Dope on the Slope

Goodbye Jumbo???

Well the big news for Brooklyn today revolves around the incredible shrinking white elephant known as the Atlantic Yards development. According to articles in the NYT (here and here), the size of the project will shrink considerably due to the inability of developer Bruce Ratner to secure adequate financing for his big idea in the current financial climate.

While the "affordable housing" component of the project may be evaporating (as if it wasn't all smoke to begin with), one dimension of the project is swelling to super-jumbo proportions - the public subsidies. According to The Brooklyn Paper, "the cost of the publicly financed arena, whose original pricetag was $435 million, but increased to $637 million last year, has now ballooned to $950 million."

What a surprise.

Daniel Goldstein, speaking for Develop Don't Destroy made the following statement:

“We need leadership in the city and the state to face the music. The project needs  to be reconfigured, rethought and renegotiated. The promise was affordable housing.   It’s clearly been put on the back burner, while the arena has been moved to  the front burner.”

Aw, c'mon Daniel. Don't you know the one thing that can carry economically disadvantaged Brooklynites through the coming recession is the knowledge that their tax dollars will bring a HOME SPORTS TEAM for them to root for in 3 or 4 or 5 or maybe 8 years? That, and a giant surface parking lot.

Private profit, public risk.

It's the American way.

Detailed coverage at No Land Grab and Atlantic Yards Report.

RIP: Gary Gygax

This has absolutely nothing to do with Brooklyn, but I just learned that Gary Gygax, co-creator of the Dungeons and Dragons role playing game passed away. According to the wired blog network:

"I don't think I've really grokked it yet," said Mike Mearls, the lead developer of the upcoming 4th edition of Dungeons and Dragons. "He was like the cool uncle that every gamer had. He shaped an entire generation of gamers." ... Gygax had been in poor health for some time, according to his wife Gail.

Poor health? I'd rather believe it was the work of an umber hulk or gelatinous cube. Nerds everywhere should raise a glass to this patron saint of socially awkward teens.

I just may have to do a special podcast in his honor.

Blogade Roadshow Rolls Into Kensington

Bad Girl Blog will be hosting this month's installment of the Brooklyn Blogade Roadshow this  Sunday, March 9, at 12 p.m. Chow down and chew the fat with your fellow bloggers at the Old Brick Cafe on Church Avenue in exotic Kensington. The cost is $15 and includes a meal. Please click here for additional details, and to RSVP so the cafe will be adequately prepared for the onslaught.

Flakey Haiku

slushfun 2, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

Forsaken snowball
waits on cold road hoping.
The next tire ends him.

Lefferts Homestead

Lefferts Homestead, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

Couldn't resist this shot, even though I was soaked and my hands were beginning to lose all feeling.

Pipistrelle told me that Prospect Park was giving away free hot chocolate and had sleds for people to borrow. Wish I had found the cocoa.

Snowfalls

Binnen Falls, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

The Binnen Bridge in Prospect Park.

White Stuff

I looked out the window this morning and saw a bunch of white stuff covering nearly everything. My first thought was that an old sugar silo at the Domino site must have exploded, but an experimental taste revealed that the substance wasn't sweet. It was  cold however.

Curious.

Winter Aconite

Winter Aconite, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

 

For I'm called Little Buttercup -- dear Little Buttercup, Though I could never tell why, But still I'm called Buttercup -- poor little Buttercup, Sweet Little Buttercup I!
-- Gilbert and Sullivan

I photographed this cluster of winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis), an early blooming member of the buttercup family, growing in the sideyard at Old First Reformed Church.

Flatbush Gardener has also bagged a number of trophies recently, including a crocus and a snowdrop.

For those of you interested in early bloomers (not to be confused with antique underwear), there is an excellent article about them on the BBG's website entitled "Spring Peepers - Little Bulbs To Trumpet A New Season." An excerpt:

These little bulbs are the true harbingers of spring. They thrust through matted leaf litter and mulch with surprising gusto to carpet the ground with color and catch the early-spring sunlight before trees and shrubs have leafed out. Their arrival depends on the whims of Mother Nature, of course, but bloom time can be anywhere from January through April, depending on the region and severity of winter.

Enjoy.

Invertebrate Blogging: Eat Your Broccoli Worm!

Well, one just never knows what one will find lurking in their salad spinner. This little feller is the juvenile form of the cabbage white butterfly that is so common during the spring and summer months.

I found this specimen munching a head of broccoli that I had just rinsed, so I decided to use the term "broccoli worm," which is what my grandmother called them, even though the rest of the free world calls them "cabbage worms." My family had sworn off growing their own cabbage since Uncle Cole forbade the practice back in 1847. We called it Cole's Law.

Anyhoo, I vividly remember my grandmother finding a particularly large specimen while cleaning a big mess of broccoli over the sink when I was around 6  years old. She extended her finger toward my little brother and said "lookie here!" He promptly grabbed it and stuffed it in his mouth.

Kid's Sundays in Prospect Park

The following release is courtesy The Heart of Brooklyn:

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Brooklyn, NY – This spring, the Children’s Corner, a kid-centric sanctuary in Prospect Park that includes Lefferts Historic House, the Prospect Park Carousel, and Prospect Park Zoo will join with Brooklyn Public Library’s Kidsmobile, to host Kids’ Sundays! From 1-4pm on the first Sunday of every month Brooklyn families can enjoy readings, history-themed arts & crafts, storytelling, Zookeeper chats and more!

The series kicks-off March 2, 2008 as the Children’s Corner participates in nation-wide Leap Day celebrations. Zoo-goers of all ages can jump into the fun by participating in a variety of amphibian activities, including a scavenger hunt, frog-focused crafts and Zookeeper chats about poison-dart and smokey jungle frogs.

After all that amphibian action, kids can hop onto the Brooklyn Public Library’s Kidsmobile, a children’s library on wheels, inside the Park by the Children’s Corner, to check out books about frogs, salamanders and other awesome amphibians, hear stories, and sign up for library cards!

And, they can leap back in time to the 18th century at Prospect Park’s Lefferts Historic House for Early American Crafts, or over to Prospect Park’s Audubon Center to celebrate Read Across America Day (from 12-2pm) with readings from Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax and other great children’s books.

Kids’ Sundays will be held on the first Sunday of every month (March through June):

• Sunday, March 2, 2008
• Sunday, April 6, 2008
• Sunday, May 4, 2008
• Sunday, June 1, 2008

For more information on the Kids’ Sundays, visit: www.heartofbrooklyn.org/kidssundays

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Mmmmmm, smokey jungle frogs.

Power To The Steeple

St. Xavier, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

The 6th Avenue facade of the Church of Saint Francis Xavier in the February sun. The image below is from a vintage postcard found at a website that provides a chronological listing of Brooklyn's Catholic churches based on date of establishment. I think it's odd that the postcard illustration makes the church look so diminutive, almost like one of those miniature buildings people collect to display at Christmas. Although there are much larger churches in the city, I've always thought this particular building had an imposing presence. The postcard version of the building also appears to be faced in red colored stone or brick. I wonder if this was historically the case or just artistic license?

Rules Of The Road

It was with great dismay and a sense of deja vu that I learned the stroller feuds continue unabated in our fair neighborhood.  I've recently become a prammer myself, and, while the overwhelming majority of Park Slope parents drive with care and consideration, there are enough jerks out there to give us all a bad name. To combat these sidewalk simpletons, I propose the following pramming penalties be implemented immediately.

 

	Violation: Sidewalk Straddling Description: Inconsiderate oaf blocks entire sidewalk to tend to infant by parking the stroller perpendicular to the sidewalk's edge. Here's a tip: park your stroller facing downhill with you on the downhill side. Your baby will be safe from any threat of rolling away from you and your fellow pedestrians will marvel at how considerate you are. Karmic Penalty: Three hours of inconsolable crying starting at 1 AM on a work night.
	Violation: Parallel Pramming Description: Also known as the "nannyjam," this violation involves two sidewalk hogging pram pushers engrossed in conversation to the extent that they are seemingly oblivious to people either in front or behind who wish to pass. I say "seemingly," because sometimes their immovability seems intentional. Karmic Penalty: Five exploding diapers in the space of one hour.
	Violation: PWP (Pramming While Phoning) Description: I'm sure that somewhere there is an individual who can drive, walk and/or push a stroller at the same time. I'm also sure there is intelligent life on other planets, I just haven't witnessed it yet. This particular violation is a threat to ankles everywhere and probably not safe for baby. Karmic Penalty: When baby is hoisted from stroller, she pees voluminously on cell phone, thereby shorting it out.

Please feel free to add your own violations and penalties in comments.

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker vs. Yellow-bellied Developer

Sapsucker Holes, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

I took this photo from just outside the fence of The Brooklyn Bears Garden at the intersection of Flatbush and Pacific. The garden was the designated meeting place for the Atlantic Yards Camera Club this past Sunday. Flatbush Gardener got there early and took several wonderful pictures. He also has a nice post about the experience.

I arrived late, so I only got this quick snapshot of a rather impressive display of niche partitioning by a yellow-bellied sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius). The "victim" in this case was a  robust specimen of leatherleaf viburnum (Viburnum rhytidophyllum).

Sapsuckers are normally migratory, so this particular little woodpecker must really love his urban oasis. Not surprising given that these birds are ecotone or edge specialists, meaning that they thrive in transition zones. The garden is an island of green in an asphalt sea - definitely a transition zone.

Sapsuckers makes two kinds of holes: deep drilled narrow openings and the larger shallow patches shown here. These holes are just deep enough into the bark tissue to allow exuding of sap. The sap, as well as any insects attracted to it,  is eagerly lapped up by the bird. Many other species of bird take advantage of this "strip mining" (the lousy parasites), so the yellowbellied sapsucker could be considered a keystone species.

Do the holes hurt the tree? While it's possible that a tree could be seriously damaged by such treatment, it would not be in the sapsucker's long term interest to kill its food source. As several of the gardeners present last Sunday pointed out, not one branch was girdled, so it's possible the damage will be repaired by the tree itself.

If only the yellowbellied real estate developer (Agripeta maximus¹) followed a similar strategy. Unfortunately, the neighborhoods that are being pecked to death are not a meaningful resource for this wily species. There is no incentive to preserve anything, because it has no bearing on the species' future success. Our local government will always be there to toss out more seed.

But I digress.

UPDATE: The Brooklyn Bear's own Jon Crow snapped this photo of the elusive woodpecker continuing his handiwork.

¹Click here for a translation of the scientific name.

Billy & Friend

billy, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

The Williamsburg Bank Building hangs out with a lanky light pole just prior to yesterday afternoon's snow squalls. They've been spotted together before, but not like this.

Does proximity imply intimacy?

You be the judge.

Atlantic Yards Camera Club

no standing, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

 

shutterbugs, originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

 

The cold and snow didn't deter the twenty or so hardy shutterbugs who showed up for the charter meeting of the "Atlantic Yards Camera Club" organized by Brit in Brooklyn. The event was designed to promote awareness of photographers rights on public property  following the recent harassment of visiting San Francisco videographer/teacher, Katherin McInnis (left), by the MTA.