The video posted above was prepared for the Bionic Fundraiser that we attended last Friday. It is a short and succinct summary of what the Bionic Project, where Nico is the Lead Educator, is all about.

Despite the fact that many of my soccer teammates were in Vietnam for a tournament this weekend, the rest of us took care of business with a decisive 7-0 drubbing of Raynham this morning. It was not one of my better matches, but I was grateful to be on the pitch at all, given how bad my hip had been hurting earlier in the week. I did manage a pretty assist during my 65 minutes of playing time.

After the match, we gathered for our customary post-game aprés, this week hosted at our house. In addition to my over-62s team, we had players from the over-48s and over-55s join us. Jeanine prepared a magnificent chili, which was a big hit, as were the fresh cider donuts she purchased from a local farm stand. Our first outdoor fire of the season took the chill off the crisp fall air and was so big it was still ablaze as the sun set.

This female Eastern Downy Woodpecker is a regular visitor to the trees around our property, as are its much larger cousins the Pileated Woodpecker. I am pleased to say that so far they have shown no interest in our house, which cannot be said for the last two we have owned in Concord. At one point, I thought I heard a woodpecker pecking on our aluminum roof, which seemed quite implausible to me. I have since theorized that it was pecking on a dead branch that had fallen on top of the roof. Since our roofs are fairly low-pitched (3:12), detritus can often remain there until a good rain storm or strong wind comes along. One of the selection criteria for our siding was that it not attract woodpeckers or rather that it would not host the insects that they are hunting for. So far, knock on non-wood, we seem to have achieved our goal.

This evening, Jeanine, her friend Barbara, and I attended the Western-themed Bionic Project fundraiser held at Loretta’s Last Call adjacent to Fenway Park. I volunteered to photograph the event, which proved to be quite a challenge given the dim and multi-colored lighting, as well as the dark ceilings, walls, and floors, making bounce flash impossible. Still, I made a good go of it. The full set of images can be found here.

Country Western music was provided by the Clay Street Unit after an emotionally stirring video explaining the work of the Bionic Project, a message from the Chairman of the Board, and a live auction. The event was a great success, and I would estimate that they raised $100,000.

Pictured below are the prettiest cowgirls of the evening and two handsome dudes.

Over the years, I have taken several aerial photos of the Concord Carlisle High School. Today, I discovered an entirely different perspective, which may well be my favorite. The reason I have never considered this angle before is because it features the back side of the school. I think the architects might have gotten the orientation decision wrong. The only reason I can think of to support their choice is that construction on the new school started while the old one remained in use. This no doubt would have limitted some options and complicated the logistics.

I had a deep tissue massage this morning to try to get my hip in shape for my soccer game this weekend. It helped, but I will be hitting the Ibuprofen pretty hard if I am going to make it onto the pitch.

At Jeanine’s request/insistence, out of concern for my safety, I will be joining a photography tour when I travel to Bolivia in March. This afternoon, I secured my reservation with a small group led by a Peruvian photographer that will visit the Uyuni Salt Flats and Altiplano Desert. I hope to combine this with a visit to Guyana, where I plan to visit the Kaieteur Falls. I generally prefer to travel alone on such photo adventures, but I can see the wisdom of going with a guide. Since the group is composed exclusively of photographers, I am hopeful that the itinerary and shooting times (sunrise/sunset) will be similar to what I would have chosen if traveling solo.

My hip has been bothering me so much since Saturday that I failed to notice a foot injury I sustained during my soccer match on Sunday. This is what happens when a defender wearing cleats steps on your foot. It is a tactic used by unscrupulous players to slow down attackers. In this case, however, it was inflicted unintentionally. If anything, I was more of the aggressor last weekend and felt compelled to apologize to my defender after the game for being too rough. I consider this injury to be karmic payback that I deserved.

With fall color peaking in Concord this week, I don’t even need to leave the house for a great photo. This shot, taken on our first floor, reminds me of a photo I took in December of 2023 from the basement window directly below it. I am now inspired to capture all four seasons through the same window with the same framing and perspective. Stay tuned.

Jeanine and I joined the Thoreau Fitness Center yesterday and went in for our first session today. I had the good sense to take it easy, given my left hip remains quite tender. Even so, I can tell I will be waking up with some sore muscles tomorrow. We have scheduled two workouts a week that we will do as a couple, and a third, which will remain floating for the time being.

iPage is the web hosting service I use for this blog. Each month they send me usage statistics generated through their hosting control panel and analytics modules. A “visit” represents a single session of activity from a unique visitor until the visitor leaves or remains idle for roughly 30 minutes.

Over the last few month the number of visits to this site have increased substantially to nearly 7,000 per day and I have no idea why. In the last year, the number of visits was more than 1.2 million which is hard for me to wrap my head around given my target audience is just friends and family.

After further investigation, I learned that for hobby-level websites like mine, it is common for between 30% to 80% of all visits to be from automated bots or scrapers. I wonder if the recent increase in daily activity is linked in some way to the increased use of AI.

Regardless, it is nice to know that more than a few people take a moment each day to visit and this serves to motivate me to keep posting.

Fall color is now moving through our neck of the woods. Pictured above is an aerial view of the section of the Sudbury River adjacent to our home, the roof of which can be seen on the left bank. Also visible in this photo, if you look carefully, is a kayaker and a Great Blue Heron.

Yesterday, I woke up almost completely unable to walk with severe pain in my left hip joint. Apparently, all the driving I did on Friday (10 hours in the car) did not sit well with my hip, pun intended. A combination of Ibuprofen, icing, walking (4 miles), and a massage from Jeanine made it possible for me to play soccer this morning, a seemingly miraculous recovery. Not only was I able to play, but I also scored my first goal of the season, and a beauty at that. I intercepted a pass at midfield and made a Nico-class juke to evade my defender. I then passed to a teammate who attacked the goal. His shot was rejected and fell to their sweeper, who I stripped and then beat a second defender to face the goalie one-on-one from the 18-yard line. He charged to cut down the angle as I fired a left-footed rocket which bounced off the inside of the far post for the goal.

I should note that this is the first game I played with a new set of cleats that I purchased to replace the pair I blew out last month, making them forever lucky.

Jeanine and I attended the Concord No Kings Rally at the Minute Man National Park today. Considering that we are a town of 18,300, the turnout was significant. I estimate close to 1,000. The photo’s resolution is good enough that you could actually get an exact count if you were so inclined. I was able to spot Jeanine in the image, but only because I knew where she was standing. As one would expect of Concord, it was a peaceful demonstration that was as frivolous as it was sagacious.

For the first time in a week, the sun was out, demanding that I jump in the car for a road trip in search of fall color. Unfortunately, the 400 miles I covered driving through three states provided few scenes that lived up to my expectations. Instead, I turned my attention to waterfalls, making stops at Moss Glen Falls, Warren Falls, and Bartlett Falls.

Work on our front walkway was completed today after a few days of rain delay. We are delighted with the results. It would have been far easier to make the curves had we chosen smaller bluestones, but I am pleased we held out for the larger ones. I think the scale is a perfect match for the house.

The two river rock streams are there to carry rainwater away from the house. The one on the left-hand side of the photo captures a substantial amount of water from our downhill-sloping 300-foot driveway. The one that crosses the new walkway collects the relatively small volume that falls from the four leftmost panels of the 2nd-floor metal roof. Not shown in this photo is one additional river rock stream that collects water from the garage roof and carries it down to the Sudbury River.

While the new walkway has added some formality to the “front yard,” we are looking forward to when all the plantings we have installed develop into the more natural oasis we are hoping for.

Conditions this year are conspiring against my efforts to photograph the spectacular fall foliage we usually get in New England. It has been raining nonstop for the past 72 hours, and today, by the time I reached Shelburne Falls, the clear skies above Concord gave way to heavy cloud cover. On the positive side, all that rain made for spectacular flow over the falls.

No doubt, I will continue to make leaf peeping excursions over the next two weeks, but most observers are reporting muted colors this year, likely the result of a rainy spring and summer drought.

I found this photo of me taken by my cousin Vincent while perusing my archive this afternoon. Initially, I thought it was taken in Montana while on a road trip from Indianapolis to California. When I reached out to him for confirmation, his memory proved to be substantially better than mine, and he provided a full accounting of the adventure. He flew out to California to help me drive my Alfa Romeo Spider from Palo Alto, where I had just completed my Master’s Degree at Stanford, to Indianapolis, where I was expected to report for work at Bell Labs a week later. In the photo below, I am seen servicing the car in advance of our departure. I believe I changed the plugs, oil, and front brake pads, the latter of which will be significant to the end of the story.

After bidding farewell to my California friends, we drove up the California and Oregon coast, stopping to see giant redwood trees and the ocean rocks of the Oregon Islands National Wildlife Refuge. Then we started heading east through Idaho and into Wyoming, where the handstand photo was taken in front of the Grand Tetons. As we were running short of time and money, the remainder of the trip was something of a high-speed blur through Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois. Vincent drove the final overnight shift through dense fog while I slept. He did this without the benefit of working brakes. Apparently, while hanging the calipers to change pads, I damaged one of the brake line hoses which led to the eventual loss of all brake fluid. Vincent used the mechanical emergency brake to complete the journey without incident.

Looking back, it was probably the most epic road trip of my life and a fond memory I will share with my cousin (now that we have collectively recalled it). I have omitted several details such that my children (and wife) will continue to hold me in high regard. Suffice it to say that we narrowly avoided confrontations with the police, collisions with wildlife, and other general consequences of debauchery.

I just discovered an Instagram post that Nico made for the Bionic Project.

You can watch the full video at https://www.instagram.com/reel/DPwTZ2wALT0/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Another video I found on his site can be found at

https://www.instagram.com/p/DOpi8SMgCnX