Prewar Cornices: That’s How We Roll

You know things have turned a corner in New York when even video games stray from the crime, murder and mafia staples the city is known for:

When we say, “I’m a New Yorker,” we sometimes say it with a little sneer. Rats? Mafiosi? Terrorists? We can take it. Bars here close at dawn. Subway doors are ripped open with bare hands. New York’s edginess is so endemic, so untamed, that a crack cocaine den was found this year in the otherwise relentlessly genteel Upper East Side. That’s how we roll.

. . .

But another, equally powerful myth defines how many New Yorkers see their city: the one that makes them announce, ecstatically, that Sarah Jessica Parker lives in their neighborhood – “I see her all the time!” – or that Jack Kerouac used to get drunk in their favorite bar – “this very booth!”

For this reason, the most telling glimpse of real New York life might be found in a far less showy new game being developed by Atari: “Tycoon City: New York.” The heart of “Tycoon City” is a real estate development adventure in which the first mission is to renovate a Greenwich Village coffee shop. Other tasks include running a hopping nightclub, opening a profitable Broadway show, managing a Wall Street firm, setting up a concert in Central Park, and organizing the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Real-life corporate logos litter billboards and marquees – Lacoste, Nokia, Toys “R” Us – but the streets themselves are spotless, the landscaping immaculate. If the other games suggest that New Yorkers secretly see Times Square as a bloodbath, “Tycoon City” speaks to New Yorkers’ obsession with window boxes and prewar cornices.

Rebbe al-Sadr

Southern Iraq or Brooklyn? It’s difficult to say [emphasis added in advance, for your comprehension and pleasure]:

A brawl broke out in a Brooklyn synagogue yesterday morning, forcing dozens of cops in riot gear to pull worshippers from their house of prayer, in the latest eruption of a Hasidic holy war.

Yesterday’s melee, which included punches, slaps and beard-pulling, broke out between clashing factions of the Satmar Hasidic sect in Williamsburg and ended with cops in helmets closing down streets to restore order on a Jewish holiday, Shmini Atzeret.

“There was chaos,” said worshipper Joel Klein, 29, who said he was pulled from the Yetev Lev Bikur Cholim synagogue on Rodney Street by cops. “It was like a war zone.”

Cops and witnesses said thousands were involved in the fight.

The bitter feud dates back to a longstanding dispute between two brothers who both claim to lead the Williamsburg Satmar congregation and its system of rabbinical yeshivas, religious schools and social services.

The grand rebbe of the ultra-conservative Satmars, Moshe Teitelbaum, picked Zalman in 1999 to lead the Brooklyn congregation, over his elder son, Aaron, who continues to lead another congregation in upstate Kiryas Joel.

The congregation fractured into rival boards that held separate elections and each side claimed victory. A law suit was filed for control of the congregation’s board, but a Brooklyn judge ruled last year that it was not the court’s job to interfere in the grand rebbe’s decision.

But an upstate judge’s decision last week — which some interpreted as leaving Aaron’s ally, Berl Friedman, to be the corporate leader of the Brooklyn congregation — sparked yesterday’s religious rumble.

When Friedman entered the synagogue at about 8:30 a.m., people began shouting and shoving matches ensued between the hundreds of worshippers, witnesses said. As the scrimmage elevated, fights spilled out into the streets.

By the time cops arrived, “there were a couple thousand people in the streets — just tons of people in the streets,” a police source said.

Cops were forced to shut down several blocks in the neighborhood.

Why They Hate Us

Not only is it possible to spend $250,000 at a strip club but the Daily News explains how:

A married business executive who dropped $241,000 during one wild night at Scores was an insatiable customer who hired a virtual harem of lap dancers, a strip club source told the Daily News yesterday.

Robert McCormick, 40, an Internet company CEO and Midwestern father of three girls, took over the exclusive President’s Club when he showed up with some cronies the night of Oct. 22, 2003, the source said.

In the mirrored room, popular with high rollers and celebrities, the stripper enthusiast demanded 10 dancers lavish him with attention at the eye-popping cost of $4,000 an hour.

When their time was up, McCormick insisted club managers bring more girls – and keep them coming.

“I need 10 more,” he would say after the hour’s entertainment was over, waving his arms like he was motioning a jumbo jet in for a landing, according to the source.

“This went on for numerous hours,” the insider said.

The gentleman is contesting the charges, a lawsuit and the whole works (what’s the statute of limitations on suing strip clubs?) but the club says it has its ass covered:

Scores said yesterday it has documents to prove that McCormick authorized the charges and knew exactly what he was doing.

“We have signed waivers,” said club spokesman Lonnie Hanover, who read the forms to The News, but declined to turn over copies with the signature.

The waiver reads: “I am at Scores of my own free will. At the time of this transaction I am not drunk nor in any way impaired. I have not been coerced nor am I currently under any duress. I agree to pay any and all charges I have incurred as a result of my purchase of diamond dollars and/or food or beverages.”

Hanover also said that once a customer charges $10,000, his right index finger is fingerprinted and hourly calls are made to the credit card company for authorization.

And that’s why they hate our freedom.

Shaun Buchanan Lies About Having The Runs

The Daily News has a difficult time finding New Yorkers willing to speak on the record about a recent CareerBuilder.com survey that found that 43 percent of employees fake being ill in order to use sick days. All except for Kmart supervisor Shaun Buchanan:

Few of New York’s workers spoken to yesterday were willing to give their names, fearing repercussions from bosses.

But Shaun Buchanan, 23, said, “Yeah, I’ve done that a lot.”

“I’ve taken sick days to play basketball or to go shopping. If I’m entitled to sick days, I’m going to take them.”

Buchanan, from South Jamaica, Queens, was quick to say he suffered his rash of bogus illnesses long before he started work as a supervisor at Kmart.

But he advised, “There’s no point in being too elaborate in your excuses.

“I would say I had a bad stomach. Nobody wants you at work if you’ve got the runs, and it clears up quickly.”

Props to Shaun for saying what we’re thinking . . .

Site-Specific Semi-Suburban Sex

The Times takes out its tweezers and monocle to investigate, with the delicacy of a butterfly collector, so-called on-site sex in Queens’ Cunningham Park:

Almost any time from noon till 9 p.m., when the lot is officially closed, the scene is the same. The narrow section has two long rows of parking spaces into which the men back their cars, forming two rows of cars facing each other with a thoroughfare between them.

Each newcomer trolls this thoroughfare with all eyes upon him and surveys the other men in cars, who may either perk up and look interested or shut the window and look away. Then with a dramatic swoop, the driver will back his car next to the car of the man he is pursuing.

It all has the deliberate positioning, shifting and movement of a chess game. The parking lot is a fishbowl and the action unfolds like a soap opera each day. Some longtime lot regulars who are openly gay enjoy gathering to observe and narrate the forays and entreaties as they occur. The lot serves the lonely as well as the lusty, they said, helping men seeking friendship and a place to socialize and bond.