kung food and a science lab.

so i got up this morning on a rather uncharacteristically wrong side of the bed, but that was due to finding my car in much worse condition than feared (another eastern market break-in after someone...AHEM borrowed my car...) names witheld to protect the er...welll...anyway.) bolt cutters gone also, which have sentimental value. boo hoo. anyway, over it. all part of living in detroit.

so to cheer up my less than amused brain i treated myself to a little walk/drive around downtown to photograph some blight - always a sure recipe to get the adrenaline moving and the mindweasels out. as it was pretty stormy, the light wasn't the best today, but ran into some rather excellent subject matter that more than made up for it.

first it was off to the kung food chop suey chinese restaurant on east jefferson - somewhere i always wanted to document but never got around to it.



with the rate that old buildings are being torched and scandalously razed, there is no time like the present to shoot. it looks to have been abandoned for quite a while now. note Saarinen and Eames furniture. also note aforementioned lack of bolt cutters. then note tear running down my cheek.



after lamenting over not being able to liberate said mid-century modern furniture (i mean, no...i'd never think of doing such a thing...just a dirty thought) it was off to the nastier end of the Cass Corridor to see what destruction i could capture, and it just so happens someone tore the plywood from some 1960's era science/chemistry lab, with the contents spilling right out into the street. well holy christmas in july!





knowing my near fetish for antique scientific instruments, this couldn't have been a more welcome sight. guess who has new bottles for the collection...and guess who is taking another spin down there later (this time properly dressed and with gloves.) mmmm...corrosive. ;)

generally i try to keep my distance from the local derilicts when photographing/exploring, but this sweet little four foot tall 900 year old lady struck up a conversation with me and she was a good baffle from the rest of the crackheads that seemingly were more interested in pillaging the antique bottles for use as crackpipes. (there had better be some left.) she didn't have all her oars in the water by any stretch of the imagination, but i have a great respect for the elderly so i chatted with her for a while.



she was more lucid than most but still not making much sense and going on veritable tirades regarding all the recent fires in detroit and swearing they were going to burn this building down next and how her father worked there and everyone is crazy. now this is where i wish i had an audio/video recorder with me. right next to where i was shooting, she pointed out "TAKE A PICTURE OF HIM SHITTING! TAKE A PICTURE OF HIM SHITTING!" and there was one of the choice individuals milling about with his pants around his knees...well, doing just as she described. that was the cue for my exit, but that phrase coming from this little lady's mouth was just priceless.

another fine day in detroit.