Is there intelligent life in Rochester, NY?

Also, I hope you like Gennesse beer.

Also, I liked to pretend I am an astronaut in the winter.

Are you going to RIT or U of R? If I recall they both had decent college radio stations. The first place I ever heard the Fall and Sonic Youth, in fact! But this was late 80's so they must have changed since then. I haven't tuned them in the last few years.

There's actually a bunch of cool record stores. I've made some good vinyl scores there over the years. The one called Be-Bop or something like that is good. House of Guitars is great! Well, it used to be, but that's another one I haven't revisited in a few years. Back in the vinyl era it was insane. Stacks and stacks of records and cds overflowing into piles on the floor. Completely disorganized. It was the best record store I'd ever been to. It really is in a house! It's three stories. Records on two floors and musical instruments up top. You can still see the legendary Armand Schaubroeck and his brother (the owners) walking around the place.

Genny Cream Ale is cool. I wouldn't drink it year round, but I like it well enough when I'm in the area. I don't know if you have much of a sweet tooth, but there are some classic local purveyors of confections. Abbott's Custard is wonderful, total Rochester institution. This place called Cheesy Eddie's makes awesome cheesecake. Oh, and I don't know if you eat meat or not, but .... White Hots!!!! God I could go for one right now..

I've actually never been to the Bug Jar. Seems like they book a lot of cool shit, but there's never been anything going on when I've visited. If you're staying in town for the holidays, I'll look you up and we can go get shitfaced...

Ummm. . . meeeeaaaaat.

Anyway, if you don't cook you are still in luck because they have tons of tasty prepared stuff to eat. One of the stores even has its own fancy-ass restaurant with white tableclothes and a sommalier and shit.

Rochester also has some hard core Chameleons fans. One guy from the alternative radio station got them to come there of all places, on their last tour. Another one has a band called Dark Heart Alarm that is pretty good. Then there's an indie film guy who made a movie featuring some of their songs.

big fan

I guess Nick Tahou and his offspring had a falling out...

so the Garbage Plate that you get on Lyell can't be called a "garbage plate" ... it's just called "Nick T" or whatevah

the Lyell location is sort of depressing .. very drab

still love the town ... 'Black N Blue' + nice neweness on the scene -- Pittsford money, meets approval metrics

this thread would never have been necessary had jw met me already! alas. we ar eboth smarter and not in rochester now.

i never ated a garbage place. the site of it made me want to vomit.

It's very neighborhoody.

yup. i love those city neighborhoods. i spent a lot of time in them as a kid. i thought all cities were like that, this kind of urban ideal of family houses and apartment blocks altogether, with sidewalks everywhere, and parks all over the place. highland park is still one of my favorite urban parks.

xp: i had a garbage plate and i'm a vegetarian. it was like a civic hazing ritual. it was pretty good, i think.

my friend took this @ bay and goodman the otehr day

http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t189/kfinch11/untitled.jpg

high slacker quotient in the population. the slackerest guys i knew were from rochester.

leaving rochester was possibly the most productive thing i've ever done.

yeah i never wanted to stay there. but i like going back to visit. i haven't been in a few years, i might try this year.

the site of it!? haha!
xp to me upthread

highland park is still one of my favorite urban parks

Highland Park is unquestionably classic.

Also, frozen custard.

On the downside, the sky in that pic is color-correct for 240 days a year, give or take.

my dad is moving to rochester to take a job that will pay him 2 1/2 times what he's making now. i'm trying to give him advice on the best neighborhoods, good restaurants, museums and such but i only know about ithaca and the wine country and i only went to rochester twice i think? once for a make up/royal trux show and another time for drinking. i have no recollection of anything else about this town. what's good here beyond what has already been discussed? don't make me go to rochester yelp.

does he want to live in the city or is he more of a suburbs guy?

no idea what constitutes good eats in rochester these days. there's a whole lotta very mediocre italian food. musuems there aren't enough to bother with. i guess the memorial art gallery's ok.

tipsy's question is key. i haven't lived there in 2.5 years, but i'd say if in the city, maybe somewhere from the park ave. area out to pittsford? webster is a v v nice suburb. also i am forgetting... some place one of my profs lived that was right on the lake was GORGEOUS but very difficult to get to in a car in the winter.

there was one really good italian place whose name escapes me right now - it was on east ave. right near alexander. it rivaled some of the food i had in tuscany.

his job will be located in Irondequoit, if that's any help. i don't imagine he'll be living too far from there and in fact might live in that particular suburb. it's by the lake, right?

my dad grew up 2 blocks from wrigley field in chicago but has spent the past 40 years living in the burbs for the most past. i imagine that's more his style. tell me about the george eastman thing~

george eastman house is on east ave. it is perty. that is a really beautiful area to live if you wanna be downtown and have $ (at least for buying, though since moving to ny, everything in rochester would feel cheap to me). they have lots of films at eastman house. also eastman school of music (woo represent!) presents lots of free concerts! and eastman theater houses the rochester philharmonic and lots of other performing arts stuff. there is also an eastman dental school - apparently he was really weird and obsessive about dental health. is that what you mean about the 'george eastman' thing?

maybe irondequoit is where i was thinking of where that chick lived - it's by a bay. iirc, there are parts of it that are quite beautiful.

it was sad/cold being there but there are things i miss about it. george eastman house has a huge film archive and shows a film like every night. i went there a whole lot. also the public market on union st. mix of farmer's market and grocery distributors, also donuts, cheese, bakery stuff, fish. anything. two ethiopian restaurants that i thought were decent. mt. hope cemetery and highland park = fun. i would also like to know if he likes suburbs or city because i know very little about suburbs. pittsford, brighton, webster, as tehresa says? i think those were the "nice" ones.

xp all those things yeah

i don't know anything about irondequoit, except i went to irondequoit mall once (i think that's what it was called) and it was 80% abandoned.

oh god i miss the public market. i used to live across from mt. hope cemetery which was really nice but probably too many collegey types for your dad. highland park is teh best!

i lived in greece my last 6 months there. tell him NOT to live there.

i miss it a lot, other places i've been (recently columbus, baltimore) didn't have as cheap/huge markets like that. plus it's open all year if you like outdoor shopping when it's 0 degrees out. i know i do!

i haven't found a market in nyc to rival that market. i am usually really disappointed bc stuff at markets here is all expensive and fancy. yeah local/organic is good, etc., but you can't beat buying a shitload of fruit, veg, and pretty flowers to decorate your house for ≤$10 when you are poor like me.

2.5x whatever is going to go a long way in Rochester. I sometimes look up RE there just to torture myself. I'm more of a city guy so Park Ave/East Ave would be where it's at, but if he doesn't feel like commuting there are parts of Irondequoit that are beautiful.

Just tell him not to act like a tourist the first time he goes in a Wegmans...

but... wegmans is like a vacation to awesomeland!

wegman's is the shit, i do miss it. i told my dad at the very least i could advise him on weekend trips to ithaca because i lived there for 3 years.

i'm trying to think of restaurants but i really didn't go anywhere adults like to go.

ming's noodles, non-terrible, cheap chinese food
KC tea and noodles on park ave, good
a lot of meh pizza (i think pontillo's was good though)
some indian food in a strip mall, actually several different strip malls
used to be vegetarian places but they seem not to last long there
esan thai on park ave.
king and i thai in henrietta (good, but also in a strip mall)
greek food, can't remember exactly where
STREET MEAT lol

i am sooo helpful

omg wegman's!

oh what was that thai place on main? it was good. kind and i was also good. lol the street meat! i liked mex - good for groups and fun dinners, but it's not for 'connoisseurs'

there's also a really good korean market on mt. hope/15 right around the 490(390?) overpass

We stopped in my old college town about an hour outside Rochester last winter when driving back from Toronto. The one place I really wanted to go was Wegmans. I took a picture of the bulk candy section and sent it to a friend. <3 Wegmans.

i was thinking about stever's' dark chocolate orange peels the other day.

also: SPONGE CANDY

i lived in greece my last 6 months there. tell him NOT to live there.

yeah. my first job out of college was as a reporter for the greece weekly paper. there are some nice places by the lake there, but most of it is pretty awful. i don't know irondequoit that well but i think it's nicer than greece. it has more woods. plus it has the house of guitars.

HOG!

um, wasn't it the GREAT house of guitars???

hmmm website says great GREAT house of guitars!

http://www.houseofguitars.com/

Only restaurant you need is ABBOT'S FROZEN CUSTARD. Chocolate almond, plz.

NOM NOM NOM

rochester: a city of quality!

(r.i.p. midtown plaza. when i was about 4 i thought that clock was one of the cooler things in the world. they had a little tram there at christmas too.)

actually that's an edited version, focused on midtown. full film is here, here and here.

I only had a car for 2 months in Rochester so I am of little help.