Remembrance of things Pabst

I guess I am feeling nostalgic these days. We were driving down the road and the wife spies a yard sale that we whizzed by, so we had to turn around and go check it out for crystal stemware. We get out and as usual we fall into conversation with the people running it.

Turns out that they were originally from Brooklyn and had in-laws that came from my old neighborhood, and they knew some of the old spots. Court Pastry. Esposito's pork store. G & G. Sam's restaurant.

I had a checkered history with Sam's. My Mom had her bridal shower there in 1956. The owner's kids grew up with me on Tompkins Place which is a very obscure street in Brooklyn. Wouldn't you know it these people at the yard sale relatives grew up there too! They knew the owners. Especially Louie who took over the joint and runs it to this day.

Now Louie and I got in a beef in around 1989 or so. Actually it wasn't me but my best friend Vito who did and in loyalty I didn't go there for about twenty years. But one day I took a stupid pizza tour and the bus ended up there. Louie was standing out there with his arms folded and goes "So you live around the fucking corner, and you had to come here on a bus." I go "look you strunz I can turn around and take these people to the House of Pizza for a better pie if you want." "No no let's let be gones be be gones or some shit like that there." So we did. For a while.

We went for dinner a couple of times. Louie was famous for throwing people out of the place if he didn't like their face. He hated the liberals that had infested the neighborhood and delighted in torturing them. They came for the authentic cuisine and Brooklyn attitude. Until it was turned against them but waddayagonnado?

Of course, we go in another stupid beef over something, and I stopped going. But I did see where he rented out the place to the FBI show as a location. Imagine seeing this place show up on TV? He must have been hurting for money. I mean he owns the building but who knows. 

Still and all I enjoyed going down memory lane with the people at the yard sale.

 

I finally know someone who supposedly died of the coronavirus

I know a lot of people. From living in New York and working in and around Times Square for thirty years and having the store and all the bullshit I have done in my life. With all of those people I did not know anyone who died because of this corona virus bullshit until today. Jimmy Glenn has passed.

They have the story in today's New York Post. Jimmy was 89 so he had a good run. He was a fixture at his bar on 44th Street where he was surrounded with boxing photos from his long career as a trainer. In the early eighties I would eat lunch in there about three times a week. Now he didn't serve food at the time. A couple of guys from the office and I would go and get our shoes shined next door. Then we would hit the chinks to get a take out and bring it to the bar to drink our lunch. The bar tender was an old friend of mine from when he was the day guy at The Quiet Man. So we would sit and watch the tv and enjoy a lunch on a slow summer day.

Later it would be a place to hit when we did a pub crawl. Jimmy might be in the bar then and we would catch up. I think he was managing Terence Ali at the time. I had tickets to the boxing shows at the Felt Forum and would sometimes see him there. He was a class act all the way.

I think he is like 90% of the people who are succumbing to this virus. He was old and with health problems. If it wasn't this it would have been the regular flu or pneumonia. It's is a shame but no reason to shut the whole country down. You know if we could ask Jimmy I think he would agree. He was a very sensible guy

RIP Jimmy. Hoist a couple in Heaven for me.

Remembrance of Things Pabst

Those of youse guys who were readers of the old Trooper York blog might remember this series. Where I would detail all of the many joints I might have bounced around to for dinner or drinks. Those days are over now. Due to my health requirements and Lisa's dietary limitations there are not many places we can eat out. There are very few places that offer decent gluten free options and I really can't eat salt and everything you get in a restaurant is salted up the wazhoo.

So gone are the days of Marco Polo or Casa Rosa or The Red Rose or Mezcal's or any of the other places we used to frequent. But some days call for eating out and our recent anniversary called for just such an unusual night out.

We went to place called Meta Osteria which actually has a gluten free menu. They don't have a separate kitchen so I can't be sure there was no cross contamination but Lisa seems to get by all right there so it was the only nice alternative.

Here I am channeling Joe the Boss Masseria before Benny Siegel walked in and whacked him in Coney Island. I am enjoying the superb veal cutlet parmigiana that they serve here. Check it out:

That is a nice thick cutlet not a chop since there is no bone in it. Still and all it was dredged in flour and breaded and covered in mozzarella and a delicious sweet marinara sauce. Now this is a portion that is made for a man. Plus it comes with a side of spaghetti. So I was happy. It was really, really salty though so I paid for it for a week by filling up with water and having some heart complications. But it was worth it. Take a closer look:

See Chip doesn't document his delicious meals by posting photos of when he was half way through!
It takes a Brooklyn gavone to do that!

Oh I didn't post the appetizer. Here are the rice balls:

I started eating them before I took the photo so pardon me.

We ended it off with dessert. I had the tartufo and Lisa had some gelato:

All in all it was a great night out and a Remembrance of Things Pabst. We can't party like we used to but we still can enjoy a night out now and again.

RIP BIll .....I forgive you for the Five Grand

I just heard that Bill Buckner the classic Red Sox player has passed away at the early age of  69, It appears that he suffered from dementia which is really sad. I feel responsible because I put a curse on him because he cost me five grand.

WKRLEM: Nothing Changes on New Year's Day

I saw U2 the first time they came to the states. At the time I was bouncing around with a bunch of Irish Waitresses from Belfast. They lived out in Sunnyside in Queens and would hang out at Sidetracks which was the big bar for the illegal Irish immigrants who came over in the 1980's to get away from the troubles.

There was a big group that hung out together. We would bounce to various Irish pubs in the Five Boroughs where they always knew someone who was working there that would give us crazy buy backs. Crap. We barely ever  paid for a drink at all.

The other thing was that we all loved music. We would hit some of the jazz joints in the Village . The clubs on the Lower East Side. The Kat Club. And of course whenever an Irish group came in it was mandatory. Later in the 1990's we would meet up to see Black 47 an Irish American band at Paddy Reilly's where it would often seem like old time week where you would catch up with people you haven't seen in years.

I have followed U2 since then. I have to divorce myself from Bono's politics which is unusual for me but I guess it is nostalgia for days gone by. We all of us have enthusiasms that we abandon as we grow older. It might be a drink or a food or a band or an actor or TV show or just about anything. We might not think about it for years and then unexpectedly we revisit it and think of back in the day when we enjoyed it. You have a little twine of nostalgia for your former self but go back to the realities of your everyday life.

You see nothing changes on New Year's Day. You are the same person that you were in the continuum of your existence. Everything that has gone before shapes you. You might make some New Years Resolutions. But bye and bye you sort of  remain the same. You can always try to do better. To be better. So making and keeping resolutions are not a bad thing.

Happy New Year to all the Lemmings!!!!

You dirty rats.......

McSorley’s bar closes over rat problem 

New York Post By Gabrielle Fonrouge and Jennifer Bain November 10, 2016

McSorley’s survived prohibition, two world wars and 9/11, but one of the Big Apple’s oldest and most storied watering holes was no match for these unwanted patrons.

On Wednesday the East Village institution was slapped with a big yellow sticker and instructions to close from the Department of Health after a surprise inspection found 42 rodent droppings and “conditions conducive to vermin and pest activity,” a Department of Health spokesperson said.

“It’s probably the most embarrassment I’ve had here in 54 years; it hits hard to see it closed… Nothing phased McSorley’s in 1962, we had 9/11, the hurricanes and a little mouse closed the place,” Matthew Maher, the bar’s owner since 1977 told The Post.

“It’s the first time we’ve been closed since 1854… This is the first violation, a little mouse found a loophole.”

Maher said the droppings were found in the basement after a construction worker left a grate open when he replaced a gas pipe last week. Apparently the critter crawled in and set up shop in the ancient bar’s basement, which has hosted everyone from Abraham Lincoln to Teddy Roosevelt.

Remembrance of things Pabst.

Every year around our anniversary we like to go down to lower Manhattan to celebrate. This year we are going to be in Florida next month so we decided to go yesterday.

Of course it was another anniversary. 911. We got married right after 911 and we got married downtown to put our money were our mouth is. A buddy of mine was the general manager of Faunces Tavern which is one of the oldest restaurants in the United States. It is where George Washington said farewell to his officers. We wanted to support the businesses downtown that were devastated by the tragedy so we spent our money there instead of some anonymous catering hall.