I spent a good deal of time today doing spring cleaning. I decided to attack the stacks of paper which include my earliest engineering work, scanning them to my computer for preservation and more efficient storage. Pictured here is my very first design as an engineer at Bell Laboratories completed some 30+ years ago. I drew this electrical schematic by hand on graph paper (in those days engineer’s did not have their own computers). Looking back on it now I am inclined to admire it more as a piece of artwork than a breakthrough in videographics.

Several years ago I purchased a used camera stand (a device for positioning a camera at any height or angle relative to a subject) for my photo studio on Craig’s List. I got a phenomenal deal because no normal person would buy such a large and heavy stand for use in a home. I had to shorten it by several feet so it would fit in my 8ft tall basement. It has always been something of a pain to use because it is just too large for my setting. Today, I replaced the aging casters with new ones that include a pedal lock. That allowed me to remove 10 pounds of locking mechanisms. I shortened the lateral arm by more than a foot which dropped another ten pounds and allows me to navigate much more freely. Finally, I removed a 20 pound ballast weight that is no longer necessary due to the shifted center of gravity. The stand is now perfectly sized for my use and glides effortlessly on its new wheels. Pictured here are a subset of the parts I removed during surgery.

After their harrowing qualification yesterday, Maya and her CRI crew placed first in the Eights final today. At her request, I took an overhead shot of her boat from a bridge that spans the race course. As is customary, her team celebrated their victory by tossing her into the river. A small price to pay for the gold medal she returned with. My sister took the photo of me below. Tell me if you think I enjoy watching Maya race.

Earlier in the day I travelled to Medfield with my soccer team. I elected to give my injured hamstring a week off in the hopes it will be fully recovered for next week’s match. We pulled out a 3-2 win which advanced us into first place over Belmont who we face next week.

Jeanine and I joined my sister, Alissa, and her family to witness the graduation of her son and my nephew, John William, from Babson College. John has been a frequent and most welcome visitor in our home over the last four years and we hope his sister, Rachel, will follow suit when she begins her freshman year at Babson in the fall. At 52 my sister is still quite a saucy number and we were thrilled to join her and husband John for the momentous occasion.

Later in the day we travelled to Lowell to watch Maya compete in a rowing regatta. She coxed an eight in her first qualifier. With twenty yards to go and a commanding lead, her number one seat “caught a crab” bringing the boat to a complete stop. Recovering the oar from under the boat and resetting the crew took almost 30 seconds. So great was their lead that they still managed to place first by the narrowest of margins.

When Maya leaves for college, Jeanine and I have decided we will be downsizing into a more cozy abode. Even though that day is more than two years away we are going to need all of that time to divest of the things we have accumulated over a lifetime. Last week I sold 4 of our 6 bicycles. This week I am focused on old electronics, including my father’s turntable and my first video waveform monitor. Both technologies have been rendered irrelevant by advances in technology. Was there really a time when we listened to music by dragging a tiny needle through an undulating vinyl groove amplifying tiny up-down-left-right vibrations into sound?

The flowers given to Jeanine on Mother’s Day by the boys are now in full bloom. I spotted this one with a lilted pedal opening a window into the interior.  I elected to do a mirror image split in post-processing and to force the background to black.  Normally, I only edit for color correction and cropping but this image really lent itself to the approach and I like the results.

It has been 10 years since I started this daily photo blog and I was moved to celebrate the milestone with an anniversary cheesecake (which I plan to eat on behalf of the blog). According to my statistics page, this is my 5,836th post which works out to an average of 1.6 posts per day (in the early years, each photo was considered a post). Trying to keep the photos and writing interesting has been a great challenge, second only to the grind of producing a post every single day for a decade. I am motivated by my loyal followers which include immediate and extended family, friends, colleagues and the occasional wayward stranger. I have received many thoughtful words of encouragement and appreciation which sustain me on those days when I have little to say or show. Earlier this month I received an e-mail from a former colleague and friend. He wrote:

When it is hard to write or work has taken all the daylight, it is comments and feedback such as this which keeps me going. What started as a simple exercise to improve my photography has turned into a cherished family history and photo archive. To my loyal followers, spelling and grammar checkers, wildlife species identifiers, fact checkers, mystery decoders, angry family members demanding embarrassing photos be removed, trusted business advisors, parenting consultants, and all others who routinely visit this site, please know how much I appreciate your visits.

I had occasion to be in Cambridge this afternoon where the conference room in which I was meeting offered a commanding view of Boston and the Charles River. If you wanted a closer view of the Charles, you need only step outside where kayaks, canoes, and paddle boards are available for rent. It is nice living so close to the city but until construction on Route 2 is completed the traffic delays remain irritating.

Although she has appeared on this blog many times, I would like to pay a special tribute to my mother today. While I cherish the gifts I have that can be traced to my father, I have no doubt that it is my mother I have to thank for those traits that have most contributed to my success in life. My mind for engineering, physical dexterity, head for business, eye for beauty, capacity for work, and desire to forever improve, all come straight from my mother. All mothers give life to their offspring. Mine gave me a bounty of gifts for which I am eternally grateful. From the toddler above to the octogenarian below she is a rare beauty and wonderful mother.  I am looking forward to her visit next weekend.

The boys earned big points with their mother today by sending her flowers. Let’s just say that prior years have not been quite up to par. Not to be outdone, Maya prepared a strawberry-spinach salad with homemade dressing to accompany the omelets prepared by her father for a midday brunch. Scheduled to race twice today, Maya’s team elected to pull her quad from competition when the day’s schedule made it apparent that the rowers would not be able to survive back-to-back heats of quads and eights. She was disappointed but concurred with the decision to maximize her chances of winning the eights. My early morning soccer match ended with a 4-1 win, a nice change from the ties we had earned over the last two outings. I did not play in the second half after a slight tweak to my left hamstring but feel I should be back on the pitch fairly soon since I stopped before any real damage was done.

Maya has been coxing an eight for the CRI Boat Club for the last several weeks. Today at the Lowell Invitational, held on the Merrimac River, she was asked to be the coxswain for a four. The former is driven from the rear with eight rowers in the line of sight. The later is driven from a highly recumbent position in the front of the boat with four rowers behind you. Despite the new boat configuration, Maya adjusted well and guided her team to a 10 boat length win in the qualification round held this afternoon. You will need to look carefully to find Maya’s head in the boat.

This section of a quadcopter was created on a desktop 3D printer capable of embedding carbon fiber, Kevlar, or fiberglass continuous filament in a nylon substrate. This results in parts of exceptional strength which can be used in demanding applications for which traditionally printed parts would fail immediately. I met with the company’s founder yesterday in what proved to be a very interesting conversation.

Jeanine and I attended Freshman & Sophomore Award’s Night this evening. It was the first event held in the auditorium of the town’s brand new $76M high school and our first time in the building. Maya received High Honors and award certificates in English, Social Studies, and Health & Fitness. We could not be prouder of her. After the ceremony, she gave us a tour of the new building which is reportedly the “greenest” in the state. Once the landscaping is completed, I will post photos of the exterior.

A monumental, aerial sculpture is suspended over Boston’s Rose Kennedy Greenway as the signature contemporary art installation in the Greenway Conservancy’s Public Art Program. Created by Janet Echelman, the sculpture spans the void where an elevated highway once split downtown from its waterfront and was made by hand-splicing 100 miles of rope and knotting twine into an interconnected mesh of more than a half-million nodes. I had occasion to enjoy it while I was downtown attending a design and manufacturing trade show being held at the convention center.