I Suppose This Means I’ll Be Taking That Whiskey Neat

Peter Meehan provides a thumbnail sketch of everything that is wrong with Manhattan restaurants:

It was the whipped cream routine that tipped the scales.

Our perky waitress at Ditch Plains dropped off our desserts and enthusiastically told us that the chef would deliver whipped cream for our pie to the table. She made the pronouncement with the wide-eyed expression and excited tone you might use when springing an impromptu field trip on a group of schoolchildren. Fun was on the way, she was telling us.

Then a harried cook sneaked past her, plopped a canister of supermarket whipped cream on the table and scurried back to the kitchen. Ta-da!

. . .

It’s unfortunate that the restaurant pairs that burger with its cafeteria-quality French fries instead of the freshly made sweet potato chips that accompany its lobster roll. The mayonnaise-rich salad of chopped lobster meat tumbling out of a buttered and toasted hot dog roll (side-sliced, not top-sliced, for those keeping score in Maine) is not exactly a bargain at $23, but that is what the market will bear.

Whether the market will bear some of the other prices the restaurant charges remains to be seen. Want ice in your whiskey? That’ll be $2 extra. How about a slice of American cheese on your burger? That will take the simple sandwich from the realm of the expensive ($12) to the absurd ($15).

Make Way For The Methadone Clinic!

Florence Fabricant notes that European Union, the East Village “gastropub” that was denied a liquor license back in March, has closed.

You Win Some, You Lose Some

Ganas, the Staten Island commune profiled by New York Magazine back in April, is in the news again after a former resident shot one of its founders on Monday:

A former New Brighton woman waged a campaign of stalking and harassment against activist Jeff Gross, the co-founder of the commune she once lived in, before finally shooting him three times on the steps of his Corson Avenue home Monday night, police said.

Now cops are hunting the woman, Rebekah Johnson — who police sources say has ambushed Gross before with a camera, and has made several baseless claims about him after she was twice kicked out of the Ganas commune years ago. And the commune’s members now fear that Ms. Johnson may come after them next.

“We truly believe that we’re being targeted,” said one of the group’s members, a 46-year-old man who asked that his name be withheld because he fears for his safety.

Gross — who was in critical but stable condition in St. Vincent’s Hospital in West Brighton yesterday — had described Ms. Johnson to detectives as “crazy, but not dangerously crazy” after the earlier incidents, according to one law enforcement source.

“Guess she proved him wrong,” the source said.

Police sources describe Ms. Johnson as white, heavyset, in her 40s, and “armed and extremely dangerous.”

. . .

On Sunday, Gross was on his way home from Manhattan, where he saw the Al Gore movie “An Inconvenient Truth” with a group of friends, said one Ganas member who asked not to be identified.

He said goodbye, and walked back to his house from farther up the road, the friend said.

“Next thing I know, I heard the gunshots,” he said.

Dont’ worry — the plot is already penciled in for next season’s Law & Order.

A Park Fit For The Elderly And Infirm

Parkgoers at Brooklyn’s Empire-Fulton Ferry Park are happy to be able to enjoy an open space were virtually everything is forbidden:

“They need to lighten up,” said John Soster, 39, a teacher and cyclist from Bushwick who was reprimanded for walking — not riding — his bike through the park last summer.

“I’ve been chastised,” he added. “What are they so uptight about?”

Another parkgoer told the Daily News she has seen rangers tell kids to stop playing ball – and teenagers complained they’ve been scolded for running around in the park.

“A couple of my friends and I were told to stop running and horsing around or we’d have to leave,” said Kenyon Harris, 17, who now avoids the state park because of the rules.

Empire-Fulton Ferry also has rules against commercial photography and filming, both of which require a permit. Parkgoers said hard-nosed park rangers can take this regulation too far.

Louis Benitez, 31, a Queens marketing manager, said a ranger made him put away his hand-held video camera Рeven though he was just filming his fianc̩e and passing boats.

“I was like, ‘Come on. It’s just for our leisure,'” said Benitez, who recently was forced out of the park because he was there with his friend’s dog. “They’re pretty strict.”

. . .

On Sunday, The News chronicled the widespread frustration that the Empire-Fulton Ferry closes its park at dusk — and even earlier. Parkgoers charged they are often abruptly kicked out at one of the nicest times of the day. At least one day last week, the park closed at 6:30 p.m.

Following an inquiry by The News, a state parks spokeswoman said they “were looking to expand” the hours to 11 p.m., at least on weekends.

Community Board 2 district manager Robert Perris said he has gotten complaints about the strict rules at Empire-Fulton Ferry — and the sometimes overly aggressive rangers.

“They sometimes treat people like they’re doing something really wrong for relatively minor things,” said Perris. “The response can seem much heavier than the ‘crime.'”

Out: Real Estate Porn. In: Real Estate Contrarianism

Out: Jane Jacobs. In: An “unholy alliance” of Jane Jacobs and the newly rehabilitated Robert Moses. Get used to it:

The planning phrase on everyone’s lips is “eyes on the street,” the reductio ad absurdum of the argument of the late Jane Jacobs’s 1961 Death and Life of Great American Cities. Jacobs argued that the lifeblood of her then-threatened neighborhood, the Village, was the shopkeepers and homeowners and stoop-sitters who watched the sidewalks and parks for free. Under City Planning commissioner Amanda Burden, neighborhoods are being contextually zoned to preserve their “special character.”

Jacobs’s vision was lovely but limited, with little room for new buildings, new neighborhoods. Rereading her arguments, one develops a sneaking admiration for the size of Moses’s thoughts. For the city to grow, it needed major change. Under Bloomberg, big thinking is happening again. What we have is a — some would say unholy — alliance of Bob and Jane. Exaltation of the neighborhood, coupled with the idea of building new ones from scratch. The Bloomberg administration still lags in taste at times. Why does every economic-development initiative have to be as big as possible? (Note to gadflies: Many of these projects are not yet set in stone. If you hate it, you can still change it. Start your blog now. But also start imagining an alternative — preferably in PowerPoint.)

OK, smart alec, you asked for it: newyorkmagazineistryingtobeohsocontrarian.com. I think the URL is available!