BLOCK-OFF! 5th Ave [btwn 12th & 11th] vs. 7th Ave [btwn 12th & 11th]

In last week’s Block-Off!, we paid tribute to Cinco de Mayo with a drunkenly epic battle between two of the Slope’s more yawn-worthy blocks. Since today marks the birthday of two of New York’s crappiest actors—Steven Baldwin (43) & Emilio Estevez (46)—we’ll be dedicating this week’s Block-Off! to their pathetic acting careers. Remember Usual Suspects? That was pretty good. The Breakfast Club? Loved that shit.  What happened, guys?

This week, we’ll be pitting 5th Ave from 12th St to 11th St against 7th Ave from 12th St to 11th St. As the two blocks inhabit the insipid souls of these two washed-up Hollywood actors, one will realize that he’s the lowest in his family’s pecking order, turn to God & start a conservative talk show. The other will start off well but eventually crash & burn by doing a trilogy based on a Disney hockey team & then turn to directing, slightly redeeming himself. In the end, nobody will be proud, but neither will have OD’d, so there’s that. Let the washed-up, B-list, I’m-the-least-favorite-brother themed judging begin!

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BLOCK-OFF! 5th Ave [btwn 3rd & 2nd] vs. 7th Ave [btwn Carroll & President]

photo via wallyg

…so the sun came out for a few days last week & got me all hopeful & in the mood for love. This week followed up by bringing the rain & getting me all wet…and not in a good way. Fuck you, rain. But I’m still hopeful & today is Cinco de Mayo, which means we get to drink crap beer & eat guac & act stupid, all in honor of Mexican pride. Some of you will mistakenly celebrate the holiday in honor of Mexican independence, which is actually celebrated on September 16th. Some guy will explain your mistake to you, but you don’t speak Spanish, so you’ll buy him a shot.

In honor of this, we’re going to infuse two blocks—5th Ave from 3rd to 2nd & 7th Ave from Carroll to President—with the spirit of the holiday & pit them in an epic Mexican standoff. One block will meet the girlfriend & a few friends after work at La Taqueria and have a couple of Negra Modelos over dinner. Then they’ll move on to a bar & order a round of Petron shots to celebrate a “successful Q1” and after a few more beers, the block will wander outside & bum a smoke off a guy out front, breaking he & his girlfriend’s “Quit Agreement” and pissing her off in the process, ruining everything for her.

The other block will begin its day with a couple of bong hits at noon, a trip to Taco Bell soon thereafter, a big post-meal Corona & blunt on the stoop, a round of Cuervo shots with its boys at the crib round four (more bong hits), Dos Equis til 7pm & Bam! Out to the bars they go. Guess which block’s getting laid tonight. Cinco de Mayo indeed. Oh wait. There are no Mexican joints on these blocks…let the holiday themed but improperly placed business-wise judging begin!

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BLOCK-OFF! 5th Ave [btwn President & Carroll] vs. 9th St [btwn 5th & 6th]

photo via Betty Blade

Seriously, this weather crap was getting to the point where I was ready cut a bitch up and then all the sudden—BAM! HOLY CRAP! The winter keeled over & died and the sun finally shone over the streets of Park Slope. Scantily clad hotties & others congregated on Prospect Park & hopefully, since I didn’t, they later got laid. It’s possible that the death of winter may have actually happened the week before, but I was "way too involved in the Tuesday holiday” to notice, so I’m going with this week as the start of sunniness.

This week, I’m splitting the Springtime love between 5th Ave from President to Carroll and 9th St from 5th Ave to 6th Ave. As both blocks brush the pile of weed off those gym membership cards & shed layers of clothing & parade down the block to places where they sit outdoor with their mimosas & oversized sunglasses, we, you the reader & I the blogger, will judge them for their wholly superficial qualities. Then we will make out, because it is Spring & love is in the air.

When we are done, one block will meet the guy or girl of his or her dreams and bed that other him or her or possibly multiple hims or hers. The other block will hit on this guy or girl for twenty minutes & then get way too focused on his or her um…way-too-exposed career or breasts & blow the whole thing. Wow. Post-gender terms are so tricky!!! Without further delay, let the partially sweaty, lascivious, sunshine-filled judging begin!

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BLOCK-OFF! 7th Ave [btwn President & Union] vs. 7th Ave [btwn Union & Berkeley]

Doooooooods. I almost spaced on writing the Block-Off! this week. It was late Monday night & I was sitting around the apartment celebrating the day, just having finished up the first five episodes of Party Down! I was totally chillin’ when “The Ballad of Helenkeller and Rip Van Winkle,” from NYC’s The Moldy Peaches filtered through the shuffle of my iTunes. It reminded me how much I hate The Moldy Peaches and how I really should delete their crap from my library, so I went & played with the cat for a little bit & had an iced coffee & came back to my computer to check if anything new & Hipster Grifter-related was going on in the blogosphere post the nude pic posting.

Some dude put a matchbook she wrote in on EBay and they found a MySpace page of hers. As a fine lady said to me the other day…Kari Farrell is no Frank Abagnale Jr. Next! I shut down Firefox and BAM! Sitting there on my desktop was a single, solitary file—“BlockOff042209.” THANK GOD the Kari Farrell story has been overplayed so much that it got boring quickly, or we never would have had this week’s Block-Off!

…so here we are. Last week’s competition was way too much of a bummer, with all that disaster & assassination, so this week’s is gonna be mad chill, folks. I’m keeping the walking to a minimum, with two adjacent 7th Ave blocks—between President & Union and between Union & Berkeley. We’ll judge the two blocks based on their merits & faults, but not too harshly, cause nobody likes to be judged, man. It just ain’t cool. At the end, we’re all gonna be like, “Shit, man. That is a good block.” Let the judging begin!…and then after a bunch of words, let the judging end! Awesome.

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BLOCK-OFF! 5th Ave [btwn 11th & 10th] vs. 7th Ave [btwn 4th & 3rd]

I can’t speak for the rest of us at FIPS, but this week, I finally stopped obsessively listening to Phoenix, the theme of last week’s Block-Off! It’s %@#!& tax week & their music’s a bit too happy for such a time, so I’ve worked them out of the rotation in favor of more appropriate Fugazi & Godspeed You! Black Emperor.

This week, the Block-Off! is going to shun this most shitty, dollar-sucking time of year by ignoring it in favor of the even shittier things that happened on this day in history. Today’s both the day that the Titanic hit an iceberg & Abraham Lincoln was shot. By the 15th, both would be gone. It’ll be fun and uplifting!

We’ll be spreading the historical happiness between 5th and 7th Aves this week, with the blocks on 5th from 11th to 10th and 7th from 4th to 3rd embodying these two tragedies. As 5th Ave takes on the characteristics of a sinking ship & 7th Ave takes on the characteristics of a terribly conflicted man assassinated soon after righting a sinking ship, the orchestra will begin to play & the actors will take the stage & Leonardo DiCaprio & John Wilkes Booth will think they’re being heroic & battle to the death.

In the end, one tragedy will move mountains and heartily win our hearts & tears. The other will get a single shed tear & a $15 Amazon gift certificate. Let the totally tasteful & unfortunately awesome judging begin!

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