Archive for the ‘Northern Blvd.’ Category
Project Firebox 59
– photo by Mitch Waxman
At 34th Avenue’s junction with Northern Blvd. waits this long serving alarm box. Its seen fire and its seen rain…
beckon eagerly
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– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whilst wandering along lost in a self critical soliloquy, as your humble narrator has more than just a few regrets and guilty interludes based around the amount of damage caused to those I care about due to my presence in their lives, this conveyance of the local gendarme caught my eye. It bears the familiar color way of the NYPD, however it is the property of the NYC Sheriff, a separate agency with a wholly different mission from the more numerous constables.
from nyc.gov
The Office of the City Sheriff, Law Enforcement Bureau (LEB) is a state and city charter mandated service of the Sheriff’s Office.
The sheriff is an officer of the court, and his primary purpose and function is to serve and execute the various legal processes and mandates issued not only by and for the several courts of the state and its subdivisions, but also for the legal community and the general public.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The vehicle got me thinking about how vision and memory actually work. My addled brain wanted to file the vehicle away under “cops” upon seeing the thing, due to the familiar pattern of blue and white. Like the adaptation to smell commented upon by employees of the DEP waste water system, wherein constant environmental stimuli renders one blind to odor, how much of our frenetic visual locale is filtered out by an overwhelmed visual cortex? If these NYPD ESU trucks said “USSR”, would you notice it?
from wikipedia
The New York City Police Department Emergency Service Unit is the Emergency Service Unit (ESU) for the New York City Police Department. A component of the Special Operations Division of the Patrol Services Bureau, the unit provides specialized support and advanced equipment to other NYPD units. For example, its Canine Unit helps with searches for perpetrators and missing persons. The Emergency Service Unit also functions as a Special Weapons and Tactical Unit (SWAT) and NYPD hostage negotiators assist and secure the safety of hostages. Members of “ESU” are cross trained in multiple disciplines for police and rescue work.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Often one ponders if this is the core thing which sets me apart from others, this allegiance to noticing literally everything. When entering a room, my head pivots about, and a careful inventory of my surroundings are made. I know where the fire exits are in any auditorium, catalog inconsistent details, and above all- instantly notice that which “does not belong”. More often than not, that out of place thing which does belong is myself, of course. Always must I remain an Outsider.
from wikipedia
Gestalt psychologists working primarily in the 1930s and 1940s raised many of the research questions that are studied by vision scientists today.
The Gestalt Laws of Organization have guided the study of how people perceive visual components as organized patterns or wholes, instead of many different parts. Gestalt is a German word that partially translates to “configuration or pattern” along with “whole or emergent structure.” According to this theory, there are six main factors that determine how the visual system automatically groups elements into patterns: Proximity, Similarity, Closure, Symmetry, Common Fate (i.e. common motion), and Continuity.
reflecting ribbon
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
These shots emanate from a time in the past, an era when a young George W. Bush taught us all how to laugh. The colorful display, unfortunately, no longer graces the tableau found at the intersection of Northern Boulevard and Steinway Street. A car wash still inhabits the spot, but the variegated signage has since been removed and replaced by the banal.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The prevailing light and atmosphere of 2012’s last couple of weeks is epitomized, I think, by the shot above. A sincere desire to drink in chromatic splendor demanded that the first shot in today’s post be displayed, in order to break up the fungoid monotony of December.
vaguely articulate
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Passing through the tangle of racing traffic, sky flung steel, and electrical equipment in Queens Plaza the other day, a humble narrator felt incredibly vulnerable. Part of my anxiety was generated by the absolutely stellar idea of siting bike paths on the sidewalk, formerly the only safe place and haven for the pedestrian in this place. The remainder was generated by the sheer sensory overload offered by this intermodal transportation center with its never ending traffic flow.
That is, until I was nearly struck by a bicyclist who was rolling down the sidewalk at a minimum of fifteen miles per hour.
from wikipedia
According to the DSM-IV classification of mental disorders, the injury phobia is a specific phobia of blood/injection/injury type. It is an abnormal, pathological fear of having an injury.
Another name for injury phobia is traumatophobia, from Greek τραῦμα (trauma), “wound, hurt” and φόβος (phobos), “fear”. It is associated with BII (Blood-Injury-Injection) Phobia. Sufferers exhibit irrational or excessive anxiety and a desire to avoid specific feared objects and situations, to the point of avoiding potentially life-saving medical procedures.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It has been mentioned before at this, your Newtown Pentacle, that in the opinion of this citizen- mixing vehicular traffic and pedestrian traffic is a fairly ill considered idea. Sounds logical, right? Bicycles are, in fact, vehicles. Bicycles are, in fact, being directed into pedestrian lanes- commonly called “sidewalks”.
Let us break that down- “side”, as in side of road, “walk”, as in walking.
Not cycling, nor riding, nor whatever the hell it is that those people call Biking these days.
from wikipedia
Agoraphobia is a condition where the sufferer becomes anxious in environments that are unfamiliar or where he or she perceives that they have little control. Triggers for this anxiety may include wide open spaces, crowds (social anxiety), or traveling (even short distances). Agoraphobia is often, but not always, compounded by a fear of social embarrassment, as the agoraphobic fears the onset of a panic attack and appearing distraught in public.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Incidentally, before “those people” (who I’ve stood shoulder to shoulder with several times on various issues involving alternative transportation options) leap at my throat, no condemnation of the biking community at large is at work here. It’s not that fellows fault that he was on the sidewalk, although he was operating his vehicle in a reckless manner given the number of pedestrians on the street, as he was following the layout of the bike lane. Which has been set into the sidewalk with no lane demarcation other than a painted lane, and which terminates in a street cut shared with pedestrians.
No solution is offered, the crowded interweaving of traffic in Queens Plaza is surely well studied, but we’ve got a problem here.
from wikipedia
The fear of being touched (also known as aphephobia, haphephobia, haphophobia, hapnophobia, haptophobia, thixophobia) is a rare specific phobia that involves the fear of touching or of being touched. It is an acute exaggeration of the normal tendencies to protect one’s personal space, expressed as a fear of contamination or of the invasion, and extending even to people whom its sufferers know well.
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Upcoming boat tours of Newtown Creek
July 22nd, 2012- Working Harbor Committee Newtown Creek Boat Tour
breakers lacerated
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Last Saturday, after conducting a walking tour of Dutch Kills for a group of enthusiasts, your humble narrator found himself walking up 35th street, and upon arriving at the street’s intersections with both 38th avenue and Northern Blvd.- I was moving past the titan Packard building.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Engaged in conversation with Our Lady of the Pentacle, who helped out with the tour, I suddenly felt as if someone might be throwing crumpled up bits of paper at my back. Spinning around to confront my attacker, this swarm of bees was observed.
It had been bees bouncing off my back!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the things I’ve learned about Queens is this- if something “should be done or said”, no one is going to do it, so you’d better do it yourself. Our Lady of the Pentacle sighed at this point and walked up the block to find a shady spot to sit down while I crossed the street and yelled “BEEs” at anyone who approached this spot.
After many years of marriage to one such as myself, she knew that the following would take a while and she might as well get comfortable.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I called 911, and told the operator that there were a lot of bees swarming on the same corner as a subway stop, and was told that that’s not an emergency and that I should call 311. With a hearty “yes ma’am” I hung up and called 311.
The operator listened to my description of the situation, and asked me if I had contacted the property owner about the situation.
Attempting to explain that I was attempting to report a dangerous situation here on the streets of Queens, she interrupted me and chided that “I wasn’t letting her talk”. There no way, of course, that this situation would have been dealt with differently if I was calling about such a situation in say… Manhattan.
She continued that “bees are part of nature and that the City of New York doesn’t mess with nature”.
The Newtown Pentacle 