Wolf, Wolf

Suspicious packages found in Boston. Ties to Iranians, ya think?

Two of the packages did not contain explosives so far. Gee, who would have guessed.

Everytime jackass Bush makes one of his assinine statements, England thwarts a terror threat, or we find suspicious boxes somewhere. Sheesh.

This time it the cartoon network. It seem that they planted these boxes almost two weeks ago as a publicity stunt. Homeland security was so on top of this that the comedy channel had to call in suspicious packages to get things rolling. Problem was there is snow forcast and security may never have found the "bombs". Eff'n dopes.

Not much longer now. 719 days to go

Second Try at Peace

Yesterday I road to the designated spot for the peace rally and noticed I had an extra dollar in my pocket. Being a day early gave me a chance to ride my bike again today.

SIDENOTE:

My regular route makes me cross a very busy highway that separates the waterfront from the historic district. There are traffic lights and it's no problem crossing. I have another option of using a pedestrian overpass.

When I got to the crossing there were cop cars and police in the middle of the road. One waived me through just as I was asking if I could go straight up the hill. I was wearing a face mask which along with the traffic noised muffled my question. There was another police presence two blocks away, stopping people from going down the hill. Hmmmm?

I called home and told wifey that something was definitely amiss. There has been trouble, (gun trouble), here in the past. I continued a half mile up the hill and low and behold, tow more cops. They stopped me and the traffic and I really wanted to ask what was going on, tactfully you know. He motioned for me to cross and I seized the opportunity, "Is someone important in town?". (Knowing full well there was a major crisis with all this police presence). "Power outage" {{{{sigh}}}}. They were directing traffic.

I was sure terrorist were in the process of causing mahem and death. After all, ther is a WalMart nearby. What better target than that?.

I really wanted to go to the rally, mostly to take some pictures. I went to the first one this group held four years ago, when Iraq had wepons of mass distructon, and were forty five minutes away from anihilating us. It was in some church in the center of town, and many of the speakers of that long ago day were at today's gathering. The one thing I noticed was that people were very vocal this time. The first one was like a gathering in anticipation of a cyclone or hurricane.

Because everything in this section of the city is closed on Sundays, I brought along a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch. When I was eating, I noticed that I was the only one with food. A lot of the people were giving me friendly looks and smiles. There was a black lab shepard mix who abandoned all his pride, walked up to me, sat down, and began drooling. Dogs don't know how to give friendly looks and smile. He got a good piece of pb&j for his work.

The day was not all protesting. I took a route that brought me by the old Ash St. Jail. This thing was built sometime in the mid 1800s "out in the country", so to speak. Now it sits right smack dab in the middle of the city.

On the way back to the city I came across two houses that made my photo finger itch.
One was yellow and one was big.

This is the yellow one.

This is the big one

Tomorrow is weight watchers weigh in. Last week was 6.5 loss. This week may be a little less but still a loss. I am eating well and excercising plenty.

Ciao.

Peace Rally

On the weekends I'm not working I get dog duty. We took an extended walk on the Phoenix Bike trail continuing down the new section. We passed my favorite spot, which in the winter, takes on a whole new look. While I was focusing this picture, a flock of ducks suddenly took flight and scared the bejesus out of me and the dogs.
We all let the world know we were startled in our own way. One of us yelped, one whined and one pee'd. All the commotion we did caused a second flock to take off and put the bejesus back into us.

The three of us continued down the new section of the trail that took us into the salt grasses. Our 90 minute constitutional was surprisingly nice considering the sub freezing temps.

There was a peace rally scheduled at the city zoo. I decide it would be a good bike ride up there to take some photos. The rallys are pretty mild and it's mostly members of the Quakers. Some of the local rightys go to try and harass them, but they are not taken seriously. Mostly losers.

I stopped for a quick lunch at one of the old hang outs, "The Dog Mill". Actually the main reason was to warm up my feet. I also wanted to say hello to the new owner, who waitressed there for overy 20 years. She got a good deal and decided to buy the business. Good luck to her.

Riding toward downtown, my old high school begged me to takes it's picture. It's amazing that there were over three thousand students in three grades.

I stopped as my buddy Kennedy's place to warm up again. The talk turned to local politics which gave me my incentive to move on. I almost turned back a couple of times because of the cold but forced myself to continue to the end of the penninsula into Fort Rodman. The penninsular road is a bike and pedestrian friendly route. Everyone has their own lane.

Get out of the way

The ride was nice and scenic but it as" cold enough to freeze salt water.

Inside Fort Rodman sits an older smaller encampment. Fort Taber, built for the civil war and constructed by Capt. Robert E Lee. Before he became a traitor that is. The Tabor museum covers the Civil War and all the succeeding wars.

I got caught at the Fairhaven bridge opening and snapped these two pictures of the hurrican barrier entrance and the tug boat Chicopee.

The peace rally. That's tomorrow. Which gives me a reason to ride.

Birthday and Bad Back

Todd came home to celebrate my birthday with dinner at the Fireside Inn in Middleboro, Ma. He was also here for a friends wedding, which worked out well.



I was still reeling from a strained back from racquetball, but mangaged, with the help of a caraff of house red, to be good company.

Two weeks of rest and stretching allowed me to get back on the court last night. Playing two full and a few minutes into the third match. Toby and I took a short break between match two and three that allowed my back to tighten up. At the first twing, I called it a night.

A little tight today, but a lunchtime walk should losen it up sufficiently.



Bike commuting can start any day. All I need is the hutzpa to get out of bed in the morning. Any day now.

Why I Own Henry Shirt

No Wait, Now It's Winter

Today is the first really cold day of the year. With the wind chill the temperature hit a low of -3 F. Lunchtime 3 mile walk was actually not bad at all. A wool hat, face mask, gloves and a medium weight coat kept things just below toasty.

Friday will be the first racquetball test since tweaking my back. Rest and "medication" is working.

Friends are suggesting going to a chiropractor. I may as well boil the eye of a newt with a wing of bat and sing kumbya, for all the good a chiropractor will do.

Winter Weather Finally

I really like winter. 35 degrees, sunny and little wind made for a very nice lunchtime
walk/jog. It's only three miles, but is so much better than sitting in the cafeteria watching the news. The walk took me through the abandoned Paul Dever School in Taunton, Ma. Not as many others walking this day. I guess many were spoiled by the balmy weather of the past few weeks.

Racquetball in the evening was not so good. Twenty minutes into warm ups my back twinged. Today I am walking like a crab. Two or three days is the usual full recovery, but it has been a couple of years since the last incident. Tomorrow I'll try walking. Fingers crossed.

First Ride of "07"

The AMC was doing their postponed New Years Day ride. The Narragansett Bay Wheelmen had their route planned. I did not feel like either. So I headed out on my own with camera.

Moorings sitting unused for the winter. Normally there are hundreds of boats tied up here. Mostly 25-40 footers.

I had heard that there was going to be some sort of celebration at the zoo and rode on over. What ever it was, I missed. I think it had something to do with the Patriots football team, of which the following pictures are coincidence and not any sort of opinion.






















A couple of places in Dartmouth got my attention.



Collecting shells















Riding over the Padanaram Bridge













I also have to give props to one of my LBS's and one of my favorite Portuguese restaurants.































I did ride by one of my favorite areas, which by the way is where another of my favorite eateries is located, Freestones.



The background building is the old Customs house. It's where a lot of us got suckered into the military.











The original Third District Court House. circa 1870













An upscale city grill. Freestones was originally "Citizens National Bank" (mid 1800's). It was also a very rough bar under two names, "Haskell's" then the "Pequod Lounge" (of Moby Dick fame), in the 50's thru the 70's.








I eventually made my way back to Fairhaven and the comfortable Phoenix bike trail.


A stream from the Naskatucket water supply.
















Another look









I did get back to Evergreen St. and was greeted by my neighbors Austin, and Zack.




Austin
















Zack










The first 25 miles of the 2000 mile club is in the book.

German waterbed

While waiting for the rain to subside and head out for a ride I was perusing Youtube. This one is a side splitter.

The last two woman are classic

Early Morning Lake Photos

When I work weekends I take roads that I avoid during the week because of the traffic. The early morning was bright and crisp when this pond got my attention.