Archive for the ‘Astoria’ Category
company graveyard
Home, home on the range, where the deer and the photographers play.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Great excitement abounds in a humble narrator due to the recent purchase of a new lens. The equipment in question is the Sigma 18-35 F 1.8 DS, which is magical for both its sharpness and ability to drink in light. The shot above was captured at 3 in the morning, for instance, while it was raining. Normally, this is an easy shot to pull off when the camera is on a tripod and I can leave the shutter open for a second and a half or so, but this one was shot handheld.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve been the happy owner of one particularly good lens, manufactured by Canon, which the vast majority of shots that have run here in the last couple of years have been captured with. Problem is that it is a “daytime” lens as its widest aperture is f4. For those unfamiliar with the nitty gritty of photography, the f stop represents the size of the hole which the lens can make for light traveling to the sensor. Wider the aperture is the more light you get, but that comes with an increase of “depth of field” which renders the plane of focus very narrow. I can focus on your eyes at a wide aperture, but the tip of your nose may be blurry, for instance. Not so with this new sigma.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Accordingly, I’ve been making it a point of shooting everything I come across in the name of testing the new unit out, which has also coincided with an August resolution to try and spend a lot more time in Astoria than has been the case in recent months. Friends, group affiliations, and work take me to Brooklyn on a regular basis. Unfortunately, this means that I spend a lot of my time there, and do a lot of my shooting there. My focal point has been, and will continue to be in Queens, which needs far more attention paid to it than North Brooklyn which can take care of itself just fine. I intend to live up to that statement in the coming months, and spend a lot more of my time here.
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
obstructing surface
Astoria, land that I love, stand beside her…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Generally speaking, your humble narrator is a misanthrope, avoiding the company of other people. When I say I’m a street photographer, I mean that I literally like taking pictures of unpopulated streets. People tend to clutter up my shots and are best avoided. Other people who describe themselves as “street photographer” focus in on the humans as they scurry about the hive and make trouble for themselves, whereas I’m a bit more interested in the hive itself. Still, in the name of breaking things up and “doing the opposite,” every now and then I wave the camera around at folks to see what I might get.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Pictured above is the bland homogeneity of a street fair imposed on the vibrant diversity of Astoria the other day. These street fairs are traveling corporate circuses, selling foodstuffs which the Mayor would probably attempt to outlaw for the amount of fat and salt they distribute to the unsuspecting Astorians who so desperately need the dietary guidance of the oligarchs and elites of Manhattan. I remember when the current form of these events took shape back in the 1990’s- with the “as seen on TV” products, sunglass vendors, and mozzarepa stalls. It always seems to be the same players, who noisily sweep in and suppress sales for local shop owners for a day, all the while running gasoline powered generators to power refrigerators and lights. The worst are the DJ booths, with throbbing club music broadcast to a neighborhood which had its fill the night before.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The fellow pictured above is one of our local “Crows,” a metal collector who scours the streets for anything shiny which might be salable to the scrap metal industry, and he opted for an al fresco lunch directly beneath my vantage. He’s a tragic and scorned figure in the neighborhood, part of a huge immigrant population of single men who arrived in Queens from foreign quarters looking for work, often witnessed lying prone on the sidewalk after a bout of drinking. Latino, the neighborhood refers to all of these characters as “the Mexicans,” although there is no guarantee that this is where he’s from. I could ask, of course, but that would get in the way of my general misanthropy.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Glittering Realms– Saturday, August 3rd, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Atlas Obscura, tickets now on sale.
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
tower chamber
Getting high in Western Queens.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As some of you may have discovered, your humble narrator is bringing his personal brand of wide eyed paranoia to Brownstoner Queens in a bi weekly column exploring some the lesser known and esoteric corners of Western Queens for a couple of months now. Recent endeavor found one at the summit of the Standard Motor Products Building at the corner of Northern Blvd. and Steinway/39th st./Harold Avenue visiting the startlingly cool Brooklyn Grange Rooftop Farm. Check out what I saw up there by clicking here.
For a full inventory of what I’ve been doing over at Brownstoner, click here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A second posting spawned by the visit looked over the walls and witnessed the majestic Sunnyside Yard from on high, which can accessed by clicking here. Just yesterday, an interviewer working on an unrelated project asked me what my reaction to “demolishing the Javitz Center in Manhattan, then decking over the Sunnyside Yard and building a convention center and hotel complex on the deck” would be.
Roughly an hour later, after a far ranging diatribe about storm water, CSO’s, and endemic PCB contamination- the question I asked the interviewer was “How, in any way, would this benefit Queens other than the creation of low wage service industry jobs?” (and a short interval of construction industry jobs, of course). I suggested we deck over the yards and install 192 acres of farmland or just a plain old park. Didn’t Central Park spur development of underutilized land surrounding it in Manhattan 150 years ago, creating what are today the most valuable residential properties in the entire city if not the world? Why not add something green to spur growth, whatever the hell that is?
I also asked the interviewer what the hell “vibrant and diverse” is supposed to indicate or mean.
Please, planners, leave your air conditioned Manhattan offices and actually come to Queens. Leave the cars and bicycles behind and actually walk around. We don’t need any more of Manhattan’s problems exported to us, as Queens’ biggest problem is the City shitting on us every chance it gets.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Sorry for the late update today, had a few connectivity problems this morning. I’ll be out and about all weekend, if anyone has anything going on they’d like me to record or write about- please contact me here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Glittering Realms– Saturday, August 3rd, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Atlas Obscura, tickets now on sale.
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
vivid melange
A rapidly cooling post today
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This last weekend, your humble narrator led a short boat tour up a long Creek for Metropolitan Waterfront Alliances’ City of Water Day festival, despite the Bataan Death March atmospherics. Upon returning to Astoria and after inhaling approximately 40 gallons of water, one went out in search of Mr. Softee. The mister is no good, as Mrs. Softee spends every night alone during the summer, and has no idea where he spends his time or for whom his bells toll.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Time spent in the ancient village of Astoria is often revelatory, as many of the neighbors speak English not just as a second, but in many cases as a third language. This will often result in unintentionally meaningful signage, as with this sign board found on Broadway nearby the elevated N and Q lines which succinctly describes United States foreign policy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Finally, a quick peek at Hunters Point, where construction seems to be gearing up and the brave new world is forming. Ten years from now, this same POV will portray the entrance to a grand tower building of the “happy shiny” sort which will be part of the new Hunters Point South community. I’ll miss the view, myself, but I like muddy puddles.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
unsanctioned frenzy
Pondering while wandering.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m all ‘effed up. As is my habit during the summer, vast explorations of existential angst and delusion rule those intracranial electrical impulses which one might generously describe as thoughts. Fear, repulsion, and raw terror are the contents of that glob of salty fat which sits between the oddly shaped ears, above the loathsome mouth, and an inch or two behind the spectacles. The particular organ in question has been giving me trouble of late, and in the future I intend to use it gently as a repetitive stress injury seems to be taking hold.
from wikipedia
A semi-trailer is a trailer without a front axle. A large proportion of its weight is supported by a road tractor, a detachable front axle assembly known as a dolly, or the tail of another trailer. A semi-trailer is normally equipped with landing gear (legs which can be lowered) to support it when it is uncoupled.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Disappointment and loneliness are the root causes of all the worlds trouble, the Castor and Pollux of evil. One such as myself, however, is drawn to their stormy coastlines with its craggy delights. Your humble narrator has too full a schedule for the “Bon Vivant” and joys of summer, it seems, and is instead a mass of mouldering psychological injuries held together with string and sealing wax. Frivolities are not meant for such a creature- who is nothing less than an assassin of joy, mental weakling, physical coward, and a most feckless quisling.
from wikipedia
Emotional baggage is an everyday expression that correlates with many varied but similar concepts within social sciences, self-help movements, and other fields: its general concern is with unresolved issues of an emotional nature, often with an implication that the emotional baggage is detrimental.
As a metaphorical image, it is that of carrying all the disappointments, wrongs, and trauma of the past around with one in a heavy load.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Arcane ideations torment, coupled as they are with a startling emotional numbness, and one suspects that all this might not actually be happening. A sneaking suspicion, lurking maliciously at the scarred threshold of that glob of electrically charged, and quite salty, fat a couple of inches behind my glasses is not interpreting the world accurately, torments. A long standing delusion one suffers from, separate from the one which causes me to always look over my left shoulder when walking through Woodside at night, is that this all might be some sort of cruel simulation being run by an extra dimensional and all powerful entity which seeks to stress test and then judge one harshly according to an arbitrary set of rules. The existence of such a being would be outlandish, of course, as there is no evidence of such an entity other than in desert legends, folk stories, and peasant traditions.
from wikipedia
The simplest use of brain-in-a-vat scenarios is as an argument for philosophical skepticism and solipsism. A simple version of this runs as follows: Since the brain in a vat gives and receives exactly the same impulses as it would if it were in a skull, and since these are its only way of interacting with its environment, then it is not possible to tell, from the perspective of that brain, whether it is in a skull or a vat. Yet in the first case most of the person’s beliefs may be true (if they believe, say, that they are walking down the street, or eating ice-cream); in the latter case their beliefs are false. Since the argument says one cannot know whether one is a brain in a vat, then one cannot know whether most of one’s beliefs might be completely false. Since, in principle, it is impossible to rule out oneself being a brain in a vat, there cannot be good grounds for believing any of the things one believes; a skeptical argument would contend that one certainly cannot know them, raising issues with the definition of knowledge.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
The Newtown Pentacle 