I have to admit, I've been obsessing over ketchup lately and I'm wondering what kinds of god-awful brands they must stock in 7-Eleven. Let's go look.
God I hate these places. They're so brightly lit they look kind of like a surgical room gone horribly wrong, with fumes of bad meat drifting in and out.
Speaking of bad meat, here's a couple of Venereal Diseased Hot Dogs. Deeelish!
Okay, I think I see the condiments section at the end of this aisle.
Well, I apologize to 7-Eleven, all they stock is Heinz. That still doesn't make up for their scary-ass rib sandwich, though!
Speaking of scary-ass things, seconds after I shot this a guy grabbed my arm and screamed out, "What are you doing?"
"Let go of my arm," I said pushing him away. "I'm taking pictures of ketchup," I told him when he released his grip on me.
"No pictures in here!" He yelled at me, even though he was less than half a foot away from me.
"I'm just taking pictures of ketchup," I told him amazed at how worked up he was.
"No pictures in my store," He continued to bark out in a Tourette's-like manner.
We argued back and forth and I told him it was a public place, he asked if I would like it if he came to my home and took pictures and I told him I could care less. Then I told him I lived two blocks away and invited him over to take pictures of my ketchup. He declined.
After awhile it got old, so I left, pounded on the window and took a photo of the angry 7-Eleven Man.
It’s been a little bit of a weird week for me. At the start of the week I got the sad news that my friend, Tony Ward, the owner of Mike’s Tavern which was the last stop on my bar crawl died. The next night I met friends at Bill’s Gay Nineties piano bar, a beloved midtown piano bar that is being threatened to be taken over by yuppie assholes who will surely gut the tavern and ruin it. A practice I refer to as: “Fedoradizing.” I invented that word after businessman Gabe Stulman bought the once wonderful, West Village bar/restaurant named after the lovely and beautiful owner, Fedora and then promptly bulldozed the place, took out everything that made Fedora’s charming and turned it into a shiny, shitty, plastic, yuppiefied, foodie facade of what it once was.
The greedy money-men that are trying to get their filthy mitts on Bill’s will do the same, I’m sure. The first thing to be tossed on to the scrap heap will be the piano—the heart and soul of Bill’s and then all the vintage photos and posters and finally the bulldozer comes in and then...voilà...they’ll turn it into a place that has all the unique charm of a T.G.I. Fridays with a thyroid condition. Why would someone ruin something that’s already perfect? The answer to that question is the punchline to the following old joke: “Q. Why does a dog lick his own balls? A. Because he can.”
Anyway, the thoughts of Tony’s death and the possible impending doom of Bill’s led me to think about when Fedora died, and how Gabe Stulman did nothing that I know of in her memory on the day and weeks following her passing. No condolences or tributes were posted on their website and I called there the night when the news came out and asked if they were open and I was told they were. I questioned if they were doing anything in Fedora’s memory and was told that they had no immediate plans, but maybe they would do something down the road. I have a feeling that that road is mighty long and nothing’s happened on it yet. All week I’ve been wondering if there’s at least a picture of her or something honoring her and the fine institution that was once, “Fedora’s.” I thought tonight I’d go there and see. Prepare your barf bags, this ain’t going to be pretty.
And it's off we go, it's starting to get cold outside. Brrrr.
And it's down into the bowels of the subway we go.
Wow, look at this ancient device. It's a giant cell phone that doesn't move. Fascinating!
All aboard!
Here we are in the West Village, time to take that sad walk to Fedora's.
There’s the new sign that Gabe Stulman put up. When I talked with Fedora shortly before it closed she told me that the new owner promised her two things: They’d leave the original neon sign up and they’d close early during the week as Fedora did out of respect for the neighbors living on the block. Right before it reopened, Gabe Stulman took down the original sign and replaced it with a new one claiming the original was crumbling away and couldn’t be restored. It’s weird, it looked fine to me when I looked at it shortly before Gabe ripped it out. Hard to believe it couldn’t have been fixed. Oh and while Fedora closed around 11:00 pm on week nights, he changed the hours to 2:00 am. He did promise Fedora he’d close early, I just think he forgot to tell her it would be early in the morning, not evening.
Its closed for a holiday party. Ah, just saves a trip to a place that's sold its soul to the devil. I looked in the window and it's no different than the last time I was in here.
You know, since this place no longer bears any resemblance or feeling to the original Fedora’s, they should just change the name of it altogether. To me, It’s an insult to the memory of what Fedora’s used to be. The name should be something to suit Gabe and his “Little Wisco” playmates, I’m just thinking off the top of my head here, but perhaps something like: “Cheddarhead’s Amnesia Factory.” Oh and pay no mind to that slurping noise you hear...that’s just Gabe Stulman, licking his own balls. Because he can.
Okay, my parents flew back and I”m back to work, which means I’m back to my normal schedule. And that also means that since it’s Tuesday, it’s Swizzle Stick Night, where I go out in search of the elusive swizzle stick. Originally I was searching for a glass one, but I’ve come to realize those my be extinct, so I’m happy with a plastic one as well. Last week the bartender didn’t even know what a swizzle stick is!
Tonight I’m going to a bar that was one of the last great taverns in Times Square and one of the highlights of the bar crawl last year—Rum House. The original owner’s lease ran out last year and the owners of the Hotel Edison wouldn’t renew it. Instead, they leased it out to a group of people whom everyone thought was going to turn it into some shiny, bright sickening place to match the rest of Times Square. Well, supposedly they did clean it up a bit, but I’ve heard it’s still dark and they’ve maintained the personality of the original pretty well. I kind of doubt it’s true, but let’s go see if that’s true and if there’s a swizzle stick in our future.
And we're off, out into the hot, sticky July night in New York City.
I really hate this part of Times Square that's so light it looks like daytime here. I took this shot without a flash!
And of course you've got your large groups of assholes just standing and chatting and blocking the entire sidewalk. Aaaahhh!
And here's the dreaded T.G.I. Fridays where they claim, "IN HERE IT'S ALWAYS FRIDAY." You know what? As much as I hate to walk in there, let's step inside and see if we're magically transferred to Friday.
Nope, it's still Tuesday and this place sucks monkey lungs on toast. Let's get out of here, I need a drink!
And here we are at Rum House. Wow, they took down the big brown Rum House sign and replaced it with this generic thing. Not a good sign, pun somewhat intended.
And here's the bar, the crowd is a little more Yuppified than before.
There's a table up front, filled with this group of loud tourists.
I ordered my double gin and tonic and it didn't come with a swizzle stick, just a black straw. He then proceeded to tell me that the Edison Hotel didn't renew the lease for the previous owners because it was dirty and they didn't like the clientele they attracted. Well since I was one of the clientele it attracted...
I got one more for the road and then got the fuck out of this place.
Goodbye Rum House, I hope Karma bites your face off.
Rum House There’s been a lot of reviews about how the new owners of the Rum House have kept the old school vibe alive in there. But I was there at the end when people who had worked there for years told me first-hand that they were yanked out of a job because the Hotel Edison wanted a different crowd in there. Last year when these greedy scumbag money-lickers refused to let the original owner renew his lease and then let some people who owned some fancy shmancy bar somewhere in the financial district reopen it, with pretty much the same look, some people celebrated it. But the drink prices rose and although I hadn’t been there, I assumed that the clientele and atmosphere would be somewhat different. I kind of dreaded walking back in there, but like Neil Young once sang, “Tonight’s the Nitght.”
So I went there and while it looked somewhat the same, it was a little brighter and a little more well polished. And all of the old staff was gone. The new ones were friendly though, and I played dumb and put on my Peter Tork face and asked one of the bartenders if they had changed management.
He told me that indeed they had and that the previous owners didn’t get their lease renewed because the Hotel Edison thought they kept the bar dirty and they didn’t like the customers they attracted. When I went there last year under previous management I was served up drinks by Fransisco, a true old school New York bartender and there were pretzels on the bar in blue plastic bowls. I didn’t see any any dirt. The clientele was a mix of working class people from around the block and no-nonsenense tourists, all people who knew how to throw back a drink or four and not get stupid. Tonight there was yuppie couples and loud tourists. And while the bar was dark, it was a shade lighter and a little brighter and sparklier than before. And people were texting and talking way too loud in the joint for my taste.
I miss the old staff and I’m not going back and I’m pissed they threw the original crew out of the joint. Oh, and fuck you Hotel Edison, you, slimy cold-ass bastardsl. Eat shit with your fourteen dollar drinks. You don’t even have swizzle sticks and you put good people out of work. And I miss the old blue plastic bowls with pretzels in them. Further reading: New York Magazine, Grub Street, Eater NY and Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York.
I have to admit, I've been obsessing over ketchup lately and I'm wondering what kinds of god-awful brands they must stock in 7-Eleven. Let's go look.
God I hate these places. They're so brightly lit they look kind of like a surgical room gone horribly wrong, with fumes of bad meat drifting in and out.
Speaking of bad meat, here's a couple of Venereal Diseased Hot Dogs. Deeelish!
Okay, I think I see the condiments section at the end of this aisle.
Well, I apologize to 7-Eleven, all they stock is Heinz. That still doesn't make up for their scary-ass rib sandwich, though!
After awhile it got old, so I left, pounded on the window and took a photo of the angry 7-Eleven Man.
And once more with feeling! Goodbye, asshole!
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