I Relish.

Numbers may be what I do but that is not what drives me.
I'm a primal-living libertarian whose current obsession is everything food-related. Other things that I enjoy:
Ron Paul, Austrian Economics, fashion, rock music, Louis CK, and exploring the nooks and crannies of the Big Apple.

Solving the Union Square Numbers Once and For All

Taken from an NYU local article (click here to view the original article).

By Sharon Wu on April 13th, 2010

No one ever seems to know what that spinning number thing in Union Square is, so we’ll tell you the real, honest answer to settle the issue once and for all: no it’s not the national debt or countdown to 2012, it’s a clock.

The spinning numbers, titled “The Passage,” are part of a larger art installation called the “Metronome” put up in 1999, according to Gothamist. The entire piece also includes “The Vortex” (the brick wall with the ripple pattern to the right), “The Infinity” (the hole from which all the white smoke comes out of), “The Source” (the gold fragments on the ripple wall), “The Relic” (a hand that extends out of gold), and “The Matter” (the piece of rock on the ripple wall). Epic, right?

So how exactly does the clock work? “The Passage” is a 15-digit clock that counts the time from midnight. When read left to right, the seven numbers to the left count the hours and minutes that have passed since midnight. When read right to left, the seven numbers to the right counts the hours and minutes remaining until midnight. The number in the middle is a hundredth of a second and is just a blur to the naked eye.

For example, if the clock reads 070437000235616, it means that 7 hours, 4 minutes, 37 seconds, and 0 tenths of a second have passed since midnight. Therefore, it is 7:04 AM (and you’re still drunk in Union Square). There are also 16 hours, 56 minutes, 23 seconds, and 0 tenths of a second until the next midnight.

Designed by Kristen Jones and Andrew Ginzel, the Metronome is meant to be an artistic reflecting geological, historical, and astronomical time — whatever that means. Jones and Ginzel apparently wanted the public to reflect upon the different forms of time and its relationship to New York City.

Now, can anybody explain what the hell Nordstrom Rack is doing there?

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