As Summer Sun Melts…

Today is a day that I’m glad I don’t still work in an animal emergency room. Heat stroke abounds and it’s always a brutal, ugly thing. If you, or your dog’s body temperature goes over 107, your internal organs begin to melt.

On that cheery note and because I have nothing else to write about this horribly oppressive Wednesday afternoon, here’s an update on the Toynbee tiles.

The new tiles that I reported a few weeks back are still covered. Whatever lies beneath the tar paper and wood glue has yet to be revealed. The first post about these new, large tiles included sightings at 15th and 16th at Chestnut. Since then, new large tiles from the same run have been spotted at 15th and Arch, 13th and Filbert, 12th and Filbert, 13th and Market and 12th and Market. In case you’re mentally retarded and can’t count, that’s a total of 7 new, large tiles in center city Philadelphia.

To paraphrase a long-gone Pittsburgh tile, as heat of summer sun melts tar paper, the new tile will be revealed. Hopefully several layers of tar paper will keep car wheels from messing them up.

In other news, the robot men that you’ve probably been seeing all over the fucking place are the work of a street artist named stickman. Head over to 12th and Filbert to see a new large tile, an old, small tile and a robot man all at the same intersection. As the medium takes hold, I hope to see more styles and varieties of asphalt mosaics.

Along with Reading Terminal and Chinatown, robot men run a stretch of the Parkway from 17th to the art museum, all over Penn Campus and eastern West Philly, 2nd street in Northern Liberties and even on Delaware Ave. Good work stickman!

5 Comments on “As Summer Sun Melts…

  1. I was just about to email you about those little robot guys. See them everyday on my way to work. Crazy!

  2. “Today is a day that I’m glad I don’t still work in an animal emergency room….”

    Damn you! Damn you straight to hell!

  3. I bought my copy of recipies for disaster by crimethinc at the wooden shoe. it details how to make and place toynbee tiles quite well (however they use only one layer of tarpaper unlike the tiler) I wonder if stickman bought this book at the same place as I

  4. The Clog did a post (as well as several archived) about the Stickman (aka Reflectorman) sightings and since I’ve started using my camera, I’ve been taking shots of them. Interesting little things that fascinate me probably in the same way the Toynbee tiles fascinate you.

    So I decided to try to start logging all the Stickman sightings. Have you got any photos on here that you’ve taken of them?

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