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 Last week workers from the Transport Workers Union were at the Prospect Park subway station warning that the MTA planned to remove one of the manned booths there. I called MTA customer service to try to confirm, but no one there seemed to know anything about it. And after making several calls in an effort to figure it out, I'm giving up for the time being.
So the Prospect Park station may or may not be among those losing a token booth worker (there are currently two booths, one at each end of the station). If true, it's certainly bad news. Booth attendants not only help people find their way around, their presence may deter crime and, of course, it's nice to know there's someone there in case of an emergency. The biggest direct impact on my life is that, when attendants are gone, emergency entrances/exits are closed. So getting a stroller or a cart full of groceries on and off the subway platform suddenly becomes a major hassle. (Presumably only one token booth will be closed, so access will remain open at one end of the station, but still....) That said, I'm not sure booth closings are the worst of it. Fare increases, reduced schedules, and failing infrastructure are no picnic, either. If it were up to me, any protest of MTA cuts would be linked to support for congestion pricing. The money has got to come from somewhere, and it's time for car drivers to pay their fair share. (Photo: wallyg)
When the restaurant was a BBQ joint called Whiskey Sunday, I thought it was uneven. As Fly Fish it is much more even but, sadly, unequivocally bad. After last night's reading at K-Dog, the families of the readers went next door for dinner. There was almost nothing that wasn't disappointing. Two people ordered the blackened redfish and two, the pan-fried salmon. Not only was the fish subpar, but side dishes that are almost inconceivably easy still managed to come out of the kitchen a shambles. Both pieces of redfish were small. Mine was so comically small that when I pointed it out to our waitress she gasped and the manager, equally embarrassed, went back to the kitchen and had them make me an adult-sized portion. It was served with buttered white rice so overcooked that it was near as dry as uncooked and string beans that were improperly trimmed and, frankly, sad looking. The "blackening" of fish was not in evidence and in its stead was a green sauce of indistinct flavor.  The salmon portions were fine, and the fish was cooked adequately, but it wasn't much better as a whole dish. The salmon had the same green sauce as the redfish and was served with raw tomatoes (covered in more green sauce) and corn that made the string beans look festive by comparison.
The cheddar biscuits were not served hot, as they were during the Whiskey Sunday days. The new version of mac-and-cheese is more oily than cheesy; you could barely taste any cheese at all and the oil was pooled in the bottom of the ramekin. To top it off, many of the Whiskey Sunday cocktails are no longer being served and half of the beer list was unavailable last night. We have no complaints about the service; our waitress was nice and comped us for dessert (a nice hot fudge sundae, but the nut-allergic should know that it comes with pralines) but it didn't make up for the overall lameness of the experience. A final note about the decor. I liked the rustic roadhouse look of Whiskey Sunday. It was minimalist and charming. The conversion to a bait shack - aqua baseboards, "gone fishing" signs, a marlin - are awful, borderline embarrassing kitsch. Hopefully the third time will be the charm for this location because I don't see the Fly Fish concept lasting long at all.
Hawthorne Street blogger Carrie and friend-of-HS Daniel Wright will be presenting slide shows at K-Dog & Dunebuggy (43 Lincoln Road) tonight at 7 pm based on their new books. Carrie is presenting "The Curious History of Subliminal Advertising," from, Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux). And Daniel will be showing some choice examples from his book Patently Silly: The Daftest Inventions Ever Devised (Prion).
 As previously mentioned, local artist Susan Berkowitz is using her section of the Lincoln Road construction fencing mural project to paint Doggywood, a mural of a K9 Wall of Fame. To that end, she solicited locals to submit their dogs for inclusion and now it is time for We The People to vote on the candidates.
There are currently two ways to vote: 1. Email Susan at thedoggywood@gmail 2. Pick up a paper ballot at K-Dog and Dunebuggy or Enduro. There will soon be an online voting option at The Doggywood, but the online poll is experiencing technical difficulties and is not live yet. I'll update this post when the site is functional. When voting, include your name and contact info with your vote in order will be entered to win either one of 2 Grand Prizes: a goodybag for those without dogs or a doggybag for those with dogs. You should also indicate your prize preference. Hawthorne Street submitted its candidate for the wall, Ethel, with the following statement:
 This is our dog, Ethel. The most special thing about Ethel is that she looks EXACTLY like a cat. However, she does all the things other dogs
do: she fetches (she'll sometimes even pull shirts out of drawers and bring them to us), she comes when called (about half of the time, anyway), she begs at the dinner table (because we're terrible behaviorists), and likes her belly rubbed. Oh, and she sheds. Amazingly, we were rejected! So we are starting a write-in campaign for Ethel. ETHEL '09!
 We came home last night and found an adorable grey, tiger-striped kitten in front of our house. She is super sweet; she let us pick her up and hold her. She wanted very much to come inside but we already have a cat. Based on her size I'd guess that she's about 8-9 months — an older kitten.
If anyone is looking to adopt a young cat, please let us know. Obviously if you know someone who may have lost a cat, let us know that too.
 Back in early July, we reported that there was going to be a new wine shop (not liquor, wine) on Fenimore. I spend a fair amount of time on Fenimore but there was no evidence at all that this was true. Until today!
While we haven't been able to peek inside, a tipster sent us this photo of the new signs oustide of 65Fen, what has to be the soon-to-open wine shop at 65 Fenimore St. (duh), just off of Flatbush Avenue. Thanks, Annel.
My friend (and fellow PLGer) Daniel Wright and I will be presenting slide shows at K-Dog & Dunebuggy (43 Lincoln Road) next Thursday, August 27, at 7 pm. Both of our talks will draw on material from new books we have out. I'm going to be presenting "The Curious History of Subliminal Advertising," from my book, Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux). And Daniel will be showing some choice examples from his book Patently Silly: The Daftest Inventions Ever Devised (Prion). Come on down!
 PLG Arts is working on transforming the "temporary" construction fences on Lincoln Road into a mural celebrating the diversity of the neighborhood. While it's a neat idea, I've been hoping they'd do something more interesting than generic nods to diversity—y'know, like a painted replica of the glass tower building. Or life-size paintings of real estate offices.
Still, I'm glad to see that someone on the planning team has the right idea—a section of the mural will exclusively feature neighborhood dogs. In fact, if you'd like to get your dog up there, you can send a photo along with a brief description of "what makes your dog special" to thedoggywood@gmail.com. Fifteen winners will be selected via an online vote starting on August 23, followed by a painted portrait by local artist Susan Berkowitz. The final work, "Doggywood" will reside on a panel 7' x 8' feet, part of the PLG Community Mural Project on Lincoln Road near the Prospect Park Station, and will be revealed during an event on Saturday, September 12 and Sunday, September 13, 2009.
This just in: A group of residents in Prospect Lefferts Gardens (PLG) are interested in starting a food co-op in the area that would serve PLG, Crown Heights, Flatbush, Ditmas Park, Kensington, and surrounding communities. If you are interested in helping to improve the availability of healthy food in Prospect Lefferts Gardens and its neighboring communities, we will be having our first meeting on August 26 at 7 p.m. to discuss our options and start planning. Location TBA. The goal of this meeting is to build a group of residents to work on the following: *Planning for a community-wide food issues meeting for October *Mission/Vision/Starting the planning process for a food coop *Advocacy for improving the quality of food in our nabe We anticipate meeting regularly to plan goals and create realistic action plans toward making our food in this neighborhood fresh, sustainable, and affordable. If you are interested in getting involved in this effort, please join http://www.meetup.com/PLGFoodCoop/ and also RSVP to the event if you plan on attending the event. You can also email contact (at) plgfoodcoop.com for more information.
Fly Fish (49 Lincoln Road) didn't have paper menus available when we stopped by this afternoon, but we were able to snap these pictures (sorry about the glare) of the new menu and the mission statement. As far as we know, Fly Fish is still under the same management as Whiskey Sunday / Enduro. There is much more of the old bbq on offer than I expected, and I am very happy to see (a) a raw bar (!) and (b) that there are a lot of non-fried fish options. Don't get me wrong, I loooooooooove fried fish, but sometimes I need to be saved from myself. Also notable is the expansion of the dessert menu. I hope that just as the addition of fish didn't decimate the meat options, the rum drinks are in addition to, rather than instead of, the excellent beer and whiskey options previously available. If you made it out to the soft open tonight or go once they are up and running for real, please post a comment and tell us what you think.  
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