Month: September 2021

There is a kitten in the window. Wait – there are two kittens in the window. Which is a curious thing given that the pet-supply shop is called The Regal Beagle.The feisty snowshoe Siamese, who is called Conchita, is climbing up a potted palm, and the torpid tuxedo, who was named Jameson for the whiskey, is lazily lounging in the bed after a raucous romp, petite paws pointing into the air.When the shop bell rings and Daisy, the first customer of the day, pulls her owner in to buy a treat,…

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To understand why Tenzing Ghama can’t wait to get up at 4 in the morning to start cooking, you have to believe in dreams.She’s always wanted to open a restaurant, but she’s never had the money or the opportunity to do so.But time is something she does have a little bit of.So six months ago, she joined the Shef app to see what would happen.Since then, she’s been preparing Tibetan, Indian and Nepalese-influenced meals three days a week, sometimes making 30 to 40 dishes at…

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It has been weeks since Stefano Poliseno has been to his Astoria Sports Complex.  Stefano outside the closed Astoria Sports Complex.He parks his car – a white Maserati detailed with a green and red stripe in homage to his and its Italian heritage – and goes to the front door of the building, which remains forever closed to him.Seeing it again is hard.“How do I feel? Sad and happy,” he says. “I’m passionate about the children who came here; I miss them, but now I’ll…

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It was more like a clatter than a crash. When the big bang occurred, I sprang from my swivel chair and flew to the window to see what could be the matter.There, sprawled on my lower-level flat roof, sparkling in the sunlight like a diamond, was a silver ladder.I’ve lived in my house for more than 16 years, and I’ve borne witness to all manner of strange happenings. But most of them occurred on the ground.Attached townhouses, I discovered too late to move, rarely make good (or…

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