The last pay phones in NYC?

This story is getting considerable attention: “Last street payphone in New York City removed” (CBS News ). And yet:

While there are no more freestanding, public pay phones left in New York City, LinkNYC says they could still exist — on private property. There are also four “Superman booths,” or full-length phonebooths left in the city, but it is unclear if their phones are in service.

That’d be easy for someone for someone to check, no?

In 2009 Scouting New York tracked down those four booths, all on West End Avenue. Google Maps shows them still standing in August 2021, complete with pay phones. Working ones, I hope.

And now I’m kicking myself for not photographing the New York Public Library’s phone booths when I was last there.

A handful of pay phones
A Blue Dahlia pay phone : A Henry pay phone : The Lonely Phone Booth : A Naked City pay phone : A subway pay phone, 1932 : Chicago pay phones : “If your coin was not returned”

[Yes, the CBS headline has payphone; the article, pay phone.]

SFW on the shelf

Take a look at this tweeted photograph of Bryan Garner’s bookshelves. Can you spot the book by Sally Foster Wallace, David’s mother?

This 2013 post, a review of Quack This Way, a transcribed conversation between Bryan Garner and David Foster Wallace, has links about the Garner–Wallace connection. This 2020 post has some sample sentences from SFW’s book.

Related reading
All OCA Garner posts : DFW posts (Pinboard)

[The book is Practically Painless English (Prentice-Hall, 1980), above the three blue volumes, lower right.]

Domestic comedy

An ordinary evening. We were watching yet another Lou Grant episode, “Boomerang” (January 19, 1981). The opening scene: a busy hospital, doctors and nurses speaking Spanish. I called the theme of the episode (not derivable from its title) forty-four seconds in, when the camera zoomed in on a respirator, the manufacturer’s name in all caps: defective medical equipment. And then:

“Yes, Michael, you’re brilliant. You’re a genius at watching television. You can quote me.”

Related reading
All OCA domestic comedy posts (Pinboard)

[“Yet another”: these episodes aren’t going to watch themselves. And if you haven’t watched, it was a really good show.]

Mary’s and Rhoda’s apartments

Computer-modeled tours of Mary Richards’s and Rhoda Morgenstern’s apartments. The presence of elements never seen on The Mary Tyler Moore Show itself — bathrooms, a fourth wall — makes me want to call the Epistemology Help Line.

Thanks, Steven.

Related reading
All OCA MTM posts (Pinboard) : I envy Mary Richards

Grain, oil, and pastries

News from way out west:

A professional outdoorsman in Utah is facing felony criminal charges for allegedly helping Donald Trump Jr. shoot a bear illegally during a guided hunting expedition. Wade Lemon of Wade Lemon Hunting hosted Trump for the outing in May 2018. According to the Utah Department of Natural Resources, Lemon illegally baited the bear for Trump with “a pile of grain, oil, and pastries.”

“A pile of grain, oil, and pastries”: is it certain that Mr. Lemon wasn’t trying to help Don Jr. make contact with his dad?

Phonics redux

In The New York Times, an article about phonics and reading instruction: “In the Fight Over How to Teach Reading, This Guru Makes a Major Retreat.”

A related post
A story from my literacy tutoring

[Ask the average college student to read aloud, and you’ll understand the importance of instruction in phonics.]

Mozart in Lviv

“We understood why musicians must not keep silent”: Natalia Dub, an audience member for a performance of the Mozart Requiem in Lviv, Ukraine.

Lambini & Sons

Lambini & Sons (The Far Side ). As the son of a tile man, I had a clipped-from-the-newspaper copy on my office door for years.

Related reading
All OCA tile posts (Pinboard)

Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday  Saturday Stumper is by Stan Newman, composing as “S.N.,” as in “iSN’t easy.” Today’s puzzle is one of the most difficult Stumpers I’ve seen. I started last night with 11-A, four letters, “Does one’s part” and 14-D, nine letters, “‘Home on the Range,’ e.g.” Half an hour later, I gave up with the puzzle half complete. When I started again this morning, I suddenly saw the right answer for 24-D, eight letters, “On which numbers are written.” And that gave me four other answers, and fifteen minutes later, I was done.

Some clue-and-answer pairs of note:

1-D, five letters, “The way of the world.” Even with the last three letters, it’s hard to see.

3-D, five letters, “Easy going.” You need to notice that it’s two words.

9-D, nine letters, “Advances in elevation.” A tough one.

12-D, nine letters, “Gorbachev predecessor.” Yes, that name is hard to pull up. (Unlike Gorbachev’s.)

13-D, “It’s in the bag.” Nifty.

20-A, six letters, “Repository of Lost Legends site.” I thought it had something to do with gamers.

30-A, eight letters, “Carry-ons regulated by the FAA.” Deceptive? Not deceptive? Deceptive.

32-D, nine letters, “One use for a horsehair.” I knew it, I knew it.

34-D, nine letters, “Of hiking, biking, etc.” I wanted OUTDOORSY.

42-A, seven letters, “It may suit you.” A fine clue for an out-of-the-way word.

47-D, six letters, “Denounce.” The answer came to me after I closed my MacBook last night.

53-A, five letters, “Something to rest on or reel in.” Funny to think of these two possibilities together.

56-D, five letters, “It’s slashed for all.” I understand the intent, but I don’t think the answer fits “all.”

58-A, six letters, “Top with a joke, say.” OUTWIT? No.

59-D, four letters, “Doctor’s order.” I can think of at least four plausible wrong answers.

67-A, ten letters, “Suitable for Champion magazine?” Perhaps in name only? But even if you don’t quibble about that, the answer doesn’t quite fit the clue. One of two clues about this magazine. It would have helped if I had heard of it.

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

Roger Angell (1920–2022)

What a wonderful writer, about baseball (which I know nothing about) and assorted other subjects. The New Yorker has a piece about him by David Remnick. The New York Times has an obituary.

One of the regrets of my teaching life is that I never found an occasion for asking students to read Angell’s 2014 essay about old age, “This Old Man.”

A handful of posts about Roger Angell
An excerpt from ”This Old Man“ : “The dream of a nine-year-old boy” : Notebook man : On Don Zimmer : On Trump’s tweetsOn voting

[P.S. to the Times: This Old Man, the book, is not “a collection of essays about aging.”]