So every time I visit Queens, I behold a spectacle that I have never before viewed in my life.
Admittedly, I get out to Queens a grand total of once a year, tops.
It was amazing to meet a woman who had grown up right in the heart of Queens - whose parents, no less, had grown up in the same water-bound confines of this neighbourhood. I quiz her avidly: "So have you been to the mechanic's store run by the naked parrot? Did you ever get shoes from the chained-up stores??"
The answer is no, never, and where exactly was I because it sure wasn't Queens.
'Oh,' I assure her. It was Queens alright.
An ex-roommate had been badgered into driving down into New York City, a joint effort between myself and her kind-of-boyfriend, a vigorous foodie, and his kind-of-boyfriend, a quiet sort who had a passion for obscure mail. I had the ultimate trump card of a parking spot - free!! - which we could use for 4 days. Said parking spot was, admittedly, in Queens.
Getting to Queens is always an adventure within itself. There's bridges with the quietly despairing toll-woman, and a stadium we circled thrice for good luck. And that's about how far we got. Stadium after stadium, well the same goddamn stadium to be perfectly honest. So as we rejoined traffic under the subway, I pointed out an auto shop. "They will definitely know where we're going. Okay, turn right. Right. RIGHT NOW."
The curious man at the hot dog truck may have known where we were going, but between the four of us we had zero words of Spanish. The ex-roommate and I left the kind-of-boyfriend and the other friend-kind-of-boyfriend standing outside the subway while we ducked behind two cars and entered the auto mechanic shop.
The attack was immediate and wildly successful. Pushed from behind by my unsuspecting friend, I was immediate in lunge-range of a rabid naked flapping monster. Screaming couldn't be enough. I immediately had to hit the deck and army-crawl towards freedom. I can't lie, I have to confess I left my friend as sacrifice. Luckily she too had the reflexes to launch her yoga-toned ass through the still open door.
"WHAT WHAT WAS THAT?" was the general shrieked consensus outside. The junior mechanic came outside, crying with laughter. He explained that his bosses' parrot had been stressed lately. Really stressed. And this parrot expressed his state of unsatisfaction by methodically pulling every single feather out of his body, until it was left with only a head of feathers to distinguish it from a live re-enactment of a rubber chicken joke.
"My boss is bringing him into work, to see if he is less stressed with company, but it turns out that he just hates people. That's why we have him chained!"
Our parking spot was less than 200 feet away.
Queens is an inextricable lodestone of strangeness for me - a strangeness that renders it unfamiliar even to this amazing woman who had grown up right there and somehow managed to miss the weekend with the flaming BBQ shopping carts wars. How is that possible??
Friday, April 15, 2016
Friday, June 13, 2014
The Secret Disco Society - Montreal
My boyfriend was the first person to notice it. It's a large cone-shaped room on top of one of the new pricey hotels along Rene-Levesque, in Montreals business district.
"It's a pulsing LED of some sort," he pointed out. "What could possibly be in there?"
We theorized about it as a boardroom for hopped-up business people; some kind of indicator to show changing temperature; maybe just a secret disco room?
For several weeks, the glowing room at the very top would catch my eye when I ventured further south than usual.
It wasn't until my boyfriend's visiting family came into town that I was able to further investigate. Meeting up with his folks, we began walking towards the glowing room.
"You're staying nearby? Wait, here? This is your hotel? The one with the glowing room? Can we go up there?" It turns out we couldn't go up to the top. We couldn't even get close. The room-key designated which floor we could visit, and no more. Even going up to the outdoor pool and peering up the side of the hotel didn't help. The glowing room was a solid 6 floors away.
Before leaving on the last night, I was determined to mine more information out. To my surprise, the front desk-clerk had very little to say about the enormous beacon on top of her workplace. She explained that she had never been up there - and neither had any of the staff she knew. The glowing room was part of a private residence. Only the person who owned the property and the technician had keys. "Besides," she said "I don't think it is actually a room at all. It's kind of a thing - only the technician knows. We can't go there at all".
What kind of thing could take up the cornermost part of a hotel and glow multiple colours throughout the night was one of those questions only one of 2 keys could answer - I suppose I'll never know. It seems like one of those secret society question that only gets answered at the highest level.
I maintain it's a secret disco society. Dance one, millionaires. Dance on.
"It's a pulsing LED of some sort," he pointed out. "What could possibly be in there?"
We theorized about it as a boardroom for hopped-up business people; some kind of indicator to show changing temperature; maybe just a secret disco room?
For several weeks, the glowing room at the very top would catch my eye when I ventured further south than usual.
It wasn't until my boyfriend's visiting family came into town that I was able to further investigate. Meeting up with his folks, we began walking towards the glowing room.
"You're staying nearby? Wait, here? This is your hotel? The one with the glowing room? Can we go up there?" It turns out we couldn't go up to the top. We couldn't even get close. The room-key designated which floor we could visit, and no more. Even going up to the outdoor pool and peering up the side of the hotel didn't help. The glowing room was a solid 6 floors away.
Before leaving on the last night, I was determined to mine more information out. To my surprise, the front desk-clerk had very little to say about the enormous beacon on top of her workplace. She explained that she had never been up there - and neither had any of the staff she knew. The glowing room was part of a private residence. Only the person who owned the property and the technician had keys. "Besides," she said "I don't think it is actually a room at all. It's kind of a thing - only the technician knows. We can't go there at all".
What kind of thing could take up the cornermost part of a hotel and glow multiple colours throughout the night was one of those questions only one of 2 keys could answer - I suppose I'll never know. It seems like one of those secret society question that only gets answered at the highest level.
I maintain it's a secret disco society. Dance one, millionaires. Dance on.
Tweety Come Home - Winnipeg
A good family friend came to have a bird. A cockatiel, to be exact: brightly coloured, with a lemon zest plume arcing off his head, the same way a long feather would from an old-fashioned hat. My friend was an at-home psychoanalyst, seeing clients in the topmost room of his house. It wasn't clear if the bird was made his after his children grew bored of it, or if he had sought out companionship while his wife was at work and children at school. Either way, soon he had the constant companionship of Tweety, who rode on his shoulder pirate-style. Tweety-Bird accompanied him everywhere: during sessions, and throughout smoke breaks with the long skinny cigars my friend had brought over with him from France.
It was during one of those smoke breaks that Tweety made a break for it. My friend had the habit of clapping his hand over Tweety's legs to prevent possible escape, though the cockatiel seemed content to live inside the warm house. With a cigar in one glove and the mail in the other, my friend was helpless as Tweety launched off and spiraled into the afternoon sky.
Now, it wasn't the prospect of telling his family of Tweety's departure, or the potential loss of companionship that filled him with dread. Instead, if anything it was the inescapable truth that he lived in Winnipeg, one of the coldest locations in Canada, a country not well known for its beaches to begin with. And Tweety was facing one of the coldest nights of the upcoming winter, where temperatures dropped down to skin-freezing degrees and if one fell asleep outside it would be unlikely to wake up again.
He called his wife.
"Well, we can search the neighbourhood for him - he's a goddamn yellow cockatiel, we can spot him."
The neighbourhood watch turned up no sightings of the errant companion.
The veterinarian had the hard task of assuring the entire family of Tweety's inevitable demise, unless found before nightfall.
The next morning, my friend woke up with a heavy heart. Slipping on coat and gloves, he went outside for his first smoke of the day. And there, huddled down on the porch's iron railing, was Tweety. Stunned, he reached out and grabbed the shivering bird, lifting him off the railing. Except Tweety's feet remained locked around the metal bar, clinging on as tight as they could.
The veterinarian offered scant hope: they were to wrap him in a towel to warm him up, and to feed him his favourite food because he would surely die once thawed out.
Tweety did not die. Instead, he began to blink and twist his head around. The youngest daughter offered him his favourite treat. His beak, fully thawed, fell off with first peck. Not simply the tip or perhaps the upper or lower half. The footless bird was not beakless as well.
One last frantic call to the vet confirmed the endless spectre of death hanging over Tweety. With no beak, they were to soak cereal in milk, and press it against his bird-hole. Tweety eagerly scooped the proferred food into his bird-hole using his tongue. It was an unsettling sight, but then again it was the last supper of a dying bird.
Tweety lived for several years afterwards. He was carefully propped up in cups when in his cage. Unable to perch on his shoulder, my friend constructed a shoulder-holster to house Tweety, a regular at sessions. It's hard to say if Tweety's hard-knock life served as a hopeful message, or a dire warning to clients. But for Tweety, life was good again.
It was during one of those smoke breaks that Tweety made a break for it. My friend had the habit of clapping his hand over Tweety's legs to prevent possible escape, though the cockatiel seemed content to live inside the warm house. With a cigar in one glove and the mail in the other, my friend was helpless as Tweety launched off and spiraled into the afternoon sky.
Now, it wasn't the prospect of telling his family of Tweety's departure, or the potential loss of companionship that filled him with dread. Instead, if anything it was the inescapable truth that he lived in Winnipeg, one of the coldest locations in Canada, a country not well known for its beaches to begin with. And Tweety was facing one of the coldest nights of the upcoming winter, where temperatures dropped down to skin-freezing degrees and if one fell asleep outside it would be unlikely to wake up again.
He called his wife.
"Well, we can search the neighbourhood for him - he's a goddamn yellow cockatiel, we can spot him."
The neighbourhood watch turned up no sightings of the errant companion.
The veterinarian had the hard task of assuring the entire family of Tweety's inevitable demise, unless found before nightfall.
The next morning, my friend woke up with a heavy heart. Slipping on coat and gloves, he went outside for his first smoke of the day. And there, huddled down on the porch's iron railing, was Tweety. Stunned, he reached out and grabbed the shivering bird, lifting him off the railing. Except Tweety's feet remained locked around the metal bar, clinging on as tight as they could.
The veterinarian offered scant hope: they were to wrap him in a towel to warm him up, and to feed him his favourite food because he would surely die once thawed out.
Tweety did not die. Instead, he began to blink and twist his head around. The youngest daughter offered him his favourite treat. His beak, fully thawed, fell off with first peck. Not simply the tip or perhaps the upper or lower half. The footless bird was not beakless as well.
One last frantic call to the vet confirmed the endless spectre of death hanging over Tweety. With no beak, they were to soak cereal in milk, and press it against his bird-hole. Tweety eagerly scooped the proferred food into his bird-hole using his tongue. It was an unsettling sight, but then again it was the last supper of a dying bird.
Tweety lived for several years afterwards. He was carefully propped up in cups when in his cage. Unable to perch on his shoulder, my friend constructed a shoulder-holster to house Tweety, a regular at sessions. It's hard to say if Tweety's hard-knock life served as a hopeful message, or a dire warning to clients. But for Tweety, life was good again.
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