Portland Skies.

Snail Candids.

Two Snails' Search Short.

... journey! ...

... looking ...

... and off ...

A Snail Narrative.

One snail peering around.

(the end)

SNAILS.

> a good day at work <

Farmer's Markets.

Although I enjoy the ride out to the Farmer's Market at Haymarket in Boston proper, it looks like there will be some markets with actual locally-grown food opening up in Cambridge soon.

Check it out at: http://www.cambridgepublichealth.org/lifestyle/cambridge-farmers-markets.php

Other non-Cambridge markets can be located at: http://www.massfarmersmarkets.org/

Looking forward to posting photos of local produce!

| J |

Morning After.

Of Two Loaves; All That Remains.

o god, crums everywhere ....

Bread.

This picture reminds me of A) a Lewitt drawing, B) American Gothic, and
C) Short Man Little Boy.

These are two wheat loaves as made from a Joy of Cooking recipe. Considering I haven't made yeast bread for two years, I am pretty jazzed at how they came out. I am also less intimidate by this whole proofing business. Can't speak highly enough for well-written instructions and simple pictures.

Aftermath.

Finally, I took a picture of the still un-fixed sign from the April 30th truck-to-bridge collision. The rumbling sound from the strike caused curious students and teachers to rush to the doors of the near-by Morse Public School. Not really knowing, or caring at first, I told an inquisitive aural spectator, "it must be thunder", only to realize minutes later that the sound was not just a truck under-calculating the school's loading bay.

How did this truck get there? Had the driver never been through Boston? Do the companies forwarn their drivers about roads they may not drive on? Is there a map out there with specific markings denoting roads that do not allow big trucks? It has to suck to drive through Boston with a big rig for the first time, although, considering the worth of the vehicle, driver, and cargo, one would hope that whoever the responsible parties are prepare adaquately for similar transits.

It could have been an honest mistake. Reading the signs, seeing a rotary up ahead, and thinking you might not make it beneath the bridge ahead while trying to figure out the next road to take is a lot to handle at one time. This occurance definitely is another good reminder to me for always checking the map.

See a brief article about the crash at www.boston.com/news

(the sign has now been fixed - they finished it sometime around the 13th or 14th ...)

Postering: Part One: The Rig.

This method of attaching the tube poster portfolio worked out alright ...

... except that the bandannas kept ripping. Also, they were time-consuming to tie & untie.

So next I went to my local Ocean State Job Lot, purchased some bungee cords at a low price, and began attaching the tube as shown below:

This method is a vast improvement by being both more chic and more efficient.

Spring!

( spring playground shadows ... sol lewitt style : )

(learning to use macro is awesome!)

More Fun with Seed Pod!

Cambridge Cleaned.

This past weekend I participated in the first annual Cambridge initiative, Clean Cambridge, to de-trash the area. Clean Cambridge provided the trash bags, recycling bags, gloves, and enabling/ commemorative t-shirt ... and us volunteers provided the scrutinizing eyes followed with collecting hands. The event lasted two days. On Saturday, I collected items along the Charles from along the park and banks nearest the Weeks Foot Bridge. On Sunday, I joined a larger team in Central to clean up one of my favorite places in Boston.

Here are a few photos of less-trashy objects I found:

(mystery seed-pod ... at first I thought it was some kind of toy weapon component

(mystery seed-pod to scale ... had a lot of trouble shooting these in-focus)

(little plastic soldier guy ... reminded me of the tin soldier story)

(pretty ... and yes, sharpened in iPhoto)

(quite a few that got away)

There was this HUGE splash at one point which nearly startles me into the river. Of course, I didn't see the fish, but I bet it was the Grandaddy of all Charles bass. Honest.

Also, along the shore, the waves rolling broken glass around on the river stones made an incredible bell-like tinkling sound. I always die a little inside when something indicative of a negative result creates an interestingly appealing result. That said, the sound was a little like fairies. Yup, I went there. Fairies. Deal.

Happy spring.

Picking up Trash

Greetings from Cambridge.

This Sunday's tale describes collecting trash along the Charles River and within Central Square.

Saturday morning I quickly donned some rugged pants and the green t-shirt provided to me the day before by a representative from the Clean Cambridge initiative. I re-packed the rubber gloves, freezer gloves, trash bags, and recycling collection bags also provided by Clean Cambridge into my own back before heading out to the Weeks Foot Bridge at 8:45. By 9:05, I was lunging left and right to gather up cigarette butts from the trails I frequently run on.

Things that caught my attention:
- the bell-like tinkling sound of broken glass rolling around in the wake of crew chase-boats tossing mini-waves onto the river banks.
- the GIGANTIC fish that startled me. Or at least I think it was huge. I, uh, didn't really see it ... but the waves were HUGE.
- the still-full can of Bud. Tempting, but not tempting enough. Gone.
- being told by a well-meaning passer-by that the city already had a clean-up crew on that area.
- cleaning an area on the waterline only to look back ten minutes later and see that a whole new raft of junk had floated in.
- all of the rowers - Go Team.
- SO MANY lolly-pop wrappers. Wtf. I didn't know the really glassy sugar pops on those long strips were that popular.

Some trash of note:
- cool fishing lure.
- most of a Boomerang (when was the last time anyone saw one of those? Or played with one?).
- little toy soldier.

Some nice interactions:
- two runners passed by and said, "thanks".
- a woman from Germany visiting with her husband on their way West stopped and chatted with me in German!
- a running friend stopped by and said, "hi".
- some adorable dogs, including a Yorkie, stopped by and also said, "hi".
- some guy with a camera told me that picking up the trash was a, "tall order". Nice phrase, guy.




is an event sponsored by Mayor Simmons and the Mayor's Volunteer Corps as a city cleaning initiative. prompted this outing. They supplied the green t-shirt and I brought given the perfect excuse to spend a few hours on Saturday and Sunday out picking up cigarette butts.

Sunday:
Cheerily chatting with my teammate about school, living in boston, running, health, our common dislike of smoking,