Ducks, Stoops and Nuts @ Cornelia St Cafe

Yesterday, the weather delivered driving rain and swift winds, but a flock of loyal fans of story and music paddled down to Cornelia Street Cafe to see and hear great performances by these fine artists: Muneesh Jain, Margarita Pracatan, Jeff Rose and Elizabeth Rowe at last night's "City Stories: Stoops to Nuts." Their work knocks me out and they all kicked ass. A welcoming crowd braved the weather to get there and cheer us on (I was the host.) Michael and Josh kept the customers satisfied with warm professional service. The Café opened their home and let us play. The Cornelia Street Café does that for all their guests.

Muneesh Jain

Storytelling at the Café on the second Tuesday of the month is a given. I’ve been the host for the last five years. Our next show is January 13, 2015. My special guest, Professor Robert White from Hunter College - the best teacher on earth. Our show case artist on February 10th is the outstanding singer and songwriter, Sherryl Marshall.

Margarita Pracatan

These are my last two "Stoops to Nuts" shows at Cornelia Street Cafe. After five years I'm onto something new, and will always treasure my time hosting the storytelling series going strong for 18 years. I thank the entire Cornelia Street Cafe staff for treating me like family. I love you all.

Jeff Rose

Barbara Aliprantis, thank you, my dear friend, for telling me I was storyteller when I was clueless, and wrapping your arms around me and pulling me into the series to meet new friends, extraordinary artists. One thousand kisses and hugs. Thank you, Angelo Verga and Robin Hirsch for choosing me to lead this amazing series. I never could have done it without your friendship and steady support. Thank you, Josh Rebell for watching my back and working with me to ensure we got the word out.

Elizabeth Rowe

Please come down to "Stoops to Nuts" in January or February on the second Tuesday of the month to say hello, goodbye. I wanna see you.

My memoir, “I Hate the Dallas Cowboys – tales of a scrappy New York boyhood,” is available at Amazon and other online booksellers. Take a trip back fifty years to street life in one rough and tumble New York City neighborhood in the 1950s and 1960s where humor is the lead remedy for pain.

Cornelia's Opening for Tommy's Photography, 2013

Here is a link to more photos from Stoops to Nuts show.

Swimming to Stoops to Nuts & Other Travel Options

It's raining, its pouring, the old man is...  heading to "City Stories: Stoops to Nuts" tonight, Dec 9th @ 6pm @ Cornelia Street Cafe. A merge of storytelling and narrative song ~ a love letter to street life, the neighborhood and the characters in it. Our artists: Muneesh Jain; Margarita Pracatan; Elizabeth Rowe and  Jeff Rose.

$ 8 admission includes a free drink. I'm your host and I'm telling one from my new book,  "I Hate the Dallas Cowboys - tales of a scrappy New York boyhood." 

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I'm at my window, the driving rain is doing its best to not hit the sidewalk, its swirling around, going mostly sideways until it finds an unprotected dressed so wrong person to smack in the face. The rain plans to stick around for a few days so I'm trying to figure out a way to get some people to "Stoops to Nut"s tonight. 

I've consulted Rory. He suggested I double check with Popeye for an updated Colorform weather report. I did.  Popeye says wear a Mac, a Morton Fisherman storm hat and Yellow matching water proof boots (disclaimer: my Colorform set when I was young had boots, updated set shown here fired the boots).

I'm thinking of friends that live within a five block radius of Cornelia Street Cafe. I'm calling in all chits. Also locating friends that swam varsity or sail. When I head down later, I'll pass through Central Park and pick up a few turtles, ducks and geese.

This is the kind of weather you pray for when that movie you've been waiting to see on the Turner cable channel is on tonight at 6pm, so you can say to your friend, "I'm so sorry, I missed your show. I have no rain gear and my lumbago's been acting up."

Or... you could look at it as a challenge, you know... kind of like hitting every puddle on the way home from school, what's your mother gonna say?

"Why didn't you dodge the rain?"

Below, today's weather report in photos.

"Davy, Davy Crockett... King of the Wild Frontier"

Up to about four years old I had a lisp.  My teeth got in the way when I talked. My parents asked, "What's your name!"
"Tonte," came out of my mouth instead of Tommy.

When they needed serious cheering up, Dad and Mom would sit on the couch and ask me to sing the Davy Crockett theme song - and I would - on the top of my lungs, lisping and stuttering through the first two stanzas until I ran out of breath and made myself dizzy. Dad bought the record, so I could practice and they could laugh their asses off. I didn't care, at least not at that point. Them on the couch covering their giggling mouths, and me centered on the rug with my head swung up singing like a loon to the light fixture.

"Davy, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier..."

Born on a mountain top in Tennessee

Greenest state in the land of the free.

Raised in the woods so he knew ev'ry tree

Kilt him a b'ar when he was only three

Davy, Davy Crockett, king of the wild frontier.

In eighteen thirteen the Creeks uprose

Addin' redskin arrows to the country's woes

Now, Injun fightin' is somethin' he knows

So he shoulders his rifle an' off he goes

Davy, Davy Crockett, the man who don't know fear.

We have a great "City Stories: Stoops to Nuts" this Tuesday, Dec 9th @ 6pm @ Cornelia Street Cafe. A merge of storytelling and narrative song ~ a love letter to street life, the neighborhood and the characters in it.

Our artists: Muneesh Jain; Margarita Pracatan; Elizabeth Rowe and Jeff Rose.

$ 8 admission includes a free drink. I'll host and tell one from my new book, "I Hate the Dallas Cowboys - tales of a scrappy New York boyhood."

I will sign copies of the book at the show.

Praise for the book ~ ( if you read it, please say a few honest words online in booksellers reviews section)

“Thomas R. Pryor has written a sweet, funny, loving memoir of growing up old-school in a colorful New York neighborhood. A story of sports, family, and boyhood, you’ll be able to all but taste, smell, and feel this vanished world.”
—Kevin Baker, author of the novels Dreamland, Paradise Alley, and Strivers Row


“Tommy Pryor’s New York boyhood…was the mid-century coming of age of all of us. A rousing read.”
—Robert Lipsyte, author and former city and sports columnist, The New York Times


“Pryor could take a felt hat and make it funny.”
—Barbara Turner-Vesselago, author of Writing Without A Parachute: The Art of Freefall


“Pryor burrows into the terrain of his childhood with a longing and obsessiveness so powerful it feels like you are reading a memoir about his first great love.”
—Thomas Beller, author of J.D. Salinger: The Escape Artist


“I wasn’t alive for the New York Thomas Pryor writes about, but thanks to his brilliant, honest, and hilarious book, I feel like I was there.”
—Dave Hill, comedian and author of Tasteful Nudes

Stoops to Nuts Sweeps Ryan's Daughter Off Her Feet

Colin Dempsey

Thank you, Michele Carlo, Abbi Crutchfield, Lincoln C. Chinnery, Walter Michael DeForest, Colin Dempsey, Eric Vetter, Jordan Okrend, Alex De Suze, Jessi Allen, James Redding, Fernando Morales González and Kenny Cooper for rocking the socks off a strong Yorkville crowd at Ryan's Daughter with story, comedy and song. Thank you, everyone who came out to root us on. My mother was Ryan's daughter before she got shanghied by the Pryors. It's a pleasure to come home to my Ryan family along with my charming talented friends. Next time, I won't forget to bring Glaser's Bake Shop's Sunday cake.

Walter DeForest

Lincoln Chinnery

Michele Carlo & Abbi Crutchfield

Eric Vetter & Alex DeSuze

The Summer Replacements

"Stoops to Nuts" will visit Ryan's four times a year starting next spring. A Yorkville neighborhood show right on time, right at home.

Here is a link to a larger group of photos on Facebook from last night's show.

My four Ryan girls gave five stars to  "I Hate the Dallas Cowboys- tales of a scrappy New York boyhood."  

Stoops to Nuts Welcomes Krusty TONIGHT @ Ryan's Daughter @ 7pm

"No Sir, not drunk, resting."

Krusty is down, but not out. He's near the 59th Street Bridge raising moolah to get his drink on tonight at the "Yorkville: Stoops to Nuts" Holiday Show @ Ryan's Daughter @ 12.4.14 @ 7pm. When the kids' favorite clown heard Michele Carlo, Abbi Crutchfield, Lincoln C. Chinnery, Walter Michael DeForest, Colin Dempsey, Eric Vetter and the Summer Replacements were going to be in the same place at the same time, well, Krusty near had a baby.


Yorkville: Stoops to Nuts" Holiday Show
TONIGHT Thurs, Dec 4th @ 7-10pm
Ryan's Daughter
350 East 85th Street
(bet. First and Second Avenue)
FREE show, free prizes

I'll sell and sign my Yorkville memoir, "I Hate the Dallas Cowboys- tales of a scrappy New York boyhood," at Ryan's. 

Murt the barkeep from Loftus Tavern has a few words. "I'll be in the back booth nursing my whiskey quieting down my lumbago.  Stop by and say hello, but if you start up with your shenanigans, pick ya window and I'll knock you through it."

"Brother, can you spare a dime?"

"Ahhhhhhhh"

"A nickel?"

"Don't leave me this way!"

"My Buddy."

Murt