Our home is located relatively close to the Hanscom airfield but we rarely see or hear planes. Today I was convinced that one was about to crash into our home based on how loud the engine noise was. I quickly ran outside to see what was going on and spotted two single engine aerobatic planes circling overhead.  Apparently they were training for low altitude synchronized maneuvers and had decided to do this directly over out neighborhood.  The geese that are feeding in the field behind our house found this none too pleasant and took flight en masse when the planes began dropping fireworks.

Normally this would be enough excitement for one day but just the beginning as Jeanine had planned a mystery date. We attended, with close friends, a play entitled “Disgraced” which offered a poignant look at the challenges of being a Muslim living in the US as well as a balanced but provocative examination of some of the religion’s not-so-attractive tenants.

I started my first day as a 59 year old in the shop with my brother. We fabricated covers for the insulated trailer fenders on the tiny house from MDF. All joints are mitered at 45 degrees and it was much much easier to complete the glue up working as a team. By 9:30 AM it was off to the airport for Mark’s return flight to Minneapolis and then on to an 11:30 AM meeting with a venture capitalist in the Seaport district considering investment in one of the companies I am currently consulting for. I had given myself plenty of time to make my next meeting in Cambridge at 2 PM but when I returned to the place I had parked my car it had been towed away triggering a mad scramble to locate it, get to it, pay to have it liberated, and travel to my next destination. I arrived with minutes to spare for what turned out to be a very enjoyable visit with a company I admire greatly. I returned to Concord just in time to gather up Jeanine and set out for the 60th birthday party for one of my soccer teammates. I really enjoyed being at a birthday celebration on my birthday and not being the center of attention. All in all, a very hectic but ultimately satisfying day. Not unlike my life to date.

Before returning to Minnesota tomorrow, my brother Mark wanted to visit his niece at Olin College where she is studying engineering. Maya gave us a tour of the campus, her dorm room, and of greatest interest, her first project. All Olin first-year students create a biologically inspired hopping mechanism that must meet their self-imposed design objectives. Mark was delighted to see Maya and to welcome another member of the Calabria family into the field of engineering. Earlier in the day Mark and I mitered all of the window trim and  fabricated all of the window sills for the tiny house.

After countless hours of painting, something neither of us particularly enjoy, my brother and I got a chance to do some actual woodworking this afternoon. This 1/2″ thick plywood panel is destined for the bathroom. The cutouts are not particularly difficult to make. The challenge is to locate them in exactly the right positions which requires extremely careful measurement and layout. A single mistake can ruin the entire panel. Working together and checking each other’s work we were able to achieve a perfect fit.

Later, we joined Jeanine at Open Table for their annual meeting and volunteer appreciation dinner. The keynote speaker shared her story of unexpectedly falling into poverty, the struggle to feed her children, and the importance of a food pantry to her family’s survival and rebound. It was a moving validation of the important work done by Open Table and organizations of its kind.

Working together with my brother Mark,  we painted the entire interior of the tiny house. It proved to be more time consuming than I would have ever imagined and I was grateful for the help. I was hoping that a single coat would suffice but that was not the case.  Not exactly the most creative of choices, the white color is meant to match the window trim so that these features are minimized and the sense of connection to the outdoors is increased.

In the last year, my brother Mark has independently survived both a stroke and sudden cardiac arrest. He survived the former because of quick treatment with a clot buster and the latter because his son was well-trained in CPR.  The only lingering impact has been a difficulty with speech and word forming, both on a trajectory to full recovery. The same cannot be said for his hair which has migrated from the top of his head to the bottom. He arrived this morning and will stay this week to help me with the tiny house build. Next week I will travel to his home in Minneapolis to help him with a deck project that he has underway. Working together is much easier than doing so alone and gives us a great chance to catch up with each other.

Kyle was in charge of dinner this evening. He prepared a wonderful Italian feast including rigatoni with marinara sauce, meatballs, two types of salad, and freshly baked apple crisps for dessert. Despite having a cold, Jeanine completed the Ride for Food 25-mile bike ride this morning. This year the hunger relief fundraiser brought in close to half a million dollars. I played soccer this morning and scored a pretty goal with seconds remaining in the half to equalize the score at 1-1. We went on to dominate the second half as our opponents began to wilt in the 80-degree heat.

I took advantage of today’s nice weather to work on the underside of the tiny house.  The area that is built out over the tongue is where the water line enters and the drain line exits the house. It is important that this area be especially well insulated and it took several hours to complete the work.  The house is now entirely sealed from top to bottom. Working with me under the house was this wasp. He did not bother me and I did not bother him except to grab a few photos. Peaceful coexistence.

Until now, I have taken over 2 out of our 3 garage bays to serve as a work area for the tiny house project. With cold weather approaching it was time to consolidate into one so that Jeanine could park her car inside again. To that end, I organized all of unused building materials in a much more condensed fashion and returned tools no longer in daily use to my basement workshop.

I spent the afternoon in Somerville at one of my consulting gigs returning home just in time to catch a glorious sunset.  It has been very windy with intermittent rain all day, the effects of distant hurricane Jose.

My sister Alissa had a dance performance last night and shared this photo from the event. My parents were passionate ballroom dancers (it is how they met) and she is the only child who has carried on the tradition. My mother, who will turn 90 next year, still goes out dancing every week. A link to the performance can be found here.

The Bruce Freeman Rail Trail will eventually connect Lowell, Chelmsford, Westford, Carlisle, Acton, Concord, Sudbury, and Framingham. This summer phase 2C of the project is underway bringing a 2.8-mile section of the trail through town.  We are located less than a mile from the trail and it will be very easy to access once completed. Can’t wait.

Usually, I try to feature my own photography on this blog. Today I am sharing the work of Dillon Baker who created a Java-based processing program that takes each frame of a given movie and compresses its average color into a single vertical line, creating a timeline of the spectrum of colors used throughout each movie. Having spent so much time in the video and film industry, I found this to be very interesting.

A nicer fall day one could not have asked for.  Even better, I stepped on the soccer pitch this morning without an ache or injury to speak of.  I stepped off 90 minutes later with three goals and one assist to my name. Moving up to the over-56 age division (something I should have done three years ago) has me competing with players my own age and revived my goal-scoring potential. Some things have not changed, however, as I spent the next several hours icing down a tender Achilles tendon and both knees. Later in the day, Jeanine and I traveled to Westwood where we dined with Tom Metzold and Karen Manor, a life long friend and my high school wrestling partner and his lovely wife. We arrived a little early and took a short stroll through the town center.

Nala received a full spa package treatment today courtesy of her mother. It included a full body shampoo, hair cut, blow dry and what can best be described as dethatching. When she gets wet she runs around the house like a crazed animal stopping at the back door to signal her desire to be let out. Should we comply with this wish before drying her, she would return caked in God knows what. The drying/dethatching phase results in a massive amount of shed fur.  It is fortunate for Nala that Jeanine seems to enjoy this ritual from time to time. If left to me, I would employ our washer and dryer appliances to make short work of the task. They are large enough that you could probably even do two dogs in one load.

In the evening, Jeanine and I attended a house warming party of one of my soccer teammates. Jamie and his wife Gill live on the Fort Meadow Reservoir in Marlborough. Live music and a sunset cruise around the lake made for a very relaxing and enjoyable evening.

I am constantly amazed by the beauty of the natural world. These parachute seeds are from a weed that has grown to a height of three feet in between the bricks of our back patio.  After photographing them, I pulled the plant out only to inadvertently liberate the paratroopers which will grow to fight another day.

Later in the day, I tried to convince Jeanine that we were going to Home Depot for mystery date night to shop for window shutters (a very plausible ruse given the state of ours).  I use this technique to lower expectations for the actual date, in this case, a movie (Wind River) and after movie snacks (at the Border Cafe). I also needed to pick up some parts for the tiny house and the Home Depot is on the way. I didn’t fool Jeanine for a second as she knows all my tricks.

Working in the loft of the tiny house always takes twice as long as similar work on the main floor. You have to climb the ladder for each visit and constantly walk around bent over. Today I completed the “beadboard” walls and am quite happy to have this work behind me.  Still needed is corner trim, window trim, and a wood beam down the center of the ceiling. I am not very happy with the aesthetics of the triangular loft at the back of the sleeping loft. It is far too angular for the rest of the lines in the “room.” That said, the storage area is precious and I am glad to have it.  I have a couple of thoughts on ways to address this and will post a photo when I settle on a solution.

Verrill Farm is operated as a partnership between Stephen and Joan Verrill and daughter Jennifer Verrill Faddoul. The farm consists of about 200 acres in Concord and Sudbury. One hundred acres are prime farmland and 100 acres are wildlife habitats, woodlands, and wetlands. Steve’s father and mother moved to Concord in 1918 and started a successful dairy business. In 1957, upon graduation from Cornell University, Steve assumed operation of the farm and gradually divested the dairy business to focus on farming and a retail farm stand which was built in 1995 and again in 2009 after a fire destroyed the first one. The new stand features their own produce, specialty foods, gifts and flowers. The expanded kitchen/bakery provides high quality baked goods, prepared entrées, homemade soups, and salads. Steve is known to everyone in Concord and has never been seen without his signature hat.

There were no winners in my name the local celebrity quiz and the prize will be doubled for the next installment.

I would like to challenge local followers of this blog to identify the person in this photo. He is a well known member of the Concord community and was in attendance at the Open Table Grand Opening. The first person to email me with the correct name of this individual will receive a 1-year free membership to this blog and be duly recognized herein.

The results of my routine colonoscopy this morning were totally normal but I was advised to take it easy for the rest of the day. Although instructed not to operate any power tools, I was unable to convince Jeanine that this pertained to unloading of the dish washer. I spent most of my time riveted to the TV watching coverage of hurricane Irma. Two years ago I visited many parts of Florida including the Keys. I fear that many of the places I visited will be altered forever. Pictured above is Fort Jefferson on a tiny island which comprises the Dry Tortugas National Park (located at the western most end of the archipelago) and Key West (pictured below). You can see how low lying these areas are. In addition, I stopped at many places along the way including the Turtle Hospital in Marathon and the Laura Quinn Wild Bird Sanctuary in Tavernier. I am praying for the safety of everyone in the path of the storm and hoping that these very special places will not be damaged beyond restoration.

After more than a year of planning, fundraising and construction Open Table at last has a permanent facility. Today’s grand opening was attended by several government dignitaries including Congresswoman Niki Tsongas who presented Open Table with a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition and State Senator Jamie Eldridge.

The celebration, open house, and ribbon cutting ceremony was a huge success. I am so proud of Jeanine for what she has accomplished with the support of her board and hundreds of volunteers that comprise the Open Table family. A full set of photos from the event can be found by following this link. 

This morning I started my fall soccer season on a high note, scoring a nice header in my first game with the Lexington Eagles, a division one over-56 squad that I just joined. As I will be turning 59 this month, I decided it was time to move up from the over-50 age division. It is nice to be one of the fast guys again.

Folks is an online magazine dedicated to telling the stories of remarkable people who refuse to be defined by their health issues. By sharing the experiences of these individuals, they hope to change people’s notions about what it means to be ‘normal’.  Last month they featured an article about Nicolai titled “Superleg” in the Health and Fitness section. Other than some bad typos (“box” instead of “ball” in the opening sentence) and questionable grammar, it is a nice  look at Nico and his accomplishments.

The Concord Journal published a nice article about Open Table’s new site this week. A link to the online version can be found here. Although the grand opening is not for a few more days, the new facility is operational and has been serving guests for a couple of weeks now as the team works out the kinks and gears up for the official launch.

I had occasion to visit the seaport district of Boston this afternoon for a business related meeting. I was amazed and concerned by the amount of new office development underway. Hard to imagine, in light of rising ocean levels, why you would move forward with new construction on oceanfront property that looks to be about 3 feet above the high tide mark. Equally concerning is that Seaport office development now outpaces housing development by 8:1 which means that all of the people working in those buildings will be coming in from elsewhere adding to what is an already ridiculous commute into Boston. So much for good urban planning.

Jeanine and I enjoyed a wonderful dinner with Beth and Victor Duvanenko, good friends from Indianapolis who were passing through on their way to Maine. Victor and I worked together at Truevision back in the day and it was fun to catch up with them.

A friend of mine and follower of this blog sent me this link to an article comparing Olin (where Maya is a freshman) and Stanford (where I obtained my Masters degree).

The College That Produces Founders at 5 Times the Rate of Stanford

I am clearly not the cook in the family but did rather enjoy this Caprese sandwich that I constructed.  I am nursing a back injury suffered while playing soccer on Monday and there is nothing like comfort food to help ease the pain. 

Before releasing refrigerant into the HVAC system it is necessary to remove all air and moisture from the lines.  This is done by drawing a 500-micron vacuum on the lines via a service port on the external unit. It was less expensive and more convenient to purchase a vacuum pump, digital micron gauge (the rectangular blue object), and the necessary fittings and hoses than to schedule a service call with an HVAC technician. Once the lines were evacuated, I charged them with refrigerant and proceeded to test the system. I only had time to test the cooling operation which worked perfectly and will verify the heating mode tomorrow. I am amazed at how quiet both the internal and external units are.  Whisper quiet is not an exaggeration. 

Working alone I made slow but steady progress on the inside walls today. Two more panels remain to be done on the first floor and a couple more to finish the loft. The “board seams” will be much less apparent when everything is painted white. I still have not decided how to cover the fender insulation but I am leaning towards 3/4″ MDF with all edges mitered and rounded over.

My sister, Alissa, has a daughter at Babson and a son working in Waltham. She came to visit them for the weekend but I probably got to spend the most time with her. We drove into Boston where we did a fair bit of walking along the Rose Kennedy Greenway, along the harbor, and around the Faneuil Hall  Marketplace where we had dinner. Between the buskers, kids playing in the fountains, and seals of the Aquarium we were treated to a wide array of entertainment.

Over the course of the summer I was approached by a number of early stage technology companies interested in having me consult for them. I put all of them on hold until September so I could maximize my time with Maya on the tiny house project. I have limited my aggregate commitments to one day per week. It will be a nice way to continue with my passion for high-tech engineering while remaining mostly retired. One of my clients is located in an area of Somerville with extremely limited parking availability. They were kind enough to reserve me one of their few spots.