Posts Tagged ‘New York City’
heavy and reeling
It’s all so depressing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Leaden footsteps carried me across the ice choked devastations of the Newtown Pentacle over the weekend. One desired to see his beloved Creek, after all. My destination and goal was the East River and getting the shots displayed in yesterday’s post, depicting the FDNY’s Firefighter 2 battling a blaze along the coastline of North Brooklyn, so a laconic scuttle was enacted through the cold waste. It was soon decided that the indolent life style of a home bound winter hermit has damaged my muscle tone and badly affected overall stamina. I’m all ‘effed up.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It took everything I had to endure the cold, which easily penetrated through the twenty nine pounds of thermal underwears, sweaters, boots, and street cassock (a pet name for the filthy black raincoat) hanging in a sickening fashion about me, as if they weren’t present. One could barely stand at certain points, and the only thing keeping my feet moving past the once upon a time location of the venerable Penny Bridge was the fear of becoming frozen to the sidewalk were I to collapse. Sometimes, one must lean into it, embracing physiological entropy. My beloved Creek sensed my weakness and fatigue, and allowed me to enjoy the ecstasies of her gestalt.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
If I have a place anywhere upon the earth where a wellspring of energy might be tapped into, where the lines of lei are arranged in my favor, it’s here at Penny Bridge. Calvary, First Calvary, is across the street and my beloved Creek splashes her gelatinous analog for water upon the oil stained bulkheads about a thousand feet away. Here, in the cold waste, was nepenthe experienced. Officially, one is “back on the beat” and this – your Newtown Pentacle – is back in session. Enough of this wintry sloth, a humble narrator is tired of the boredom, and the Newtown Creek offers thrills both salacious and sublime.
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swept aside
Conspiracy in North Brooklyn?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Pictured above is the FDNY’s Firefighter 2 Fireboat dousing the remains of a document storage warehouse at North 11th street right at the border of Greenpoint and Williamsburg. The building is likely a total loss and will be probably be demolished, as this was a seven alarm “all hands fire” which required the attentions of more than 200 Firefighters to control. It’s eerily similar to the Greenpoint Terminal Market fire, which “Grenperntners” will eagerly describe as an arson job designed to clear the way for real estate development. FDNY investigators described the Greenpoint Terminal Market event as an accident brought on by a homeless man’s campfire.
There’s a few conspiracy theories already forming around CitiStorage, which I’ll pass on with the caveat that these are “conspiracy theories” and nothing resembling the final analysis of what happened will be available for months until after the FDNY investigators pronounce judgement.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The first conspiracy theory is alluded to above, and declares that the Real Estate Industrial Complex was hungry for this valuable piece of land on Brooklyn’s Gold Coast. Arsonists were sent in to get rid of the structure, which is why the fire had two distinct ignition events. To me, this one doesn’t hold water, as it’s far simpler for the REIC to legally gain possession of anything they want simply by pushing the right political buttons. Look at Willets Point, or Atlantic Yards, or Hudson Yards for examples of the vulgar display of their power. This “burn out” concept used to be a thing, during the 1970’s, 80’s, and 90’s, incidentally.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The second theory requires a bit of context to fully appreciate. The documents storage facility which went up in flames housed, amongst other things, court and hospital records for the City. The Albany scandal revolving around Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver accuses him of various improprieties regarding referrals to a personal injury law firms, from which he personally profited. The conspiracy theory is that somebody torched this place to protect the former “most powerful man in New York” from some revelation or “smoking gun” which Federal investigators might have found there. Again, a conspiracy theory, not a conclusion.
from nytimes.com
Those that said they had records stored in the warehouse, which occupies nearly half a square block, included the state court system, the city Administration for Children’s Services, the city Health and Hospitals Corporation, and members of the Greater New York Hospital Association.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whatever happened, the toxic plume of smoke from the fire has been painting the neighborhoods surrounding this spot at Bushwick Inlet for a couple of days. I was able to smell it in Astoria just last night, and as one approached the spot in Greenpoint where the shots above were captured, it was inescapable and somewhat nauseating. Pictured above is what the scene looked like in 2013, incidentally, sans conflagration.
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recalls nothing
There’s something wrong…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
When the prophesied storm of fimbulvinter rolled through our town the other night, Our Lady of the Pentacle and myself (along with our little dog Zuzu) were warm and snug down in the bunker we had readied for the Mayan Apocalypse. My understanding is that when the glacial ice sheet moved south across Astoria, according to some of the hardier Croatians who disregarded the warnings of City and State, a wooly mammoth was spotted on 31st avenue as it fled from a group of fur clad Neanderthals. Word has it that folks in the East Elmhurst area spotted a Sabre Toothed Tiger roaming about. The ice age escalated quickly, and this is how we live now. Please, please, generate some global warming and fast – do something to increase your carbon footprint right now – it’s freezing outside.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One realizes that the singular tonality of the age we live in is one of looming apocalypse. I get it. Jaded, the human infestation won’t respond to warnings about this and that unless you attach an existential danger to the message. Having grown up in a home where my mother would pop a blood vessel if the kitchen sink displayed moisture or a crumb was found nearby the toaster, I really do understand overreaction. However, the lesson of “Chicken Little” seems to be something that our risk averse culture has forgotten these days.
The sky was literally falling last week, but it was snow. This is normal, and expected, because it’s January in New York. If the government really wants to get ahead of this sort of thing, they should start considering turning NYC into one of those science fiction style domed cities.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Those things one such as myself worries about are a bit mundane, I fear. Having somebody who is texting while walking on a subway platform jostle and knock me onto the tracks, getting crushed by a falling air conditioner, or being splattered by the manic actions of some truck driver. Being struck by a bicyclist or electric delivery bike as they speed down the sidewalk – all of my little scenarios are far more likely than being flash frozen in a “Day after Tomorrow” style atmospheric inversion.
While sitting in the bunker, drinking hot chocolate with Our Lady, one did begin to ponder what has become of all that post Hurricane Sandy money which was spent studying ways to protect the City against extreme weather events.
Perhaps we should initiate a blue ribbon commission to study the studies which studied the problem?
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
these assertions
Boats, and a ship, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A recent trip to the Kill Van Kull, the busy waterway that defines the border betwixt New Jersey and… Staten Island… happened to coincide with a small burst of shipping activity. DonJon’s Emily Ann is pictured above.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A cargo ship was emerging form the Port Elizabeth Newark complex after having crossed under the Bayonne Bridge. She was riding pretty high in the water, destination unknown. The rail tracks are all that’s left of this branch of the Staten Island Railroad.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Moran tugs are iconic, especially when posing against the newest NYC icon, the so called Freedom Tower. Sorry for the “softball” post today, it’s been a heck of a week. More on that in a future posting.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
corporeal tenement
Wind, snow, rats, egg rolls, fear.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An interesting visualization of the locations where rats were reported in 2014 in the City of Greater New York, as presented by the Village Voice, was reviewed over the weekend. The health department and the writer of the piece focused in on the seeming correlation between the addresses of Chinese restaurants and the location of rat colonies. Officialdom and the Voice writer speculated on whether or not the rodents have a preference for Chinese take out. When viewing the map, I couldn’t help but notice that the shape of the rat infestations closely mirrored that of the NYC Subway system. Follow the critters through Queens, and you can trace out the path of the R/M, 7, and F lines rather neatly. Same thing with Brooklyn, where you can trace out the G tunnels. Just saying… these restaurants are either located above subway tunnels or are nearby the entrances to the system.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Personal observation of the Chinese restaurants here in Astoria, a few of which are on the Voice map, reveals that the owners of these establishments consider the corner sewer drain as a handy receptacle for the issuance of both fryer oil and the emptying of mop buckets. Rats love fatty foods (who doesn’t, after all?) and hang around the local sewer interceptors and underground vaults knowing that the good stuff will be coming soon. Thing is, my belief is that these sorts of anecdotes are coincidental to the real issue of where the rats are coming from – which are the MTA tunnels.
Ask anyone who lives in public housing – the worst landlord in the City of New York is actually the City of New York, which passes strict rules and enacts a series of fines on the citizenry to enforce them, rules which it does not find itself obliged to follow. Show me a New Yorker who hasn’t seen a rat in the Subway and I will declare them a one percenter who normally gets around town in the back seat of a limo. Show me an apartment house owner with black mold on the walls and no available heat or hot water, who never gets fined, and I’ll automatically tell you the owner is the City of New York.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After the snow finishes falling, look around tomorrow. You’ll be able to discern which properties in your neighborhood are owned and operated by the City simply by noticing which sidewalks haven’t been shoveled (with the exception of schools, courthouses, and anything within camera range of Manhattan’s City Hall). These City owned stretches of pavement will remain covered in snow, which will shortly compact down into a plate of milky colored, rotting, wet ice that will persist until the spring thaw. Sadly, many of these spots will surround Subway stations and bus stops. This is one of the things which “I don’t get” as even the Soviet Commisars acknowledged that they had certain responsibilities to the Proletariat. The connection between high volume restaurants and rats is actually a correlation of the proximity of these establishments to Subway infrastructure. Dealing with NYC’s rat infestation should begin with that which connects us all – the subway tunnels. Then, we should work our way up to the surface and blame the Chinese restaurants.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 