The Buzz

BROOKLYN BOUND: a 2500-square foot, inter-active, interpretive exhibit for a wing of the Brooklyn Childrens Museum, designed by Carol May and Tim Watkins, whose workplace is the former firehouse in Athens. The new facility will encompass “areas” devoted to water play, workshop, Bing Bang Bong (=learning about sound), sand play, reading, coral gardens, theater, Toy Town. This project is not quite on the scale of what the dynamic duo created for the Creative Kids Museum in Calgary (Mr Watkins just went up there to celebrate the first anniversary of that 10,000-square-foot facility). It differs too from their mutating murals, their functional sculptures, their Garden of Motion in Turkey Lake FL (20 25-foot high, painted, variously shaped giant weathervanes, dancing in the wind), their giant Glamour Dogs, their multiple 18-foot high squealing, swaying Sunbabies. But really, folks, we’ve only given a hint of their range. Check out http://www.maywatkinsdesign.com/

DITTO. Also Brooklyn-bound is another Athenian, Johnnie Moore, who is singing and dancing in the Irving Berlin review "I Love a Piano." The show goes next Sunday (10/21) to the Brooklyn Performing Arts Center, after stops most recently in Pittsfield, New Haven and White Plains.

OFF-BROADWAY BOUND: a GreeneLand-generated play, “The Prophecy of Isaiah,” written and directed by Isaac Klein from a monograph, Spinning Jesus, by his father, Art (the Tile Guy) Klein. The one-act drama, first staged last April in Catskill, at BRIK gallery, espouses a version of Christianity that, in contrast to the contemporary “fundamentalist” or “social conservative” orientation, is tormented by poverty, hunger, cruelty, torture, xenophobia, homophobia, bigotry, and degradation of Earth. Manhattan debut is set for November 16 at the Times Square Arts Center. Audience members and performers will share five tables that form a circle. Oh, BTW: the senior Klein is the author of ten books (so far); five were Book of the Month selections.

BOOKED for the “Today” television show next Friday (10/19) where she will concoct some dishes from recipes in The Relaxed Kitchen: How to Entertain with Casual Elegance and Never Lose Your Mind, Incinerate the Soufflee, or Murder the Guests: GreeneLander Brigit Binns (who also will be making an authorial appearance in Catskill tomorrow

BASS NOTE. “When bass are suspended and relating to baitfish this fall, turn your back on the shoreline cover and structure you’ve been targeting and switch to a blade bait to coerce the bite.” Got that? From Bassmaster magazine.

SELF-PUBLISHED recently is a book fetchingly titled Catskill, Greene, County, New York, Revisited. 1930 to 1960. According to a Daily Maul scribe (9/24), author Wanda West Traver wrote “in intermittent spurts” (not to be confused with regular spurts?); her account “transverses [!] life in Catskill during Traver’s life here”; and she believes that “Catskill centralizing its public schools was a progressive step forward”—in contrast, presumably, to a progressive step backward.

BEST BEANS & stuff. Judges in the recent two-county chili Cookoff decided that the tastiest dish came from GreeneLand’s Kristopher Rose (yes; with a k). Among tasters, who voted by depositing beans in appropriate boxes, the Peoples Choice iby a single bean at Catskill Point was Scotty’s Too Hottie (= Scotty Christman), followed by dishie Gwen Seeley's dish. Official judges were Paul Rother, Bill Dowd, Randy Hatch and Michael Hunter.

FOR SALE at foreclosure auction: house at 844 Leeds-Athens Road on which defaulting mortgagee Dennis Izzillo owes, according to the legal notice, “approximately $127,323.28.” As previously reported (Seeing Greene 6/15), Mr Izzillo ran the Firehouse Tavern on Main Street, Catskill, until his landlord ran out of patience over non-payment of rent. Also imminent for Mr Izzillo is a hearing in Bankruptcy Court.

METAPHOR MASHER. Jim Tedisco, leader of the State Assembly’s Republicans, has put out a fund-raising bid affirming that “We have drawn the line in the sand, and have turned back the tide in our favor,” and “stood up” to the Governor AND “proved that we would not be steamrolled.”

SWEENEY UPDATE. GreeneLand’s former representative in the U.S. House of Representatives, John Sweeney (affectionately dubbed “Congressman Kickass” by President G. W. Botch for his thuggery in the midst of vote-recount controversy in Florida in 2000) is now a bachelor. He and Gayle completed divorce proceedings in July, amid mutual accusations of brutality. According to the TimesUnion, moreover, they have admitted that, with regard to the State Police report about the 911 call (from her, about him) that they had claimed, during the 2000 election, was false, they lied. Meanwhile, the State Police union is mounting a lawsuit on behalf of Captain Frank Pace who, upon being suspected by his chief of passing that fateful report (that suppressed public document) to the Press, was consigned, in effect, to Siberia.

WEEKEND TREATS. Farmers’ and Artisans’ Market at Historic Catskill Point, Saturday from 10:30am, features music by the folk/country Rovin’ Cowboys. In the afternoon, kids are invited to don suitable costumes for an early Halloween, including a matinee showing of “The Witches” at the Community Theatre, along with “paint a story” doings at Imagine That. Then it’s Second Saturday, with galleries and shops enticing Main Street strollers. See the new “painted lady” (raspberry, key lime, whatever) that is 400 Main St, along with the flanking exhibits at the Open Studio and the Arts Council galleries. Get a pre-launch, autographed copy of The Relaxed Kitchen from Herself, at Hood & Co. Llater in the evening, back at Catskill Point, rock diva Lex Grey joins the Will Smith Trio at Stella’s Lounge.

Elsewhere on Saturday, GreeneLanders could try a soap-making workshop (with Kelly Tsakoumagos of “Old Thyme Soaps”) at the Agroforestry Center in Acra, 10am-2pm Saturday; 622-9820; a Hudson Lighthouse tour (828-5294); a Mountaintop Pumpkin Festival at Bear Creek (www.mentgroup.com/events.htm; 263-3839) site; or a creep through haunted Massacre Mansion (Blackthorne Resort; 6342341).

On Sunday, Susan Wides leads an autumnal photo hike to Sunset Rock on North Mountain, with foliage-aflame views of the Catskills+North Lake+South Lake+the Mountain House site, starting at noon from the Mountain Top Historical Society’s Haines Falls campus. (917-697-0334). For devotees of gregarious idleness, meanwhile, there’s a potluck party at Beattie-Powers Place in Catskill, with musical entertainment provided by the aforementioned, the inimitable Lex with pianist Al Garzon, from 1 pm. The organizers (www.friendsofbeattiepowers.org) ask participants to bring a dish or $10. Make it $20. They have sunk a lot of money, as well as effort, into restoration of that gracious estate.