Tag: photos

How do you like them apples?

Third day in on my attempt to resume daily blogging, and I nearly forgot to post. This does not bode well…

In any case, I remembered. And I found a photo on my phone to share. These are some apples that the kids and I picked a couple of weekends ago on an idyllic weekend afternoon. We picked quite a few varieties of apples, and it’s interesting to see how varied they still appear, even after being peeled. (We also bought an apple-peeling gadget, that also slices the apples into spirals. It was quite fun, and made a cool tangle of peels. It was also fun to snack on the peels.)

Tonight I am grateful to have access to an abundance of healthy food for myself and my family.

a new leaf

It is November once more, and I find myself reminiscing about my daily November blogging of yore. I have much to say, but don’t know whether I will manage to find the time and motivation to say it. However, as with many things in life, if I don’t try, I know I definitely won’t succeed. So, I will start. And I’ll start with a leaf, because fall in New England brings many leaves to my path. (Also to my lawn, my driveway, and my gutters…) This particular leaf was striking in its colorfulness.

I have also been thinking about how I would like to take stock of the many things in my life for which I am thankful, and share them here. I’ll start by saying how thankful I am for the fall, and for living in a place where the fall brings dramatic and dynamic displays of color and light.

In case of fire, ignore punctuation.

I think it’s pretty clear that the sign below is not well-punctuated:

The question is, what would the better punctuation be? Would a semicolon be amiss on a sign advising emergency protocol?

upstairs, downstairs

Here is another collection of stairways, both near and far. (Most of these near, it would appear.) In most of these, I’m looking down, but the last two are looking up.


Dublin, Ireland.


Boston, MA.


Cambridge, MA


Boston, MA


Cambridge, MA


Cambridge, MA


London, England.

spiraling down (or up)

Here are several spiral staircases I’ve seen.


A double helix spiral staircase in Paris, France. 2007.


An ironwork spiral staircase inside the library at Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland. 2014.


Stairway inside a hotel in Glasgow, Scotland. 2015.

the stairs not taken

It’s good to take the stairs when you can. It’s good exercise, and all that. Of course, there are times when it’s less feasible to do so. These are the back stairs at my old house at a couple of times when taking the stairs was a less-than-inviting option. (Of course, I had to take on those stairs. With my snow shovel. Which I guess is also good exercise.)


February, 2013


February, 2015.

Happily, this year was a very moderate winter for snow. On the other hand, we have snow on the forecast for tomorrow. Which is technically not part of this winter.

another ball dropped


A festive holiday ball that someone dropped in an icy parking lot a couple of years ago. (I’m happy to say that this year, we haven’t yet had more than a few stray flakes of snow. I know it’s coming, but I’m not ready for it yet. I’m still recovering from last winter.)

So much for trying to blog daily for the month of November like I’d done the past 7 years. Not only did I drop the ball early in the month, but I dropped it again at the end. I got caught up with a deadline, and totally forgot to post one day. And then once I’d broken the pattern again, I didn’t find it in me to rush back. (Or, if you will, I couldn’t be bothered to pick up he ball again. I figured that the ball had rolled off somewhere, maybe into the bushes, or under the couch, and I didn’t want to have to hunt for it.) I did, happily, meet the deadline, and submitted a paper to a conference. In all, 25 posts does not make a bad tally for the month, especially after 5 solid months without a single post.

However, it’s starting to feel like roughly 60% of the content of this blog is about how I’m not blogging as much as I’d like. Another 30% seems to be about balls. Nah, that can’t be right. I also had the significant and weighty topics of: leaves, poultry, potatoes, pants. In any case, I am more-or-less back to blogging. And I plan to continue to blog more-or-less regularly.