Urban Explorers Network

Home

News Feeds

News Feeds
NewYorkology
Dylan's Candy, Waffle Truck insider deals via Twitter Just a quick plug of some NYC Twitter users who will save you money - though they might also make you fat. Dylan’s Candy Bar, new to Twitter, has posted an offer code that will get you 30 percent off your order in their online shop until midnight tonight. And follow Waffletruck and your learn the day’s secret password to get a free topping. Image source: Waffles & Dinges website for the Waffletruck. Earlier: Follow NewYorkology on Twitter for the latest, briefest Demand extends Footlight going-out-of-business sale Footlight music shop is still going out of business. Just not as fast as they thought. Sunday was supposed to be the last day, but the online-only shop “will remain open through Thursday (the 4th) or Friday (the 5th) due to the immense amount of orders we have received,” one of the Footlighters confirmed to NewYorkology via e-mail. Until they’re done, you can get 60 percent off many of its CDs on orders over $30. That includes a lot of Broadway offerings such as “Cabaret,” “GiGi,” “Tommy” and things like “Noel Coward Sings Sail Away and Other Coward Rarities.” “Other sites we are recommending to customers after we close are Amazon.com, Dress Circle in London and Sound of Music in Germany,” the Footlight e-mail read. Locally, “perhaps for Academy Books & Records.” Image source: Gigi on sale at Footlight. Earlier: Footlight Records going out of business November 30 Footlight Records closing store, going Internet only US Helicopter hopeful of Wall St. service any day now After a full month of delays, US Helicopter is still awaiting approval to return to the Downtown Manhattan Heliport. “We were very hopeful it would be today,” US Helicopter?s VP of Marketing Donal McSullivan told NewYorkology in an interview this afternoon. “We’re totally at their mercy.” Since November 1, US Helicopter has been unable to use the location near Wall Street because the new heliport managers have been unable to get their full security plan approved by the Transportation Security Administration. On November 1, the management of the heliport switched from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to FirstFlight of Horseheads, N.Y. While some portions of the heliport’s security plan have been approved, it still lacks TSA approval that would allow helicopters from the Wall Street heliport to land at Newark or JFK Airports. And that’s US Helicopter’s main business. Lara Uselding, a spokeswoman for the TSA, warned in today’s New York Times that the delay could stretch a few more weeks. McSullivan said FirstFlight’s inability to get a TSA plan in place has been very costly to US Helicopter, which is still offering service to the airports from the 34th Street Heliport in Manhattan. As soon as the plan is in place, he said service could resume at Wall Street within a day. US Helicopter offers 8-minute service to the airports from Manhattan from $159. FirstFlight has not returned calls to NewYorkology for this story, or since the story was first reported here November 20. Picture credit: Amy Langfield/NewYorkology Earlier: US Helicopter temporarily suspends all Wall St. flights On the 8-minute $99 helicopter from JFK to Manhattan Port Authority to handoff Wall St. heliport management $45 helicopter transfer to JFK for Delta economy-class Will Ferrell Broadway tickets on sale Dec. 3 with AmEx Tickets for Will Ferrell’s one-man Broadway show, ?You?re Welcome America. A Final Night with George W Bush,? will go on sale this Wednesday for American Express cardholders, according to today’s update on the Telecharge website. The general public will have to wait until December 21 for a chance to buy tickets to the limited-run comedy, which will play the Cort Theatre from January 20 through March 15. Regular tickets will be priced from $56.50 to $116.50. Premium seat will range from $251.50 to $301.50. When a performance is sold out, standing room tickets will be sold for $29.50 at the box office. There has been limited information about the show, which is likely to be based on Ferrell’s popular characterization of the outgoing president for “Saturday Night Live.” Last month, the Post reported that Ferrell tested some of the act at a Los Angeles comedy club. Guided West Village walkabout, photo pro in the lead NewYorkology contributor Anna Links has been sizing up some of the newer tours on offer in NYC, including the Staten Island pizza tour, and most recently, a Photo Walk-about. Her report: My digital camera is well used and certainly worse for wear. It’s met many pavements and spilled beverages and resides primarily at the bottom of a messenger bag. Our mutual agreement is thus: I use it liberally and it does not crap out on me. Until recently however, I failed to notice some of my camera’s subtleties. Mainly, that it has a manual setting. And I don’t know how to use it. Enter Lora Danley and her Photo Walk-abouts. A professional photographer and licensed tour guide, Lora leads historical walking tours interwoven with brief photography lessons that offer ample opportunity for experimentation. She offers three Walk-abouts: Central Park at 1 p.m. on Fridays; Greenwich Village at 10 a.m. on Saturdays; and Wall Street at 2 p.m. on Saturdays. Each tour takes about 2.5 hours and costs $20, cash only. Her Photo Walk-abouts illuminate historically and visually interesting places in the city by encouraging you to conduct your own photographic exploration. I join her for the Greenwich Village tour on a brisk Saturday morning, with ample evidence of the previous night’s Halloween parade still scattered around Father Demo Square, our meeting place. We begin with a basic photography lesson that covers rules of composition and camera functions. Lora encourages us to be creative, to take pictures from odd angles, to squat down and look way up, to take abstract photos and at least one portrait. It’s at Lora’s behest that I agree to make friends with the manual setting. Our first stop is St. Luke’s Place where we learn about the colorful inhabitants of the street, so many that a handout is necessary, highlighting the homes of poet Marianne Moore, former mayor Jimmy Walker and the exterior of the Huxtable’s house from The Cosby Show (at No. 10). There is no dearth of material with the trees in the prime of fall, stately brick and brownstone facades and the errant boa feather from the parade. Lora’s directive to “Go forth and photograph” is easily obeyed. She happily reviews our photos at each stop but is there mainly for encouragement and improved camera stewardship. My pants get dirty from kneeling for a few shots, my coat is smudged from rigging up a tree-trunk tripod but I like my pictures and find it very satisfying. Next, at the garden of St. Mark’s in the Fields we get a lesson in lighting and I’m warming up to this manual setting idea. I photograph the same curling leaf ten times with different settings, the same leaning rake, the same sun-dappled wall and I feel I’ve discovered photography, even if the best pictures are still happy accidents. We pass by the Cherry Lane Theatre and on to Bedford Street where No. 75 1/2 was home to Edna St. Vincent Millay, Cary Grant and John Barrymore. At Grove Court, a resident unloads a trunk full of decorative cabbages for the courtyard and the gate is open, allowing a rare glimpse of it’s shady idyll, but I’m shooed out before I can adjust the camera settings. Automatic still has its uses. We finish up at Christopher Square Park, bordered by the Stonewall Tavern and the Northern Dispensary and I’ve yet to take a portrait. Ken Johnson and General Colonel Popcorn Pimp are happy to oblige for a dollar each, and while they insist that I get one shot only, they exercise editorial privilege and demand several retakes. The Photo Walk-abouts aren’t in-depth history or photography exercises but an entertaining introduction to both. It’s an easy way to get comfortable with a new camera or to introduce a visiting friend to New York’s attractions. Lora stays behind to answer questions or look at photos but I feel pretty good. It’s early afternoon on a Saturday, my pictures aren’t half bad and there’s still time for brunch. Picture credits: Anna Links.

Sponsors