Harlem Mourns Loss of Pedophile.

Everglades City: “If you need anything while you’re here…go to Naples.”

Clubland.

06: Designing Mokai from rakontur on Vimeo.

The Big 10 is Bullshit.

Once again, thank God for football season.

At the ass end of last season, my Gators were down three games and the bullshit Buckeyes were still undefeated. Strength of schedule was always the topic of argument between myself and my misguided Big 10 friends. I mean, how much do wins against teams like Akron and Kent really matter?

Sure, Florida lost a few games…but before that tragic Capital One Bowl loss to Michigan (which can be attributed to the curse of the Heisman, obviously), our losses were to other SEC powerhouses.

And they were close games. My heart was broken as I watched the Florida/Auburn game at a shitty bar in the Meatpacking District. Watching the LSU game from my seat in Baton Rouge’s Tiger Stadium the following weekend was even worse.

But in November, seeing the mediocre Illini assram the Buckeyes while freezing my ass off in the Horseshoe made the pain subside quite a bit.

Saturday night was a bloodbath, and 35-3 is the kind of score you’d expect a team like USC to have at the end of a season opener against a D2 school.

Mark my words- the Big 10 is bullshit, the ACC is irrelevant, and for the third consecutive year, the BCS champion will be an SEC team.

…but hopefully, said SEC team will have a real opponent this time.

White people continue to ruin Harlem in my absence…one cozy, affordable brownstone at a time.

It was after 4 am on the last night of my most recent visit to NYC. I’d just gotten back to my boy’s place after a night of heavy drinking.

I was hungry. We were in Harlem. I knew from years of drunken nights in the neighborhood that there wouldn’t be shit open.

Except…

“Let’s go to Pathmark!” I said. My boy rolled his eyes and put on his sneakers.

We walked down 125th toward Lexington, home of the infamous, mostly 24-hour, Mid-Atlantic/Northeastern ghetto supermarket chain, when I spotted a brightly-lit, Murray Hill-esque bodega adjacent to the plexiglassed Popeye’s just east of Park.

It was open. At 4 am. In Harlem.

Inside, there was a wall of Soy Crisps, my favorite yuppie delicacy. They had green tea. And protein bars. And upon entry, no one tried to sell me drugs.

I stammered, stupefied by both the shock and my indisputable drunkenness. My boy smirked at me. “You remember what this place used to be, right? Think back to two summers ago.”

No way.

The same space had once been the only place we could get our cigarettes (and by “our”, I mean “non-menthol”) late night. It had been a total dive; squalid even by Harlem bodega standards. When the door was open, the interior stank of rotting meat and stale smoke; when the door closed, probably at 11 pm, a line would form at the window and the surly, scruffy little Middle Eastern owner would sell blunts, 40’s, and smokes through the plexiglass window behind the counter. I loved that place.

My boy pointed behind the deli counter, and I recognized the owner of the previous place, still scruffy and surly, buttering a bagel.

I got my yuppie food, and as we exited, a white girl with a nose ring and her nerd boyfriend walked in.

And at that moment, I knew it was true…as Stuff White People Like concluded,

“Harlem had a good run.”

*************************

Look! Another Times article about gentrification in Harlem! The Pioneering, Open-Minded Yuppies Muster the Courage to Deal with the Natives! I especially enjoyed this part:

“And many new residents are uncomfortable with Harlem’s noisy street life, including sidewalk barbecues that can draw large crowds. Some believe there are too many churches on the one hand — Harlem has more than 100 houses of worship — and a casual flouting of the law on the other, with people littering, double-parking and drinking alcohol on the street. Some white women complain that they seem to receive more rude sexual come-ons in Harlem than elsewhere.”

(Please note that this isn’t the Times‘ photo; it’s mine. And it’s much cooler than the one they used.)

In an Evolving Harlem, Newcomers Try to Fit In.
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS
Published: September 6, 2008
In the past few years, the “Village of Harlem,” as older residents still call it, has become a 21st-century laboratory for integration. Class and money and race are at the center of the changes in the neighborhood. Lured by stately century-old brownstones and relatively modest rents, new faces are moving in and making older residents feel that they are being pushed out. There have been protests, and anger directed as much at the idea of the newcomers as at them personally.

Florida v. Miami in Gainesville, September 6, 2008.

Why Floridians don’t give a fuck about tropical storms and hurricanes.

In a New York Times Times article a few days ago, the mayor of Miami expressed concern that South Florida residents were dangerously complacent in regard to a hurricane finally severing Miami-Dade off the end of the state and sending it, like a refugee on a floating door, into the ocean where it belongs. It’s human nature,” Mayor Alvarez said. “After a couple of years of nothing, you start to say, ‘It can’t hit us.’ ”

There’s that.

But the real reason South Florida residents don’t give a fuck: painful, inescapable local news coverage.

In the 48 hours leading up to a storm, several channels cut into quality programming, like Dr. Phil and Maury Povich, to bombard viewers with at least ten ever-changing possible storm tracks and footage of dipshits buying bottled water and plywood.

And then, just before it hits, it gets even worse.

1. Free Sandbag Giveaway!
Since sand is such a scarcity here on the beach, volunteers gather, wear ugly ponchos, and fill bags with the shit. Then, residents line up, show proof of residency, and greedily hoard them.

2. Them Wacky Surfers!
There are no real waves in South Florida, but when a storm approaches, it produces large, choppy, bullshit. Surfers infiltrate the beaches, even though this washing machine slop is virtually unrideable, so that they can feel like badasses. News anchors always cover this, and somehow, it’s always surprising to them.

3. Obnoxious Anchor Goes to Major Tourist Spot to Ask People What They’re Doing.
“Well, you know, I’m a teacher…they canceled school tomorrow, so I’m just taking advantage of some extra shopping time here on Lincoln Road! I can’t believe everything’s still open…even though the storm, which isn’t really going to touch us, is still like 7 hours away!”

4. Dipshit Anchor Stands Outside in an Area the Storm is Currently Passing Over.
“Yeah, it’s really rainy out here, guys. And windy! You should probably just stay home.”

What I did with my Batman Movie Masters Chase Figure: WAVE 2, Batman Begins.

The new Batman variant. You know, from the shitty Katie Holmes movie that came out a couple years back.

This operation was moved indoors when I had to try to explain to a passing Miami Beach cop what the fuck I was doing.

“You look like a man who takes himself too seriously.”

“You want my opinion? You need to lighten up.”

DEAR NERDS:

No, the girl in the picture is not me. But I, too, am way too hot for you.

P.S. I do it because nerd tears give me strength.

Someone’s gonna run into ATLAH’s Pastor Manning at the new Target in East Harlem.

Just when I thought the No Dew Nor Rain campaign was starting to take hold…

Forget IKEA: East Harlem Target Looms on Horizon

“Everyone is super excited about the Target.” Everyone! Or at least real estate players like Jessica Armstead of the Corcoran Group, who predicts that the Target store finally coming to fruition in East Harlem will “totally change” the area’s lagging pace of gentrification. “It appeals to everyone,” she tells the Sun. “You go in to get toothpaste and come out with three bags. It’s amazing.” Armstead is already luring condo buyers into East Harlem with the amazing, exciting shopping utopia to arrive any year now.

Currently scheduled to open in October 2009, the store is part of the perennially delayed East River Plaza shopping complex, which will cluster other exciting big box stores such as Best Buy, Marshalls and Home Depot – unless that company decides to sublet its 110,000 space to Costco. The Harlem Target (the first in Manhattan) will join a growing Target army in New York City, with seven currently open and two others under construction in the Bronx and Flushing, Queens. To help inspire shoppers to stimulate the national economy, the Harlem store’s façade will be wrapped in a steel mesh American flag.

And those who recall how the controversy surrounding the Red Hook IKEA tended to split along class lines know how this will play out: Kenneth Knuckles, president of the Empowerment Zone Development Corp., is framing the $440 million project as a chance to provide 2,000 full and part-time jobs to East Harlem residents, who will then “take money they’ve earned and spend it in the community.” But NIMBY brownstone owner (and architect) Raymond Plumey predicts terrible traffic and pollution from consumers flocking to the amazing 485,000-square-foot shopping center, whenever it finally opens.

By John Del Signore

Cocaine Cowboys 2 premiere at Cinevegas.

Cocaine Cowboys 2 premiered at Cinevegas this weekend.

Set in 1991 on the inner-city streets of Oakland, California, cocaine dealer Charles Cosby has his life is changed forever when he writes a fan letter to the “Cocaine Godmother” Griselda Blanco, who is serving time at a nearby federal prison. Six months later, Cosby is a multi-millionaire, Blanco’s lover, and the head of her $40 million a year cocaine business. Also known as “The Black Widow” for her propensity to permanently dispose of her men when she’s done with them, Blanco will stop at nothing to ensure that Charles is faithful to her. Cosby soon learns that he’s in way over his head.

Oh, and from the film, crack cooking 101: