Taking Up Skateboarding After 40 Wasn’t So Much A Problem As Conceiving Of It As “Gliding”

Because someone has to be to blame other than me:

The piles of corned beef may be gone and the matzo soup dried up, but that doesn’t mean the 2nd Avenue Deli can escape kvetching.

A 45-year-old skateboarder is going after the venerable East Village restaurant, which closed shop in January, and its ex-landlord in a lawsuit filed over her December 2004 spill on the sidewalk in front of the kosher deli.

Julie Ashcraft, a Manhattanite who only recently picked up the hobby, says she was slowly gliding when she hit a break in the pavement and took a nasty fall, shattering her right wrist.

“I fell super-fast,” said Ashcraft, who had to get a titanium plate in her wrist with 10 screws. “Once the pain hit, it was horrible . . . I was so afraid I wasn’t going to be able to write again.”

Ashcraft, who works defending tenants facing eviction in Housing Court, filed suit Feb. 24 in Manhattan. She accuses Clearwater Associates, the deli’s landlord, of negligence for not maintaining the sidewalk.

The suit also names the 2nd Avenue Deli, which closed down after a rent hike. The deli’s owner, Jack Lebewohl, has hinted he may reopen elsewhere.

Ashcraft’s lawyer, Michael Lamonsoff, said that in New York, property owners — not renters or the city — are responsible for maintaining the sidewalk. But the deli is named in the suit, he said, in case it caused the sidewalk damage.

And when you’re going after deep pockets full of corned beef, don’t forget to pull that big, dog-eared Sept. 11 card — a sure-fire way to get any jury on your side:

Ashcraft said she took up skateboarding as a distraction after the Sept. 11 attacks but, except for a brief spell during the transit strike, has given up her hobby.

Although she never learned any tricks, she said she used to love skateboarding around the city and to work.

“Now I’m terrified. I’ve even had nightmares about it,” she said. “And I used to dream about gliding to work.”