And... Go.

Well, Lucas the Dumpling Man is at it again, with the seasonal variations on his logo. Also, he's launched a DumplingBlog . He's set up a DumplingCam so you can keep an eye on things. He's got incredibly sweet new Dumpling T-Shirts. And while he expands the Dumpling Empire in all directions, he's still producing the best affordable meal in the East Village. How does this man do it? -PAR

I got word from Waldo last night that Phil had passed away . And it really kinda shook me. Well, shook, but more saddened. I mean... Phil. Buddha Phil. Phil Gair. There's a whole bunch of us, kids who hung out (and grew up) downtown, for whom Phil was just... He was a constant reassuring presence. Always there, always would be. Those big iron and wood Mall benches were there for him, weren't they? He was an original Mallfellow , there long before any of us even coined the term. His thick glasses and suspenders and snap-down cap and his child-like smile and his turns of phrase that didn't usually make sense, but really didn't need to. Talking with Phil didn't fall under rules that you'd apply to conversations with anyone else. He said something to me once, I wish I could remember exactly... About how we had our own rainbows and didn't need to worry. From anyone else, it would've been laughable. But from him, there was a sincerity that ma...

As usual, I've been neglecting to keep up to date here. I expect both of you reading have probably noticed. So, let's see... There's been a LOT of snow. Obviously. Wintertime hitting hard, pausing for a day to psyche us all out... Letting everyone run around in the sun wearing t-shirts, then dropping a blizzard on our heads the next morning. Most of the above pictures were taken a couple weeks ago, on a night that I'd just gotten home from work and gotten settled in... And then the news of Hunter S. Thompson's death hit, and sent us all back outdoors, right as a nice gentle snow turned into all-out insanity. Rounds of free whiskey, snowball fights with random strangers, and much lunacy ensued. (My buddy Lamb recaps the entire evening here , and gets it all exactly right.) Other than that, it's been a string of crazy days and nights... A hip-hop concert here, a quick lighting gig there, a job interview that I never hear back about, an almost-constant re...