The Lights of
Dyker Heights

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Justin Ferate likes to observe that Italians who start making more money tend not to move to new neighborhoods, like most other groups, but instead to build bigger and better houses in the same neighborhood. This particular bigger and better house is like a storybook castle guarded by fierce creatures (another pair in Fig. 1).

As you walk around Dyker Heights, you will come across grand houses with spectacular details (Fig. 2) right next to a block of working family rowhouses (Fig. 3). It seems to the Rube like it would be a good kind of neighborhood to grow up in.

The Rube, when retracing Justin's walking tour (posted earlier) -- he wanted to get some of the subjects in dayligh -- spotted the Lioni Fresh Mozzarella store -- "The King of Mozzarella" -- and stopped in on his way back to the subway. They told him to pick out his own loaf of bread, which are kept in a rack off in the corner. Then there was a choice of at least 50, and maybe 100, celebrity sandwiches, the description of each rounded off with a appropos celebrity wisecrack -- for example, a "Marlon Brando" might have been "a sandwich you can't refuse".

The Rube chose the Ernest Borgnine: thinly sliced pepperoni and juicy sweet peppers on a bed of fresh mozzarella. And he got a big ball of the smoked mozzarella also. This latter had such a pungent smell that it secured him his own subway seat on the way home. The sandwich was great, but the smoked mozzarella is awesome -- while you are still in the act of eating one piece, an uncontrollable desire comes over you to cut another piece, so as not to have to wait ONE SECOND after the first piece is gone.