cupcakes

Got this info from Ocho Loco... Cinnabon is obviously jumping on the cupcake bandwagon, a bit too late if you ask me, but hey, cupcakes is cupcakes! ;-) So, the Cinnabon at Penn Station is offering 8 cent cupcakes to the first 888 people who come by.

Get the coupon here.

May 18th / 11 am
Cinnabon
1 Penn Plaza
(7th Avenue and 30th)

Tenement Museum

Another one of their nifty free talks! This one is part of their Behind the Scenes at the Museum series, Making the Epstein Apartment. It's a moderated discussion about 103 Orchard St. and the real lives of its residents including the Epsteins, a family of refugees from post war II Europe. RSVP: events@tenement.org.

May 17th / 6:30 pm
Tenement Museum
108 Orchard St. (Between Broome & Delancey)
Free

Deluxx Fluxx

Old school! Well, with a new twist. Take some old arcade games get a bunch of artists to slap collages on them and voila! You got yourself an art exhibit. Actually, it's a bit more than that. They've somehow changed the machines to feature games of their own making with music by Seth Jabour of Les Savy Fav. Mais oui! The artist collectives of Faile and Bast who provided the images also had some of their work in the Banksy movie Exit Through The Gift Shop. Looks pretty cool. Check it out!

Through May 27th
Tuesday to Sunday 3 to 11 pm
Deluxx Fluxx
158 Allen St. (Between Rivington and Stanton)
Free

Flesh to Canvas II

Opening reception of artwork by tattoo artists at this uber-cool gallery!

May 15th / 7 to 11 pm
Last Rites Gallery
511 W. 33rd St. 3rd Floor
Free

Rooftop Films Opening Weekend!

Holy Rollers! It's opening weekend for the open air Rooftop Films. They're showing a sneak preview of Holy Rollers a true story drama about Hasidic Jews caught up in drug smuggling and selling. Doors open at 8, live music at 8:30 and the film starts at 9 pm. After the flick there's a Q/A with the filmmakers AND an after party with FREE Radeberger beer at Fontana's (105 Eldridge St.)

May 15 / 8 pm
New Design High School (Rooftop)
350 Grand St.
F, J, M, Z to Delancey Street / Essex Street
B, D, Q to Grand Street.
$10

Cosplay Party 2.0

Last year I went to the Cosplay (Costume + Play = Cosplay) party at the Japan Society. No, I didn't dress up, but a mess of other people did. Some people really went all out on their costumes by making the costumes themselves!
This year there's a screening of Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone , a DJ, World Cosplay Summit 2009 Team USA and a Cosplay competition with prizes from Kinokuniya Bookstore. Oms/b is serving up onigiri and tea and there's free admission to Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters. Check it out!

May 15th / 3 pm to 8:30 pm
Japan Society
333 E. 47th St. (Between 1st and 2nd Avenues)
$15

Theatre for One

In Times Square's Duffy Square, (a square within a square), a portable performing arts space is being set up for one performer and... one audience member. For ten days you'll get one artist presenting music, dance, and theatre pieces to an audience of one. (Somehow this seems un-American.) ;-) Why only one when you get 10, 20, 50 or 100? Well, one reason is the space can only fit one audience member. First come, first served.

Theatre for One
May 14th to 23rd 2010
Hours: 1 to 3 pm, 4 to 6 pm, 7 to 9pm
Times Square / Duffy Square 226 West 47th Street
Free

Pies 'n Thighs

This restaurant sounds like a little bit of south up north! Apparently the fried chicken is awesome and the pies are to die for! Banana cream with chocolate pudding anyone??? So the pies change daily but the cookies... choco chip, oatmeal, trail mix and molasses... are constant. The decor is pretty simple but that goes along with it's Dixie down stylins'. I wanna go!!

Pies 'n Thighs
166 South 4th St. (@ Driggs Ave)
Williamsburg
347-529-6090
J, M, Z to Marcy Avenue

Walk the Walk

You've only got until Friday to see women Walk the Walk in Bryant Park. This art piece is done by artist Kate Gilmore and sponsored by the Public Art Fund.
Basically it's an 8 foot high wooden box painted a happy, sunny yellow with a bunch of women in dresses of the same color as the box walking around on top. I guess it's supposed to be some sort of play on what's going on around them in the streets?? Check out a video and more info here.

8:30 am to 6:30 pm through Friday 5/14
Bryant Park
E. 41st Street and 6th Avenue
Free as a walk in the park!

Samsung Reality Dodgeball

1500 People + 600 Balls = 1 Dodgeball World Record

It looks like people are coming in from all over to be part of the largest Dodgeball game in history. Don't know what Dodgeball has to do with Samsung but who cares! I've got class (Argh!) until 8:30 but since the Armory is right by my school, I'm gonna go and check it out and see what I can see. Will try and get some photos!

Click here to RSVP.

Wednesday May 12th / 7 pm
(Doors open at 6)
69th Regiment Armory
68 Lexington Avenue between 25th and 26th
Free

Aqua Teen Hunger Force Live!!

A friend turned me on to this crazed cartoon that you can see late at night on Adult Swim on the Cartoon Network. So you got Frylock, Shake, Meatwad and their hairy, balding and randy neigbor Carl. Frylock is the smart one even though he's a box o' fries. Shake is a shake and is the self-absorbed selfish one and Meatwad is a wad o' meat who's childlike and oh, so cute! And of course every cartoon involves their gross neighbor Carl and often his pool of which he doesn't like having a shake and a wad o' meat hanging around in.

So the co-creators and voice actors of the show, Dana Synder and Dave Willis, are performing live with the above mentioned characters made into puppets, singing nasty little songs and showing rare or never before seen clips from the show.

Yeah, it's a little pricy at 25 bucks but how often do you get to see these guys live? See, it's worth it. ;-)

Tuesday May 11, 2010 / 8 pm
Nokia Theatre
1515 Broadway @ 44th Street
$25

Oh My Dog!

Yeah, so Howard Stern's cute blonde and perky second wife wrote this book but she seems really into dog causes so cut her a break. Beth Ostrosky STERN reads from Oh My Dog at the Barnes & Noble on 66th and Broadway tonite at 7:30. It's sort of a dog guide with info on picking the right dog, training the beast and basically creating a happy home. Aww!

May 10th, 2010 / 7:30 pm
Barnes and Noble
1972 Broadway and 66th Street
Free

Etsy in Chelsea

If you head to Design on a Dime also in the area is Crafts in Chelsea. Over 100 of Etsy and local craftspeople get together to benefit PS 11's art program. Check out the jewelry, knits, clothing and ceramics and more.

May 8th, 2010 / 10 am to 5 pm
Crafts in Chelsea
21st Street between 8th and 9th Avenue
Free

Design on a Dime!

Housing Works, a non-profit that helps homeless and low-income New Yorkers with AIDS, hosts the Design on a Dime special weekend. There will be vignettes of rooms put together by top interior designers and all the furniture and housewares in each is 50 to 70% off! Shop now!

Saturday May 8th and Sunday May 9th 2010
10 am to 6 pm
Metropolitan Pavilion
125 W. 18th St.
Free

Break of Reality

This band of cello players is awesome! Basically they're a "cello-rock" band. They do their own tunes as well as covers like from System of a Down. The first I saw them was at a fundraiser for this Brooklyn animal group and they blew me away. Saw them before at Baruch and as usual, they did not dissapoint. They're also a bit like Apocalyptica, the Finnish band who plays Metallica with four cellos. (Saw them too and they ROCKED!)

Get tickets here.

May 7th 2010 / 7 & 9 pm
Engelman Recital Hall
Baruch College
$25

Limelight Marketplace

Don't know if I should be happy or sad?? The old Limelight club (a 19th century deconsecrated church)is open again...but it's been turned into a mess o' shops. Well, I'll have to check it out. It opens today.

It looks like it'll be successful though. It's in a fairly residential neighborhood which helps. Looks like there's going to be a lot of organic food and marketplace there, a hairstylist, a Sportsac store, Miss Tea and Vintage State of Mind jewelry as well as Grimaldi's famous Brooklyn pizza among the three floors.


Opens today / May 7th, 2010 at 2 pm
Limelight Marketplace
656 Fifth Avenue @ 20th Street

Basement Bhangra

I love Bhangra! Once a month SOB's goes to India to rock out to music with a Bollywood flair. There's a dance lesson at 9 pm and it's only 5 bucks before 8 as well as free mojitos between 7 and 8. But there's usually not too much going on until 10 pm. Yeah, I've taken the dance lesson and it's really fun. There's usually a live band which plays a set in between the dj-ing. A good time will be had by all.

May 6th, 2010 / 7 pm (But nuthin' really going on 'til 10)
SOB's
200 Varick St.
$10 tickets

Bowie Dance Ride

If you like Davie Bowie and bikes, well you are in luck. Your two passions combine tonight! Dress up as your favorite Bowie character and pedal around Thompkins Square Park. Ziggy Lives!

May 6th, 2010 / 7 pm
Sponsored by Times's Up
Tompkins Square Park
(Avenue A @ 7th St.)
Free

Henry Luce and the Future of Journalism

What's gonna happen to the field of journalism? Will I one day be mowing lawns or working at Mickey D's?? Columbia Journalism Professor Nicholas Lemann and Alan Brinkley, a history professor talk about Henry Luce that famed founder of Time, Life and many other magazines and, the future of journalism.

May 6th 2010 / 6:15 pm
Columbia University
Heyman Center Common Room
Bway @ 116th Street
Free

New Russian Drama

At Cuny Graduate Center tonight there's a discussion with two leading Russian playwrights of the post-Soviet generation, Yury Kladiev and Vyacheslav Durnekov and the Moscow Times theatre critic. There's also a reading from Kladiev's play I am the Machine Gunner (in English.)The two were co-screenwriters on the now-cancelled raw Russian TV series School about kids in high school drugging and drinking it up and having sex, etc.

May 5, 2010 / 7 pm
Martin E. Segal Theatre
CUNY Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue @ 34th St.
Free

2010 Bike Month FootDown Festival

Sponsored by Time's Up / NYC's Direct Action Environmental Organization. Footdown is basically a game where the object is to NOT put your feet down as you ride around a circle. You try to get other riders to put a foot down and players are eliminated if their foot touches the ground. They're meeting up at Union Square and then moving on to a undisclosed private venue to play, so don't be late.

I'd like to go but have class tonight. :-( A friend of mine would also like to go but she just got her bicycle stolen! They broke into her apartment building and into her basement storage unit. Bastards!

Union Square - South side / By the steps (Facing Whole Foods)
May 4, 2010 / 7 pm

Free Mondays / Museum of the City of New York

I love this Museum! And it's even better now 'cause for the month of May there is free admission on Mondays! There's an exhibit of Charles Adams drawings up now. He's the artist who did the delightfully creepy Addams Family illustrations.

Right now you can also see photographs and learn more about the 400 movers and shakers in NYC. You've got people in entertainment like Woody Allen, the arts (Alvin Ailey to name one), writers (James Baldwin), politics (Aaron Burr who killed a poltical rival in 1804), business (Estee Lauder), sports and science.

And for all you car buffs there's Cars, Culture and the City.

Museum of the City of New York
1220 Fifth Avenue
www.mcny.org

Feminist Book Club

De Becker "The Gift of Fear"

From the Bluestocking May E-mail: The Feminist Book Club reads and discusses feminism. We make no claim about what feminism is or whom it serves, and are not a forum for any particular feminist platform. Rather, we rely on feminism(s). We read theoretical texts,literature and primary works. We welcome all genders, political persuasions, and levels of familiarity. We meet on the first Sunday of each month. This month's book is "The Gift of Fear: And Other Survival Signals That Protect Us From Violence" (available at Bluestockings) by Gavin De Becker.

Sunday, May 2nd / 2:30 pm
Bluestockings
172 Allen Street @ Stanton

Cherry Blossom Viewing

Hanami baby! Going to the Cherry Blossom viewing shindig (Sakura Matsuri) at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG) with my friend Emily today. It's a fine day for it. Supposed to be 88 degrees today. 88! Um, what happened to Spring? Spring? It does not exist. Sigh.

Anyways, am looking forward to the festival. There's taiko drumming (my fave!) at noon, haiku poetry readings and Okinawan & Butoh dance. The costume play (cos-play) community will be out in force as well... Will take a lot of pictures of those Gothic Lolitas fer sure. And there's some kind of sushi pillow photo op??? A pillow made of real sushi or a marketing ploy by a pillow manufacturer or something altogether different. Will let you know!

May 1 and 2nd 10 am to 6 pm

$15

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

900 Washington Avenue

Brooklyn (Duh!)