A plastic procession. A cabal of color. A throng of things carefully lined up for our viewing but only for the adventurous who journey to the land of lost toys.
Our hero (name withheld because I forgot to ask) seeks and finds the lonely, discarded extruded polymers that once filled Toys-R-Us but which have been outgrown and forgotten. He is drawn to markets and yard sales where he discovers the treasures that he brings back to his enclave hidden deep in the Hunterdon Hills saving them, at least temporarily from obscurity.
…
I don’t hate fishing. I just don’t think I like it. It has a romantic aura. Dip your line peacefully in calm water. Relax and wait patiently. Feel a nibble and catch a prize. What’s not to like?
It’s more slippery than it’s image. First you have to bait the hook, maybe by torturing a poor earthworm and then drowning it. If it survives long enough underwater, it may then have half its body bitten off by a hungry fish.
If that fish is really hungry it will chomp into that hooked worm only to discover a sharp barbed piece of metal.
Once hooked, the fish gets yanked towards the surface where it can’t breath. It finds itself flopping around instead of swimming, experiencing sharp pain from the hook and gasping for air. If the fish is big enough, it gets saved, slowly suffocating and then gets gutted maybe while it is still alive.
Fishing. Such a peaceful pastime.…
He is hyper-cautious and rarely ventures out in the day. It’s just not safe, or so he believes. He may be right. There are many things to be on the lookout for.
The streets are dangerous places that we often take for granted. Big rolling masses of metal piloted by Twitter-following operators pass by frequently. There are curbs and sidewalks to navigate. Chewing gum and occasional dog droppings to avoid. Falling clouds, fingerprint thieves, binary crayons, overripe avocados, feral tinsel…. It’s a dangerous world.
When in doubt. Dive back into your hedge where it’s safe.…
I’m definitely getting some messages, here. I’m pretty sure it is intentional, on purpose, meant for intellectual consumption.
I think I know what I’m being messaged. Let see if I’ve got this right…
Someone in the family likes to run, That someone is a woman.
The man in the photo must be an anthropologist, having discovered humanoid remains that he silver plated and put on display. These humanoid had very unusual ear structures.
This apparently make birds angry.
One simply needs to observe carefully and think things through to fully understand.…
A happy face set in stone must be a good sign. Combined with a flag is extra assurance. Americans are known (sort of) for being positive friendly people.
I saw this yard art and stopped to admire and photograph it (from a public street).
I was spied by the happy-face owner who was not happy. Yelling at me from her porch she challenged my intent. Perhaps she thought that in the middle of the day on a modestly busy street I had larceny in mind. Not really. My mind is usually pretty blank.
…
They may not be “perpetual” perpetual motion machines but they seem that way. They run off of biofuel so I guess that means they are actually just regular machines. Biochines.
There is plenty of research, experimenting, prototyping and exploration around sources of alternative energy to produce electricity. I bet this source holds promise. At a minimum I bet you could light your house and maybe run your AC if you could figure out how to tap it. It runs on Cheerios, mac & cheese and ice cream.…
I always though cicadas were just big, goofy insects. They don’t seem too bright, often bumping into things and crash landing with a surprised and slightly vacant look.
But, I’m way off. Totally wrong, misinformed, entomologically ignorant. They are among the smartest insects in the world with an I.I.Q. rivalling such brainy bugs as the Madagascar toe jam beetle and the Asian rough-bellied lizard mantis.
They aren’t great flyers when they first emerge because they need a little time to comprehend a world through two giant compound eyes and three ajnachakra eyes . It’s this set of three eyes that gives them their intellectual prowess.
The big round compound eyes are standard issue for many bugs. It’s the ajnachakra eyes in the middle of their forehead, that are so amazing. The upper left eye detects light and the upper right eye detects sound. The middle, lower eye detects time: present, future and past.
No wonder it takes them time to learn to fly. It requires some serious brain power to manage all that sensory input, especially the time component. … and all in the name of getting laid and making more cicadas…
It must take nerves of steel and an unbending will to dive off of great heights into a raging current. Courage is the act of doing something that scares you. It is the ability to move forward into the abyss if that is where your future lies.
These divers know no bounds. They leap with conviction and confidence never being 100% certain they will survive to leap again.
…
Is there a little statue of a man (or a statue of a little man) on your lawn? Is it holding an imaginary horse or maybe a lantern?
Who decided to have a person who races horses stand in a front yard? How do real jockeys feel about this?
Originally they were supposed to be representing footmen, a male domestic worker. You could could actually hitch your horse to it. Sometimes they held a lantern.
Legend has it that Jocko Graves, an African-American youth who served under George Washington was deemed too young attack Trenton and was left behind to tend the horses and keep a light on for their return. He froze to death at his post and Washington was so moved, he had a statue made to honor him. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawn_jockey…
The NJ Pinelands are interesting. Except for rapidly encroaching development along the edges the region is mostly natural area, much of it protected. You can drive for miles through the pine forests and then suddenly come across something interesting.
While passing through the region I came across a patch of road that for some reason was covered in graffiti for no apparent reason. It was deep in the Pinelands far from any towns or buildings.
When I stopped to get a shot, a motorcyclist came by and popped a wheelie for the camera.
It was a little baffling why this patch of road was selected for graffiti art. After plotting the location of my photo on Google Map for future reference, I discovered that just off the road, into the woods were the ruins of the Brooksbrae Terracotta Brick Factory.
I always thought of the Pinelands as being sandy but much of it is clay which was mined for years. According to Scott Wieczorek in his article “The Story of Pasadena and its Neighboring Clay Industry” the Brookbrae Terracota Brick Factory was built around 1905 but never actually went into full operation and was shut down just a few years later.
At some point it became a destination, for people to hang out and somebody decided to bring a can of spray paint. I don’t know if that person was an artist or a vandal (a vartis?) but he or she was followed up by hundreds of other spray painters who have covered nearly every square inch of the old factory with graffiti, so much so it has become a landmark. If I had known what was just off the road I would have dived in.
