Saturday, August 16, 2014

reminder about tomorrow


I'm heading down to see Zef’s short about 2:15.

If you are going let’s meet in the lobby about 2 or hit me up clocktowertenants@gmail.com and we’ll make a plan.


See you there!

6,737 miles


ny

It’s been a couple years since I tried the Ippudo ramen in Tokyo and posted here about the meal:


tokyo

Last Sunday we tried the Ippudo here in New York, on 4th Avenue about 10th Street, just down from Webster Hall.

We joined a line and waited about 15 minutes, then we were seated at a big open rectangular soup bar filled with burnt driftwood.


The private booths are fairly calm.


The open dining room is not.


Noisy and bustling.


Our ramen arrived in minutes with very good edamame and a side of yuzu salt.



...and with a smokey and complex, green iced tea.


Was the ramen as succulent and rich as the soup that's so far away?

ny

Hard to say. It really was delicious.


But come on!  


It’s tough to beat ramen in Japan.

kyoto

Friday, August 15, 2014

furniture friday














Have a great weekend!

Thursday, August 14, 2014

it only takes a minute but



If you don’t like heights...


don’t watch this.



seriously.

poetic injustice



There’s nothing quite like dying young to romanticize a poet.

Two hundred years ago young Joseph Rodman Drake was famous.


His poetry referenced the natural beauty of the Bronx and he was often recited in our schools. 


Drake lived in Hunt’s Point when it was rolling meadow and oak forest, with wildflowers and the pristine East River nearby.





Thomas Hunt, a close friend to George Washington, had purchased the point of land now named for him and built a stone mansion there in 1688. 


It was lush and beautiful here then, and Drake was a regular guest inspired to write a poem called simply “Bronx.”


That was then. 

Today Drake’s Park is a tiny oasis surrounded by block after block of gritty wasteland, blighted auto repair and metal scrap yards.

google earth


Drake died in 1820 from tuberculosis at just 25 years old, but he was laid to rest in the Hunt family burial ground.


He’s still there surrounded by refrigerated food trucks. 


So in 1909 the Parks Department acquired the land and named the streets around him for other poets like Longfellow and Halleck and Whittier.


Now it’s dangerous here. 
September 12, 1832

The historic gravestones are so badly vandalized they were repaired with cast concrete.


Few visit here anymore because it’s so industrial.


Except Drake’s last little plot of green.