Printer's Row

I remember one of the things I loved in Philly was that the districts/rows were actually districts...i.e. fabric row actually had loads of awesome mom&pop fabric stores (and I could walk to them/publicly transport myself to them)...now, fabric row i remember in particular --- probably because it contributed to my She-Ra costume and was just south of South street and just north of South Philly (& the awesome italian market).

Which is why I sortof love that Cherokee street is becoming Printers Row. It's charming, it's old school, and I like it. Imagine every old business district in town having a commerce niche. IMAGINE IT! It will be great. Imagine the college kids taking the bus to this row or that row to shop b/c it's clear, and they know what they'll find there and might even wander the neighborhood and buy more things...not like it's never happened. Never in my wildest would i have thought, hey, printing presses will be the start. But life is strange sometimes.

Just found out about Sleepy Kitty (moved on down from Chicago to better weather and better people...oh snap!) via SauceMag's "Sip of the Hip" --- hoping this type of commerce never ever reaches critical mass.

London Calling is moving!

To Cherokee. To the new Stable Loft.
Interesting.

Saturday Night

How's about a little street culture, St. Louis?



at Fort Gondo

Banana Man! of course!

Banana Man! of course!
Originally uploaded by lolololori

Saw it last friday.

Halloween Hilarity

We had so much fun on Halloween. Mer was Barbie, I was Aretha Franklin and we dragged Mark out in a sheet with a scarf on his head (he was Yassar Arafar or some facsimile thereof) and we met Schaper, who was a "prisoner" and went down to Boots on Cherokee.

It was awesome.

Cherokee - a friendly street

I did a little drivin' today, as I'm prone to do. Everyone knows when I say I'm running out to get like, a day planner for example, that means I'll be back in a couple hours, with the gas tank a little low.

So I went to Cherokee - I didn't have the energy to visit grouchy Jim of The Purple Cow...I'll have to be grouchy right back about him later, he's a cool guy, you should go see him...but I did finally get to APop records (a little pretentious, but what record store isn't? They didn't have any Smothers Brothers vinyl, so I left empty handed) and to the Black Bear Bakery. I got some fresh foccacia, some samples of the wheat bread, and a brief (as my parking meeter was running, and I only had 12 minutes) convo with the perhaps owner Greg. What a nice fella - used to live in the neighborhood as a kid, said it was really happenin, even then. For some reason I always thought that like, really OLD people were kids runnin' the streets of the then awesome, now blighted city streets, but this guy was barely older than my mom. What up with that? My timeline readjusted, I headed home. It's great to go places and really be able to interact w/ shopkeeps. I dig it.

I also did some interacting with the shoppers, too. It was mid-day wednesday, and the people on the street were out, and they were talkin' at me in that special way people on city streets talk to you, and it was great. I used to go to other areas of the city in high school, and as much as it bothered me then (and bothers me a bit now) -- when the catcalls disappeared in the Loop and in CWE, it seems something jumped the shark, for me at least.

Just a thought? More later.

Officer B and Me

So I was chatting about how I'd like to move near Cherokee to this totally awesomely nice City Police officer (Officer B!) and he looked at me like I was crazy.

I don't think I am. I've lived in a Muslim Slum/Banlieu in France, and spent 4 years in West Philly (west even of Penn, OMG)...sooooo, Cherokee sortof hits "pleasant" on my Creepy-O-Meeter. I may look like a sortof birdbrained, be-pigtailed white girl, but I'm a street smart dame, too.

Maybe I should get a giant vicious dog/boyfriend before I close on a house, though. And Officer B said he'd run a crime report (on what, my house? my block? me?)

Of course this is all hypothetical, and partly due my 16 year old dreams when I first started going to Casa Loma, but I don't really want to live anywhere else.