Vanishing New York Backup

An interview in Next American City: "The Gospel According to Jeremiah Moss." Choice quote: “it’s hard to imagine New York without Moss…. Jeremiah Moss, the mourner of a lost Manhattan, could become New York’s conscience.”

"I Heart" takes a look at the High Line 's graffiti cover-up. [ IH ] Doctorow tackles Harlem's infamous pack-rat Collyer brothers in "a kind of male, New York City version of Grey Gardens." [ NYT ] The Brooklyn Book Festival schedule is now available. [ MCB ] Mark you calendars for Open House NY : 10/10 & 11. [ OHNY ] Take an odorific walking tour of Manhattan. [ NYT ] Getting clipped at Kings barber on 14th. [ HG ] NY Post "scoop" ends with a punch in the nose. [ NYS ] Viral corporate graffiti attacks the EV. [ EVG ]

In this Vanity Fair article (which, months later, I still enjoy), James Wolcott recalls a time when, "Each day in Manhattan (can’t speak for the other boroughs) offered an outdoor excursion into street theater. It was carnival-esque... like impromptu psychodrama performed alfresco." Those days are mostly gone. But if you want to experience the street theater psychodrama of the Now , pick any night of the week and go to Astor Place. Stand facing the sleek glass tower of Gwathmey's Green Monster , peering in to the Chase Bank, closed for the night. Under the blue hum of the glowing sign, listen to the soundtrack--snippets of cell-phone talk from the commuters streaming behind you. "I want to party like it's Sex & the City ." Move from west to east, from cubicle to cubicle. Let your eyes scan the flat, empty desks, impersonalized, cleared of all human traces. There is nothing here to spark or stimulate. Notice that you feel nothing, only a vague, spreading ...

Standard Hotel exhibitionism inspires cover story on voyeurism in NYC. [ Metro ] The closing of Cafe des Artistes --"the death of an intrinsic part of old New York." [ NYT ] "We Live in Public" --remembering the silicon 90s, when our Webbed life today was forecast in an underground Soho bunker. [ NYT ] At Spike Lee's party in Brooklyn for Michael Jackson . [ Gothamist ] Slacktivists rally outside Christodora, asking to be adopted. [ SG ] The Howl Festival kicks off this week. [ BB ] Buying a bra on Orchard Street. [ HNY ]

Rally tonight with the Slacktivists at the Christodora. [ EVG ] Irrationally exuberant Brooklyn condos in danger. [ Gothamist ] The story of how Hell's Kitchen didn't become Clinton. [ CR ] More gunfire in the East Village . [ NMNL ] Michael Jackson's Neverland ride is for sale at Coney Island. [ ATZ ] Street art in E. Williamsburg. [ NYS ]

Young professional men who can't get laid are looking to hire "wing-women" to help them. [ HG ] The experiment to luxurify W. 8th St. may be coming to a crashing halt. [ Eater ] More public nudity hijinks --gone awry. [ Gothamist ] Meet the Man in the Van in a short film by Sean P. Dunne. [ EVG ]

I keep thinking about the sexual exhibitionism of the Standard Hotel guests and why, as much as it has captured the national attention , it isn't quite as compelling as one might hope. First, a quote from Penelope Green's 2007 New York Times article " Yours for the Peeping ," on the proliferation of glass towers in the new New York: " City life has always been to some degree a public performance, and one of its pleasures is the opportunity to catch a glimpse of other habitats, to watch the movie of others’ lives through a half-drawn curtain , as Jimmy Stewart did in 'Rear Window.' But in the same way overheard phone conversations used to be tantalizing until cellphone use reached saturation point — 'I’m on 14th and Fifth,' bellows the guy into his Bluetooth, and your ear — ogling other people’s apartments is no longer so appealing ..." In the old New York of Rear Window , we do catch glimpses. Of Miss Lonelyhearts and her candlelit su...