Put Your City On

New Yorker Sign, photograph courtesy of nycgeo.

• Ask About Immigrant Entrepreneurs <City Room>
  
• Audio slide show: Joan Miró: Painting and Anti-Painting 1927-1937 <Time Out NY>
  
• The NY Press website gets a much need makeover, and NYC The Blog approves!
  <NY Press>
  
• WNYC’s Benjamen Walker looks into why movies love to destroy New York. <Art.Cult>
  
• Not only did immigrants demonstrate their voting power this year, they're organizing for greater muscle in future elections. <City Limits>
  
• Carmines and Estelle Stanger Windows and Neons <The Weblicist>
  
• I Can't Afford To Love NY T-Shirts. <via Newyorkology>
  

Nuts 4 Nuts On 53rd And Broadway

I've since forgotten what the proprietors name is, having neglected to write it down, though I did remember a few details from our conversation. He came to the U.S. from Chile ten years ago, and lives a few blocks west from where he sets up his cart here at 53rd and Broadway, south of the Ed Sullivan Theater, this evening catching everyone waiting on line for the Late Show With David Letterman. He's been working the cart in this spot for seven years, from 10 am to 11 pm everyday; sometimes he set up across the street on the east side of Broadway if the foot traffic is better over there. He tells me that he takes home about 70-80 dollars a day, 100 on a good day. I'm not sure if he was referring to his gross take or his profit and am unaware what his expenses might be, if he rents the cart, pays a fee of his take to someone else, how much the peanuts cost, etc...so I'm inclined to believe those numbers, if accurate, were referring to his profit after any and all expenses, as in the ten minutes I stood there conversing with him, he sold a half dozen or more bags of peanuts at two dollars each; if indicative of his business, that's about 70 dollars every hour.

Put Your City On

Mother and daughter waiting for the train

• The Vote Boat <Tugster>
• New Yorkers Sound Off: "Yes We Did!" <Art.Cult>
• Immigrants from Mexico and Haiti may be newer to New York City — but many emigre Italians continue to speak their mother tongue exclusively. <City Limits>
  
• The U.S.S. Growler is on the Move Again! <Gothamist>
  
• Remembering Willy on Willis Avenue <City Room>
  
• Designing NYC Streets for the 21st Century <Streetsblog>
  
• Staten Island Youth Beaten After Ohio Called for Obama <Runnin' Scared>
  
• Gettin’ Racial on Little Rodeo Drive (uh, Bleecker Street) <Mr. Bellers Neighborhood>
• What 11 Spring Looks Like Under All That Graffiti <Daily Intel>
  
• Bargain-Basement Basquiats <NY Obesrver>
  

Bagels & Pizza At 203 E.Houston St Has Closed

Bagels & Pizza had been there for 14 years. They closed for business after Sunday's shift, and yesterday at 3pm they auctioned of their equipment.

When I went to get a coffee yesterday, The two sons, the father, an employee, and a straggler or two were present. All their equipment was tagged and ready for sale.

Four years ago, they told me, they renewed their ten year lease at more than double the previous rate. I asked the proprietor what he was going to do now. He laughed nervously, and said, "Not be self-employed. I want to work for someone else." It was hard work, and the neighborhood changed he told me, it just isn't profitable anymore.