When we first moved into our Concord home, Jeanine and I both disliked the casual brick hearth and surround decorating our living room fireplace. This morning I started a renovation project and made good progress between outings to buy materials, and shuttling Maya to her soccer game, guitar lesson, and a birthday party. My first task was to correct an installation error on the flue. Indoor air was able to flow freely around the closed flue because a large gap had not been filled. I built a frame from wood and poured in a batch of concrete which did the trick nicely. Next I removed the top course of bricks from the fireplace arch since they stood proud of the face by about an inch. Finally I used thinset to adhere cement backing board to the facade and hearth covering the existing brick. This will provide a nice flat surface to which the new stone will be applied. A sample tile of the marble is shown in the lower left corner of the after photo. I plan to complete the stone work over the next few weeks.

Clad in my slippers and bath robe, I wandered into Jeanine’s garden this morning searching for signs of the changing seasons. I am not sure what I photographed (although I am sure Jeanine will help me with the identification) but I liked the patterns and composition. Work was unusually hectic for a Friday which meant that the day was over before I blinked twice. Maya was invited by a friend this evening to attend the Boston Ballet’s production of Romeo and Juliet which she enjoyed immensely.

I recently built a very simple adapter that allows me to attach my point and shoot camera to our spotting scope. Some further refinements are needed but this morning I was able to photograph a rafter (yes, that is what a group is called) of turkeys who were gathered in our back yard. Nala was going out of her mind as we observed the intruders and I had half a notion to let her retrieve our Thanksgiving dinner. Fortunately, the memory of several recent jail breaks (traversal of the electric containment fence) informed my decision to keep her inside.

Last weekend Jeanine was in Lebanon, Indiana for her thirtieth high school reunion. Today I downloaded photos from her camera and found this one of her posing with the school mascot and yearbook. She reported having an absolutely wonderful time and has reconnected with many long lost friends. She also had an opportunity to visit with Bradley, her nephews son and her great friend Monica. I think after taking stock, Jeanine concluded that her life has turned out pretty well since high school. The other photos which included her classmates turned out too blurry to post but were clear enough for me to conclude that Jeanine is still the hottest girl in her class.

If I have an addiction, it is the constant pursuit of finding the right tool for the job. My tripod collection (to which I made an addition from Craig’s list this evening) is a case in point. Each one of these carbon fiber tripods is designed and optimized for a specific application. The ideal tripod would be weightless, infinitely adjustable and able to support the heaviest telephoto lens/camera combination. In the real world one must trade each of these attributes for another and hence the array of sizes, shapes and weights.My work horse is the second tallest but there is no way I was going to drag it to the top of Kilimanjaro (that application was better served by the second shortest). If I go more than a few months without using one of these then it winds up on eBay or Craig’s list. My passion for tools is in their use rather than their collection.

Incidentally this photo does not include the stand on which I mounted my camera to make this photo. Although technically not a tripod it is yet another tool in the camera support family. Speaking of families, I wonder if I could have saved money by buying the two big tripods first and leaving them alone in a candle lit room with some nice wine and mood music.

This may be the first Halloween I can remember with snow. As a result, we had less than a dozen trick-or-treaters and a massive oversupply of candy which I was very tempted to personally rectify. Instead, I decided to bring all the excess to work and distribute there in a reverse trick-or-treat scenario. Pictured here is the horse farm across the street. I liked the punctuation of the orange pumpkin within the otherwise gray-scale scene.

As predicted, Massachusetts was hit pretty hard overnight by a snow storm which set records for this day in many parts of the state and did considerable damage to trees and in turn power lines. I was working at my computer at 5:30AM when our power went out. I was actually thrilled because I recently installed a standby generator for the house and was eager to see it in action. My computer, cable modem, and routers are all on battery backup so I had no interruption of service. The generator is programmed to wait for 20 seconds after power loss and then to automatically start. Everything worked perfectly and all critical circuits in the house were back on line. (Un)fortunately the power came back on within a few minutes and the system went back into standby. Shown here is a long exposure of the view out our front door. A snow plow drove through the scene during the extended predawn exposure adding some nice color to the otherwise gray scale image. By 6AM I was in my car searching the neighborhood for good photographic opportunities of which I found many. During my 1 hour outing I encountered dozens of downed trees and power lines. My soccer match was cancelled because the field was under several inches of snow and I spent the day relaxing indoors, working in my shop, and doing a little shopping with Nico.

Maya is carried from the field by her coaches during today’s game against Lincoln Sudbury. She was kicked in and then twisted her right knee. The injury does not appear to be too serious but we iced it all day long as a precaution. Her team prevailed with a 3-1 result and all were happy to get out of the freezing cold for our post game detour to Dunkin Donuts. Nicolai spent the morning working as a referee and the afternoon doing community service with his church youth group. I prepared for a forecasted early season snow storm by getting the snow blower ready and installing snow sticks along the driveway contours.

With a co-located engineering organization my work routine is rather constant. In virtually every position I have held over the last 20 years my teams have been distributed and travel has been a requirement of my job. Today I attended the Mass TLC (Technology Leadership Council) Innovation unConference at the Hines convention center making for a nice departure from my routine. I was invited to attend as a so-called “expert (entrepreneur)” and part of my responsibility was to meet with three different aspiring entrepreneurs to provide feedback and guidance. Conference sessions are created in real time and are self organized. Attendees propose topics which are assigned locations. Interested participants join and/or migrate to sessions of interest to them. At the end of the day the conference is primarily a networking and recruiting opportunity. I ran into Colin Angle, our CEO and Kirk Arnold, Avid COO and a former boss as well as several other shakers and movers from the Boston high tech community. Jeanine traveled with her sister Lauren to Chicago yesterday to visit their long ailing aunt Karen who has been struggling with cancer. They visited with her again today before she passed away peacefully this evening. I know it meant a lot to Jeanine to have this chance to say goodbye and I am sure it was of great comfort to her aunt as well. Karen was kind and pure in heart. She believed in God and Heaven and I am sure she is resting there now with her sister. Not to be found in that neighborhood is this she devil who attended her school’s Halloween dance this evening.

I dropped Jeanine at the airport very early this morning for a flight to Indianapolis where she will be attending her 30 year high school reunion on Sunday. I made a second trip downtown later in the day for a pair of meetings in Cambridge at the Field Pub. The first was with a new employee at Sonos who was interested in understanding the company and its founder better. The second was with my new MIT Gordon Engineering Leadership program mentee. Justin is a senior from Nevada who is studying materials science. I am looking forward to getting to know him better as the year unfolds.

With five minutes until sunset I found myself passing the Great Meadows Wildlife Refuge and decided to interrupt my evening commute for a quick visit. The last rays of light were captured in this photo. Three minutes later the entire scene was in shadow. Days are growing very short and I will soon be leaving the office in darkness. Not my favorite time of year but a good catalyst for planning my next solo photo adventure to someplace sunny and warm. Snow is in the forecast for tomorrow providing further motivation.

As I was walking around the office today I noticed a couple of engineers standing on the desk in a vacant cubical. Curious about this high altitude gathering I was drawn in to investigate. They were testing a new design concept for picking up dust with one of our robots. Dust it turns out is rather difficult to simulate so they went in search of the real McCoy which they found in abundance on the tops of the cubical bookshelves. Earlier in the day I met with a former colleague of mine who I hadn’t seen in 6 years. He is a brilliant individual and would be a great addition to the team at iRobot. The trick now will be finding the right opportunity for him. We announced Q3 earnings after the close of business and reported another stellar quarter.

A tough day for Nico and his team on the soccer pitch. Newton South proved to be a very strong opponent, winning a hard-fought match 3-1. Despite the tough going, Nico demonstrated great leadership both on and off the field in his role as co-captain.

I scored an inconsequential goal in the final minute of my soccer match this morning. It was an easy tap in following an intense sprint to intercept a pass in front of the net. The one sided affair ended in a score of 9-1. A win next week will secure promotion and it is sure to be a close match (we tied in our last meeting with Needham). After the game I took a team photo which will be used to update the league website.
Although the sky was overcast I decided to get out for a little photography taking advantage of an otherwise perfect fall day.