samhexum

Tootles & French Wine Bar elevates Astoria’s dining scene The top Italian establishments in western Queens

Who would have guessed?

Top things to eat, see and do in Flushing https://qns.com/2023/07/top-things-to-eat-see-and-do-in-flushing/ Home to the second largest Chinatown in New York City, Flushing is popular for its quick-bite bakeries, including Apollo Bakery, Taipan Bakery and Fay Da Bakery. Among the most popular bites on the menus are hot roast pork buns, Portuguese custard tarts, and curry puffs. The theme of Asian-inspired cuisine, however, does not stop there and continues to “a dizzying number” of food stalls that can be found in the popular neighborhood spots like New York Food Court, New World Mall, The Shops at Skyview Center, Hong Kong Supermarket, Queens Crossing, and Tangram. The collection of spots offers everything from traditional noodles and dumplings to fish-head dishes and rich desserts. Flushing Tangram opened its long-anticipated Food Hall on Jan. 12, featuring specially selected vendors of international cuisine. Xi’an Famous Foods, a chain based in New York City that serves authentic Western Chinese dishes, is opening a location at Tangram. Besides the bites, Flushing is also home to elegant tea houses in the heart of the neighborhood, including local businesses like Prince Tea House and Fang Gourmet Tea. Some visitors, however, may be more accustomed to bubble tea, a growing trend that originated in Taiwan and can now be found easily throughout the world at malls or branches of international companies, such as Coco, Kung Fu, and Happy Lemon, all of which can be found in Flushing. “Greater Flushing is a wonder to explore,” MacKay said. “Head to the Murray Hill section for an array of authentic Korean BBQ dishes at Hahm Ji Bach or visit the Hindu Temple Society of North America, whose Temple Canteen is a well-kept secret for delicious dosas.” Hahm Ji Bach, located at 40-11 149th Pl. in Murray Hill Other places of significant popularity include Asian Jewels for seafood and dim sum, Gyu-Kaku for Japanese BBQ, Kum Gang San for Korean food, Leaf Bar & Lounge for craft cocktails and small Taiwanese plates, OK Canaan for more Taiwanese dishes, and Pho for a wide range of Vietnamese dishes. While this diversity in food reflects the neighborhood’s multicultural spirit, the same is also true for Flushing’s many tourist attractions that capture the area’s rich history. “History buffs can visit several landmarks, many of which are within walking distance from one another,” MacKay said. Flushing is home to the Lewis H. Latimer House Museum, which is named for the African-American inventor known for his work on the telephone and light bulb with Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison, respectively. Other popular spots include the Kingsland Homestead, the Queens Historical Society headquarters, as well as the Voelker Orth Museum, known for its Victorian garden and bird sanctuary. Nothing, however, comes quite close to the John Bowne House, the oldest and “most historic” building in all of Queens known for helping establish religious freedom in the United States in 1662 after New Netherland Director Peter Stuyvesant arrested John Bowne, a quaker who eventually appealed the arrest to the Dutch West India Company and won. Not to brag or anything, but guess who graduated second in his class from John Bowne H.S.? John Bowne House, located at 37-01 Bowne St. in Flushing. “As the country’s birthplace of religious freedom, Flushing is home to spiritual centers representing almost every faith,” MacKay said. Aside from the Bowne House, crowds also visit historical religious places like St. George’s Episcopal Church on Main Street, the Free Synagogue of Flushing, the Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation’s northeast regional headquarters, the Gurudwara Sikh Center of New York, the Muslim Center of New York and the Conservative Jewish Temple Gates of Prayer. The historical sites, however, do not stop there and continue with Flushing Town Hall, known as “a dynamic cultural venue” for its performing and visual arts programs that range from theater and jazz or classical music to dance and puppetry. Aside from various productions at its 308-seat theater, however, Flushing Town Hall’s significance runs much deeper as a Romanesque Revival building dating back to as early as the Civil War. Flushing Town Hall, located at 137-35 Northern Blvd. “Built in 1862, Civil War conscripts were sworn into the Union Army in the upstairs assembly hall,” MacKay said. “In the late 19th century, an extension was added and the venue started hosting opera and traveling theater. For a time, the legendary P.T. Barnum was its impresario and Tom Thumb was its star performer.” Currently, visitors can enjoy Flushing Town Hall’s “Monthly Jazz Jam” that happens on the first Wednesday of every month under the direction of saxophonist Carol Sudhalter and the house band. Arguably the largest source of entertainment, however, will come late next month with the U.S. Open Tournament at Flushing’s USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, which welcomed a record-setting 776,000 fans last year and looks to repeat that during this year’s tournament. Just like the neighborhood it sits in, the stadium complex offers a diverse range of cuisines for tennis fans to enjoy, including American, Asian, Indian, Italian, Latin, and Mediterranean bites, as well as gluten-free, vegan, vegetarian, and kosher options. Ultimately, visitors may opt to venture to these Flushing sites on the 7 Train from countless Manhattan hotels, they can instead stay in one of Flushing’s hotels, including the Fairfield Inn or The Parc Hotel on College Point Boulevard, Four Points by Sheraton on Farrington Street, Hotel Indigo on Flushing Street, Hyatt Place Flushing or the Sheraton LaGuardia East Hotel on 39th Avenue, and the Renaissance New York Flushing Hotel at Tangram on 37th Avenue.

I think you made a mistake in your post. I believe you meant to say you have a hard spot for cutie Will Smith of the Los Angeles Dodgers. (perhaps for him to perch on in your lap?)

Possible new topic: Movies/Plays you sought a refund for. That would be Punch Drunk Love for me. (Hey! I just remembered another movie I walked out of!) I saw it with one of the friends who walked out of JRB, and the first ten minutes were so abysmal that we left and actually got a refund because it was so early in the movie.

I walked out at intermission, my 2 friends joined me after the first second half number. We met in front of Mama Leone's and had dinner there.

I walked out on Jerome Robbins' Boredway and a matinee of Hurlyburly.

I sent him a brief email the other day asking if he's doing okay. He replied yes (and thanked me for asking) but didn't provide any other info. Ditto for @jjkrkwood. I wrote to tell him that a nearby White Castle had reopened after remodeling. He replied that he'd passed it and stopped in to satisfy his craving. I assume he meant for meat (or whatever passes for meat at White Castle).

Junkie 'Cocaine Sharks' are strung out and 'tweaked' in Florida: expert I guess we now know the plot of the next Sharknado movie.

Bayside White Castle now fully open after completing renovations

It's from the Secret Messages album (or Stupid Messages, as I affectionately called it). It was one of their later albums, after they away from being an 'orchestra' and using lush arrangements like on their earlier stuff. Thank you, Elon... I'm listening to the album now & enjoying it.

And the first Canadian woman to be tied up by Stewie Griffin!

@Unicorn feels a song coming on he doesn't even know...

Rikers Island inmate found dead for 7th time this year The medical staff should be praised for reviving him the first 6 times.

Based in Manhattan, Andrew C. (for privacy, he has asked us to use only his full first name) graduated from an Ivy League university and worked as an engineer for more than six years before going to one of the Top 10 MBA programs in the country. From there he got a job in finance, developing financial models for traders. At his day job as a vice president at a Wall Street bank, Andrew currently makes an annual $250,000 base salary with a yearly bonus of as much as $100,000. Yet since 2007, Andrew has also been an exotic dancer. “Although I did everything I was supposed to do, I never really felt fulfilled,” Andrew said. He first started moonlighting as a dancer for fun on the weekends. “It turned out to be much more enjoyable and I was much more passionate about it than anything else,” he said. “I would fantasize about what it would be like to quit my day job and to start my own show, but I just kept telling myself it wasn’t possible.” When he had a falling out with his dance employer, he realized he would have to start his own show — that’s how much he wanted to remain in the industry. Having signed a noncompete, in 2017 he launched a female stripper website, Exotique Girls, to grow his knowledge and experience. “I had no idea what I was doing. After I built the website I just sat there and did nothing,” he said. “A year and a half later I got my first phone call asking to book a dancer and I was so nervous I just hung up on the guy.” With time, Andrew gained the chutzpah to stay on the phone and book parties in New York City and other metropolitan areas across the country, and his female stripper agency became profitable. “I was able to use the profits to invest in the production, development and marketing of a male strip show,” said Andrew, who launched Exotique Men in 2021. Andrew eventually made the decision to start “quiet-quitting” and began doing only his necessary workload at his Wall Street gig. “Plus with the option to work from home, I was able to use my free time from my day job to focus on building my side hustle,” he said. When Andrew dances, he makes up to $1,000 a weekend. Though some weekends are slow, weddings and bachelorette parties help fill in the gap — he can work at a club and then do private parties afterward. Running the agency, which hires dancers for private events but also runs a show at Belvedere Lounge in the East Village, also helps keep his dream job lucrative. While you may be in no hurry to rock your birthday suit in public any time soon, Andrew has some valuable and hard-won insight into how to overhaul your job path. “There were no number of books, podcasts, self-help seminars, etc., that could have prepared me for [such] a career switch,” he said, while recommending taking “calculated action.” By that, he means calculating the amount of risk that you find to be comfortable. “For example, I didn’t borrow a ton of money and quit my day job right away to dive into my side hustle,” he said. “I took the necessary steps without burdening myself with unnecessary risk.” Working toward that career shift helps, too. “A lot of people I meet always talk about how they want to do this or that side hustle but they never take action,” he said. “It is important to set a goal and begin.” Andrew also lives by the ethos that you “treat your life like a business.” That means embracing the attitude that every waking minute has a return on investment. “It’s important to identify the things in your life that are providing a positive ROI and those that are causing a negative ROI. Doing extra at your day job and staying late with no intention of moving up in the company would provide a negative ROI because it’s eating into time that you could be spending working on your side business.” When changing careers, Andrew believes, people tend to give up too early, or to act inconsistently. “There has to be something driving you to want to make the radical career switch,” said Andrew. “There’s a deeper driving force than just doing it for the money.” People often create mental blocks similar to the one he had when he thought he couldn’t pursue the adult entertainment industry full-time, said Andrew, “but honestly if you can overcome these mental obstacles and break down your goal into smaller tasks and stay consistent then you should see results.” To that point, Andrew recommended building on small wins “to keep the momentum going and to remind yourself that what you’re doing is possible.” Failures along the way can be a hindrance, but they ought to be used as building blocks for future successes. “Male stripping has taught me to focus on finding solutions instead of honing in on the problem,” he said. “There were nights where we had to do the show in a small cramped room with music that wasn’t loud enough and the girls were complaining about their seats,” Andrew said. “We used whatever resources we had and we made it work.” Worried about your employer finding your side hustle? “Form an anonymous LLC,” suggested Andrew. Anxious about getting phone calls for your blossoming biz while you’re at work? “Get a free Google Voice number and have the calls go to voicemail and return them when you’re off work,” he said. Basically, find a way to make it work. “Many people will come up with reasons why their side hustle won’t work or why they can’t do it, but only a few will come up with solutions.” Andrew started moonlighting as a dancer for fun on the weekends in 2007. https://nypost.com/2023/07/23/wall-street-worker-has-turned-to-stripping-to-fulfill-his-dreams/

I suppose answering, "Yes, please, and do you offer gift wrapping?" would not have been appreciated.

And if you're interested in France's bacon...

When my mom saw or tasted something unpleasant, she'd say "FEH!" That was more than a few steps down from meh. If you were talking with her and paused at any point leaving the word "So" dangling (as a question 'So?', or for dramatic effect 'So...'), she'd say Sew, Sew, Sew your pants

Right-hander Domingo Tapia was designated for assignment today by the Padres. The Brewers announced the selection of Sal Frelick’s contract. Raimel Tapia was designated for assignment in the corresponding move. They're unrelated, AFAIK, but BAD day for the Tapias of the world! By the end of the 4th inning tonight, everyone in Washington's lineup had a hit and a run scored.

Celebrity crush Retired TV news anchor confesses he'd love to date Martha Stewart and smoke pot with her Former TV news anchorman Bill Boggs is single and ready to mingle — and smoke weed — with Martha Stewart. My thought when seeing this? 'After you've been married to Tara King of THE AVENGERS, I guess the average woman seems boring, huh?'

Not really a recipe, and not sure if it's no-fail, but I think it might not be: I was putting together an online grocery order and was reading the nutrition facts for Stouffer's Roast Turkey, which also had the cooking instructions: Microwave (1100W): Cut film to vent. Cook 22 minutes on high. Stir both sides of the tray and re-cover. Cook again 22 minutes on high. Let stand 1 minute to complete cooking. KEEP FIRE EXTINGUISHER NEARBY.

Jeremy Allen White goes for shirtless run I gave up on SHAMELESS after about 5 years. I couldn't stomach Frank anymore.

Carlin Glynn 'Sixteen Candles' star dead: 'Best Little Whorehouse' Tony winner was 83