Archive for the ‘Weather’ Category
In which The Gay Recluse enjoys “summer hours.” Today we worked from home, which meant lots of watching the GWB. I too had an obsession with the GWB when I lived in the Heights in the ’80s. Mine was doing as much cruising as possible under that majestic bridge. The “little red lighthouse” was used […]
Filed under: Architecture, Gay, GWB Project, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Summer Hours, The George Washington Bridge
In which The Gay Recluse takes what he can get. Summer is by far the worst season in Washington Heights. Stereos are constantly blaring, there’s trash everywhere, the elevators and street corners are filled with macho-man drunks. When a woman walks down the street and these geniuses make a big production of staring at her […]
Filed under: Gay, Pessimism, Pleasure, Search, Sickness, Small Pleasure Project, Stereotypes, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | 8 Comments
Tags: Corner Huggers, Drunks, Faggot, Losers, N-word, Shadows, Shower Curtains, Summer, Trash
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with the George Washington Bridge. Yesterday. Today. I, too, have an obsession with the George Washington Bridge. However, mine involves a nagging compulsion to complete a football pass from the deck of the bridge to a buddy on the ground below. –Ryan Pissed and Petty (March 31, […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Infrastructure, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | 1 Comment
Tags: Haze, Summer, The George Washington Bridge, Today, Yesterday
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time/Date: June 28th, around 7:00pm. Before the storm. During the storm. After the storm. Othmar H. Ammann designed the bridge with a new theory at the time called deflection theory. This allowed him to increase the span length due to less weight […]
Filed under: Architecture, Dissonance, GWB Project, The Gay Recluse, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Othmar H. Ammann, Storms, The George Washington Bridge
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time of Photographs: June 16, 2008 — dusk. We find these clouds infinitely fascinating. Others may find them ugly or unattractive. We can accept that. “The George Washington Bridge over the Hudson is the most beautiful bridge in the world. Made of […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Clouds, Dusk, June, Le Corbusier, The George Washington Bridge
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and Date of Pictures: June 10, 8:30-9:30ish Sometimes you just know it’s going to storm. Our windows were shaking, in part because they’re shitty windows, but also because it was so windy! We wish we could say that the water was […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Technology, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Le Corbusier, Lightning, Storm Fronts, The George Washington Bridge
In which The Gay Recluse hears a song from another life. Yesterday we turned on the stereo in our basement. We hadn’t played it in years. Miraculously, it worked! The receiver and speakers are from ninth grade. Hey computers! Sometimes bigger analog speakers still sound better! More miraculous was that a CD was already in […]
Filed under: Capitalism, Decay, Dream, Good Rock, Memory, Obsession, Photography, The Gay Recluse, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Compilation, Hamish Kilgour, Rent Control, Rocks, Sky, Soho, The Clean, West Broadway
On the Arrival of Summer Torpor
In which The Gay Recluse languishes. Yesterday we went for a run, even though it was 156 degrees out. When we were young, we laughed at the heat. Let’s just say we’re not as young as we used to be! Today we’re not going anywhere. Even though we’re kind of in the mood for a […]
Filed under: Animals, Dissonance, Dream, Photography, The Gay Recluse, The Russian Blue, Weather | 5 Comments
Tags: Coffee, Dante, Donuts, Heat Waves, Jogging, Running, Summer, Torpor, Zephyr
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and date of photographs: June 6, 2008, sunset. Supposedly tomorrow’s going to be a thousand degrees. But the bridge doesn’t care: It looks great in any weather! Even though it hasn’t even arrived, we’re kind of dreading summer. We say that […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Resignation, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | 1 Comment
Tags: Dread, Heat, June, Spring, Summer, Sunsets, The George Washington Bridge
In which The Gay Recluse remembers life in Washington Heights. We’re in Berlin, which means we’re nostalgic for the George Washington Bridge. Let’s take a walk down memory lane, shall we? This was last Sunday morning, as in May 11. We don’t remember it, either. This was at the end of the day Monday, which […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Infrastructure, Landscape, Longing, Nostalgia, Obsession, The Gay Recluse, Travel, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Berlin, Friday, Monday, Sunday, The George Washington Bridge, Tuesday, Wednesday
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with trees. We were waiting a long time for the copper beech (Fagus sylvatica “Dawyck Purple”) to open this spring. We had only planted it last year so didn’t know what to expect. We were worried when everything else was in bloom and the beech showed no […]
Filed under: Decay, Dissonance, GWB Project, Landscape, The Gay Recluse, The Spring Garden, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Beech, Copper Beech, Dawyck Purple, Fagus sylvatica, Lies, Problems, Shells
In which The Gay Recluse retires to our garden in Washington Heights. Date of photograph: April 28, 2008, around 6:30pm It’s hardly a secret that sometimes the spring garden looks better in the rain. Today was one of those days… One of our favorite plants is the creeping yellow groundcover, which we bought a few […]
Filed under: GWB Project, Language, Longing, Memory, New York City, Obsession, Pessimism, Photography, Pleasure, Resignation, Ruins, Search, Stereotypes, The Gay Recluse, The Spring Garden, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Alpines, Chasing Amy, Creeping Jenny, Green Markets, Groundcover, Lesbian Conversions, Lysimachia nummularia, Perennials, Rain, Rocks, Sighs, Union Square, Washington Heights
In which The Gay Recluse contemplates an old friend. Date of Picture: April 24, 2008 Location: Our garden in Washington Heights. Even as a child in Pittsburgh, we loved this table. All winter it would sit out on the porch as we stared longingly at it. Every May, when it was finally warm enough (this […]
Filed under: City Pattern Project, Dissonance, Landscape, Longing, Memory, Ruins, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: 1970s, Chores, Porch Furniture, Porches, Spring Cleaning, Suburbs, Tables, Wrought Iron
In which The Gay Recluse rather quickly gets lung cancer. Date of Photographs: April 18, 2008 We’ve noticed that almost every chimney in Washington Heights is spewing thick, black smoke these days. It’s definitely a lot worse than it’s ever been, which leads us to ask: Does it have anything to do with the rising […]
Filed under: Capitalism, Disease, Government, GWB Project, Health, New York City, Politicians, Sickness, Technology, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | 2 Comments
Tags: Boilers, Community Board 12, Dirty Oil, Lung Cancer, New York City DEP
In which The Gay Recluse celebrates Easter. It was not until eleventh grade — in Mrs. S____’s English class — that we began to appreciate the obsessive and illogical side of literature, which of course is to say we were reading Wuthering Heights. Do you remember Mrs. S____? How thin and small and severe she […]
Filed under: Dissonance, Dream, Landscape, Language, Literature, Memory, Obsession, The Gay Recluse, The Spring Garden, Washington Heights, Weather, Writers-British | 1 Comment
Tags: Catherine, Easter, Emily Bronte, Fort Tryon Park, Heathcliff, Heather, Sylvia Plath, The Moors, Wuthering Heights
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and Date of photograph: March 19, 2008, 6:54am. Notes: A gray morning, but the cats are up. (There’s no going back to sleep.) “The George Washington Bridge over the Hudson is the most beautiful bridge in the world. Made of cables […]
Filed under: Architecture, Dissonance, GWB Project, Infrastructure, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: 1947, George Washington Bridge, Gray, Le Corbusier, March, Morning Light
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and Date of photograph: March 18, 2008, 6:48am. Notes: It was early, but the blue and orange — i.e., together — was the best part of the day. “The George Washington Bridge over the Hudson is the most beautiful bridge in […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Infrastructure, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: 1947, Blue, George Washington Bridge, Le Corbusier, March, Morning Light, orange
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and Date of photograph: March 13, 2008, 7:38am. Notes: The cloud bank this morning looked like a mountain range. “The George Washington Bridge over the Hudson is the most beautiful bridge in the world. Made of cables and steel beams, it […]
Filed under: Architecture, GWB Project, Photography, Technology, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: 1947, Blue, Clouds, George Washington Bridge, Le Corbusier, March, Morning Light, Mountains
In which The Gay Recluse shares a letter. Robert from Ohio writes: “I saw the article you wrote on the Corsican Mint. I live in North East Ohio, which is just as harsh a climate as NYC. I have planted the mint at several folks’ homes and it does come back every year. Sometimes the […]
Filed under: Letters, New York City, The Spring Garden, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: Corsican Mint, gardening, New York City, Northeast Ohio, Winter, Zone 7
In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge. Time and Date of photograph: February 28, 2008, 7:56am. Notes: The sky is starting to seem spring-like, but it was actually close to minus-fifty. “It was to be encased in granite but because of the Depression was never done and the structure […]
Filed under: Capitalism, Dissonance, GWB Project, Photography, The Gay Recluse, Washington Heights, Weather | Leave a Comment
Tags: 1947, Blue, February, George Washington Bridge, James Renner, Minus-Fifty, Morning Light

