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Did you ever wonder what the insides of a communications cable looked like? It looks like this. At least, my guess is this is an old phone cable. A piece about 20 feet long and four inches in diameter was lying next to the bike path along the Harlem River a block or two south of Swindler's Cove. It is a little heavy but is there for the taking if you want it.
I don't know. I walked by this on W. 79th St. and thought it looked like a duck. What does it look like to you?
Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle (Harmonia axyridis) on an Al Jarreau LP that was precariously balanced on top of a mail relay box. The Asian Lady Beetle is a pest that invades homes by the thousands in the fall and stink when you squash them. They are not the adorable lady bug that everyone likes.
It seems that I have been photographing lots of odd signs recently. Despite that, I have to say that I am sometime reluctant to share them here. One reason for my reluctance is the sheer number of signs in the city. On any given commercial block there are probably several hundred signs large and small, handwritten and commercially produced etc. Even if the vast majority of the signs are error- and weirdness-free, there will still be a handful per block that are "different" and some of those will be interesting enough to photograph. Multiply those interesting photos by the number of blocks in the city and you have a lot of photo ops. In a sense, taking photos of odd signs is just too easy because there are so many of them.
Having said that, I've walked around the city with a person, a person who lives in the city, who barely noticed what block they were on, let alone the businesses on the block or the signs in a window. That's an extreme case (and is not, as far as I know, a regular reader of these pages), but it indicates to me that lots of people are missing out on entertaining weirdness that surrounds us.
I'm also reluctant to post photos of signs, like above, that have punctuation and grammatical errors. We all make mistakes and I'm not interested in broadcasting the honest errors of others. For all I know this sign was written by someone who has been in the country for six months, and for whom English is a second language.
Sometimes, though, the signs are just too good to pass up. While walking west along 17th St yesterday morning I glanced left and saw this sign:
By itself this isn't an interesting sign, so I kept walking. There were no instructions immediately to the right so I assumed the arrow was pointing to another set of doors about 40 feet down the street. What sort of instructions would you expect if you saw that sign? I didn't put much thought to it but I assumed there would be some instruction to call security, use your keycard, show ID, etc. to get in. Instead, the only instruction was this:
Now there's building management that has really low expectations of those who enter!
I went out of town on the weekend for the first time since early June. I went to New Haven to take some photographs to be posted later, and to Shelley's house in Stamford for what was billed as an "All-American" dinner. There were people from Holland, Germany, Canada, New Zealand, Fiji, the Philippines, and the U.S. It was a feast. We had grilled steak, grilled chicken, grilled kielbasa simmered in sauerkraut, onions, and apples, cucumber salad, potato salad, corn salad, yellow, purple and orange carrots, key lime pie, peach tart, homemade chocolate cake, American beer and French, Australian and American wines. I'm sure I'm missing something. It was quite a task but, except for sticking to the beer, I tried nearly everything.
I finally got to meet Roseanne's mother, Emma, above. Emma's nickname for me is "the Thief" for the summer two years ago when Roseanne was out to sea for a month and left more than one person in charge of her garden. I kept helping myself to the ripe vegetables before Emma could get them herself.
Shamefully, I only took three photos at the party. Two of them were lousy and the one above was fuzzy without the flash.
It has been rumored that Dinosaur BBQ of Syracuse was interested in expanding to Manhattan. As I drove up the short stretch of 12th Avenue behind Fairway yesterday morning I saw the sign above. A bit of Central New York is coming to NYC! Sure enough, according to their website Dinosaur Bar-B-Que is looking to open in late-September or early-October.
Their bbq sauce is really good but I've never eaten at the Syracuse location. My niece Jan lives in a suburb of Syracuse and likes it.
Will it be any good? We shall see. Will people want to eat at a place so close to the North River Sewage Treatment Plant? The odor tonight was not a palate pleaser.
The neighborhood they will be in is known as Manhattanville. Columbia wants to expand to the neighborhood and is in the very early stages of doing so. If they do there is a small chance that my job will move from its current location to either the main campus or the new campus. That's a few years off but the thought of having good barbecue for lunch is a pleasant thought.
Speaking of Manhattanville, the Columbia expansion proposal has generated some controversy in the community. I walked through the neighborhood a few months ago in a BlueJake-esque photography tour to get a better feel for the neighborhood. Maybe this will be my motivation to post those pictures.
Koronet Pizza on Broadway near Columbia University is well-known for the size of their slices. I happened to be walking by last night and soon found myself enjoying a slice. The pizza is pretty good. The crust is both crunchy and chewy. The slices are large enough that I find myself shaking parmesan on one section, hot pepper on another section, and oregano on a third.
While I was eating three teenagers with southeast Ohio accents came in and also got slices. Koronet's slices are so large that you have to fold them in order to eat them. These guys weren't folding and it wasn't a pretty sight. I was about to show them how to fold their slice when the unforgivable happened. One guy asked at the counter for marinara sauce for dipping and the guy pictured above asked for ranch dressing. Ranch dressing??? They were beyond my help.
For more about how to order and eat New York pizza visit GOPizza.net and to learn more about New York pizza in general visit the excellent SliceNY.
Traffic was moving slowly as we went through George Washington Bridge toll booths yesterday afternoon. Greg, Bridget and I were talking about vacations or Manhattan apartments when this brand new Toyota Prius pulls up beside us. It had stripes on the hood, flaming alien feet on the side, and arrows on the rear.
REVS graffiti underneath the Henry Hudson Parkway, northern Manhattan.
Highly secure Amtrak line.
The answer to the question posed earlier in the week is: the trail along the Hudson, south of Dyckman Street. I rode my bike around northern Manhattan Sunday afternoon. There is a bike trail that circles most of Manhattan. The trail is especially nice along the Harlem River north of 155th St. At the eastern end of Dyckman is Swindler's Cove. The cove features a new community boathouse designed by Robert A. M. Stern, a garden planted by the students of neighboring P.S. 5 (excellent-looking plum tomatoes kids!), and a restored Sherman Creek wetland area.
So, I rode up the bike path to Dyckman, which I then took across to the Hudson side of the island. At the foot of Dyckman is Tubby Hook, a marina and cafe. The Henry Hudson Parkway and Amtrak are high above.
A fence runs from the bridge support to the marina, but there is a gap wide enough to ride a bike through and an ill-maintained trail beyond. Hoping I can get down to the George Washington Bridge from here I head down the trail.
At first there isn't much happening along the trail. It is overgrown with weeds and brush. At some places it is so overgrown you would think you're on a forgotten country lane. I passed a couple of men walking along the trail. The Amtrak fence is 10-15 feet to my left. The Hudson is 10-20 feet to my right.
Every once in a while I see a trail leading off to the river. At a couple of the side trails I get off my bike, walk over to the river and take in the view. One spot had a small version of the decaying piers further downtown. I get back on my bike, start riding, and pass a few more men walking along the trail. I take another side trail and have my suspicions confirmed when I see a guy pulling up his pants. I retreat to the main trail and continue riding until I get to the hole in the fence above.
At that point the trail ended and I turned around. I could have continued by walking along the railroad tracks but that seemed a bit dangerous, not to mention illegal. Plus, I didn't have any idea where I could get off the tracks again (Penn Station?).
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