'Heads Nod: End of the Long Weekend'

It's late in the evening, even well after dark where the sun goes down after 9:00 p.m.,

almost everyone is exhausted from the weekend's activities, and two of them show it,

with their heads in deep 'nod'. Your ratings, critiques and observations are invited and

most welcome. If you rate harshly, critically, or wish to make an observation, please

submit a helpful and constructive critique. Please share your photographic knowledge

to help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! john

Good one, John. Here in Japan also public transportation seems to have morphed into a moveable version of Motel 6. I don't know what this has to say about the increasing pace of life as we rush from one place to another, catnapping when we can. Just when I think it can't go any faster, the speed gets ratcheted up a notch. Doesn't really effect me, I proceed along at my usual too leisurely pace but everyone else seems in a hell of a hurry to get somewhere.

Good shot John, including the "selfie" :)

Best regards

 

PDE

I acknowledge those who have commented so far, and will respond in due time to each above, after initial comments have run their course; this photo has some complexity in composition, and I prefer to let others tackle that, rather than take on that task myself.

 

You should critique it, rather than I.

 

The capture quality here may surprise those who have seen my prior metro photos, with better grays and more tonality.

 

Partly that's because this camera I think was capable of being set at 14-bit, and was thus set, and in main part, I think because this is one of the most (not absolutely THE most modern), of the series of 'very modern' metro cars in a pretty wonderful, efficient system, which research indicates have always been manufactured in Ukraine, contrary to statements in prior posts.

Perhaps, since the older coaches look identical to the older Moscow Metro cars, and, since they were both parts of one large country, the USSR, and for instance, the Antonov aircraft company, a huge Soviet aircraft manufacturing company, is headquartered in Ukraine with huge facilities in Kyiv, it is possible that numbers of the Moscow metro coaches to a certain time were build in Ukraine.    Until just recently, Ukraine built substantial numbers of arms for Russia, and just abrogated their arms manufacturing agreement this month.

 

Who made Moscow coaches of 20 years ago and still in service when I lied there is speculation, but the older style Moscow metro coaches (to my memory) look almost identical to the older Kyiv metro coaches, and indeed some of the Kyiv stations seem cookie cutter versions of their Moscow counterparts -- some Kyiv stations (few) are quite ornate, which is more common in Moscow's center, while others are plainer (BUT VERY CLEAN), and  on one line (as in Moscow on a line or two) at least one of three lines in Kyiv is elevated at the end.

 

But what makes this photo stand out from others may not be so much the equipment even though I think this photo was taken at 14 bits, as much as the interior coach lighting.

 

Lights in the newer coaches, when one is lucky enough to ride a train with them (there is more than one style), have fluorescent lights with a 2 or 3 stop increase over the older style coaches.

 

So, in older style coaches,  if a camera which tops for viewable captures at ISO  2500 with a f4.0 fixed aperture 12-24 mm wide angle lens on it, then the shutter speed maximum would be about 1/13th second, which makes shooting very hard, since such a lens is not corrected for vibration, and in such circumstances, especially when the train is rolling, and shooting with a dx sensor Nikon camera, one might well do better for sharp image quality to use the very serious and cheap Nikon 18~55 mm f 4.5~5.6 optic just for its good V.R. qualities.  

 

Coaches sometimes jerk and shake on some parts of some lines, and vibration reduction (V.R.) can help smooth out photos taken at slow shutter speeds, as can the new Adobe Photoshop CC 2014 blur reduction (sharpness) filter, which basically is Adobe's drastic and sometimes very harsh plug-in for photos that cannot be rescued any other way.  (It's found at the top of the sharpness tools while unsharp mask is at the bottom -- on the Windows version anyway).

 

So, as more and more of these new coaches are produced and put on the lines, look for image quality to increase, and as camera makers make new cameras that can take a very good image at ISO 3200 or even 6400 (higher even), look for sharper, more detailed images when shooting in the depths (and I do mean 'depths' as one of the Kyiv metro stations is stated to be the world's deepest, just prior to the metro coming out from a hillside and crossing the very wide, muddy, Dnipro river) on a dedicated bridge.  (then it's 'lights out', too, except when it's very, very dark outside.)

 

More on the comments at a later time.  (thanks all).

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Please make this correction to the statement above where it refers to Moscow and my onetime place of abode. x x x   'when I lived there'  x x x (not with the 'v' missing, which at one time, before the editing window time out was introduced, I could have fixed once I saw it, and nobody would complain.)

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

John, I have a feeling you probably like the addition of your "selfie" in the door window and I suppose you could find several philosophical layers in the reflection, comment on observer and observed etc etc., but for this photo, I think that much door creates too much dead space on the right.  Other than that a nice capture, well done and presented as usual and a nice slice of life.

Thanks for the vote of confidence.  This photo may look like a 'snatch and grab' photo, a sort of 'one-off' 'grab shot', but it's far from that.  I really 'worked the subject' in ways that even before I took would have seemed almost horrifying to me, but the people were so tired, they just let me be, and mostly just ignored me, even with me (that is me in the window reflected), standing there, not hanging onto anything in a moving train.

 

I took lots of shots to get one that was 'just right' as the baby bear would say, including the framing and the seated/standing denizens of the opposite side.  More later about their precise positioning which has some compositional significance so far no one has commented on.

 

I wish they would comment, so I don't look like i'm promoting my own photos and I'm critiquing what I asked others to do.

 

But I have an idea that no one has touched on, and I think it's significant that may affect one's thoughts about this complexity of this photo and why or why not it is 'attractive'.  And, it was 'planned' as much as one can 'plan' a photo taken under such circumstance.  And of course, 'planning' also includes editing from more than one capture.

 

I've been meaning to tell you that your work, presumably in Osaka and Kansai is marvelous and far beyond and above anything I'm capable of doing, and particularly your first folder and the months folders.  Keep up the food work/it's as close as I have seen recently to gallery level work.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Thank you both for the compliment.  I did WORK for this photo; there I am, as you note in the 'selfie' comment in the reflection, standing in the middle of a moving coach, unsupported, hanging onto nothing, running the risk of being jolted, jerked and falling (which would have been maybe seismic and quite a spectacle), and being quite more visible than I'd like to be, but this is just about the end of a series of shots where I had not been successful in framing, and DAMN, I just HAD to get this shot; it was far, far too inviting, and the people not objecting, not staring at me or resisting in any way in their tiredness.

 

Ukrainians can be that way, sometimes; respecting the photographer who is obviously not spying on them but getting a capture they can imagine themselves a photographer might take (here I am sure these people thought I was taking JUST a photo of the passed out man -- not just sleeping but passed out-- right), and so they let me be and paid no attention, not imagining I think at all theat they were an itegral part of the composition. but how to integrate that damn door!

 

And, worse,I ended up with an unintended selfie I discovered on download.

I usually would try to obscure such things by using minus contrast and minus brightness, or attempt at cloning, but past experience told me that it would be impossible to do and pass muster with my skill level in Photoshop.

 

Anyway, there it is!

 

As the French say, voila!.

 

Thanks for the kind comment and the time it takes to view and effort to write me your thoughts -- it's very appreciated.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Your short comment hit the nail on the head.

Good! Thank you for the compliment.

 

Artistic.  I always try to make 'street', 'candid' or any other type of capture 'artistic' no matter what pressure I'm under, and it's said 'practice makes perfect, if you provide yourself some feedback, and I carefully read these comments for that.

 

I read almost NO comment without some serious thought.  People generally don't comment for nothing, and no matter how much I sometimes disagree, those written thoughts come from someone's almost always honest impression and except for the very worst (and extremely few offenders), deserve to be taken seriously. With your history of hitting the bullseye, any favorable comment from you is worth is weight in critical gold.

 

'Life Photo'  I want to excel in this category more than any other. It's my preferred mode/genre of shooting, although I think I can tackle well almost any sort of shooting.

 

Pierre D., thank you so much. 

 

Best wishes; I'm glad to know you sometimes have a looksee.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Yours is a wonderful commentary, and really credits me with too much intellectualism when I go out and shoot.

 

I won't say I don't have a certain amount of that, but frankly, I hardly ever go out with the intent or even allow myself to take a 'selfie".  I actually go far out of my way to avoid taking what now are called 'selfies'.

 

I don't know how to embed, but here's a photo that should by all means have a 'selfie' of the 22 or 23 year old John Crosley in it, but I went to great trouble to avoid it, as I took a photo of the old people in the San Francisco SRO (Single Room Occupancy with only a sink -- often used for urinating and getting a glass of water with the toilet down the hall) hotel --very often used by poor people for lodging on Social Security with no pension.  

 

No cooking was allowed in rooms, but if someone brought in a hotplate, no one complained, and there weren't too many roaches or other vermin, one could actually live one's life in one's room and the lobby. for society/newspaper reading.  

 

Look and see if you find the 'selfie'  of me as a young man, but in the same window in this 'unPhotoshopped' capture, see if you can make out the big cinema marquee on the corner behind me and across the street in the window reflection.  Here is the URL:

 

 

It's one of my all time character favorites just for the expressions and the way the old folks reveal their ages in varying ways, even if its composition is not my very best.  It's also, in my view, a social history document, as some critics have posited, and I agree.  

 

Maybe you know if this Tenderloin hotel still is there?

 

In any case, I think you will not see the 'selfie' in that photo, yet if ever there was a tendency to take one, that would have been it, and it set the tone for the rest of my photographic career and journalistic career -- one of professional self effacement.

 

Later, after I quit the Associated Press photographer's job as a new hire (on advice, very offhand, from a guy I never met but was sent to meet 'because your photos remind me of his' by this guy's old friend and China compatriot, a fellow AP worker named Jimmy Smith), I saw 'this guy's' photos, and 'this guy' was sitting outside the DeYoung Museum watching the crowds come into the museum filled with his photos, and he took a few minutes to talk with me, and advised me (never having seen my photos but for me in particular as well as in general) that taking photos for a wire service was OK but it was dead end, and it was dead end artistically, also.  He said 'look at me, I have this big exhibition, and I can't even get assignments any more' (it was theage of television in 1969 and even the weekly photo magazine circulations were falling so drastically they no longer would send the grand maitre himself on assignment (so he was quitting to do art, which I didn't even learn until I joined Photo.net).  

 

I hadn't even seen this French guy with the very good English until after I toured his museum-filling exhibition, but the work was so stunning I would have bought almost every photo in the place, and almost all were priced at under $500.  I would have given my eye teeth just for a lesser one, much less the great ones, like the bicyclist in Hyere, France, or the other landmark Cartier-Bresson greats (an oxymoron?).

 

In any case, HCB's advice, when I didn't even know who he was, was so sound, I went back and quit the AP photo job to their stunned surprise.  It was a job almost all photographers in AP (and elsewhere) coveted -- the San Francisco bureau, where knowing and even dining with Willie Mays was part of the job, and the working conditions (for AP) were pretty cushy.

 

In any case, AP like me, decided to keep me on as a writer, even though I never went to J school and in my life had never written a story, ('you did good on the caption writing test, John') PLUS I could type like the blazes, so they were guaranteed output IF I could write my way out of a bag.

 

And I could it turned out, with my first day's output one story went onfront pages throughout the US, and my next day's output, one story went worldwide.  (no one was more astonished or scared of not being able to repeat success than I!)

 

I felt I had just pulled off the journalistic equivalent of an Ocean's 11 caper, convincing them I was a 'writer' and moreover in San Francisco of all places, their most coveted bureau in the US.

 

Later they shipped me to Reno for a year and then the boss of all AP photos flew to the West Coast to ask me to join his staff in NYC world headquarters, and I left Reno for NYC spent several years in AP photos, eventually representing the worldwide AP Photo department in the 'daily news planning/budget conferences with major bureau chiefs by speakerphone and all major NYC world editors, which  ended when I quit on turning 25.

 

The worldwide boss, the general manager, asked to mentor me to some day take over his job and be boss of the entire AP, outlining Bureau Chief assignments I would get (Rome and Tokyo, I think I recall), then when he retired, I would be a natural choice with his blessing.

 

Then HE gave ME my luncheon check to pay MYSELF.

 

I  was outraged HE and AP were so cheap.  It took me six weeks to quadruple my pay, and I quit for an editor/writer/photographer's job elsewhere, then after a year went to law school where I excelled.

 

The message (and perhaps the test) was whether I could be stingy enough, I think in retrospect, to run the AP, a non profit cooperative run by newspapers which owned it and paid subscriptions, at a time when owning a newspaper was a chance to print money. (now no more).

 

In all of the AP time, I was often asked to 'sign' my name on special 'enterprise' stories, which were outstanding enough they called for the writer to 'sign' them, and were called colloquially 'signers'.

 

I don't recall I ever signed a story once even though (believe me, it's true), a partner in Reno and I sometimes apiece would write up to or more than 100 stories apiece once each for the news wire and SECOND rewritten version for the 'radio wire' at the teletype. The other guy went on to become San Francisco bureau chief.  He was a terrific worker (and better although taken aback when I first just grabbed his stories and started editing them, which his prior partner never did -- apparently they fought like blazes!  I think (and he agreed), they were better after the editing.

 

The man who got AP to hire me, I think: was the wonderful Sal Vader, who later got a Pulitzer for a photo at Travis Air Base when of a Viet Nam vet returning to his jumping and joyous wife on the tarmac.  I think he liked my manners, that I didn't promote a 'point of view', and handled myself well on the street, PLUS I'm sure he he liked my photos.  Great guy.

 

The decision to hire me had to go to the AP board to, because at the time I had no college degree (Columbia students had rioted and shut down the university depriving me of my degree then.)   A college degree was a prerequisite they waived specially for me.

 

Now, you can see, there's history about me and revealing myself in my work.

 

It's probably obvious to you now, after reading the above, I don't mind writing or writing about myself, but I do not like to associate seeing my photo or even my name with things I've taken or things I've written, and that includes selfies.

 

I do like very much your philosophical reflection  suggestion (which I had not recognized) about the observer being observed, and it's a very good critique, and quite worthy, but it never entered my mind, for this circumstance in the taking or editing to prefer a 'selfie'.  

 

In fact, my idea was to try to think of a way with my growing but still minimal Photoshop skills for an 'honest' way to eliminate my reflection fir the very same reasons enumerated above.

 

I still move about generally to avoid getting my reflection in a photo, for in almost all circumstances, (extreme exceptions) I feel it has a great tendency to spoil a photo ,and to deprive the photo of the 'suspension of disbelief' that they are looking DIRECTLY at the scene, not 'A SCENE IN THE PROCESS OF BEING CAPTURED WHICH  IS ANOTHER ANIMAL'.

 

While 'gonzo journalism' and the same with photography, and the work of Pierre Woodman and Hunter S. Thompson do interest me as they have removed the invisible barrier between what is being observed and the observer, I prefer (for the purpose of any one photo within the frame of the photo) to be more simple, and keep myself out of it.

 

I have no problem writing about the process; and I am in the process of writing several photo books, with photos only, but one prominent member has urged me to write a book just about the TAKING of good photos, as she finds my explanations good reading, and her exhortations are serious, obviously heart felt, and I think there is a place in my future for at least one such book.  (all I have to do, is look at my photos on Photo.net and look at the comments, then do a lot of thinking and rewriting and voila, a ready made manuscript, which is why many of my most serious comments are marked with the copyright sign.  I've be

I note the difference between the 'normal' more journalistic or documentary style of 'street' that I have espoused above in the Cartier-Bresson, etc., fashion in which the photographer hides his presence, and even refuses to let his likeness be seen (how many photos of me have you seen?)  I know of two), and the 'new journalism' that includes the 'gonzo' style of journalism.

 

New Journalism is part fiction and/or novel, and as Faulkner stated so famously great novels often tell the truth far better than good journalism.  But new journalism (NJ) was literally a departure, when the reporter literally became part of the story, as suchr journalists jchallenged what they thought was a 'myth' that there could be 'objective reporting', and instead sought to reflect what they saw as they themselves filtered it, and thus passed it on as they felt what they encountered subjectively.

 

George Plimpton, a literary darling (and professional dilettante), I think could be classified as a 'New Journalist' whee he participated (as an amateur) in all sorts of tasks, especially sports, alongside world greats, though he by no means was great other than his willingness to weasel his way into places ordinary people never could dream of, and write of them not as an insider, but as he himself, an outsider, allowed to pass (almost always one time only) through the barriers that separate the players from the observers. He had an outrageous resume of 'things he had done'; I won't attempt even to summarize it here, but he had literally done 'almost everything', though the quality of his performance was not the 'work'  he did but of his reportage.

 

Here is a great quote about the difference between novelist/writer Tom Wolfe and gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson:

 

'One striking difference between Thompson and the new journalist Tom Wolfe is that while Wolfe seems to be the fly on the wall, Thompson is literally the fly in the ointment.'

 

Tom Wolfe had a huge ego, as shown in his fantastic writing, and his trademark white dress suit, but Hunter S. Thompson outdid him, inserting himself into stories, until HE became the story. We're at least as much interested about the observer and his life as the events being observed; maybe more so.

 

Pierre Woodman was not only a successful European porn director and porn actor, he made a famous series, now deemed artistically worthy as 'gonzo' by famously and secretly (later showing and selling with releases), tapes of his 'casting' sessions, which have become classics of their genre and have had enormous staying power because of his vigor, technique and the beauty of the women he was casting.

 

None of those is a hero to me, though I have enjoyed Wolfe's writing as much as anyone, I think. In a way, his inventive style reminds me of the breakaway from convention made in the '30s by John Dos Passos.

 

I do not wish to make a series of photos of John C. taking photos of scenes in part to document in reflections John C. documenting scenes, camera in hand.

 

It's just not my more self-effacing (professional work at least) style.

 

That may surprise Barry F. above, who made a very astute suggestion, but intellectually, I think it's honest with clear lines drawn between the depictor and the scene.

I prefer it that way.

 

Who knows?

 

I might at some time try to step through the imaginary curtain that separates the photographer as 'stage manager' and the scene itself; this scene above then might  then be first of a series.

 

Hmmmmmm.

 

Thanks Barry for setting my mind working.  Of course, I'd try to remember to give you credit if they are welcomed critically.  I had never thought of it; credit where credit is due.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

John, as always, thanks for the undeserved appellations:)  Unfortunately "selfie" is one of those contemporary "buzz" words that perhaps suggests a myopic self-involvement I didn't mean to imply:)  But I do like suggestions of the photographer in the picture.  Certain, Lee Friedlander [sp] used that device often.  

Anyways, I've never lived in the Bay Area, though I may some day when I grow up (only 64 now) always enjoyed it and have friends up there.   i've only shot there a couple of times.  But I loved your story about the AP.  Unfortunately as much as I admired Willie Mays, I was an avid Dodger fan in those days, and those were great days for that rivalry.  Every meeting between the Dodgers and Giants was more than just a ballgame. That was a bold move turning away that position.  

Now see, you've got me writing over a paragraph:)

John, did you know a photographer named Rory McNamara up there? He may have worked for the paper or freelanced up there.  He's a great guy and a wonderful photographer.

Ahh just read your last John.  Yes Hunter Thompson did become the story and with T.W. maybe the story became him.  It seemed T. Wolfe always tried to deify his subjects, which imbues himself with the creative power of a god to grant that sort of immortality.  I wonder between the two which was the bigger ego.  I read more Wolfe than Thompson, and I should rectify that.  I did enjoy "The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test"  and came away convinced that Ken Kesey was the second coming and also "The Right Stuff" where I knew that Chuck Yeager was the greatest man's man ever.  

But for all this, did you ever respond to my comment re too much dead space on the right? :)

LOL

 

I try like blazes to avoid false flattery; it strains the mind and memory to try to remember 'made-up' and often untrue compliments, whereas if one just tells the truth, however flattering, if put on the spot about a particular comment, and one cannot remember it, one can just as easily restate one's thoughts, maybe in other words. which only lends more credence to the initial praise.  It also doesn't hurt one's (my) reputation for veracity and forthrightness; few appreciate those who leave lots of unctuous praise that may not truly be deserved, and once found out, that person's word is forever discounted.

 

If I were as famous and lovely as Kim XXXashian, and anything I did was calculated to and did attracted publicity and therefore money, taking and maybe publishing a book of selfies or of photos in which 'selfies' were a part, might at least be very financially lucrative.

 

Those TV bound homebodies (male or female) who have nothing else to do than deify their celebrities could then deify me and in the process cause all sorts of advertisers, publishers, TV networks, etc. to glamorize me, my life and in the process send me oodles of money.

 

I could become famous for being famous.

 

I don't think I'd like that; it goes against my Midwest grain-fed roots far back in the genealogy and the Germanic/Teutonic part (probably strictly Lutheran) on another, and notice that you don't and haven't seen a current photo of me in my bio for more than ten years here.

 

I have a great photo taken by a world renowned fine art photographer when she was a student instructor in Germany that she gave me showing a younger, bearded me that I would post if I more bio space, I might post it there, but I'd rather show my work than me.

 

After all, it isn't about ME here, it's about what I do. Moreover, Cartier-Bresson who felt he was risking his life if he revealed his visage (and probably rightly so) is not much further from the situation I find myself in from time to time, so I have little incentive to publish my own likeness.

 

I'd rather be anonymous except where I'm in person and can vet, then choose my viewers/audience.  I  honestly do credit you for the suggestion of the photographer taking photos of the photographer taking photos, though this above is not the first ever it's probably a first for me. that I recall.

 

When first hired and when I wrote my first few stories at the AP, I got my back up when I turned them over to the editor who edited stories before putting them onto the wire. My face flushed with every edit, I was so rankled.  'How dare he?' I felt so violated, and insecure at the same time.

 

Finally, the night shift guy, a loner newsman appropriately named Jack Schreibman (get it?), took me out for a beer and said to me:  'Hey, kid, don't get your back up when you're edited.  The editor, whoever is chosen for the day, is chosen for his great writing skills andhis ability to understand what readers will read, and how they understand the flow of information, and what attracts them to stories.  An editor can spot flaws or just better ways to say things often in far fewer words than you can imagine right now, but one day you'll understand . . . and right now, understand this, the editor is there to  MAKE YOUR WRITING LOOK BETTER.'

 

(PARAPHRASED)

 

And so from that night forth, I've never rankled at being edited.  It was like master's class for news writing to have a good editor, I discovered.

 

(There were few bad ones in S.F. either during my brief stay at AP there.  The one guy who was never editor was the lush kept sneaking into the darkroom (where he hid his bottles), and when vacation time for him came, who never showed up home at the start of his vacation.

 

The staff sent me to find him to quiet his wife, screaming over the phone 'where is he?'!

 

HE was in the San Francisco jail drunk tank, having gone on a bender.  Three days later he was barely coherent from his intoxication.

 

I was hired under one bureau chief, a nice guy AP soon got rid of in place of a SOB named Paul X, and the photo department guy was headed by a guy named Ottinger (Ott) whose idea of running a photo department was to keep all the photographers sitting around awaiting the big earthquake unless they were on assignment to the Giants, the '49ers, or some such.

 

They rankled at that, and soon after I left for Reno, Ottinger was history; fired, I think.

 

(nice guy, helped them hire me, but he kept great talent, including later, Pulitzer great Sal Vader -- a nice guy, mentor and friend -- sitting around on swivel chairs, swapping stories to pass time, waiting for the 'big one' instead of doing 'enterprise' work.  Or they went out to do 'meet and greets' specials for local newspapers countrywide when their local big shot got some money or a minor award at some San Francisco hotel venue from some association or somewhat.  

 

One of the photographers had a contest with himself to see just how cheesy he could make those 'meet and greet' or 'congratulation' set up shots.  

 

His shots were a great form of parody, and would have been worthy of being published or being put in a gallery.  He got hit in the head later, in Marin, with double vision, and retired out on disability I was told.  He was a fun guy to be around with a great sense of humor, but AP needed someone more serious, like Vader, and they had counted on me too, I think.

 

The nice guy bureau chief I was hired under, went on the chopping block, Paul 'F, widely hated by the staff (grown sedentary and self-righteous in their ways, partly because they were mostly so damn good at what they did) resented bureau chief Paul F. seriously.

 

When I was shipped off to Reno, it was as a writer,and for a good part of the time,I'd have control of all AP from California's Sierra crest to the Utah border . . . . . a good chunk of the US and FULL of great stories.

 

Here are a few.  Stories of outlaws and recaptured outlaws (Leonard Fristoe -- prison escapee -- double murderer caught and put in prison before my eyes after 47 years on the lamb)  

 

A millionaire I often saw, who kept MILLIONS of silver dollars and gold in a pile walled in in his basement, who bought up from cash stuffed in his pocket at bank and foreclosure sales, most of the land around Reno, and became Washoe County's largest land owner.

 

Now everything in the Reno area, it seems is named after the old coot, too insanely cheap to buy a newspaper, so he read it in the library.  LaVere Redfield.

 

Joe Conforte, convicted white slaver, and I had a history.  He tried to set me up to blackmail me when myu writing of him offended him, calling me up to offer me 'free sex' with his prostitutes,  after I wrote something he unexpectedly found derogatory.  

 

Just come on out to the Mustang Ranch, I'll give you a card, and you can use it any time with any of the girls . . . free, on me.  Later he went to Brazil, a federal tax evasion fugitive (he had taken one federal fall for violation of the Mann act (transporting gulls over a staid lion????? if you know the joke, possibly the only LEGAL pimp in history who spent time in prison for asking women to work in his legal business, except they were, as I recall, from California, and that was the violation.    

 

He kept his mobile brothel (before the permanent one) in trailers (like today's mobile classrooms), at the junction of three counties.  When  it got hot in one county, he moved them to another.  Once, he wasn't fast enough and the sheriff of Rerno's Washoe County got a court order and burned them down as a 'nuisance'.  Prostitution was 'illegal' in Washoe County, one of a few such counties in Nevada.  A relative by marriage rented in a big apartment complex near his more permanent brothel, and upon signing the lease, she was handed a voter registration card, urged to fill it in (and whom to thank for her low rent).  

 

Nevada's biggest and most memorable whoremaster also wanted to take me to hockey games with the local Reno team he owned, and while an AP employee sit in his owner's box with him, and his wife, Sally, (famous for being the lover of famous Argentinian boxer Oscar Bonavena who 'accidentally got shot, just outside the brothel, when a guard of security I think mistook him for a 'prowler' or maybe a deer.

 

Bonavena's days as a contender ended with one bullet.  Source, 'San Jose Mercury News'

 

Conforte had money; Reno didn't and he was trying to buy the city bus line; I con't recall if he succeeded.

 

When he became a fugitive for not paying taxes claiming his prostitutes were 'independent contractors' and not employees' so he didn't 'withhold', he went to Brazil (no extradition treaty).  

 

The mustang ranch was run later by the United States court's appointed bankruptcy trustee, as it was in bankruptcy . . . . facing millions of dollars in unpaid taxes.

 

Nevadans watched the Nevada State Journal every year around Jan. 1, for its summary of the court filing from the bankruptcy trustee to the bankruptcy judge supervising that case.

 

Those filings enumerated the various sex acts of each kind, numbering the ti

I wrote above that I hoped a commenter would find a device in this photo that was more 'complex', sparing me the thought of having to write in this critique.

 

Imagine that this line up of people is a musical scale; there is a rhythm to the photo caught in their varying postures.

 

I often am unaware of things I do that are 'musical' or 'music' - related.

 

A requirement in 7th grade music class was to write a composition.

 

I fretted; I had taken and given up piano at age 6/7 and remembered nothing; how was I dto do even a one line string of notes to turn in as a required composition?

 

Our music teacher started in class at semester's end playing on her piano turned in student compositions, and they all sounded like nursery rhymes or Gregorian chant, or just mixed notes, though she added appropriate chords, and followed appropriately all the music notations.

 

But one piece she played, adding appropriate chords and a few flourishes was an outstanding success; everyone loved it. I did too; and I wondered 'Who wrote this?'

 

She asked who had written it; no one raised their hand.

 

Surely I thought, someone very talented who played an instrument and was shy, had written  it, I thought, but was absent or too shy to come forth.

 

After several minute of guesswork and speculation from the class, she pointed at me; the amazed musician.

 

My mouth fell open, literally.  

 

I had no idea.

 

I had no idea that my string of notes, half notes, and quarter notes sounded so good; I had done them by rote and sort of mathematically.  But in the hands of an artist, they sounded wonderful!

 

Here, I was entirely aware of trying to capture this group of people, not as just a straight line of people, but was more interested in capturing and mirroring the drooping heads of the passed out and sleeping guy, right, and the awkward, sleeping-on-his-hand posture of the little boy, center, left.

 

In doing so, I also chose a moment in which the others were 'standing, seated back, standing again, seated back again, (boy) leaning and sleeping forward, mother partly leaning (empty seat -- musical rest?) and then the slouched and passed out guy.

 

I find a certain rhythm and musicality to that lineup, and thought the rhythm of these people in their postures was worth a comment.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

I hear much broadcasting in and from parts of New York City with New York City subway (metro) passengers complaining about 'manspreading' in which a guy apparently spreads his legs wide, taking up more than the usual space a person might minimally occupy for a subway passenger.

 

I hear (mostly women) complain it's offense and maybe purposefully so.

 

Due to the large number of references to that practice, one might assume that it's more than just the latest feminist mantra, but has a real serious following not just among NYC subway riders, but among especially women in many parts of the USA and seems to be used as a synonym for 'male boorishness' among subway passengers, and particularly not just 'oafish' behavior, but 'oafish in some sort of coded sexual way'.

 

In other words, it appears on listening to some women (broadcasters, etc.) speak (and complain) about that practice of some male NYC subway riders, that the men who do it intend to cause offense especially among female passengers.

 

Such behavior is almost unheard of on the Kyiv metro (and I suppose the smaller metros in a couple of other Ukrainian cities).  

 

Also, from 15 years ago and one more recent trip a half decade ago to Moscow, I saw no sign of 'manspreading' and was previously cautioned by several Russian  women that even crossing legs on the Moscow metro was gauche and considered very bad behavior, though sometimes packs of young (or older single) men would get on the metro very, very drunk and sometimes mean and aggressive acting, making it necessary to avoid their gaze to avoid buying into a confrontation with an aggressive confrontation.

 

People presently in Ukraine's capital are so poor, few drink and drinking in public on central places no longer is a major problem.  Open bottles are now forbidden everywhere, and fewer and fewer stink of alcohol on their breath as before during more prosperous times.

 

Manspreading would almost NEVER happen in Ukraine -- it would be almost unthinkable -- almost, of course, as anything it possible)

 

In Ukraine even young women get up from seats for the elderly, the infirm, and even for children often of mothers with kids to age 6 or even older, even on crowded trains, almost always without being asked.    

 

Some seated able-bodied young passengers try to ignore passengers who obviously should be accorded such deference -- Ukrainian rules -- by gazing down at their e-readers, head way down, eyes averted,, with smartphones ear buds tightly in place (so they can excuse not hearing a request or seeing a need to get up, thus ignoring stong social pressure to give up their seats.

 

In this, seldom a word is spoken. It's Ukrainian and it's done by visual cues, while being caring of other people's needs with respect.

 

From years spent riding the NYC subway, such civic behavior was almost unthinkable there in past decades.  Maybe it's changed since I last rode the trains 10 years ago.

Ukrainian authorities will pull a train out of service and NOT put it back into service if it is defaced at all by graffiti - but defacing a metro train or station again is almost unthinkable -- almost to a one.

 

Kyiv  Ukrainians have a great deal with their metro, the trains are fast, clean, efficient, cheap and go all over for less than a quarter US dollar.

 

It goes all over for a small fraction of a dollar in a city that may contain 4 million people or more.  

 

No one knows for certain due to an 'outdated' registration system tied into utility credits, flat and house ownership, taxes, etc., that is Byzantine.

 

A husband, wife and two children who live together in a flat owned by one of the adults may all be'registered residents' in different places, maybe in Kyiv, for instance, or maybe various other places in Kyiv, its suburbs, or even maybe far away.

 

It's a leftover I think from the old Communist system of 'registering people' to housing.

 

And if you are registered as 'living' somewhere, that affects the price of, say, heating utilities (electricity and/or gas, even sometimes water, I've been told, so it's very important for children of poor, elderly parents to keep their registration at their birth place so mom and pop get the benefit of heat in the winter, which an inflation-eaten often cannot pay.  Banks with savings have almost to a one gone bust, sometimes serially.

 

And so forth . . . I think you get the idea.

 

So what about the guy in this photo 'manspreading' at the end of the metro bench?'

Is he uncouth, being oafish, a male being predatory in some minor but very irritating way or is there something else going on?

 

I think it's far simpler.

I think he's just dog tired and has stabilized himself so he won't fall over and onto the floor, so when the train stops and starts and his mostly unconscious brain taps into the signal of movement that may tumble him, his legs have good floor stability, even if his brain's reaction is tardy sending the stabilizing signal to his legs.

 

Nothing oafish at all, other than from being so tired he's fallen asleep late at night on the long ride home, just as a child here is doing.

 

That's the way I read this.

 

I do know that 'manspreading' on crowded subway trains was not usual in the NYC subways I used to ride when I lived there, but all sorts of other oafish behavior was prevalent, including men touching women with unwanted hands even in private parts, (and unseen) on very, very crowded cars, flottalism by some, graffiti which at one time was over everything, turnstile jumping (in check by the newer payment systems) and so forth.

 

In other words, at one time it was near 'hell' to ride the NYC subway; a friend was stabbed at 96th St. Manhattan and Broadway on the 'local'.  In Flatbush I saw a knife flash long after midnight after taking a date home to her Holocaust survivor parents and walking past (1) a building being burglarized, indicated by the pencil beam flashlight moving about the shop's dark interior. and (2) on the opposite platform of the elevated portion of the train tracks, a scuffle, then a quick flash from one individual at waist level, not a flash bulb or from any known device then, but the glint of a reflection of overhead lights off a drawn knife blade.

 

Was someone then stabbed?

 

I'll never know.

 

My opposing direction train came and cut off my view.

 

That's a story the ending of which I can only imagine.

 

I even got shot once while riding the old and decrepit Penn Central to Washington, D.C. (it was nationwide news).  One bullet felled two men and the shooter escaped, returned, and tried to finish off the 'other guy' firing a bullet at his head after pistol whyipping him, and the bullet hit the guy's head, but he lived (with a snall piece taken out of his ear -- he had instinctively jerked).

I had hobbled away on the new station platform to hide. (they caught the shooter  and sent him away after upending my life with his .38 Smith & Wesson snug nose police revolver.

 

Things were rough in Moscow but much moreso in outlying cities where bodies seemed to turn up regularly, and a visit with a wife-to-be to the nearby cemetery of one such town revealed massive bas relief carvings to young (very young) Russia Mafia chieftains and often their girls/wives and even families, all buried and their economic importance memorialized by these huge, tall black carved grave stone memorials which often were as tall or taller than a person.

 

I was forbidden in winter from going out alone in the regions, as I could never know where it might be 'safe' (read that safer).

 A common car (machine) 'sport'in the those regions and even in Moscow sometimes even frequently often involved chasing down pedestrians in the street or even curbside, seeing if one could 'hit' them or come close enough to frighten them to death.  Honest.  Women with children made them run and hide if they heard a car a block away at one time.

 

On one of Moscow's superwide boulevards (Prospekt Mira--Peace Boulevard) often cars would drive on the sidewalk through pedestrians to avoid huge traffic jams.

 

I think Putin has probably helped put a stop to that, and won the respect of many Russians for that, for their safety EVERY DAY was threatened. I met three women in Russia whose brothers were hospitalized an average of six weeks after their partners in business offered them a pittance for their half share, were refused, then 'changed their mind' when car exploded enough to cripple them and cause them to sell out (this from my personal acquaintanceships).

 

I'm told but have not verified that throughout Russia which has new prosperity under Putin that Russians tolerate a lot partially out of thankfulness and respect for control of the once-openly-warring criminal factions, and their containment under present leadership, but at a cost in freedom and self-determination.

 

Trump cannot know this; he's not asked me and I doubt he was told any of this from a personal perspective from someone's who's been there during Yeltsin's time, particularly in the regions.  

 

Moscow was much safer to be in -- taxis hardly existe