We began the Palm Beach County Grand Tour on Worth Avenue. Oddly, Tiffany's doesn't seem to decorate for the holidays, at least outside the building's elegant coquina exterior.
Christmas wreaths and alligators are about as asynchronous
. . . as decorated pine trees and palms.
At the Manatee Lagoon, Florian was lucky enough to spot one. It took me three visits.
Florian did find a BIG one where we'd been told to look by a fisherman, but the poor creature had a floater embedded in the tip of its snout, making it look like Rudolf the Red-Nosed Alligator. I prefer photographing uninjured wildlife.
Visitors gathered on the viewing platform to watch the sunset over the Everglades.
Park signage conveys the diversity of Florida's fauna, although it doesn't necessarily protect those depicted. I passed a tire-squashed snake on the opposite side of the road.
We dined at Oceano Kitchen where the coconut cream pie looked a little bit like a crab but tasted heavenly.
On Friday, we headed to MacArthur Park.
While Florian and Arko frolicked in the surf, I walked the length of the only undeveloped stretch of beachfront in the county.
Upon return, I retrieved Arko's stick from the ocean.
The boardwalk was much busier than during my last visit.
Florian took me to brunch at John G's, an "old Florida" restaurant now under new management, where we enjoyed delicious cranberry mimosas. If the waitress hadn't screwed up my order, I would have taken a picture of my eggs Benedict with crab cakes. Afterward, we drove an hour to Wynwood, where Florian took a picture for his friend Uwe who gets a kick out of signs that don't make sense.
Back at the Folly, we dined on fresh branzino, purchased the night before after checking out the Loggerhead Marine Life Center and perfectly prepared by Florian.
I'm sure he felt a little bit like this kid after I took him to the airport on Sunday.
I also joined Thom for a week of blue skies, traffic and homelessness in Los Angeles. As much as I enjoyed the trip, if California is America's future, we're in deep trouble.
During all the summer weekends I drove to Jones Beach in Herr Cucaracha with David and Barnet, I never checked out the splendid boardwalk and pool. Swimming in the ocean and cruising the dunes were higher priorities in my youth.
You can't escape pickle ball.
Afterward, Anthony & John hosted Thom and I for another beautifully presented, delicious meal.
In South Boston, Magda & Joe gave birth to their third child and first son. Audrey and Tom are over the moon and the D-Girls couldn't be more delighted with their baby brother.
Can't wait to meet Desmond in person at Thanksgiving.
Florian travelled to Quebec and Ontario. He and Arko celebrated Pride in Montreal.
Call me jaded, but seen one Pride parade, seen 'em all.
But that Arko is one photogenic pooch. He turned six in the spring.
This photo recalls the infamous hot dog soup Florian cooked up the summer we spent together in the Pines. Flashback to come soon.
I took surprisingly few photos in Central Park this summer.
Steven joined me for one of my routine walks. I showed him a new wooden structure erected just below Belvedere Castle.
Groundskeepers are wrapping some tree bark in plastic.
This guy had all the accoutrements of fatherhood but I never once saw him glance at his phone as he lovingly fed his infant son. Now that's what I call being present!
These sunlit leaves got a head start on autumn.
While reading The New Life one morning on Central Park West after my bike ride, a pretty bug landed on me. I soon discovered that you're supposed to stomp on them mercilessly, no easy task for someone who finds Jainism appealing. Spotted lanternflies, a beautiful but invasive species, could decimate California's almond crops if they go west. That's one way to reduce the state's water consumption. Did you know that it takes three gallons of water to produce a single almond?
Here's a unique view of the park from Steven's roof deck. Since he had Randy and me over for drinks, he's retired. At age 52!
Davidson trains his lens on ordinary people as intently as Diane Arbus focused on "freaks," which probably explains why her work is so much more famous (that and her back story, of course). I find his work just as compelling.
Inlaid marble floors and a stunning elevator bank sent me straight to Google after a security guard shooed me away. The Fuller construction company, which built the Flatiron Building at the turn of the 20th century to house their headquarters, moved uptown in 1929. Art dealers clamored for gallery space in the lower six floors before the scene moved to Soho and then Chelsea.
Stunningly detailed bronze reliefs illustrate the buildings trade.
Speaking of construction in New York City, have you visited the new LIRR station beneath Grand Central? It's truly a marvel and contrary testament to the conventional wisdom that big things don't get built here any longer.
Bright mosaics cheer commuters.
Yet even the much-maligned subway continues to surprise. I'd seen these mosaic hats many times in the subway station at 23rd Street and 5th Avenue yet had no idea that they depict haberdashery worn by specific individuals, including Harry Houdini.
If unreconstructed New York is your thing, take a stroll on Lexington Avenue in midtown. The Roger Smith Hotel, where I think my parents may have honeymooned in 1946, is just south of these buildings with vintage signage.
New York walkabouts reveal statues both new and old. When I first passed Carol Feuerman's "Sea Idylls" in the spring, I didn't notice any male swimmers among the nine sculptures on lower Park Avenue.
The Golden Mean, 2012
Force and wisdom face off in front of New York State's Appellate Division of the Supreme Court.
It seems like they're about to do so in the next Presidential election, too. Wisdom does not look particularly reassuring.
Randy used to work for Kenn Duncan, the photographer who shot Joe Dallesandro, my first celebrity crush, in his prime. But even $800, the expected minimum for a portfolio of five portraits, seemed like a lot to pay for something so easily reproduced in digital format.
The Met threw me for a loop with its new "virtual line" system. A guard kindly allowed me into "Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty" without an advance reservation.
Chanel Ensemble (Autumn/Winter 2016-17)
By the time I went to see "Van Gogh's Cypresses," I knew the drill and spent some of my 115-minute waiting time on the roof which took me right back to Karnak, with an African-American spin.
"the eastside of south central los angeles hieroglyph prototype architecture" by Lauren Halsey (2023)
"A Walk at Twilight" (1890)
Although this isn't a representative work, the Pepón Osorio exhibit at the New Museum induced an extraordinary sense of childhood wonder at the symbolic, overstuffed and meticulously re-created Puerto Rican environments he has created over the past three decades.
Retirement gives you plenty of time to fool around with new Apple apps that mysteriously appear on your phone without your consent (remember when U2 got in a lot of trouble for that?). Freeform seems to be competing with Pinterest but it did provide an easy way to let Pines neighbors know when to show up for my 70th birthday celebration at Victor's house. Little did I realize it was a "collaborative" app, not my strongest characteristic.
