I don’t know how this eluded me but I’ve been in need of more payphone sounds, or sounds recorded using payphones, and the music on Steinway Street is perfect. There is even a cluster of phones around 30th Avenue, where the music is loudest. So I dumped some quarters into them and will see if anything recorded.
Still kind of chuckling about last night’s email exchanges. John obviously does not want me posting anything about his rogue phone but I can get away with writing about it as if I never talked to him, and with no clues as to its exact location. I don’t think it’s illegal but being on private property probably means it is unauthorized and could be considered a form of trespassing. If he got permission from the property owner then it’s all good but I doubt the owner of that lot even gives a shit. They let the empty payphone enclosure stand there unmolested for years. It is pretty cool how it works, though. Just a standalone battery-powered device run on solar energy. He said it costs $8 a month to operate and has been making a few bucks a day. That trend should stop for now, until he fixes the jammed coin slot.
Nothing to report this beautiful day. I just walked around some ahead of the rain tomorrow. Did not get the windfall check but not going to worry about it. They were said to have been mailed December 1. I went over to a couple of Hour Children thrift shops I did not know existed, over on 36th Avenue and 12th Street. Not worth the trip but at least now I know that much.
I was telling a bartender friend about some of this rogue payphone skulduggery and it seemed appropriate to mention that I’d been in a short movie with the owner of this payphone. He found the movie and started watching it as I left the place. He said he’d watch it all and give me a review.
At the ghetto coffee shop.
Oh, saw a sweet scene. Elderly man on Broadway walks up to a payphone, looks at it, walks away. I thought I’d just seen an elderly version of myself until I looked at the payphone and saw that it had no handset. It looked like it had been cut off with something like a tree pruner. So the old man walked on to the next payphone. Broadway between 31st Street and 49th Street is actually pretty ripe with payphones. What was noteworthy about the payphone the old guy did use is that it had been plowed down by a car or truck a few months ago. I spotted it on a Sunday and put a picture of it on Twitter. I assumed that a toppled payphone like that would just be hauled off and never replaced but no, the folks at Titan, the payphone-smart guys at CityBridge, had a new and functional payphone back in place within the week. And that’s the one this old gentleman used today. Of course there’s no reason to shower Titan’s replacement of the payphone as some kind of charity. There are 3 advertising panels on that payphone enclosure and those panels make good money. The payphone itself does not.
