February Train Ride

Frosty Morning

Fall Sky

Micro-climate

Late yesterday afternoon a cold front passed through the area and brought some rain with it along with some nice cool air. As I walked across the wet parking lot to my car after getting off the train I noticed that my car windows were covered in condensation. After I hopped into the vehicle and started the engine I turned on the wipers to clear away the moisture from the windows. The condensation however was inside the car. The warm humid air that was trapped in the car condensed on the windows as the temperature dropped during the afternoon. This is not a major event nor an earth shattering insight, but rather an interesting little science moment, and another indication that fall is well underway -- as if the beautiful foliage and the fact that inside the house is chillier than outside (another micro-climate) were not enough.

US-1 & The Modern Lovers

When you are a contractor you follow the money and take the gigs where they are (within reason). Since moving back to Boston I have taken two gigs at agencies north of the city. Since I live just west and a bit south of Boston I've had some decent commutes. The ability to write off the gas makes them profitable, and I've had the opportunity to traverse many of the north/south highways and by ways of The Commonwealth on my way to and from work.

Recently, after a meeting in Boston, I shot over the Tobin Bridge and headed up US-1 North to get to my current gig. Each time I drive this road I feel compelled to blog about it, but have not until now. This road is a throwback to the earliest days of the American interstate highway system. Two lanes in either direction, lined with motels, retail stores and restaurants, and occasional traffic lights it recalls an era when people took their time going somewhere and made a day of the motor-car outing. Today, the road can be a real nightmare of traffic and it is hard to imagine taking it from Boston to Florida, as people once did, when, prior to the opening of I-95, US-1 was the highway for North-South travel on the Eastern Seaboard. As is fitting for a road that is no longer a major route, US-1 has drifted into that netherworld of faded glory that befalls so much Americana.

To say that the road is ugly is an understatement, but it also does not do the route justice. In fact, US-1 is so ugly that it is beautiful. It runs through some scrappy little towns and cities like Everet, Chelsea and Saugus and probably boasts more cell phone stores, Dunkin Donuts and auto body shops per mile than any road in the country. These establishments occupy shoddy mid-60s strip malls and old cinder block buildings along both sides of the highway. There are some classic signs along this road. One of the greatest is the giant cactus, (with fiberglass cows grazing beneath it) of Hill Top Steak House. Another iconographic sign of US 1, complete with rounded, space age design, made from painted tin and recently refurbished in the least sympathetic way possible belongs to the Ferns Motel

There is also some excellent highway architecture along this road:

No doubt The Ship Restaurant in Saugus (now a mall I've read) once served seafood baked beneath a mountain of buttered bread crumbs and garnished with parsley.


The Leaning Tower of Pizza



The mini golf T. Rex.



All of this brings me, finally, to a quintessential Boston-band, Modern Lovers, and their most famous song, Roadrunner:

Roadrunner, roadrunner
Going faster miles an hour
Gonna drive past the Stop 'n' Shop
With the radio on
I'm in love with Massachusetts
And the neon when it's cold outside
And the highway when it's late at night
Got the radio on
I'm like the roadrunner

Originally recorded in 1972, and released in 1976, this song still gets (deservedly so, in my opinion) air play in Boston.Written by a local kid, Jonathan Richman, from Natick, MA. It un-apologetically describes what it was like to grow up in suburban Boston where, once of legal driving age, each weekend was an extended, auto-based peregrination through your hometown and neighboring communities looking for something to do.

So, on this cold, winter day, after a meeting, driving my car up US-1, soaking in its sights Roadrunner came on the radio and transformed the drive into a classic Massachusetts moment. It was not one of those "I'm depressed, and every song on the radio speaks to that angst" moments. Instead, it was a perfect confluence of one of the most local of local songs (far more local than overplayed, tired Dirty Water, which was written by The Standells of California)about a place that you know, by a person who knows that place too, while you are in that place.

I got the modern sounds of modern Massachusetts
I've got the world, got the turnpike, got the
I've got the, got the power of the AM
Got the, late at night, (?), rock & roll late at night
The factories and the auto signs got the power of modern sounds
Alright

Right, bye bye!

December-180

This December has been the absolute opposite of last December. Last year the temperature through December was in the 50s with some days in the 60s. I actually mowed my lawn in mid-December because it needed it and had continued to grow.

This year I mowed the lawn in early December just because I got a bit psychotic about the leaves that were blowing onto it from the hill at the back of the Quarter Acre. An injured ankle kept me off the hill and prevented raking which lead to blowing leaves and the aforementioned psychosis. The temp that day was about 30 F and it started to snow as I put the mower in its shed.

It only snowed a dusting that day but last week we got two heavy winter blasts. The first came on 13 December -- a ten inch deposit of snow that absolutely crippled the region and left me in my car, stuck on 128/I-95 for seven hours. I never made it home, opting, instead, to stay at my parents' house rather than extend my 53 mile commute into an 11 hour ordeal. I'd never seen anything like that evening's commute and I've driven to Buffalo in less time than it took me cover those 35 miles between work and my folks' house.

Two days after that we got a funky Nor'easter that dropped a decent amount of snow before turning to rain. It made for some miserable and soaked shoveling but it's real, New England, winter weather. The front yard of the Quarter Acre now looks like a World War One trench system with the front walk shoveled out, a path around to the side door, the drive way and sidewalks cleared and a trench dug that permits the spotlight that I put on the front door each Christmas to actually light the door.

I've long been a fan of the pristine snow cover but this December has changed me. I love the paths and boot prints and the sled marks in the yard -- a real winter camp/adventure feeling is permeating the Quarter Acre. I'm not quite sure where to put any snow from any future storms, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Unless some crazy tropical air mass surges in from the south this Christmas should be a white Christmas, the first that I can remember in years.

Raptor On The Merrimack

Yesterday, I saw something I've never seen in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts: a Bald Eagle. I was talking to the IT person at my current gig when I looked out the window and saw this large dark bird with a white head and white tail feathers swooping over the Merrimack River. It was a pretty amazing sight and it reminded that in August, after writing "Hawk vs. Crows" I had mentioned that I would post about some of the raptor activity I'd seen over the summer.

Well fall has passed as well and I never did that post, so here is a brief rundown of some of the more memorable things I've seen.

In late June Mrs. Agricola and I were at a Red Sox game. At some point in the early innings I looked into center field and saw a falcon soaring around. It alighted on the large John Hancock sign in center field, sat thee for a couple of batters and then was gone. I'm sure that it was the same falcon that I used to see when I worked in the Prudential Center.

In mid-summer a moving van nearly hit a huge Red Tail about 400 yards from the Quarter Acre. The bird swooped low across the road and banked sharply and nearly vertically up the front of the truck's box to avoid being hit. I got a great view of its breast and wings and tail feathers as I drove by in the opposite direction.

We visit Mrs. Agricola's father on Cape Cod frequently during the summer and the Ospreys are all over the place down there. As a kid it was rare to see the Sea Hawk, but they are everywhere now -- their huge nests resting atop perches built for that purpose as well as on power line towers.

Up until about a month ago I was working in Harvard Square where a Peregrine Falcon often caught my eye. I didn't see this bird too much this summer but did notice that it had returned in the Fall.

I jumped back into the freelance market in mid-November and took a job up in Newburyport, MA. I cover about 53 miles each way up I-95/128 and there are loads of Hawks along the ride. At least twice over the past three weeks I've seen a large hawk standing in the median strip, in the grass, in the same place each time. I don't why he's there but the fact that he's in the same spot leads me to believe that he's not just made a kill. His northern-Mass kin all sit in trees, but he's on the ground.

Nothing compares to the Eagle though, that was an amazing site.

Conspiracy Theorists

On the morning commute today I saw a car with three, large, homemade bumper stickers. They stated that WTC 1,2 & 7 fell on their footprint at terminal velocity which is impossible without explosives . . . then went on to invite the reader to a web site.

The September 11 conspiracy theorists infuriate me because they've latched onto this tragedy not as a way to honor and bring justice to the day's victims but rather to besmirch a president they revile and also to show what a wretched country we all occupy. The motivators behind the latter are mysterious to me, while the former is typical of the left's vitriol -- which never fails to astound in its rage and depth. It's not enough to dislike the president anymore, the opposition must now vilify and accuse him of a monstrous act of murder.

I am also amazed at the lack of coherent logic in the argument that the Bush Administration perpetrated this act. After all, as I'm sure the liberal conspiracy theorist would tell you, Bush is the stupidest president we've ever had. He heads the most incompetent and corrupt administration in the history of this country. Yet, he managed to pull off an amazingly destructive, murderous attack involving 19 Saudi nationals, four hijacked planes and a black-ops demolition team to execute a plan that involved flying three planes into three of the most famous buildings in this country, and crashing the fourth into a field (it was shot down, actually, don't you know that?)and then detonating the charges to ensure that the Twin Towers collapsed. In fact, this plan was so secretive that in the six ensuing years no one involved in the plot has breathed a word of it.

Writing out the theory -- as I imagine it must play because I've not visited the site and will not lend credence to the theory by linking to it or visiting -- makes me afraid to actually share the road with such deluded people. To think that this was a US government hit job defies imagination. To think that this guy probably has a job also mystifies. I wonder what his co-workers must think as they walk by his vehicle in the company lot. I also wonder how he misses the irony of the fact that these stickers grace the back bumper of a BMW, rather than the side of a stolen shopping cart filled with someone's possessions. We live in an amazing country, except for the people who think it's not.

Tall Bike

This is the second time I've seen this guy in the past week or so. I don't normally comment on my photos but this one deserves a little context. This picture was taken at the corner of JFK and Mt. Auburn Streets in Harvard Square. The guy's head must be 9 feet off the ground, and he was hanging onto the street sign for balance while waiting for the light. The bike has a little battery pack on the left, rear side and it powers some speakers that were playing Rush.

I showed the photo to some colleagues and one of them knows these folks, or at least of them. They are called SCUL, and there are many bikes, pulled from trash heaps and reconfigured or engineered from scratch. Check out Armada to see the number and styles of bikes.

Not So Sure . . .

On my morning commute I saw a guy who must have weighed 270 lbs. -- if he weighed a pound -- riding an old Kawasaki or Honda motorcycle. The bike was not a rice rocket, nor was it a high end cruiser -- just one of those 200CC beaters with the boring paint job. He had on a big, silver, full-face-shield helmet, a gray polo shirt, jeans and Ugg boots. It's the Ugg boots that spur this posting, my first in a while, because they put the scene over the top in terms of ridiculousness. Grown men shouldn't wear Ugg Boots, especially not 270 pound men riding old, beater bikes on 80 F mornings.

This is a petty, pointless little post but absurdity reigned.

More Liberal Bumper-stickers

Coming into work this morning I saw another stupid, liberal bumper-sticker:

"Support Our Troops By Telling the Truth"

What does that mean? Can we define "truth?" To what "truth" is the owner of that car referring? Is it the the liberal "truth" that Bush lied? The liberal "truth" that the war is lost? The liberal "truth" that war solves nothing?

The great irony of the liberal bumper-sticker-displayers crying for troop support by "telling the truth," "bringing them home," etc. is that they don't support the troops because they don't support the troops' mission. They want to bring them home to score points against the stupid and hated W, and really don't care at all about the troops. Listening to liberals speak of the troops they actually regard them as country-boy-hicks (lots of Red-Staters) with retarded social views (no gays in the military, you know) who aren't smart enough to do anything else but carry a "gun" in the American Imperial Army . . . (Jean-Francois's "joke"). It makes me crazy that the troops have been so politicized by the Left in the service of the Left's political aspirations.

Highway Prioritzation

Unfortunately I need to drive to work every day. I'd prefer it if I could take the train, but I can't. I live in a part of the Boston 'burbs that would require me to take a 40 minute car commute and turn it into a highly scheduled, 90 minute train commute. In my time in the car, commuting to work I've become quite familiar with the dismal condition of the Commonwealth's road ways. While the roads aren't as bad as the roads found in the Himalayas, they are certainly sub-par for a First World Country such as ours.

Potholed, uneven surfaces patched many times over, water collecting dips and severely sinking man hole and storm drain covers make for a tough ride, regardless of municipality and local tax base. The roads around here stink.

Imagine my surprise when I noticed the paving crews alongside Nonantum and Soldiers' Filed Roads (that I drive twice-daily) -- alongside being the operative preposition . . . They were digging up and resurfacing the recreational path that sits between the road and the Charles River. It's a nice section of road, one I've often thought I'd like to run, or bike. I commend the Commonwealth for improving the user experience of this trail along the river.

however, I ask, did anybody in the bureaucracy look at the road alongside which they replaced the path? Did they not think it important to fix this road so that the substrate is not exposed? Do they think rim bending potholes do not warrant repair? The prioritization process that lead to the upgrade of the recreational trail over the roadway that carries people to and from work every day is laughable, and a classic example of how the leaders of the commonwealth think, or don't. I was talking about roadways with a friend of mine and mentioning how a regions roads tell much about a place. The roads in and around Boston speak volumes.

March 16?

More fun!

Commute

Fun!

Sunset

Liberal Wit

One of the great joys of commuting around the Commonwealth is that we get to see all of the hilariously witty, liberal bumper stickers.

Don't Blame Me I Voted for Kerry!
Somewhere in Texas a village is missing its idiot.
Bush, like a rock, only dumber.
More trees, less Bush.

Then, this one, seen today, the crowning achievement of liberal bumper sticker wit:

Where are the Republicans taking us and why are we in this handbasket?

None of these are funny. None are witty. None are that interesting. If you replaced Kerry, or Obama, or Hillary for Bush, and changed the state to match, lefties would get mad and say that conservatives are puerile and stupid. Yet, they cover their vehicles in this inanity and somehow think that they are being funny. The "don't blame me" bumper sticker is a holdover from the first Clinton Presidency. It was only mildly amusing then, and now, co-opted for use against Bush it lacks a certain impact, yet, there it is, shouting in our face at many a stoplight.

These silly little liberal tropes really sum up for us the inanity of the left and its lack of seriousness. All protest and no program. Sound and fury . . . signifying nothing. We wonder why the level of debate in this country is so low. The answer is on the leftist's SUV in front of you at the light.

Winter Morning

Winter finally comes to Boston.

Encountering the Raptor

Despite living in NYC for the better part of a decade we never saw the famed nesting- pair of Red Tailed hawks that lived in Central Park; nor the Red Tails who were evicted and later reinstated at a tony address on 5th Avenue; nor the Peregrine Falcons who supposedly hunted at will throughout Midtown; nor the trained falcons used to control pigeons in Bryant Park. It took our move to Boston to start encountering urban raptors.

Just last week, while walking near my office a sudden movement high atop a bell tower caught my eye. The pigeons who roost up there suddenly took flight and started flying around the tower in large swooping arcs. Within moments a Peregrine Falcon coasted into view looking for lunch. The small bird peeled away and about three minutes later it reappeared, approaching the bell tower and potential lunch on a new vector.

At another job, in one of Boston's tallest buildings, we had the good fortune of sitting in a cube with a westward facing window -- looking out towards Fenway Park and Boston's western 'burbs. A Peregrine Falcon lived nearby for we saw it almost daily, hunting while riding the updrafts that scoured this structure. Our perch was high enough that at times we could see the falcon from above.

As much as we might have wanted to we did not see either of these falcons make a kill. We did witness a kill on the Quarter Acre in the spring of '05. One morning, while holding Child One by a window, watching birds on the feeder, all of the avian diners bolted in a panic. Within a moment a hawk dove past the feeder, talons out, and landed on the lawn. It came so close to the feeder that at first we thought it had picked off an unfortunate sparrow. However, as it flew away, after standing proudly in the middle of the lawn, most-definitely occupying the top of the food chain on the Quarter Acre, we saw that it had nailed a ground-feeding chipmunk.

This same hawk has flown by our porch -- at eye level, close enough to hear the air moving over its body -- and we frequently hear it while working in the yard, chirping and screeching from its nearby, but unseen nest. Last spring this raptor had a partner and we watched them soar high, high above us, nearly transparent in the sky, but highly audible as they screeched to one another while making lazy circles.

Spending as much time as we do commuting to our job we also notice many hawks perched above the highways and byways of the Commonwealth. Two hawks hunted from neighboring lampposts over I-95/128 in Woburn. One was struck by a car -- we saw its carcass by the side of the road in the late summer -- leaving only one hunter to scan the shoulders and median strips of that road. A giant hawk perches atop a lamp post along Soldiers' Field Road in Brighton, hunting along the obviously abundant banks of the Charles River.

The overt presence of these amazing predators is one more exhibit in a growing body of evidence that nature is adapting and growing ever more comfortable living in close proximity to humans. Many might argue that Man encroaches ever-more into nature, and forces this adaptation. Our neighborhood, however, was built in 1954, and is therefore, not a recent encroachment into some pristine wilderness area. Despite the seemingly settled nature of our man-made environment we are surrounded by the eternal struggle between hunter and hunted, entropy and stasis. It would not take much for our environment to revert to its original state as evidenced by the raptors that live comfortably in our midst.

Traffic "Flow"

Being employed as a contractor compels one to follow the money. In the case of the author, the money trails leads 40 miles from the home field. That translates into an 80 miles round trip in pursuit of gainful employment. This distance is covered on roads neither scenic nor calm but rather on some of the nastiest, most miserable highways on the Eastern Seaboard. The traffic is atrocious, the driving of fellow wayfarers even worse (if there is something worse than "atrocious") and the ability to predict conditions nearly impossible. The Massachusetts State Police call the section of highway that we drive each and every work day "The Banzai Pipeline." Enough said.

The time spent on these highways, often sitting, sometimes hurtling in a mad dash for any sliver of open road, has provided ample opportunity to ponder the phenomenon of traffic. Certain phenomena that amaze, yet never delight, on a daily basis are:

1. The evolution of the left hand lane as a 45 MPH travel lane.
2. When approaching major right hand merges/exits with other highways the left hand lane stops dead, yet the lanes between the merge/exit continue to flow unimpeded.
3. Mere taps of breaks at the head of a line of traffic can cause a multi-mile ripple effect throughout the traffic stream that effectively stops traffic behind the point of the initial slowdown, leaving people behind the offenders stuck in a jam long after the perpetrator is home, enjoying a cocktail. These are the jams that mysteriously disappear at some random point on the road.
4. People must slow to watch a cop take a speeder's licence and registration, or watch people exchange papers after a fender bender thus causing the aforementioned ripple effect.
5. There is nothing like the setting sun to surprise people at nearly the same spot, and the same time every day. "I came around the corner and the sun was in my eyes so I jammed on the breaks . . . "
6. Hitting the breaks to slow down while going up a hill.
   
7. This is specific to the Commonwealth of Mass, but, there is nothing like cleaning out storm drains, replacing guard rails and trimming trees along the highway during the morning drive to snarl traffic.

Without a doubt, the commute from the 'burbs to the job, whether in the city or in another 'burb has been the biggest challenge and adjustment over the past two years. Never, would we have thought that we would miss the A-Train out of Brooklyn. All of the quality of life changes that we anticipated by moving out of the city, into the 'burbs have either not materialized, or been mitigated by the commute. It is something that was unexpected, and still being processed, and perhaps the thing that most make us question our move.