east village idiot

Or, you know, maybe you could use your fancy smartphone in your right hand and its stylus in your left hand to look up a restaurant’s phone number and save yourself the money.

What do you think went into creating this ad?

“Hey, 411 use is WAY down.”

“I have an idea! Let’s put the very reason that nobody uses 411 anymore IN OUR AD FOR 411!”

Via Gothamist:

Drop Off Service, Planet Rose, Forbidden City, Common Ground, Habibi Lounge, and Superdive will donate 50% of their register on Monday, Aug. 31 (all day and night) to set up a college fund for Pagan’s children, a 14-year-old daughter and a 17-year-old son whom he adopted when the boy’s mother died.

Passers-by in Madison Square might think that Shake Shack has a new competitor. Nearby residents may be afraid that the city is commercializing their public spaces again.

No worries. Taj Ma Hot Dog is just part of a set for the show Ugly Betty. Who said that LA was the only place where everything is fake?

After all, Broadway also has this storefront just a few blocks south.

In the interest of journalistic integrity, I should say that they caught the alleged bastard. There has been an arrest in Sunday morning’s shooting, according to NY1.

Great work by the detectives at the 9th Precinct. I pray that Taz Pagan’s killer is brought to justice for the sake of his children, his family and friends, and our community.

A tragic shooting at 4:30 on Sunday morning left a beloved community member dead as he tried to intervene in a fight that broke out outside a bar at 13th Street and Avenue A. It’s the first confirmed homicide in the 9th Precinct this year, and the details are gruesome. Taz Pagan was shot point-blank in the head simply for trying to break up a fight outside Forbidden City, where he often DJed and was bouncer who was off-duty. Even more tragically, he was a single father who leaves behind two children.

This atrocity must not go unpunished. Unfortunately, the perpetrators got away. Police were combing the neighborhood yesterday looking for clues. While spending some of my Sunday afternoon across the street from the scene of the crime, the detectives of the 9th acted very professionally and were doing their damned hardest to find any clue to help catch these heartless sons of bitches.

At the same time, however - not 10 hours after Taz Pagan was shot and killed - neighbors along Avenue A were shamelessly harping on his death as another example that East Village nightlife has gotten out of hand. As family members and friends were mourning Pagan’s death at a makeshift memorial outside Forbidden City, cranky neighbors hopped on their soapbox to complain to the press about the noisy bars on Avenue A and the 4am closing time of these bars, and attempted to make the case that it contributed to Sunday morning’s shooting. But the circumstances of the crime, the timing of the incident, and the very location of the incident itself tell otherwise, and show just how desperate a vocal minority of the East Village has gotten in trying to rob the neighborhood of its vibrant nightlife.

Nearby bars on Avenue A have drawn the ire of neighbors in the East Village recently. Things came to a head just last week when a community meeting was called to discuss the recent opening of two new bars - Destination, at the corner of Avenue A and 13th, and Superdive, one block further south.

I mention this only because this incident has nothing to do with either of these bars, yet these neighbors tried to shoehorn their complaints from that meeting into the dialogue about Pagan’s death. In fact, this incident has very little to do with Forbidden City (which has been open, by the way, for more than seven years), since according to the Post’s account of what happened, the gunman was never even at the bar. It has nothing to do with the closing times of these bars, since thousands of bars in this city close at 4am every night without incident. It has nothing to do with the “fratty crowd” that patronizes places like the ghastly Superdive and roam the neighborhood in noisy packs in search of pizza or tacos after the bars close.

Pagan’s death has everything to do, however, with the fact that hoodlums still exist in this city, they still carry illegal guns, and they still believe that violence is the only way to solve a problem. On top of this first homicide, there have been 90 reported felony assaults in the East Village this year. I was mugged earlier this year at knifepoint on 12th Street. Overall, crime in the neighborhood is up only slightly over last year, but it’s still a problem. If my cranky neighbors spent less time complaining about a few drunkards and more time devoting their efforts toward curbing violence, maybe some of this wouldn’t have happened.

Let me tell you a story. On a mild November night in 1990, a bouncer refused to let two patrons into a vibrant East Village nightclub without paying. Those two patrons went back to a car, grabbed a gun, and shot and killed the bouncer. That tragic and seemingly random incident set off increased community scrutiny of the club, and a string of other violent incidents at similar nightclubs elsewhere in the city during the 1990s led to this particular club’s demise.

That club was the Palladium. You know what’s there now? An NYU dorm and a chain supermarket.

Is that the future of Avenue A? I sure hope not.

So please, let’s all calm down, show some respect to Pagan’s family and friends, and stick to the issue at hand: a member of our community died at the hands of hoodlums that infiltrated our neighborhood. Let’s do everything we can to bring the perpetrators to justice and make sure it doesn’t happen again. It would be awful if the already tragic death of a beloved member of our community led to the death of East Village nightlife - the very industry Taz Pagan used to express himself and make part of his living.

This internet commenter, found regularly on Projo.com lately, makes me smile every day.

- a hawker today at Union Square.

Poor marketing. That makes me not want to take your free paper.

Above, Google Map’s view of the East Village.

Observe:
- A briefly historical landmark that closed in 1971
- A neighborhood institution that closed in 2006 and reopened 20 blocks away
- A bar that opened in 2007 and has a habit of serving obnoxious underaged emo kids

Ironically, the one point of interest that’s still open is the least deserving of being a “point of interest.”

I’m on a boat plane!

Delta’s in-flight wi-fi is only $5.95 for a flight, and more reliable than my own wireless connection at home. I approve.