Vanishing Davis
Apr. 22nd, 2007 08:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spatchThis weekend was beautiful so on Friday, when the sun was out and the sky was nice, I took pictures of two businesses on Highland Avenue whose physical presences will be just a memory to those of us who were there Back In The Day, whenever that Day is. One's already been closed and the other will be closing sometime next month.
R. J. Cody (something of a "Eweler", if you believe the large sign out front) had a combination jewelry and stationery store. I never went in, but I bet the atmosphere was always very quiet, as quiet as businesses running on inertia and borrowed time often tend to be. It's now closed and the windows have been papered up, but I believe there's work going on inside. For what, I don't know. I do hope whatever business takes over keeps and re-uses that nice 3D sign. The UPS store down the block a bit re-used their space's sign.
La Contessa is a lovely Italian pastry shop and one of the few places this side of the Charles where you could get a damn good cannoli, filled right before your very eyes, as well as those black-and-white cookies you can only get in Italian pastry shops. It's family-run and operated, with a blessing from Pope John Paul II hanging proudly on the wall. No, he didn't visit, but the Pope will send you a nice blessing if you know the right people and send the right contribution. But I bet if he had stopped in, JP2 would have enjoyed the cannoli. While Ron Newman reports the family has been rather sketchy with providing details, it doesn't look as if La Contessa will last past Mother's Day, so get your black-and-whites while you still can.
R. J. Cody (something of a "Eweler", if you believe the large sign out front) had a combination jewelry and stationery store. I never went in, but I bet the atmosphere was always very quiet, as quiet as businesses running on inertia and borrowed time often tend to be. It's now closed and the windows have been papered up, but I believe there's work going on inside. For what, I don't know. I do hope whatever business takes over keeps and re-uses that nice 3D sign. The UPS store down the block a bit re-used their space's sign.
La Contessa is a lovely Italian pastry shop and one of the few places this side of the Charles where you could get a damn good cannoli, filled right before your very eyes, as well as those black-and-white cookies you can only get in Italian pastry shops. It's family-run and operated, with a blessing from Pope John Paul II hanging proudly on the wall. No, he didn't visit, but the Pope will send you a nice blessing if you know the right people and send the right contribution. But I bet if he had stopped in, JP2 would have enjoyed the cannoli. While Ron Newman reports the family has been rather sketchy with providing details, it doesn't look as if La Contessa will last past Mother's Day, so get your black-and-whites while you still can.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-23 03:11 am (UTC)at any rate, the stationery store? never saw a single soul in it. then again, I've never seen that travel agency near Comicazi's new place open, either, but every time I go by, there's that crazy half-cracked hula statue waving in eternal aloha. for all the good they do they might as well be just empty storefronts except then we wouldn't have the hula entertainment.
There are just so many places that just keep running, again, due to inertia of some sort. And at some point, the proprietor finally decides it's time to close up shop, and there it goes. You can't blame someone for that. you can't chain them to the store and go NO YOU KEEP ON RUNNING THIS, MISTER, FOR THE GOOD OF THE COMMUNITY.
What's good is when some entrepreneur takes ahold of that space and breathes new life into it. something that is their own dream, their own business, their own little chunk of storefront with merchandise. hooray for comicazi, hooray for magpie, hooray for your move games, hooray for cd spins.
What's bad is when some corporation takes ahold of that space and puts a $CHAIN in it. HOORAY! say the people. Now we don't have to go alllll the way to the other square to buy the same kind of food or the same kind of coffee or the same kind of smoothie drink or the same kind of shoes!
sure people do. ON PLANET CRACKPIPE.
There are a few exceptions to this, of course: pharmacies, as those are necessary for health and sometimes it's not such a good idea to go allll the way to the other square when you need a prescription refilled NOW. oh, and dunkin donuts, because everybody needs a bit of hypocrisy in their views to balance out the eternal truths, and there's mine for the evening.
but if someone were to find a bit of capital underneath a rock, say, or under the sofa cushions, and decided to put in their own fresh-made donut place with twenty-seven varieties and a window so you could see the donuts being made and maybe a bit of fresh coffee too that doesn't taste like the T, well now then, goodbye to dunkies and hello to Abbie's Donuts.
er, not that I have ever thought of such a thing.
the someday closing was an aberration and bad form all around. it was bad that the owner forgot his lease was up, and it was bad for the landlord to not say anything. but what's done is done, and people blaming mr crepe or hating mr crepe or saying nasty things about mr crepe like replacing the first e with an a and then dropping the second e off are people who are completely tilting at a windmill which isn't even there. besides I cannot speak ill of mr crepe as they will let me order crepes off the menu and I don't have to justify my order at all and the people who have given the place snooty bad reviews are the people who are never satisfied with a restaurant experience unless they get a foot bath along with their goddamn hash browns.
and the people who are working to bring the someday back in a new fashion are people who love the place and more power to them.
this post has been powered by an especially tasty 16-year single malt which has been drunk out of a particularly nice and perfectly-weighted five-sided glass which I acquired through nefarious means. I am sure tomorrow I will feel very very silly about the whole thing but on the other hand, I just wrote an abbie post and my brain is still in the cat mindset. hi.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 06:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 03:18 pm (UTC)