Category Archives: photos

Misc photographs of absurd things.

More dog food on the way!

Posted on by under About writing, Books, photos

I have another book in the works. Anyone who knows my penchant for OCD behavior had to see this coming. After all, how could I have nine books out when, with a little effort, I could release a nice round tenth book? Well, the book isn’t round. It’s rectangular like the others but the number 10 is…

Oh, never mind. You get it.

With any luck and some hard work on the part of myself and the rest of the team—designers and early readers—it should be out in time for beach reading season. Not that I expect you to actually read a beach. What I mean is…

Oh, never mind. You get it.

And a beach read this will be, with some romance, some excitement, some mystery, some broad comedy. That isn’t supposed to be a sexist comment. The term “broad comedy” refers to…

Oh, never mind. You get it.

In case you’re looking for a good reason to buy my next book, or any of the others, you might be interested in an endorsement one of my books recently received. The following picture gets the point across:

Yes, even pets enjoy my books! This little dog tore into my recent book, “Only Love Can Break Your Leg”. Now, how many authors can claim multi-species fandom? It was traumatic for the dog’s owner who hadn’t finished it and had no idea how it ended! After I told him the ending and he had a few months of therapy, he was okay. The dog needed no such help because he finished the book. And when I say, finished, I mean…

Oh, never mind. You get it.

[Obligatory shameless self-promotion: If you don’t have it, you should get it. This and all my others can be found on my Amazon author page today. In a couple of months there will be one more. The tenth, a nice round number but not a round book. Then I’ll be able to sleep better.]

Skimming off the photo pile

Posted on by under photos

Some more photos to share from my backlog. These are bicycle related:

Window boxes outside a great bike shop on Martha’s Vineyard:

The flowers aren’t doing so well but the sentiment is spot on.

Seen in the North End of Boston:

Can you believe some people put water bottles in this super convenient sub holder? What are they thinkin’?

For every temporary impediment to cycling…

…there’s a glittering invitation to go farther!

This is my favorite bridge in all of Massachusetts. Straddling Newton and Watertown, the Charles River Greenway Bridge is a beautiful structure spanning a beautiful river along a beautiful bike path. It has me dreaming of spring already.

A couple of turtle pictures…

Posted on by under blog snax, photos

A BlogSnax© post

Can there be enough turtle pictures? Here’s my contribution:

I count over 40 turtles on this one fallen log, possibly as many as 50. It’s like a horizontal Yertle. An amazing demonstration of coexistence.

From the No-Brainer Department, seen on a local road:

Well, yeah! Next we’ll have a sign saying “fast cheetahs”.

Partial Photo Backlog Dump

Posted on by under photos

The ideas for this blog have been piling up, but so have the weird photos I’ve been sitting on. And there are more just about every week. Let’s throw a few out into an unsuspecting world before they get too stale.

From the people who brought us the ever-so-tasteless “FU” ad campaign comes this bit of stupidity. They’re “Flamin’ Hot” but they’re Cool Ranch. Only in the Frito-Lay universe is that possible.

So much better was this much needed encouragement received at a local self-serve gas station:

It’s nice to know someone believes in me.

Covid-19 is over but as this photo, taken recently inside a porta-potty (yeah, I’m that desperate for material) indicates, the paranoia and madness remain.

Lock it up! Lock it up!

Is this a big enough problem–people putting their bikes on top of this fence–that they need a special sign for it? On the other hand…

…this sign is clearly needed, especially for whoever put the sign on the piano.

And last, but not by any stretch of an already stretched-to-the-breaking-point imagination least, this alarming picture-within-a-picture from the what-the-heck-were-they-thinking department:

I don’t even know where to begin with this disturbing picture, obviously the product of a seriously deranged mind. It has given me nightmares since I first saw it. Now it’s your problem. Good luck.

Scenes from a novel…

Posted on by under About writing, Books, photos

The following photos capture locales in Boston that serve as settings for my newest novel, “Only Love Can Break Your Leg”.

If you’ve read it, I hope you enjoy the background. If you haven’t, maybe this will pique your interest. Enjoy.

A beautiful day at Boston’s waterfront, a great place to explore on a blind date.
Bike path in Southwest Corridor Park,
for a fast getaway from South End fiascos.
A walkway on the Greenway,
perfect for a romantic stroll.
A bike on the Rose Kennedy Greenway.
Walk those bikes!
Food trucks waiting to serve you on the Rose Kennedy Greenway.
The very posh Boston Harbor Hotel,
an ideal location for a midday tryst.
Harbor view of Boston Harbor Hotel.
Archway of the Harbor Hotel.
A desperate cyclist could ride right through it.
The Hatch Shell waiting for an oldies concert.
View of an Esplanade lagoon.
Nice setting from which to listen to a concert.
Arthur Fiedler footbridge spanning
a busy Storrow Drive.
Food store in the Boston’s North End.
Mangia!
North End baseball field.
Even more fun “under the lights.”
Bike path through the North End
Pageantry and dining on Hanover Street
in Boston’s North End
There’s always a reason
to celebrate in the North End
Restaurant on North End side street.
View of MIT in Cambridge across the Charles River.
What dirty water??
Sunset over the greatest city in the world.

Mixed Messages

Posted on by under Generic Rant, photos

Saw this sign on the side of a building during a recent bike ride:

Okay, I’m good with that. I’m a massive proponent of supporting local businesses.

But wait! Pull back a little and we see the bigger picture:

What am I supposed to do with this cognitive dissonance? Subway spreads like a deadly pandemic across the face of this country. Fine. Let Iowa, Florida, and New Mexico have their nasty, mass-produced, generic sandwiches. But here in the Boston area, home of some of the best local sub shops east or west of Tuscany, Subway is unnecessary at best, a cancer at worst, eating away at our culture like the rot slowly consuming the shack in this photo.

Run away! Run away!!

Priming the pump

Posted on by under About writing, Generic Rant, Original writing, photos

You ain’t a writer if you don’t write

Much to my embarrassment, the last time I wrote a real blog post for this blog–not a shameless advertisement for one of my books–was January 23 of this year. (My other blog is not much better. Last post: August 16, 2019. And that one was preceded by an eight-month hiatus.)

Mea culpa.

Once I completed The Endless Cycle (a four-book series for middle-grade readers (all installments now available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle versions (I couldn’t resist (sorry)))) I decided to take some time off to regroup, relax, recover, rethink… and do some jigsaw puzzles.

Time’s up. I have to put something out here to prime the pump for my next large-scale project, one as yet to be decided. So here goes: A brain dump of random strange thoughts that have been piling up.

Lessons I’ve learned from my grandchildren, Part I: Any truly good book has stickers at the end.

I don’t think, therefore… am I?

I love Maine. It’s a beautiful state. My favorite spots are Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park, or as we say in Boston: Bah Hahbah and Arcadier National Pahk. (Contrary to popular opinion, we don’t discard our “r”s, we recycle them.) I have one problem with the state, however. They need to put a moratorium on the use of the pathetic pun “Mainely” in their advertising and business names. Driving around the state, you’ll encounter “Mainely Lobster”, “Mainely Antiques”, “Mainely Burgers”, “Mainely Brews”, and Mainey more. Enough already.

Speaking of Maine, on my last trip there, I saw this bumper sticker:

I thought it was a souvenir, but then I noticed it was on Donald Trump’s car. Makes perfect sense.

It’s a shame that the common expression is, “sweat like a pig.” Two fun alliterative alternatives exist: “sweat like a swine” and “perspire like a pig.” Just sayin’.

Here’s some word weirdness that makes me say hmmm…

  • Overlook and oversee are opposites. As are “look over” and overlook. Yet an overlook (noun) is something you should look over rather than overlook.
  • Loosen and unloosen mean the same thing.
  • Flammable and inflammable mean the same thing.
  • Valuable and invaluable aren’t quite synonyms but they aren’t the opposites one would expect, given the spelling. Invaluable, in fact, means more valuable. Go figure.
  • A one-way mirror is the same thing as a two-way mirror. Good thing streets aren’t like that.

The English language was obviously created by committee.