Posts Tagged ‘Astoria’
groping again
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Perhaps one has become an internet troll.
I do spend an awful lot of time scuttling around beneath bridges and overhead trusses of all kinds, while wandering throughout the concrete devastations of the Newtown Pentacle. Then I find myself posting photos of them to the internet, which offers connection via correlation. As the scions of some mythical “old neighborhood” might proffer: “Dictionary definition, look here douchebag, trolls live under bridges. That means you a fucking troll. Fuck you, troll.”
That really is a quote, incidentally, from a Dungeons and Dragons comrade in Canarsie back during the 1980’s. Essential usage of the Brooklyn patois, at that time, always involved explaining your work when cursing someone out. It was a gentler age, when a young Joe Piscopo taught us all how to laugh again.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Perhaps, one can be cast as a paparazzo for decaying infrastructure and artisan pollution instead. Imagine a humble narrator clad in scarf and motor scooter, zipping around town searching for remnants of the forgotten and occluded world of fat rendering and manufactured gas while always keeping a watchful eye on the once and future king of the Creeks, called Newtown.
Dynamic, this lifestyle of the paparazzi would, given the poor and mediocre existence currently endured, irrevocably brighten ones outlook.
Back in the “old neighborhood,” which was not all that old or really much of a neighborhood, it was opined as best to keep ones sights set low lest disappointment and regret rule ones mind in extreme old age. It was commonly decided that prudence demanded the acquisition of a government job with benefits and regular hours, receiving a pension after 25 years, and then moving away from “all the bullshit” to be the best course of action one could take.
There were a lot of cops, garbage men, firemen, and EMT’s in the old neighborhood. Nurses too.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Unfortunately, it does seem that one has indeed become this much maligned creature of hideous modernity called an “Internet troll.” If you spot some scruffy bag of mostly water, all wrapped up in a filthy black raincoat and scuttling about while clumsily picking its path around and beneath a bridge, that very well might be me.
What else it might be, for my countenance is somewhat unbearable to behold by the unprepared and there are certain asymmetrical oddities in my gait and postures which defy impersonation, few can say. I will continue to post these captured photons on the internet, notwithstanding that they might be dispatches from Trollheim.
curiously dislocated
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Although it is the Mother of harlots, entering Manhattan on a regular basis is periodically required of your humble narrator, for none may trade nor sell in the City of New York lest this borough’s mark is upon them. Usually this journey is accomplished along the subterranean R line, but often will one walk over to the elevated N line on the 31st street side of the neighborhood just to mix things up. You take the low road, I’ll take the high road, and I’ll be in midtown before ye…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Shining City, a place which your humble narrator actually lived for many years, has become lost in an inferior incarnation of itself. One does not long for the era of sin and fornication recently passed, it is the modern facade of the City which agitates. Many disagree with me, arguing for acceptance of a halcyon and quite modern era of progress and development which will eradicate the mistakes of prior centuries. All I can tell you, in retort, is that I don’t see many autochthonous smiles in Manhattan. Also, $9 is too much for a tuna sandwich.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An echo chamber, things there are no longer hot, nor cold- rather they are lukewarm. Don’t get me wrong, there ain’t no mountain spring water running out here in Astoria neither, there are oodles of things wrong in Brooklyn and Queens. I’m sure the Bronx and …Staten Island… likely have some problems too. I’m just saying that we don’t export them, unlike the unsustainable island of Manhattan, and that I- for one- am a lot more comfortable and likelier to be smiling here in Queens.
inexorably crawling
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One is fascinated by the automotive corridor through western Queens that is known as Northern Blvd. It is literally an “automotive corridor” as in the sense of it being a busy vehicular roadway, but it is also an industrial corridor which speaks of a forgotten moment in NY history when automobiles were manufactured in the five boroughs. This is largely a start of the twentieth century sort of thing, of course, but it was a pretty big deal back in the 1920’s.
That’s before the American auto industry consolidated itself around the City of Detroit, of course.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Standard Motor Products is still located at the corner of Steinway/39th street and Northern, of course, but they don’t make anything here anymore- it’s just offices. At that, SMP only uses a small section of their former factory, which famously carries a modern day rooftop farm at its crown. This “history of the automobile industry in Queens” thing is a topic which has been gathering steam and certain interest for your humble narrator of late, but my research has only just begun and intelligent presentation of fact is still far off in the future.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There is still a significant amount of auto related commerce going on around these parts, but it’s all about sales these days, not manufacture. An incalculable number of used… sorry… industry parlance is “pre owned”… cars are available along that stretch of Northern Blvd. which sits happily between Queens Plaza and the Grand Central Parkway. Something I’m working on, one of many background tasks and research projects performed and underway here at Newtown Pentacle HQ.
shrank away
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In the posting “perfect service” a few days ago, the tableau of a Con Ed street repair was described. The gentlemen who performed this repair left behind a safety cone sitting on top of the manhole cover to their street pit. Two days later, the cone was moved for a time by a group of gentlemen with a giant masonry saw powerful enough to cut street.
It was all very exciting.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After packing their saw back up onto a truck, they replaced the cone.
One is beside himself waiting for the next pulse pounding installment. Will someone come with a drill, punching holes in the asphalt? Will the entire block drop through the subway below? Lasers, perhaps? I will keep you posted.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Happy place… happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place… …happy place…
eternal day
“follow” me on Twitter at @newtownpentacle
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Last weekend, a social engagement found Our Lady and myself breaking bread with another couple at an Indian place here in Astoria. One of our quartet is a Federal Employee, who was describing the practical effects of the so called “sequestration” upon the mechanics of the Government. Simple transactions, such as getting a tax return check or obtaining a new passport, will be delayed. She continued that in her case, she would simply not be able to go to work for a period, despite the urgency of her task.
The paroled child molesters whom she normally polices will simply have no one looking after them.
What could go wrong?
All the way up the food chain, however, chaos will ensue as Federal functionaries are furloughed, and the Defense Department has to start laying off soldiers. Medical research will also be hard hit.
Remember that a motto of the far right wing, when referring to the Federal Government, is to “starve the beast.”
Remember that when the Cubans invade Texas next winter.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Visions of the Roman Senate and Pompey Magnus danced in my head, and the sound of galloping horses approaching the Rubicon clouded my hearing. I tuned out my friend entirely, as I just couldn’t discuss the subject without blowing my cool. All I could taste was fire, but after all, I had just eaten an entrée at an Indian restaurant.
After dinner, a new policy was decided and is announced today.
As of now, whenever a subject upsets or annoys me, I am going to block it out and go to my happy place.
In my case, that happy place is a bakery, and I shall blot out the reality of my situation and just think about cake. No more parables, politicians nor portents for me, not anymore, just pastry.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Intercession with the human hive is a good thing, allowing one to form opinions and offer new questions for expert answering. As many of the answers which have been offered in recent years have often forced one to retreat back into his “happy place” and resort to living in nothing more than a world of his own imagining- anticipation of visiting this inner paradise of baked goods often in the coming year nearly overwhelms.
Also, I make this sewer cover as 1910’s-20’s. How about y’all?
The Newtown Pentacle 