P for pancakes
It's a pancakes party!
Last week Danielle and I had our annual Pancake/Museum Day! Each year we take a day off of work, eat Clinton St Baking Co’s pancake of the day, and go to a museum (it’s right in the name really). It is truly the best time of the year and I encourage all of you to create similar pancake-based traditions. It’s important to have stuff to look forward to when the weather outside is paler than my white ass flesh.
Something else I’m looking forward to is visiting Las Vegas for the first time next month! I don’t enjoy your typical Vegas activities (I don’t gamble, I don’t like loud music, I don’t swim in pools, I don’t drink) but I’ve still been able to find a bunch of activities that I think I’ll enjoy. I’m hoping to visit the Pinball Museum, the Neon Museum, multiple buffets, and convince Lorenzo to go on a hike in Zion National Park (pray for me y’all). If you have any Vegas recs that you think I might like, send them my way! If you’re reading this in your inbox, you can just reply to the email to chat with me (I promise it won’t reply all and send your thoughts to my whole subscription list).
1. Exploring 🛼
One of the museums Danielle and I visited last week was Mercer Labs. I was cautiously optimistic about this place because on the surface it looked like another “Instagram Museum” that’s just a bunch of photo ops, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was actually really cool! The admission fee is definitely on the pricier side, so read along and see if it’s something you think you’ll enjoy before traveling to FiDi and dropping $50.
The exhibit features a bunch of experimental art and experiences by Israeli artist Roy Nachum. You could go through this entire museum without knowing that artist’s name or learning anything about them and that was definitely one of the downsides, for me at least. I absolutely crave context when viewing art and this museum provides absolutely none; not a single plaque, no descriptions of what you’re looking at, truly just vibes.
A lot of his work features Braille text and a recurring motif is a “child with a gold crown covering his eyes, suggesting man’s blindness caused by displaced values and desire.” Roy Nachum isn’t blind (as far as I could tell), so I thought this was really weird. But a lot of his installations are interactive and include sound and tactile pieces, so I imagine blind people would be able to experience them to a degree. He also has a series called Fire that was made in collaboration with blind folks whose fingerprints were left on the work, thus documenting their touch and leaving a trace of human contact.
You might recognize one of his more popular works though:
But enough about Roy, let’s talk Mercer Labs. You’re given shoe booties upon entering and then follow a mostly linear path from room to room. The first room set the bar pretty fucking high. There were some swings to sit on as you watched videos play on the walls and floor around you. The cherry blossom sequence was particularly nice and I really felt like the petals were flowing around me. This wasn’t just art projected on the walls (looking at you Van Gogh Experience), there was a sense of movement to it that made you feel, well, fucking immersed. There would be more rooms like this with various light configurations and so many mirrors that made me feel truly surrounded in the best way. This was the first time that I actually felt enveloped by the installations and not like I was just watching a tv on the wall.
The installations weren’t only visual though; there was one room that was like a sound bath. Before entering an employee told us we could not speak or take photos with flash. The room itself was bathed in a blue light and filled with mist. I could only see what was directly in front of me and eventually found my way to some mats on the floor. The speakers in the room played various oooms and vwoooos and it was actually really relaxing. I enjoyed some of the room sounds with my eyes closed and then sat up and watched as additional figures came into the room and appeared through the mist.
Some other rooms had more tactile experiences. One room had a big electronic sand raking machine that reminded me of Doc Ock’s tentacle arms. It made vwoom sounds as it raked the sand and it occasionally “looked” at me through the glass. That room also had kinetic sand you could play with, which was something I always wanted as a child and never got. Take that Nickelodeon Magazine, I got it now! Another room allowed you to color in a bunny or penguin which was scanned and 3d-ified into a tv screen. My penguin and Danielle’s bunny frolicked together on the tv!
If you’re looking for a chill way to spend some time, I think Mercer Labs might fit the bill. It doesn’t ask you to think about the art at all, so it was actually a nice way to turn my brain off a bit and simply be. A long time ago one of my friends smoked salvia and began exclaiming that he was in a movie, and this kind of felt like that. I didn’t feel like I was on a movie set, but actually in a movie, part of the electricity of it all.
Still images don’t really do this experience justice, so I’ll post some of the videos I took on the @bigcity.littlefriend Instagram.
2. Learning 🧠
Last week I wrote about the historically black neighborhood in Brooklyn of Weeksville. I recently learned about another neighborhood in NYC that was home to many notable African Americans and also a neighborhood that I’d never heard of before: Addisleigh Park in Queens. It’s made up of a few blocks in western St. Albans and is fulled with the most adorable English Tudor and neo-Colonial Revival style homes, many built between 1910 and 1930. While this neighborhood would eventually come to be known as the African American Gold Coast, it was initially settled as a White only community.
All of the racist ass White folks got together and made a restrictive covenant that prohibited the sale of any properties in the area to Black folks. In the early 1940s they even managed to successfully file lawsuits against neighbors who were going to sell their home to *gasp* Black people. Despite ruling in favor of the plaintiffs, the judge was like “you know some Black people already live in this neighborhood, right?” There was a collective gasp of white incredulity. Turns out, in the 1930s a white policeman sold his house in Addisleigh Park to an African-American man as a result of a feud with a neighbor and Fats Waller became the first Black jazz musician in the ‘hood. No idea what this feud was, but I’m going to start making my friend bet me their homes because I don’t know how else to become a homeowner at this point.
Because of the St. Albans LIRR station that operated near Addisleigh Park, Manhattan’s Swing Era epicenter at 52nd St was just a short ride away and the area quickly attracted lots of successful jazz musicians who wanted a nice suburban home. The area soon became home to Ella Fitzgerald, Jackie Robinson, Lena Horne, Count Basie, and Cootie Williams. And in 2011 the neighborhood received Landmark designation from the LPC!
The area is still home to predominantly African American and Caribbean residents with a average household income of about $80k. The migration of affluent Black folks to Addisleigh Park illuminated African-Americans’ struggle for and achievement of the basic civil right of home ownership, just as the residents of Weeksville knew that owning property could mean the difference between safety and displacement.
One of my favorite Instagram accounts, @landmarksofny, recently posted a whole series on this neighborhood and I encourage you to check his stuff out if you want to learn more!
3. What’s Good 😎
Artist Manny Vega will be producing free mini portraits at the Museum of the City of NY this Saturday! These portraits will be on view for a short time alongside his current exhibit there.
If you’re looking to shop small this weekend and pick up a belated Valentine’s gift, stop by Lazy Suzy in Bushwick for their Lunar New Year Market on Saturday.
La Cantine in Ridgewood is having a special Steak Night on Feb 21. I’m not a big fan of steak, but all of the sides on the menu also look delicious.
The Dean Collection at Brooklyn Museum opened recently and has been getting great reviews. It features works by Black artists from Alicia Keys/Swizz Beatz private collection. The exhibit is set up to make you feel like you’re right in Keys/Beatz’s living room - can you even imagine? General admission is $20, but NYPL card holders can reserve free tickets to the museum on Culture Pass!
The NY Historical Society will begin hosting a Meet the Curator program on Fridays at noon. You can ask them all of the questions about the art. I’ve spoken with some of their docents before and they’re so knowledgable!
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden is still open through the winter! They offer pay what you wish admission on weekdays through the end of February are are running a free Chase the Winter Blues Away tour this Saturday.
4. Noshing 😋
This year was the third annual pancake outing that Danielle and I enjoyed at Clinton St Baking Co! Clinton St is known for their blueberry pancakes and every February they do a special Pancake Month where there’s a different flavor pancake available every couple days. In previous years I’ve had their apple pie and Japanese pumpkin pancakes. This year, I had their raspberry jam pancake and y’all, they were fucking fabulous. Let me tell you about these pancakes.
I’m usually a thin pancake girl. I have very strong memories of my friend’s dad making us thin cornmeal pancakes and I crave those fuckers to this day. So at first glance, Clinton St’s fluffy boys aren’t what I’d gravitate towards. I also don’t even like blueberries, so the fact that I enjoy Clinton St’s blueberry pancakes are an anomaly to me. Despite their fluffiness, the pancakes maintain a slight crust all around that keeps them from becoming mush after being drowned in buttery maple syrup. And the blueberries aren’t those tiny ass blueberries my mom would buy from King Kullen, they’re juicy and plump and cooked down to become a sweet jammy jam that is so freakin good.
But enough about the blueberry pancakes, you can get those anytime. Let’s talk about the raspberry jam pancakes I had last week. I was expecting whole raspberries on top, which I got. I was even expecting a sort of raspberry puree or syrup - also ✅. What I wasn’t expecting though, was how delightfully almondy the pancakes were! The menu promised a “toasted almond butter” but these pancakes were downright marzipanny and I loved it! There was an almond cream on top, but there were also almonds in the pancakes. They tasted sweet and almondy like an almond croissant, so fucking good. And all of the tart raspberry did a great job offsetting the sweetness.
Pancakes of years past were also top fucking notch! The apple pie ones had a cinnamony granola and cream on top. The Japanese pumpkin were slightly savory with a thick pumpkin seed crumb and pumpkin puree. I’m honestly baffled when I see people order anything but the pancakes at Clinton St even though I’m sure the rest of their menu is great, too. But it’s pancakes for me all day.
5. Watching🍿
I generally enjoy Matthew Vaughn’s films, but I’m not quite sure how I feel about his most recent one: Argylle. The reviews are bad. A lot of the criticisms fall under the following categories: bad/too much CGI, too many twists, the need for IP dominance.
I’ve lamented the state of movie CGI before. I feel like an old fart when I say this, but why can’t be have more practical effects? As good as effects are these days, they still always veer slightly into the uncanny valley for me. I can tell when actors aren’t actually petting a dragon, when they aren’t actually jumping across rooftops, when they’re standing on a single rock surrounded by green curtains. I understand that it’s not possible to do everything practically (because cost, safety, dragons don’t exist), but our little human eyes can tell when stuff is fake and when there’s too much stuff that’s fake it’s such a turn off. Argylle uses so much CGI over practical effects that half the movie looks like a video game, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Multiple action sequences and character movements look more unnatural than Henry Cavill’s strange haircut.
It was bad enough that the visuals were lying to me half the time, but the amount of twists that this movie had was simply too much. I love a good twist. The end of the Sixth Sense? Brilliant. Fight Club? Classic. I even loved twist in The Village, I’ll admit it. But in order for a twist to be effective, the audience has to have some degree of trust in the story being told. A movie can’t just be like “hey this is real….and now it isn’t psyche!” The twist has to make some logical sense in the universe that the movie has created and the audience has to buy into the new contradictory information that they’re being fed. After the third or fourth twist in Argylle, I realized I couldn’t trust anything in this fucking movie and all subsequent twists were moot. Nothing surprised me because nothing surprised me. The movie lost my trust and that’s about the worst thing that can happen to a film’s audience. Shame on you, Argylle!
Finally, this movie is afraid to be original. I’ll cut them a little slack here because it’s hard to get a movie made nowadays. Maybe you’ve noticed Kung Fu Panda fucking 4 is coming out soon? Fantastic Four is being rebooted for the third time. Studios want a safe bet and nothing is safer than something they’ve already made and gotten a return on. Argylle hit the ground running by releasing a mysterious book into the world (that was allegedly not written by Taylor Swift), immediately setting up a prequel, and basically promising that the Kingsman-verse is so gonna be a thing. A movie can’t just be a movie anymore - it has to spawn a universe with multiple tie-ins and spin-offs that can exist to make a studio money indefinitely. Argylle bought into this tactic unabashedly and that just felt kinda icky.
All that aside, parts of this movie were fun! When John Cena grabs Dua Lipa off the moving motorcycle - I can believe he did that without CGI. Sam Rockwell was a goddam delight, as always; I will watch that man in anything. Some of the fight scenes were fun to watch (on the train), others weren’t (everything else, especially the smoke-dance and the oil ice skating). I know the Matthew Vaughn can pull off cool spy movies (the first two Kingsman), but he also made The King’s Man which was so strange tonally that it actually just made me sad.
I’ve also been rewatching all of the X-Men films and Matthew Vaughn’s First Class holds a special place in my heart as one of my comfy rewatchable movies. One thing that I especially love about First Class is the fucking romance between Charles and Erik. The relationship that he created between these two men is the reason that I love the X-Men prequels so much. After learning that Argylle and Wyatt (Cavill and Cena) were based on Elly and Aidan (Howard and Rockwell) I realized that by god he did it again. Vaughn created another beautiful bromance and buried it in the book universe within the movie universe. In all actuality this particular twist is a bit confusing and doesn’t make sense, but I also think it’s quite sweet.
Luckily, you know you have a niche audience to joyfully receive your niche gif, which is even better than the nougat.
Just started reading the book and I kept having to check the cover because none of it seems to match up to anything I saw in the trailer. I'm still here for the ride but utterly confused!