The Gallery of Absurd Stuff Blog

Be careful of the moving platform.

2011-04-01T09:41:00.007-04:00

14th Street-Union Square (IRT), Uptown platform
These new countdown displays are nice. They tell you how long you can expect to wait for your train. They tell you important messages related to subway service, and in this case, they give some sort of safety message. For those who are not aware, this station has platform gap fillers (also referred to as "moving platforms") installed on the downtown platform, due to the severe curvature of the platform.

The thing is that the uptown platform does not have platform gap fillers, but the message is displayed on the displays hanging over the uptown platform anyway. Isn't it nice to be warned about something that exists in one location, but doesn't exist in another?

32-bit Integer Fail

2011-03-15T12:32:00.003-04:00

Rhymes With…

2011-03-01T14:57:00.001-05:00

Carrot, Claret, Carat, Parrot… Nothing ending with the "o" sound, that's for sure.

Oh No!

2010-07-15T19:22:00.001-04:00

The Exit has been replaced by a Museum!

330 cm³

2010-04-02T21:10:00.003-04:00

Here's an example of a little-used unit of volume: the cubic centimeter. Here, it is clearly written as cm³. However, it has two more common equivalents: cubic centimeters — expressed using "cc," and milliliters (mL). Other liquid products throughout most supermarkets use mL as their metric measurement of volume, though cc and cm³ are one-to-one equivalents. Why not just use mL then? I guess they would answer with something similar to what Abe Simpson once said:

“My car gets forty rods to the hogshead, and that’s the way I likes it!”

Make Your Car Shin!

2009-11-02T18:16:00.006-05:00

Sure, and after that, we can go watch The Shinning.

Let's see… The Jamaica LIRR station is in…

2009-10-24T11:45:00.003-04:00

Manhattan? Manhattan doesn't have this many Q routes!

Danger!

2009-07-13T10:53:00.001-04:00

Ad on a bus:

There's something about putting your service area on a sign marked "DANGER" that screams, "Don't do business with us!"

This does not look right…

2009-07-13T10:44:00.001-04:00

The back of an Orion 7 bus (3694) on the Q60.

That Familiar Web Browser

2009-04-29T17:48:00.004-04:00

So in other words, Internet Explorer 8 is the latest version of Firefox?

No Job Is Too Small… Almost.

2009-04-25T19:44:00.003-04:00

No job is too small, except correctly spelling “painters.”

The translation of the Spanish word for Spanish from Spanish to Spanish is…

2009-04-11T19:23:00.001-04:00

“Spanish”?
-- Post From My iPhone

Transfer to the…

2009-03-17T09:47:00.000-04:00

I thought they closed this in 1973.

-- Post From My iPhone

Manhattan, The Bronx, Queens, Staten Island and…

2009-03-16T13:08:00.003-04:00

BROOKLVN?

C105e it!

2009-03-14T10:50:00.001-04:00

C105e teh d00r y0u 1aundry n00b!

-- Post From My iPhone

Dial "O" for Out of Your Mind

2009-03-05T13:59:00.002-05:00

First off, this isn't a phone, so there wouldn't be a receiver. Second, unless this phone had a QWERTY keyboard, there wouldn't be an O key! Besides, DTMF tones don't support dialing O. They can dial 0, but not O.

This 0/O confusion is why I always write my zeroes like this: 0̸

-- Post From My iPhone

The B61 goes HERE???

2008-12-08T11:14:00.001-05:00

Location: Chelsea Piers

Since when does the B61, a route that starts in Red Hook, Brooklyn and goes through Downtown Brooklyn, Williamsburg, and Greenpoint before terminating in Long Island City, make a a stop here?

Wrong Beverley, Beverly!

2008-11-13T01:40:00.005-05:00

This screenshot taken with my iPhone shows an art display in a subway station. The caption identifies the station as "Beverley Road and Nostrand Avenue on the Q line." Whoever wrote this caption needs to look at a subway map. Beverley/Nostrand is NOT on the Q line! It is on the 2 and 5 lines! Not only that, the station at Nostrand Avenue is fully underground. The station in the photo is in an open cut. The image is indeed of a station on the Q line, but it's Beverley Road and East 16th Street.

Didn't They Discontinue This?

2008-11-04T14:14:00.002-05:00

With all the money Microsoft is putting in to promote Windows Vista, why are they still promoting Windows XP on this mall advertising sign?

It's 8 PM...

2008-10-29T20:07:00.000-04:00

...Do you know where your 8th Avenue-bound L train is?

Well, it's not 36 minutes from here (6th Avenue), that's for sure.
It's that train on the left.

HOW Long Until the Next L?

2008-10-29T20:02:00.001-04:00

2008.10.29 19:52

There must be a glitch in the "Next Train" system on the L line. The sign says the next L train isn't for 27 minutes, but it looks like the next L train is arriving right now!

It's one thing to repave a street, but...

2008-10-29T10:50:00.002-04:00

Why bother painting the double yellow lines when you're going to pave over them in a day or two?

0:08 AM

2008-09-19T22:08:00.002-04:00

Taken just shortly after midnight, the clock on this R142 car reads, "0:08 AM." It's a mix between the computer's internal 24-hour clock and the forced formatting of the time into a double-12 AM/PM format. However, they seemed to have left out the line of code which says that if the hour is 0, then the display should show 12 as the hour.

Either that, or they should just drop the AM/PM bit, and just go to using a 24-hour clock on the display, like they did with the R110A and R110B.

Staten Island: Part of New York City, or not?

2008-08-29T21:22:00.004-04:00

If you've ever taken a ride on the Staten Island Ferry, you'll know that the ride lasts 25 minutes from end to end, at the blazing fast average speed of about 12.5 miles per hour. If you look at any of the boats they use for this service, you'll notice that three strings of text are emblazoned on each side.

Staten Island Ferry (Duh!)
Dept. of Transportation (The agency which operates the Ferry.)
City of New York

However, I found something interesting aboard the Spirit of America, one of their newer boats.

A bus map of Manhattan. Note, however, that the label on the lower left reads, "NYC Bus Map." If it were really a NYC bus map, it would show all 5 boroughs on it, not just Manhattan!

Second, one of those "You Are Here" signs on the boat. Note that it identifies the ends of the boat as the "Staten Island End" and the "New York City End."

Isn't Staten Island part of New York City? If so, why doesn't it say, "Manhattan End" at the end of the boat opposite the Staten Island end?

Looks like someone needs to look at a map of New York City! Either that, or just give the whole island to New Jersey. That's closer, anyway!

About This Blog

2008-08-28T10:00:00.001-04:00

This blog will eventually be the home of the Gallery of Absurd Stuff (GAS), currently located here and here. I've decided to convert the gallery into blog form so I don't have to bother with writing all the HTML code myself. This also gives me a chance to upload better versions of the photos currently in the GAS, as well as add some new stuff (and let me tell you, I have a LOT of new stuff). So sit back and enjoy!

NOTE: As I add some of the old stuff onto the blog, you may notice the date of these so-called "new" posts being from several years ago. I will be using the date the photo was taken (or the date the film was developed for photos I took using film) to set the date and time of the blog post.

Rameedial Speling, Pleez!

2008-08-27T17:33:00.000-04:00

In order to even enroll as a student at Queens College, you need a high school diploma or a GED. Apparently, that requirement isn't necessary to advertise rooms for rent to Queens College students. In fact, it seems that anyone with a word processor and a printer can hammer out a message, print it out, and post it wherever they please. It doesn't matter if the message looks like it was written by a kid who failed second-grade spelling, like these two.

How many blocks away from where? First off, tow is not a number. It's what happens to your car if you're parked on the street where you're not supposed to. Then there's Quess College. Where the heck is that? It's certainly nowhere near where this sign was posted. You couldn't get the spelling of the institution, despite the myriad signs bearing its name, as well as its proper spelling. Grade: C+.

Let's see… One, two, three… SIX words misspelled here, including two of the most important ones: the name of the institution. QWEENS COLGE? Nope, don't know of any "qweens colge" around here. Maybe you should try again when you get a good English dictionary. Grade: F.

Is It Really DOG FOOD?

2004-11-06T13:02:00.001-05:00

This vintage 1943 advertisement, found on R1 car 381, seems like an innocent ad for dog food. There are so many references to this being for dogs.

The emphasis on the word Dog on the bag
The drawing of a dog on the bag
The word DOG on the bowl
The dog apparently eating from the bowl
The tag line, Give your Dog his daily vitamins
The expanded name, Gaines Complete Dog Food

Then, there's something startling in the first bullet point: Used by U. S. Army.

Don't tell me they were feeding Dog Food to those soldiers!

How Far Is It to the LIRR?

2004-11-02T09:13:00.000-05:00

At the Vernon-Jackson station in Long Island City, you have these signs. One says that it's only 2 blocks to the LIRR. The other says it's 3 blocks to the LIRR. So which is it? It's actually two short blocks (from 50th Avenue to Borden Avenue), followed by a long block, that's about the length of two-and-a-half blocks (from Vernon Boulevard to 5th Street). You can see the neighborhood in the map below.

View Larger Map

Tower Does Tha Ghettospeak

2004-10-24T16:02:00.000-04:00

Tower Records, 66th & Broadway.

So tha so-called "ghettospeak" has seeped into tha marquee of tha store.

It gets cold in New York, but not THIS cold!

2004-10-21T22:27:00.003-04:00

55th Street & Broadway, Manhattan, 21 October 2004, 22:27:23

You're not seeing things. This clock/thermometer is actually saying that the temperature is -75°. In other words, SEVENTY-FIVE DEGREES BELOW ZERO! I am assuming that this is in the Fahrenheit scale, because if it were Centigrade, it would be even colder! However, with the date and time provided above, the weather records clearly indicate that the actual temperature was nowhere near this otherwise record low for this or any date in New York City.

Looks like there's a building here already.

2004-10-08T14:05:00.000-04:00

Banner on a building in Kew Gardens, Queens
That's funny. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that there's already a building there! In fact, the building came before the banner did!
Also, it looks like the banner originally said, "Coming soom." I guess the sign makers didn't want to spend the money to make a brand new banner, to hang from the building that's been there since before this banner was made.

What Color is the Lexington Avenue Line, anyway?

2004-07-01T16:03:00.000-04:00

It's certainly not red!

No Standing

2004-07-01T15:49:00.000-04:00

Either the D.O.T. thinks that time runs backwards, or they put up a rather confusing way of saying no standing 24 hours a day.