Wikipedia City?

How much do you know about this building and the statue in front of it? There is scant information in plaques on-site.

Joe from Belleville found a very interesting story at the NY Daily News online about a small town in Wales that has made itself the first "Wikipedia town". Joe thinks we should follow that example and make Newark the first major Wikipedia city. I agree.

A small Welsh town where English King Henry V was born [has become] the world's first "Wikipedia town."

Visitors [can] use smartphones to scan barcodes at points of interest in Monmouth in Wales' southeast, instantly bringing up a Wikipedia page about the landmark on their phones, in whatever language they are set to.

Wikimedia UK ... says hundreds of articles about the life and history of the town will be available online in more than 26 languages, from Hindi to Hungarian.

Around 1,000 different bar codes plaques and stickers now decorate its schools, museums, historical sites and even pubs.

The project — dubbed "Monmouthpedia" — has been in the works for six months, helped along by the local council's installation of town-wide free Wi-Fi.

Local residents and businesses have created and edited articles about Monmouth that are linked to the barcodes, while other volunteers have been translating them. * * *

While the project is geared at capturing "every notable place, person, artifact, flora and fauna" in the town, some less-historically notable — but equally welcome — articles have been added.... local businesses such as bakeries have also got involved, placing bar codes in their windows linked to articles about the history of baking, and local pubs have also signed up, highlighting the history of their establishments.

We could do this. It would surely boost Newark tourism, which is "free money" to be made from things that are already here, and, in some cases, have been here for hundreds of years. For instance, there already is a Wikipedia article about Military Park, but tourists passing by wouldn't know that, so wouldn't know how old it is (from 1667) if they didn't think, on their own, to do a Wiki search. Nor might they even know what that park is called unless they came upon it at its southern point, where its name is written out in the pavement. But with a barcode displayed in a prominent sign of standardized appearance (size, color of the border around the barcode, height from the pavement), tourists, students, and even people who live or work in Newark would have instant access to the wealth of information already available about this wonderful city, including the overview available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newark,_New_Jersey.

You want to know how old and how tall 744 Broad Street is, and how it compares to 1180 Raymond Boulevard nearby? At present, in order to look these things up, you have to know that 744 is called the "National Newark Building" and 1180 is called "Eleven80". But if there were barcode signs outside these landmark buildings, you could get to the Wikipedia article without knowing that, and discover that 744's ornate top is modeled on the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

You see the statue of Seth Boyden in Washington Park and want more info than appears on the pedestal? Scan the barcode and you'll be taken to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seth_Boyden. How many figures are in Gutzon Borglum's statue "Wars of America" in Military Park? A Wikipedia article says 42 people and two horses, and says as well that the granite base came from Stone Mountain, Georgia, site of a Confederate monument (which I sure didn't know). There's a lot more to be said about "Wars of America", tho, than the Wiki "stub" provides (such as that it is the largest bronze statue Borglum ever created, and is one of three surviving Borglum works in Newark; how long and high it is; where it was forged, in how many pieces; how it was moved to the site; etc.). Similarly, the articles about the Essex County Courthouse and "Seated Lincoln" statue shown atop this post are stubs that offer very little information. If you try to find out about Abraham Coles, of whom there is also a statue in Washington Park, you're out of luck, because there is no article in Wikipedia about him. So there are lots and lots of articles that need to be generated or improved (and translated).

Free wifi at least Downtown and in other actual or potential touristic areas (the vicinity of the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart and lions on the lake in Branch Brook Park; Schools Stadium; Weequahic Park and High School; the Ironbound; University Heights; etc.) would make such a network of barcodes maximally useful, and make Newark a much more appealing location for young people who are trying to decide where to go to college, and for businesses trying to decide whether to locate in Newark or a suburb.

Newark's over 40,000 college students and thousands of high-school students might be enlisted in a Wiki-City project, and some departments could even give course credit, or extra credit in the high schools, for student contributions.

NJIT Campus Center, late afternoon.

In case you wondered, Monmouth, Wales and the county around it (Monmouthshire) are what Monmouth County, NJ, is named for. For a very long time, until 1972, it was unclear whether that county was part of Wales or of England. In any case, there is already one connection between Monmouth, Wales, and our area. Let's create another, Wiki-City Newark.

Solo(s) Opening Art Reception Tonite; Short Blackout in Vailsburg

I meant to get this online earlier, but first got caut up in other things, then was foiled by a brief power outage in my neighborhood.

Petting zoo/art show at Solo(s) in March.

Solo(s) Project House has an art-show opening this evening from 7-11pm.

DER FEHLER: YOU WRITE IT IN YOUR HANDS May 25, 2012 - July 1, 2012

Opening Reception: THIS FRIDAY, May 25, 2012 7 - 11pm

Music provided by DJ RUIN Refreshments + After Party provided by Hell's Kitchen Lounge (www.hellskitchenlounge.com)

Also: View NEW Lobby Installation by David D. Oquendo: DECIDE WHAT TO BE & GO BE IT

Ashli Sisk's painting of an extinct giant Irish elk at the last Solo(s) opening reception I attended, in March.

About DER FEHLER: YOU WRITE IT IN YOUR HANDS

Der Fehler (The Mistake) is a pseudonym[ ] created in 2001 by a collective, a German duo graduated from Kunstakademie [Art Academy] Düsseldorf. This entity was publicly assumed in 2005. Over time it evolved into an ongoing project that maintained continuity of the artistic identity, consistent with the original concept, despite occasional changes in team membership.

The collective sees Der Fehler as a "shrewd, a rebellious, amusing and ageless character", focusing on political and social questions, with a critical and ironical approach.

Der Fehler's work is known by its large-scale canvas prints and installations - often of a pamphleteer nature - exploring political iconography, producing illustration and graphic imagery. Most of his work is created and produced, exclusively, through the use of digital processes.

About DAVID D. OQUENDO: DECIDE WHAT TO BE & GO BE IT The lobby installation will live from May 25, 2012 - November 25, 2012 and opens with a reception May 25th from 7 -11pm.

David D. Oquendo is a painter influenced by holy iconography and pop culture imagery. Using such, he creates a quasi-spiritual universe and attempts to confront human enchantment and doubt of perfection with the transcendence of communicating with a "higher power".

Oquendo admits awareness of the human allure of finding self-improvement and reaching an overall higher plane. The notions of becoming your superior self, often imposed by non-secular groups, fascinate him, but also render him skeptical. Through collecting and reconstructing online images such as Cross Monkey, Mushroom, and Monk Puppy, he depicts human and nonhuman characters both meant to be part of the mythological and spiritual concepts of an imaginary world.

Driven by the vehicle of his symbolic language which he dubs the "Trickster", Oquendo's art possesses a type of deity that undermines grand institutional schemes that claim to have the answers to all moral and spiritual questions. Large in scale paintings of anthropomorphic figures on interior and exterior walls aim to create comprehensible compositions which challenge these popular notions of self-idealism. Essentially, at the core of his art practice, Oquendo's symbolic language allows him to express his conflicted feelings toward the notions of transforming to an overall better human being without "drinking the kool-aid".

Oquendo hails from New Jersey and is currently a graduate student at Montclair [State] University where he is acquiring his MFA in painting. Oquendo completed his undergrad at Rutgers [ ] University [at Newark] with a BFA in painting. Since 2007 his work has been exhibited in the tri-state area and London. Oquendo is the recipient of the 2009 Rutgers State University Creative Achievement in Art award.

Solo(s) Project House is at 972 Broad Street (next to the Rodino Federal Office Building, at Court Street), Newark, NJ 07102. Fone: (551) 580-3450; URL: www.solosprojecthouse.com; email: info@solosprojecthouse.com; Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/SOLOs-PROJECT-HOUSE/306936386693; Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/solosprojects.

One-Hour Blackout on Smith Street. I was working on my computer today, starting this post very late (it should have gone online last nite), when my electricity went out abruptly at 4:55pm! My computer stayed on, because it's a laptop and the battery took over. But the cable modem went out, so I could not upload this, even if I were able to finish it.
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Somehow I knew that it was a blackout, not a flipped circuit breaker on the one circuit my home office is on, nor a billing problem affecting only my house. But I went downstairs to check a different circuit. No power.
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I didn't know if Solo(s) was affected by the blackout, since I couldn't check their website and didn't have a fone number. I called Gaetano, in the Ironbound, to get a sense of how widespread the power outage was, and his power was fine. He looked up the fone number for Solo(s) for me, and I asked if he'd like to join me (and my friend Jerry) for the opening reception, but he had plans. I called Solo(s) and, after leaving voicemail and getting a callback, established that everything was a go for the reception.
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For my part, there was nothing to do but take my shower in preparation for the reception before daylite failed. So I finished a couple of computer matters I could tend to without being connected to the Internet, then headed downstairs. I flipped on the lite in the bathroom, and nothing happened. But I wanted a way to know if the power came back on and, lo and behold, at 4:53, two minutes short of an hour, the lite came on. I'd rather we not have blackouts, but PSE&G tends to them expeditiously.

Change of Pace

I haven't updated this blog in over a week because other demands required my time and attention. For one thing, a friend of long standing is getting ready to move from the Tristate Metropolitan Area to some part of rural Pennsylvania, and needed a place to stay for a month, or at most two months, during which he would be happy to contribute to household expenses if I let him stay with me. So I said sure, come on over. Having seen situations like this go sour on small-claims-court shows, I made sure to memorialize our understanding in writing, and to give him a written receipt for the money he gave me. That was not a problem.
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What did prove a problem was making the house fit for someone else to stay in. Given that I ordinarily work long hours on the computer for my various projects, I have neglected housework. And as a single person, I have organized my household in ways that someone else might not find congenial or easy to work within. So I had to do some reorganizing and housework. I'll be better off after Jerry departs for Pennsylvania, for having tended to these things, but they have reduced the time and energy I can direct to my customary activities.

My fotos inside Prudential Center are from a Devils-Sabres game that Gaetano treated me to in April 2010.

Let me, for now, merely refer to a few Newark-related items. First, the Devils are holding their own in the NHL Eastern Conference playoffs against the Rangers. Let's hope they make the finals. Joe from Belleville said that one of the commentators on last Saturday's NBC coverage showed views of Downtown sights that looked good onscreen. Joe thought they might leave a good impression on the national TV audience.

Second, Mayor Booker was on NBC's public-affairs television program Meet the Press  last Sunday morning, where he seemed to rise to the level of a go-to guy for national political commentary. Unfortunately, he made a stir in what many people in media perceived (or at least characterized) as a gaffe, a comment that the tone of the Presidential campaign is "nauseating". Critics landed on Booker's defending Romney's work in private equity as a betrayal of Booker's role as an "Obama surrogate", even tho Booker tried to be evenhanded by condemning Republican attempts to dredge up the dead and dopy Jeremiah Wright issue.

Perhaps Booker is just a cockeyed optimist, in thinking the Nation wants less stridency in its political campaigns. Booker is literally "cockeyed". That is, he has "strabismus", a condition in which the eyes do not point in the exact same direction. In all seriousness, his having grown up with that physical characteristic may play a role in his seeing things differently.

Booker was also shown, on Meet the Press, playing nice with Governor Christie in a New Jersey Press Club video. That video had even made its way into a major story in Britain's Daily Mail newspaper's online edition on "16 May".

The video contains a scene shot inside the rotunda of the State Capitol Building in Trenton.

Toward the end of that video, Booker is shown supposedly talking to "Governor Romney" about becoming his running mate. Booker demurs, citing various reasons, not  including that he is a Democrat. Democrats in other places have now learned what we in Newark discovered years ago: that Cory Booker is a very Republican kind of Democrat.

Later that Sunday, the Billboard Music Awards did a tribute to the late Whitney Houston, conferring upon her its Millennium Award. If you missed the broadcast, there's a video of it on YouTube.

On May 10th, Howie Mandel was on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and mentioned that the start of America's Got Talent said something like "Live, from New York, ...", and Mandel said it was actually Newark. So why on Earth would the show announce that it was coming from "New York". That's not just inaccurate. It's insulting. Leno's other guest that nite was Vinnie Guadagnino of Jersey Shore, so that was a big nite for both Newark and NJ.
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On May 19th, blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng and his family achieved freedom from Communist China in landing at Newark Airport, a one-time justification for the otherwise foolish renaming of that facility in the post-9/11 era to "Newark Liberty International Airport". Among the people there to greet Mr. Chen was NJ Congressman Christopher Smith, a Mercer County Republican. Tho Chen has taken up residence in New York City, he arrived in the U.S. at Newark.
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I shall pass over brief, non-prominent mentions that the tanning-salon nut from Nutley was arraigned in Newark.
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All in all, this has been a good couple of weeks for Newark in the eyes of the Nation — yea, even farther afield than that, as shown by the Daily Mail  item. Am I imagining it, or is Newark being mentioned in major media much more often than in the past?

SUPERweek!

Look, up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane (from Newark International Airport — I don't use the dopy "Liberty")! No, it's SUPERweek!

Newark Pulse sends out a newsletter on Tuesdays that lists Newark events thru the following Monday, and what a week this is. The season opener of the Newark Bears (our independent-league, minor-league baseball team) is on Thursday. (The New York Mets refused permission to a farm team of another Major League Baseball franchise to play in Newark this year. How contemptible, and stupid, to antagonize Newarkers, fans in the Mets' own home region, by denying this put-upon city a chance to get some MLB farm-team action, which even Trenton gets.) The fotos above and below are from last year's season opener, which Gaetano treated me to. Above, Guy ("Gaetano" is pronounced gie.tón.oe, like "Guy Tahno") takes a picture with his cellfone. This year, Gaetano forwarded an email from the Bears with this most interesting information:

specials offered for their 2012 season include[:] 1st 10 foul balls caught by fans receive a choice of a FREE hot dog, drink or Bears ticket, any college ID or Newark resident with ID will receive 2 for 1 tickets, 2 for 1 hotdogs and $1 beer for the entire season, beginning on Opening Night! Seniors, 65 years+ take advantage of the Bears Senior Discount, 2 for 1 admission. In addition, Newark Bears Kids Club members receive a mystery gift at EVERY home game when attending a game. In addition, every Sunday Kids under age 12 eat for FREE!

Field of Seams. The elegantly mown grass in Bears & Eagles Riverfront Stadium (which might also be called "Skyline Stadium") looks like a patchwork quilt in this foto.

Frank McCree has told me that the new owners of the team are trying to get a reality TV show about their lives, which would doubtless redound to Newark's benefit. Mayor Booker STUPIDLY refused a request from MTV's Jersey Shore to tape a season in Newark. What kind of IDIOT turns down that kind of publicity? Cory Booker, who turned down Jersey Shore — and how does he have any right to tell a TV show where it may and may not tape or film? — after Hoboken's Mayor Zimmerman did the same, that's what kind of idiot. By contrast, Frank tells me, Jerramiah Healy, mayor of Jersey City, permitted Snooki's show to operate in J.C., "and stated it helped the economy, especially local eating and drinking establishments". Maybe there's something in the water or air from NJ's many Superfund pollution sites that promotes mental retardation among some NJ mayors, tho, curiously, not all. I guess they never heard the maxim that there is no such thing as bad publicity. The gay Britwit, Oscar Wilde, put it a little differently: "The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about." Alas, Newark is talked about plenty, in national media, but rarely in glowing terms. Mae West is usually (if implausibly?) credited with another verson of that maxim, "I don't care what the newspapers say about me as long as they spell my name right." But Cory Booker is more protective of Newark's rep than that, and than he should be. He was perfectly happy to be featured on Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s PBS series, Finding Your Roots, but apparently doesn't want to get people talking about Newark except in some prewashed, approved way.

On Friday and Saturday there are art-show opening receptions at Solo(s) Project House and Index Art Center, respectively. The Solo(s) reception is for the screening of a documentary about Newark artist Jerry Gant. I don't know if there will be artworks by Gant on display as well.

Here, Ashli Sisk is seen within her wonderful Solo(s) show,"Big Game", which closes Thursday. I'm very glad I got there on time. You still have time to see it before it vanishes into history, save for the pictures on this blog and not many other places.

On Sunday, Bill Maher, who was raised in Bergen County, plays NJPAC. On his HBO television show, Maher recently expressed his unhappiness when someone like Christie does something that calls down shame or mockery upon NJ, "my home state", in the "Overtime" podcast #238 of Real Time with Bill Maher. I subscribe to his free podcasts. This one was added to iTunes' offerings on 2/22/2012, but I don't know if it is still available thru the iTunes store. It was, in any case, good to hear. Maher said that NJ is the state that is most mocked, but that he is usually glad he can feel that at least it is a sophisticated, educated state, not like Alabama. So when somebody like Christie acts like a Rightwing fool, Maher takes it personally, because it gives some justification to the mockers, and, in that he identifies with NJ, that annoys him. Me too. And you?

NJPAC, seen from the Center Street side.

On Saturday afternoon and Monday evening, the NJ Devils and NY Rangers play the only two Newark games in the playoff "PATH Series", the hockey equivalent of a Yankees-Mets "Subway Series". Gaetano thinks he heard Mayor Booker call it that, tho it is presently called the "Hudson River Rivalry" at the Prudential Center website. One Sports Illustrated commentator anticipated a big Devils win for the series overall. Let's hope so. (By the way, in case you don't understand the choice of the name "Devils", it is a reference to the "Jersey Devil" of the Pine Barrens of South Jersey, and thus an attempt to draw South Jersey fans to a North Jersey team.) Recent playoff activity has entailed a lot of conflicting loyalties, inasmuch as the Devils played the Philadelphia Flyers (first choice of a lot of South Jersey hockey fans) in the last round and are playing the New York Rangers in this round. Governor Christie, a long-time Rangers fan, predating the establishment of the Devils, is among the people suffering tugs of loyalty in the current series. I have no such problem. Nor does Gaetano nor Joe from Belleville. In a contest between any NJ team and any NYC team, we have no difficulty in siding with NJ.

And on four different evenings this week, starting at 6pm, there will be community meetings to show how the people responsible for drawing up a new Master Plan for Newark have responded to the feedback they got in community meetings last December.

This and the next foto show that even Downtown Newark still has some open areas that need to be planned for. The area here is the slope to the Passaic riverbank. This first foto shows the kind of mixed use that makes Newark both vital and hard to characterize, because you can have very different types of land use very close to each other. Here, the large complex on the left is the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, two theaters or auditoriums under one roof. To the right are various office buildings, from different periods of 20th Century architecture, and a tower of the Peddie Memorial Baptist Church slitely right of center.

Brian Williams on Letterman Tuesday Nite. The anchor of the NBC Nitely News was David Letterman's first guest tonite, and twice proudly mentioned being a New Jerseyan. I forget the first reference, but in the second, he contrasted himself to Scott Pelley, anchor of Dave's own network's evening news show, by saying that Pelley is every inch a Texan, as he (Williams) is every inch a New Jerseyan. Good boy. He was raised in Middletown Township (Monmouth County), where I lived from 1954 to 1965. Wikipedia says that before he transferred to two Washington, DC colleges, he attended Brookdale Community College, in the Lincroft area of Middletown. My late mother took some classes there in her old age. I don't know if she got credit or only audited classes and participated in social events and bus trips organized by the college. I've thought to take or audit some courses at Newark's community college, ECC (where the CC stands not for "community college" but "County College". But I'm too busy at present.

In this foto, we see at far left the HQ of the Episcopal Diocese of Newark (church offices); then the mirror-walled HQ of Public Service Electric & Gas; a bit less than half of 1180 Raymond Boulevard, a former office tower converted to luxury rental apartments with many amenities available to all tenants; the too-short present HQ of Prudential Financial, which corporation wants to build a taller (hopefully MUCH taller) building Downtown, two office buildings, a hotel (the Robert Treat), and part of NJPAC. It's a jumble, to be sure, but not a dissonant mess. One thing missing from that vital mix is housing, apart from 1180. But there are two highrise luxury apartment complexes planned for the area, one sponsored by NJPAC, the other by Newark's own Shaquille O'Neal. The developers should have started work on these projects by now, using the Great Recession to lower building costs. Remember that the Empire State Building and Rockefeller Center were built during the Great Depression. Did Americans of that time have more ambition, prescience, or common sense than Americans today? Maybe so. Take that as a challenge, young people, not an insult.

Last week I attended the Newark History Society lecture at the Newark Public Library, and have a bunch of fotos and other materials still to draw together from that. So I'll put off thoughts of attending classes at ECC until I've reduced the time I spend on attending events and taking fotos for this blog.

50th-Year Reunion Plans, and Lobeless Ivy

Mid-July will see four events for members of the Class of 1962 of Middletown Township (NJ) High School. That's my graduating class. Rather than repeat things that have already been published to the Internet about these events, or soon will be, let me merely direct you to the class website (that I am building) and to the photo album appurtenant to it. The website is still under construction, and in the early stage of construction, but the foto album is in good order, tho there are as yet very few fotos in it. If you are a member of the Class of '62 and would like to offer comments, fotos, or anything else, please write to [MTHS AT gmail DOT com] (make appropriate replacements to render this character string into a working email address).

Lobeless English Ivy. Today's fotos show a wide view (above) of the English ivy on the trunk and a major side branch of one of my oak trees. The zoomed-in foto below, however, shows that altho the leaf of English ivy ordinarily has three lobes, many of the leaves in the climbing portion of the ivy mass are devoid of lobes, but are rounded, essentially lobeless.

The foto I published here on Friday shows lobed leaves even in the climbing form of English ivy, but today you can see that at least some of the uncountable leaves in the climbing form do not retain distinct lobes. I have not seen that fact acknowledged in texts online, but you can see it here in pictures. Today's fotos are of ivy climbing an oak tree; Friday's foto was of ivy climbing an adjacent spruce tree. I wouldn't think that the kind of tree/bark that English ivy climbs would make a difference, but who knows? I report. I do not draw conclusions. I'll leave that to botanists. Oh, botanists, could you please explain this?

Two-Tone Evergreens

When I was young, cars came in only one color per vehicle, and that "color" was mostly black (not technically a color, but the absence of color; as white is not technically a color but a combination of all colors — tho only pedants trouble to 'correct' people who use "color" to include both black and white). People got royally sick of black cars, so manufacturers started to offer other colors, but only one color per car. Then somebody got the incandescent idea (that litebulb over the head that we have become accustomed to seeing in cartoons; what are we to see in the future? curly CFL's? LED's?) to offer two colors on a single vehicle, usually separated by a metallic rib of chrome. These cars were called "two-tone" or, less commonly, "duotone". I suppose you can still get two-tone cars, or create a paintjob of your own to suit your taste, but two-tone cars are presently unusual. Two-tone trees and shrubs, however, are commonplace at this time of year, when dark evergreens issue lite new needles.

Above, you see new growth on my yew, a very large, widely spreading shrub in my front yard (say it with me, in a dopy imitation-Southern accent, "my yew").
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Below are two fotos of the 60- or 70-foot spruce(?) tree that starts below the main portion of my three-story house and towers over it.

This closer view shows how puffy and lite the new growth appears as contrasted with last year's needles.

New leaves on the evergreen English ivy that climbs the trunk of that tree are also lyter in color than old leaves, but the contrast may not be as striking as that between new needles and old on conifers (which I pronounce kón.i.ferz, so if people hear only the first part of the word, they will know that I'm not talking about cones as such (be it ice-cream cones, traffic cones, or tree cones), but the type of tree that bears cones; both pronunciations are correct). The new growth on conifers is always at the end of branches or twigs, but new leaves on the mass of English ivy might sprout anywhere.

Don't you just love spring? It's my second favorite season, after summer. My sister Sue Ann, who lives in Long Beach, L.A. County, California, misses distinct seasons. I can do without one of them. I'll leave it to your imagination which one I would gladly dispense with. Want a hint? Not gonna give one. Guess on your own.

My Rhododendrons; More Broadcasters

The azaleas have finished their floral display in my front and side yards, and the wisteria blossoms have all dropped and blown away. The tulips did very poorly this year. I don't know why. Maybe they profit from a cold winter. But the rhododendrons (which are related to azaleas, both being evergreen members of the heath family) have come into bloom.

The view above is of the one shrub that bloomed best, along a fence in my side yard, seen from the front portion of my side yard.
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Here it is seen head-on. It's about 5' tall.

And here's the only other rhododendron that has started to bloom. There appear to be at least clusters of leaves coming up, and maybe more flowers. Only one flower cluster, low to the ground, has popped as of yet.

I have, I think, four rhododendrons, but they are in partial shade. I thought that they would do well there, from things I had read, esp. in that they bloom early, before the oaks and other shade trees have issued all their leaves. But if I decide to move the ones that are not blooming, that should not be a great problem, in that a webpage at the American Rhododendron Society says they are easy to transplant. The blooms that do appear arise in clusters several inches across. Glorious. This is one great reason I no longer live in an apartment in Manhattan.

Update to TV Info. WPIX has, within the past couple of days, dropped its Spanish-language programming, called Estrella ("Star"), from subchannel 11-2. That subchannel initially carried the same programming as 11-4, Antenna TV, which is mostly "classic" (old) sitcoms, some in black-and-white, and B-movies. After a couple of days, tho, WPIX dropped its channel 11-4 altogether, so it now broadcasts only on 11-1, -2, and -3.
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A new channel 3-3, very weak in western Newark, has also been added to digital OTA (over-the-air) television. The call letters are CTVN, which turns out to be a religious broadcaster, Cornerstone TeleVision Network, that began operations in Pittsburgh 33 years ago. The channel 3-3 signal some people in Newark can receive is out of a repeater in Manhattan.
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I have tracked down that mysterious radio station out of Irvington on frequency 107.9. I heard an on-air promo for Friendship Radio and TV, and found a website for that entity that shows 107.9 as the frequency and streams its programming live. The bits I heard were in standard French. Are there two radio stations in French (and Krèyol?) out of Irvington?
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In any case, I now have not just France Deux to listen to while working on other things on my computer, but also TWO local Haitian-French stations. Maybe I'll surprise my Acadian "ex" (from 1966) by writing or calling him in French. When we met in Montreal for a weekend in 2009, after 43 years, we had to speak English, and he did all the talking to locals who didn't speak English.