This year started off with a bang. I have a new monthly column in WestView News called “Catch and Release,” about my dating mishaps and misadventures. I’m so happy that people have been commenting that they like the story. I can’t wait to tell you what happens next! I hope you get a giggle from it.
I felt sadness and a profound sense of loss that a precious piece of New York is slipping away when I learned that the iconic rink at Rockefeller Center is scheduled for demolition in January 2021. It is classic New York sensory overload to skate here, with the magnificent Christmas tree shining rainbow colors above, and golden Prometheus forever falling to the ice at rinkside. Colored lights flash and bathe the ice in pink and blue, and sometimes the music from the Saks Christmas display across Fifth Avenue is so loud it drowns out the music at the rink, which seems to range between Christmas classics and funk.
When I read the news, I immediately went online and bought a ticket to skate at 6 PM every Saturday from November 21 to January 16. The first Saturday, the splendid 75-foot tall Christmas tree (which weighs 11 tons!) was in place, but not strung with lights. I went downstairs to the skating area right at 6 PM, pasted a yellow sticker from the ticket taker on my right leg, and rushed towards the rink. I was enchanted to see two angelic ice dancers in white costumes with fairy lights walking down the hallway to the dressing room ahead of me. I found a locker, put on my skates, and rushed onto the ice. The ice dancers were already out there, filming a video. They spun and twirled and swooped in the center of the rink for the entire time I was on the ice, which seemed to last only 20 minutes.
It was my first time on skates in a couple years, so it took the full 20 minutes just to warm up and feel less wobbly in the ankles, but still I soared past all the other skaters on the rink. I kept telling anyone who would listen, “I’m Canadian!” to explain my superior performance, possession of my own skates, and knowledge of ice grooming. The ice was a choppy mess, in fact. But I loved the feeling of gliding and tentatively trying out a few of my skating chopsâswitch to backwards skating for a few seconds, try a twirl in a quiet corner. And secretly wished I could skate like the ice dancers.
Because of Covid, the ice was socially distanced, meaning less crowded than usual, but it was still at the maximum allowed, filled with couples holding hands and trying to keep each other vertical, kids falling and skating in the wrong direction, and packs of people taking each other’s picture and blocking the flow.
Unfortunately, my mind kept finding fault with every little thing for the entire 20 minutes until I was told people wearing the yellow sticker had to get off the ice. Then the problem was that my miserable time had been cut short!
I went over to the skate rental return counter with my litany of complaints. I didn’t have any skates to return, having brought my own (because I’m a Canadian). But I complained about the quality of the ice and the short session, which was supposed to be an hour from beginning to end. After lodging my comments with the skate rental attendant, I waited for a manager, and then repeated the litany. The manager asked to see my yellow sticker, and my ticket, and went to investigate. It was the first day of rink operations, and the manager–let’s call him Tim, since that’s his real name–determined that an error had been made in the color of sticker I was issued. I should have received a blue sticker, not a yellow one. He said I could go back on the ice, but by now I had changed out of my skates. He said they were still working out the system but that next week would be better.
Then we turned to the matter of the ice. “The ice was a mess!” I said. “We cut it every few hours,” Tim said, clearly not realizing that this was completely inadequate. “I’m a Canadian!” I said. “I’m used to better ice.” He appeared to be quite sympathetic to my plight. I obviously knew what I was talking about, since I was a Canadian, and besides, I’d purchased eight tickets in advance.
He gave me the general manager Kristen’s business card, and said to email her on Monday. Which I did. I didn’t mention the fact that I was a Canadian, but my expertise in ice matters must have been convincing; by end of day she had changed my remaining tickets to the 7 PM session, immediately after the ice cleaning, which for some reason they call cutting here. That’s quite a stretch, considering the puddles of water everywhere on the rink. Their ice is not exactly cuttable!
The next Saturday, I knew the drill. I was first in line to go downstairs to the rink. Since I was the only one who brought my own skates (quite probably the only Canadian) I changed into my skates in a flash and was the first on the rink!!! For five minutes I had the rink to myself! I couldn’t believe it. The lights were on the tree, casting a magical glow. There were hordes socially distanced above on 49th Street, waiting for their timed visit to look at the tree. And here I was, circling round and round, the rink and the tree all to myself. I wept at my good fortune and craftiness. Finally I could relax. I had controlled the universe. And when others started to trickle and totter onto the ice, I smiled with fond benevolence. I was the ruler of the rink!
Check out my new video, “Crappy Skaters”!Â
P.S. They use an inferior ice cleaning machine called “Olympia,” perhaps in deference to Prometheus’s family. Every Canadian knows that Zambonis are the ice machines of the gods.
A seldom viewed deer-populated forest outside the dressing room
This month, I have been honored again to have my artwork accepted in an open exhibition at the Salmagundi Club. Last year, the photograph “Summer Piano in Washington Square Park” was part of a Village-themed exhibition co-sponsored by Village Preservation. I took the photo on my second trip to New York, in 2015, while I was having a mad crush on the city. The moment when I took the photo was also the birth of my Another New York Love Affair video art project on YouTube. The series is up to 53 videos now!
Karen Rempel, Tailor, 10″ x 10″ Framed
I took the photo currently on exhibit, “Tailor,” in May 2020, the day after the first major protests in New York in response to George Floyd’s murder. I was photographing the aftermath of the protestsâburned police vehicles, graffiti, and broken windowsâwhen I came across this whimsical display in the window of a Wash and Fold on University Place. My heart was pierced watching small business owners patch up their shattered storefronts. This miniature sculpture arrangement expressed a simpler, fairy-tale time, when mice came out at night to help the cobbler finish his work.
As I mentioned in my last post, I took a gallery walk on Madison Avenue in October. The Castelli Gallery had three Joseph Cornell paintings on display. A man working at the gallery showed me the backs of the artworks. Cornell had put art and found objects on the back of each frame. I was delighted at this secret treasure, which eludes all but the most curious viewers. This inspired me to do the same for my modest photo.
I haven’t done collage before, but I began collecting bits and pieces. The date for bringing my photo to the Salmagundi Club fell in the middle of my staycation weekend at the National Arts Club, so I brought the pieces with me, as well as all the supplies I thought I might need. The morning of November 7 dawned bright, and my room overlooked many windows of other creative New Yorkers who live across from Gramercy Park. I imagined each building was packed with artists and sculptors, and I was steeped in creative inspiration. After making coffee and checking on the New York Times election map (no decision yet), I brought out the makings and spread everything on the kitchen table.
The first piece was a beautiful watercolor painting of a pink and yellow-toned forest, from a chocolate wrapper my friend Lew gave me on my birthday. I had some “outtake” prints of my photo, from testing different types of paper, so I cut out a few bits from the photoâthe sewing machine, the tape measures, and the woman doll’s head (with my own distorted reflection dimly seen). I had a postcard from my friend Sally’s recent birthday dinner at the Gramercy Tavern, and a wonderful zebra in a gold party hat cut from the birthday card my cousin Julie sent me from Germany.
I often think of the New York artists from the ’60s (Warhol, Rauchenberg, Stella, Lichtenstein, et al) when I slip on the shoes of artist, wondering how they felt as they prepared their art for exhibit, attending to the details of framing, wiring, and packing. I imagine my methodology is more feminine. I wrapped my 14 pieces for Shadow Play in pillow cases. Now here I was using birthday cards with a decidely pink tinge in my Cornell-inspired collage.
As I placed the pieces, trying different compositions, I needed a few more bits to fill it out. I turned to the copy of The Week laying on the table, and cut out the delightful squirrel dining at a mini picnic table. Suddenly I heard cheering, car horns honking, and bells ringing. I checked the NYT graphic on my phone, and Biden had surpassed 270 electoral college votes! Mad joy and euphoria spilled out around me, through me, and in texts with my cousin Julie in Germany and my sister Kim in Canada. New York was alive with celebration, and so were cities around the country. Half the world exhaled a profound sigh of relief. (The rub is in the other half, but let’s not dwell on that today.)
The cover of The Week had a signpost, with one pointing towards the current fake president, and the other pointing towards Biden. I cut out the sun shining through the clouds from the cover, and this was the last piece of the puzzle. I made a few final embellishments in silver ink, and one more mystery addition on the upper left corner of the frame. Ta da!
I love these moments of slipping into two dimensions and living an artist’s life. Then it’s back to the third dimension, lunch at Kubeh celebrating with friends, New York City alive again, for one brief day. Which is more real?
If you’re in New York, come to the Salmagundi Club and see the exhibit, November 10 to November 20.
Salmagundi Club, 47 Fifth Avenue at 12th Street. Open Tuesday-Friday 1-6 PM, Weekends 1-5 PM.
Some people think the cultural life in New York is over, because of the bans on live performances and movies. This is far from true. Galleries are open, from Whitney to the Met, and on a sunny, crisp October Saturday I had the extreme pleasure of going on the Madison Avenue Gallery Walk with my friend and neighbor Carol.
Our final stop was the Leila Heller Gallery. The works on display by the multi-talented Mia Fonssagrives were fun (robots!) and pleasant, especially a luminous translucent blue sculpture. But the treasure of the day was completely unexpected. I commented on a striking sculpture of elongated, twisted metal that was on the counterâpart of their permanent collectionâand the gallery manager, Alena Marajh, asked if I’d like to see another work by the sculptor. She led me into the back garden, where I was stricken by a majestic, alien being that seems to have descended from outer space.
Who would have suspected this beautiful alien visitor was living in a garden behind this tucked away gallery on East 76th Street? I am haunted by this beckoning into an unseen, magical world.
Like millions of others around the world, I was deeply saddened when I learned that Ruth Bader Ginsburg died on September 18. I admire many things about her, from her fitness regimen to her incalculable contribution to equality for all people in the United States. My physiotherapist has her fitness book in the waiting area, and I had a little tin of RBG “judgemints” on my desk for a couple of years. I can’t find it now.
The morning after Ruth died, I found a strange sight in my livingroom. I keep my Judge badge from the 2019 Mermaid Parade with a collection of other little mementos on the window sill. Suddenly, the card was upside-down. I took it as a personal message from Ruth to me, but I don’t know what it means yet. Perhaps simply an honoring of her passing.
In the Tarot deck, the justice card reversed means: Law in all its departments, legal complications, bigotry, bias, excessive severity. This could be a portent of what’s to come, with the immediate, hypocritcal nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. I definitely felt a call to action, and wrote an article for my local paper giving people information on how to vote.
Ruth Bader Ginsberg shrine at the foot of Alma Mater statue, in front of Columbia University Library
On a cool evening, Sunday, September 20, I went up to Columbia University to see her shrine, which mourners had created in an impromptu fashion in front of the Alma Mater statue at the Library of Columbia University.
Alma Mater “nourishing mother” bronze sculpture by Daniel Chester French, installed in September 1903.
I lit a candle in her memory, and spent a few minutes wishing her peace on her spirit journey, and feeling gratitude for all she has done in her lifetime. There were students sprinkled here and there on the steps, and I envied them the chance to be starting out in life, with the tremedous opportunities that studying at Columbia will bring them. The campus is wide, open, and beautiful, with lovely architecture, and I felt inspired to study there myself! A woman walking her dog came up to the shrine, and told me it had grown a lot since the night before.
To the left (out of frame) were more yellow legal pads with messages on them. May the young folks who left these gifts be a flotilla of guiding lights in the world.
The flags on campus were flying at half-mast in RBG’s honor, and as you probably heard on the news, Justice Ginsburg received two honors that no other woman has: “She became the first woman to lie in repose at the Supreme Court Building on September 23 and, the following day, became the first justice to lie in repose for a second day. On September 25, she lay in state at the Capitol, becoming the first woman and first Jewish person to do so.” (Wikipedia)
On my way home I encountered a festive scene: people dining in bubbles at Cafe Du Soleil on Broadway! Humanity is endlessly inventive in finding ways to thrive and flourish and enjoy life.
There are two fascinating films about RBG, which I watched on Hulu:
RBG – documentary about her life and contributions.
They are both excellent films, inspiring and celebratory of a great life and humble woman who kept following the path of her own inner vision. I loved seeing her mischievous spirit at play and learning how she got the nickname the Notorious RBG, after the fellow Brooklynite rapper the Notorious B.I.G.
As many of you know, I have been writing for WestView News since 2017, and have had my monthly column, Karen’s Quirky Style, for 18 months. During this time I’ve gotten to know the remarkable cast of characters that run the paper, write for the paper, and read the paper. I love these people and want to help our community paper. It is a West Village institution, and the only independent voice left in the Village after the closure of the Village Voice and the buy-out of The Villager by Schneps Media.
Today, WestView News is launching a crowdfunding campaign in a final bid to survive. Here’s their appeal. Please help if you can. Thank you.
George Capsis, publisher of WestView News
Crowdfunding Appeal from WestView News
We are asking for help because our beloved local newspaper is in danger of folding forever. With ad revenues sinking as our local businesses struggle to survive in the face of the COVID 19 pandemic, WestView News can no longer make payroll and pay printing costs. We have distributed the paper for free to 12,000 West Village homes, year after year, and to another 500 paid subscribers. Without your help, we canât do it anymore.
Publisher George Capsis recalls: When I started the paper 17 years ago, I found myself giving it a subheading, âThe Voice of the West Village.â I wanted the readers to talk backâto ask the newspaper to use âthe power of the pressâ to get things done. This paper has made incalculable contributions to the West Village community during the past 17 years, from holding free concerts for seniors to successfully campaigning for a Village Heart Lab at Lenox Hill Hospitalâa vital local resource to save a heart attack victim in the 15-minute window from attack to medical treatment.
But the news for newspapers is not good:
The Daily News recently closed their one of their offices. Hinting at the cost, the New York Times recently announced it will no longer print their TV guide. Shortly after the Times finished their gleaming new headquarters, they found the mortgage onerous and sold the building and rented back their offices.
A major New York real estate firm contracted to buy the expensive back page of WestView when the pandemic prompted a quick cancellation. Restaurant ad sales have fallen as well: you don’t advertise a restaurant that can’t be entered. The traditional way of funding a newspaper via advertising is dead and it is very easy to predict that the bankruptcy of newspapers will continue until they will only be found in museums…
We think that some of us still like the feel of a real newspaper, and would like to try to continue WestView for a few more years and maybe even make it a little bit better.
Today, we are asking our neighbors and community to help. If you love the paper, we ask you to help save WestView News. We need community support to help us pay a backlog of bills and keep the paper printing for the remainder of the pandemic and the following year as our community rebuilds.
Your contribution will help pay our staff and our printer, but more importantly, you will help us bring the local news to the people of the West Village. Our stories, told by the people who live here. Which bird Keith Michael and his dog Millie spotted in the Village this month⌠How you met your husband⌠What the Village was like 40 years ago⌠The most exciting thing that ever happened in your life⌠This is your paper. Without WestView News, there will be no one left to tell these stories. Please help if you can.
Please support our crowdfunding campaign. Please give what you can afford, what you think the paper deserves. And please ask your friends and neighbors to give as well. Thank you. We greatly appreciate your support.
Sometimes it takes a martini. This espresso martini is the sublime ending to a pandemic-shattering brunch at Osteria 57, 57 West 10th Street.
July was one of the strangest months I’ve seen in NYC. The pandemic is “under control” but everyone is wearing masks. A necessary but bizarre and disturbing daily reality. The protests continue on. It’s been over two months since the first protest in New York, on May 30. Protestors are much more organized now. There has been a lot of legislative change and massive increase in public awareness of systemic racism, so the protestors have succeeded in their initial aims, but clearly the desire for real change has not been met yet.
Homeless man rests on church steps on West 10th Street.
Homelessness is a growing problem. An estimated 20% of New Yorkers are unemployed, and it’s uncertain whether the pandemic rent protection will continue much longer. Indeed, parts of the protection plan have ended. I am very concerned about what will happen as more New Yorkers lose their homes.
Homeless man sleeps on brownstone stoop. He is mentally ill and uses the stoop as his toilet. He blocks the passage of tenants into the building, and they literally have to step over him to enter or leave.
On the bright side, outdoor dining has taken over some New York streets, bringing a sense of unreality as people eat, drink, and be merry in the sunshine. Once seated at the table, the masks come off, and it seems like life is back to normal. I met with the brunch gang for the first time since March. Most of my friends have been in strict quarantine since the pandemic began. The company and decadently indulgent food and wine at Osteria 57 made us feel glad to be alive. The feast was capped with complementary canoli and the above-pictured espresso martinis. Almost worth waiting 4 months for.
Joyful hours with friends as we have our first meal together since March.Â
And in the most unusual July 4th celebration, the city shot off fireworks from the top of the Empire State Building. It was quite a symbol of our times to see the Empire exploding. A clever idea, of course, to allow a modest celebration that all New Yorkers could view, from all over the city, without crowding the streets as is the custom for July 4th firework viewing.
Moon over the rooftops of Manhattan on July 4th.
I feel a heavy dread in my heart, and it has been difficult to write anything for this blog, as I usually have something positive to share. As REM said so stirringly, it’s the end of the world as we know it, but I don’t feel fine.
Sun sets into New Jersey as I have a solo picnic by the Hudson River on July 4th. I reveled in the gooey, crispy tacos de pescado and a tart lime margarita from La Contenta Oeste on 6th Avenue. A moment of serenity as a man plays acoustic guitar on a nearby bench.
On top of the global and city-wide events, our building is mourning the loss of our beloved doorman Moss Kuqi, who died in June of a heart attack. He was a welcoming beacon of joy to many who live here, and I always felt uplifted by his warm greeting when I returned home. I miss him dearly. Blessings on your spirit, dear Moss.
Iconic opening shot from Norman Lear’s All in the Familyâa show that captivated us the entire decade of the 70s
“Boy the way Glenn Miller played…,” the man sang through his open Pontiac window. “I know what you’re doing!” He yelled, as he sailed past the graveyard and pastel-colored rowhouses.
I was standing in front of a tidy, light blue rowhouse with an American flag planted in the front yard and a year-round wreath on the door. Signs gave a personal greeting of welcome to visitors. This is one of the most famous houses in television history. Can you guess the show?
All in the Family was the background track to my formative years, running weekly right through the ’70s and taking me from childhood through puberty. It showed the turning of the times, and my family was following similar themes. I’m pretty sure my “Old Country” patriarchal father identified with Archie’s authoritarian approach to running a household, while my mother was younger and didn’t take to being called Dingbat. Which my dad did try to lay on my mother, more than once…
The Bunker house at 89-70 Cooper Avenue, in a triangle where the Queens neighborhoods of Glendale, Middle Village, and Forest Hills converge. Though Archie often identified his address as 704 Hauser Street in Astoria, Queens.
As ground-breaking as it was, I didn’t know that at the time. I did know that the consciousness-raising and changing awareness the show depicted seemed utterly natural. It informed my nascent world view, and has percolated through the years as a compass showing the way forward to equality. An interesting fact I just learned on Wikipedia is that Sally Struthers was dissatisfied with how static her character Gloria was, and sued to get out of her contract in 1974. As a result, her character began to grow in subsequent seasons. Life informing art!
This house is archetypal. The image is burned in our collective brain. I used to drive through neighborhoods in Vancouver looking for rowhouses like this.
So this show had an incalculable impact on me personally, but also of course on society as a whole. It expressed the Zeitgeist, and ranked number one in the Nielsen ratings from 1971 to 1976, becoming arguably one of the most influential comedic programs of all time, and certainly of that decade.
St. John Roman Catholic Cemetery with sun smiting the gravestones
When I first came to New York, I wanted to see the iconic house in Queens shown in the opening credits. But it is quite a trek to 89-70 Cooper Avenue. So I didn’t get around to making the journey to Glendale via the M train until February 21 of this year. Covid was in the air, and I felt an internal pressure to see the things in New York I’d been meaning to see before it was too late. I felt that life as I knew it was drawing to a close. There was so much uncertainty politically and with this new virus. I was considering returning to Canada, so on a cool, sunny Friday, I took the M train to the end of the line.
This definitely feels like the burbs. Bushes, parking lots, drive-throughs… And a link to Canada (Toronto Dominion bank).
It felt great to break out of my routine and see a part of New York I’d never been to. Though the show was set in Astoria, the opening credit scene of the camera panning over a row of houses was filmed on Cooper Street in Glendale. Both are neighborhoods in Queens. That image had been burned in my brain and represented something powerful about a way of life and an era, but also of my girlhood and a more innocent time.
Middle Village, Queens, on Cooper Avenue, with the graveyard behind
I didn’t know what to expect, but the neighborhood near the M train station was def the burbs. Small businesses, low buildings, a sense of space and openness. The route along Metropolitan Avenue led through a large graveyard, and I looked with interest at the names and dates on the stones…
Most of the older names in the graveyard are Polish and Italian. This is the Italian section.
At the far side of the graveyard I came to Cooper Avenue, cutting off at a bit of an angle. There was a business on the corner, which I scarcely noticed, and then a small lane, and then the famous row of duplex houses. 89-70 was the second row house. I began to cry as I stood in front of it. Though Google maps says it’s just a 27-minute drive from where I live in Manhattan, in my inner map it is both much closer and much further away.
DIY Car-4-Sale in Middle Village, Queens
It’s all bound up with countless family dinners in the house I grew up in on Portland Street, in Burnaby, BC, and our ’70s living room with black-velvet flocked wallpaper and orange and green velvet furniture. All the emotions of that time, and a father who is now deceased and forever out of reach. And a mother who is no longer a beautiful young blonde, but a woman in her 70s (still beautiful in a different way) with arthritis and cataracts, who just had a stroke.
Grimaldi’s – The New York Slice
It was quite a long trip, and it seemed silly to just turn around and go home again after a few minutes of singing and being sung to at the Bunker house. I walked back to the corner and noticed a pizza place. The sign said Open, though the place had a bit of a deserted, disarrayed air to it. I walked in and there were tables pulled out blocking the aisle, and I didn’t see a soul.
“Are you open?” I called out. A woman hurried to the door and said, yes, they were just cleaning the windows. The slice is a New York tradition, so I asked her if I could get a mushroom slice. I thought it would be like most pizza places, with some premade, precut pies.
But she yelled, “David!” and a young man came up to the kitchen from the basement. To my surprise, he started building a single-slice-sized pizza just for me. The place was called Victoria G’s Pizzeria, and I found out that this is the latest store opened by the famous New York pizza family Grimaldi’s. Wow, what a fortuitous day!
Colorful ceramic bunny captivates customers at the counter at Vicky G’s
There is no such thing as a hole in the wall, in any corner of the five boroughs, it seems. Every inch of the city is connected to history. I hadn’t heard the story before, but the owner Patsy Grimaldi (Victoria G is his daughter) learned to make pizza at age ten at Patsy’s Pizzeriea, his uncle Patsy Lancieri’s restaurant in Italian Harlem in 1941.
Victoria, for it was she, the eponymous owner, told me tales of the family’s Pizza Wars tangles with other pizza empires while the pizza baked in the coal oven and I sipped on high-end organic specialty white tea. Victoria was a talkative sweetheart, and she gave me another teabag to take home.
Frank Sinatra impersonator JJ Burton, David Grimaldi, and owner Victoria G.
Meanwhile, another guy came out and resumed work on cleaning the windows. This was none other than Frank Sinatra impersonator JJ Burton, who performs every Saturday night at Vicky G’s. He warmly invited me to come back the next night to hear his tribute to Sinatra and other classic rockers. Geez what a nice bunch of people.
And OMG, this was the best pizza I’ve ever tasted! Look at this shape. Completely unique. I’ve never seen anything like it. They use a judicious amount of a home-made mozzarella that’s divineâless chewy and more creamy than the usual. The herbs are heavenly. A smear of tomato sauce, just enough to add some zing. And then a handful of thin, fresh mushroom slices. I don’t eat pizza often so it is always a special treat, but this was something else. A glimpse into a better world!
This custom built single slice is enough for two meals! And so yummy.
It is especially poignant to recount this trip to you now, as this was one of the last carefree days in New York, about a week before our first recorded case of Covid-19 on March 1.
Boy the way Glenn Miller played. Songs that made the Hit Parade! Gee our old La Salle ran great. Those were the days…
Weâve all been missing the sounds of New York bustle. The streets of the city are eerily silent these days, as non-essential activities falter and we cross the road to avoid six feet of contact. If you need your fix of New York noise, from Coney Island to Times Square, check out this YouTube playlist of one-minute soundbites: Another New York Love Affair: Audio Meditations.
The bottom photo is a video still of âNew York Love Affair #11 â Times Square Busker.â The top photo is the same shot of the street scene today, with the US Armed Forces Recruiting Station in the background.
The emptiness in Times Square is enough to make a person cry. Though many of my New York friends are starting to adjust to the empty streets and enjoy the spaciousness.
With “The Pause” ending soon as New York began Phase One of re-opening, we’d better take the opportunity to visit all the spots that are usually hopping busy, while we still have a chance! Personally, I can’t wait for the new improved al fresco dining experience that will be taking over the streets of New York.
Note: Three months later, CVS still has empty shelves where the toilet paper used to be. A new shipment comes in once a week and is immediately snapped up.
