Posts Tagged ‘newtown creek’
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.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
titanic gateway
3 top reasons that Listicles blow chunks, in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
You many have noticed a certain invective this week, aimed specifically at the so called “Listicles.” The phylum of Internet posts propagated by buzzfeed and other high volume sites which promise “5 things we love about” or “3 things we hate about” or “7 best moments in…” annoy me as they tend to dumb down the discourse and feed off of content created by others. One does not offer promises which will not be kept, but one oath which a humble narrator will swear to is that Newtown Pentacle will not be offering posts of that ilk to you in 2015. My plan for the year is to continue the current publishing schedule – 5 days a week, Monday to Friday, with posts arriving sometime between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Add in my two posts a week at Brownstoner Queens, as well as my other obligations, and I think you’ll agree that my plate is rather full. Pictured above: one of the best lit USPS trucks on Northern Blvd in Queens, which is parked by a Best Buy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Goals for the new year are non existent. I have an odd desire to photograph Rockaway Beach during a blizzard, for some reason, but plans for the year are still forming up. When Spring comes, I’ll likely resume my walking tours of the Newtown Creek watershed and other area waterways, but nothing is definite or scheduled yet. I do have a certain something that I’m trying to cook up on Staten Island, but it’s too early to mention specifics on that one. One desire which I will admit to is to spend some time exploring the more easterly parishes of Queens a bit, scuttling past Maspeth and Jackson Heights and into the central districts of the Borough.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s plenty going on right here in LIC to keep an eye on, of course. The Degnon Terminal will be receiving a major facelift this year when LaGuardia Community College implements its capital program in January to reconstruct the facade of its “Building C” – the former “Thousand Windows Bakery” of the Loose Wiles company. Additionally, Tower Town has now extended itself all the way to Queens Plaza and there’s lots of new construction going on to keep an eye on. As always, however, My Beloved Creek will retain center stage in 2015.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
everywhere present
I also hate Tuesdays.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recently one visited the Hunters Point Avenue Bridge, which spans the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek in Long Island City’s Degnon Terminal. It was low tide. The smell was abominable.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The tidal evacuation of the liquid during an unusually low winter tide – and we will just refer to that hellish chemical compound which sloshes about and between the shattered bulkheads of Dutch Kills as “water” – had revealed the hateful ooze and depraved sediments which underlie and poison the canal.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Gaze into the Black Mayonnaise, lords and ladies of Newtown. An amalgamation of centuries of sewage and oil and industrial pollution, as concentrated into a hard jelly that extends from twenty to thirty feet down from the surface. The wind was rather still, this day that the sediment mounds rose, and Dutch Kills exuded its peculiar flavor profile.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The smell back here isn’t necessarily that of sewage, which has a distinctive and quite unique odor, this scent is also biological. The ambient aroma is that of sewage that’s been allowed to simmer, that is. These sediment mounds are teeming with armies of mephitic entities – most of whom could be politely described as “pathogens” – and when the “water” pulls out, they all fart at once and it smells not unlike rotting egg salad sandwiches.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The odor is best described as a flavor, as it activates a region far back on the tongue in addition to the nasal passage, which autonomically causes the abdomen to tighten up as well as causing vocalizations of some sort. The vocalizations are either profane or invoke the name of a god. To one such as myself, it is nepenthe, of course.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This century old point of view, of the former Loose Wiles Bakery at the Degnon Terminal in Long Island City, is about to be inextricably altered. A multi million dollar upgrade to the building, which serves as the modern day “Building C” of LaGuardia Community College, will be wiping away the intricate but crumbling plaster facade which has been so long familiar.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
in confirmation
Break time.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A single image greets you this morning, as will be the case through the Thanksgiving holiday.
A humble narrator requires a break periodically, to recharge and reinvent. Worry not, however, for pithy commentary and puckish intent returns on the Monday following Thanksgiving – the first of December.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
fled unsuspectingly
Break time.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A single image greets you this morning, as will be the case through the Thanksgiving holiday.
A humble narrator requires a break periodically, to recharge and reinvent. Worry not, however, for pithy commentary and puckish intent returns on the Monday following Thanksgiving – the first of December.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 