Winter

Signs of the Apocalypse

Nature

Chinatown.

  Near entrance to Williamsburg Bridge in Brooklyn.


Captions always give more gravity.

Weirdos

It seems like New York used to be filled with bona fide weirdos. Maybe the second guy is not a weirdo, just a stylish fellow. But that first guy, he is clearly a character, sunning himself in Washington Square Park.

Keith Haring Bathroom

Some flattering photos of Dan and I at the Keith Haring bathroom. It was cool.

Wonder What the Neighbors Think?

There was a post on the blog Apartment Therapy in January about a pink brownstone in Park Slope. What was creepy about the responses wasn't that some people thought the color was ugly, but that everyone seemed so horrified in a gated-community, block-association, keeping up with Joneses type way:

"I feel it's flat out tacky. Wonder what the neighbors think?"

"when you have to subject passersby to such a bold statement, it seems a bit discourteous. Soon you'll have a street of rainbow houses."

"This is a shameful. The outside of a home should be RESPECTFUL to the context of it's surroundings. This is like giving the middle finger to all of the neighbors."

"I would not buy the house across the street from this house."

"Oh, how dreadful. This horrid should not be allowed in urban environment. If people with no taste want to project their personal “style” onto the exterior of their houses they should move to the country side and do as they’re pleased."

Wait, an urban environment is where it shouldn't be allowed? I thought being exposed to different things is exactly what you should appreciate about an urban environment. Go back to the suburbs, lady!

By contrast, one commentor wrote:

"I've lived near that house since the mid-80s. The neighborhood used to be a lot funkier, with bicentennial-painted fire hydrants, old clawfoot tubs overflowing with plants, "cheap landlord" paint colors, and many of the brownstones in disrepair. Then came the real estate boom, the money, the mass renovation/restoration movement, and the movie-set perfection that is Park Slope today...

Garish as it is (the pic doesn't do justice) it pleases me every time I walk by, and reminds me of what Brooklyn (and life?) used to be like before The Fall (when Eve bit the apple and understood that her pink house was wrong)."

Anyway, this discussion certainly reinforces the idea that people want to live in places like Park Slope so they can fulfill their suburban fantasy and further neutralize the neighborhoods personality to suit their own bland, tasteful, and ultra- expensive aesthetics.

Brooklyn Academy of Music

I wish people were still carving angry cherubs onto buildings instead of coating them with brushed stainless steel (how did that become a building a material???) and "reclaimed " wood veneer and filling them with drywall. Actually, BAM has a very modern awning I find ugly, complete with brushed stainless steel poles that look like they belong on some sort of industrial staircase. I know people get annoyed when you tell them you hate modern architecture but hey guess what soon it will be old and the lovers of modern architecture will find it ugly and dated, like in the future when we have internet walls and doors that scan our brains.

Chinese New Year, Last Year

God, there was so much snow on the ground all last year. We were probably coming from Big Wong. Sometimes I think about how many great, cheap places there are to eat in Chinatown alone, and it can be hard to cram it all in.

Coney Island, Last Summer

Oh Coney Island, bet you won't be looking so awesome this year. The day the first photo was taken on one of the first really hot days in the air, a really humid day that felt electrically charged. There were all these teenage hotties prowling the boardwalk, and fights were breaking out every couple minutes. It always seems new-agey to talk about energy, but there was some energy in the air that day.

Eventually Dan was like, "We gotta get out of here!" because we were feeling hella white and out of place, and then we left and on the way back we saw all the cop cars and someone had been stabbed or shot or something.

The thing with Coney Island is that people don't go the arcades and rides that much, because of the modern age, but it's certainly well populated with locals during the summer, but the people trying to redo it act like it's empty. And the signs and the rides are so beautiful, of course.

I love beach photos and the colors of everything on the beach. It's so beautiful when the sun starts to set and it's hazy and warm.

Coal Yard, Coolest Bar in Town!

Me and Dan pretending we are old school, heroin-addicted, authentic 1970's punks at the Coal Yard. What a cool mural, though. New York definitely has San Francisco beat as far as grafitti and murals go, with all the Chico stuff and actual cool, colorful grafitti and the Williamsburg Bridge and everything. All San Francisco's murals are like Cesar Chavez with ying yangs around him. (No offense to Cesar Chavez!)

Trashy South Williamsburg

Doorway to that hostel on Broadway, which seems to be your classic flophouse.

Plants grow so rainforest-like and huge here in the summer.

Kumho Hankook

Little Nassau Street looks like the Lower East Side of yore.

I love this sign on Franklin.

What a cool store. Near the Flushing JMZ.

Stately Clinton Hill

Lush Foliage From November 2011

Cars

Clinton Hill