Happy WWII Flag Raising on Iwo Jima, UESiders…
Moments in history don’t get more symbolic, pivotal or worthy of remembrance…
Or dwarfing of the date’s other designation: Love Your Pet Day.
(You bet you’re loved, Fido/Fluffy/Tweetie Bird/Mr. Gerbil!!)
On to the week ahead:
Saturday, February 25th: 82nd Street/St. Stephen’s Greenmarket
82nd Street between First and York, 9am–2pm
Compost & Clothes Collection, 9am–1pm
With us will be American Pride Seafood, Bread Alone, Ballard’s Honey, Hudson Valley Duck, Rising Sun Beef, Comfort Bardwell Cheese, Ole Mother Hubbert, Hawthorne Valley, Samascott and Gajeski Farms!
Fingers crossed but ify on the Nolasco Farm front… Their winter stores are running thin.
REMINDER: Coming up March 25th at our Market: We’ll be hosting GrowNYC’s Regional Grain Project and it’s amazing array of food and drink all made with NYState-grown grain!! Yet another special event brought to us by the fabulous GrowNYC and Manhattan Market Manager Margaret!!
Last week’s recycling totals: 77 lbs. batteries; 32 lbs. cords, corks, cellphones and cartridges; 2 pairs eye glasses; 10 1/2 compost bins; 28 bags of clothes.
Yes!! We like 10-plus bin weeks!!
By February 28th: Vote for the One Book All New Yorkers Should Read!!
Head immediately to http://www1.nyc.gov/site/mome/initiatives/1book1ny.page!!! (Winner will be announced in March!)
Thursday, March 9th: Free Mammogram Screening
Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright’s Office, 1365 First Avenue between 73rd & 74th, commencing at 9am
All insurances accepted. Fees and co-payments all waived. Free for uninsured women over 40 who’ve not had a mammogram in more than a year. All anyone needs is an appointment (and it’s a must): 800-564-6868!
Saturday, March 11th: Shred-A-Thon – Ides of March Edition
82nd Street/St. Stephen Greenmarket, 82nd Street between First & York, 10am-2pm (rain or shine)
Closer and closer…
Just keep in mind:
NO cardboard or plastic-handled shopping bags.
REMOVE paper clips and spiral bindings.
NO HARDCOVER BOOKS. (But paperbacks are fine.)
(Donate those hardcovers at Goodwill or Housing Works.)
As ever, a giant thank you to Council Members Kallos and Garodnick for their many years of generous Shred-A-Thon grants and Assembly Member Seawright for sponsoring the event!
Sunday, March 12th: New York Theater Ballet’s “Cinderella”
Schimmel Center, 3 Spruce Street, 3pm
The Dancing Clock… Those not-so-nice stepsisters… Everyone’s favorite princess-to-be… And– Well, you know the story. Made all the better when dancing’s added! With choreography by Donald Mahler, costumes by Metropolitan Opera’s Sylvia Taalsohn Nolan and sets by Gillian Bradshaw Smith. Perfect for kids of all ages! (Come at 2pm for fun like prince/princess crown decorating, Cinderella’s magic pumpkin game and a royal photo booth!) Adults, $20. Children, $10. For more and tickets...
By Monday, March 13th: Nominate Your Favorite Library Branch!!
Go immediately to http://www.nyclibraryawards.org!
Five NYC Library Grand Prize Award winners score a fat $20,000!! Five finalists win $10,000!! The 67th Street Branch… The 96th Street Branch… The Webster Branch… The Roosevelt Island Branch… The Yorkville Library… Lots of libraries to love on the UES!!
Miscellany… Miscellaneous wrong-footedness first:
Say what? Governor Cuomo’s budget includes a 4% cut in library funding? (Should you disagree…)
Must read: The Times’ “The Bee Mogul”!! (Made the international edition, too!)
Or that the Nuclear Regulatory Agency considering approval of a new dump for radioactive material in West Texas, with shipping through major population centers to a poor, largely Hispanic hamlet? (Just the facts, people.)
Like what more Appalachian streams’ll be looking like now that coal slag and tailings can be dumped in them again:
Not that NYState doesn’t have water problems of its own… Immediately coming to mind: Newburgh (lots of residents still haven’t had their blood tested) and Lake Erie...
Into sunlight:
LOVE this idea: The Empire State Trail… 750-miles long… Multi-use… Extending from the New York harbor through the Adirondacks and as far north as the state extends to Lake Erie (!) and Buffalo!! Set to be finished in 2020!!
Beginning with this from Justmeans: The good news in the European Commission’s “Second Report on the State of the Energy Union” has almost been lost amid the angst over the future of the European Union. The report finds that “renewable energy is now cost-competitive and sometimes cheaper than fossil fuels, employs over one million people in Europe, attracts more investments than many other sectors, and has reduced our fossil fuels imports bill by €16 billion.” These facts support the report’s assertion that Europe is on track to meet its ambitious 2020 energy and climate targets. And its larger perspective conclusion is truly eye opening: during 1990 to 2015, the EU’s combined GDP grew by 50% while total emissions fell by 22%. Now that’s a bottom line that adds up to both literal profits and air-clearing benefits.
Abundant cheers for Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the Monarch Research Project and the 1,000 of bee-friendly acres they’ll be creating!! (The first 199 acres will be seeded this spring!!) (There’ll be bee and butterfly plant havens in the Green Park Garden and Bicycle Island Gardens, too!!)
We’re used to see Lewis B. & Dorothy Cullman’s names at the beginning of countless hours of PBS programming, but who knew they were plant people too? So, here’s the lowdown on Cullman-funded plant research at the Botanical Garden!
Trust the Greenwich Village Historical Society to get the job done… i.e. prevent tampering with one of NYC’s 3 remaining Seamen’s hotels and barring the way for another deed restriction lift!
Unsatisfied with your internet speed? NYS Attorney General Schneiderman would like to know!! Read… Then measure that speed and send to the AG!
Live in a building with 10 or more units? Yeah, there’s a (free) training course involved, BUT you and fellow residents are eligible for free electronics pick-up or even – for 100-plus units – a free E-recycling bin! 10-plus unit buildings can have their own clothes recycling bin, too!!
For those wondering why St. John the Divine was landmarked just last week..
If only this guy (and his machine) would come to First Avenue…
Wine and your health? The latest from “Consumer Reports”…
Holy crow! Competitive eating has a pre-Coney Island history…
Ready for animals:
Guess what? Just as references to climate change have magically disappeared from federal government sites, so have docs and records relevant to animal cruelty.. Puppy mills, horse soring (gait improvement via injected irritants, roadside zoos and more would now seem to be AOK. (Should you object…)
Meanwhile in Africa… A hero’s providing water to drought-stricken animals!
The reputedly oldest rug in the world ‘s woven in the shape of a – what else? – cat!
Year round New Yorker, the Northern Cardinal…
An agricultural fair in Paris? Paris, France?? Salon International de l’Agriculture, no less!! (Black cow “Fine” is the official mascot and current media star!)
Rescue dogs as ball boys at the Brazil Tennis Open...?! (They’ll be returning for Year 2 duty on February 27th!)
What better way to close than a Hudson River Almanac excerpt:
2/4 – Manhattan: On a recent bicycle ride in downtown Manhattan, I spotted a lone bufflehead on the Hudson River across from Battery Park. In Battery Park there were dozens of brant and Canada geese eating grass. Continuing up along the East Rover I came upon two double-crested cormorants. Although I see fewer of them in winter, these two were actively fishing. I also saw a single pair of common mergansers; the female’s head feathers make her look like a little maestro!
Female Common Merganser
[The hen common merganser is quite gorgeous. With her fly-away red-feathered head, she always reminds me of Elsa Lanchester’s “Bride of Frankenstein.” – Tom Lake.]
2/8 – Manhattan: In early afternoon we went to check our collection gear at the River Project’s sampling station on the lighthouse tender Lilac at Pier 25 in Hudson River Park. It was low tide and unseasonably warm. Our crab pots were empty but one of our killifish traps had caught a young-of-the-year striped bass (85 millimeters). We also caught far more tiny mud crabs (about the size of a lima bean) than we had been lately. – Melissa Rex, Jacqueline Wu
[In the early 1980s, there was an environmental battle to stop a project called Westway that would have substantially altered the inshore ecology of the Hudson River along the west side of Manhattan by destroying piers and filling in the areas between the water’s edge and the pier-head lines. One of the arguments that helped stop the project as proposed was the theory that young-of-year [YOY] and yearling striped bass (Morone saxatilis), such as the one captured today by the River Project, wintered in the inter-pier areas. Researchers tagged and released many YOY and yearling striped bass from the piers in the fall and then recaptured them in late winter in the same locations, indicating that they were wintering there. Other scientists demonstrated that a substantial portion of the total Hudson River population of these juvenile fish was present along Manhattan’s west side during winter months. After the project was halted, the west side of Manhattan was developed into an ecologically-sound park, and the adjacent water areas were designated an estuarine sanctuary. – Dennis Suszkowski.]
We live to be green,
UGS
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