:(

Thanks, Robert Moses

Jacob Riis Park in the New York City borough of Queens, is part of the Jamaica Bay Unit of the Gateway National Recreation Area, and managed by the National Park Service (NPS). It lies at the foot of the Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge middle of the Rockaway Peninsula, just east of Fort Tilden and west of Rockaway Beach. It features an extensive sand beach, and an early 20th century bath house listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The park, which was largely built on the site of the former Rockaway Naval Air Station, was designed by the powerful Robert Moses and intended to be a destination for the few New York City residents who owned a private vehicle, in a city with extensive public transit. As evidence, he included what was, at the time, the world's largest parking lot (over 5,000 parking spaces) as part of the designs. The lot is still in existence and maintained by the NPS. The park also includes a "pitch and putt" golf course.

In May of 2008 New York Water Taxi began ferry service from a dock in the northwest side of Riis Park to the Brooklyn Army Terminal and Wall Street (Manhattan).

Day at the beach + margaritas + beer =

Last Day at JCP Summer Camp

Haunted train tunnel?

In the southeastern Ohio town of Lake Hope sits the MOONVILLE TUNNEL. This long forgotten railroad tunnel is one of the only remaining remnants of a small mining town that thrived for a short time. The town of Moonville was born in the late 1850's when the Marietta and Cincinnati railroad was built to transport the coal and iron out of the Ohio mines. Moonville was never a big town, at its height, there were probably never many more then 100 residents, and almost all of them were exclusively miners and their families. There was a row of houses along the railroad tracks, a sawmill, schoolhouse, post office, general store, and a saloon. In its early days the residents of Moonville worked in the Hope Furnace nearby, but later on they turned almost exclusively to mining underground. The coal and iron was then used in the Hope furnace, where weapons and artillery for the Union Army were made during the Civil War. By the turn of the century the coal mines were closing and the town was dying. The last family left in 1947, by the 1960's all of the buildings were gone. The tracks have recently been removed along with the trestle that used to cross Raccoon creek.
The Moonville tunnel is about 50 yards long and is very narrow, trains would go through at full speed and have very little clearance on each side. Many accidents supposedly happened in the tunnel, so naturally, many legends have made their way into the local folklore. Some legends are based on historical facts and some have probably been exaggerated throughout the years. The most well-known story is that someone who worked for the railroad, possibly an engineer or a brakeman was crushed under the wheels of a train. It's been said that he was a conductor murdered by a vengeful engineer who asked him to inspect underneath the train and then started it up. One source even said that he was trying to get the train to stop because Moonville was in the grip of a plague and was running low on supplies. A newspaper article from the McArthur Democrat on March 31, 1859 featured this Moonville story; "A brakeman on the Marietta & Cincinnati Railroad fell from the cars near Cincinnati Furnace, on last Tuesday March 29, 1859 and was fatally injured, when the wheels passing over and grinding to a shapeless mass the greater part of one of his legs. He was taken on the train to Hamden and Doctors Wolf and Rannells sent for to perform amputation, but the prostration of the vital energies was too great to attempt it. The man is probably dead. The accident resulted from a too free use of liquor."

In 1895 the Chillicothe Gazette published this article: "The ghost of Moonville, after an absence of one year, has returned and is again at its old pranks, haunting B&O S-W freight trains and their crews. It appeared Monday night in front of fast freight No. 99 west bound, just east of the cut which is one half mile the other side of Moonville at the point where Engineer Lawhead lost his life and Engineer Walters was injured. The ghost, attired in a pure white robe, carried a lantern. It had a flowing white beard, its eyes glistened like balls of fire and surrounding it was a halo of twinkling stars. When the train stopped, the ghost stepped off the track and disappeared into the rocks nearby."
Other accounts of the Moonville ghost tell the story of seeing a swinging light in the tunnel.....but upon closer inspection, realizing that nobody was holding it. There were at least four deaths near the tunnel, including a young girl who was killed by a passing train on the nearby trestle while going to visit a lover.

The Moonville Cemetery
The Olde Forester's History of Southeastern Ohio
Ghost of Moonville
The Moonville Ghost Tunnel
The Moonville Ghost
Legends of Athens: The Moonville Tunnel
Haunted Southeastern Ohio: The Moonville Tunnel
Ghosts of Ohio: The Moonville Tunnel
Ohio Trespassers: The Moonville Tunnel
Ohio Exploration Society: The Moonville Tunnel
Trip to Moonville
Athens News Article: "Ready For Some Different 'Haunted Athens' Stories? Read On."

6b junk tower, r.i.p.

(photo by Wally G.)

Bring your metrocard

Cincinatti Subway

Lunch in Pennsylvania Dutch Country?

http://www.birdinhandfarmersmarket.com

columbus, indiana?

some days it's hard being a rainbowologist

Anna alerted me to this from the latest New York Magazine cover story:

Gitty says for a long time she tried to get her mother to sing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” from The Wizard of Oz, one of Matty and Carol’s favorite films. For a while Gitty thought Deborah wouldn’t sing the song because “we were taught when a rainbow appears in the sky it meant G-d was angry with the Jews. G-d once destroyed the world with a flood but he promised never to do it again. So now, instead of a flood, he leaves a rainbow, as a warning. You see a rainbow, you’re supposed to repent. They always make me anxious.”

I have original ideas

click

Dolphins vs. Porpoises

Dolphins and porpoises belong to the same scientific order, Cetacea. This order includes all whales, even the great whales, to which both dolphins and porpoises are related. All cetaceans are completely aquatic mammals, have a streamlined body, a tail fluke, and a blowhole (which is what these air-breathing animals use to breathe). The dolphins and porpoises are also classified in the scientific suborder, Odontoceti, which are the toothed whales. All odontocetes also have the ability to echolocate, the ability to detect objects in their underwater environment using the echoes of a sound, much like sonar.

Porpoises and dolphins are classified into two different families. The porpoises are in the family Phocoenidae and the dolphins are in the family Delphinidae. When separated at the family level, dolphins and porpoises are as physically different as cats and dogs.

In comparison to dolphins, porpoises are very small. Porpoises seldom exceed 7 feet in length, whereas many dolphins can exceed 10 feet in length. Porpoises are also more robust than dolphins. Dolphins have a lean sleek body, whereas porpoises often appear chubby. The dorsal fin (the fin on the back of the animal) in porpoises is also triangular, looking more like a shark. The dorsal fin of the dolphin is shaped in a wave. Porpoises lack a rostrum or a beak. This rostrum is very prominent in dolphins. The teeth of the porpoise are spade-shaped, whereas the teeth of the dolphin are conical or cone-shaped.

Many porpoises do not live past their mid-teens. Porpoises have an intensive reproduction schedule that may play a role in their lack of longevity. A porpoise can become pregnant each year, give birth, and then it can become pregnant again five or six weeks later, so it can be nursing and pregnant at the same time. This can also happen in dolphins, but dolphins are larger in size and it seems their body is suited for handling such occurrences, and anyhow it is less common. Dolphins can live in an upwards of fifty years.

There are many behavior differences as well as physical differences. For the most part, porpoises are shy. They do not often approach people or boats. The dolphin, on the other hand, if often seen riding the bow wave of fishing boats. We rarely see porpoises at the surface unless they are coming up for a breath.

The dolphin, rather than the porpoise, is often seen in marine animal shows. This comes back to the idea that dolphins tend to show a lesser fear of man than porpoises. This is often why dolphins, not porpoises, get stuck in tuna nets. For this reason dolphins are widely studied whereas porpoises are not.

Dolphins and porpoises have a lot in common. There are some differences, but the similarities among their behavior and looks outweigh the minute differences. You are more likely to see a dolphin, both in the wild and captivity. Consider yourself lucky if you encounter a porpoise in either situation.

NY Water Taxi ride

To view the complete album, click here

I wasn't correct in thinking I could get an iPhone today

steph = right again

latest find

Ohio: We Lynch Astronauts

that weird round thing on my bathroom wall

is an outlet for a lighting fixture!

The two Ethans

Today at camp, Noah (age 3.5) built a farm using the Legos. I noticed that he included a Lego fire hydrant on the farm, and I asked him what the hydrant was for.

Noah: Fire comes out of there. That's how they get died. They're died.

Me: You mean, "They're dead". When someone dies, you say 'they're dead'.

Noah: They're died. I died... I dead them. I died them.

Me: (trying to change the subject) Can I put this here so the cows can drink water from it?

Noah: No. Cows drink milk. From down here. (points to Lego udder on Lego cow).

Me: Um... (decided not to try to explain that cows do in fact drink water). Who's that? (pointing to two almost identical Lego people on two Lego horses.)

Noah: Those are the two Ethans.

Me: Oh. I see they're both sitting on horses.

Noah: They're dead, so the two Ethans can't sit there. (takes them off)

Me: Oh.

A good way to pay off an ice cream debt

NEW YORK —

Behold — the power of Oprah now extends to ice cream.

It was business as usual at Cincinnati-based Graeter's Ice Cream — until last Thursday, when Oprah Winfrey declared Graeter's "absolutely the best ice cream I've ever tasted," on her TV show.

"I think she said it about three times," said Graeter's executive vice-president Richard Graeter. "And after that, it was like Christmas in June overnight."

Since last Thursday, the toll-free number and the Website for the 130-year-old chain of 13 Ohio ice cream parlors (and 20 franchises further south in states like Kentucky) have been deluged with orders — churning out almost 10 times as many orders as they usually do this time of year.

"I was floored. I couldn't have scripted it any better myself," said Graeter, adding that since Winfrey plugged his family's ice cream last week — she reportedly favors the butter pecan flavor — their mail-order business has swelled to about 1,000 more orders a week than usual.

Winfrey is said to have first tasted Graeter's ice cream last year, when a friend gave her some as a gift for Christmas. Earlier this year, her producers called to ask for a sample.

Two weeks ago, an Oprah producer called Graeter's to say they were planning a special show on summer foods, and wanted to serve Graeter's vanilla ice cream to the 300 studio audience members.

Early last week, Graeter's shipped 10 gallons of vanilla and one pint each of the company's 24 flavors to the show's Chicago studios.

Richard Graeter said he meant to watch the show that day, but missed it when he had to take a call. The next thing he knew, the phones were ringing off the hook.

Graeter said the company, which was founded by his great-grandfather as a malted milk stand in 1870, is having no problem keeping up with the rush of orders.

They've got two extra employees helping Graeter's father, Dick, and his uncle, Lou, pack the pints of ice cream in Styrofoam boxes with dry ice.

By Don Kaplan

"You haven't had ice cream till you've had Graeter's. The butter pecan is Stedman's favorite, and mine, too." — Oprah

June 2002

BRING IT!!!!!

gild the lily

verb (inf=to gild the lily, gilds the lily, gilding the lily, gilded the lily)

1. (intransitive) To embellish something that does not need it.
2. (intransitive) To add unnecessary bells and whistles.

Etymology: A common misquotation of a line from William Shakespeare; William Shakespeare's 1595 play The Life and Death of King John, King John, iv 2: "To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw a perfume on the violet, to smooth the ice, or add another hue unto the rainbow, or with taper-light to seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, is wasteful and ridiculous excess."

First morning glory!

Happy 4th of July!

Remember Bomb Pops? You'd think in our hyper-vigilant, politically correct, post-9/11 climate they'd have gone the way of hassle-free air travel, or at least been renamed Freedom Pops. But no... I'm pleased to report that Bomb Pops are still around. Although they may not be quite like the ones you remember from your childhood.

The original Bomb Pop:












And the code-orange, anti-terrorist Bomb Pop of today:

Bomb Pops are now officially part of our modern American vernacular landscape® and have inspired the creation of weird gay art, a clothing line, a cocktail and even a national holiday!

Have a great 4th! Don't forget to take a moment today to think about how our forefathers escaped the oppression of generations of tyrannical European rule to come to America, kill all the natives and create a country where white men could be free at last.

The Garden Report (2nd try)

Lots of green tomatoes

One ripe sun gold!

One sad little carrot sprout

Significant lack of strawberries

Little drunken bee


Orchid??

Full stoop view