Park Slope: Hate it or Love it (or Hate it)

There’s a lot to love and hate about Park Slope. An illustrative example: there’s the Tea Lounge, but there’s also Café Regular. Either PS Tea Lounge is a hateful and ratty hole. The baristas are mean in a mean way and the coffee is mean too (I stopped going there the second time they steamed old coffee back to life and served it to me.) At Regular, Martin is mean, but in a good way (once, when asked by a “Slope” dad if the cigarettes in the packs are for sale, I heard him answer menacingly, “nah, I give them away… to children,” as he looked down at the boy.)

Gawker had an article (tagged “stroller derby” which is my description of 7th Ave on any given sunny Saturday) about the Times’ Sunday Styles article. Good readin’.

Full disclosure: I live in Park Slope. I am a member of the Food Co-op. My wife is pregnant. In fact, she took this picture outside of the park slope YMCA while attending a prenatal yoga class. Check out all those strollers!

…and then there were eight

I realized tonight, upon the sale of T’s Bianchi “Cross Project USA” Cyclocross, that we’re down to eight bikes in the basement (E’s Eddie Merckx went to Phillly over the weekend). I sold the Bianchi to a very kindly gentleman and his wife (who drove a hard bargain).

The Power of Beer

I have been searching (albeit not very intently) for “Bierkraft” in Park Slope for about two and a half years. Well, it’s where it apparently has been the whole time: at the corner of 5th and Union. It’s a nice little shop that’s devoted 50-50 to beer and food (cheeses, meats, chocolates, cookies, etc). At the back of the store they have a selection of beers on tap, which they will kindly put into a growler in exchange for a large number of American greenbacks. It took quite a while to get my Kelso Pilsner (which, they neglected to tell me, is from Brooklyn), partly because they pressurize the growler to 18psi before filling it. With this system the beer is transferred from keg to bottle without “being poured” so it doesn’t lose any of its carbonation. Sounds hokey, but it tastes good.