USA | NYC
 


Day 1331

1954 Chevrolet 3100 pickup

August 22nd, 2015


Day 1331

Mildly ominous

August 22nd, 2015


Day 1331

FUCK YOU

August 22nd, 2015



From The Catcher in the Rye:

But while I was sitting down, I saw something that drove me crazy. Somebody'd written "Fuck you" on the wall. It drove me damn near crazy. I thought how Phoebe and all the other little kids would see it, and how they'd wonder what the hell it meant, and then finally some dirty kid would tell them--all cockeyed, naturally--what it meant, and how they'd all think about it and maybe even worry about it for a couple of days. I kept wanting to kill whoever'd written it.

. . .

I went down by a different staircase, and I saw another "Fuck you" on the wall. I tried to rub it off with my hand again, but this one was scratched on, with a knife or something. It wouldn't come off. It's hopeless, anyway. If you had a million years to do it in, you couldn't rub out even half the "Fuck you" signs in the world. It's impossible.

. . .

I was the only one left in the [Egyptian] tomb [at the Metropolitan Museum of Art] then. I sort of liked it, in a way. It was so nice and peaceful. Then, all of a sudden, you'd never guess what I saw on the wall. Another "Fuck you." It was written with a red crayon or something, right under the glass part of the wall, under the stones.

That's the whole trouble. You can't ever find a place that's nice and peaceful, because there isn't any. You may think there is, but once you get there, when you're not looking, somebody'll sneak up and write "Fuck you" right under your nose. Try it sometime. I think, even, if I ever die, and they stick me in a cemetery, and I have a tombstone and all, it'll say "Holden Caulfield" on it, and then what year I was born and what year I died, and then right under that it'll say "Fuck you." I'm positive, in fact.

Day 1331

The upper Lower

August 22nd, 2015



This is an odd spot on the NYC street map. The Lower Montauk Branch of the Long Island Rail Road, in the foreground, passes over the through lanes of Flushing Avenue, at bottom, while the local lanes of Flushing Avenue, on the upper level, terminate on either side of the Lower Montauk tracks. If you're not following my unintelligible description of what's going on here, this aerial view should prove much more elucidating.

Day 1331




Corporal Rodriguez, a Marine, was the first serviceman from New York City to die in the Iraq War.

Day 1331

1953 Buick Super

August 22nd, 2015





Day 1331

1963 Ford F-100 pickup

August 22nd, 2015


Day 1331

Pathetic little weenie plant

August 22nd, 2015



Colocasia

Day 1331

F. Kowalinski Post No. 4

August 22nd, 2015



This Polish Legion of American Veterans post is named for Frank Kowalinski, "the first U.S. Army soldier of Polish descent to be killed in combat during World War I".

From 1895 until about 1914, this building was a firehouse, home to Maspeth Engine Company No. 4. You can see a couple of old photos of the firehouse here and here.

UPDATE: On Veterans Day of 2015, a couple of months after I passed by, this block of Maspeth Avenue was co-named Frank Kowalinski Way.

Day 1331

8-month-old Buddy

August 22nd, 2015



Day 1331

Portal of the day

August 22nd, 2015


Day 1331

Curbside cacti

August 22nd, 2015



Day 1331

Custom fountain attachment

August 22nd, 2015



A great technological leap forward for those who prefer their drinking water straight from the hydrant.

Day 1331

St. Stan’s grotto

August 22nd, 2015


Day 1331




This church (not to be confused with the church of the same name in Brooklyn that I mentioned a few posts back) was built in the 1920s on the site of an old Quaker burial ground.