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  • Linda Troeller Found A Snake and Her Husband At The Chelsea

    Lt1 Art photographer Linda Troeller has lived at the Chelsea Hotel for 12 years.  The Chelsea and its quirky, creative residents have provided excellent subjects for Linda’s Hotel Chelsea: Inside Out project, which is garnering attention across the country and in Europe.  A film about Linda’s career as a photographer, much of it shot here at the Chelsea, is scheduled for release in 2007.

    Why did you decide to move into the Chelsea?
    I have a collector, Marion Schneider, who always stayed at the Chelsea Hotel when she visited my loft on 18th Street, so I thought the Hotel might be a good place to consider for a change since I was traveling so often for my photography assignments. I liked the idea to have my things protected and my mail kept for me.

    How did you score your apartment?
    Stanley showed me a ‘writer’s room on the 8th floor, 832, with a huge closet and to both our surprise Lt2 there was a caged snake inside!  He blushed and said he didn’t know it was there…”But don’t worry.” he said, “our staff will have the room perfectly clean for you.”

    I‘ve lived in two other rooms – 319, and presently on the 9th floor. From 832 I moved down to a balcony room, 319, where I enjoyed an art studio space. When the nightclub below, Serena’s got popular and noisy I wanted to move into the back of the hotel and just about that time a man who had occupied my room passed on after living there almost his whole life.  I have a wide and expansive panorama window view of the Hudson and it was where I saw one of one of the Twin Towers collapse.

    Lt3 Do you think there is a creative energy in the Chelsea?
    Yes. Perhaps seasons actually. Brooding, isolation and introspection in winter and in spring when the light flows more strongly down from the skylight, it adds radiance to our halls and drifts in the rooms. The attitude and ether is more buoyant, upbeat.

    How has living in the Chelsea affected your creative development?
    Lt4 The hotel provides a safe haven and artistic acceptance that allows me to work as though I might be attending an art colony. Living here is convenient for editors to stop by and has led to publication
    opportunities.

    My book Healing Waters, on spas and hot springs around the world, Aperture, and exhibition was edited in Room 832; and, Erotic Lives of Women with the Swiss publisher, Walter Keller, was planned Lt6 in 319. Marion Schneider, the writer/interviewer on that book and I created four shoots with women at the hotel. I also evolved my fashion portfolio here with C4, a Lt7 photo and model agency, active in the late 90’s in the hotel. A regular guest, Klaus Boehm, my collector from Germany, dreams up his creative
    projects , such as suggesting me to photograph the design Apolda Award catalogues and his own spa, Toskana Therme. recently praised in the NYT Travel section.

    What other creative people at the Chelsea or elsewhere have influenced your development?
    I was an assistant for the photographer, Ralph Gibson, who lived  at the Chelsea in the 60’s and was a photography teacher of  “Bookmaking” at the Ansel Adams Workshops in Yosemite. While working with him he radically shortened my Leica camera strap, that I had dangling long at my side.
    With the redesign I could quickly pull it out to my eye and it had proved useful for shooting my whole career.

    Who is the most famous person you’ve ever ridden with in the Chelsea elevator?
    Nina Hagen.

    What’s the worst/best thing that has ever happened to you at the Chelsea?
    The worst experience was when they were renovating the hotel’s façade. I had been away for a few weeks and returned after dark. I didn’t know why there was tape on the windows of my room so I opened the window for air in the middle of the night. I awoke with rusty dust on my face about 1/4 inch
    thick. It took some hours to hear back from the EPA whether I was exposed to too much dust. I learned that there was nothing I could do to help my lungs, except breathe fresh air. So, I went to the East River and rode my bike and haven’t had a problem.

    The best thing was the visit of my now husband, Lothar, who I met as my student in my photography class at the Salzburg Art Academy in Austria, 2000. I always told students if you ever come to NYC, look me up. He did. We went to photo openings and he offered to assist me when I was in Europe. Eventually it led to our engagement party at the Chelsea Hotel.

    How did you get interested in photography?
    My parents gave me the gift of a bus tour to the art museums of Europe when I graduated from high school. It was also my birthday season so they gave me a Minolta SLR with lenses. I took b/w photographs on my trip which started my interest. During college I was a student actress at Ghost Ranch Conference Center in New Mexico where Georgia O’Keeffe had a home. Every year she invited the students for a luncheon and on the wall I saw the Steigliz’s photographs and was enthralled. Later that summer the director of the play gave me his Rollei 2 1/4 camera to take photographs of the
    plays and I fell in love with the drama in the viewfinder. I went back to college and changed my major to the School of Journalism so I could take photography courses and got my MFA in Photography from Syracuse University.

    Tell us about your Chelsea Hotel book and other projects that you are currently working on?
    I was introduced by the bellhop, Timur to Alexander McQueen, the fashion designer from London.  He Lt8 came to my room and saw my Healing Waters prints and immediately invited me to be among press to shoot his fashion show that night. I returned to the hotel with my camera on my shoulder and a couple in the lobby started up a conversation discussing if I would photograph them. From then on it seemed natural to photograph my life in the hotel. I made portraits of guests and residents in my studio and in their apartments.

    In 2000 Stanley Bard had seen my photo books and approached me to take interiors of some of the apartments toward a book that would feature my art photographs and his memoir. We created a proposal and approached publishers with an agent but that book idea didn’t connect with the
    publishers.

    I have been evolving my hotel images since 1994 and have two upcoming presentations this fall on the project: Hotel Chelsea:InsideOut. They are for the Society for Education Conference, Oct 29, at Lt5_1 Metropolitan College, Omaha, Nebraska, "Scanning the Horizon: social, natural, and political landscapes”, and on Nov 11, at Orange County College, Ca. in "Conflict (cultural, interpersonal, political, psychological, spiritual), http://www.spewest.org. Three of these Hotel Chelsea photographs are on view in Arles, France and for which I won the juror’s prize selection.

    Tell us about the film to come out in 2007?
    Winnipeg Genie nominated filmmaker, Jeff McKay, received a Manitoba Arts Council grant to make,  Linda Troeller, A Photographer¹s Portrait. The documentary is a one-hour profile on my photo career. Jeff and his wife, Ruthie, came and stayed in the hotel last summer in the room next to mine
    and filmed me creating shoots and portraits with residents Victor Borckis, a writer; Joseph O;Neill, writer and Sally Singer, Fashion Director at Vogue;  David Linter, screenwriter; and Robert Lambert, painter, among others.

    What other photo projects do you have?
    I will have a revival exhibition and lecture at Ryerson University, Toronto of my TB-AIDS DIARY photo collages, which were first shown in early the 1990’s in New York, Havana, Helsinki, Paris among other
    Lt10 locations. This show was created in 1987 to address issues of stigma by comparing the response to TB patients in the 1930’s to AIDS sufferer’s today. I was using TB as a metaphor for the stigma surrounding contagious disease and treating it primarily as a historical artifact. Over the last
    few years we have witnessed not only the rapid increase of AIDS worldwide, but also the activation of TB in the homeless, drug users, and now the vast increase in AIDS patients. The project has been shown around the world, translated into fourteen languages and I won Women of Acheivement, Douglass College/NJSFWC.

  • Plastic Fantastic Bohemia

    I can’t believe they didn’t consult us!  The NY Times comes out with a whole issue of their magazine about Bohemia, and there is no mention of the Chelsea.  And we are, after all, the Last Outpost of 10boho120BohemiaTM.  There’s something rotten going on here.  The very first thing I noticed is that the issue contradicts itself: First there’s a piece about how bohemia has disappeared from Manhattan – migrating to various places in Brooklyn – and then there two big photo spreads about all the oh so cool “Bohemians” in Manhattan. Can’t they profile some bohemians, and talk about some cool boutiques in Brooklyn ?

    But the answer is obvious: Manhattan is where the money is! All the bohemians in the magazine are young, rich kids; they don’t have to worry about the rising rents that have sent so many writers and artists scurrying to Brooklyn. Bohemia is here defined in terms of youth and privilege. Old bohemians are simply bores, I suppose, scarcely worthy of a mention.

    Of course, Bohemia needs the young, but it needs older people as well. That’s part of the meaning oNytimesbohf Bohemia: It’s a cross pollination among generations. Hence the title of this blog, Living with Legends: our elders, and even the dead, walk beside us and guide our efforts. Bohemians hanging out at Marc Jacobs! And oh my, aren’t they photogenic! The Times presents a sterile plastic vision of Bohemia.  (Ed Hamilton)
    (Thanks to S. Mazzocchi for demanding that we write about this. She also wants the readers in Kansas to know that Danny Meyer’s Shake Shack is dirty. )

  • Viral Insanity of Chelsea Claims Yet Another Victim.

    Willie Nelson – who never lived in the Chelsea as far as I know – is releasing a new album, titled Willryan Songbird.  The album is produced, however, by former Chelseaite Ryan Adams, and contains a song, “Blue Hotel,” which Ryan wrote for Willie. on Oct. 31st of this year.

    Ryan was our neighbor when we lived on another floor back in the 90s.  We didn’t talk to him much, and he mostly just stayed in his room.  Only rarely did I ever hear his guitar. But there was someone living above us at that time who insisted on playing The Willie Nelson Christmas Album over and over ad nauseum at high volume with his window open.  I always wondered if this maddening experience influenced Ryan’s musical development in anyway.  And now I know.  (Ed Hamilton)

  • Change Your Lock Now!

    Room531key If you live in 531 you may want to change your lock.  A vintage version of the key to room 531 is for sell on e-bay. The bidding starts at 9.99. 

  • All Tomorrow’s Parties: September 11 – 17, 2006

    Monday, Sept. 11,  11:00 – 12:00
    Tribeca Radio.net will be broadcasting live today and we’ll be the guests on Gerald Busby’s show from 11:00 to 11:30.  We hope he doesn’t ask us any difficult questions like whether or not we think the Chelsea Hotel has a creative energy.  Tune in to hear us stutter.  From 11:30 to 12:00 he’ll be interviewing German composer Cord Meijering.

    Tuesday, Sept. 12, 10:30 p.m.
    Susanne Bartsch and Kenny Kenny invite you to Happy Valley Tuesdays. Last Nights Party and Gazelle Land magazine launch. SHOW: Kenny Kenny’s singing debut, "STILETTO KICKBACK" Hosts: Miranda Moondust, Kim Aviance, Astro, Theodora Ladyfag, Charley & Amanda Lepore.
    14 East 27th St. NY NY

    Wednesday, Sept. 13, 8pm to late
    One of our neighbors keeps promising to show us around Red Hook and now we finally have a reason tSjoneso go. Edie Sedgwick/Hotel Chelsea fan and struggling young artist, Shena Jones has a show up at Jalopy. (Jalopy is a new contemporary gallery with many services such as instrument sales and repairs, espresso, and live music.) The art show, which opened on Saturday is up all month, includes portraits of Stanley Kubrick and Iggy Pop, and self-portraits from inside the Hotel. Jalopy, 315 Columbia St., Red Hook, Brooklyn

    Friday, Sept. 15, 6:00 – 8:00 p.m.
    Join Kevin Fitzpatrick at New York City’s other literary hotel as he kicks off Parkerfest 2006. Cash bar.
    The Algonquin Hotel, 59 West 44th St., NY NY

    Saturday, Sept. 16, 11:00 a.m.
    Sherill Tippins (she’s writing a history of the Chelsea Hotel) will be giving a talk about "February Febhouse House," after which several actors will read excerpts from the works of some of the February House residents–Carson McCullers, W.H.Auden, GypsyRose Lee and Richard Wright.   Sherill previously told us that she’s mainly writing about famous people who have lived at the Chelsea. So, don’t miss this chance to go and introduce yourself and make sure that you get in her book. Otherwise we’ll have to demand that the publisher release a second volume.
    Brooklyn Borough Hall and Plaza,

    Saturday & Sunday, Sept. 16 & 17, 5:00 p.m.
    Short films by Harry Smith.  Saturday’s schedule includes EARLY ABSTRACTIONS (1941-57, 23 minutes); MIRROR ANIMATIONS (1957, 4 minutes); LATE SUPERIMPOSITIONS (1964, 28 minutes)
    OZ, THE TIN WOODMAN’S DREAM (1967, 15 minutes). On Sunday, NO. 12 Heaven and Earth Magic screens.
    Anthology Film Archives, 32 2nd Avenue NY, NY

    If you have a relevant event you want added to "All Tomorrow’s Parties," e-mail chelblog@yahoo.com

  • Hotel Potty Humor

    Another Sunday, and time once again to pat ourselves on the back for being the very first hotel blog Gershwin and for being even remotely interesting to boot.  Now, however, we’re pleased to announce that the field of hotel humor bloggin appears to be entering its golden age, with sites springing up like shit-house mushrooms. 
    The sites include:

    Hotel Bed Jumping —  Pictures and videos of hotel mattress abuse.

    Hotel Bed Headquarters – Pictures of beds overloaded with too many pillows, and mattress brands you’ve never heard of used by various hotels around the world.

    Hotel Bathrooms Exposed – Out favorite by far: hotel bathroom throne humor.

    Why do these sites succeed where others just bore you to death?  Maybe because they are non-corporate.  Hotel Bathroom Exposed founder, Chris Clarke, recently wrote to us and shared his secret:

    I’ve been a fan of your Chelseablog for a long time now. Actually it’s your work that got me thinking about hotel-trade blogging in the first place about six months ago. I’ve been trying to develop a style that is different from the "regular" hotel press and see where it takes me.

    

    How’s that for making your mark on the blogosphere?  Now all we need is a merger and a blog to book deal: The Best of Chelsea Hotel Potty Humor.  (Photo: Some guy destroying a matress at the rival faux art hotel, The Gershwin.)
    

    

    


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    Miss Amelia Invites You…
    



    

    

    

    



    The MsameliaCountess and the C.U.N.T. Rock Revolution is performing on Sat. @ Mo’Pitkins on Ave A between 2nd and 3rd @ "11" (Really means midnight). That is a Punk-rock-opera-cabaret band I sing/dance/perform with.  I think it’s $10.  Go over to myspace to listen to some of their awesome music.
    

    Plus, tomorrow, September 10th, tickets go on sale for the new Twyla Tharp/Bob Dylan musical, THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN’.  The box office will open at 10 a.m. at Broadway’s Brooks Atkinson Theatre (256 W. 47th Street, between Broadway and 8th Ave.)  The first 250 people on line will get a free copy of Bob Dylan’s new CD, Modern Times. Dylan’s first CD in five years is being called "A Masterwork!" by Rolling Stone.
    

    


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    Chelsea Mystery Lunatic
    



    

    

    

    



    In his memoir, SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME, David Goodwillie describes a ChelGood_2sea character, but we can’t for the life of us figure out who it could be.  Below is the excerpt. Any guesses as to who the cigar smoking man who walks into rooms with closed doors might be?
    

    Here he is again, the man from across the hall.  He doesn’t care that my door was closed, that I was working, or trying to.  He comes in, takes a seat in the corner, and produces a cigar from the depths of his crumpled jacket.  It’s one of those skinny hybrid cigars, the type smoked by street kids and men who no longer fit in the world.  He rolls the thing around in his fingers, then lights it and sighs.  
    

    “I’m here to save you,” he says.  
    

    He says the same thing every time.  He talks without breathing, streams of words rushing past thoughts.  Today it’s Edie Sedgwick and the fire.  It was candles, he tells me, candles and coke and too much confusion.  He says he was here in the hotel that night and I believe him.  The names are what get me, so many famous names that I wonder if he ever knew anyone ordinary.  Back when he knew people.  
    

    Arnold at the front desk laughed when I asked about him.  Said he’s some kind of writer, been here almost 40 years, one of their permanent transients.  He’d been a talent once, a voice of his generation and all that.  There were a few published stories in the sixties, heady comparisons, soft fame, but then a book deal went wrong, addictions emerged, and the spotlight moved on.  The requisite poetry came next, bitter and unreadable, and then nothing.  Two decades of silence.  For a while, in the mid-eighties, he’d started work on a new book, a history of everything left unsaid. But then his wife left him for a banker and he withdrew again, became the Joe Gould of 23rd Street—a sad loner spinning tales that never were. Arnold said I shouldn’t listen. 
    

                But I can’t help it.  The man looks past me out the window and speaks of ghosts. Heroes of that New York.  Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan, William Burroughs and toothless Gregory Corso.  He was here the night Sid stabbed Nancy, the night Mapplethorpe met Patti Smith.  Leaning forward he describes Edie’s skin, how the pills made it pale, how all that speed had her running in circles.  He talks with his hands, conducts a symphony with every sentence, and when he’s done, when the only story left to tell is his own, he gets up, looks solemnly at the pages piled on my desk, and walks out.
    

    Goodwillie lived here in the early 00s, so this would have to be someone we all know.  Any guesses?  {Remember that certain identifying characterisics may have been changed.}  By the way, Mapplethorpe didn’t meet Patti Smith at the Chelsea.  And even more importantly, what the hell is a "permanent transient." 
    

    


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    A Punk Lourdes: Bruno Wizard on Dee Dee Ramone, The Chelsea, and Early Punk Rock
    



    

    

    

    



    At last wBrunoed_1e get a real rock star in this hotel! Bruno Wizard, singer and songwriter for the seminal 70s punk band The Rejects, and later for The Homosexuals, checked into the room right next to us last weekend.  Abandoning our usual rule of making people write these answers out, we interviewed him in person last Sunday afternoon.  Bruno is tall and thin, youthful for his age, and, inkeeping with his rock star image, he wore a red polkadot shirt and a snazzy blue plaid blazer.  He talks pretty much non-stop, and is very engaging, so hopefully I was able to take notes fast enough to do justice to his words.
    

    

    What do you do? Along with Anton Hayman, I sing, write, and co-produce The Homosexuals, a Antonbrunoband that Anton and I put together in 1977-78. We recently gave our first performance in 20 years at  London’s Madame Jo Jo’s, which used to be a glam bar for transvestites—though not all gay transvestites. It’s more for the old type of transvestites, who may be bikers, mailmen, what have you, men who like to dress up in women’s cloths and go out on the weekend. It’s now one of the hippest glam, rock, indie, electro, tranny, fetish, trisexual club hangouts in London. 
    

    Why did you change the name of your band? I lived through the 60s and I saw how the establishment pulled the teeth out of that revolution. In 1976 I was 26 and I saw the same thing happening all over again to Punk. The Rejects were opening for bands like The Adverts and The Damned, but these bands were all selling out. (The Rejects opened also for Generation X, complete with Billy Idol, who were managed at the time by another Hotel Chelsea resident Norman Gosney. We also opened for X-Ray Spex and The Jam.) Once again the Holy Grail turned out to be a replica. The Rejects were like dropping the bomb, but there was nobody there with me. We weren’t exactly as clear-thinking as we are now, but I think calling the band The Homosexuals was a way of saying to the record companies: we’re not ready to deal, you have nothing to offer us. They want to fuck me in the front, fuck me in the back, and then take my money for doing it. Back then it was more of a reactionary thing, a way of keeping these people away, whereas now it’s more of a conscious artistic decision. 
    When did you live at the Chelsea? 
    I lived here in the early 90s, when Dee Dee Ramone was here. I was bringing designer clothes over from London, and so I lived here off and on, maintaining an apartment here with my girlfriend, traveling back and forth between New York and London. Since then, I’ve been back several times, and I always stay at the Chelsea. (Even before my stay in the Nineties, I used to sneak into rooms with an Italian girlfriend of mine in 1986/87.) 
    

    How has the Chelsea changed over the years? I haven’t been here long enough this time, but I would say in general that over the years it’s remained the same, with the same mix of characters, though the individuals have changed. Dee Dee is gone, but you might meet someone on the lift and say, oh, he’s carrying the energy of Dee Dee. I see the Chelsea as a metaphor for life itself, society in rarefied microcosm.  Whilst there is nothing NEW under the sun, at the same time EVERYTHING changes! 
    

    Can you tell us any stories about Dee Dee Ramone? Dee Dee was the instigator and the driving force of the Ramones. When punk kicked off in London, one of its crystallizing moments was when the Ramones played the Roundhouse. Punk was to sweep away anything to do with the hippies, and the Roundhouse was a symbol of the hippies. Just to see that gig was a momentous experience for me. When I got to know Dee Dee later, he came to stay with me in London. I took him out to the Rave clubs, and it was amazing to see how all the DJs worshiped him and bowed down to him, dropping all pretense, because even though it was part of their thing to say that his music was for old people, they realized what an enormous influence it had had on them. I knew Dee Dee when he had cleaned up, and that’s why he liked hanging out with me, because he knew I wouldn’t be whipping out some cocaine or something and saying, hey come on Dee Dee, let’s do a line. 
    

    One time we went to a party with the Hell’s Angels at a club called the Lions Den. Dee Dee was like a God to them because of his reputation for fast living. He was trying to stay sober, but he was worried about letting them down. He was nervous because he thought they’d kill him, saying, ah we’re doing you a favor Dee Dee, you’ve gone soft. (They were very respectful to Dee Dee but he was somewhat overwhelmed by their perception of him as a fast living hellraiser etc. which was entirely understandable.) It was OK at first because nobody much was there. But then all these bikes roared up and they all surrounded Dee Dee and he disappeared into a sea of leather and beards and beer bellies and nose hair. It wasn’t until much later that night that I saw him again, and, well, the rest goes without saying. 
    

    Another time, I was in Stanley Bard’s office—it’s like being called into the headmaster’s office—for not paying the rent. I remember him saying, “I’m gonna change the lock,” but he always said dramatic things like that and I knew he wouldn’t do it. But right when he said that, I looked out the window and something came crashing down onto the pavement. Oh my God, I said, and I ran out to see what it was. At that moment I ran into Dee Dee coming back into the hotel, his face white as a ghost. This was right at the time he was trying to quit using drugs, and he had just worked up the courage to go out after staying locked in his room for several days. What had happened was that a woman had thrown herself from a window on the 9th floor. The operator had called her and said she had to check out, and she had said, “I’ll be right down.” And it was right at that moment that Dee Dee stepped out of the hotel. [Editor’s note: You wouldn’t believe it if it was somebody else, but that was just the sort of thing that always happened to Dee Dee.] 
    

    Dee Dee was very sensitive and struggled to find meaning in his life. At the time he was asking himself, can I live my life without drugs? Music was central to his being. He was a blues purist, but neither the other Ramones, nor his fans, wanted him to deviate from the kind of music he was famous for. 
    

    What about Sid and Nancy? I didn’t know them at the Chelsea, but I knew them in Britain. When I met Sid I already saw The Sex Pistols as being like The Beatles. Replacing Glen Matlock on bass with Sid was like replacing Paul McCartney with George Bush — in the sense that it was a political move on the part of McLaren, Machiavellian in the sense that Sid was an intended sacrifice to the God Of Mammon, and that Sid like Bush had somebody else’s fist up his arse working his tonsils!!! Malcolm McLaren didn’t care if Sid could play bass, and he didn’t care if he died. He hired Sid because of his excess, knowing he’d kill himself. Sid was a blood sacrifice and McLaren knew it. Sid was a necessary sacrifice so they could all become millionaires. Sid was a poor innocent boy, clueless and not too bright. I knew him, but not to talk to him. He was always passed out in the toilet of some club. Who would want to talk to somebody like that? 
    

    We have a question that we always ask everybody… 8 inches and thick. 
    

    No, that wasn’t it. Or, actually, maybe that is a pretty good answer. The question is, Do you think the Chelsea has a special creative energy? 
    It is unique, there’s no denying that. But you can’t say that the building has an energy in it’s own right. Without the people who live here it’s just bricks and mortar. It’s the people who are the spirit of the Chelsea. They
    
are already creative when they come here. Some people don’t see that: they think that if they stay at the Chelsea they will become great artists, like making a pilgrimage to some kind of Punk Lourdes. Editor’s note: before the interview began, Bruno told us that people in Europe see the Chelsea more in terms of popular culture, as a center for the exchange and dissemination of ideas, where different art forms can come together and cross pollinate and form movements. New Yorkers, he argued, only see the Chelsea in terms of their own personal interests. 
    |Bruno_1
    Why does Stanley Bard call you Borris? He resists the fact that I am the spiritual owner for the Chelsea. Actually, I don’t know. He just got it in his head one time, and then he can’t get it out. 
    

    The Homosexuals have a new CD coming out in the next few months. In the meantime you can buy their 3 CD set, Astral Glamour online at www.hyped2death.com and at many places around town, including Other Music on East 4th St.  Bruno’s jacket is from KoKon 2 Zai of London. 
    (Photo: Bruno by Hiroya’s Dee Dee Ramone painting.)
    

    


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    Chelsea Hotel Is Like An Old Rolling Stones T-Shirt
    



    

    

    

    



    We’re tired of all of those people on tripadvisor.com bad-mouthing us so we decided to check DrawerYelp.com.  That’s where the young people post their reviews of the Chelsea.  
        A tourist named Jay Chan H. stayed here recently at the rock bottom price of $195.00 a night.  "Everything is tired and worn," he says, "unlike the pictures on the official Chelsea Hotel website."  
        Actually, though, Jay seems to have had a pretty good time. He got to read some poetry scrawled in the drawers of his furniture, and was entertained by a crack-smoking nut job whose room smelled of pee.  (A long-term resident, he says.  Who could this be? Another Chelsea mystery.) We too are entertained daily in a similar fashion.
         Jay compares the Chelsea to an old Rolling Stones T-shirt that you just can’t bring yourself to throw out. Actually, Jay, it’s a Ramones shirt.  (Ed Hamilton)