For Sale: A Century’s Worth of Sweat and Sneakers

Photo via Here's Park Slope

Mom-and-pop store Triangle Sports has sat at 182 Flatbush Avenue since 1916. For nearly 100 years it has bravely survived amid the growing monstrosity of its now-neighborhood, much like the last chip in the otherwise empty plastic party bowl. The party is over for many family-owned businesses in the area, as attested to by Henry Rosa, who worked in the store as a teenager and is one of the partners in the almost century-old venture. “It’s getting harder and harder for a small, independent retailer to survive,” he said last week in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

The rise of Atlantic Yards and the controversial Barclays sports arena has changed the smaller-scaled Brooklyn landscape forever. Growing numbers of big-box chain stores and eateries are following the big money and pushing out local businesses that can’t compete. 

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[My Favorite Park Slope...] Places To Buy Housewares

Because I love housewares, I have -- not one -- but a few favorite stores for kitchen supplies and home decor: an expensive place that's more fun for window shopping, a place that's cheap when I can get my ass over there, and the place where I usually end up shopping.

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Cool Brooklyn Bartender Alert: Lem of Flatbush Farm

Lem, the bartender at Flatbush Farm, plays the coolest music.  If that sounds a bit teenage and gushy, maybe it’s because his musical taste is not easy to define. Like the dark-haired boy who always sat in the back of the class in high school, I just know I likes it.  The music is a mix of everything from jazz to world music to guys who sound like they might be Ian Curtis’s older brother. When I stopped in to talk to Lem last Thursday, he was playing a dark swirl of moody-Englishman that reached out and enveloped me. It was a mellow tone that could have passed for a 1950’s cocktail lounge song that somehow did not make you immediately want to slit your wrists. Flatbush Farm has low lights, a gorgeous dark wood bar, organic beers and wines, slammin’ cocktails, plus delicious affordable bar food, so that doesn’t hurt either. 

Lem is a bit of a closed oyster -- a man who doesn't normally like to talk about himself -- so I was gratified when he agreed to have a chat.

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Park Slope Craigslist Personals: Bachelorette Edish

 

What are your plans for 2012?  Finally invest in a beer-making kit? Really start getting coffee at the bodega since it’s only fucking 75 cents? Cool, but what about your love life? What about getting effed in Park Slope?  For inspiration, I’m attempting to match this lovely local bachelorette with three potential Park Slope connections! You’re welcome, pers-n6uuf-2791791953@craigslist.org, and may you reach your corporeal goals! 

First let's meet:

The Bachelorette: Spanking. And dates. - 27 (Park Slope)

Hello out there -- it's officially a new year. So I'm looking forward to new possibilities! My ideal winter date would be a guy in his 30s who is handsome, has his life more-or-less in order, and likes to indulge in a little kink. I do not want a crazy S&M boyfriend or whatever. Just want the pool of men I date to be guys who really like spanking, and are good at it. Life's too short to wait till the third date to disclose that, right? :)

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Park Slope's Little House on the Crazy

If you've walked down 1st street between 7th and 8th avenues you can't miss this house: the plethora of trash and junk that litters, nay, decorates the front yard of this limestone is the neglected reflection of a deranged inhabitant -- or simply the biggest expression of WHATEVER. My personal favorite artifacts are the broken mirrors, always a sign of a healthy mind. Then there’s the carefully laid out newspaper pages draped like graceful, gloved hands ascending the sides of the stone steps leading to the front door, where sits a large piece of old furniture.

What the fuck must her neighbors, whose own houses on either side are by all appearances normally maintained, think about the-nightmare-next-door? At the very least, it’s bringing property values down. But who the fuck cares?  Them’s yuppie concerns. Besides, good luck getting that shit changed.  

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