Bites of the Apple: A Selection of Events in New York This Weekend, June 13-15, 2008

Greetings. I've been out walking the streets, as is my habit, enjoying watching the couples of various types at seemingly every New York intersection pouring over their various maps of New York. This sight of the two heads leaning together and looking over their pocket maps of the city is so common that I surmise a variety of scenarios:
1. It takes two to read a map.
2. It takes two to argue about where to go next.
3. The two are totally lost, and one of them has persuaded the other that they need a map.

Maps are nice, and I can't wait for everyone to load up all the Walking Off the Big Apple maps (cute sleeping dog alert) on the forthcoming IPhone. Though I have problems with people walking and talking on the phone at the same time, I want one. With the GPS feature, I even look forward to stalking my own self. On the other hand, it's also fun to wander around the boroughs without such guidance, Manhattan especially, and to discover things independently of cartography's growing hegemony. Getting lost isn't an enormous problem in Manhattan, because if grade school still teaches that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, let the sun be thy guide. Also, eventually one comes upon water features that define this particular watery island locale.

What I personally need is not a map but some sort of weekend event guide that pares down the thousands of performances, events, gallery openings, happenings, films and book signings that drive Gotham's art economy and trajectory of so many individual careers into a manageable list. Then, once I find a few things I'd like to do, I can then break through the onslaught of the PR machine that drives so many additional NY careers and finally consider doing something other than looking at couples on street corners staring at maps or watching the same Law and Order: CIs that I've seen five times.

Thusly, I present,

Bites of the Apple: A Selection of Events in New York This Weekend, June 13-15, 2008

Friday, June 13: (I didn't realize it was Friday the 13th until now.) Lower East Side Gallery crawl. Official name is Artlog Presents: Collect LES '08. 7-9:30 p.m. $6 in advance for members of the New Museum ($12 for non) ; $12 limited tickets at the door for members of the New Museum ($16 for non). See the happenin' new art scene.

Through Sunday: Affordable Art Fair. All works priced $100 - $10,000 at the Altman Building. 135 West 18th Street, NYC. My budget falls in the $100 to $109 range. Many details at the website.

Starts Saturday. NYC Food Film Festival at the Water Taxi Beach in Long Island City. Doesn't the very location sound sexy? See website.

Sunday night. The Tony Awards on television. An important event for the overview it provides of the past season, plus it's part of the overall inexpensive staycation. Tickets for the revival of South Pacific, however, no matter the cost, are mandatory. Official website.

Free Shakespeare in the Park in Central Park with “Hamlet” (through June 29). Public Theater website.

Stay home all weekend and read Netherland: A Novel by Joseph O'Neill.

Image: Though I was there just last week, I am already nostalgic for Roosevelt Island, the new Paris, off to the right in this picture. On the left, you can see the outlines of the new Heliport park on the Manhattan side of the East River. After I get a smart phone, I look forward to landing my personal spacecraft on the heliport and blowing around people's clothes and hair.

UPDATE! A bite of the Little Apple! Speaking of RI, add to the list Roosevelt Island Day. Please read the comment following this post. Thanks, Roosevelt Island 360, for the reminder! After checking the site, I must say I'm a little nervous about what's going on with the street signs over there.