A Dark Night Out on the Solstice

Roar! Monday night was the eve of the winter solstice and also a night of a full lunar eclipse! It was a rare occurrence where the longest night of the year was also the darkest night! On a night like this I decided to revive the long forgotten role of lamplighter and help bring light to the darkness here in Brooklyn! Last year I celebrated Prometheus this year I was going to be him! It was going to be quite the challenge, so first I decided to head over to a couple of local eateries and fuel up for the night ahead of me!

Here I am in front of Chimi Mundo on Myrtle Ave by the corner of Wcykoff. Chimi Mundo is a Dominican hamburger joint that serves some really delicious burgers! I got a regular beef chimi  and it was absolutely delicious! The burger was ultra thin and had this amazing vinegar coleslaw on it. With food like this it's sure going to be easy to fight the cold!

Next, I headed over to Chimi Loco which is on Wyckoff Ave right by the corner of Myrtle. It sure is bright at this place! I guess they won't be needing my help around here! Their chimi was also awesome! Their bread is amazing and is definitely one of the things that makes a chimi a chimi!

After all that delicious food I got suited up in my lamplighter uniform and prepared to head out to bring light to NYC! Roar!

Here is my lamplighter torch! It's a pretty neat tool and is just like the ones the 19th century lamplighters used to light gas street lamps all over the city!

My first stop during my role as lamplighter was over in the neighborhood of Park Slope. A good number of people there have restored their old brownstones to the point where they have gas lamps out front again! They're definitely going to need my help tonight!

Oh no! It looks like this lamp is out! This is a job for... Lamplighter-Rex! Roar!

My torch seems to be doing the trick! Burn, baby, burn! Roar!

Now that's more like it! Looks like my work here in Park Slope is done! All the beautiful old gas lights are flickering away, adding to the curb appeal of the neighborhood, and spreading their warmth near and thin! From Park Slope I decided to head south through Brooklyn and help spread light throughout the rest of the borough. But it turns out some neighborhoods weren't going to need my help at all!

Here I am down at "Dyker Lights!" Every December all the houses in the neighborhood of Dyker Heights put on a series of elaborate Christmas light displays. There were so many lights I don't think anyone around here will be having trouble on the darkest night of the year!

The houses down at "Dyker Lights" were so crazy! There were all sorts of wacky animatronic displays! It was just like being on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan! Roar!

The homes down in Dyker Heights were also pretty crazy all by themselves! This one had a fancy fountain that was still running despite how cold the weather was! It had even completely frozen over! Maybe I can go ice skating with my claws! Roar!


There were so many neat things to see in "Dyker Lights" that I ended up taking a ton of photos! Here is a slide show of all of them!

A lot of the houses also had nativity scenes set up in their yards. In all the nativity scenes people were really strict about keeping baby Jesus out of the manger until the 25th of December. Yet in most of them the three wise men were set up and they didn't get there until January 6th! Roar!

Despite how serious people in Dyker Heights were about keeping baby Jesus out of the manger before Christmas, the St. Francis Cabrini Catholic Church doesn't seem to have a problem with it! Roar!

A bunch of the shops in Dyker Heights were even getting in on the Christmas displays! Just get a look at the windows of Samurai Sushi! Talk about festive! Roar!


I had a lot of fun down in "Dyker Lights" and for a moment I even forgot about my job for the evening. But then around 2:30 the eclipse happened and I was abruptly reminded of the task before me! I decided to head down to the darkest place in the city and bring light to the darkness there!

Here I am at Floyd Bennett Field, the darkest place in the city. I'd been here once before on my one year anniversary. That was during the day, now I can barely see my claws in front of my face! I hope there isn't anything spooky around here!

Roar! What was that?!

I aint afraid of no ghosts! Roar!

Things got a little dodgy there towards the end of the night while I was at Floyd Bennett Field, but I was able to successfully vanquish the darkness! The moon came back out and before long the sun was rising over the field. It sure was a beautiful sight! There was a moment there when I was afraid I might never see it again! Roar!