Steinway Creek is one of my favorite weird little spots I've found while walking around. I was in the Steinway/Astoria area today and just stopped by to take a quick look around, when I noticed three sheep standing atop the far bank of the creek! (You have to zoom in to see them.) There was also a chicken wandering around closer to the water. A guy who works nearby told me there's a vivero south of here and sometimes some of the animals escape and run off to this area by the creek, but they're always eventually caught and taken back to be slaughtered. This aerial view will give you a better sense of things. The vivero is on the north side of 20th Avenue by the soccer field; I took this photo by the southern end of the creek at 19th Avenue.
No Ham on My Pan
(No Pork on My Fork)
This shot and the next were taken while doing some unofficial walking around Harlem.
Jam Master Jay!
Hey, in two weeks it'll be Christmas in Hollis.
The city line appears to pass diagonally through this house, which has two different addresses posted beside its front door: 87-101 257th Street (Queens) and 1 Keene Avenue (Floral Park in Nassau County). Keene Avenue is an odd little roadway. It's the continuation of 257th Street from Queens into Nassau, but it only runs for maybe 50 feet before it crosses Jericho Turnpike and turns into Garfield Avenue (which itself lasts only another 300 feet before coming to an end). Google Maps doesn't acknowledge the existence of Keene Avenue, but check out Street View. You can see a Keene Avenue street sign on Jericho Turnpike, and you can also see where the newer Nassau County pavement ends around the city line, which gives you a good visual sense of how ridiculously short Keene Avenue is.
I'm not sure what kind of tree this is, but my vain attempts to find out led me to an excellent new word: fastigiate.
From across the street, I couldn't see the apostrophe in "Loft's", and I started cooking up a weird image in my mind of some old-timey chocolate makers living in a loft above what is now the first-floor card store. Turns out, however, that Loft's was also a confectionery company, and the sign on the second floor is merely an old advertisement for the candy that was presumably once sold in the storefront below.
I can't find much information about this quaint church, but you can read a little about the parish's history here.
They put the old Sniveling Weasel Body Shop next door right out of business.
According to an engraved tablet in the wall, this shrine at Our Lady of Lourdes Church was built in 1925, the year after the parish was founded. Like two other such grottoes we've seen, this one has a water spout to represent the spring that flows from the Grotto of Massabielle. The water wasn't running when I walked by, but perhaps it will be turned back on in warmer weather.
at the Eltingville station on the Staten Island Railway
In the early part of the 20th century, there were hundreds of railroad grade crossings in New York City, and they were becoming more dangerous and disruptive as the volume and speed of vehicles was increasing. A 1910 article in the NY Times called them "deadly grade crossings . . . traps that imperil human life". Almost all of them have since been eliminated, with the railroad tracks now passing over or under the roadways. The plaque above, found outside the Eltingville station on the Staten Island Railway, commemorates the elimination of grade crossings along this section of railroad, a project apparently carried out under the auspices of the Public Works Administration.
This leads to "a boarding house for the Young Israel of Eltingville synagogue". The house is now boarded up, however, after catching fire in July.
The name of this childcare center brings to mind Martin Van Buren — "Old Kinderhook" — the first president from New York State. Speaking of Old Kinderhook, have you ever wondered where the expression "OK" came from? There's some dispute, but the predominant theory is pretty awesome.
