TCC 2/19/08

The Caretaker's Concern 2/19/08
Ghetto temp. 51 F. and rising slowly
Island tmp. 26 F. Yesterday's L/H: ?/45 F. Caretaker missed the low.
Current conditions: Mostly clear, occasional clouds, occasional wind from the West.

The day started out well enough for the Caretaker, then it went South, then it got weird, then it got good, and then it got quiet. The Caretaker had to go to the big city of Albany to drop off a ton images at the photo printer he uses for prints to be made so he can fill out his portfolio. After that he was to meet up with S. for lunch at Justin's. The Caretaker had dropped a memory card in S.'s car the last time he was down in Albany, luckily S. found it. The Caretaker also had to give S. a belated birthday gift for L. and so lunch at Justin's is where the exchange would take place. After lunch the Caretaker would head back North, take care of a few errands and then return to the Island. At least that was the plan for the day.

The Caretaker woke up very early, took a shower, got his things together and skied over to the mainland, reattached his car battery and bumped on down the road. In less then 10 seconds of turning onto the main road a police officer drove by in the opposite direction. Just before the officer passed a piece of ice from the Caretaker's windshield flew off towards the path of the officer's car. The officer passed without incident. However, the Caretaker expected the officer to turn around, so the Caretaker didn't go racing down the road and sure enough, in a few minutes the officer was behind the Caretaker with his lights flashing. The Caretaker pulled over. The Caretaker is not omniscient.

This piece of ice that flew off of the Caretaker's windshield was placed there strategically, the intent was to cover up the car's out of date inspection sticker. However, as stated above, it probably worked the exact opposite and ended up drawing attention to the out of date inspection sticker rather than concealing it. The Caretaker was hoping to pull off the Albany trip and then take care of his car's inspection problem. In the end the officer was kind enough to let the Caretaker go without giving him a ticket. The Caretaker then decided that perhaps it would be best to pop into the closest garage, have the car go through inspection, (knowing it will fail), get a failed inspection sticker and then continue on down to Albany. The Caretaker was born an raised in New Jersey, he has only been a legal resident of New York for three years, this is the first time he has had to deal with his car not passing inspection. After the car went through inspection the Caretaker learned that unlike New Jersey, New York state no longer issues failed inspection stickers, instead they just scrape your old inspection sticker leaving you with nothing.

Ha-ha.

Ah, but it gets better, the Caretaker expected his car to fail inspection because his exterior door handle does not work. After learning that his out of date inspection sticker had been removed, leaving him with nothing, the Caretaker was informed that his car would have passed inspection if only the door handle was broken. Apparently working door handles are not a part of the safety inspection, which would have been great if that was all that was wrong with the Caretaker's car. Instead the mechanic produced a list of some 6 items that needed to be repaired before the car could pass inspection--none of which could be accomplished in a short period of time. So the Caretaker paid his 10 bucks, said thank you and went on his way. He figured that if he got pulled over again on his way to Albany he would show the officer the paperwork on why his car failed and that he just learned of it today, blah, blah, blah. Luckily the Caretaker never got pulled over again this day. This might have been in part because after meeting with S. for lunch he drove straight back to the Island foregoing his other errands.

After the Caretaker dropped off the images at the printer, he decided he would stop in at a repair shop that specialized in German cars, the shop is behind the Honest Weight Food Co-op, so after looking into the Car he would be able to pick up a few things from the Co-op. En route, just after passing the Armory on Lark street the Caretaker saw a collection of police cars parked at the side of the road. Behind him an officer had his lights on to pass, the Caretaker pulled over, while stopped two or three more police cars came whipping around corners all converging at this one spot. The Caretaker was quite sure that there would not be this much show of force just because he was driving with no inspection sticker, so when it looked safe to pass he pulled around the collection of police cars to continue on his way. While passing he noticed that three or four police officers were in the middle of subduing a man. Two of the officers had the man's arms behind his back seemingly trying to work him to the ground. Then the Caretaker heard a loud buzzing sound, immediately followed by loud painful screams from the man. The Caretaker quickly realized that while driving by in his car he saw a man get tazered by the police. It neither looked nor sounded like fun. The Caretaker then brought his attention back to driving. Going down the road, life became surreal. Stunned, he kept going straight. It never occurred to him to turn around and watch the rest of the events unfold on these mean streets of Albany.

Lunch went well. It was good to see S. and some of his friends. After lunch the Caretaker drove back to the Island. After disconnecting the battery of his car he skied back to the Island. It was nightfall by this time and the moon had risen. The Caretaker dropped off his gear in the Ghetto and headed out on to the ice with his camera and tripod. It was mostly a quiet night but the ice was a bit unsettled. There was one crack that buckled his knees. This made the Caretaker smile at his insignificance.

--The Caretaker