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Vegetarian Thanksgiving, NYC

Vegetarian Thanksgiving, NYC published on

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If you’re anything like me, chances are you are making family or friends do all the work for Thanksgiving. You show up with 2 bottles of wine and some dessert. Know what I’m sayin’?

If you ARE that sucker who has chosen to do the entertaining and you want to save the turkeys this year, check out the NY Times Vegetarian Thanksgiving section. Loads of wonderful recipes. You may invite me over for leftovers, I’ll critique your cooking. Free consultation.

For those of you who prefer restaurants to a home cooked meal, here are a few places doing the veg thang.

Braeburn is doing a “Very Veggie Thanksgiving” as part of Zagat Presents. The dates are Nov. 16th and Nov. 25th. Looks like you should make reservations ASAP and specify the veg meal for the 25th. I don’t think that’s totally vegetarian. Dishes include herb gnocchi with roasted squash sauce and chestnut stuffing with slow poached egg and creamless trumpet royal soup with celery leaf. $70 includes wine pairing.

Counter in the East Village is serving maple herb roasted seitan with wild mushroom and sage gravy. They have a selection of organic wines. $50 per person, $75 with wine pairing. Seatings are 1-9pm.

Chelsea’s vegan Blossom Restaurant is charging $68 per person. Main course choices include phyllo-wrapped vegetables with traditional Thanksgiving sides or Seitan Kiev with brussels sprout cake and sauteed greens. Yeah, I want that NOW!

Reclaimed Handmade Parquet

Reclaimed Handmade Parquet published on

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Summit Surfaces has introduced a new parquet flooring line. The recycled 200 year old maple comes from a factory in Tribeca. It looks a little different than that thin crap you can buy at big box stores, no?

Although they do use the word “affordable” on their website, I’m not quite sure it’s affordable to everyone as their clients look pretty high end. At any rate, perhaps I can afford one tile to use as a trivet? They ARE beautiful!

Props to Brooklyn

Props to Brooklyn published on 5 Comments on Props to Brooklyn

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Awesome news for County of Kings thrift junkies! Film Biz Recycling is moving to Gowanus! If you want to hit the Long Island City space one last time, they are having a name-your-price clearance sale starting today until the end of the month.

Grand opening at 540 President Street will be on or around December 1st.

If you’ve never been, the massive shop is chock full of used TV and movie props. Everything from vintage dish sets to clean linens to artwork.  It. is. awesome. And it will be ours! F.U. Queens where I was never able to find parking.

Also! The new space will stock building materials and paints. So again, Brooklynites won’t have to schlep to Build it Green in Queens for these items.

It’s a win/win for everyone. (Except Queens)

Beacon Open Houses Today!

Beacon Open Houses Today! published on 1 Comment on Beacon Open Houses Today!

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Two open houses today from 1-4pm in Beacon. Both cute 3 bedrooms priced at $269,900.

The one in the photo above was written up here back in June. They’ve since lowered the price. It’s worth a look, trust me. Address is 21 St. Luke’s Place.

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This 3BR home one is at Dinan and Rombout. I haven’t been inside, but it looks great from the photos.

More info @ JonCar Realty: 845-831-3331

Rant Van in Brooklyn

Rant Van in Brooklyn published on

So, I was driving down 9th Street near Smith and I see this “Rant Van” in front of me. Curious little thing that I am, I googled them when I got home and sho’nuff, Rant Van is exactly as the name suggests.

The venting service is the brainchild of Mad Props Productions. I don’t know if they drive around and people flag them down like a taxi or if they park somewhere. This is the first I’ve seen of them and the video archives only go back to October.

Awesome idea, no?

Sanity/Fear Rally Was Insane!

Sanity/Fear Rally Was Insane! published on

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I thought I was so smart. I had it all planned out. Booked the hotel a month in advance. We would drive to MD early Saturday morning, leave the car at the hotel and take the metro into DC.

I overlooked one thing. Everyone had the same plan.

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When we arrived at the Silver Spring metro station, there was a line down the block. Ok, it’s just a ticket fiasco. We’re New Yorkers. We can navigate this line and get to the platform. (*Note to any budding DC entrepreneurs: Scalp metro tickets during huge events.) BTW, we did do a good job getting to the fastest line.

Platform was mobbed. After letting 2-3 trains pass with no chance of getting on, the husband had a great idea. “Let’s go the opposite direction!” shouted he, for all to hear. Whether everyone took his advice or copped on for themselves was never determined. We barely managed to get on the train to take it back to the first stop. Lucky for us, they didn’t make us get off before heading back to DC, because the train was completely full.

We were on our way! By now, we knew we were going to miss the National Anthem (I was sure Bruce Springsteen was going to perform that) and sadly, Father Guido. The “kids” on the train weren’t too disappointed with that as they had never heard of him. Ugh, youth.

Luckily, one of those little smarty pants was able to stream the rally live on his non-iPhone PDA, so we caught a bit of what we were missing.

Yada, yada…we get there about 2 hours late. Had to stop at the Smithsonian to pee, find a way in.

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Can’t see or hear a darn thing.

Well, what did we expect?

One thing I did manage to hear from a mile away was Tony Bennett. I can now cross that off my bucket list. Seeing (or hearing) Tony Bennett live.

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Anyway, it was pretty awesome to be there! Lots of fun. Great experience. Really effin tiring walking around the city afterward trying to find a place to sit and have a drink or food. The lines were out the door at EVERY. SINGLE. PLACE. If the city was so overrun by this rally, I can’t imagine what the inauguration was like.

The next morning, I was chatting with a woman at Starbucks. A young, black, well educated woman who informed me she was a tea party conservative.

I didn’t even ask her WTF?  It was all very civil.

Perhaps a bit of sanity was restored.

(PS: I also believe she was a plant. An actress. But that’s just my theory because I can’t believe…..you know.)

More photos on Flickr.

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Vanishing Catskills

Vanishing Catskills published on 2 Comments on Vanishing Catskills

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A friend turned me on to this fabulous Vanishing Catskills site. Visual artist Raymon Elozua photographed the abandoned bungalow colonies and hotels around Sullivan and Ulster Counties. The site is easily navigated by type of structure or map.

From the site: “The desire for a new improved lifestyle, assimilation into the American melting pot, and the aging of an older immigrant population were underlying factors coupled with a time when air travel became cheaper and newer chic resorts and communities were springing up elsewhere spelled the end of the Catskills by the 70’s.”

That’s when my family started going there. From the mid 70’s to early 80’s, my parents rented a bungalow in a colony where all the other cousins stayed. The destinations changed every few years…there was Greenview in Spring Glen, Jan’s in Ellenville and Rosenblum’s in Spring Glen from what I recall. Some of the places (like Greenview) had already started to decay. But we had fun anyway.

My fascination with abandoned dwellings coupled with my history in the area has put Vanishing Catskills near the top of my obsession list this week. And the memories these photos triggered! OMG, I recognize that Homowack bowling alley! OMG, I helped my Grandma cook in kitchens exactly like that! (And see that pink and white chair? I have that set in yucky brown!)

Too bad my Grandma is rolling over in her grave whenever she sees me “cook” now.

Related:

Catskills Past

Borscht Belt. Then and Now

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Waxing Wood Floors

Waxing Wood Floors published on

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Ever look at your hardwood floors and notice how dull and scratched they are? But you really don’t want to deal with a full blown sand and poly? Well, the solution may just be waxing.

We researched alternatives to polyurethane earlier in the year when we were getting ready to put our house on the market. The best option for us was to wax with Johnson’s paste and then buff. We bought an inexpensive hand held orbital buffer at Home Depot and it we are still using it.

Waxing is kind of an idiot proof method of getting your floors to look nice. It doesn’t take long at all and it’s as easy as a good cleaning.

Make sure you vacuum up all the dust and dirt, then mop with hardwood floor cleaner and wait until the floor is thoroughly dry before applying the wax.

Let the wax dry completely before buffing! In other words, have patience. You should see a film start to develop as it dries.

Go over the area a few times with the buffer. You’ll know when it’s right when the floor starts to shine. Not a horrible glossy shine, but it will look sealed and protected.

And that’s it. Just don’t do it if you’re getting your floors sanded soon. This is kind of an in-between solution. For instance, I just waxed the apartment where our tenants lived for 3 years. Just wanted a quick fix before we moved all the furniture in. The floors look great now!

Weekender: Greek Revival Under $200k

Weekender: Greek Revival Under $200k published on 3 Comments on Weekender: Greek Revival Under $200k

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This fabulous Coxsackie, NY house belongs to a friend of mine. Sadly, I’ve never been invited up to see it in person. (How subtle was that hint?)

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The Greek Revival was built circa 1839 and has been lovingly restored by said friend. I know that “lovingly restored” is a ridiculous real estate term, but it’s true…she did the restoration with love. And a bit of good taste didn’t hurt either. Before photos on Flickr.

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$199,900 will get you 3 bedrooms in a 1969 square foot home on 1/3 acre bordering a state park.

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So, where is this funny sounding town of Coxsackie? It’s upstate in Greene County. That’s west of Hudson (both the town and the river) and close to the other quaint towns of Athens and Catskill. It’s most famous for (in my mind) the kick ass Coxsackie Antique Center.

Check out the house! If you buy it, maybe you’ll invite me up.

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Gifted ala BK Flea. Save the Date!

Gifted ala BK Flea. Save the Date! published on 3 Comments on Gifted ala BK Flea. Save the Date!

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Yup. It’s not even Halloween and I’m talking Christmukkah already. This year the Brooklyn Flea takes Gifted back to our favorite boro. The 9 day festival of fleas will take place at the beautiful 1 Hanson (aka Williamsburg Savings Bank). Design Sponge is partnering up.

This House is Empty Now

This House is Empty Now published on 5 Comments on This House is Empty Now

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We rented a truck and some guys last Friday to move the rest of our belongings from Beacon to Brooklyn. Anything left in the house was sold off in our moving sale on Saturday. Apart from a few leftover items that will be donated or dumped, the house is sitting empty, waiting for the new owners to come and make it a home again.

The sale was called for 10am on Saturday. We woke up early to get our personal belongings out of the way. As I sat on the toilet at 9am, the bell rang. And that was it. The early birds had arrived.

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The first moving sale we had prior to putting the house on the market was in the driveway. This time, we had things from the basement all the way up to the attic and out to the garage, so we let people wander around.

My husband asked afterward if I felt violated having people rip through our stuff like that. Had we been given that extra hour to get a few more tote boxes out of the house, it would have been fine. But I had forgotten about some boxes in the attic. When I went upstairs in the afternoon, I found Alpine’s garbage scattered about the floor. I felt protective of her. There were a number of antique bottles that we took back from people. That’s a memory that stays together. Not for sale.

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Then I saw we had left a box of old tax files up there. Hopefully, we weren’t visited by an ID thief because they could have gotten our social security numbers and birth dates quite easily. Yeah, that was a big no no. More important than any other expensive possession I grabbed out of the house.

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The thing about these sales is people don’t respect your stuff. They don’t carefully go through boxes and closets. They scatter things about. I can’t imagine what it’s like to run an estate sale if you’re a child of an elderly or deceased parent, when it’s a lifetime of memories up for grabs.

I’m not saying I’m not the first one through the door at an estate sale! I love going through people’s old photos and keepsakes. It’s a way of honoring their lives.

Anyway, I don’t know what I’m going on about. We were in the house for 6 years. We were just getting rid of some old junk. I’m just getting sentimental about the house now that the transfer of property is becoming a reality.

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