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Score one for living in Manhattan

photo via The Stranger

The Brooklyn Superhero Supply Co.

Sis is in town. I've been showing her around parts of New York, so yesterday in preparation for this year's Goonfest we headed over to Park Slope and the Brooklyn Superhero Supply Company. Its a very cool, very clever idea: a superhero-themed costume shop that operates as a front for 826 NYC, a non-profit creative writing organization for kids (for you McSweeney readers, its run by the same group).

Inside the store, one found all sorts of various implements of justice, ranging from grappling hooks to jugs of invisibility potions. There was a bonefied cape tester, which required me to try on various capes and stand under an array of fans to test its aerodynamic response. Behind a wall of bookcases lay a hidden passage to the community writing room where a room full of kids were learning how to craft stories (the store even sells the "best of" works, written and published by the kids).

It was a long way out to Park Slope just for a cape and utility belt, but I feel better prepared for goonery than ever. It was also a great way to see a functioning charity thriving on unique ideas and implementation. For those of you in Seattle, 826 Seattle operates a similar store, The Greenwood Space Travel Supply Co. Its worth a visit!

Links:

826 NYC

826 Seattle

Goonfest 2007

Shea Stadium

Dave Martin was in town this weekend, so we headed out to Shea Stadium to see Tom Glavine pitch for his 298th win.





A couple rows down we were lucky enough to have Mr. Met himself come up to visit the crowd - Dave got to leave with a little souvenir (though no Elizabeth, it wasn't David Wright).

I heart NY

from Gothamist: "It turns out that a contractor found some bones - and a rusted gun - "embedded in cement,"

Slideshow here.

NY Cares

This past Saturday I was fortunate to take part in New York Cares day, a volunteering day held throughout the city of New York. I had volunteered to be one of twelve Marquette alums to take part in the cleanup of Bowne Park in Queens.

NY Cares sponsored the event; someone there has a sense of humor as we were paired with exclusively midwest catholic alumni groups - Notre Dame and St. Olaf's.

It also happened to be a fantastic day to get outside; yours truly was finally able to get some color on him. Not a bad way to spend a day!

Photos

finally...

a little snow in New York!

One good thing about living in a place without street-facing windows is that you get to see pleasant little surprises like this one when you leave for work in the morning.

SoHo

After checking out the firestation, I took the afternoon to walk through SoHo.

Pretty cool neighborhood, but crowded on a particularly nice Sunday afternoon. Tons of little shops, small streets, and nice looking buildings. Pics

NYC Fire Museum

The NYC Fire Fighters museum is located on Spring St. in NY's Soho district. Taking up two floors of a renovated fire house, it holds equipment and memorabelia dating back to the department's colonial history.

The museum is where you will also find the firefighters 9/11 memorial, where pictures of each of the 300+ are displayed. In addition, recovered equipment and even pieces of aircraft fueselage can be found.

The museum is small and only takes about an hour to go through both floors. Its worth a quick stop though if you are visiting NY and will offer you a lot more perspective on 9/11 than a trip to the WTC site will.
Pics

Seals vs. Subway

The first two weeks I was here, my morning commute took me roughly 30 minutes. I would jump on a 2 or 3 train down to Times Square, walk to the Port Authority station, and take the E train to 53rd St.

There was a problem with this, however. Living in Seattle for so long, your body becomes acustomed to the sea air. The breezes keep the humidity down and fall tends to be very crisp early in the year. In New York though, there is no benefit of a breeze (most of the time). Especially in the subway. It can be 60 degrees in the train, but because of all the bodies and lack of air circulation, the humidity skyrockets. It does take a while for your body to adjust, but I was beginning to hate the morning commute. I looked all around the train and found to my shock that I was the only one sweating at 7 in the morning.

So instead, I decided to walk to work through Central Park. Its about a 60 block walk, which takes me just under an hour to do. I have to get up a little bit earlier, walk the dog a little shorter, but I feel that its worth it (at least until the snows arrive). Its great - I get out of the city, walk through the trees, look at monuments and statues, gaze at ducks on the pond, and grin at the various outfits that people in New York force their little dogs to wear. Best of all though, is I walk by the seal tank in the Central Park zoo, where every morning the seals nap just outside the water.

So yeah, it takes me 20 minutes longer and my commute time isn't that much improved from the horrible traffic in Seattle, but shit - I walk by seals on the way to work. I don't know why more people don't do this.

American Museum of Natural History

The American Museum of Natural History is located outside of Central Park. I was particularly interested in the massive dinosaur exhibits featured here. Never having seen a full dinosaur skeleton, I was particularly impressed with how God was able to create such old looking bones in only 40,000 years. When I asked the curator why no cavemen were on display with the dinosaurs, she kindly informed me that men and dinosaurs lived millions of years apart from each other. Huh! Go figure! Someone needs to tell the director that their "curators" are idiots.

Anyway, the museum also had an extensive collection of ice-age creatures (Mastadon! Megladon!) and enough cultural artifacts to impress Indiana Jones.

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