September 08

This isn't sunset proper, but it is an interesting view of the sun silhouetting the dome of The Church of Christ, Scientist, in Back Bay this evening.

This church is the Mother Church for the Church of Christ, Scientist -- the first and foremost church of the denomination -- and is part of a large complex. A plaza with reflecting pool and various church buildings are a popular place to gather in the summer, with children playing in a fountain on the property. It's an ornate building, with the large dome and the smaller spire from the original structure, and it has one of the largest pipe organs in Boston.

Whatever your thoughts on the tenets of the Christian Scientists, the complex is impressive and beautiful from many angles, and certainly photogenic enough from almost any angle.

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August 28

I thought I should call this one "Urban Escher."

I got this shot while it was still a little sunny out, before the clouds came in and it began to drizzle. I park near this building two or three times a week, but had never noticed this courtyard with its maze of fire escapes before. Shows what happens when I actually bother to look around.

Unfortunately this framing doesn't show the maze of stairs to best effect. The trees block a lot of the view; the fire escapes ride for four or five stories on either side. It's almost too urban a scene to fit in Boston's chi-chi Back Bay.

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August 21

This honeysuckle is the largest that I've ever seen. It's as big as my hand.

I kind of half pay attention to plantings as I walk around. This spring I was big on flowers because I'd had a really, truly, dismally-crappy winter, but overall, flowers don't catch my attention that readily.

As I went to my car today, though, the smell of honeysuckle wafted by as I turned the corner onto St. Botolph St. It's not an "urban" smell, so it merited notice. I actually looked past these flowers three or four times looking for the honeysuckle before realizing that this was honeysuckle -- just on a Brobdingnagian scale.

It's certainly not the kind of thing you expect to find in New England. It was quite a delightful surprise.

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August 12

Part of me finds it obnoxious that the driver of this stretch limousine parked at not one, but two, parking meters this afternoon. The other part of me marvels at the good parallel parking job he did. His most remarkable feat, however, was in finding two adjacent parking places to claim.

I had to make a few circuits of the block to find my own parking space, which is about a block further down the street from where I work. So naturally, I felt a brief surge of annoyance when I saw it. In fairness, as I walked by, I checked, and the driver had put money in both meters, so at least he wasn't being a complete jackass about it.

I suppose that stretch limo drivers don't have many options for where to park the 20-foot-long monsters in Boston. And whatever else I feel about it, I still admire his skill at parallel parking.

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August 09

Having spent a week in 90-degree weather, with lots of bright Florida sunshine keeping things hot, coming back to 70-degree weather with overcast skies was a nice change.

I had a busy week on vacation, and ended up spending most of today sitting in my pajamas doing nothing. I'm feeling a little tired, and think I've got a little bit of a sore throat from going from air conditioning to the humid outdoors to air conditioning over and over. Floridians are absolutely in love with their air conditioning.

I did finally drag myself out of the house to catch a movie with Boyfriend. Go see Julie and Julia if you get the chance; it's very worth it.

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July 18

I thought I was being clever and sneaky in getting this amusing photo of somebody standing on the grass next to the "keep off the grass" sign. If I'd been really clever, I'd have noticed the bag she carried is from Agent Provocateur, a high-end seller of women's knickers and things.

Brandon and I went on a photo walk in Back Bay today, starting off in Copley Square and quickly seeking shelter in the shady areas of the Public Garden and Boston Common. We had no real plan for this photo walk, other than possibly meeting up with Tom and Steph somewhere along the route. Eventually we ended up at Government Center before reversing course and heading back.

I ate the entire way, it seemed. A hot dog on the way to the Commuter Rail, another one on Boston Common, a fried dough with cherry pie filling near Park Street Station, and a cherry slush on the way back.

All in all, it's been an excellent way to spend an afternoon.

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July 14

It was a beautiful, partly-cloudy day in Boston today. High temperature of 80, light breezes, and just really delightful.

It's a pity I had to work.

I took my camera with me both times I had to go do the meter dance (moving my car space to space), and caught the clouds reflecting on the mirrored glass facade of 111 Huntington Avenue. I originally planned to zoom way in and get the faceted effect up close, but I only had a mid-range zoom. Cropping was a possibility, but after polling friends online, I decided I liked this composition well enough to go with it as-is.

Many city dwellers -- unlike tourists -- go about their lives in cities with their heads down, charging through the crowds to get where they need to be. It's really a shame, because you can see beautiful things if you just look up occasionally.

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July 11

Periodically in Boston -- every ten years or so -- we're visited by a flotilla of tall ships.

Being a Sailor, I'm always drawn to these events. Many people assume that any sailing ship is a tall ship, so all the sailing ships in the harbor generate quite a bit of buzz. To be considered a true tall ship, the vessel has to have traditional rigging, usually has square sails, and is a fairly large ship. In this case, there were several tall ships among the myriad smaller sailboats.

The ship in the foreground is the Portuguese sailing ship Sagres. Their ship was definitely the best lit tonight. I may try to make it back tomorrow for a tour, but if I don't, I'll feel better knowing I got to see them.

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June 12

There was a rainbow over Boston today, and one of my residents called me so I could snap a photo of it. Rainbows, being ephemeral things, often don't last long, and this one faded before I could get a good picture of it.

Since I was 19 floors over Boston, though, I took advantage of the opportunity to get a panoramic shot of the South End. After the clouds parted, it was a lovely day -- perfect for outdoor photography.

They say life is what you make of it, and I'm beginning to see their point. You can't ignore beauty while chasing rainbows.

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June 11

Having gone into the subjects of curious juxtapositions in Boston yesterday, it figures that the perfect illustration would present itself today. Oy ...

I have my doubts about whether the smart car is as intelligent a choice as it's being made out to be. I just think it might be more hype than substance. My friend Sean says that all early adopters are showy, but he's willing to believe the car may have something going for it other than its novelty.

It was amusing, though, to see this über-modern little car -- one of the visual punchlines to the new Pink Panther movie -- parking in the Back Bay, among the ever-present Saabs and Volvos.

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I'm experimenting with a new "frame" for my Photos of the Day. Opinions on it are welcomed.

June 10

I was walking back to work after parking my car when I happened to look up and catch sight of these two very traditional-looking pipes sticking out of a very postmodern wall of the very postmodern building where I work.

As I'm mechanically disinclined, I have no idea what these pipes do. It did make me think, though, about how Boston manages to meld old architecture and new architecture into a seamless whole. When the Apple Store opened on Boylston Street, the minimalist glass cube set among a row of traditional storefronts should have looked ludicrously out of place. Yet in Boston, it works -- and it won a design award to boot.

If that can work, and win awards, I guess it's not surprising to find two "vintage" pipes in a postmodern ediface. Truth be told, it's nice to live in a place where the two extremes, and everything in-between, can coexist.

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May 27

You have to admire the lawless insouciance that inspires a driver who's earned a parking ticket to casually crumple it up and toss it in the gutter with his other litter.

Having earned many parking tickets in my life -- and suffered the consequences of untimely payment of same -- Careless Charlie's casual tossing aside of the ticket suggests to me that he's not from Boston. Back Bay does get a few tourists now and again, so it's quite easy for them to run afoul of the labyrinth of parking regulations and overlapping jurisdictions that hold sway over Boston's precious few on-street parking spaces.

As for the littering ... well, that's just inexcusable.

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May 23

The City of Boston is holding a small Memorial Day observance tomorrow at the Mount Hope Cemetery in Mattapan. Boston purchased this cemetery 140 years ago, and offers veterans and dependents free plots here. It is also the site of a memorial dedicated to all veterans.

I drove by this afternoon and was struck at the sight of all the freshly-planted flags. Each flag marks the gravesite of a veteran. It is a moving sight.

Getting this photo of the day was very difficult. I couldn't -- and wouldn't -- cheapen such a moving sight by merely viewing at it as camera fodder. I tried many angles, including close-ups of individual stones and shooting the memorial without the gravesites, before deciding on this shot of some of the graves, with the memorial standing guard in the back.

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May 19

Vacation is over. It's time to get back to the routine, which includes walking the dog and going to work. Good thing the building where I work is photogenic.

After having what was one of the busiest, workingist vacations I've taken in a while, I'm back to the usual routine at home. Realistically, this means getting up late, having a very unhealthy breakfast before nearly being late to work, then bickering almost good-naturedly with my doorman, Ennio, before settling in and doing my job, which is best described as keeping a building full of wealthy people happy.

Oh yes, it's good to be back.

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April 22

It's street cleaning day on Castleton Street in Jamaica Plain, and the meter maids were out in force today. There were seven cars on one side of the street, which runs about the length of a football field, and six of them had parking tickets. Thus is the joy of on-street parking in Boston.

These cars are lucky. In heavily-populated areas like Boston's Back Bay and South End, the cars wouldn't have just been ticketed, but towed. Those poor car owners get to pay for the ticket, plus the cost of towing and impound, before they can get their car back.

Fortunately, I live on a street without any posted street-cleaning days, so I don't have to do the on-street parking shuffle, because it can be a giant pain in the butt.

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March 16

There are a couple of things wrong with this sign.

Massachusetts law states that pedestrians have the right-of-way in an uncontrolled crosswalk. Still, they put up signs to remind drivers of this -- which is fine with me, by the way. While I drive to and from work, I do walk around in the city from time to time and appreciate everything that can be done to keep me from being run down in my perambulations. That having been said, somebody needs to proofread their signs before letting workers put them up.

Note that nowhere on this sign does it say what you're supposed to do when encountering somebody in the crosswalk. Common sense -- and looking around at signs that were done correctly -- tells you that you're supposed to stop, but common sense, as the old adage goes, is an uncommon thing.

Also, just what is a "pedestrain?" (That's a rhetorical question.)

Driving in Boston can be an adventure, as I commented here and here. An overtaxed road system is to blame for many mishaps, but having better signage around the city would make things a little easier.

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February 03

"Nuisance snow." It's the only phrase to describe what Boston is getting today. The snow is wet and sticky, clings to everything, and is treacherously slippery on roads and underfoot, which means it requires action to clear it and keep it roads and sidewalks passable. However, it's not accumulating enough to shovel or use a snowblower on, but it's too sticky for a broom to move effectively. You can lay down salt and sand, but the falling snow covers it without it doing much good. Clearing the snow involves a lot of pushing and shoving for not too great an apparent return. It's a real inconvenience.

No, scratch that. It's not an inconvenience, it's just a pain in the ass.

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February 01

Here I am, surrounded by beauty and brains. Belynda is in purple, Anna in orange, Marion in blue and me in front. Belynda and Marion are taking over the municipal liaison duties for Script Frenzy (SF) in the Boston region. Neither Anna nor I have done well with SF, and while I actually enjoy setting up events for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), the scriptwriting competition just wasn't as interesting for me.

We all met to chat and catch up, since Belynda and Marion are NaNoWriMo alumni and both a lot of fun to hang out with. Of course, Anna and I were also there to offer advice and support for our replacements, and also to coordinate sharing of certain materials useful to both NaNoWriMo and SF (since duplicating our purchases would be wasteful).

The photo itself isn't really POTD material. It was taken without tripod by crowding around a table and setting the camera right on the Cold Stone Creamery countertop. It does capture some of the fun of the afternoon, and that's the important thing, isn't it?

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January 09

Strangers to Boston, and occasionally, Bostonians themselves, are confused, bewildered, and even baffled when trying to drive here. This photograph is a prime example of what's so confusing. The photo is taken at the corner of Ipswitch St. and Boylston St. Well, one of the corners (there are two) -- it's the corner nearer the 1200 block of Boylston. Last Sunday, this is what the sign looked like.

I probably drive by this sign once or twice a week, depending on the route I drive to work, and I'll continue to monitor its inexorable surrender to gravity -- especially since I can take this photo from the driver's seat without having to worry about walking.

(Image manipulated to desaturate background, punch up sign color.)

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