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.

Girl Heroes

sidenote: I just figured out how to use the "send to" function on my google toolbar, so now I can quickly update this thing w/o getting overly distracted! Amazing! The tumblr might suffer, but all the better. Tumblr is stupid (though it's a lot prettier than my blog right now, ooo wee I need to spend some time).

So, I've been readin' up on the new batman movie. People have a lot to say about this film, and I'm liking it! So glad that lil' Katie's decided not to reprise her role. I always think Maggie G is a little too deep for her own good, but maybe the awesome husband+baby power combo have brought her back to normal-people world b/c I am lovin' her currently. Way better quotes than "we're so happy together" crap KH was saying about the last movie/tom cruise. (ps what's the deal with christian bale and the assault charges? He was in newsies!)

Maggie Gyllenhaal | The A.V. Club:

"What does it mean to be the woman in this movie, in this big Hollywood action movie?

And is there a way to do it that's cool, that's awesome?

Is there a way to do it that you actually believe that these incredible guys actually like her this much?

Is there a way to do it where she actually also has a point of view about the state of the world, the moral state of the universe, like these guys do?"

Replace the word "movie" up there with "life" and you'll have a pretty good critical viewpoint of a girl in a world that seems to be full of primarily male superheros. Its a pretty old conceit/motif/thingee, but one worth thinking about.

Go Maggie. She's thinkin'!

The AV club review of The Dark Knight, and the new batman movie itself, really touch on what it means to try to do things in a city and what the ups and downs can do to a person. To an extreme, sure - but its easy to lose that perspective with Carrie Bradshaw running around choosing the wrong boyfriend all the time.

Glad that Maggie's attempting to show what impact living in a city has on a real life girl, even though that real life girl is also a comic book girl-character. Not enough quality female perspectives (socialites don't count) when it comes to movin' and shakin' in the city. Any city. Even a fake one.

St. Louis is no Gotham, but do you think it would rank that far above us at #52?
I don't.

I dazzled and I stretched

at Joe's last night! (i finally made it)

It was so fun. I called in the gang to come see&dance to our staple, Hudson and the Hoodoo Cats, and let me tell ya - we tore it up! (politely) It was just so great - people digging the music, watching the dancers...all sorts of folks who wouldn't otherwise have chatted really talkin' it up. Wonderful stuff. Live music and dance are really really important to bringing fun people/communities together, did you know that? Met this terrific gal from the UK, too - we had ourselves a time! She really got to see what StL people are all about last night, I think.

The owner was a real sweetheart, too. One of those quiet, dignified elder(in this case) statesman types with not too much to say, but a lot to do (and already done). A good type, I'd say. He seemed glad to see people just appreciating the music and really giving the stage the attention it sometimes doesn't get enough of. I loved looking over to see him smiling contentedly at this thing he created. Must be one of the greater feelings to have. Great stuff.

St. Louis is a wonderful town. So much opportunity to be great, and so much greatness already there for us!

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.