Normally, I am not happy when a tool I own stops working. Pictured above is the cordless pruner I have used for the last week while clearing the yard of trees, saplings, and downed limbs. Our local composting facility will accept such yard waste if it is less than 4 feet long and 4 inches in diameter. A twenty-foot 4-inch diameter tree requires about 10-20 cuts with the chainsaw and several hundred with the pruners to meet the requirements. Multiply by several dozen trees and hundreds of smaller bushes. I have little doubt that I made more than 5,000 cuts with the tool in the last week alone and who knows how many during seasons past. When it stopped working yesterday, I was surprised only by how long it had held up to the relentless use.

Today, I took some time to figure out the failure mechanism and see if I could effect a repair. The brushes in the DC motor have reached the end of their service life and are not available as a replacement part. You have to replace the entire motor, which is half the cost of a new tool. Although there is still some usable brush material remaining, the angle of contact with the commutator is out of range for proper operation. Also, the pruning blades are quite well worn.

I did not hesitate to pick up a new tool (on sale, luckily) and am back in business. I hope that this tool will get a brushless DC motor upgrade in the future.

Maya will be moving to a new apartment in September. She will continue to room with her current flatmates, Fiona and Luke, and will be joined by Fiona’s boyfriend, Ben. The third floor, 4 bedroom, 2 bath apartment is located near Inman Square, a mile from her work and half that to her dance club. It has a front and back porch and a large backyard. Best of all, she will continue to live with Fiona’s sibling felines, Walden (brother, left) and Kurt (sister, right).

I was so tired after my soccer match yesterday that I took a 4-hour nap and missed the town-wide remembrance ceremony for the 3 seniors we lost last week. Today, Jeanine and I swung by the high school entrance to pay our respects.

My soccer match overlapped with this year’s Bionic 5K, but the rest of the family was fully represented. Jeanine womanned the Merch Tent. Kyle showed up with his entire running club and placed 28th overall in a field of 712 and 4th in his age group. Maya pulled in Owen, Fiona, and a few Formlings (people who work at Formlabs). Nico had a PR shaving more than 2 minutes off his best time.

My team managed a 12-0 shellacking of Medfield in our first home field match. By the end of the game, however, injuries had reduced our roster to 11, and I played far more minutes than I would have preferred.

Guess what our country stores in this facility. Read about it here.

Jeanine shared this picture of her sister celebrating her 73rd birthday. Apparently, after seventy, you get really tall candles on a very short cake.

Jeanine returns to Concord tomorrow. It remains to be seen if we will get to sample this yummy-looking cheesecake.

Yardwork remained the order of business for me today. There is a small window during spring when clean up and pruning are easiest (before trees leaf out and undergrowth pops up). Today, I focused on gathering and stacking wood and brush piles. The brush will go to the Concord compost station, and I have offered the logs to anyone in the neighborhood looking for firewood. Pictured here is but one of a dozen brush piles, and a small one at that.

Hearts are heavy in Concord as we mourn the loss of three 18-year-old seniors who died in a Florida car crash on Monday. A fourth is hospitalized in critical condition. The four were on spring break when the SUV they were driving collided with a tractor-trailer making a U-turn on the highway. Such loss is incomprehensible and a reminder to hold our loved ones close whenever we can.

Jeanine is in Burlington, VT all week to celebrate her sister Susan’s 73rd birthday (on Friday). She is pictured here sitting on the “healing rock” at The Carving Studio & Sculpture Center on the grounds of Vermont’s historic West Rutland marble quarries, source for many Washington, DC monuments.

I spent another long day taking down small trees and saplings at the front of our lot where it borders the road. I consistently underestimate the amount of work to section and clean up each tree. Thankfully, fatigue has served to moderate my enthusiasm. For the rest of the week, I will shift my attention to cleanup.

In the evening, I drove into Medford to help Kyle with a plumbing project. The toilet we installed three years ago during the renovation of his basement has started to malfunction. It is an uplift toilet designed to pump waste up to a drain pipe. It recently started to flush continuously. We isolated the problem to a solenoid valve that controls the water supply line. We observed it malfunctioning, took it apart, found it clogged with a ton of rust flakes from corroded pipes, cleaned it thoroughly, reassembled it, and tested it. We were 100% confident that we had identified the root cause of the problem. When we reassembled the toilet, an arduous and time consuming task, we found the problem had not been corrected. After much deliberation, we concluded that it made more sense to replace the entire toilet than try and order replacement parts that might of might not address the issue.

Before leaving for Vermont to visit her sister for the week, Jeanine casually asked me to clear a new section of the front yard. Six hours later, I was halfway done with the job, finished for the day, and covered in dirt. I was able to pull many of the small saplings from the ground, roots and all. Apparently, shaking the dirt from the root ball left some of it deposited on my head. I did not notice until I came in for lunch, and am now left to wonder what the neighbors I spoke with as they passed by the house must have thought about my appearance.

Left to my own means for preparing dinner, I opted for a healthy salad that I purchased in kit form. The meal was not really photo-worthy, but I thought Jeanine would be impressed that I was not eating junk food.

In the 22 years we have lived in Massachusetts, Jeanine has never watched the Boston Marathon in person. Today, we rectified that situation. I took her to Wellesley, arguably my favorite spot to watch the race. It is just shy of the midpoint, and the eventual winners are generally among the lead pack. Once again, I managed to photograph the men and women winners of the elite and wheelchair divisions.

Pictured above on the right in the light blue shorts is John Korir of Kenya, who won his first Boston Marathon in the professional men’s division, joining his brother, Wesley, who won it in 2012 (the first siblings to ever win).

Below on the far left is Sharon Lokedi, also of Kenya, who won the professional women’s division in a course record time, defeating defending champ Hellen Obiri, who finished second.

Marcel Hug of Switzerland won his eighth Boston Marathon in the men’s wheelchair division, and American Susannah Scaroni won her second championship in the women’s wheelchair division.

The Wellesley supporters never disappoint with their enthusiastic encouragement.

I was back on the pitch this morning with my Concord United team for the first time since the fall season ended last year. I did a 50% rotation at right wing and had a solid game with no ill effects from the 10 miles of walking I did yesterday. We managed a total of 7 goals. 5 for us and 2 own goals for them! It was not our prettiest game, but we got the job done. Several of my teammates were missing, so I will be taking another photo later in the season.

The kids all had other plans for Easter, so we invited our good friends Irene and Eric over for dinner to celebrate the holiday.

After months and months of preparation, the 250th anniversary of the battles of Concord and Lexington finally arrived. The center of town was closed to automobile traffic as tens of thousands arrived to watch reenactments, a parade, speeches from our governor and state representatives, and an evening drone show. Jeanine served as an ambassador to provide visitors with information and to alert the police in the event of trouble. She rode her bicycle into town, as did Maya, Owen, Fiona, and Ben who left pre-dawn so they could watch the reenactments. I walked into town arriving by 6:30 AM with plenty of time to stake out a good vantage point for the parade. I also attended the speeches and ceremonies at the North Bridge.

Although quite exhausted by the time we returned home, Jeanine and I drove to Gilette Stadium, where Nico and his New England Revolution Amputee Soccer Team played against the New York Metro Amputee Soccer Team after the MLS teams concluded their match. The Revs won 2-0, and the Amputee Revs won 6-0, a great night for New England fans.

When Kyle and I renovated the basement in his house, we installed an upflush toilet rather than a gravity toilet to avoid excavating his concrete basement floor. Unfortunately, it recently started flushing continuously, suggesting a problem with the valve that lets water into the tank. To his credit, Kyle disassembled the complicated toilet to troubleshoot the problem, but was not able to find any obvious issues. He pulled me in on a video call, and we made more progress, but we still have not figured out what is wrong. I will be making an in person visit soon with some diagnostic tools that Kyle does not have at his disposal and hope to get it working again. Nicolai and amputee soccer teammate and Bionic teaching partner, Jovan, will be moving into the basement in the near future and Kyle wants to ensure that all is ready for them.

While driving through Somerville on my return home after a day of consulting work at Formlabs, I saw this art installation in the outdoor seating area of a restaurant. Traffic was stalled at the time, so I was able to capture a quick photo through the windshield with my phone. It expressed a sentiment that I share, so I decided to post it here.

Pictured above is about 1/20th of the pruning debris I produced during 6 hours of working in the yard. I removed 100s of saplings and cut down a few 20-foot-tall trees. The prior owner of our property let the forest grow wild for several decades, and we are hoping to introduce a little more diversity to the ecosystem. I was quite exhausted by the end of the day, but also 3.1 pounds lighter at my next morning weigh-in. Normally, I prefer to chip away at such large undertakings, but this is the first dry day in several and I will be busy for the next few. The work is much easier before the trees have had a chance to leaf out which is just about to start.

Several months ago, I helped construct stands to support a number of photo cutout boards that are going to be used for the Concord 250th Celebration this weekend. Today, I completed the project with my partner. We cut out the face openings and finished drilling the mounting holes for each of the four boards, which feature Revolutionary War characters.

Next weekend, the 250th anniversary of the start of the Revolutionary War will be celebrated in Concord and Lexington. A drone light show will be one of the significant events. It will happen over the Concord Carlisle High School baseball fields. I was asked by the Concord Bridge, our local newspaper, to capture an aerial image of the high school grounds so they can illustrate where spectators should gather to get the best view of the show.

During the last few days, we have seen increasing numbers of Blue Heron returning to fish in the Sudbury River. This evening at dusk, this beauty took up a perch to survey the menu. I am surprised by the image quality given it was shot with an ISO of 51,200. In years past, such a photo would have been unusable but now using the latest noise-reduction software it is quite acceptable.

Earlier in the day, Kyle stopped in to spend time with his mother on her birthday weekend. Nico was here as well and the four of us watched the Liverpool game. I was reminded that this family gathering was made possible by the new couch. I was back on the soccer pitch later in the afternoon for the first time since the fall season ended. All the hiking in New Zealand and the ten pounds I left there certainly helped my game. Our league match scheduled for the morning was canceled due to weather so we played a 6v6 intra-squad scrimmage.

Jeanine celebrated her 62nd birthday today. It was the first time in her life that this auspicious occasion found her in the presence of snow. We enjoyed breakfast at the Colonial Inn with friends and Nico before attending the raising of Concord’s new and substantially larger American flag.

Later in the afternoon, we caught up with our good friends Dave and Sarah before a roaring fire, the perfect antidote for the unseasonably cold weather.

Jeanine has been known to stretch out her birthday celebration for days if not weeks. This year, she decided to cram it all into one day.

We joined Maya, Nico, Jeanine’s friend Stephane, and her son Ben for drinks and appetizers at the Mad Monkfish in Cambridge before walking over to the Havana Club where we hit the dance floor for Bachata and Salsa dancing.

Ending a tumultuous week on Wall Street, temperatures also dropped, leading to an uncharacteristically late snow here in Concord. Fortunately, I completed a third day of yardwork before the weather arrived.

When we purchased a bistro table base for our patio, I fashioned an octagonal piece of bluestone (salvaged from the original house) for a top. Unfortunately, it was a bit too small and not uniformly thick or particularly flat. To address this, I ordered a circular granite top that arrived today. I still need to affix it to the base but wanted to do a test placement first.

For the first time in days, the sun was out and it was not raining. Jeanine and I took advantage of the weather to do some spring yard work. Among other tasks, I removed the straw waddles that were in place to prevent soil erosion while our plantings took root. Jeanine said that our neighbors might be interested in reusing these. Let’s just say I was a bit skeptical. Even more so when I explained how hard they would be to transport. They are bulky and heavy, especially when wet. Our neighbor suggested draping them over the roof of his car. It is an idea I would have never considered but it certainly proved effective as shown in this photo from one of our security cameras.

My first introduction to Patricia was during the excavation phase of our house-building project. She introduced herself and asked if she could take some of the clay that was abundant in the mounds of excavated earth. I told her she was welcome to as much as she wanted.

Today she arrived on our doorstep with a beautiful housewarming gift that she had crafted in her ceramic studio. She had hoped to use the clay harvested from our property but explained that the resulting plates were too fragile.

We were thrilled with the gift which will find a prominent place for display in our home.

The couch evaluation committee convened this evening and unanimously approved our new sectional before enjoying a lovely all-family prepared dinner.

It has been several months since we have all been on the same continent, and we were thrilled to catch up with the kids and to share tales of our adventure with them.

I spent some time today curating photos from our New Zealand and Australia trip. My goal is to reduce the keepers to less than a thousand. I am almost there having deleted more than three times that many. I also reviewed some of the short videos I made. I decided to post this one because a picture alone did not do justice to these beautiful falls in the Milford Sound.

Based on my experiences over the last decade, I can predict with some certainty that I will pass a kidney stone whenever I am on a flight that lasts for more than a few hours. I cannot explain why but there is no longer any arguing with the data. I passed the pictured stones after our flight to New Zealand and started passing another after the flight to Australia (still struggling with that one). I apologize for posting on this topic but this blog, now almost twenty years old, also serves as something of a medical history.

On a less gruesome note, I received a request from the Marketing & Communications Director at the Greater Cape Ann Chamber of Commerce in Gloucester seeking permission to use three of my photos in the Greater Cape Ann Guide & Directory for 2025. A sample of last year’s guide can be seen here: https://issuu.com/bostonguide/docs/cacc_2024_issuu?fr=sZTUyMTY2MDI3MDg. She found the photos with a Google search that landed her on my website.

I was happy to submit my photos and look forward to seeing them in print later this year.

While we were in New Zealand, my sister shared this photo of herself with Joe Canelos. He is the son of my cousin Alex (son of my mother’s brother). They met by chance at the Hudson Valley Tango Festival.  Joe has been taking Latin dancing classes with my mother’s former tango instructors and somehow Alissa made the connection.

It turns out that Joe is a budding professional furniture maker. Between my brother, Joe, and I, that makes three woodworkers on the branches of the Canelos family tree. Joe’s website can be found here.

While we were away, the new sectional couch we ordered last year finally arrived. Jeanine and I are both pleased with the new piece and believe it will address the key issue raised by the kids (the ability to sprawl out the way they did on the sectional we owned during their childhood. Nico has already tested it and issued a thumbs-up. Hopefully, Kyle and Maya will reach the same verdict.

Now we need to sell the 1-year-old sofa it is replacing (pictured in the foreground). For reasons that I am unable to ascertain, my Facebook Marketplace account has been suspended for something like the 6th time with no reason provided and a cumbersome process to reinstate. I have listed the sofa on Craigslist and will ask Jeanine to post it on her FB account as well. Reach out if you know someone looking for a like-new modern sofa for half the original price.

Our return to the US took 32 hours from start to finish. We flew from Sydney to Auckland to Houston to Boston. A proper neck pillow and compression socks helped make the journey more relaxing but strong turbulence on all three flights had the opposite effect. We were expecting to return to spring-like weather rather than near-freezing conditions when we touched down. Despite the cold weather, it was wonderful to sleep in our bed for the first time in 5 weeks.

Danish architect Jørn Utzon won the design competition for the Sydney Opera House in 1957 with his innovative concept inspired by spherical geometry and natural forms such as bird wings, clouds, and shells. Construction began in 1959 but faced numerous challenges, including cost overruns and engineering complexities, leading to Utzon’s being forced to resign in 1966 amid political disputes. The project was completed in 1973 by other architects, transforming Utzon’s vision into a global architectural icon and UNESCO World Heritage site. Utzon never returned to see his completed work in person but did receive significant global recognition for his design. Australian architect Peter Hall completed the project resolving complex issues related to seating, acoustics, and glass walls. His significant contribution is often overlooked.

Since arriving in Sydney, I have photographed the Opera House at different times of day and from different angles.

Today, Jeanine and I took a tour and got to see all six of the performance spaces inside and to learn about the architectural features and engineering mastery that went into the building. I think I can safely say that this is the most magnificent and beautiful modern structure I have ever seen.