·:[ photo log ]:·
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I flew back from Miami on Monday night several hundred dollars poorer and maybe a little more tan. Waiting for the long term parking shuttle, I was greeted by a constant blast of 35° air in Newark. I probably should have found the time to change out of my shorts I was enjoying in the sunny mid-80’s weather of south Florida.

Fortunately, that was the only bad part of the trip. Me, Jim and Matt all flew down to take advantage of a Red Sox spring training package which included tickets to two games, photos and autographs with Coco Crisp and Tim Wakefield, a BBQ next to the field, a VIP tour of the stadium down in Ft. Myers (they even let us on the field during batting practice), and passes to the biggest Irish bar in Florida on St. Patrict’s day. In addition to that, we managed to pack the weekend with several more fun things including an evening in South Beach an evening in Ft. Lauderdale, and a tour of the everglades on an air boat. The rest of the time was spent driving back and forth between Hollywood and Ft. Myers, and hanging out at Al’s place. It was a first class weekend all around - with first class flights there and back, access to the Regency Club at the Hyatt (as many free drinks and bacon-wrapped scallops as you could stand) and of course the VIP BBQ and tour at the stadium. Frequeny flier miles are fantastic. Thanks to Jim for those.
I’m already planning my next vacation to some place with palm trees…

We happened to notice Johnny Pesky walking by while we were at our BBQ at the park. I snapped this photo of him with Matt, Jim and Al. Being the guy with camera means you never get to be in the cool pics.

Some other pics from the weekend are here.

An unexpected mid-winter racing event to shoot was a welcome change for me. There really aren’t many exciting things to shoot this time of year. Sunday’s Mini-Motard racing at “Racing America’s” go-cart track in Foxboro, MA was a ton of fun. Racing mini motards around a go-cart track is a pretty new phenomenon - this was the first motard race at this track, and there was a huge turnout. Despite the full day of racing, there was only one minor injury requiring attention - probably much better than anyone was expecting.

The two obvious racing styles in this new sport were polarized by each racer’s experience - there were the knee-out road racers and the foot-out motocrossers. Some people may argue with me, but it seemed like the road racing style was dominating at this track. The road racers seemed better able to shift their weight on these little bikes. Nonetheless, both types were a ton of fun to watch around the track.

The accomplished road racer, Jeff Wood, blew the field away in all of his races, including the final in the fully modified class, in which he was competing on a lightly modified Honda. Jeff is pictured in the second photo…
Here’s a link to the gallery.

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Taking a picture of Alan taking a picture of me… somewhere along the way in the deserts of socal.

I liked the sign in this picture taken on Mt. Otay in way southern CA. We were only a few miles from the Mexican border here. This sign appears to urge mexican aliens to run in the opposite direction of approaching wildfires. It was evident that most of this mountain had recently burned in wildfires - the vegetation in most parts was very sparse and thicker branches were charred.

I put up a gallery with a few more pictures from last week here.

I love vacations. I now have a beard and am 10 lbs fatter from eating burritos and burgers all week. Besides eating, we did some other cool things such as sailing.

I snapped this photo on Friday evening - we went sailing in San Diego Bay and caught a great sunset over Silver Strand beach on the way back to the dock. It was also a full moon, so we watched the moon rise over downtown SD while the sun set. Nothing is cooler than wearing a t-shirt on a sail boat in mid January. I already miss socal. I’ll get a gallery with a few more pics up a little later.

Took some photos at First Night in Boston…

Christopher Columbus Park, lit up all nice for the holidays.

Stopped by Bova’s for some Italian baked goods in the north end.

Fireworks over the Harbor.

I’d generally limit this log to photos I personally take, but this one ended up on my camera somehow, so I guess it’s fair game. I’m assuming my brother took this, but I don’t remember. I would attribute the artistic lighting to him having no idea how to use the flash. I leave it in manual mode, so apparently he didn’t know how to adjust for exposure. Nice job though, neat effect. I’m inspired to take more photos like this in the future. I just cropped it, otherwise untouched.

Snapped this pic of Al’s dog, Roscoe last weekend. It pretty much sums up the relaxing Christmas weekend I had.

Just playing around with my new macro lens. 60mm f2.8. Looks really sharp.

I sold my bike today. We had a lot of fun together.. sad to see it go.
There will be another bike some day.