Denise Goldberg's blog

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Hawk watching

Ah... a hawk watching me watching him (or is it her?)...

watchful hawk

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Summer color

summer wildflowers

summer wildflowers

summer wildflowers

Guineahens prancing

Funny birds...

guinea hens

guinea hens

Are you watching me?

These two funny beings share the name Peekin' Zeke.

I was first introduced to one of their relatives at my office. There was a red-headed Zeke watching one of my colleagues. He made me laugh, so I asked who he was. It turned out that he was there when my colleague moved into her cube. I picked him up to find his "proper" name jumping out at me.

Ah, a quick web search, and I was able to invite these two to join me. They arrived yesterday, and yes, they do make me smile.

Peekin' Zeke




Want a Zeke in your life? I found them here.

Friday, July 25, 2008

Emerging into sunlight

Sunshine, blue skies, colors, flowers glowing... What a welcome change after what seems like days of constant rain.

flowers

flowers

That's a lot of water!

It feels like the rain has been falling and falling and falling...

The National Weather Service rainfall totals for the storm were just published. Wow!



The town I live in isn't listed, but Lawrence is, and that's the town just north of here. Almost 4 inches - that's a lot of water!

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Rumble, crack! Dark, wet...

Yikes! As I was driving home the emergency broadcast system kicked my normal drive radio program away, announcing the sighting of a funnel cloud and a tornado warning. I wasn't far from the office when I heard that, I could have returned - but the tornado warning was for an area many miles south of where I was, so I just kept driving. Driving slowly, conscious of very large puddles of water on the road...

I knew it wasn't going to be a riding day, but I was hoping for a nice walk in the rain. This wasn't nice rain though. It almost seemed as if sheets of water were cascading from the sky. Not drops, sheets!

It was a good excuse for a rest day, a day of watching the water fly from under the cover of a solid roof. Tomorrow? I'll hope for a good walking day (it's going to be wet again, so I think riding will need to wait for yet another day).

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Organizing my world

Fine tuning the entry to my galleries keeps jumping up and calling out to me. Most of the groupings that I present seem to work - but my Travel category keeps growing and growing and...

The original organization of my travel galleries was simply by trip. That meant that when you entered Travel that your eyes were overwhelmed with lots of choices. Too many choices. I've been thinking about it for a while, and I've finally come up with some groupings that (I believe) work. I'm relying on you to tell me if my new organization works - feel free to sign my guestbook (look to the right and click Talk to me, I'm listening to sign my guestbook or to send me an email).

My Travel galleries are still organized by date. The galleries from my latest trips are at the top of the gallery. Trips from previous years are grouped together by region, and within the region the newest trips are again at the top. Yes, when you click Travel you are presented with a combination of things - starting with recent trips, and then going back to groups of trips by region. I think it works. Take a look, and let me know what you think.



Some examples...
Travel, top level of my wanderings as linked from navbar.
Coastal New England - 2007 & earlier, trips by region.
Southwest wanders - 2007 & earlier, trips by region.

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Between the raindrops

Heavy rain was predicted for the afternoon. While the morning temperatures were relatively low compared to yesterday, the air felt like it was loaded with water.

It was a morning for wandering on my bike, for getting caught in a brief but light shower, for catching a few bright flowers in my camera lens.

raindrops reflection

flowers

No birds!

I'm still fascinated by the sand sculptures that I visited in Revere Beach. Take a close look at this one. Look at the top of his head. Do you see the wire? The artists place wires at the top of the sculptures to convince the birds that they shouldn't land on the sculptures. I never would have thought of that!

And yes, that really is a pencil in this sand man's hand!

Revere Beach sand sculptures

Revere Beach sand sculptures


The face of an artist, hard at work...

Revere Beach sand sculptures artist at work

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Sky before storm

sky paintings light peeking behind clouds before the storm

Images in sand

Oh look! There is a sand sculpting festival in progress at Revere Beach. A simple newspaper announcement caught my eye and drew me in... The festival started on Monday with a demo sculpture that was to be created by everyone working together, and there was a juried competition running from Wednesday through Saturday. I thought about wandering over there today or tomorrow to see the finished sculptures, but I was stopped by my lack of interest in being in the midst of hordes of people. Somehow heading to a beach park close to Boston on a summer weekend day when the weather was forecast to be very hot didn't seem like a good match to my normal habits.

I really wanted to see the sculptures though. Hmmm... what to do?

I decided that there should be enough to see if I wandered to Revere Beach after work on Thursday. After all, the big demo sculpture was supposed to be complete at the end of Tuesday, and the sculptures for the competition would be two days done. As it turned out, that was a great decision. I saw some pretty amazing art in the sand, visited with the sea gulls, and walked on the beach and into the ocean.

OK, OK, walking into the water was a bit of an accident. I was walking while I was looking through the lens of my camera - admittedly not too smart. And as I was walking along the edge of the beach, the ocean snuck up and caught me. The water was surprisingly warm.

The demo sculpture appeared to be pretty close to complete.

Revere Beach sand sculptures

Yet signs of tools and wood-encased sand are seen behind the still-in-progress work.

Revere Beach sand sculptures


The details sculpted in sand are truly amazing.

Revere Beach sand sculptures


Planes soared overhead as they left Logan Airport for places far away. And birds and the ocean drew my camera's eye.

plane taking off from Boston's Logan Airport

sea gull running

waves breaking on Revere Beach


And yes, of course there are more photos! Jump to my Images in sand gallery if you'd like to see them.



If you're interested in more information, I recommend visiting the web site New England Sand Sculpting Festival at Revere Beach. A quick sound warning though - this page is accompanied by sound, the sound of waves crashing along the shore.

And you can read an article about the festival titled Beach beauties published in the Boston Globe on July 19, 2008.

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Colors of the day

wildflowers

flowers

twisted vines

Unclear?

Today a big smile came courtesy of an email:

It's been reported that some of you are having problems with your phones. If you're experiencing problems, please call the help desk at <>help desk phone number<>.
Hmmm... that would be a good trick, wouldn't it?

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Painted white on blue

sky painting

Watching over my shoulder?

Were you watching over my shoulder, enjoying the sights as I pedaled from home to Portsmouth and back again?

If you'd like to see some of my captured images, please visit my photo gallery.

Are you looking at me?

I knew I should have been biking with my long lens today; a close-up of this face would have been priceless!

I felt like this beautiful creature - I'm guessing it's an alpaca - was wondering what the two-legged being on the other side of his fence was doing.

Climbing vine

Do you suppose that the power companies intended for their poles to be a conduit for this very energetic vine?

I didn't think so either!

Friday, July 11, 2008

Off

Wandering off again, that is. I'm headed out on my bike for a two day trip - home to Portsmouth, NH today, back again tomorrow.

You can wander over to my journal titled Short, sweet - Seeking ocean views if you're interested in following along.

Monday, July 07, 2008

Sunday, July 06, 2008

Relaxing, quiet

Ah, a three-day weekend. I had hoped to do an out-and-back ride this weekend - out one day, and back the next, that is - but the weather forecast called for a rainy middle day. As it turned out, there wasn't any rain on Saturday and I could have done my two-day tour, but I'm just as happy that the weather wizard's iffy forecast stopped me from traveling.

Why? Because I think I needed some quiet time, some relaxing days. Yes, I rode every day. But I also relaxed, read a mystery, added a new Recent galleries page to my (web) site. Relaxed. And it felt good.



Here are a couple of shots that I grabbed during a photo stop during my ride today. This fountain in a park in the center of Lawrence, Massachusetts was built in honor of Robert Frost.





Yikes!

I was just about two miles from home, rolling down the road on two wheels, when I suddenly felt like I was missing something...

My thoughts... Something feels wrong. What is it? What should I have with me that I don't? Hand to head, yes, my helmet is there, and so are my sunglasses. Something is missing. Something...

It took me a second, and then I realized that I was missing my Road ID. Uh oh!

I could have continued my ride sans ID. I thought about that for all of a second, but I didn't. I couldn't. I looped back home, strapped my ID around my wrist, and repeated the beginning of my ride again. I'm much more at ease knowing that if something happens to me that my emergency information is on me. And luckily forgetting my ID is not something that happens very often.

And if I'm traveling, I just never take it off.

Too many photo galleries?

Sometimes, when my camera has been particularly busy, I wonder if you can find my most recent galleries. I've been featuring galleries (or sets of galleries) on my Kaleidoscope page. And I've been toying with the idea of creating a recent galleries "map". Well, yesterday, I took the time to do just that.

My new Recent galleries page can be accessed from the Kaleidoscope page, or by clicking Recent Galleries in the Links (sidebar) section of my blog. You will see a list of galleries, with the newest galleries at the top of the list. If a gallery interests you, just click on the sample photo or the gallery name to jump directly to that gallery.

Try it out now... click here.

Friday, July 04, 2008

Simple beauty

Pssst... Rover here!

I know that some of you know me. If you read the journals from Denise's trips in June, then we've already been introduced. But for those of you who haven't met me before... I'm Rover. I'm a little red dog, and I travel with Denise. In fact, here's a photo of me on our recent trip to Acadia National Park as we rolled around Park Loop Road:



I convinced Denise that I should write the journals for our trips while she played with her cameras. And in the process of writing those two journals I became addicted to writing. So I figured I'd jump in to Denise's blog every so often to keep up my writing. I hope that you don't mind!

Why am I writing now? First, it's the middle of the night; Denise is sleeping, so I thought I'd jump on and use the computer. And I wanted to let you know that Denise finally finished uploading photos to the journals. Her photo galleries have been done for quite a while, but she also likes to put photos in the journals so that people reading there can be enticed by seeing some of the photos.

Have you read our stories in the journals? And seen the photo galleries?

If not, and if you're interested, just click to see our Acadia journal and photo galleries, or to see our Zion journal and photo galleries. And if you want to talk back to us, there is a guestbook in each journal, and one in the photo galleries too. Feel free to sign it!

And oh, I do like to write!

--- Rover

Thursday, July 03, 2008

Oops... wet!

It was supposed to be a riding day. While the weather for most of the week consisted of late day pop-up thunderstorms, today that was supposed to wait until after dark.

But the weather wizard was busy. Changing, changing weather...

I arrived home after work to a light sky if I was looking in one direction, and a very dark sky if I turned around and looked the other way. Hmmm... should I ride? or walk? My decision? Walk!

At the turnaround point of my almost-4-mile walk, the rain started. It was light at first. And then... Waves of water pelted down, bands of raindrops visible as the wind blew. Rivers flowed down the edges of the pavement.

It was a walk that reminded me of the kindness of strangers. A woman in a car with a young child stopped and offered me a ride. I thanked her, but opted to keep walking. A bit later, I passed a house where a woman was standing on her porch with her two young daughters. I smiled at them and waved. In response, the woman asked if I was all right, offering shelter. I kept walking.

I was very wet. And I was laughing!



It was in the mid-80s when I started my walk, and I left the house without a rain coat or hat. I have both, and both would have been useful on this walk. The air was warm, but oh! the water was cold!

I did choose to walk in my very comforable (and washable) Chaco sandals instead of my normal walking running shoes. So my feet were quite happy, and I had no trashed shoes to deal with when I "dripped" into the house.

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Sweet treat

Some when, many, many years ago, I was introduced to papaya. Not somewhere - that was Hawaii. But some when...

The taste of this wonderful fruit is always welcome, and always a treat. I discovered that while papaya from Hawaii tastes wonderful in Hawaii, it doesn't seem to travel well. Luckily the papaya that grows in Central America does seem to keep its good taste when it wanders into the markets here in the northeast.

My treat this week comes from Belize. And oh! It's so delicious.

I could eat papaya all by itself and be perfectly happy, but tonight I tossed it with strawberries, blueberries, and some yogurt. Yum!