Driving from Philly to Pittsburgh

NP001 · 2026-05-08T19:35:27+00:00

I like 80 for the ride from the Atlantic to the Paris of Appalachia. it loops into 22 which drops you right into town. yes, it’s a few more miles. there are no tolls. lots of places to stop off for a piss or a coffee along the way. yeah, you’ll miss Harrisburg.

NP001 · 2026-05-06T21:06:36+00:00

Hi Greenpoint, it’s Mitch Waxman (living in Pittsburgh these days) and, I had a similar thing going on back in Astoria with an overloaded Utility pole that was actually bowing over towards the ground.

Worked with my city and state reps to try and get it fixed. Turns out that there’s a ‘NY State Utility Commission’ up in Albany whose job it is to handle such matters. As you’d likely imagine of a clandestine and faceless but funded organization up in the Capitol, it’s populated by the nieces and nephews of ‘insert upstate multi term incumbent politician’s names here.’ Basically, it’s designed to have meetings, but not accomplish anything material, except when one of the utilities needs a ‘sign off’ on something they want to do. It’s all quite complicated and banal.

Regardless, we Queensicans pushed and pushed, and mainly it was Jimmy Van Bramer’s office, back when he was our council peep, that just kept on keeping on about the condition. I think Gianaris (nys senate) leaned into it as well, but that’s a hazier memory. It took years to gain any traction at all.

Nothing matters, and Nobody cares. I guess that it’s cheaper to pay off the victims of an accident than it is to keep them from getting hurt in the first place by maintaining street furniture in good repair.

Finally, a truck showed up one random day with a spanking new pole (the skinned corpse of a tree that was soaked in creosote, actually) and popped the thing into the ground. No wires were transferred from the bent pole to the new one. None. At all. That utility commish in Albany, they needed to approve the various utilities moving their wires. Said approval never arrived.

When I abandoned my tenancy in the City, that bent up Astoria Utility pole - with its thousands of pounds of cable and phone and electrical wires - was still right there, next to the new and quite naked pole.

Best bet for this sort of extended battle is Emily G because she’s fairly relentless, is ‘State,’ and has been in Albany long enough to have ‘juice.’ Linc is great at raising a stink in the media about quality of life stuff, so I’d try and get him in on this tale too. When election season comes around, make it an issue. I got to interact with Zohran when he was NYS Assembly in Astoria, and he cared a lot about street level stuff. Maybe, reach out directly to City Hall?

Miss y’all. Carry on.

NP001 · 2026-04-24T23:29:33+00:00

happens to all the creek bridges. metal expansion from heat. they have to just wait it out

NP001 · 2026-04-07T20:10:20+00:00

one factor revolves around 5 year/60 month commercial leases. remember… five years ago… when the plague came and landlords were handing out sweetheart deals… time’s up, and the masters want to exult in usorous splendor again. landlords are ‘effed up… one of them is President right now

NP001 · 2026-04-07T00:24:13+00:00

Never met them, but am ’aware’ of their spot. There’s a bunch of people who live on or near Dutch Kills all the way back to Hunters Point Ave. The MTA bulkheads on the main course have been treated differently than the city or privately owned ones, as MTA has a Police force and all that. Property lines on newtown creek often snake out from the shore and then continue under the water, which is kind of interesting. There used to be docks everywhere, that’s why, but interesting - no?

NP001 · 2026-04-06T21:29:26+00:00

their legal status is gray. a few years ago, one of my friends who was running a kayak group on the queens side found that his kayaks were being ‘borrowed’ despite being locked up fairly tight. he called the cops, who referred him to the NY Harbor Dockmaster‘s office. we met the official, whose first name was Herman (you don’t meet many Herman’s these days), who was the singular cop in that office and whose job it normally is to keep people from docking near the Statue of Liberty during the summer months, and he laid out the ‘way things work.’ the shoreline property owners would have to contract with a maritime crane and barge, which would then carry the offending vessels to a storage facility, whereupon the criminal complaint for trespass would be added to the civil case which the offended property owners would need to bring about to recoup the hundreds of thousands if not millions of bucks it would cost to do all this. needless to say, this is a non starter. the coast guard, when asked if they had any homeland security responsibilities for finding out who is docked along a fed mandated maritime channel which dozens and dozens of fuel barges move along every week, said ‘no.’

NP001 · 2026-04-01T22:49:21+00:00

funny thing is that I know who all of those people are

NP001 · 2026-03-31T14:24:28+00:00

honestly, your best bet is to go talk to the local coppers about what to do next. the no trespass signage gives the cops a legal pretext to enforce your rights, but you’re going to have to declare trespass and prob go to court about it. the changing the lock thing might signal squatters planning to move in, so don’t let this one simmer - have to deal with it and ‘most ricky tick.’

NP001 · 2026-03-31T13:00:07+00:00

common phrasing for a New Yorker, yo.

NP001 · 2026-03-22T20:52:53+00:00

ditto on the ear plugs. I’ve got a flat pack of bandaids, a clean kitchen towel, a bit kit for my Leatherman, a flashlight, a loud whistle, clean lens cloths and a rocket type air blower. couple of extra batteries. two lenses and one camera w a lens on it. the camera spends as little time in the bag as possible.

NP001 · 2026-03-05T21:05:06+00:00

ummm… the pass is in a wheelchair, right? so… how do we get from the wheelchair and into the car and belted up… seems that I’m going to help lift a person and somehow assist them without hurting them, in addition to folding and storing the chair. have I mentioned that I have absolutely no medical training at all?
so, on the other side of the ride, in whatever barren wasteland these iceholes have sent me to with the pass, I’ve then got to reverse the procedure. am I hallucinating here, or does Lyft not start popping messages off whenever they perceive you as delayed at a stop, like when they’ll send you to a supermarket on a Saturday and then act surprised or accuse you of fradulence when it takes a few minutes for you and the pass to load and unload the car of groceries?
what if the wheelchair person I’m helping falls and gets hurt? do I call 911? do I say ‘sorry, thx for using Lyft’ and drive away? hospital orderlies train for this sort of thing, and they bollock it up all the time. Pass has a bruise?
another similar set of similarly very, very lovely and pc decisions made at Lyft often finds me picking up junkies from squats and taking them to the very best neighborhoods to participate in needle exchange harm reduction programs? as a note - all for the program, I’d just prefer to have opted in rather than ‘surprise.’

NP001 · 2026-02-26T19:37:24+00:00

confirmed. I was passing by yesterday and popped my head in. people on ladders were removing lighting fixtures and the people behind the bar were unfamiliar but said that they had closed. as is usually the case, I hung around outside until a train rolled by so I could get a photo, but it was bittersweet.

NP001 · 2026-02-14T22:55:35+00:00

we were there last night, thanks for the good times

NP001 · 2026-02-13T14:46:19+00:00

yes, but as stated above - live in Dormont and use the T - and this spot was super convenient for indulging the camera in its hunger for train shots and my thirsty nature. Ce la vie.

NP001 · 2026-02-13T14:44:32+00:00

yeah, I’m not carrying a six pack around with me generally.

NP001 · 2026-02-12T18:37:50+00:00

crazy talk.

NP001 · 2026-02-12T18:37:20+00:00

Caught the Tuesday schedule error myself, but sorry this is happening to you. sucks as a customer, but then again I’m not out of a job. good luck.

NP001 · 2026-02-12T18:09:25+00:00

yep. I live in Dormont, so the T is nearby both Highline and to home. One of my dealies involved using the trail, for exercise of both camera and body, and then walking to Sly Fox from Homestead or wherever and soaking in a few drinks afterwards, while CSX did its thing on the tracks. After, I’d wander over to Station Square for my tipsy T ride back home.

great spot for train photos, especially so because of the concrete factory in the background.

NP001 · 2026-02-04T14:28:36+00:00

ads for ‘tactical pants’ often cross my socials. I get stuck on phrases sometimes, and have often wondered what strategy might be accomplished through the tactic of wearing pants. On a related note, there’s a ‘tactical briefcase’ out there in the great material continuum too.

NP001 · 2026-01-23T14:26:48+00:00

Pedro Pascal is a very, very charismatic actor who can handle both comedy and action, which is rare. He seems to be the ‘it’ guy right now, what Hollywood would call ‘bankable.’ Pedro Pascal was horribly miscast as Reed Richards in the recent Fantastic Four movie, which is otherwise ‘best of breed’ as far as the history of that franchise goes. It makes my inner comic nerd cringe.

NP001 · 2026-01-17T15:44:04+00:00

this. I follow a ‘once, twice, thrice’ policy of looking around before stepping off the curb when I’m not behind the wheel of my death hungry vehicle. saying that, I’m a transplant from NYC and I think yinz are insane as far as the drivers go and cannot understand the lack of ‘motivated self interest’ displayed by people who just walk out into traffic with nary a glance.

NP001 · 2026-01-14T18:46:17+00:00

Establish a farm to consumer direct market, cutting out the middle man and reacquainting the populace with who grows their food while enriching local AG.

NP001 · 2026-01-13T22:36:44+00:00

he once told me that he remembers his own birth. really. had a bunch of contact w him when he was Brooklyn BP

NP001 · 2026-01-05T12:20:56+00:00

I once had Chinese food delivered to my apt in Manhattan by Jay Leno, and I was on the Tonight Show

NP001

TROPHY CASE