Ugliness Rears Its, Uh, Ugly Head

A roving band of “ugly girls” is terrorizing Prospect Heights:

In at least three instances over the past two months, a group of adolescents headed by one or two young girls has approached pedestrians and either hit them over the head with a blunt object or pointed what looked to be a toy gun in their direction.

The perpetrators demanded nothing. Indeed, they appeared to have no motive beyond the sheer fun of harassing pedestrians, according to victims and the police.

. . .

“They literally came out of nowhere,” said Jess Eddy, a 29-year-old graphic designer who was only two blocks from home when she was assaulted on May 15 at about 10 pm.

“I was on Prospect Place, near Vanderbilt Avenue, when I got struck on the head from behind,” she said. “I turned around, and there were six to eight kids, with two little girls in front, who were between 12 and 13 years old.

“They were waiting for me to do something. I was taken aback. I mean, the normal reaction is to attack, but they were so young, and girls.”

After hesitating, Eddy rushed at the girls, prompting a counter-attack by two slightly older boys who had been lurking in the background.

When they tried to hit Eddy on the head, she yelled “like a crazy woman,” and one of the boys pulled out a small silver gun that Eddy presumed was a toy because of its size and the boy’s age. Eddy fled across the street. The kids ran in the opposite direction.

. . .

The third assault occurred about two months ago to a man named Raymond Alberts and his wife as they were walking along St. Marks Place between Classon and Grand avenues.

“As we were walking, we saw a kid hiding behind a Dumpster,” Alberts told The [Brooklyn] Paper. “My wife says, ‘He’s got a gun.'”

Alberts, 56, estimated the kid was between 13 and 17 years old. He was accompanied by an “overweight boy” of about the same age.

“I turn around, and he points the silver gun at me . . . We kept on walking . . . He was just smiling.”

Alberts promptly reported the incident to the cops, who sent out an officer to investigate.

“He comes back and says it was a toy gun, and he said it wasn’t a boy, it was an ugly girl,” said Alberts.

Sure, The Plush Toys Are Trite, But They’re The Only Plush Toys We’ve Got

The cleverly contrarian Observer wonders whether all of Coney Island is really worth saving:

Several iconic Coney Island attractions — including the rickety, whiplash-inducing Cyclone rollercoaster and scenic 150-plus-foot-tall Wonder Wheel — are already city-protected landmarks that [developer Joe] Sitt can’t touch. Same goes for the long-defunct Parachute Jump structure, commonly referred to as Brooklyn’s Eiffel Tower, and the original Nathan’s hot-dog stand, built in 1916.

And the nonprofit group Coney Island USA, which operates the freaky circus-themed Sideshow by the Seashore, is in contract to buy its own 12,000-square-foot building along of Surf Avenue for more than $3 million.

The contested turf, therefore, mostly boils down to a dense, three-block-long stretch of video arcades, bumper cars, kooky haunted houses, various food and beverage vendors, and trite plush-toy prize contests.

Does the public really care if that stuff gets bulldozed?

Well when you put it that way . . .

Location Scout: Coney Island Amusement Core.

Actually, I Think Most Agree That A Lowe’s Home Improvement Center Is Substantively Different Than A Terrorist Attack

Time was when you wanted to offensively overstate your case all you had were Nazis. Fortunately today we also have terrorists:

With its signature royal blue exterior, Mill Basin’s Lowe’s Home Improvement Center might one day look like any of the other hardware stores the company has dotted across the country.

But in the eyes of one state lawmaker, everything is not as it appears.

“Terrorists come in all shapes and sizes,” State Senator Carl Kruger told Lowe’s officials last week.

“This plan, in its very simplest form, is a terrorist attack on the Mill Basin community,” Kruger said at Community Board 18’s monthly meeting.

At the meeting, company officials, including Kevin Bulger, Lowe’s senior site development manager, and Deirdre Carson, its land use attorney for this project, got an earful.

“I know what an attack on a community is all about — I know what a stealth attack is,” Kruger said. “When you find a terrorist in your neighborhood . . . you deal with them.”

We Don’t Need No Stinking Bagels

A pocket of dead-enders refuses to give up the fight:

Just a few hours after bagel man Ravi Aggarwal put up an “Arena Bagels and Bialys” sign on his soon-to-open Fifth Avenue shop, opponents of the basketball stadium that inspired the name made their feelings clear: they planned to protest outside Aggarwal’s store if it remained “Arena Bagels.”

. . .

“For me, naming it ‘Arena’ was all about location,” [Aggarwal] said. “I just knew I wanted to come to Brooklyn with my bagels, which are the best, by the way. I don’t know anything about the Atlantic Yards project.”

He quickly got an education about the mega-project — and the negative passions it provokes in some.

From the moment the sign went up this week, people started complaining — and some were openly hostile, he said.

“At first, I said, ‘No way. I’m not going to be pushed around,” Aggarwal said.

But that steadfast conviction didn’t last long. Aggarwal said the sign would come down on Thursday — after this issue went to press. His other stores are named “Slim’s Bagels,” so he said it’s likely that he’ll name the Fifth Avenue store “Brooklyn Slim’s.”

This week, Atlantic Yards opponents were pleased that they’d beaten the bagel man into submission.

“I think the whole story shows perfectly how passionate this neighborhood is against Atlantic Yards,” said Jon Crow, one of the people who expressed his displeasure to Aggarwal.

Now Everyone Will Know The True Story Of Where Mohammad Atta Got His Steroids

This unfortunately does little to combat some popular perceptions of Bay Ridge:

State drug enforcement authorities raided a popular Bay Ridge mom-and-pop pharmacy on Wednesday, seizing hundreds of thousand of dollars worth of steroids and growth hormones.

Workers at Lowen’s Pharmacy were stunned as investigators from the state Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement entered the store and began a search that yielded $200,000 worth of the illegal performance-enhancing medications.

The investigation was first reported Thursday by the New York Daily News. The raid was confirmed by the Albany County District Attorney’s office.

Officials aren’t calling it a “raid,” per se, because narcotics officers are allowed to randomly search any state-regulated pharmacy without a warrant if there is reasonable cause to suspect something untoward is going on.

Those fears were apparently generated by an unrelated investigation by the Albany DA into a pharmacy chain based in Florida.

The Lowen’s “name had come up frequently” in that investigation, Assistant District Attorney Chris Baynes told the News.

. . .

On Thursday, it was business as usual at Lowen’s, whose stately, old-style building is at the corner of Third Avenue and 69th Street.

“Why should I comment to you? We have no comment,” said the pharmacist.

Big bonus points for pulling a shocking — and I think totally, completely unsubstantiated (like, was this actually published anywhere?) — 9/11 card:

It’s not the first time Lowen’s has been linked to a big news story.

Days after the 9-11 attacks, several Bay Ridge residents claimed that hijacker Mohammad Atta was a regular customer at the store.