Three lamps, Ponsonby

It was 9 a.m. The temperature was about 60 degrees and the sky was blue. It was time for me to jump on a bus and go somewhere. I decided on Ponsonby. I've done other posts about this area, but I have not covered it all, by a long shot. Here is another instalment. 

The old Ponsonby Post Office stands on a historic corner. 

(This building reminds me a little of the Town Hall in Auckland, shown below, which was supposed to look like a ship)

Wow, look at how that's maintained. 

Quick facts

Hip, residential Ponsonby is known for shopping and dining, with stylish boutiques, independent bookshops and trendy cafes along Ponsonby Road. The foodie scene ranges from gourmet taco trucks and burger stands in the market-like space of Ponsonby Central to upscale gastropubs and seafood bistros. Small galleries showcase Kiwi crafts and edgy modern art, while buzzing bars specialize in craft beers and cocktails. (taken from the Google Maps page.)

This meeting of streets was/is known as "The Three Lamps."

There is today's three lamps. 

Always appreciated...The mens' public restroom. The whole thing was tiled, top to bottom, and was clean as. 

Ponsonby has plenty of historic buildings, but it has some modern as well. 

This is the Ley's Institute. Today it houses the Ponsonby Library, meeting rooms, and a gymnasium.

 Inside the library.

 I judge the worth of each new library I encounter by whether or not I find a book by P. G. Wodehouse on its shelves.  This one passed.
This particular book is an early Wodehouse, published in 1909. The story behind it is complicated. Rather than try to tell you about it, I've provided a link if you're interested. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Swoop!

 One nice thing about being old(er) is that I have acquired the nerve to act on my impulses to explore old buildings. There was no sign saying I couldn't snoop a bit so I did. 

 This is the largest meeting room up here and it was full of people taking a first-aid class. 

The view from the top of the stairs. It feels good just to look at all that symmetry and neatness. 

This is the gymnasium and it was locked up. 

This building was originally Ponsonby's Fire Hall.  Today is is a pricey steakhouse. A one pound Angus t-bone will cost you $98. This guy was setting the tables along the sidewalk. 

 A modest little house, but look how cool it is.

It's a pizza place. 

https://www.paneevino.co.nz/

I've really enjoyed walking around Ponsonby today and sharing it with you.       -djf

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And one of the nicest things about writing a blog is that one gets to put whatever one wants into it. Within reason of course.  

I have decided to exercise that ability to choose and place by providing you today with a number quotations from the writings of P. G. Wodehouse. (October 15, 1881 - February 14, 1975)  Finding the book set me off, I guess. 

Many of you already know how much I have enjoyed his work. You might not share my opinion. 

His last quotation below says it all I think. His writing has done that for me. At least momentarily. And it has reminded me to thank our Creator for putting such people on earth to help the rest of us. 

“She fitted into my biggest arm-chair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing arm-chairs tight about the hips that season”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Carry on, Jeeves

[I'm] as broke as the ten commandments.”
― P. G. Wodehouse

“Unlike the male codfish which, suddenly finding itself the parent of three million five hundred thousand little codfish, cheerfully resolves to love them all, the British aristocracy is apt to look with a somewhat jaundiced eye on its younger sons.”
― P.G.Wodehouse

“He had just about enough intelligence to open his mouth when he wanted to eat, but certainly no more.”
― P.G. Wodehouse

“At the age of eleven or thereabouts women acquire a poise and an ability to handle difficult situations which a man, if he is lucky, manages to achieve somewhere in the later seventies.”
― P.G. Wodehouse , Uneasy Money

“I could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, The Code of the Woosters

“Freddie experienced the sort of abysmal soul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's Russian peasants when, after putting in a heavy day's work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city's reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only to find the vodka bottle empty.”
― P.G. Wodehouse , The Best of Wodehouse: An Anthology

“Beginning with a critique of my own limbs, which she said, justly enough, were nothing to write home about, this girl went on to dissect my manners, morals, intellect, general physique, and method of eating asparagus with such acerbity that by the time she had finished the best you could say of Bertram was that, so far as was known, he had never actually committed murder or set fire to an orphan asylum.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves

“He groaned slightly and winced like Prometheus watching his vulture dropping in for lunch.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Big Money

“Golf, like measles, should be caught young.”
― Wodehouse

“What are the chances of a cobra biting Harold, Jeeves?"
"Slight, I should imagine, sir. And in such an event, knowing the boy as intimately as I do, my anxiety would be entirely for the snake.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, The Inimitable Jeeves

“The object of all good literature is to purge the soul of its petty troubles.― P.G. Wodehouse