Alright kids, today — MARCH 1 — marks the first day of the new ban on plastic bags in NYC and all of NYS. Let’s a have a look back in this fun, rather beautiful at times, Ode to a Plastic Bag photo essay and commentary. Ohhhh BAGS. We hardly knew ya.
As you may have heard, we’ve been avoiding the office this week. Which means our Elevator Interview — the weekly chats we’ve been conducting with Times writers and editors to get inside their heads about how they do their jobs — took place over email.
That was no problem for Veronica Chambers, who has an early morning writing ritual that, at times, has involved her sleeping on her kitchen floor to ensure that she would be so uncomfortable that she wakes up early. It appears to have worked: She is the author of more than a dozen books, including her most recent, “Queen Bey: A Celebration of the Power and Creativity of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter,” and is editor of the Times archival storytelling project, Past Tense.
It’s worth noting on a national holiday extolling the value and dignity of labor that Americans are uniquely obsessed with work. Could any other nation come up with a product like Soylent, a meal substitute, not for the elderly, the poor or the malnourished, but for software engineers, Wall Street brokers, tech entrepreneurs and others who don’t want to be diverted from their work by the time consuming intricacies of a meal? Could you imagine the French conceiving such a thing?
While other wealthy nations have shortened the workweek, given their citizens more free time and schemed to make their lives more pleasant, stress-free and enjoyable, the United States offers a curious paradox: Though the standard of living has risen, and creature comforts are more readily and easily available — and though technological innovations have made it easier to work efficiently — people work more, not less.
Super cool piece and interactive photo essay on skateboarding master Tyshawn Jones. Check it!
Tyshawn Jones’s jaw-dropping athleticism has made him a skateboarding icon. But is skateboarding big enough for someone like Tyshawn Jones?
Tyshawn Jones’s jaw-dropping athleticism has made him a skateboarding icon. But is skateboarding big enough for someone like Tyshawn Jones?
By Willy Staley
Photographs by Philip Montgomery
Videos by Danilo Parra and Zach Sky
One of Tyshawn Jones’s favorite places to skate is the William F. Passannante Ballfield in Greenwich Village. Even by skateboarding’s flexible standards, this park is barren: a flat expanse of asphalt with paint denoting a baseball diamond. There are no ledges sweaty with wax, no stairs to jump down, not even a measly curb; once you leave the painted infield, the ground becomes too chunky to really skate on. And yet it’s still a destination in New York, known to locals as ‘‘T.F. West’’ — short for ‘‘training facility,’’ a convoluted inside joke about the fact that there’s nothing to skate there.
With warmer weather approaching, many of us are making plans to grill and be merry. In our experience it is good to have a few ground rules when the merriment and grilling mix:
ROOF FUN RULES
We all like to have a good time, and we want you to in our buildings.
BUT
If you are have a BBQ or roof get together clean up after yourself.
Respect your neighbors!!
If we get complaints from our cleaning crew, you will be charged depending on the mess.
We get it. Everyone is busy. Finding time to set-up a personal recycling program and vision is not probably high on your priority list. It turns out the city, state federal, government (and private industries) are also struggling with the clean up and separation that goes with a standardized recycling program. I learned in this recent NY Times article, that one of the primary reasons recycling has trouble catching on is because of dollars and cents:
