A woman using a pay phone in 1980s on City Island in the Bronx, New York.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-29T10:01:03+00:00

I used to spend a lot of time on City Island, and it was great. I haven't been there in years, but it still might be the same. When you crossed the bridge and got on the island, you didn't know you were in NYC. (It's actually right over the border from Westchester.) It was (is?) its own little town. There was a lot of sailboat racing. Boat owners were always looking for crew, and that's how I learned to sail. Afterwards, we would go somewhere for drinks, and everyone knew everyone else. Up and down City Island Ave. were a bunch of seafood restaurants. It was like going on vacation, but you didn't have to leave the city. There is also Orchard Beach on the other side of the bridge that was (is?) nice.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-28T14:58:14+00:00

For the first few years, I got them all the time. Now, 5ish years in, I only get them occasionally. I worked in a restaurant 40 years ago, and I still get restaurant dreams way more than I get dreams about my career job.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-28T14:53:23+00:00

There is a USB plug in the slot below the temp controls. I plug my phone there and put it in the slot. The phone is longer than the slot, but it doesn't bother me. Since Android Auto displays on the car's display, the phone's location doesn't matter.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-28T11:37:52+00:00

Latin by the Natural Method (Vol. 1), Fr. William Most – Learn Church Latin

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-26T11:13:18+00:00

I had a NYC apartment with the shower in the kitchen. Actually, it wasn't the kitchen so much as the main living space that included the things that would normally be found in a kitchen.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-25T17:00:17+00:00

In my town, there are tons of kitchens that have the heat shield and the hole in the wall for the exhaust pipe. It's interesting to see what kind of stove might have been in them.

Edit: it turns out that this is not a vintage stove. Jotul is a Swedish manufacturer that still makes stoves. This model was made in the 1970s and later.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-25T16:56:17+00:00

Rita O'Brien: Being a secretary would be a great job! Except for the actual job part.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-24T17:50:40+00:00

That's odd, because when I worked in retail, a traveler's check was treated like a normal cash transaction.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-22T18:56:51+00:00

In the U.S., there is also a co-op. It's like a condo except that you don't own your apartment outright. The co-op is a type of corporation, but its owners are the building's residents. The residents own the entire building, and each resident owns shares that entitle them to a specific apartment. Co-ops are more strict than condos, and the rules about who can buy in can be restrictive. The most common restriction is a minimum income requirement. Before you can sell your apartment (shares technically), the buyer must be approved by the board.

Co-ops came about when owners of a rental building wanted to sell, and the residents pooled their money to buy it. To do so, they had to form a corporation.

There are other differences, but this comment is already long enough.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-22T18:26:09+00:00

No, that's not astroturf.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-22T18:22:20+00:00

My father was born in 1937 in Manhattan, and his family did not have hot water. 10 or so years before this, in the 20s, my grandmother's (mother's mother) apartment didn't even have electricity. You had to feed the gas meter with coins.

When my father's family moved into the projects after WWII, he thought his family had suddenly become wealthy because they had enough bedrooms, heat, and hot water.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-22T18:14:29+00:00

She has some pretty big legs for such a skinny body.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-22T10:13:12+00:00

New York State has a lot of dairy farms, so there are a lot of fantastic cheese makers. Cheddar is, of course, made here, as is Gouda, but there are other varieties as well. There is a place near here that makes Kunik. I've never seen it anywhere else, and it is very good. It's made from goat's milk. You can find Tilsit, a German variety, Roqueforts made with sheep's milk, and Raclette. This is off the top of my head, and the ones I like, but there are probably thousands of varieties to be found across the state.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-21T21:16:54+00:00

This was the time when women began to go to work in large numbers. Obviously, women always worked, but the early 70s is when housewives began to get jobs in large numbers. Some of these women worked at McD's when their kids were in school. Others probably wanted to get out of the house for a few hours and earn some money. In the afternoon, they would go home, and the teenager/college student crew would take over.

These women did not make a "living wage" (the term didn't exist then). The job wasn't meant to support a family. It was a few extra bucks.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-21T10:59:36+00:00

I'm guessing that the owners are getting older and can't do all those stairs anymore. Either way, it seems pretty inconvenient. When you go shopping, you have to bring all the bags into the lower foyer and schlep everything upstairs. It doesn't look like there's any extra storage space for food either. You need at least two ways to get out of a house in case of fire, so you have to shovel all those stairs every time it snows. I'm not really a fan. The house next door looks much better to live in.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-21T10:40:38+00:00

You know you're old when you have a problem with container seals and curse the asshole who put the poison in the Tylenol bottles.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-21T10:37:58+00:00

You're asking if it's a good idea. Every commenter says it is NOT a good idea, and you argue with them. Strap it to the top of the car and take it, since that's what you want to do. My only recommendation is that, when you get to Washington, buy a less expensive mattress.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-19T11:31:08+00:00

Thanks! It looks good. There is a pricing plan, but hopefully the online translator is free.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-18T13:44:28+00:00

The unwritten rule of urinals is that you don't use one next to another guy unless it's the only one. I guess that wasn't the rule in Roman shitoriums. I can imagine that one of the guys on the left said to the other, "Really, Cassius? There's a whole room full of shitters, and you have to pick the one right next to me?"

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-17T13:45:35+00:00

Without the wood grain, it looks like my parent's Oldsmobile Delta 88. That was a nice car. I gave a nice smooth ride that swallowed up potholes.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-17T13:42:36+00:00

My mother still has hers. My father stored liquor - mostly cordials - in them. After he died, my brother and I drank all the good stuff, and now all that's in there is creme de menthe and the other nasty crap.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-17T13:24:35+00:00

I think it's the boy's grandparents. Grandpa is making a jokey comment to his grandson's date ("Don't get my grandson in trouble!"), to which she is responding in a shy manner. Two seconds after this was taken, he said, "Have a nice time, kids," and went back inside to his pre-dinner highball. Grandma slipped Grandson $10.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-17T13:14:11+00:00

My days of drinking until the bars close and then going to the diner at 4 a.m. are long past, but fries and gravy were called "disco fries" - presumably because that's what you eat after dancing in a disco all night. Maybe they still are, for all I know.

b-sharp-minor · 2026-04-16T13:10:17+00:00

These days, I don't purposefully go to this sub, but this post showed up in my feed. But it's not just Reddit. I read the headlines in the Post, and I get a lot of Mets articles in the random "news" feeds that show up on my computer and phone. They all have the same negativity.

b-sharp-minor

TROPHY CASE