25 Random Things About Park Slope

My most favorite Facebook moment thus far, hands down, was the 25 random notes phenomenon. This went down waaaay before this fly-by-night Doppleganger b.s. Do you remember? For a few glorious weeks (circa 12 months ago), Facebook friends shared over 125 million random facts about their lives.

Stuff like:
 
2. When I am alone climbing stairs, I always count the stairs. I run up the stairs by twos.

Ohkay.
 
21. I have one tattoo...that I regret endlessly. I got it right after college in one of those "HEY WORLD...SEE THAT!? ERICA IS COOL AFTER ALL" moments. Newsflash = I'm not.

Yes people, this IS that Erica.
 
18. I was named after Erica Kane from All My Children. Well...sort of. My mom Marcia said that she didn't *necessarily* name me after her, but she heard the name on the show and really dug it.

OMG, Erica was a treasure trove. I’m tempted to publish the whole note, it’s that masterful.
 
2. I got bar mitzvahed at 40.

Oy (also, we've moved on from Erica now. She's allegedly not 40 yet).
 
5. I own five vacuums. I vac the three floors in our house daily.

Can you say OCD?
 
17. In junior high I was a cheerleader and was voted best dancer, which was a title I don't think I deserved.

She goddamn well didn’t. I was robbed!
 
11. Despite being a mother and family magazine writer, I don't actually like children all that much. Well, I like some. But not others.
 
12. My children are extremely flatulent (that was for you Sam for just farting on me) but very pretty and funny and I like them and love them, despite my generalized abhorrence of children. Just to confirm: I am a sucker for scatalogical humor.

Yeah, those last two were me.
 
See how distracting these can be? I just wasted a half hour re-reading all my friends notes.
 
Anyway.

In honor of the first anniversary of the 25 Things craze, I am calling for a "25 Random Things About Park Slope" post! I’ll get the ball rolling:
 
1. The Park Slope Civic Council has photographs of every building in Park Slope, from 4th Ave to PPW between Flatbush and 15th.

2. In my mother’s day, South Park Slope was called Park Slop.

3. There used to be a school in Park Slope called Manual Training High School (where the dreaded John Jay now is). Needless to say, I think we can all agree that manual training is obviously now a thing of the past, as only 5% of Park Slope males can perform the most basic of home repairs.

4. A plane crashed on 7th Ave in 1960.

5. Some famous peeps who grew up in Park Slope: Jean-Michel Basquiat (liked it so much he ran away at 17), Laurence Fishburne, Wentworth Miller (who??? Oh, wait, it’s the hot Prison Break dude). Kind of slim pickings, but its a start.

6. Old people apparently aren’t allowed to live in Park Slope. Median Age: 34.4.

7. There are more annoying and more interesting people in Park Slope then anywhere else on the planet. Okay, well if not the planet, at least NYC.
 
8. In fact, Park Slope is the most reviled neighborhood in NYC.

9. There are nerds building war dioramas in a basement on 5th Street.

10. Park Slope has the highest number of strollers per capita of anywhere on Earth. And babies go to bars here.
 
11. Half of white-collar Park Slope is unemployed or underemployed (okay, this is my opinion but seriously: does anybody have a real job anymore?).
 
That’s all I’ve got at the moment being that the younger is home from school today and just announced she wants to be homeschooled. Agggghhhhhh!

But, I know you guys have good factoids, trivia, equally possible but fictitious demographics, etc, so bring ‘em on.