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,