A Straight Pride Parade that was supposed to kick off in Crown Heights Sunday morning (following the same route as the next day's West Indian American parade) never materialized. According to this press release, the parade was supposedly conceived by a music label to defend reggae artists from the gay community, which "targets Reggae because 99 percent of the artists are African American." But when gay blogger Joe My God schlepped out to the corner......

Photo by Jake Dobkin. If you see some graffiti around town declaring November 11th there will be "World Screaming," don't alert Homeland Security just yet. The Brooklyn Paper points out that the message is really part of a marketing campaign for graf legend Dumar Brown's book, The World Screaming Nov (the "11" in the tags were meant to be quotation marks--see the one in Paris). His last book was called Nov York. Brown told......

Bushwick residents Jan VanDamme and Paul Nicholson surely weren't the first roommates with an ambitious dream of transforming their apartment into something special, but hot damn if the duo didn't follow through on it. As the story goes on their website, last April Nicholson "walked into the backyard of his Harman St. first floor apartment and stated, 'We have to build a beer garden.' Without a word, Jan nodded. The next three months would be......

A study by the Center for an Urban Future, called Attack of the Chains? is showing that Brooklyn prefers Dunkin' Donuts over Starbucks, the Daily News reports. The center's director Jonathan Bowles says, "It has to do with different shopping culture. The Dunkin' Donuts is more a middle-class type of place than Starbucks. Not everybody can afford $4 lattes. It’s more of a working person's Starbucks." The chain has 89 outlets in Brooklyn--71 more than......

Tens of thousands of colorfully costumed revelers partied down on Eastern Parkway from Crown Heights to Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn yesterday for the annual West Indian American Day Parade with millions of people lining the street. This year's celebration was somewhat muted by Gustav's damage to the Caribbean. Mayor Bloomberg, who led the parade with Gov. Paterson, told the revelers, "We know Mother Nature is a powerful force and there have been some deaths......

The two carriage horses who ran amok through Bay Ridge Sunday are recovering nicely on a Connecticut farm, the Daily News reports. Stormy and Elvis, snow-colored, 2,000-pound Percherons who work pulling buggies for Valentine Carriage, survived with just scratched-up legs. However, driver Richie Valentine Jacobson fractured five ribs after being thrown from the carriage onto a town car's windshield. The buggy was about to pick up bride-to-be Nunzie Lumberto when a pole snapped, spooking the......

Saturday was the day the music died at McCarren Park Pool (well, not really), but one couldn't have asked for a better note to go out on than one provided by Sonic Youth ("Expressway to Yr Skull" was a perfect finale from the post-punk pioneers). The NY Times spoke to concertgoers and locals about the venue, which could return to its original function as soon as 2011. An elderly resident declared, “This music, very noisy.......

The utterly unnecessary return of 90210 to the small screen tomorrow means the arrival of giant billboards displaying the new cast. The Brooklyn Paper reports on one in which teens wear swimsuits and lounge in pools in the form of the 90210 numbers. The image can be seen from the BQE and hangs above Williamsburg--specifically in the Hasidic Jewish area. Rabbi David Niederman says, “In Jewish law, it is forbidden to see any part of......

Early this morning the J'Ouvert Parade made some noise in Brooklyn. The Daily News had a preview to the tradition earlier this month, saying, the pre-dawn procession provides "the music, the magic and the nitty-gritty of Caribbean carnival." The WIADCA noted on their website, "J'Ouvert is an extremely casual event. Traditionally powder, paint and dye throwing are among the festivities, so it is wise to wear cloths you do not mind getting messy." The annual......

A horse-drawn buggy was totaled yesterday during a wild stampede through Borough Park in Brooklyn that left one car with a shattered windshield, the Post reports. The white buggy was a block away from picking up bride-to-be Nunzie Lumberto, who was waiting to be escorted to her wedding at Regina Hall of St. Rosalie's in Dyker Heights. But before she could get in, a wooden bar under the buggy snapped, striking one of the horses......

Tomorrow is the annual West Indian American Day Carnival and Parade, which goes from Eastern Parkway and Utica Ave. to Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn. The parade, which attracts millions of people, features floats, dancers and bands that celebrate the cultures of the Caribbean. The festivities are all day--here's a little history about the parade--and expect to see politicians there (last year, Mayor Bloomberg joked he could be considered West Indian because he spends so......

New blog on the block, Snark in the Park, will be documenting the beauty of Prospect Park each day after a stroll through the outdoor wonderland. The Windsor Terrace resident has made a vow to visit each morning, detailing the sights and sounds, but the first sighting wasn't that of a rare bird or flower--it was the fornication tree. "It's a symbiotic relationship - The Condom Groves only flourish where fertilized by the species that......

Early this morning, police shot a man who had fired at two other people in Bushwick. WNBC reports that when police responded to a call about shots fired, "they arrived to find a man with a gun trying to get inside a building on Central Avenue." The man refused to drop his gun and instead fired at the police, who returned fire. A witness told the Daily News there were two men involved with the......

Rumors of another big box department store following Ikea's footsteps into Red Hook have been all but confirmed by the Brooklyn Paper, which is reporting that BJ’s Wholesale Club is "on the verge of announcing plans to move into the former site of the Revere Sugar factory." That would put the members-only retailer just down the street from Ikea and bring Red Hook residents closer to fulfilling their dream of living in a world class......

A gambling den was held up by three men who posed as cops: WNBC has footage of "men armed with guns and radios rounding up unsuspecting patrons in the Midwood home, lining some against a wall and searching their pockets for cash." The gambling parlor was illegal, but apparently customers have agreed to file complaints. Police have not made any arrests; the suspects are reportedly "male whites in their 30's." Last year, a group of......

A man who owned a video store Lott Avenue was shot to death in the store, The Whole Nine Yards, yesterday morning. El-Hajj Kareem Shabazz, described by the Daily News as someone "known for forgiving customers...if they were a few dollars short," was confronted by two robbers yesterday morning. An employee "walked in as Shabazz collapsed." One teen remember that Shabazz let youngsters look around, which many shop owners didn't allow, and one neighbor told......

Sure, there's a lot of prefab housing on display at MoMA right now, but have you seen any of the modular structures inhabited in New York? Design*Sponge points out a Kithaus in Williamsburg, whose "location required each module to be carried, by hand, through a 3 story brick rowhouse. The builders then added custom decks and wedged it in between warehouses and light industrial buildings to create this compact urban oasis." Prepare to be jealous......

The pigeon keepers of New York have been in the spotlight recently, and now a new JL Aronson documentary, Up on the Roof, looks at the gentrification of Williamsburg through their experiences.Up on the Roof follows several devoted pigeon breeders in one predominantly Latino section of Brooklyn through the rigors and rewards of a quintessential New York tradition. All along the waterfront, and throughout blue collar Brooklyn, pigeon fancying has been an active pastime for......

This week Frank Bruni files two shorter reviews for the Times instead of handing down his usual hefty decision on a single restaurant. He heads east to follow up on Sushi Yashuda on 43rd Street, declaring that from the time it opened "more than eight years ago, when William Grimes awarded it three stars in The New York Times, it has been among the best. And a recent visit suggested that there’s been no slippage,......

Greenpoint ladies, there's a new doctor in town, or at least an old one with a new marketing campaign. Dr. Leon Nitkin has posted ads for his OB/GYN practice on some "of the newly-renovated buildings on the south side of Greenpoint Ave b/t Manhattan and Franklin. Everything about it says 'please don’t let this man touch your privates, even in a medical context.'" Well, not everyone can be as web-savvy as Dr. Parkinson or his......

Cornelius Abson, who admitted to choking and robbing an 85-year-old woman as well as robbing other victims, appeared in court last Friday. However, his arraignment was postponed because his lawyer requested a psychological exam. Lawyer Eric Bannister said, "It's my belief that my client is suffering serious mental health issues," and noted the bruises and bump on his client's head, "I believe my client has a legitimate fear for his safety." Abson, who claimed his......

A Craigslist hookup went tragically wrong for 24-year-old Daniel Brandt late Saturday night. Police say the Brooklyn man showed up at a Coney Island apartment expecting to rendezvous with a woman he met on Craigslist. Instead, he was fatally shot in the head by two men who robbed him and fled the scene. Brandt later died in Coney Island Hospital; his assailants are still on the loose but an NYPD source tells the Post that......

The Battle of Brooklyn (also known as the Battle of Long Island) was the "largest of the American Revolution" and was fought after the Declaration of Independence on August 27, 1776. For the 232th anniversary, the battle was re-created at Green-Wood Cemetery (the Minerva Statue is on Battle HIll). WNBC reported, "Re-enactors in period costume demonstrated the use of Revolutionary War muskets and other weapons in Green-Wood's Meadow and the surrounding area near the main......

The UTNE Reader takes a look at New York's jazz scene in their latest issue, and more specifically how the epicenter has shifted from Manhattan to Brooklyn. They recall that back in the day "the music especially thrived in areas where crime and abandoned buildings kept the cost of living low for artists like Charlie Parker, who rented an apartment at 151 Avenue B." So where can one find the best live jazz now, without......

The Daily News reports that firefighters found a pot-growing operation in a commercial warehouse on Decatur Street yesterday morning. They had just put out a fire in a building next door when "Somehow the smoke-eaters sniffed out the pot in a three-story building next door and called the cops," who then removed 80 to 100 marijuana plants. The building's super says he was clueless because the "growing area because it was chained off and padlocked."......

The police have arrested a suspect in the brutal attack and robbery of an 85-year-old woman in a Crown Heights elevator last week. According to the Daily News, Cornelius Abson "confessed and then apologized for choking and robbing Lillian France." But a police source adds, "He's sorry he got caught. He wasn't sorry when he was choking the lady." It's suspected that Abson followed France from her bank on Eastern Parkway to the apartment......

After the disturbing footage showing an 85-year-old woman who was followed into an apartment building, choked to unconsciousness in the elevator, and then robbed of her money AND cane, the NYPD is now, per Newsday, "focusing in large part on the area around Flatbush, near Prospect Park." Police suspect the same person is behind that attack as well as 11 others (the other victims are 11 women and one man); they were robbed of money......

Residents at the Wythe-Taylor Houses in South Williamsburg are sad and angry about the death of 5-year-old Jacob Neuman, who fell ten stories down an elevator shaft yesterday morning. Residents at the buildings--which are operated by the city's Housing Authority--had complained about the elevators, which had many problems, numerous times. The Post and Daily News have diagrams of what happened: Jacob and his 8-year-old brother were in the elevator when it stopped between the 10th......

The Municipal Arts Society presented some alternative ideas to the U.S. Army National Guard Bureau about the fate of Admiral's Row. The MAS hopes to show it's possible to "retain the historic buildings on the Admiral’s Row site while also allowing for the construction of a much-needed supermarket and new retail and industrial space." While six plans were presented, here's a look at how stark the visions are, by looking at renderings (created by the......

Michel Gondry may have just moved to Orient Avenue in Brooklyn, but certainly not to #59, which was briefly in the limelight when it appeared as Kate Winslet's apartment in his film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Four years after the cameras stopped rolling, The Brooklyn Paper takes a look at the house in its current state--and it's in no way ready for its next close-up.Squatters, junkies, and prostitutes have turned the vacant building......