Tag: Brooklyn College

Posted on

Mmmmm, Photo Cakes….


“Lords” (located at on Flatbush Ave near Brooklyn College).

This reminded me of that Simpsons episode where Homer falls into the third dimension and stumbles into “The Erotic Cakeshop” . And you know what, the solution to this mystery was just one google search away:

“There is no real `Erotic Cakes’ storefront; that was made up for the scene. The real storefront is Rose Photography, 13567 Ventura Blvd. The establishment appears to be mostly vacant, save for a few ladders. It’s right between Yoshi’s Japanese Restaurant (red roof) and The Coffee Roaster.”

Posted on

Did I Mention that Purple is the Official Brooklyn College Color?

I wrote about Monk parakeets before.

Well, it looks like the Brooklyn College Environmental Education Science Masters Program. members are involved in some cutting edge research:

“On the athletic field we saw 5 birds perched on the lamp post on the right side. They were flying back and forth. While we watched their flight we viewed one of the birds relieving themselves. We approached the ramp and examined the droppings. We counted 11 droppings and saw a distinct color change in its appearance. This change was not the same as what we had previously viewed, it was purple in color.”

“On East 23 and Avenue J we saw three birds eating acorns and making a lot of noise. “

This reminded me:

Posted on

Brooklyn College Pictures

I had to wake up early today to get to the speech class that is held at the ungodly hour of 9 AM. On Sunday. Sadists. It was raining. Brooklyn streets were foggy and smelled of jasmine tea for some reason. Ok, I did have jasmine tea yesterday, but I could not smell any on myself. The fog definitely smelled of jasmine tea. And sea.

I’ve had some espresso at Michael’s bakery on R and Nostrand and took a bus to Brooklyn College. Some pictures had to be taken.

A Jellyfish From Outer Space or a Manhole Cover? You Decide.

Brooklyn College officials like to spend money on infrastructure. About six years ago, I remember, they purchased these really expensive, but nice ashtrays.

The ashtrays came with these garbage urns. This is Brooklyn College La Guardia tower reflecting in the top of such an urn. Note the uglorific purple color. That’s the official school color. Maybe, some time in this century, I’ll get to wear a robe of that color.

The cupola of the nearby Midwood High School.

Even the storm drains are pretty.

Posted on

Beeeep beeeep beeeep beeeep SLAP

Most people I know don’t like their sleep to be interrupted. I, on the other hand, as long as I don’t have to get up right this minute, don’t mind being woke up multiple times.

First of all, the actual process of falling asleep after quieting the harsh beep of the alarm clock is a very pleasant experience. Second, I find that a short series of naps is more refreshing than a long “wow, how long was I out” sleep. I also a series of alarms has a much greater chance of waking me up from an REM state. This is the best way to wake up: the brain is already active and the dreams can be easily recalled.

At some point I wanted to make an alarm clock that would detect either eye movements or the brain waves associated with them and wake me up during REM. Understandably, for the lack of time, skills and gumption I never got further than playing with a basic stamp microcontroller and reading EEG newsgroups. I suck.

Anyhoo, this morning, between the infamous 9 minute alarm clock buzzes, I had 2 dreams.

In the first one, came for a visit to America. We went to explore the power station at Brooklyn College. Tema had a really old looking key that opened the gate. As a side note (not a part of the dream): Brooklyn College has some very interesting infrastructure. There are tunnels connecting all buildings, a power plant, a heat plant and a buncha other interesting things. I’ve heard that there is a linear accelerator somewhere. Right. So we explored the area around the power plant a bit, I pointed out Monk parrots to .

You’d think I went clubbing with in the second dream, but I didn’t. Instead I was still in Brooklyn College. My high school English teacher was giving a lecture standing behind a podium in the middle of the quad. He said: “the time now is [don’t remember] and the temperature is 28 Therms “. I asked him is there is a thermometer on his podium that measures temperature in “Therms” ( I think a Therm is the same thing as BTU). He said that that was the case. For some reason I called him Alex, even though his name is Alan.

Posted on

Oral Picard on a Spiral Staircase or Otterby dAttabroth

I’ve started what I am hoping to be my last semester at Brooklyn College. I am taking a speech course and a database management course.

The speech course is taught by an professor from NYU who looks very much like Captain Picard. He repeats himself a lot, tells cheesy stories and does not like my comments. The syllabus says that we “will be graded on oral performance”. Yeah, huh. I guess if I don’t miss too many classes and don’t piss him off too badly I should pass. Oh, and the class starts at 9 AM on Sunday. And there are no places where I can get an espresso. Arrrgh.

The professor who teaches the second class annoys me in oh so many ways. First of all he always smiles. Literally, says every word with a smile. Secondly, he teaches by example rather than by explaining. In the speech class we talked about non-verbal communication, and the professor didn’t much like my comment about a test for engineering thinking , which goes like this: you ask a person to quickly define a spiral staircase.


A person who thinks like an engineer will explain verbally , for instance, that a spiral staircase is a staircase that was bent into a spiral. A non-engineering type will try to explain with gestures : “you know, it’s a staircase like [whistles and makes spiraling gestures]” or examples – “ya know – like that staicase at Bill’s house”

How did you do?

Well, instead of explaining, this database professor gives examples. And spends lots and lots of time writing example tables and data on the blackboard (when he could have just given everybody xeroxed examples from his notes).

His accent is pretty heavy. I’ll write phonetic spelling of some of his pronunciations, and you try to guess what it means:

“Otterby” – “order by “
“sIkkle” – “single “
“valU” – “value”
“noW” (this is a tricky one) – “NULL”
“dAttabroth” – “\date of birth”

That’s not too hard to get used to though.

Posted on

Whatcha Gonna Do?

Today I had lunch with lj user tonomo at a really cool Cuban cafeteria called “Margon Restaurant“. That place rocks! On our way back asked — where would I go if were to become homeless. Knowing me, I don’t think he was much surprised by the fact that I already gave this question much though.

One thing for sure – I would not go to a shelter. You see, homeless people don’t go to shelters because those places are very dangerous. It’s very easy to get beaten, robbed and raped at the same time there.

I guess I would try to raise some “capital” first. said that it would probably be a good strategy to try and look really miserable. But my approach would probably be to drag around some humorous sign. Something classic, like “Tell Me Off for $2” or “Official Sperm Donner – Fill My Cup and I Will Fill Yours”. I would definitely not beg for money in two places – trains and near places where people eat. I would try to pick places where people go for a walk – near Central Park of ferry terminals.

Having enough money for a subway fare would allow me to ride around in subway cars. In winter it’s a sure way to keep warm at night. I would have to take a lot of cat naps, sleeping for long periods of time would be dangerous. I would try to switch to Uberman’s sleep schedule. I would also spend a lot of time sleeping and reading in libraries. Libraries also have bathrooms (as well as some of the better terminal subway stations).

Keeping my personal hygiene at a semi-decent level would be hard, especially in winter. I suspect that there are some churches that have showers, which let homeless in. Dunno. That’s a tough one.

Finding a place to stash my things would be tough.

There used to be times when homeless could rent a small cubicle in special “hotels” for very small sums of money. There’s an amazing book by my favorite photographer, Harvey Wang, about such places. It’s called “Flophouse: Life on the Bowery“. Well, those places are now gone with gentrification and all.

Another alternative would be to become one of the Mole People, but I am afraid that after that book came out, all the homeless were kicked out of the tunnels. My favorite chemistry professor, Dr. Hussey, told me once about homeless that lived in the tunnels under Brooklyn College. Those tunnels were secured as well, I believe.

There is a “Homelessness For Dummies” type book called “Homeless Survival Guide“. The price is a bit steep at $18 though. To the wish list it goes.

You know, “Clean Underwear from Amazon’s Target Store” is a good suggestion (as always). Not so “Ladybug Rain Boots” and “Helicopter Sleepwear Sets for Baby”.

In any case, what’s your homelessness strategy?

Posted on

Bang! Zoom! To the Moon, Alice!

There is a big map of the Moon hanging above my bed. I bought it in Lowell Observatory’s gift shop. It hangs mostly as a decoration, I never spent much time studying it. My knowledge of Selenology is limited to being able to identify sea of Tranquility , sea of Crisis and craters Tycho and Copernicus. I suck.

Yesterday I was looking at the map. And here’s what I learned: right below Sea of Crises are seas of Waves (Undarum), Foam (Spumans) and Fertility (Fecunditatis). On most maps Fecunditatis is translated as “Fecundity“. One more SAT word.

And now – a Rorschach test.

I am planning on reviving Brooklyn College’s observatory. Unfortunately it has been closed for many years. When I asked to see it, I was told that inside everything is covered with pigeon poop and that it’s a health hazard. I never had the time to be more persistent in gaining access there, but maybe this year I’ll find some time. Supposedly there is a 7 inch planetary refractor there. I’ll have to spend some money and time, but it will be less than the price of such a scope, not even counting the fact that it’s in a rotating dome.

I think I’ll spend some time looking for TLPs, even though such research is poo-poohed by most astronomers.

One thing is for sure – I am going to invest in a nice lunar atlas. There are no good Moon maps on the Net.

Posted on

Studly Matters

Brooklyn College officials like to put their full titles into the from field of the email. For instance, I used to get emails from “Alice Newcomb-Doyle, Public Relations” [..@brooklyn.cuny.edu] because I am on some email list. Well, now the name has changed into something funny – “Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Stud,” [..@brooklyn.cuny.edu]. I guess there is a character limit.

This is doubly funny, because before checking email I was playing with a stud finder device that I recently purchased from Radio Shack.

Posted on

What I have seen on a half hour lunch break in NYC

New York Yacht Club building at 37 West 44th Street. I’ve never seen it before. It has these really cool bay windows. Here is what it looks like outside and here it is inside.

It’s located right next to the Harvard Club, where ‘s previous employer liked to give office parties before his company went bust.

Believe it or not, I can’t find a good outside picture. For having such a cool clubhouse they have a pretty crappy website. I guess I’ll have to take some pictures myself.

I don’t have a yacht (I have to ask how much it cost, so according to J. P. Morgan, I can’t afford it) and I have not gone to Harvard. And there is no Brooklyn College club. Or is there? I like the idea of a club. Clubs are cool. Be like a real gentelman. Have some steak. Read a book. Smoke a sigar. Have some scotch. Well, I do those things at home, but it must be much cooler in a club.

—

In Times Square, inside MTV studios, some show was shot live. I could see the host and the audience through the window.

—

Saw a middle aged cop with a citation bar for Medal For Valor. It’s kind of like Purple Heart.

—

Bought some lunch from and interesting street vendor, who apparently used to work as a chef in now closed Russian Tea Room. His name is M.D. Rahman. A few places wrote about him.

Well, the times are tough, but at least he is not Rahman, M.D.

Posted on

We’ll Take Your Money

No, I am not talking about NYU here, even though “We’ll Take Your Money” is its unofficial motto. The official one is “Perstare et Praestare” – “To Persevere and Excel”. Yep, not PowerPoint. Excel.

Hmm, I wonder what other interesting unofficial mottos other colleges have. Brooklyn College’s official motto is “Nil Sine Magno Labore” – “Nothing Without Great Effort”. I know that firsthand. This is especially true about registering for classes. There is no popular unofficial motto, but if there was one, it would probably be pretty profane.

Cornell’s “Deus Et Humanitas” – “God and Humanity” is sometimes mistranslated as “God Went To Cornell”. And MIT’s “Mens et Manus” doesn’t mean “A man and his hand”. Well, what can expect from them, their mascot is a beaver.

Whoops, I got sidetracked. I wanted to write about charities. You see, I use Yahoo!Shopping a lot. As you spend money, they give you points. You can get some crappy merchandise for those points or you can also donate the points to a charity from http://www.guidestar.org. There are 850,000 charities in their database. Pretty interesting. If you search, let’s say, for “goat”, you can find “American Dairy Goat Association”. Search for “butt” brings forth hilarious results, like
“Friends of the Butt-Holdsworth Memorial Library”
“Charles C. Butt Foundation”
“HE Butt Foundation”
“Hurl Butt Street School House, Inc.”
and absolutely bizzare
“AMERICAN LEGION SN345 COLE-OGLE-BUTT”

And they all can take your money.

Me? I am going to donate those points to my usual charity – The International Dark-Sky Association.