Kio Stark thinks your grad school savings have better places to go. Like around the world.

In the middle of getting a PhD in American Studies, Kio Stark dropped out after she realized how much she could be learning on her own. Now, she’s one of the leading evangelists for independent learning and, perhaps ironically, an adjunct faculty  at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. She is the author of Don’t Go Back to School: A Handbook for Learning Almost Anything, featuring interviews with successful independent learners like Cory Doctorow, Dan Sinker, and Quinn Norton. We spoke to her about how to DIY grad school, the growing recognition of self-education and what it takes to get a really awesome job right now. Spoiler! It’s not that piece of paper. You know. That one.  (more…)

Shopping while drunk is not something we’d typically endorse here at Brokelyn, if only because it’ll empty your pockets faster than you can say, “How cute does this Bloody Mary look on me?” Plus, the next-day hangover is a two-parter, because you’ll be lucky if you’ve got the cash left to swing a Gatorade. The best way to prevent your vodka-buffered buyer’s remorse? How’s about some drunk deals? Shop, Drop, Drink is Williamsburg’s all-day answer to this weekend’s otherwise pious Passover/Easter holidays. This Saturday, 50 shops, bars and eating spots will offer storewide sales and special giveaways, including free mini ice cream sundaes from Mlik Bar, zombie makeovers (?!?) at 8 of Swords, and for the heartiest guzzlers, even more wine and whiskey at Brooklyn Oenology Winery’s in-store tastings. (more…)

Sergei's sound massage in action. Would this be considered infidelity?

I’ve only paid for a few massages in my life, but I know how they work. Walk into a softly-lit room, drop trow and wait on a cushioned table for a quiet healer’s oiled hands to pull back the sheet and hit play on a Pure Moods cassette. Then again, this is Brooklyn. A place where cartoonists will sharpen your pencils, the arteesenal way. And a massage can be a “massage performance” using sound waves instead of oiled-up palms.

This weekend at Issue Project Room downtown, Brooklyn-based electronic musician Sergei Tcherepnin is hooking up volunteers to his synthesizers via “magnetic transducers (like a speaker without a cone)” For a half hour, he’ll pump his music into your bod, and rather than hearing it, you will feel a “six-channel electronic composition.” All I really know is that it sounds cool, and I’m SIGNING UP.

It’s free, but they’re asking a suggested donation of $10. Get all the details, including RSVP info, on our Brooklyn events calendar.

Writers of both the realized and aspiring kinds know the sometimes torturous solitude that accompanies their star-crossed profession. Or at least, the torturous impulse to keep hitting refresh on their Facebook feeds. Brooklyn writers now have an affordable way to flee their desk distractions and break through writer’s block, without 8-week commitments or cultish memberships in groups that make you flash your pedigree card before joining. The New York Writers’ Coalition offers weekly pay-what-you-wish writing workshops [link fixed] every Wednesday afternoon (that’s today), right in the center of Literary Brooklyn — and Walt Whitman’s old stomping grounds — Fort Greene. Writers of any experience level and type are welcome, but sessions are capped at 25 participants so early arrival is encouraged. No sign-up is required. (more…)

Rachel and Sari from Hoax Zine are among the participants.

The air in Brooklyn has felt ultra heated this week. Between the mid-week’s mid-summer dream weather and the call to protest tv’s latest bastardization of an American sub-culture, my winterfied bones are all a-tingle again. And good thing, because the fiery magic continues tomorrow at Brooklyn’s first ever Feminist ZineFest. Writers, thinkers and artists will be converging on Brooklyn Commons to showcase their feminist works and overall radical bad-assery.

In case you thought zines were stuck in the 90s along with Portland and “The Rachel,” this event should help you remember why the smudged, error-strewn pages of a zine are the perfect tiny vessel for carrying big, wild ideas.  And whether your feelings on feminist zines are filled with a “my first time” level of nostalgia, or you’re still not certain what either means, this event offers ample opportunities for weighing the F-word on a different scale from the blogs and books you’re used to reading. (more…)

Lana Del Rey's got nothing on these guys: The spread at Brooklyn Strategist's temporary location.

Here’s your daily Jeopardy-style quiz: The last time you sat down to a rough-and-tumble game of Battleship. What is “Way too damn long ago?” My friend, that is correct. But a new game center in Carroll Gardens is hoping to change that. After a few months of temporary residency, the Brooklyn Strategist recently opened a set of permanent doors at 333 Court St. between Union and Sackett. Ten bucks buys you four hours of game time, in addition to a staff of gaming experts who can either be enlisted as challengers or strategy consultants. The club has 250 games including long-lost and out-of-print gems, newly favorited, and of course, classics from the bitter battles of family game nights. “You name it, we probably have it,” says the club’s owner Jon Freeman. (more…)

You can class up your V day drinking a bit while still saving money. Via istockphoto.

If all the Valentine’s Day talk by our lovable Brokelyn bros has made you believe that Feb. 14 is anything but a glittery, kitten-filled fuzzy-wuzzy hug to break you out of your mid-winter murk, I’m here to fix that. Now maybe we don’t all bow down to kittens, or share the same penchant for pastel hearts. Maybe rose petals dipped in chocolate and worn as a bra would be the kind of thing that would make most of us vomit in our mouths. But what if I told you I knew a way to get you out of the massacre you’re imagining will be Valentine’s Day 2012, and cooing like a newborn baby to boot? Get your arrow and your underpants out, you’re going drinking.

I had the pleasure of saddling up to the bars of my favorite Brooklyn drinking spots this week, where I asked the handymen and women calling the shots (and the pints) to share some tips for mixing up love potions like a broke pro. What they offered was even more generous — see, the season of love! — and I walked, er, stumbled, away with three cocktail recipes that are so cheap to make, even that broke-ass baby could swing one. (more…)

Ladies' night, and the feeling's right. Mo's photo via Yelp.

“Ladies Drink Free” sounds like the best idea on paper, but as some of us learn the hard way, it doesn’t always pan out. So I was jazzed to discover that Mo’s, one of Fort Greene’s oldest bars, holds weekly free drink hours for ladies. And they don’t involve tacky Spanish-speaking frogs or an unknowing pledge to dance in the window (the aforementioned ”hard way”).  The happy hour applies to cocktails only: 8-9pm on Wednesdays and 11pm-midnight on Friday and Saturday nights. The bar recently re-opened under new owners with a sleeker design, while still paying homage to its previous namesake (Moe’s). How did “Ladiesss niiiight!!!!” get left out of this?

If Brokelyn were a glossy print magazine, you would cut out your fave posts and put them on your bulletin board or locker door. But this is the internet, and what we lack in physical boards we’re making up for with Pinterest, the new site that’s a pretty, virtual pinboard for your favorite online finds. We skipped into the dreamboard party of Pinterest and set up our own page, armed with enough boozy articles and Brooklyn wit to undo the site’s gazillion polka-dotted bows. Here’s a one-sentence brief on why it’s worth checking out in: mucho content from our site, compiled into organized categories (boards) that you follow like a Twitter feed; paired with pickings from other sites on DIY tips and photo inspiration, to Brooklyn ridiculousness and all the stuff that’s so fresh, we can’t even bite into it here. Follow Brokelyn on Pinterest!

Wait! You can resell that jerk's stuff!

A new startup has a solution for dealing with your relationship’s baggage and making a few bucks while you’re at it. Never Liked it Anyway is an online marketplace specializing in the treasures (trash?) of past loves. People sell no-longer-wanted gifts from relationships past at a steep discount. Whereas traditional methods of retail therapy only seem to toss a person from one romantic hole into another financial one, this site is intended to dig you out of both. It doubles as a support group for the recently dumped, with member-generated tips for moving on and a forum for ranting.

It’s like an anonymous therapy session, made even better by the chance to turn your spiteful memories into cold cash. But if these four items are an indication of things to come, I hope more happy relationships end in 2012. (more…)