Oh... yes! Photo courtesy of Frankie's Spuntino.

There’s a giveaway at Frankies Spuntino, but sadly, it isn’t a 7-course “Foodie’s Dream Threesome” with messieurs Castronovo and Falcinelli. The Carroll Gardens Patch reports that Sweet ‘N’ Low (based in the Navy Yards) is giving away dinner for eight to a Brooklyn couple married for an increment of five years (heh?) with the best love story. From the Patch:

Couples who will have been married for 5, 15, 25… (you get the idea) years in 2012 are asked to submit their love story in 300 words or less with a photograph to:Sweet Celebration
c/o Kellen Company
355 Lexington Ave, 15th Fl
New York, NY 10017

The deadline is Feb. 24, and you can get the complete details on the Sweet ‘N’ Low Facebook page. A winner will be chosen on February 29.

So why might you have to actually print out and mail your stuff in? Just a hunch that the saccharin company is hoping for some cute old Brooklyn couple that’s been married since Sweet ‘N’ Low was invented in 1957. This is only a theory, but anyway we’re pretty sure your hookup last weekend won’t cut it.

[via Carroll Gardens Patch]

A humble little slice of the Catskills dream: 576 feet, 3 acres, $54,900.

This we did not know until we were turned on to the addictive new real estate blog Upstater, which has a weekly budget-friendly house roundup called Five-Figure Fridays, featuring rock-bottom Catskills properties. To be sure, not all are beauts, but there are some cute finds. In the latest FFF roundup, “at least three of them seemed inhabitable,” Upstater writes. “A couple of them could probably transform into something closer to adorable with a little love.” The favorite: a 576-foot cottage on three acres of land.

Upstater was launched in April  by former Brownstoner writer Lisa Selin Davis, who lives in a rent-stabilized apartment in Park Slope and swaps a  bedroom with her brother up in Tivoli. Since she’s perpetually in search of her own pad, we asked Davis where the deals are north of NYC. She told Brokelyn that Sullivan, Greene and Delaware counties are cheaper than Columbia, Dutchess and Ulster Counties. What if $100K is still too much? Try a bungalow:

If you want a serious deal, then, yes, a bungalow is the way to go. We’ve covered bungalows for sale for $6,000! The most expensive one we’ve seen is $59,000. There are annual co-op fees–usually less than $,2000–and most places have a pool and some other communal facilities. They’re vacation houses, three-season places, so you can’t get a mortgage on them. And, of course, you can’t use them in winter, unless you want to “camp” in them. Here’s a sample.

Hmmm… no interiors? Upstater also has winter Catskills rentals that you could split with some friends (this Hopewell Junction place is adorbs) as well as a handy blog item on half-off ski lift tickets at Plattekill, but you may have to use these.

Ghenet means "Yes, I'll sleep with you but not until you wash your hands" in Ethiopian. Photo by Serious Eats.

Dear Serious Eats web site, we hate slideshows, unless they’re celebrity plastic surgery photos. Love, Brokelyn.
Formatting quibbles aside, check out Serious Eats’ list of 10 modestly priced Valentine’s Day restaurants, which include three in Brooklyn (Olea, Cafe Moto and the “sensually” utensil-free Ghenet). There’s also one in Staten Island (the ferry’s romantic, even if mac and cheese isn’t.) Down at Broketown HQ, we’ve been debating the merits of acknowledging Valentine’s Day at all, with single dudes some of us staunchly opposed and married breeders others looking for any excuse to break out the bubbly and cupid-festooned Joe Boxers… ROAR! Whatever your plans (we’re actually curious, so feel free to pipe in), these places seem worth a visit at some point. Or are you single dudes down on restaurants altogether these days? [via Serious Eats]

Apparently, they haven't heard of Fox's.

So there’s this site called Xpatulator that runs cost of living comparisons of the 950 cities/regions worldwide where someone might move to from somewhere else. They just came out with a worldwide cost of living report, and there is one especially curious data point about Brooklyn.

Our borough is not only home to the Man Bun, but the world’s fifth most expensive place for clothing. It is pricier to buy clothes only in Minsk, Manhattan, Belarus (all areas) and Sao Paolo. Paris is #39. London is #82. Moscow, where they wear fur socks and underwear (don’t they?)  is #21. And sorry, Giorgio, lowly Milan is way down there at #264.

Clothing on Xpatulator is described as “clothing and footwear products, business suits, casual clothing, childrens clothing and footwear, coats and hats, evening wear, shoe repairs, and underwear.” Sounds reasonable enough. But how is this possible?

Brooklyn of the Kurt Cobain sweaters and stoop-sale jeans? We have gobs of Bobby’s, Cookies, Rainbows, all of Church Avenue, and those places with the pink bags (not Conran’s, but… help us out… Conway). But there’s only one Barneys — and it’s a Coop. The J. Crew creative director lives here, but she’s selling her place. Is there a boutique in Bay Ridge selling diamond-encrusted thongs that we don’t know about?

We wrote to the site for clarification, but their offices are in Cyprus. (Maybe they’re factoring travel time to Hayden Harnett?)

In the meantime, here’s a link to Xpatulator’s overall cost of living index for Brooklyn, and our rankings in other categories below. At least our subways count for something:

Overall Cost of Living rank: 29
Clothing: 5
Restaurants, Meals Out and Hotel: 11
Personal care: 27
Furniture and appliances: 34
Household accomodation: 37
Recreation and culture: 37
Food: 39
Alcohol & Tobacco costs: 60
Education: 102
Healthcare: 142
Communications: 350
Transportation: 388

Also, Brooklyn’s overall hardship ranking is only 10 percent, which is relative good news. But don’t they know SOUTHPAW IS CLOSING?

Jodi Kantor, Timeswoman, Obama profiler and journalistic dreamboat.

Have you ever seen those “Reasons to Love New York” year-end issues of New York Magazine, where they distill the year’s happenings into truths about the city and everyone feels warm, fuzzy and smart at the same time? Stay with us — here’s a “Reason to Love Brooklyn” (not this one.): When the local synagogue has an author’s night, the speakers are the novelist behind a Best Picture-nominated movie and the writer of a scandalicious White House tome. Yep, Jonathan Safran Foer (Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close) will grill Jodi Kantor (The Obamas) about her buzzy new book in Park Slope next week, and it’s totally free. Should be interesting.

Jonathan Safran Foer interviews Jodi Kantor, Thursday Feb. 2 at 7:30 p.m., Congregation Beth Elohim, Eighth Avenue at Garfield Place, Park Slope, RSVP with Lauren Shenkman, (718) 768-3814 ext. 242, or email her at lshenkman [at] cbebk.org

If you see this man in Brooklyn, please tell us!

When you get together some friends at a coffee shop and shoot a video, interesting things happen. As of this writing, 24k people have watched Brokelandia, our sendup of the Brooklyn food scene and homage to the hit show Portlandia. Many said nice things on Twitter and Facebook (thanks!), including New York Times national editor Sam Sifton (“These people are real”) and the folks from Portlandia, who put it on their Facebook page (thanks!). Some people didn’t like Brokelandia,  including Gothamist commenters and a Portland Mercury blogger named WM. Steve Humphrey (pictured here). Humphrey cited three reasons he wanted to “kill everyone and everything associated with this project.” Whoa, even the baby?

It’s possible — and this is someone with a showbizzy little TM symbol next to the WM. in his name  – that he’s working the “cranky blogger” angle to land some kind of Portlandia cameo, but we just wanted to issue a formal threat alert (level: sparkly rainbow) in case you don’t see a blog post from us for a while, or if suddenly you see lots of stories about golf shirts. Please be on guard if you see a blondish dude with a menacing grin busting out the fosse moves. That hand might not be his.