Posts Tagged ‘New York City’
urbane rector
It’s National Caramel Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As a well known physical coward, and after having observing that a quartet of fourth graders (whose aspect I did not like) were heading my way along Northern Boulevard the other day, it seemed logical to duck under a parked car and hide. You really just cannot be too careful these days. While passing the time it would take for these rough looking nine to ten year olds to exit the scene, one pondered about life in Western Queens and the meaning of it all. Also, I wondered how I was going to wiggle my fat ass out from under this car, which was pretty easy to dive under, but which ended up being a tighter fit than one would have guessed.
Banal reality is all I’ve got, what can I tell you?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
“The Queens Cobbler” is the name I’ve assigned to a likely serial killer operating hereabouts whose macabre trophies adorn the streets of Queens in the form of singular orphan shoes. The Cobbler left behind one of his or her little messages on Broadway in Astoria recently, pictured above. It’s my belief that, just like Jack the Ripper, the Queens Cobbler is connected to one of our noble political families and that both the press and police are laboring to keep the thing quiet just for the sake of maintaining everyone’s patronage. You won’t get to be judge, or a DA, or a Captain, or an editor, if you piss them off. There’s rumors, of course…
Maybe that’s just a cast off shoe, or maybe not… the question you have to ask is – where’s the other one? You and your “Occam’s razor.” pffft.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Usually, whenever a humble narrator leaves the house, people point and stare. Women clutch at their handbags, mothers gather their children close, and dogs begin to whine pitiously. If one steps out of line in any minor way – say jay walking, or depositing metal foil in a bin marked for paper – a crowd gathers and law enforcement displays an enviable level of efficiency and deployment. These sorts of experiences are why one is constantly confused by the freedom enjoyed by serial graffitists, the bastards who post those cash for cars stickers, and those who can urinate anywhere they choose to.
My reverie beneath the car was broken when the owner of my hiding place began heading towards the vehicle, as signaled by the “beep boop” signal sent by the electronic key chain fob to the conveyance. One rolled out from my shadowed safe space and discovered that that the threatening quartet of sinister seeming children had moved on, so once again I stood and faced the concretized reality of Western Queens – here in the Newtown Pentacle.
Upcoming Tours and events
First Calvary Cemetery walking tour, May 6th.
With Atlas Obscura’s Obscura Day 2017, Calvary Cemetery Walking Tour – details and tix here.
MAS Janeswalk free walking tour, May 7th.
Visit the new Newtown Creek Alliance/Broadway Stages green roof, and the NCA North Henry Street Project – details and tix here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
minor detail
It’s National Cordon Bleu day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Totemic exemplars of existential horror are everywhere you look in the Newtown Pentacle. To wit, at the border of Sunnyside and Blissville, you’ll find the Long Island Expressway, which was sited along it back in the 1930’s. Pictured above is the overpass which carries Greenpoint Avenue across the expressway, where a “ghost bike” has been encountered for several years. Ghost Bikes, for those of you not in the know, signify the spot where a bicyclist died after being struck by a motor vehicle. Post facto the installation of this Ghost Bike, the NYC DOT has since installed a bicycle lane, which is a badly placed one given that heavy trucks and thousands of automobiles routinely execute turns on this traffic choked overpass.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The ghost bike, as originally encountered a few years ago, and before the bike lane was striped in.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Walking over to Greenpoint from Astoria the other night, for a meeting between the DEP and the Newtown Creek Monitoring Committee, the scenario above was witnessed. It appeared that a vehicle of some sort had taken out not just the ghost bike, but had also snapped the steel signpost it was affixed to. The thing I’d like to point out is that the driver of this vehicle had to have been “busting a move” through the bike lane, which proves a point I’ve been talking about for awhile.
You’re not even safe on the freaking sidewalk.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Bike lanes area a fairly decisive issue amongst some Queensicans. More often than not, the argument against these things involves people protecting their street parking or something. I see bicyclists completely ignoring the street markings for these bike lanes and doing whatever the hell they want to – sidewalks, wrong way, running lights, all kinds of stuff. Everybody has probably ridden a bike at one time or another, everyone has also done something stupid on their bikes – that’s not the point.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I see some truly tragic implementations of this bike lane thing, which were clearly drawn out in an ideological fashion by people who are staring at maps of remote places they’ve never visited. The bike lanes on, and leading to, the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge are ludicrous and actually cause a constant traffic jam mid bridge – it was and is far safer for the bikes to ride on the sidewalk of the bridge than to try and navigate the gravel and debris which litters the GP Ave. Bridge lanes. The ones here at Greenpoint Avenue and the LIE are also a disaster. Again, it’s better for – and is the observed custom of – bicyclists to use the sidewalk to cross the overpass.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s what 5:41 p.m. looks like on a weekday at this intersection. That white SUV in the foreground is the head of a vehicular snake of east bound stop and go traffic which coils all the way back to Midtown Manhattan. It’s so busy that NYPD has permanently stationed traffic control officers here during the rush hours. If there has to be a bike lane on Greenpoint Avenue, lets widen the sidewalk and line it with those concrete jersey barriers to protect both scuttling narrator and the riders of those mechanical contraptions called bicycles. That would be smart.
If this spot can kill a ghost bike… the mind boggles over the implications for one such as myself.
Upcoming Tours and events
First Calvary Cemetery walking tour, May 6th.
With Atlas Obscura’s Obscura Day 2017, Calvary Cemetery Walking Tour – details and tix here.
MAS Janeswalk free walking tour, May 7th.
Visit the new Newtown Creek Alliance/Broadway Stages green roof, and the NCA North Henry Street Project – details and tix here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
tremulous pen
It’s National Chocolate Mousse Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The staccato of lonely scuttling steps are the rhythm of my life, and a humble narrator recently found himself pulsing down Jackson Avenue in Long Island City after dark. Were it just a few hours later, the subway would have been utilized to return to the rolling hills of almond eyed Astoria from the post industrial dystopia of cylcopean construction sites which typify modernity in this ancient place, but since the evening had just begun it was my bet that the legions of vampire who hide in the rafters of the elevated train tracks were off conducting their nightly siege of the NYC Blood Center over on Vernon Avenue, a few blocks to the west. Still, one had left the garlic and cruciform back home…
I’m guessing that as I age I’m starting to slip up – ten years ago I would have never left the house without the garlic…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One did encounter unholy and inhuman things along the route, of course. Bizarre statuary adorned a median divider, its misshapen countenance perhaps hinting at what those who walk amongst us unseen are working towards turning mankind into. Have no doubt that a shadowy group is at work at all times in LIC, an unseen cabal organized and controlled by that impossible thing which dwells in the cupola of the Sapphire Megalith and stares at the world through an unblinking three lobed burning eye. Also, the rats hereabouts are oddly organized and operate in a seemingly orchestrated or military manner. Do they all serve some hidden master, a monkish being who is the lord of all that is darkness in Western Queens? Only time will tell.
The organized efforts of the rats might be due to the Vampires (who are known to possess affinity with “creatures of the night”), however, as I haven’t been able to connect the shadowy cabal or any monkish master with rodent control… quite yet.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Heading eastward, towards Queen Plaza, one removed his headphones and tried to focus on separating the sounds of the eternal cacophony of the place. It is critical to listen closely for the rustle of grave soil choked clothing coming from above, and to remain vigilant for the other horrors which lurk in harsh contrast. Queens Plaza is a sensory melange of automotive headlights throwing out beams of bright bluish light, emergency vehicles strobing white and red, the thunderous crossings of the elevated N, W, and 7 Subway lines above and the E, M, and R lines below. The ground shivers with the passing of transit, quakes with the activity of heavy construction, and the very air you’re breathing is a poisonous fume. This airborne taint is painted into the breeze by the hundreds of vehicles a minute which are moving at speed through here at any given moment, and by the out gassing of buried toxics from the former industrial properties which rim Queens Plaza.
Perhaps, underway is some sort of environmental adjustment designed for the comfort of that shadowy cabal, the vampires, the army of vermin, or for the inhuman thing which dwells in the megalith. Who can say?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Historical research reveals that the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek used to run right through the section of Jackson Avenue between Queens Plaza and 31st street, in fact the clear eyed Mariners of the United States Coast Guard were able to navigate and map the waterway all the way to 29th street and what is now Jackson Avenue as late as the Civil War. In accordance with the engineering habits of earlier eras, when the Sunnyside Yards were constructed in the early 20th century, the waterway was contained underground. It’s still flowing down there, as the East Side Acces project engineers found out at the start of this century, and as we all know – Vampires are proscribed from crossing running water. That’s why you don’t have to worry too much about them once you cross Queens Plaza while heading for Astoria.
We do have an issue in Astoria with a race of Grecian Goblins called the Kalikantzaros, but that’s another story.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One is preparing a check list for my carriable prophylactic measures to ensure that age, haste, and other factors do not allow one to go out into the night without a full compliment of deterrents. A garland of fresh garlic – as well as a compliment of cruciforms, crescents, and Stars of David, amongst other wards and amulets – will now be everpresent in my camera bag.
Remember to avoid the area around the blood center on Vernon after sunset though, if you should find yourself somewhere in the northwestern section of LIC, here in the Newtown Pentacle, at night. You’ve been warned.
Upcoming Tours and events
MAS Janeswalk free walking tour, May 7th.
Visit the new Newtown Creek Alliance/Broadway Stages green roof, and the NCA North Henry Street Project – details and tix here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
swarthy foreigners
It’s National Clams on the Half Shell Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So… right after that last snow event we had a couple of weeks ago, I saw something utterly unique in my experience as a New Yorker. I’m almost a half century old at this stage, and one has never – NEVER – observed the Department of Sanitation do anything but plow the vehicular section of the streets in Brooklyn or Queens. This year, however, they were out in force – in Astoria, Queens – clearing the curbs and walkways of snow.
Wha, wha, what?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
DSNY had this neat little bobcat doohickey, which they were using to mash up and disassemble the berms of ice and snow which had piled up along the sidewalk and curb boundary area. I noticed this as it was happening directly under my bedroom window, which woke up both my little dog Zuzu and Our Lady of the Pentacle.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
They were actually clearing the streets! The slush lagoons too.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
“Welcome to Queens, now go fuck yourself” is the borough motto most of the time around these parts. Snow clearance has been a political thorn for Queensican Electeds, going back to the days of Mayor John Lindsay, but seldom is anything improved. Not in 2016.
Maybe this gentrification thing has its benefits, after all.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A few hours later, around four in the morning (yes, I was still up and awake at four a.m.), another DSNY crew rolled through. This time they were shoveling pathways at the crosswalks. What has happened? Am I in some parallel reality? Is this a dream?
Is Trump still President? Was that just some sort of fevered vision?
Upcoming Tours and events
MAS Janeswalk free walking tour, May 7th.
Visit the new Newtown Creek Alliance/Broadway Stages green roof, and the NCA North Henry Street Project – details and tix here.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
country seat
It’s National Turkey Neck Soup Day, in these United States.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Racing thoughts, cold sweats, night terrors, or existential anxieties notwithstanding – one is happy to report that the Hell Gate Bridge Centennial has been marked. Last weekend, one attended a walk conducted by the estimable Richard Melnick of Greater Astoria Historical Society celebrating the event. Mr. Melnick was joined by Dave Frieder, a photographer and bridge expert, as well as around fifty enthusiasts. For me, it was nice just to be around people who weren’t chasing or deriding.
Pictured above, a CSX freight train heading eastwards over the bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While following our course, the usual grand panoply of sights were encountered along the east river, including the transit of an articulated tug and barge – the Bouchard corporation’s “Evening Star” tug towing a fuel barge… It’s all so depressing, really.
As always, one reminds that whether they’re pulling or pushing, Tugboats are always “towing.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Hell Gate bridge overflies Astoria Park, of course, and one spotted the curious tableau seen above while there.
I’ve been warning all of you about Lovecraftian phenomena occurring in Queens for years, and now at last I can demonstrate the presence of the Shoggoths amongst us.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This looked like the kind of fun I would have enjoyed having as a child, in those halcyon days before my soul had been blackened to a crisp by the unrelenting fires of adulthood. Life – it’s become a neutral gray for me nowadays – banal, ashen, joyless.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Greater Astoria Historic Society has a full calendar of Hell Gate related programming coming up, and this summer the folks who live in “Astoria, Astoria” or plainly Astoria’s north side are planning a few summertime celebrations for Lindenthal’s triumphant arch bridge over the East River.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 