Photo: Accumulated

"Accumulated" (Flickr)

Unless you've been sleeping since Christmas Day, you'll have heard about the blizzard that dumped a whole bunch of snow on the northeastern United States last weekend. I had a snow day on Monday -- which was really a no-brainer since the nearest subway line wasn't running and there was no way in hell I was going to make it to the next-nearest. (Turned out there was no way in hell I would have made it even to the nonfunctional nearest line, but I didn't find that out until I went out for a few groceries.)

So, I took a picture of the snow that built up on the windowboxes out back. Just to give you a sense of scale, each of those boxes is about two feet long and maybe five inches high -- and the snow, as you can see, is taller than the boxes. And just to give you a sense of magnitude, behind those windowboxes is the only side that isn't sheltered.

Photo: two sheep

I went to a fleece festival in Ringoes, New Jersey, earlier this month, and have been too lazy to post about it until now -- now that I'm heading off to the huge festival tomorrow, that is. Here's one of the pictures that turned out well:


With the prospect of my first trip to Rhinebeck, I kept my purchases to what I think of as a minimum, buying two skeins of yarn (a worsted-weight ringspun and a laceweight, both hand-dyed), a blue roving, some mohair to blend with something, and a pair of spinning magazines. But more on that will have to wait until my computer figures itself out and starts behaving itself again.

Photo: Face

A sculptural decoration on what used to be John Jay High School in Park Slope. I'm not sure if it's supposed to represent something, but I didn't exactly research it, either.

Photo: Orchid

Orchid
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

"My office has an orchid, its..."

It's... Well, it's blooming, even if I haven't fully thought through how I'd rewrite the Oscar Mayer jingle. It bloomed about six months ago, and I got some really good photos of it then, too.

Signs of Misdirection

I have a thing for signs. Especially signs that seem to say something they don't mean. Or, alternatively, have been modified to say something they don't mean. I've seen a few posted on Gownus Lounge recently. One features a sign with a misspelling which, like confusing its and it's (and inventing its'), leaves the capabilities of the sign's poster open to debate. Another sign was merely bent, but in such a way that could very easily create confusion.

Similarly, I spotted a few such signs on my own. One of them suggests that East 90th Street and Madison Avenue is not an intersection, but a single street.


Another sign was deliberately modified, to create a similar effect I'm calling the "all paths lead to 10th Ave":


My contribution to the rash of misspelled stuff is this sign, in front of a soup store that is now (perhaps fortunately) long closed.


But I'll close with a few messed-up one-way signs. (I once saw one that was pointing straight up. As in vertical. If only I hadn't been in a moving car at the time!)

Photo: I committed a funny.

Be careful what you put your drink next to.
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

I haven't posted in a couple days, so I'll make sure there's something new by posting this bit of accidental visual humor I committed last night. I got a cup of hot chocolate on the way to a doctor's appointment, and put it down on a table when I got there so that I could take off my coat. I just didn't look at just what the magazines were first.

Photos: It must be December

Yesterday, it was bitterly cold. Bitterly cold. Despite this, I took this picture:


We even woke up to snow this morning. Compare the picture above to these I took today:

Photo: Lattice detail

Lattice detail
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

OK, here's another photo from the Cloisters. It's a detail of a stained glass window they have there -- I'd write more about it if I had the info in front of me.

Photo: Crocuses at the Cloisters

Crocuses at the Cloisters
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

I haven't said a thing here all day, so yet again I'm falling back on a photo. I took this at the Cloisters in the Manhattan panhandle. Despite being so far north, it really isn't all that hard to get there: the A stops at 190th Street, and take the elevator to street level. From there it's a pleasant enough walk through the park , though I'd recommend waiting for the M4 bus if there's any reason whatsoever to think the ground may have any weather-related slipperiness. There is an especially steep set of stairs along the way from the station to the museum, which would be particularly nasty with a coating of rain/snow/ice. The trip takes maybe an hour and a half from Park Slope, maybe a little longer if they're screwing with the subway service.

Photo: Park Slope, Late Fall

Park Slope, Late Fall
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

I've been quieter than usual today, so perhaps it's time for another foliage photo. I took this one over the weekend and finally got around to uploading it yesterday. It promptly got a comment: so promptly, in fact, that the uploader was still thinking, and hadn't registered that the photo was fully uploaded.

But I would have liked this shot, even if someone hadn't commented so quickly.

Photo: Montreal Foliage and the Marché Bonsecours

Montreal Foliage and the Marché Bonsecours
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

As I said earlier this afternoon, I discovered a disappointing, if simple, error in my knitting and had to undo a day’s work. As an ego boost, I decided to post this photo. It's one of the most popular ones I've uploaded -- Scout says it reached #30 in Flickr's Explore -- and has been blogged by Urban Nature.

I took this picture in Montreal in October of 2006, when I turned my one week of vacation into a week and a half, courtesy of a Columbus Day return to New York. The foliage was early (something to do with a wet summer), and I took Amtrak up there. Spending a day on an Amtrak train is no worse than going through airport security, and the view is often better. Especially when that view is the Hudson Valley in October.

Photo: Potted Plants, St-Guilhem Cloister

Potted Plants, St-Guilhem Cloister
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

I got an e-mail this morning that this photo was shortlisted for inclusion on Schmap.com's guide to New York City. I agree that it's a decent shot, but I'm a little surprised that they went for this one and not, say, the double capital I took in this same part of The Cloisters.

The full list of my Cloisters photos can be found in a Flickr set.

Shots they passed over include:

Photo: The Foliage is Up Late.

Girl Scout Tree
Originally uploaded by The Loopweaver

I took this photo yesterday in Cranford, New Jersey. Like many trees across the region, it still has leaves -- an unusual occurrence around here for this late in November. The trees in Brooklyn are noticeably barer this afternoon than they were a day before, due in all likelihood to the wind we had, there was still a good amount of color still up.