Photo Friday: View from Domino Sugar, Williamsburg

After visiting an art exhibit at the old Domino Sugar factory in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, we stopped at a tiny adjacent park and took in the Manhattan view.

A Walk Across the Williamsburg Bridge

When it comes to New York City bridges, the Williamsburg Bridge is the ugly stepsister to the Brooklyn Bridge's Cinderella.

But no matter. I wanted to walk across it anyway.

I've seen the bridge dozens, maybe hundreds, of times from the confines of a subway crossing the East River, but I'd never once stepped foot on it, never once driven across it.

The Williamsburg Bridge connects Manhattan's Lower East Side to Williamsburg, Brooklyn's hipster enclave. Now that I've made the crossing, I understand why no one exactly sings its praises.

For one, it's just not that pretty. The Brooklyn Bridge is gorgeous. The Williamsburg Bridge is the dowdy sister.

Two, the views aren't that great either. When they aren't blocked by tall buildings nearby, they're difficult to see through the chain fences on each side of the walkways.

One of the "lovely" views.

And three, it's a little claustrophobic. That's about the last thing I would expect from a bridge, but the bars overhead made it seem like the bridge actually had a ceiling.

Looks like the bridge has a ceiling.

Nevertheless, it was a pleasant walk ... and since our favorite restaurant in all of New York is just a few blocks from the Manhattan entrance to the bridge, it's very likely we'll even make the trip again.

I asked Paul to take photos, too, so there's finally some pictures of *me* on the blog.

Renegade Craft Fair: Indie Art in the Park

Sunny skies and a 0 percent chance of rain: The perfect day to walk across the Williamsburg Bridge.

And when I learned that the two-day Renegade Craft Show would be held not far from the bridge's Brooklyn entrance, that only confirmed my belief that this was the stuff that makes up a perfect spring day in New York City.

As the name suggests, the Renegade isn't your typical craft show. No doilies or table runners in sight. Instead, more than 300 "indie crafters," as the website proclaims, lined McCarren Park in hipster-central Williamsburg with jewelry, clothing, notecards, artwork, pins and more.

An example of the "and more"

Needless to say, Paul wasn't exactly thrilled about being dragged to a craft show, but after securing a promise that he would be sure to spot some ironic t-shirts, he didn't even complain.

We arrived about two hours after the fair opened, and the park was packed. At some booths it was difficult to even see the wares.


I wore my beloved C-bus shirt, pretty secure in the knowledge that no one would be able to decipher it. In fact, two people commented. One, a girl from Pittsburgh, said she herself uses that abbreviation for Columbus. The other, a guy from Akron, was manning a booth filled with similar city- and state-specific tees and said the business had considered creating a C-bus shirt itself. Anyway, my attire seemed to fit right in with the crowd.

My C-Bus Shirt

With just a few exceptions, everything seemed to be below $100, and the majority of items were $50 or less. Some of the more interesting things I saw: food-centric jewelry (think necklace with a charm shaped like a piece of meat), buttons made from microfiche and a shop called "Get Felt Up!" featuring items made from, of course, felt.

After two hours of browsing, I walked away with a beautiful $15 necklace and tons of business cards. I hope to feature some of my favorite items on Thrifty Under Fifty in the coming weeks.

Alas, we were so tired after our (well, my) day of crafting, that we opted for the subway instead of our planned walk across the Williamsburg Bridge. The bridge will always be there, but Brooklyn, unfortunately, hosts the Renegade Craft Show only once a year.

Bowling: A Comparative Study

I love that split-second feeling of elation just before I get a strike, when I know the bowling ball will hit the center pin and the rest will soon come crashing down.

It's a feeling I don't get very often, and Saturday night was no exception.

After watching the Red Sox destroy the Mets in an exhibition game Saturday, a group of us went to a bowling alley not too far away in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. It was not only my first time bowling in New York, but also the first time I've bowled in two or three years.

I never bowled too often in Ohio-- maybe once or twice a year. In other words, just often enough to keep my average at about 100 and rarely higher.

Waiting for my turn Saturday night, I compared the alley to those I've visited in Ohio. The Williamsburg alley had a '70s feel: 8 lanes, no frills. A small black and white screen at each lane tabulated the scores, but there was no overhead screen like at the large, popular, modern alleys.

To the left of the first lane was a wall-length window. On the other side of that window was the connected bar, about as big as the alley itself. The bar was sunken about three feel below the alley itself, giving drinkers a unique view of the action on the other side.

To the right of the eighth lane was an exposed brick wall with -- and this amused me -- a sagging American flag with only 48 stars.

All in all, it was pretty similar to the alleys in Defiance, except this one was smoke-free and had better beer.

It was completely different to the alley we'd occasionally visit in Columbus, however.

The C-busers know what I'm talking about: Columbus Square Bowling Palace. It might be known as ghetto bowling for it's questionable east side location, but inside it's 64 lanes of bowling pleasure with a wide variety of '90s tunes. And it's open 24 hours.

So how'd I do on Saturday? I barely broke 100 in the second game thanks to a 10th frame strike. I was secretly (well, not so secretly now) quite pleased.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Williamsburg

With only a few more weeks (days?) of sunny, warm weather, Paul and I devoted Saturday to exploration.

First up: the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Entrance is free from 10 a.m. to noon Saturdays (yep, I'm still a cheapskate, even here). According to a brochure we picked up there, it's 52 acres with more than 10,000 plants. I liked the Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden (Gail and Joe-- that photo's for you!), and Paul enjoyed walking around the Herb Garden. It almost felt like we were back at his mom's house.

The trees and plants were green and lush, and I look forward to going back in the spring to visit the rose garden. But even among what must be one of the most peaceful places in Brooklyn, you could still hear the traffic not terribly far away.

Next up was the Brooklyn Brewery. Obviously my home-brewing husband was looking forward to the Saturday morning tours (also free) and samples (alas, $3). He hadn't been to the brewery before, but he had visited the neighborhood for work not long ago and assured me I would like it.

But first, the brewery. The tour is in one large room of a warehouse and the "bar" is an adjoining room with picnic tables and taps. I believe the bar is only open on Saturday afternoons for the tours and on Friday nights. Oh, and there's a skinny and extremely tame cat that has the run of the place and seemed to like to nuzzle against the guests and sit on the table where you buy your beer tokens.

It's in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, near Queens and just east of Manhattan. I fell in love with the neighborhood on the spot. But besides the rents being out of our price range, we agreed that we're probably not cool enough to live there. As Paul said, we would probably always have to eat at vegan restaurants where they used humanely-slaughtered beans. The place did have a lot of vegetarian, vegan and environmentally-friendly options (we ate lunch at a cafe where we ordered organic pancakes and organic french fries). I like that. And I really enjoyed all the one-of-a-kind specialty stores and the young crowds (I find that "hipster" is often repeated when referring to this neighborhood).

Another possible problem to living there-- I probably don't have the required number of ironic t-shirts. They were so prevalent that I think we started ignoring them and then had trouble remembering the good ones when I tried to make a list (examples: "Jesus was homeless" and "Relationships are hard work" with pictures of tools). But I'm sure I could up my collection. I would probably start with the shirt in the photo. (It's not true-- I love NY!)