The Nor’easter that moved up the Eastern seaboard petered out before hitting Concord but did manage to deliver the first snowfall of the season. The precipitation turned from snow to rain by mid-morning and our white blanket was gone by late afternoon.
Jeanine and Maya will be traveling to NYC this weekend to visit with friends. Maya will be attending the birthday party of her friend Izzy, who she met at Farm & Wilderness Camp. Jeanine will connect with Monica Frost, a close friend from Indianapolis, who is flying in to join her. The adults plan to take in Cougar The Musical while the girls will see Wicked. Initially, it appeared that Hurricane Sandy would disrupt this long-planned excursion. Friends in the city, however, indicate that life is returning to normal and the best way to help with the recovery is to keep the tourism dollars flowing.
Mother and daughter did a little apparel shopping in preparation for their travels and Maya was all too happy to model her new outfit for me.
I love voting in Concord. The process here is intimate. At the same time, it is a community event during which you are likely to meet neighbors and friends. I am pleased to report that all but one of my votes (the Death with Dignity ballot question) carried the day. Jeanine and I voted together which was a very nice way to start the morning. I spent the balance of the day offsite at the Babson Executive Conference Center with my boss and a number of colleagues working on product road maps. The session ended shortly after 5pm allowing me just enough time to make the one hour drive to Danvers where Nico’s soccer team was competing in the second round of the state title tournament. CCHS emerged victorious by a margin of 5-3. Temperatures hovered at the freezing mark and probably contributed to the high scoring (goalie’s hands don’t work as well when numb).
Kyle sent me a number of photos from California and a nice note with an update on his extracurricular activities, excerpts of which I am including below.
I have become more active in a group on campus called In To The Wild. I took a trip to a beach in Santa Cruz the second weekend back to school, and last weekend we traveled to San Francisco Bay and sailed a catamaran under the Golden Gate Bridge. I got an up close look at Alcatraz. I am planning on going on a hiking trip this weekend and hopefully every weekend they offer activities. I am also attending a viewing session of this indie documentary called The First 70 which documents California’s attempt to close down the first 70 national parks in an attempt to reduce the deficit.
I joined the boxing club today with my friend Athan. I just turned in the forms last night and will be traveling to a gym in Sunnyvale tonight to start training. College boxing has relatively well padded gloves, as well as padded head gear. I haven’t decided whether I plan on competing or not, but for now I will just be training with the team to get in better shape. I am very near my peak soccer/ wrestling shape. My bench press has nearly reached my old weight and reps, I am down to weighing 142 lbs (my wrestling weight) and I run regularly. Last weekend I went for a 10.5 mile run and plan on running a school-sponsored 5k this Saturday. The stretching has really helped, and I have learned to work out regardless of minor injuries. I am just more careful not to over exert my injured muscles.
While Jeanine was in Burlington I spent some time completing projects around the house. For the master bathroom, I built a wood frame to surround the mirror, added new light fixtures, and hung various artwork. For the laundry room, I built a two-level, ten foot long shelf above the washer, dryer and laundry sink area. I tend to spend more time on indoor projects as the winter months approach.
My outdoor soccer season concluded today on a redemptive note. We won our first game of the season beating Canton, the divisional champions. I created several scoring opportunities, forced a number of turnovers, and left the field very satisfied with my play and totally spent. Our record for the season was 1-5-4. An optimist would conclude we only lost half of our games and beat the top-finishing team in head-to-head play. The realist would observe we failed to win 90% of our games, resulting in relegation to Division 2 next season. As for me, I am happy with any season that ends with my ability to walk unimpaired.
Yesterday while at Maya’s game, I was approached by a parent from the opposing team. She asked if I would be posting the images. I explained that I was not a professional and was only taking pictures of Maya. She gave me her e-mail address and asked if I would send her any photos that happened to include her daughter, the goalie, in the same frame. I got the sense that this woman probably had few, if any, pictures of her daughter in an athletic setting and decided to shoot a small series which I sent to her yesterday. Today, I received a very nice thank you note which ended in the following quotation and left me very moved.
The man said ”Don’t you realize that there are miles and miles of beach, with starfish all along it? There’s too many, you can’t possibly make a difference!” The young girl bent down and picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea and said…. “made a difference to that one”
Jeanine is spending a writer’s weekend in Burlington, VT with her sister Susan. Meanwhile, I am charged with the care of the dog and Maya. Nicolai, for all intents and purposes, is self-sufficient these days. Maya’s schedule: 8:30 am outdoor soccer match in Natick, 11:30 am ballet class in Concord, 2:15 pm dance recital rehearsal, 4:10 pm indoor soccer game in Acton, 5:10 attend birthday party until 9 pm. I am tired just typing it out. Maya is planning to spend next weekend in NYC making this her last outdoor game of the season. She finished in fine form.
Until today, the only components of his crutches that Nicolai has failed to break were the carbon fiber tubes. Now he can add that to his list. His soccer team came from a 0-2 deficit against Belmont, in the opening round of the DCL championships, to win 3-2 with a golden goal in overtime. In the exuberance of the ensuing celebration he collided with a teammate who fell on the crutch and snapped the carbon fiber tube just below the junction with the handle/cuff assembly. I was able to cut off the damaged portion and extend the foot adjustment to compensate for the shorter tube. Good as new.
The patio off iRobot’s in-facility cafe was empty when I decided to enjoy my lunch, a hot cup of beef stew, outdoors. Temperatures have dropped sufficiently to keep most employees inside the cafeteria. It did not take long, with no one to talk to, before I noticed the movement of several butterflies among the bushes. This Cabbage White rested long enough for me to get a closeup.
I happened upon the beaver pictured above within a short walk of iRobot during my lunch hour. It never ceases to amaze me how much wildlife abounds if you simply take the time to look for it. Pictured below is a male hooded merganser. During breeding season his plumage changes color. The head, back, and neck become black, with white stripes near the chest and tail, and a white crest develops on the back of the head that can be extended to attract mates.
In the light of morning, I was relieved to learn that we had escaped the wrath of Hurricane Sandy. The yard was covered in small branches and clumps of leaves but nothing beyond that. By contrast, my commute to work took me past no less than half a dozen downed trees and power lines. Our main inconvenience was the loss of power for about an hour. When the lights went out, I initiated a mental countdown. 15 seconds for the standby generator to confirm a total black out, 5 seconds to auto start, 10 seconds to stabilize engine speed and voila…. and voila…… and…… nothing. After a minute elapsed, I went outside in the gale force winds to determine what went wrong. I tried a manual start. I tried resetting the controller. I verified the natural gas supply, still no joy. Having spent a good bit of time and money installing this generator it would be an understatement to say that I was not a happy camper. The unit does a self test every week and has started perfectly every time. I was perplexed and irritated as I read every detail of the owner’s and installation manual for a second and third time, searching, to no avail, for some kind of answer. About 5 minutes after our power was restored, I developed a failure theory and made a quick modification to confirm my hypothesis. I postulated that the only difference of consequence between the last successful test and the current conditions was the intense wind (gusting to 50mph). I used duct tape to cover the intake baffles which were fully exposed to the wind. The generator started on the first attempt. Mystery solved! Severe winds were entering through the intake baffles and either throwing off the gas-air mixture or pressurizing the chamber in such a way as to prevent combustion. Hard to imagine that an emergency back-up generator design would fail to consider this possibility. I will have to wait until the next big storm and power outage before I can feel any satisfaction with this generator and will be making a call to Generac, the manufacturer, to share my disappointment with them in the mean time.
Even the seagulls of Goldthwait Reservation in Marblehead, MA were hunkered down as Hurricane Sandy made its presence felt. Schools and many businesses (including iRobot) across Massachusetts were closed today at the request of the Governor. I ventured out to the coast for a few hours to experience the raw power of nature. Jeanine was not thrilled with the idea but I was not to be dissuaded. I have never seen anything like it and am glad I made the excursion. I kept a respectful distance from the water and returned to my car when the wind became dangerous.
It was eerily calm this morning, even as Hurricane Sandy began moving towards the Eastern Seaboard. It could be the largest storm to ever hit the United States, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s website. Anyone out there still doubting global climate change? My soccer game this morning was an hour and a half away in Fairhaven, MA which it appears will be in one of the most seriously affected storm surge areas come tomorrow evening. We were down 0-2 at halftime before clawing our way back with two goals for the draw. I had a very nice assist on the equalizer and saw about 70 minutes of playing time which left me content to spend a large portion of the remainder of the day on the couch. Our final game of the season will be next week against the division champions.
Sarinnagh and Maya pose after putting the finishing touches on their homemade Halloween costumes. They are attending a party this evening where they hope to earn a prize for their efforts. Maya had no less than 2 dance classes and an indoor soccer match today. I am guessing she will sleep well this evening. Jeanine and I did a little work around the house, readying it for winter and Hurricane Sandy which is predicted to impact us on Monday.
Maya hosted a slumber party for her friends after they attended their middle school Halloween dance this evening. One of the girls was admiring a photo I had taken of Kyle (or possibly was just admiring Kyle) and wanted to know how I made it look so good (answer being good lighting). I offered to show her and in less than 2 minutes all 5 girls were posing in my studio. Each one could be a model in her own right. Taken together with a small dose of teenage girl silliness and I had the perfect elements to create some very memorable photos.
