Hello Everybody and welcome back to My Weekly Flickr.
I see the website has changed again. I like it, don't know if it's my computer but everything seems bigger and brighter.
Anyway, it was a beautiful day today, sunny, a little cool but not cold and no rain. Hope we get to enjoy some more of this before the weather turns ugly.
I went into the City this morning and had a little adventure traveling. All I wanted to do was bring my defective apple peeler back to Bed Bath and Beyond and get to The Frick for an exhibit when they opened at 10 AM. This should not have been a problem as I catch a bus at 8:30 AM which usually gets me into the Port Authority around 9 AM. Not today though, can’t say where all the traffic came from but it was a very slow trip and we didn’t arrive at the PA until 9:40 AM, an hour and ten minutes for a 30 minute ride. Still, I figured I had time. I walked down to 18th Street and Sixth Avenue in about 25 minutes and was able to get in and out of the store with a replacement in a short time. I don’t do much in the way of shopping and most of it is done online but I do enjoy shopping at Bed Bath and Beyond. They’re pleasant, helpful and truly understand the words customer service. The item was taken back with no questions asked, so unlike most of my retail transactions, this will go under the banner of successful. Now in leaving the store I had the option of walking up to 23rd St and catching the E train, then transferring at 51st St. to the Lexington Avenue line or just walking the three blocks over to Lexington and then walking up to 23rd St. I chose the latter thinking it had to be quicker than transferring. Except I got to 23rd Street and there was no entrance to the subway. I was truly nonplussed as I know it to be a stop. But what could I do, I walked up to 28th Street, the next stop, still no subway. Now I was really doubting myself. Kept going and when I got to 34th Street, a major stop on all the subway lines, and there was still no entrance, I finally stopped someone and asked where it might be. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the Lexington Avenue subway actually runs on Park Avenue below 42nd Street. Despite living here all my life it’s not a line I frequented so I had no idea about this. So I walked over and went down in to the subway and waited for the number six. I t finally arrived and I got out at 68th Street and being directionally challenged immediately walked downtown when I wanted to walk uptown. Corrected myself, walked to 70th Street, then immediately walked East instead of West before righting myself and finally getting to the Frick.
Where I saw a very nice, small exhibit of 3 oil paintings and 45 drawings by the 16th Century artist Andrea del Sarto. The three paintings were beautiful, a portrait of John the Baptist as a handsome young man. A portrait of a young man which I assumed to be a self-portrait, only to discover by reading the wall plaque that for many years that had been the thought but that it was now determined that it wasn’t and the sitter remains unknown. The last was The Medici Holy Family showing the Virgin and Child with St. Elizabeth and her son, St. John the Baptist as a child. The drawings were done in red and black chalk and ranged from studies of hands and torsos to portraits and head shots. Some were distinct and some were rapid sketches done just for placement. It was pointed out how valuable paper was as some of the drawings had images on both sides. And one had unreadable writing that had bled through the paper from the other side into the drawing. For the most part all were done as preparation for larger works in oil and frescos. Del Sarto is a great artist but he has never been in the top tier of Raphael and Michelangelo because of the way Gorgio Vasari, his pupil, depicted him in his book “Lives of the Artists.” Vasari claimed that Del Sarto’s devotion to his wife Lucrezia, kept him from opportunities that would have advanced his reputation while repeatedly putting her image into his works. He describes he and his artwork as timid. This is gone into below in the review from the Record newspaper. I found this a very enjoyable exhibit.
This is a link to the Frick description of the exhibit.
http://www.frick.org/exhibitions/del_sarto This is a link to all the objects in the exhibit. Remember to click on them to enlarge them.
http://www.frick.org/exhibitions/del_sarto/checklist This is a short video from the Frick introducing the exhibit.
http://www.frick.org/interact/andrea_del_sarto_renaissance_workshop_action And this is a link to a 55 minute video discussing the exhibit and Del Sarto.
http://www.frick.org/interact/julian_brooks_andrea_del_sarto_tailors_son_and_making_masterpieces Finally this is a link to the review of the exhibit in the Record newspaper that I discuss above.
http://www.northjersey.com/arts-and-entertainment/art/high-renaissance-artist-gets-his-due-1.1426792 I was there a little under an hour and expected an easy ride home so long as the traffic into the City wasn’t now on its way back to New Jersey. So I took the crosstown bus to the West Side and went down into the subway only to discover that there were no downtown trains, all local trains were running on the express tracks from 125th Street to 59th Street. So I had to go uptown, cross over and then go downtown. I finally got back to the Port Authority and had to run to catch my bus but I made it and was grateful to be home and drinking my coffee.
While I won’t go into great detail about it, I had my talk with my employer about my future and I was able to get him to agree to allow me to work from home three days a week starting December 15th . I knew a compromise was going to be needed and I can live with this. I told him I was considering retirement and he said he wasn’t surprised so I see this as the first step. I’ve been thinking about it for so long and going over my expected conversation with him in my head that I was really glad to finally get it over with. So I’ll work my usual schedule until the middle of December and hopefully we won’t have any bone chilling weather before then. We agreed that if the weather was unduly poor I would stay home and once we get to my 65th birthday on April 4th I will then make a decision about actual retirement. I have a feeling that this will take place towards the end of next summer as I definitely don’t want to be commuting next winter even for one day a week. I will miss my salary but I will enjoy staying home and relaxing. I’ve planned well for my retirement and if I can avoid catastrophic illness, something none of us can rely on, I should be fine.
And on that positive note let’s visit the Flickrs.
Andy G.
Tired Stocking Feet In Pumps !
https://www.flickr.com/photos/123515053%40N05/21110840736/ 20150901_230016
https://www.flickr.com/photos/126820131%40N05/21042652966/ a hint of a smile
https://www.flickr.com/photos/25488909%40N03/21199304355/ 9.5.15 Freaky Friday
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gentv2000/21209099395/ Shall we stand in the doorway all night long, or do you have some thing else in mind?
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ailananata/21148043355/ There are no favourites, you know you want us all together Xx
https://www.flickr.com/photos/128444174%40N05/20576808603/ melissa in off the shoulder teal blue dress (1)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/93148443%40N04/20463614054/ summer pink
https://www.flickr.com/photos/cheryl416/14823274916/ Sunday afternoon
https://www.flickr.com/photos/135069972%40N08/20726372820/ Femininity
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ladydonna77/20209879751/ So much more fun being a girl, I could spend all my time shopping for nice clothes. I hate it when all the make up comes off and I put on a T shirt and jeans, I was surely destined to wear heels and dresses
Betty's Pub 20.1
Topic: I’m wearing long pants again so I guess this is the Fall Flickr (Read 24329 times)
