Posts Tagged ‘Long Island City’
sleepy inefficiency
Just cannot stomach the indolence, and not for one minute more…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Like Yogi and BooBoo, my busy time of the year seems to come between March and November. Accordingly, the month and change during which I have little reason to wake up at all that falls between Thanksgiving and the second week of January. During this a period a short break is enjoyed. A humble narrator watches a lot of TV, sits around, and entertains the dog. Not too much excitement comes along, and annually, this is when I get a bit itchy for fun.
from wikipedia
Seasonal affective disorder (SAD), also known as winter depression, winter blues, summer depression, summer blues, or seasonal depression, was considered a mood disorder in which people who have normal mental health throughout most of the year experience depressive symptoms in the winter or summer.
In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM-IV and DSM-5, its status was changed. It is no longer classified as a unique mood disorder but is now a specifier called With seasonal pattern for recurrent major depressive disorder that occurs at a specific time of the year and fully remits otherwise. Although experts were initially skeptical, this condition is now recognized as a common disorder, with its prevalence in the U.S. ranging from 1.4% in Florida to 9.7% in New Hampshire.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s a good time to design new business cards, work on the book, and back up the hard drive. I also work on updating portfolios of photos, and retouching work, showing off notable jobs accomplished during the prior year. Lately, that includes blog stuff as well. One of the recent jobs which I’m kind of proud of is the redhookwaterfront.com site, for which I provided photos and did some historical workups and also did general blog writing. Check it out.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I have a couple of short adventures planned for the next few days, out there in the cold wastes, and hopefully there’ll be some cool stuff encountered to tell y’all about. Never know what Queens wants to show you next, as out of all the Boroughs, she’s the most coy.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
regarding life
Color please, bright and saturated, tall glass with lots of ice.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This interminably frigid period has brought an abundance of dark gray into the sky, or so I am told. An unavoidable consequence of such atmospheric phenomena, one such as myself is possessed of the need to witness and be exposed to color. Bright, saturated, vibrant color. Accordingly, I’ve reached into the archives for today’s post. What’s more colorful or cheery than Mt. Zion Cemetery, after all?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another shot in Queens, this time of the estimable Kosciuszko Bridge immersed in the emanations of the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself in the westerly sky. Spanning the antiloquacious depths of the Newtown Creek, the great steel monster will meet its end at the hands of state officials and municipal contractors quite soon, or so they tell me. One grows older by the minute, as does this bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve always loved this lucky shot. Right place at the right time, a passing squall of thunderstorms had produced a phenomena known as Mammacular Clouds. I happened to be in town for a friends birthday and spotted the otherworldly lighting at work around the Chrysler Building. This is what it really looked like. Could use some of that kind of light in January.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
cold and cramping
Lurid shimmerings of pale light, that’s what I’m about.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The hours one spends marching about Queens are severely impinged upon by weather during the winter months, a fact injurious to both health and morale. A humble narrator attempts to fill the empty hours productively, but there is little solace for one such as myself in hours spent in the office. Perhaps relocating to a warmer climate is in order? That would mean that New York City had finally beaten me, and that a life long grudge match had been lost.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The various medications which my staff of doctors prescribe to manage those ailments which bedevil and weaken my material form have a certain downside – inducing a particular fragility to my homeostasis when the temperature dips down. Simply said, cold weather such as that which the City is experiencing is actually painful. Vital ichors run away from the extremities, and one begins to experience the sense of being in a long dark tunnel which terminates in a distant but brightly lit aperture. I call that aperture “April.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The hard reality of this, I’m only a quadragenarian after all, has made me truly love to see the oil companies delivering the fuel that stokes all the furnaces and boilers. I propose a new secular holiday, one which celebrates the constancy and efforts of the oil truck man, without whom we’d all surely freeze to death. Brr.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
rusty impediments
Your motive is loco, man.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So few places to go, no one to see. The gray frigidity has me down, lords and ladies, and it is not impossible that over the last few weeks, I’ve watched everything on Netflix- including a couple of episodes of “Power Rangers Jungle Fury.” Playing with the cords on my hoodie, counting the floor tiles, bored. That’s me. Cabin Fever, I think they call it.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Been reading lots of good stuff, including a marathon exploration of the dissimilar topics of leprosy and the genetic consequences of multi generational incest- both of which led to the Hapsburgs. None of this relates one little bit to the history of Newtown Creek nor Queens, which actually has been my intention. Little projects like mine tend to drag you down a long drill hole, and you become so focused that you lose sight of the bigger picture… which somehow includes leprosy and incest.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Its cheerier reading than I normally do during this time of year, when my google searches have historically included “stages of putrefaction of cadaver” and “common practices of yeast distillation in 19th century america.” Hey, a guy gets curious about things. Its better to know something, well… some things… than to remain willfully ignorant about unpleasantries.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
tossed and tattered
A cool vantage at the foot of the Maspeth Plateau.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the neat things about Western Queens is all about its declination and altitude. The terminal moraine of Long Island sets itself up starting over in Maspeth near Mt. Olivette cemetery, and a surprising rise in the level of the land becomes apparent. I’m particularly sensitive to such phenomena having grown up in a section of Brooklyn called “Flatlands” which is right next door to “Flatbush” and several communities whose names end in basin, island, or beach. That’s the south eastern flood plain, Astoria and Hunters Point are the north western- its Maspeth and Middle Village which are the start of the high ground. That’s why the Dutch came here first.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
These hillocks are bordered in modernity, unfortunately, by highways such as the Long Island Expressway – which swallowed up the otherwise wholesome Borden Avenue’s historic right of way. There is a pedestrian bridge which will carry one over the highway, which is where today’s shots were captured. When I was up there, I found a Bernie hole.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Bernie Ente was, amongst other things, a photographer who lived pretty close to this spot in Maspeth. Bernie was always annoyed by fences that obscured his shots, and would sometimes open a hole just big enough to stick a lens through. There’s still a few of his holes found in the industrial fencelines around Newtown Creek, some of which I’ve shared with others, and some I keep to myself.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is the view from the Bernie Hole over the Long Island Expressway. I think I might come back here with a tripod sometime, when a dramatic sky presents itself. Of course, if you want some strange looks and accusing stares thrown your way, walk around Maspeth at night with a dslr. I swear, a cadre of old ladies followed me from Maurice all the way to Middle Village the other night, convinced that I held some instrument of gleaming death within my camera bag.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 