gastropoda

The sad news is not that the Strand Diner on 96th has closed — I can still smell the morning I stopped in years ago when something had definitely died on the premises and I only hoped it was not a forgotten busboy. What’s depressing is that the place is being torn down. And that undoubtedly means another obscene tower is going to be wedged into a low-rise block, after construction forces us to walk well around it for months for fear of falling cranes (and crane operators). One diner/mortuary has to be worth more than another high-rise in a neighborhood where it seems half the buildings are festooned with “for rent” signs. And I have to admit I’ll miss walking past and wondering yet again where the “top rated” rating it boasted in a big sign in the window came from. The place knew its audience, idiots not worthy of even Maroon deception.

Here’s a budding trend ripe for nipping: The tip jar at Amy’s Bread in the Village is now labeled the “karma cup.” If there are countinghouses in the afterlife, I’m taking another look at reincarnation. But even that Bush-era innovation is not as fucked up as the Chowhound “reviews” posted a couple of doors away on the Murray’s Cheese window. Not only can any establishment cherry-pick favorable ones, but the potential for fraud is unprecedented (check out the first alleged everyman’s swoon over at menupages for a new place with an unfortunate name off Columbus). The one venue where autofellation is actually possible, after all, is the internets. But I guess the faux touts could be dumber: They could have come from Zagat.

It’s that time of year again, when the Zagats tell the media to jump and the only response is, “How ridiculously high?” No end of nonsense was churned out, but the most annoying spewing, as usual, came from the big eaters themselves. This time the WSJournal got snookered into running one of their self-promos posing as an op-ed, and it was even more annoying than usual. The idea that anyone could take their restaurant prices seriously is about as idiotic as presuming Mrs. Chimp actually cared enough to write her piece for the same pages. (Evil illegitimate government oppressing citizens? Bad. But only in Burma.) You would think this of all newspapers would remember that old Mark Twain saying about figures lying. The Skank Twins would be more credible.