Poetry in Motion: Subway by Billy Collins

This Poetry in Motion poster on the subways is still hanging around, as it went up in 2016:

Subway                  Billy Collins, b. 1941

As you fly swiftly underground
with a song in your ears
or lost in the maze of a book,

remember the ones who descended here
into the mire of bedrock
to bore a hole through this granite,

to clear a passage for you
where there was only darkness and stone.
Remember as you come up into the light.

~ ~ ~

Visit the MTA Poetry in Motion page here.

Bios of the poet and the artist whose work in the subway that serves as the backdrop for the poem above, which was one of three released in 2016, appears on the site here. You can also click on the Poetry in Motion tag at the bottom of the post to see prior BillyBlog posts about the series.

Marching in Manhattan

Yesterday I participated in the Women's March in New York City.

It was amazing.

Conservative estimates put the crowd at 400,000 people. Organizers say it was closer to 600,000. Regardless, it felt like a million. It probably wasn't, but when you're packed in the streets with several hundred thousand people, you feel like the number of fellow citizens around you is immense.

I marched to support the women in my life, and countless friends and family members who feel threatened by the turn that the government is taking. The language of oppression and disenfranchisement, the threat to equality that is espoused by "leaders" who want to make the country great again when their definition of "great" and my definition of "great" are split by vast chasm of meaning.

When you're walking in the canyons of Manhattan and surrounded by fellow marchers, and you hear a distant roar, and can feel it approaching, rolling up to you in a wave of sound, you know that your one voice, when combined with others, can create an incredible noise.

I have posted several photos below that I took. I wish I had had more battery so I could take dozens more.

Just Another Day in New York City

What a day Monday was! Woke up and, on the way to work, saw another classic cover from the New York Post:


Then, at lunch, met Hooter, an English Mastiff, outside the Garden:


What a face!


I always love working where I work this time of year, as we get to see a whole slew of amazing show dogs.

Of course, some people don't love the Westminster Dog Show. The Peta protesters were out with their latest shock-and-appall campaign:


What the hell are they doing? Offending most passers-by. Then again, they got me to blog about it, didn't they? Check out the article in USA Today here. The article features this photo:


I reprinted it here just to show the readers that, in the background is a big neon sign for Madison Square Garden, right behind that is a building. That's where I work.

A Random Photo from the End of 2008

Sunset at Battery Park, December 28, 2008

'Iolani School Orchestra at Saint Bart's

Today I took my daughters to hear the 'Iolani School Orchestra perform at St. Bartholomew's Church in New York City.




The highlight for me was the inclusion of the traditional Hawaiian song 'Ulili E. Nothing like seeing a beautiful hula performed in New York at the end of December.

It was a brief, thirty-minute performance, but the highlight of my day.

Here it is, a little dark, but lovely none the less:

And Another Train of Thought: Samuel Eliot Morison

First spotted on the Q train (November 7, 2008):

"America was discovered accidentally by a great seaman who was looking for something else; when discovered it was not wanted; and most of the exploration for the next fifty years was done in the hope of getting through or around it. America was named after a man who discovered no part of the New World. History is like that, very chancy."

Samuel Eliot Morrison (1887-1976) The Oxford History of the American People (1965), Ch. 2 "The European Discovery of America."

New Train of Thought: Isaac Newton

First spotted on the R train....

"I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

--Isaac Newton (1642-1727), Memories of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton (1855), ed. David Brewer

New York Minute: Waterfall from a Moving Train

Haven't heard of this? Read the New York Times article here.

More Statues of Liberty Spotted!

Melanie spotted the Kansas City Royals statue on the steps of One Liberty Plaza this morning.

Also, an Anonymous commenter posted that the Colorado Rockies statue is at 1 New York Plaza downtown.

And Peterpanic reports "White Sox is in front of the Walgreens on 4th ave and 14th street."

And aswang in the city reports "NY giants is inside toys r'us in times square, near the entrance."

Here's a map where you can find them all. I'd go around and take pictures, but I have a job.
There's also a fan photo gallery here.

Statues of Liberty on Parade: The New York Mets

In the spirit of The Cow Parade, New York City's upcoming hosting of the Major League Baseball All-Star Game next month has a publicity parade of its own. Although this occasion was discussed earlier this month in the media (New York Times article here), Wednesday morning revealed this New York Mets-themed statue in Penn Plaza, directly in front of the Borders store.


Of course, Mr. Met was relegated to the back of the statue:


When I see any of the other teams, I will post photos here.

21 Questions for BillyBlog

I had so much fun with the Jamie Lynn Spears post (if you missed it, and are intrigued, it's here), that I couldn't resist this one as well. It's based on New York magazine's 21 Questions feature, when I originally stumbled on the one by book-jacket graphic designer extraordinaire, Chip
Kidd, here.

So here I go...

Name: Bill Cohen

Age: 40, but not for much longer.

Occupation: Lover of All Humankind

Neighborhood: Bay Ridge, Near Fort Hamilton

Who's your favorite New Yorker, living or dead, real or fictional?

This was tougher than I expected, since the definition of "New Yorker" is so open to various interpretations. I will say John Lennon.


What's the best meal you've eaten in New York?
Maybe after being here a year, the parents of a friend of ours, visiting from Houston, took us to Felidia. I don't remember what we ate, but I remember it was awesome. A close second is the River Cafe, in Brooklyn.

In one sentence, what do you actually do all day in your job?
Put out fires and sulk.

Would you still live here on a $35,000 salary?
Me, yes. My family, no.

What's the last thing you saw on Broadway?
Spamalot. For my birthday the year it opened. Tim Curry is awesome.

Do you give money to panhandlers?
Generally, no.

What's your drink?
Black Russian.

How often do you prepare your own meals?
Generally it's a team effort. Maybe once or twice a week I make a killer salad.

What's your favorite medication?
Pearl Jam's eponymous album, also known as the Avocado Album. It has taken on new meaning for me as it has braced me for difficult days at the office.

What's hanging above your sofa?


A print of Francisco de Zurburan's Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose(1633).

How much is too much to spend on a haircut?
I spend $20, including tip, every six weeks or so. My hair is generally one of the things I care little about.

When's bedtime?
Usually much earlier than when I actually go to sleep. I have been hard-wired as a night owl, ever since my freshman year in college when I religiously watched Late Night with David Letterman on NBC from12:30 to 1:30AM each night.

Which do you prefer, the old Times Square or the new Times Square?
Having never really experienced the old Time Square, I'll go with the old, as it is shrouded in mystery and the displaced nostalgia of others.

What do you think of Donald Trump?
The fact that he can parlay a career in business and succeed in reality television is either admirable or despicable, I'm not sure which. Adspicirble?

What do you hate most about living in New York?
After 11 years here, I have yet to build the network of friends like the wonderful ones I have in L.A. Although that is more likely due to me being me, as opposed to New York's fault. One of my best friends, Jill, I met in L.A., and she is a New Yorker now, too.

Who is your mortal enemy?
People who clip their fingernails on the subway. Nothing brings me closer
to rage.

When's the last time you drove a car?
Someone asked me this the other day and I was stumped. I think last summer (2007) when my father-in-law was in town and he sprained his ankle. I had to retrieve his car for him to spare him a long walk to a remote parking spot.

Who should be the next president?
Dennis Haysbert. And not his character from 24. Pedro Cerrano from Major League.

Times, Post, or Daily News?
Times. I love the Post's silly headlines, but I am annoyed when their clearly conservative agenda is so thinly-veiled in the guise of news. A perfect example is when, several weeks back, Barack Obama left the church where Reverend Jeremiah Wright is pastor. The Post headline reported
"Obama Quits Church". Seemingly innocent headline, one might say, but others could falsely interpret it as Senator Obama forsaking religion. Clever, but despicable, and not in the Trumpian way.

Where do you go to be alone? The Laundromat. Sure, I'm not really alone, but I am in a bubble, oblivious to the world around me.

What makes someone a New Yorker?
Being able to get from point A to point B on foot, or by mass transit, with minimal confusion or panic.

No Thanks, I'm Not Hungry

Subway Art for a Saturday

This is either a new feature or a one-time thing. We'll see.

This is one of many panels at the Union Street subway station in Brooklyn. The artist is Emmett Wigglesworth and the panel is part of the complete project called CommUnion, 1994.

There's a description of the whole installation here. I also discovered that, through that link one can also see the art and get the story behind it throughout the New York City subway system. Check it out and get lost underground for a while this weekend.

BillyBlog Random Tuesday Assortment

Just skimmed the recent New Yorker anniversary issue. Of note was a piece of personal history by David Owen about nicknames (a little bit more of the piece here) and a good story ("Free Radicals") by Alice Munro (who rarely writes "bad stories").

I was thrilled to see a doubling of my traffic on Tuesday when BillyBlog appeared as a link on the New York Times website in a daily section on notable items in the blogs. My photo of the Smart Car got some attention. Thanks to the good folks over in the City Room for noticing me.

A gaggle of tourists just boarded the N train to Brooklyn and were cacophonous when they realized they weren't Times Square-bound. Lovely day to forget my BilliPod at work.

Check out this artwork:



Want to see more, go here. The artist, Philip Dusel, was spotted by me in the Chelsea Salvation Army store last Tuesday. He had tattoos and, well, you know, the rest is history. Read about one of his tattoos, which he designed himself, here.

Finally, one of the perks of working near Penn Station/Madison Square Garden is all the free stuff they give away to commuters as promotional items. Tuesday was an exciting day, to say the least, as they gave away these:



Mmmm. Nothing like the taste of bacon and cheese on a cricket! I am saving mine for after I've had a few beers.

Grate Scott!

This was the view out our window Saturday morning.


At first we were baffled.

But we came to learn that under that snow, within the rectangle of yellow safety tape, is a metal grate.

As of Tuesday morning, the car and the cones are still there.

Curious?

Read on:

Con Ed pays 'em to sit on grates

Livery drivers making a bundle to guard dangerous city hot spots

By JIMMY VIELKIND
DAILY NEWS WRITER

Posted Thursday, May 3rd 2007, 4:00 AM

Cabbie Zafrul Islam holds letter explaining why he's guarding manhole in Brooklyn.

---

Con Edison has come up with a bizarre way to protect the public from stray-voltage hot spots throughout the city - it's hiring livery cab drivers to guard them until crews can fix the problem.

The dark cars and their drivers sit next to a roped-off area around the clock for days, with a placard explaining their mission.

"A stray voltage hazard was discovered here," the card says. "The coned/taped off area contains an extremely dangerous electrified object or structure.

"I am unable to move my vehicle because I am guarding this coned/taped off area from pedestrians."

The utility said the program started about six months ago and about 1,000 drivers from various livery companies are involved.

Previously, when Con Ed was alerted to a stray-voltage area - which can deliver a deadly shock to people and pets - it had one of its own cars protect the site.

But high-tech vans that roam the city looking for electrified pavement are finding so many danger zones that Con Ed had to enlist outside help, said spokesman Chris Olert.

He referred to the livery hacks as "site-safety" personnel who have been specially "trained."

But the training consists of being told to keep people away from the cordoned-off area.

"I just watch and make sure no one goes near it," said Zafrul Islam, 42, a driver for Executive Transportation in Borough Park, who has sat sentry over stray current in Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens.

Yesterday, his dark-blue Lincoln Town Car was stationed near a 5-foot power grate on 11th St. near Third Ave. in Gowanus, Brooklyn, where a 16-volt leak had been discovered.

Annoyed neighborhood residents said cabs had been stationed there since Thursday evening.

"It's a gimmick," railed Cosimo Catanzano, 80, whose home is directly across from the faulty grate.

The curbside was blocked off with four construction cones and yellow safety tape. Islam's car had another cone on its roof - and its constant presence had alarmed locals.

"I called 911," said Rosemary Snyder, 58. "Don't you think ConEd should have let us know instead of letting a stranger sit outside like that?"

Maryann Slattery, 32, called the situation "ridiculous."

"Con Ed wants to raise our rates but they have the money to pay for a private car service? We have a lot of children and a lot of dogs. Why can't they send someone to actually fix it?"

Con Ed, which is spending $4million on the entire stray-voltage program, could not say how much it costs to have cabs baby-sit.

But if the power company were paying market rates of $30 an hour and up, the bill would be at least $720 per day per site.

The utility also said it did not know how many cab companies were hired by its subcontractor, Sarnoff Co., how many spots they've guarded since the program started, or how long it takes to fix each spot.

Sarnoff makes the vans ConEd uses to detect stray voltage. Last year, those vans found 1,969 hot spots, while manual detection turned up another 914.

Just four months into this year, the vans have already identified about 1,500 stray-voltage sites, Olert said.

Roger Lane, whose daughter, Jodie, was electrocuted in the East Village in 2004, was surprised to hear about Con Ed's new fleet of lookouts - but glad they were at least doing something to keep people away.

"Cones and cabs, policemen and firemen - whoever they put there that will protect the pedestrian from inadvertently walking on top of it is fine with me," he said.

With Tracy Connor

Astonishing.

UPDATE 2/27/08 At around midnight, there still seemed to be no progress. Livery cab company still raking in the bucks for watching this rectangle of pavement! God Bless America!

But then, a large pick-up truck appeared, and the driver talked for a while with the cab driver, talked on his cell phone, stood inside the forbidden golden rectangle (gasp!). When I went to bed, finally, the truck was still idling out front. At 5 AM, when I woke up, everything had vanished. Cones, car, stray voltage (apparently). It was as if it was all a long, bizarre 3-day dream......

New York City Icicle

I am calling this a New York City icicle, although it could occur in other cities, I guess.

Any city-dweller surely will bemoan the phenomenon of plastic bags, usually from grocery stores, getting stuck in trees.

They are an eyesore, to say the least. The writer Ian Frazier wrote a piece (abstract here) about it in The New Yorker about four years ago.

Anyway, take a bag in a tree, add snow, then heat slightly causing said snow to melt. Preferably there is a small hole in the bag, causing dripping snow to freeze as an icicle. Behold: the New York City icicle. Any icicle on an awning or dangling from a gutter could be from anywhere. There is something ugly and special about this one.

A lovely glistening shard of ice clinging to a plastic bag, twisting in the wind, trying to break free of the tree that refuses to let go. Nature and litter's bastard child.

It made me smile.

Liveblogging Two Twenty-Two

It is snowing in New York City. I already had a scheduled day off, so I am not inconvenienced by the snow, merely in awe of it. This is our first real significant snowfall this season (and February almost over). It has snowed, but in minimal quantities. What was predicted last night as 2 to 4 inches in the city has swelled to a 6 to 9-inch estimate.

I am writing now from the R train. Jolee, Shayna and I are going to Manhattan. The American Museum of Natural History is our destination. They were supposed to go on Monday, but the plans didn't materialize as expected. I am wondering, with the snowfall, if the museum will be crowded or suffer the ill effects of inclement weather on attendance.

The Today show sadistically broadcasted this morning from Miami Beach.

At 36th Street I saw a yellow train marked "DE-ICER CAR". Makes sense, but I have never seen one of those before. We switched over to an N train.

We recently sent out our annual family newsletter. 2 months late, or ten months early, depending on your perspective. I welcome all those new visitors who may have seen the BillyBlog plug in our family newsletter.

It's not always like this, but then again, sometimes it is.

I may post more today from the Museum, if I can.

Signing off for now.

Cool Stuff People E-mail Me: Frozen in Grand Central

Worth watching. This is amazing. Melanie sent me this link.

Interesting Obituary: Jack Brod

This struck me as fascinating, from the New York Times obituary section:

Jack Brod, a businessman who over nearly eight decades gradually worked his way from the 7th floor of the Empire State Building to the 76th, where he reigned as the skyscraper’s last original tenant, died last Sunday at his home in Manhattan. He was 98.

Read the remainder here.

Or, check out a similar bio here.

Springtime in January

We broke records today, I think, or came close. The temperature in New York City was in the 60s, a rare treat for us warm weather lovers.

I celebrated the thaw with exercise, rising at 5am so I could ride my bike to work in pleasant, albeit dark, conditions.

It's a nice trek, just under 12 miles. The temp (before sunrise) was in the high 40s.

We shall see how long this "heat wave" lasts. There is rain in the forecast tomorrow!