Hello and welcome to the librarian is in the New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next.

I'm Frank.

And I'm Rhonda. Hello, Rhonda.

Hi, Frank. How's it going? It's good, I guess. You know, it's going well. I mean,

we're sort of both under construction. We've talked about before we came on. Like,

there's might be construction noise in the back, but. There may be a few drills and your apartment.

And my, I'm in the library because it's under renovation.

But that said, on the way here, my apartment building, which is half empty, a lot of doors were open

and there were workers like, you know, fixing up the apartments because they're empty.

Wow.

I've never seen so many vacancies.

And then the other thing, on the way here, my favorite coffee place, like a local family-run coffee place, after 10 years is leaving.

Oh, no.

Yeah.

I think when that happens.

Yeah.

He said, like, you know, he had a 10-year lease.

I just found out today. And he said, I guess it was perfect timing. The lease is up and retail is not doing so well as it used to be. They were doing like a two-for-one food thing. And, you know, so a lot of change, that we say. change the neighborhood is changing and you know my library is still closed

for the renovation reasons and

I look forward to

reopening it and I have some plans

for sort of a street side

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