WEDNESDAY-THURSDAY-FRIDAY

MANHATTAN
Wednesday
5.6.2020
6 a.m.

My Window view

Later
A walk About

Note who was blocking the crosswalk. Meanwhile, people will have their say:

"In God We Trust" With empty liquor bottle, signature from 'Skippy' and label by 'Dave Sito'

Storm cloud above Union Square sent me hurrying home.

5:15 p.m.

~*~

Thursday
5.7.2020
Another warm sunny day
 Noon

Rescued Plants on the Windowsill

Walk About
Third Avenue Bus Stop
(with photographer reflected)

Third Avenue Bus Stop

Our National Debt moves relentlessly upward night and day on 14th Street corner of Park Avenue and at the Treasury Department. I wonder, can a country declare bankruptcy?

Meanwhile
Building has resumed for luxury housing all around the City, Non-essential except for the hungry Real Estate Industry.

~*~


Friday 

5.8.2020
Building has also resumed at 23rd on Third Avenue

Pause

"Happy Birthday"

David Attenborough
May 8th, 1926, London

David Attenborough went to Clare College, Cambridge for a degree in Natural Sciences, after which he did two years National Service in the Royal Navy. He subsequently applied to the B.B.C. and after an initial rejection he was brought in to work as a broadcaster. With the growth of the B.B.C. television service he was put in charge of non-fiction programes. Between 1965 and 1969 he was the controller of BBC2. He has always been in favor if natural science and historical shows, and his presentation of natural history series has included Life on Earth, The Living Planet, The Trials of Life, The Private Life of Plants, The Life of Birds, the Life of Mammals and Life in the Undergrowth. He was knighted in 1985. He has made his witness statement on climate change in a new Film.

(9 minutes)

https://youtu.be/2PRJL07-WK0

Blooming
A pale Lilac at St. George Episcopal Church
Park Avenue at 21st Street

and at Gramercy Park
Lexington at 21st Street

Evening

6:30-8 p.m


I joined another Zoom virtual session with my Zendo for the "Wisdom Sangha" and all went well enough. However the Gift cell phone, run by AT&T informed me I am running out of Data Space. I can't fix it since I do no financial transactions on line, but my Sensei agreed to meet me (properly protected and appropriately distancing) at the actual Zendo Sunday to sort it out so I might continue to participate. All's well Friends.
<<<<>>>>>

SHELTER

Roaming the streets of this City in the dark I have always been fascinated by this building at 58 Rivington Street.
It used to be a Synagogue.

 It's a private residence with a cabin on the roof

 and a formidable entrance door.

Hale Gurland was among the aspiring artists, bohemians, and hippies who crowded Soho in the 1970s. From the small room he rented on Wooster Street, the Jewish sculptor and painter ventured out one day in 1973 to buy a pair of cheap shoes. On his way, he noticed a derelict synagogue with a “For Sale” sign at 58-60 Rivington, at the corner of Elridge, a scene he described in a magazine interview a couple of years ago: “People were going inside the building because the doors were out, junkies were shooting up. I walked in, and the place looked like Dresden after the bombs.”

By 1979, the recognition he had gained from his metalwork and iron creations enabled him to buy the abandoned house of worship and turn it into studios and residences for local artists. He had the interior fully revamped, but chose to leave the building’s still-beautiful facade mostly intact. I've written to him in hopes he might let me see the inside (there are some photos in the links), but he has few references on line and may wish to remain private. 
I doubt he will answer.

 ~*~

Speaking of Real Estate, while walking up towards Houston Street in a light drizzle I paused to shoot this shelter (without flash) and did not disturb the resident sleeping there.

I think about homelessness and the rapaciousness of real-estate interests a whole lot. There's a special police unit that "offers" to take homeless folks off the street to shelters or hospitals and they also police the shelters, but the homeless folks I talk to (and you may have seen some on several of my posts) tell me the shelters are awful.


https://youtu.be/tDolUXsEDeQ

LINKS

58 Rivington Street

http://bedfordandbowery.com/2016/12/how-the-synagogue-where-george-burns-worshipped-became-an-artists-studio/

Hale Gurland

http://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/hale-gurland/#_

Homeless Services
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Department_of_Homeless_Services_Police 

READ THIS
http://vanishingnewyork.blogspot.com/2017/06/freeze-all-commercial-evictions.html 

REAL SURREAL

Title References

(Two Links)

 Hudson River

Blue enhanced and surreal. Let's just say it's how I feel.

Last Blooming Roses

We're having a real heat wave.

Bus Reader

 Even she seemed surreal.

Surreal Estate

How real can you get? This elaborate, ornate, Gothic gem of a property at 281 Park Avenue South used to house social service organizations among other businesses. Now it's for sale as the flagship headquarters of some willing super entity.

(Link)

Appropriately they are advertising their availability in the unfinished lobby with this arresting display:

 Bizarre, life size latex sculptures...

 haunting the haunted house.

Political Vision Airy

Apparently Surrealism has returned with melting clocks that don't tell time, and time itself in retrograde sliding off the periodic table. The unconscious is having a fling with us, or are we only dreaming? What labyrinth is this? Is it a moon or simply another mirage
(Link to Periodic Tables)

 Wishing you all sufficient means and Peace of mind.

~*~

LINKS

Park Avenue Property

http://rfr.com/properties/property/281-park-avenue-south/

Title References

Surrealism

http://www.theartstory.org/movement-surrealism.htm

 +

Entertaining article from The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jul/22/david-bowie-surrealist-inspired-dali-duchamp-dr-caligari

Primo Levi Periodic Tables
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07ksrzl#play