Sometimes just knowing about the all-night places in this city is as good as actually going to them. After all, the presence of 24-hour services affirms that "city that never sleeps" supremacy thing that seizes so many New Yorkers, anxious to justify high rents and tiny apartments to buddies in Tulsa, or seeking something to do at 4:30 a.m.
photo: Kate Lacey
Ice age: the sky rink at Chelsea Piers
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For those 4 a.m. document-translation emergencies, call on ALL-LANGUAGE SERVICES(77 West 55th Street, 212-986-1688), where a 24-hour staff is on hand to translate English into 59 different languages or vice versa. Translation is immediately available for frequently requested languages, such as Spanish or German; you may experience a wait for others, like Tagalog, Armenian, or Swahili.
Run, lift, and squat in the middle of the night at the 24-hour branch of CRUNCH on Lafayette Street. (404 Lafayette Street, 212-614-0120, crunch.com) while your friends and neighbors are at home "sleeping" or "having sex." The gym closes for just a few hours before midnight on Saturday and Sunday and reopens in time for early-morning techno remixes.
The only fully operational 24-hour spa in the city, JUVENEX (25 West 32nd Street, fifth floor, 646-733-1330, juvenexspa.com) specializes in "purification" services. Most mysterious menu item: the "gyno spa cure," described as an "ancient remedy that Asian cultures have known for centuries." Right.
ACCIDENTAL CDS, RECORDS AND TAPES (131 Avenue A, 212-995-2224) is open 24 hours to satisfy the urges of bargain-entertainment hunters, or perhaps to reel in the hordes of drunk passersby on Avenue A. Where else can you browse at any hour, with intoxicated determination, through aged VHS workout videos, crusty cassettes, and Wham! CDs you will never play? Here, you are a hunter; the crap you desire for ironic purposes or kitsch value, your prey.
You can't show up and go ice skating any old time you feel like it, but the SKY RINK AT CHELSEA PIERS (23rd Street and the Hudson River, 212-336-6100, chelseapiers.com) is always open. There are at least six hours of general skating every day, while the other 18 hours are devoted to showcases and hockey games, which anyone can attend. The rink is also available for private parties, in case you want to plan some sort of weird midnight Ice-Capades-orgy thing.
Perpetually connecting hipsters with Marlboros and falafel, the freshly renovated ANYTIME (93 North 6th Street, Brooklyn, 718-218-7272, anytimeny.com) is the only eatery in Williamsburg and Greenpoint that delivers beer until 4 a.m., and reasonably priced snacks and cigarettes 24 hours.
