Archive for the ‘Queens’ Category
Low Tide at Maspeth Creek
– photos by Mitch Waxman
Shallow as it is, Maspeth Creek at an extreme low tide on Wednesday the 22nd of December.
dark apertures
– photo by Mitch Waxman
“The daily reminder”:
Please consider purchasing a copy of the first Newtown Pentacle book:
“Newtown Creek for the Vulgarly Curious” – a fully annotated 68 page, full-color journey from the mouth of Newtown Creek at the East River all the way back to the heart of darkness at English Kills, with photos and text by Mitch Waxman.
Lamentable, this dark part of of the solar cycle both frustrates and delights.
Unwelcome, the return of frigid conditions renders my wrecked health tremulous. Unbalanced, my delicate constitution reaches out desperately for amusement and titillation. Tenebrous- the light of December is thin, ephemeral, a cloying charlatan.
I’m all ‘effed up.
from wikipedia
Anxiety is a generalized mood condition that can often occur without an identifiable triggering stimulus. As such, it is distinguished from fear, which is an emotional response to a perceived threat. Additionally, fear is related to the specific behaviors of escape and avoidance, whereas anxiety is related to situations perceived as uncontrollable or unavoidable. An alternative view defines anxiety as “a future-oriented mood state in which one is ready or prepared to attempt to cope with upcoming negative events”, suggesting that it is a distinction between future vs. present dangers which divides anxiety and fear.
Physical effects of anxiety may include heart palpitations, muscle weakness and tension, fatigue, nausea, chest pain, shortness of breath, stomach aches, or headaches. The body prepares to deal with a threat: blood pressure and heart rate are increased, sweating is increased, blood flow to the major muscle groups is increased, and immune and digestive system functions are inhibited (the fight or flight response). External signs of anxiety may include pale skin, sweating, trembling, and pupillary dilation. Someone who has anxiety might also experience it as a sense of dread or panic. Although panic attacks are not experienced by every person who has anxiety, they are a common symptom. Panic attacks usually come without warning, and although the fear is generally irrational, the perception of danger is very real. A person experiencing a panic attack will often feel as if he or she is about to die or pass out.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Loathsome, the reflection which gazes from every shop window and puddle of urine during my long walks is that of something which can only be superficially referred to as a man.
Filthy and blackened by time, my garb has become tattered and beggarly of late. Financial hardship experienced over a long and sordid lifetime instructs that only the coarse and lasting textiles worn by beasts of burden should be considered for replacements, as they will outlast the fancy caprices of fashion and comfort by virtue of their sheer and stolid composition. These are hard times my friends, and the hard rain has already fallen.
A season of the witch is apparent, Lords and Ladies, and Woody Guthrie would recognize our time immediately as his own.
from wikipedia
Self-Awareness Theory states that when we focus our attention on ourselves, we evaluate and compare our current behavior to our internal standards and values. We become self-conscious as objective evaluators of ourselves. Various emotional states are intensified by self-awareness, and people sometimes try to reduce or escape it through things like television, video games, drugs, etc. However, some people may seek to increase their self-awareness through these outlets. People are more likely to align their behavior with their standards when made self-aware. People will be negatively affected if they don’t live up to their personal standards. Various environmental cues and situations induce awareness of the self, such as mirrors, an audience, or being videotaped or recorded. These cues also increase accuracy of personal memory.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Lutescent, my skin color produces impressions of some jaundiced ginger candy lightly drizzled over with a thin syrup of sweat, a noted change from the sun baked complexion which was earned during the many maritime adventures of the vernal months that were described at this, your Newtown Pentacle.
A recent observation of myself at 4:30 AM in the bathroom mirror, after having spent a considerable number of hours researching a certain bridge which crosses that malign influence known as the Newtown Creek, was the moment when I realized that I had let my beard grow unchecked for better than 60 days and allowed my external appearance to betray my state of mind. The wild eyed thing staring back at me… reaching out to me as I did the same to him… surely it remains trapped in that pane of mirrored glass.
I went to the barber the next morning, and as Joe of “Joe and Tony’s” dragged a straight razor across my throat and scratched off months of neglect- for the first time in ages- I was able to relax.
from wikipedia
Clinicians assess the physical aspects such as the appearance of a patient, including apparent age, height, weight, and manner of dress and grooming. Colorful or bizarre clothing might suggest mania, while unkempt, dirty clothes might suggest schizophrenia or depression. If the patient appears much older than his or her chronological age this can suggest chronic poor self-care or ill-health. Clothing and accessories of a particular subculture, body modifications, or clothing not typical of the patient’s gender, might give clues to personality. Observations of physical appearance might include the physical features of alcoholism or drug abuse, such as signs of malnutrition, nicotine stains, dental erosion, a rash around the mouth from inhalant abuse, or needle track marks from intravenous drug abuse. Observations can also include any odor which might suggest poor personal hygiene due to extreme self-neglect, or alcohol intoxication. Gelder, Mayou & Geddes (2005) tells us to look out for weight loss. This could signify a depressive disorder, physical illness, anorexia nervosa or chronic anxiety.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Labefaction of my very self continues unabated, and flavor is absent from all the elixirs of joy.
Sleep, and concurrent dreaming, has plagued me with its insistence and Antaeus like grip. When the oppression of these periods of unconscious hallucinations lift, I force myself from home and wander the streets in the manner and aforementioned garb of a mendicant. Drifting like some cast off ember caught on the wind, I follow the sun but as always- I am relegated to stand in the shadows of this world and its bright places are reserved for others to enjoy. Outside, in the cold and filth is where I belong- not amongst bright and happy faces chortling over shared intimacies and embarrassing overtures.
Inevitability is enjoyed by the sleepy, for in the end, they shall drop off.
from wikipedia
Depersonalization (or depersonalisation) is a malfunction or anomaly of the mechanism by which an individual has self-awareness. It is a feeling of watching oneself act, while having no control over a situation. It can be considered desirable, such as in the use of recreational drugs, but it usually refers to the severe form found in anxiety and, in the most intense cases, panic attacks. Sufferers feel they have changed, and the world has become less real, vague, dreamlike, or lacking in significance. It can be a disturbing experience, since many feel that, indeed, they are living in a “dream”. Depersonalization is a subjective experience of unreality in one’s sense of self, while derealization is unreality of the outside world. Although most authors currently regard depersonalization (self) and derealization (surroundings) as independent constructs, many do not want to separate derealization from depersonalization.Chronic depersonalization refers to depersonalization disorder, which is classified by the DSM-IV as a dissociative disorder. Though depersonalization-derealization feelings can happen to anyone subject to temporary severe anxiety/stress, chronic depersonalization is more related to individuals who have experienced a severe trauma or prolonged stress/anxiety. Depersonalization-derealization is the single most important symptom in the spectrum of dissociative disorders, including Dissociative Identity Disorder and Dissociative Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (DD-NOS). It is also a prominent symptom in some other non-dissociative disorders, such as anxiety disorders, clinical depression, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, migraine, sleep deprivation, and some types of epilepsy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Lexiphanic lickspittle, the lickerish lientery offered today is limaceous, foully libanophorous, and is admittedly… logorrhoea.
The question you may be asking, of course, might be “What exactly does this all have to do with anything, and what’s up with dem boids?”. Simply put, today is the beginning of the Roman festival of Saturnalia, a day of tricks and treats- and described as the “best of days” by the poet Catullus.
Traditionally, it was the day when masters and slaves would trade places. What fun that would be.
from wikipedia
Mad hatter disease describes the symptoms of mercury poisoning, specifically its effect on the nervous system. These include paraesthesias, vision and hearing impairment, slurred speech, anxiety, hallucinations, irritability, depression, lack of coordination, and tremors. The condition was observed among workers in the hat-making industry in the 1800s. Chronic mercury exposure was common in hatters who used a mercury solution during the process of curing animal pelts. Poor ventilation in the workshops of the time resulted in the hatters breathing in the fumes of this highly toxic metal, leading to an accumulation of mercury in the workers’ bodies. Metal toxicity was poorly understood and the broad range of symptoms were also associated with insanity.The phrase mad as a hatter is derived from the condition, and commonly associated with Lewis Carroll’s character the Mad Hatter in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. While the character’s eccentricities differ from those suffering from mercury poisoning (the Hatter was likely inspired by Theophilus Carter, a furniture dealer), Lewis Carroll grew up near the town of Stockport, where hatting was the dominant trade.
Progress
– photos by Mitch Waxman
The growth of the Tishman Speyer Gotham Center building in the new Queens Plaza, from every corner of the Newtown Pentacle.
History of the Necronomicon by H. P. Lovecraft
Notes:
- Don’t miss the Hunter’s Point Avenue Bridge Centennial tomorrow, on December 11th, a free event. For more on the HPA Bridge Centennial, click here.
- Also, please consider purchasing a copy of the first Newtown Pentacle book: “Newtown Creek for the Vulgarly Curious” – a fully annotated 68 page, full-color journey from the mouth of Newtown Creek at the East River all the way back to the heart of darkness at English Kills, with photos and text by Mitch Waxman.
Woodside Botanica – photo by Mitch Waxman
History of the Necronomicon
by H. P. Lovecraft
Written 1927. Published 1938.
Original title Al Azif — azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos’d to be the howling of daemons.
Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia — the Roba el Khaliyeh or “Empty Space” of the ancients — and “Dahna” or “Crimson” desert of the modern Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told.
He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a race older than mankind. He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.
Vanderbilt Study – photo by Mitch Waxman
In A.D. 950 the Azif, which had gained a considerable tho’ surreptitious circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon. For a century it impelled certain experimenters to terrible attempts, when it was suppressed and burnt by the patriarch Michael. After this it is only heard of furtively, but (1228) Olaus Wormius made a Latin translation later in the Middle Ages, and the Latin text was printed twice — once in the fifteenth century in black-letter (evidently in Germany) and once in the seventeenth (prob. Spanish) — both editions being without identifying marks, and located as to time and place by internal typographical evidence only.
Altar at Mt. Zion cemetery fenceline – photo by Mitch Waxman
The work both Latin and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin translation, which called attention to it. The Arabic original was lost as early as Wormius’ time, as indicated by his prefatory note; and no sight of the Greek copy — which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550 — has been reported since the burning of a certain Salem man’s library in 1692.
An English translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments recovered from the original manuscript. Of the Latin texts now existing one (15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of Buenos Aires.
Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was so preserved, it vanished with the artist R. U. Pickman, who disappeared early in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries, and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the general public know) that Robert W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of his early novel The King in Yellow.
Thrice Damned?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Several emails arrived today inquiring into why, in yesterday’s posting, the Kosciuszko Bridge is referred to as “thrice damned”. We’ll get into that shortly, but first- a certain anomaly of the information age needs to be mentioned…
from nytimes.com
The association, which handles many of the city’s largest projects, pored through an annual report that the New York State Department of Transportation released earlier this year to develop its list. Researchers looked at the city’s bridges and freeways that were given “red flags” — for everything from weak columns to uneven pavement — to compile the list, which included only those operated by the state.
The association announced the following rankings:
-
- Kosciuszko Bridge
- Gowanus Expressway
- Bronx River Parkway over the Amtrak tracks
- Cross Bronx Expressway viaduct over the Amtrak tracks and the Sheridan Expressway
- Bronx Terminal viaduct carrying the Major Deegan Expressway by Yankee Stadium
- Major Deegan Expressway over Sedgwick Avenue and the Metro-North Railroad tracks
- Bruckner Expressway Service road, northbound
- Bruckner Boulevard viaduct1
- 50th Street over the Belt Parkway
- Major Deegan Expressway ramp to 153rd Street/Cromwell Avenue, southbound
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In 1939, during the Great Depression, arguably the most powerful man in New York City was Robert Moses. Moses had a project he was keen on, the Brooklyn Queens Connecting Highway.
The Meeker Avenue Bridge opened on August 23rd, 1939 (renamed in 1940 as The Kosciuszko Bridge) – some 24,855 days ago- and it was the first link in a chain that eventually metastasized into the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. It was promised to allow easy egress to the World’s Fair, and was a showpiece project for the Great Builder.
Yet, it seems not to have any fanfare associated with it according to online sources…
Q- Who designed it? How long was it under construction? Thinking about the chain of supply, where did the steel come from and how did it get here? Where are the City records? Surely this project was reported on, why doesn’t the NY Times or Brooklyn Daily Eagle have multiple stories in archives about it and attendant scandals?
A- Certain terms, called “tags” or “keywords” attached to every web page allow search engines to classify the content of any given web page. A sort of echo effect forms around these tags, a scalar which wipes out all other interpretations of search terms. The Kosciuszko Bridge is caught up in one of these echo effects, which has caused all other results to be crowded out. The echo surrounding “The Kosciuszko Bridge” search term at the Big G is formed by three or four modern sources and swirls about the replacement of it. This is kind of disturbing…
Andrew Carnegie’s American Bridge Company was the contractor, incidentally.
from nytimes.com
The Kosciuszko Bridge in Brooklyn received 20 yellow flags for corrosion and decay of steel beams and small cracks in beams and welds. The bridge also received eight safety flags for problems that included exposed electrical wires and loose concrete.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is mentioned, as it has raised certain misgivings in me about the future of verity and truth. If something like The Kosciuszko Bridge can lose its past and be defined only by its destruction, just how malleable has the historical record become in the age of the Big G? Can a skillful manipulation of Wikipedia or some other major “site of authority” change the past?
Just wondering…
Now- the “thrice damned” part
Damned Once- The Kosciuszko Bridge catches radio frequency emissions from several nearby commercial radio broadcast antennas. A lot of it.
Whatever knows fear burns at The Kosciuszko Bridge’s touch.
Damned Twice- The Kosciuszko Bridge is at extreme risk in the eventuality of a seismic event. The Brooklyn pier actually sits on the Creek bed, some 6 meters below grade, but the Queens side is anchored on piles driven into the mud. The hard soil around Queens Plaza will merely shake, but the land surrounding the Newtown Creek will liquify.
Damned Thrice- The Kosciuszko Bridge once had pedestrian walkways, but they were removed in 1961. Can you imagine what kind of photos would be possible on a pedestrian walkway 124 feet over the Newtown Creek?
from brooklynpaper.com
But the department has bigger fish to fry than the aesthetics — drivers just want the city to get it done. The current bridge is constantly in gridlock, with some 160,000 daily drivers pushing forward — very slowly — at on- and off-ramps, making two impromptu lanes. The new bridge is supposed to cure all these problems.
Luckily, project manager Robert Adams has said that the $1 billion needed to finish construction — which ballooned from $700 million last year due to a longer build-out time — is already lined up through federal funding, and that the tentative completion date is in 2017.
