With this being the last weekend before Jeanine heads off to vacation in Greece, we drove into Boston to spend the afternoon on the Common and at the Downtown Crossing. At the former, the Marine Corps had several aircraft on display as part of their 250th anniversary celebration. Photos do not convey the scale of these machines. They are enormous and insanely impressive, especially the tilt-rotor vertical take-off Osprey.

Although it was installed almost three years ago, this was my first opportunity to see The Embrace, a bronze sculpture by Hank Willis Thomas, commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. It depicts four intertwined arms, representing the hug they shared after he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. The work was created by welding together about 609 smaller pieces.

Later, we walked over to Downtown Crossing, where we attended two musical performances as part of the We Make Noise Festival, which showcases women and gender-expansive artists.

We enjoyed more music when we returned to Concord and a truly unique outdoor venue called the Back Forty. All in all, a very fun day.

Among photography professionals and enthusiasts, the “Holy Trinity” refers to a set of three professional zoom lenses designed to cover a vast range of focal lengths with constant wide apertures. These are:

• 16-35 mm f/2.8
• 24-70 mm f/2.8
• 70-200 mm f/2.8

For the last 8 years, my lens kit has included the following zooms:

• 16-35 mm f/4
• 24-105 mm f/4
• 100-400 mm f/4.5-5.6

I chose f/4 lenses because they are lighter than their equivalent f/2.8 counterparts, and I already have a set of primes for low-light situations. Even though it is quite heavy, I chose the 100-400 mm for shooting birds and soccer.

Today, I began the transition to what I am calling the “Dynamic Duo,” a pair of zoom lenses to replace the trinity.

• 20-70 mm f/4
• 70-200 mm f/4 + 1.4x teleconverter

I started with the purchase of a new 20-70 mm f/4 lens (pictured above) to replace my 16-35 mm and 24-105 mm lenses (pictured below), which are now up for sale on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace. My new kit will weigh 3.2 pounds, down from 5.7 pounds. I will lose 4 mm on the wide end and 120 mm on the long end. It remains to be seen if the reduced range will be worth the lighter load. I would not have gone down this path if I were not already fairly certain about the answer. I used Lightroom to create a histogram for the 115,000 photos I have taken to determine my most frequently used focal lengths. The answer: roughly 6,000 taken at each of 24 mm, 50 mm, 70 mm, 85 mm, 100 mm, and 135 mm.

Every so often, my preferred online photo printer runs a 50% off sale. I take advantage of these occasions to print photos that I would like to display or share. Most recently, I had them print my all-time favorite aerial photo, which I hung in my office today. The photograph is a wide-angle panorama composed of 21 images and stitched together with software. The 3-foot-wide by 1-foot-tall picture is of Mount Fitz Roy, located in Patagonia straddling the border between Argentina and Chile. I took this photograph with my drone during my trip there with Nico in 2019. Rising to 11,170 feet, Fitz Roy dominates this section of the Andes located within Los Glaciares National Park near the village of El Chaltén. On this early morning, Nico hiked to Laguna de Los Tres (pictured below, a small slice of the larger panorama), a climb I had done 7 years earlier with Kyle. I opted instead to hike to a different area where I could launch my drone safely and away from other climbers. The further I flew away from the mountain the more spectacular the panorama became. I was positioned perfectly when the sun lit up the peaks and against all odds, there was not a cloud in the sky.

Yesterday, I started testing my newly constructed deionized water window washing system. A feature that distinguishes it from every other system I have seen on the market is the ability to switch between regular water for washing and (expensive) pure water for rinsing using electric solenoid valves rather than a mechanical bypass valve. This allows me to switch from the window washing pole location rather than having to go back to the deionizer tanks. What I realized after washing a few windows is that a wireless remote control switch would be a far superior alternative to the wired version I initially built. Managing an electrical cable in addition to the water feed tube proved to be something of a hassle. For the whopping sum of $12, I purchased a wireless transmitter, receiver, and case to upgrade my system. I initially considered this approach but was concerned that a transmission might get dropped and leave the system in the deionized delivery mode wasting the expensive pure water. For an additional $6, I will be adding the beeper/flasher pictured below which will provide a visual and audible alert anytime deionized water is being used.

Against all odds, several of the coneflowers that Jeanine planted last year are blooming. Most succumbed to the voracious appetite of our resident groundhogs, who have a particular fancy for the young sprouts.

Recently, the water level in the Sudbury River has dropped significantly, exposing wide enough banks to create a nice area for walking along the river edge. I took advantage of this to explore and was rewarded with sightings of a Great Egret and what I believe is a juvenile Sharp-Shinned Hawk.

Back in early June, we were visited by a large snapping turtle, which deposited a clutch of eggs in the compost pile at the end of our driveway turnaround. We left the pile undisturbed in the hope that those eggs would hatch. Today, while working in the yard, I spotted a baby turtle making its way across our driveway and into the river rocks that line it. When I investigated the compost pile for signs of further hatchlings, I discovered the poor little fellow pictured above, who was not strong enough to break free from his shell.

I spent a couple of hours today “chipping away” at our wood chip piles. Of the 21 tons we started with, I estimate that only 9 remain, all to be spread adjacent to the street. Pictured above are some of the areas that have already been filled in. Given the August heat, I am only able to work for one or two hours a day. It provides a surprisingly effective workout for both strength and cardiovascular training. I keep telling myself that it is a good way to prepare for the fall soccer season, but that remains to be verified. The trick has been to do a little bit every day. Kyle has helped me on two occasions, which made the work go three times faster.

I also completed the design of a switch enclosure for my new deionized window washing system. It will get strapped to the carbon fiber extension pole, allowing me to select between regular water for washing and pure deionized water for the final rinse. The switch will be press fit into the enclosure.

In response to a recent post about window washing, a former colleague reached out and shared his approach, which utilizes deionized water for a spot-free final rinse, replacing a squeegee with a pole mounted water fed brush. After a brief amount of research, it proved to be a superior method requiring less effort and producing better results. I identified commercially available systems using this approach, but these generally cost several thousand dollars, so I set out to build my own. The expensive bit is creating pure deionizer water. One method uses a reverse osmosis filter to do the heavy demineralization and a resin-based deionization filter to do the finishing. I opted for what is called a dual deionizer approach which uses two resin filters in series. When the first filter has reached its service capacity (400 gallons in my case, a function of the total dissolved solids in Concord water) you replace the resin inside and reverse the order of the tanks in the system. This allows you to squeeze every bit of useable filtration out of each filter while insuring an uninterrupted supply of pure water.

Pictured above is the system I built. It incorporates two 10-liter resin tanks, a three-channel TDS (total dissolved solids) meter, three flow control valves, two solenoid water valves powered by a DeWalt battery-driven 20V to 12V converter, a three-way switch at the end of a long cord, and quick-connect fittings for the water supply and output. The switch and solenoid valves allow me to use unfiltered water for extended washing and initial rinsing. When it is time for the final deionized water rinse, I throw the switch, wait 5 seconds for the water line to the pole-mounted brush to clear. Using this method of deionized water conservation, I estimate that I will use only 1/2 gallon per window. This translates to roughly 20 gallons per whole house window cleaning which I plan to do twice a year. Thus it will be 10 years before I have to do my first resin replacement at a cost of $80.

I constructed the whole unit on a wood frame that can be lashed to a hand truck for easy transportation when in use. The last thing I need to do is 3D print an enclosure for the three-way switch so that it can be mounted to the extension pole for easy actuation. The total cost for the deionizer was about $400. The carbon fiber extension pole was $250, and the water-fed brush and tubing were $250. All in, my DIY window washing system costs less than a single professional cleaning and should be a lot easier to use than my current squeegee setup.

Our hummingbird feeder has been quite a hit with our local population. There was enough light today that I could crank my shutter speed way up to freeze motion on a sequence of shots illustrating one full wing flap cycle.

Maya is set to move to a new apartment at the end of the month and asked if we had any moving boxes left over. Although the answer was no, Jeanine contacted a neighbor who moved in across the street yesterday, who was happy to unload hers. We delivered them to Maya late this afternoon, and she thanked us with a homemade Korean beef rice bowl dinner. On the way into Somerville, we drove into a massive thunderstorm, which ended as quickly as it started as we pulled up to Maya’s apartment. On the way home, the massive clouds still in the area were lit up by the setting sun. I wish I had pulled over for a better picture of the dramatic lighting.

At Jeanine’s behest, I installed a pole near the patio on which to hang a pair of hummingbird feeders last weekend. Since then, we have had several guests. They prefer to dine in the morning and from late afternoon until dusk. I can recognize at least three different birds so far. Surprisingly, hummingbirds are not good at sharing. Even though we have two feeders, they will “fight” for minutes on end to determine who will get to feast on Jeanine’s special nectar recipe. “Fighting” involves dive bombing each other until someone relents. It is highly entertaining, and the position of the feeders allows us to watch from the living room, main bedroom, and my office.

Equally cute is the baby turkey that has been finding lots to eat in our clover patch.

My Ego battery-powered snowblower is one of my favorite tools. It works better than the exceptionally good Honda snowblowers I have owned in the past. I cannot say the same for Ego’s pressure washer. In many ways, it is a very well-designed machine, but it has a few shortcomings that led me to return it less than an hour after purchasing it. The wand handle has a clever display and a pressure control switch that is coupled to the main unit by Bluetooth. It works fine when you are standing close by, but loses connection when you are working at the limit of the hose length or when your body shields the wand from the base unit. In my book an intermittent control function is worse than nothing at all. Next, the indicators for low, high and turbo pressure on both the base unit and wand are completely unreadable in bright sunlight. Regardless of the machines other strengths, I cannot tolerate a poor user interface.

Mount Katahdin is the highest mountain in Maine, standing at 5,269 feet, and is the centerpiece of Baxter State Park. It is named “Katahdin,” meaning “Great Mountain” by the Penobscot Native Americans, and serves as the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. The mountain is known for its rugged terrain, unique alpine environment, cultural significance to indigenous peoples, and is a popular but strenuous hiking destination. Nico shared this image from his weekend in Maine, where he combined work with hiking and time spent with friends.

The day started with Jeanine picking basil from our herb garden for a tomato and mozzarella salad. This would be one of the dishes shared over lunch with our good friends, Louanne and Alex Mackenzie. We were invited to join them for a driving/ferry tour of Jamestown and Newport, Rhode Island. They live in Providence and offered to give us a grand tour of their neck of the woods. Their daughter, Fiona, is one of Maya’s closest friends from high school and a current flatmate. Alex and I play for the same Concord football club, although he usually plays one age division down from me.

On the way to Jamestown, we stopped at the birthplace of Gilbert Stuart, one of America’s foremost portrait artists, best known for his iconic unfinished portrait of George Washington, which became the image on the U.S. one-dollar bill. He painted over one thousand portraits, including six presidents and numerous prominent figures of the early United States, helping shape how generations visualize America’s founders. Despite his artistic achievements, Stuart struggled financially throughout his life and died in 1828, buried in an unmarked grave in Boston.

The Jamestown Windmill, a three-story, octagonal windmill built in 1787, still stands today and operated until 1896. The hill on which it is built includes farmsteads, the Quaker Meetinghouse, and has archaeological significance due to evidence of prehistoric Native American occupation. The windmill, an important part of the local agricultural community, was built after the original 1730 mill and is maintained as a working historic site by the Jamestown Historical Society.

The Beavertail Lighthouse, located on the southern tip of Conanicut Island, was originally established in 1749 and is the third-oldest lighthouse in the United States. The current granite tower was built in 1856 and marks the entrance to Narragansett Bay, serving as an important navigation aid for vessels. The lighthouse—and an associated museum—has a rich history, including damage during the Revolutionary War and the 1938 hurricane. It is so named for the shape of the tip of the island on which it was built.

We paused for a brief hike and lunch in Fort Wetherill State Park. From the marina there, we got to watch a sailing regatta in progress. Its start was signaled by a thunderous blast from a cannon located at nearby Fort Adams.

A short ferry ride took us to 18.5 acre Rose Island, known for its historic lighthouse and military significance. The Rose Island Lighthouse was built in 1870 on the site of Fort Hamilton’s southwest bastion and served as an important navigation aid for a century until it was decommissioned in 1970 due to the construction of the Newport Pell Bridge. After a period of abandonment and vandalism, local efforts in the 1980s led to its restoration, and since 1993, the lighthouse functions as a private aid to navigation and a museum open to the public. Rose Island played a significant role as part of the Naval Torpedo Station at Newport starting in 1883, when it was designated as a U.S. Naval Magazine and used primarily for storing explosives and torpedoes. The island’s facilities included storage for gun-cotton and other munitions, as well as serving as a torpedo warhead arming facility during World Wars I and II.

After returning from Rose Island, our next stop was the Sachuest Point National Wildlife Refuge, where we worked off our lunch with a traverse of the Ocean View Loop Trail.

We ended the day with dinner at Flo’s Clam Shack, which features a distinctive shark sculpture in their outdoor dining area. All-in-all, a thoroughly delightful day.