Well it’s about 1200 miles away, but everyone in Brooklyn is wondering about Iowa. Who’s going to be the Mike Huckabee of 2012? Rick Santorum? Ron Paul? Or Mitt Romney?

In just a few hours we’ll know, and it will seem so much easier to gauge what’s going to happen next, who’s out of it already, ahem, PerryBachmann, excuse me, and who’s going to make Romney fight till the bitter end.

But do these caucuses really make a difference? Are they anything more than a show of hands for whom a rural segment of Middle Americans wouldn’t mind seeing in the White House? Maybe. Some would argue it depends on the state. Now South Carolina — there’s a caucus!

One thing’s clear: no one really likes Mitt Romney. His Mormonism is one thing, his extraordinary wealth is another, and his repeated attempt to take the Republican spotlight makes me wish we had a better candidate to oppose Obama, at least for the sake of the debates. I can just see it: Romney will do that stupid I’m-right-head-jerk-smile-laugh  after stuttering a response to Obama‘s defense of how he handled the economy over the past two years.

The sad thing is that if presidents weren’t so concerned with their legacy and their second term, they might be more preoccupied with making the four years they have worth it, instead of playing moderately to get their next four. Then these caucuses would really be fun.

Let campaign season begin!

The end of the year brings about competing degustations of art, music, and books. And so let mine be added to the compendium.

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If the lighting of the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center whet your appetite for Christmas light displays, don’t worry there are other free events in NYC that will truly satisfy the urge.  My favorite out of all the Christmas light themed free events in NYC is Brooklyn’s Dyker Lights Festival.

Each year 11th Avenue to 13th Avenue and from 83rd to 86th Street in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn transforms into a winter wonderland of lights. Each house is trying to outdo the neighbors with massive displays of lights, music, and holiday décor. It is amazing to see what people come up with every year, and is sure to give you some ideas if you haven’t put up your holiday decorations yet.

You can experience Dyker Lights by car or by foot. If you go by foot just remember that it involves a lot of walking in the cold, so bundle up. The lights go on at around 5 and are usually off by 9. There is no official start date but by mid-December all the lights are up.

So if you are having trouble getting into a festive mood take a walk or drive through Dyker Heights. It is sure to kindle your holiday spirit.

I recently met someone in Brooklyn who was a leading participant in the Occupy Wall Street Movement. He told me his story, which I’ve tried to remember as accurately as possible.

When I was a little boy, I used to ride the subway with my mother and her boyfriend Ali. Ali was an organ-grinder and he also an played accordion. He carried it from one end of the car to the other while my mother led me, felt hat in my hands, back and forth. People threw in dimes and quarters and the whole time Ali played the same song. Even when I went to sleep at night that song played, duh-dun-duh-dun-duh-dun-dundundun-duhdun…

On and off the subway cars we’d ride for hours every day. Some days were good and some were bad. Still it wasn’t enough for us to live in an apartment. We drifted, and when we scrapped up enough money for a week at a boarding house, we were soon back in the subways.

When I was maybe four or five we were staying in the Amtrak tracks on the Upper West Side. It was midwinter and I woke up one shivering morning between Ali and my mother. They were not shivering. They were not moving at all. The accordion was there. I left it.

I wound my way to the street. I walked through the park. The whole time I kept hearing Ali’s song, duh-dun-duhdun…An older woman found me. She asked me where my parents were; was I lost? I said we were all sleeping together and they didn’t wake up.

After that I spent some time in a foster home. I dropped out of school. I traveled, got a gig on a shipping tanker, saw a lot of the world.

Last year I was in Lebanon, in a seedy part of Beirut, at a peep show. And as the dancer started to take off her top, Ali’s song started to play.

Recently, we discussed how Rockaway is hot right now. But since it’s kind of far away, you may think to yourself, well Brooklyn Trends, where can I catch some cool-down that doesn’t involve a train ride? The answer, dear friend, is at your local pool.

The top ranked pool on Yelp is in Bed-Stuy, at least when it comes to lap swimming. The Kosciusko Pool is large and relatively clean. It is a short walk from the G train, which…kind of sucks.

What else is crackin’ this weekend?

Steel Pulse is playing  a free show at Prospect Park tomorrow night at 7:30.

There will be tons of barbecues at your local pourhouses. See Brooklyn Based for a complete menu.

Check Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest at Coney Island on Monday, or just go for the rides, the waves and the freaks. Let’s see if Joey Chestnut can beat his old record of 68 hot dogs in ten minutes.

It seems like those bastards on Manhattan are going to have the fireworks from now on–it’s been four years running. Not because they’re cool or nuthin’ but because the piers on the East River aren’t big enought to hold the explosives. The ones they’re building south of the Brooklyn Bridge should do the trick, when they’re done. Then it will be back to alternating between the Hudson and East Rivers.

But if you live in Brooklyn and aren’t leaving for the 4th, get your own fireworks and light them away from the cops. GOD BLESS AMERICUH!

Last evening while waiting for the train I met a young man who wore brown wingtips, gray peacoat, Yankees beanie, and a v-neck sweater over plaid. He held a Heineken keg can and looked around warily as we chatted before cracking it and taking a deep pull.

As the train exhaled I asked him where do you live. With a grimace he replied the Upper East. You should move to Brooklyn, I said.

When we sat on the crowded 5 train and he opened his bag to hand me one of his CDs I noticed that his notebooks had the name Sascha Gray on it. I chuckled while he fondled the pockets and finally extracted the blur-faced CD in white paper and plastic sleeve.

Soon thereafter we had our formal introductions and I laughed. The deep irony, I inveighed, is that after you blow up and her breasts begin to sag, people will think it was a reference to the porn star. And that will probably help you, although you spell your names differently. How bizarre, how bizarre, I pondered, thinking about the layers of significance this would have to a young musician in our postmodern era.

There are so many Brooklyn novelists. Continue Reading

Gov. Cuomo has approved a bunch of new cuts. Continue Reading

Me, brakin my friggin back.

I been living in Brooklyn my whole life and dis winter’z been one uh da weedest. I gotta dell ya man, I dunno if it’s da global worming er what, but between it bein da hottest summer eva, and now wit a storm every week, it’z makin me think. I ain’t even gonna tawk about springtime yet cuz I know we’re probly gonna have another montha blizzardz.

Snow’s been on da ground for a month now. Shure it’s been cold enough, and there’s tawk of the Arctic fence being melted away, so we get all their cold air, and they got our warm air, but I rememba when it was colda. Wit da wind, ya know?

So I wuz shuvelin my stoop dis mornin and I sweah I nearly trew my back out. And So far Bloomberg’z being doin’ a shitty job a clearnin’ da streets, but I ain’t gona hold it against ‘im. Fact is dough, dat trew dis Janyary’s snow season, we seen 49.4 inchez a snow, more than any udda New Yowrk winta season in istory. Secon most?  Janyary uh 1948, 44.9 inchez.

My wife’s callin’ me so I gotta go. But I’ll keep ya postid on ow my backz doin.

For those singles out there, you may be well aware that the dating game has changed. These days it’s not about meeting someone in a cafe (come on, how often does that work out?) but rather answering questions about yourself  and filtering through online compatibility results to find someone who also likes both Norman Rockwell and Jeff Koons (or either one, if it comes down to it).

The result is that you constantly check your digital profile for new messages, winks, or the equivalent form of communication that may portend an actual tete-a-tete. How will this evolve I wonder? Like eventually, if you see some cute girl sitting on the opposite side of a cafe, you should be able to do a Foursquare search to see people who are checked into the cafe. If she’s cool, she will have alerted the online community of her whereabouts and you can notify her or give her some hint that you noticed her both digitally and in real-life. If she’s not checked in, she’s probably not that cool, and even if she is, you can’t risk doing anything as creepy as actually approaching her and breaching silence without knowing her.

I can’t wait.