Living Quirky

I went to an indoor picnic-slash-documentary filming for a Meetup group that I belong to, called Living Quirky this past Sunday. Sarah Harney, upcoming filmmaker extraordinaire, was on hand to film a mini-documentary about our group.
Keep your eyes peeled for a rare on-screen cameo - I won't appear here often, so commit this face to memory.

The food was too good not to photograph!

Sarah adjusting her camera behind the scenes. And yes, it was all filmed with an iPhone.

Sarah adjusting the lapel mic on yours truly

Ms. Harney, I'm ready for my closeup!

City of Brotherly Love

Do I owe you a post, or do I owe you a post! Without getting into detail, last week was hard. One of my responses to stress is to withdraw and do as little as possible. So unfortunately, although there were nearly a week's worth of blog posts ready to go with minor editing, the will just wasn't there. Now that that's out of the way, here goes: 

Two Saturdays ago, I took a break from the city and headed down to Philadelphia, phone and Moment lens in hand, for the day. As much as I love the pressure cooker known as New York, I love my weekly get-outta-New York trips just as much. Sometimes just a hair more.

 

Market Street with fall foliage covering

I liked this example of 19th century architecture topped with 21st century digital advertising.

Whoomp there it is.

Train of Many Colors

I'm not a sports fan, so if you ask me, as a conversation starter, how them (insert seasonally appropriate team here) are doing, I'll probably smile, nod and say something like "doing alright, I guess."
However, I am a fan of vintage subway trains (as much as I hate riding the subway). Last Sunday, the Mets did a thing that was special enough for the MTA to bring out the Train of Many Colors - a ten-car train of retired subway cars that each sports a paint scheme from subways gone by.
I just happened to be on hand to take a ride from 34th St-Hudson Yards to Flushing.

 

Old subway cars, new subway station.

I rode trains just like these to/from high school back in the day.

Last stop! Everyone please leave the train.

Under Construction

Ouch. Some time has gone by since my last blog. Bad news: yeah, some time has gone by since my last blog, and that's sad.
Good news: I'm back. My best friend Amanda and I caught up last Thursday, and in the process of doing so, we walked past this interesting residential building under construction on 58th Street at 11th Avenue.

 

It's hard to tell from this angle, but the building's shaped like a half-pyramid. Almost like the ones in Egypt, but without the slave labor.

One of many construction cranes in the area.

All the way up.

Aren't the sides kinda cool?

Princeton

I took a random ride down to Princeton after church yesterday afternoon - as much as I love the city, an afternoon trip out of the pressure cooker works wonders for my sanity.
While I was there, I explored the town, popped in at the Princeton University Chapel (the organ and the open door lured me in), and finished things off with a Wawa sandwich - I've traveled all over the country and eaten more good things than I can recount, but there's nothing, nothing like a Wawa sandwich. Ahem, hoagie. 

Princeton Arches

Palmer Square kiosk

Campus Sculpture with Foliage

Holy Ground

Skating around the fountain

This Week In Randomness

It's been a quiet week here on 365, but not totally without photography in and around the city I call home. There was a fire safety event, even a belated birthday celebration!

Fire safety event at Rockefeller Center

I've always liked the humble, underrated mail chute. The efficiency, the sleekness, the sense of prehistoric technology...

I turned a year older last week, and my bestie Amanda took me out to Harlem Public (you can probably guess what neighborhood that's in) for a belated celebration. It's hard to tell because of the darkness of the photo, but HARLEM PUBLIC is stamped into that burger bun. #butdatbrandingdoe

Downtown Albany pt. 2

My travels led me back to downtown Albany (and eventually on a return trip to Crossgates Mall for a coffee refill, but that's neither here nor there).
Sundays are the deadest days in downtown Albany (followed only by Saturdays), but there were still plenty of streetscape and architecture shots to be had. 

Alfred E. Smith Building with reflective pond. The name of each county in New York State is chisled into the marble running around the front and sides of the building.

State Street looking downhill from the Capitol Building lawn

Wedding party on State Street

Capitol Building at night (neither of my daytime attempts were worthy of the blog)

Albany City Hall

State Street downhill at night

Washington Park

Washington Park is Albany's equivalent of Central Park. It has been public property since Albany's 1682 city charter, and was expanded through the 19th century. Washington Park sits in the middle of Albany, between Center Square, just outside of downtown, and the Pine Hills neighborhood, just outside the SUNY Albany student ghetto.

 

Albany Plan of Union Avenue - named for Ben Franklin's 1754 idea to unite the 13 British colonies under a single unified government. We all know what that led to.

Washington Park Promenade

Promenade leading up to the Soldiers and Sailors Monument

The Moses Fountain

 

Hudson Avenue with Corning Tower in the foreground

Afternoon in Center Square

Center Square is a compact neighborhood wedged between Washington Park and Empire State Plaza, just outside of downtown Albany. It was also my home for a few months in the mid-aughts, so I swing by whenever I'm in town.

Tree-lined Willett Street. One of very few Albany streets with NYC-style apartment buildings

A half block up Willett Street

The Village in the City

Lark Street balconies

I used to live here - 256 State Street, Apt. 9

Downtown Albany

Your Humble Photographer is in the Capital District, visiting some college friends and enjoying a belated birthday celebration.
Before heading up to the Saratoga area to see them, I spent part of the afternoon in downtown Albany, walking around and taking pictures. What downtown Albany on a Saturday afternoon lacks in people, it somewhat makes up for in still lifes.

Albany's concrete canyon

Pearl Street heading south 

North Pearl Street at Sheridan Avenue

The Palace Theater

Still life of a still bar

BusFest!

On Sunday afternoon, I swung by Atlantic Antic after church. My introvert tendencies make me want to flee from a mile long, super crowded street fair, but my favorite part is the BusFest exhibit on Boerum Place near the beginning of the Antic.
Every year, the Transit Museum rolls out a mini fleet of historical buses, from a 1930s-vintage double decker to a modern-day city bus. The buses were crawling with children, but I got a few good shots, anyway.

 

This was built by Yellow Coach in 1932 for the Fifth Avenue Coach Company, and ran until 1953.

Stick shift

This bus was not designed for tall people

Full frontal view

This General Motors bus was also built for Fifth Avenue Coach in 1958, with one surprise feature

Not the U-shaped loveseat in the back

Not the classic 50s design 

Air conditioning! Those two jet propulsion-looking things are an early air conditioning demonstrator