Last week

another picture from last week. to the right you see the orange line station where we always get on the train. quite some snow!! and today it almost felt like spring....

Some snow...

last thursday it was snowing the entire day, but as it wasnt cld enough, nothing stayed on the ground. overnight it got cold, and we woke up to quite a layer of snow on friday. when we got to work they already had been busy for hours to get the roads clear, as you can see here. but... crossing streets is always messy; all the snow from the roads gets piled up, and as a pedestrian you just have to climb over it, and often sink deep into it. as you cant see where the pavement stops and starts, you might even sink deeper and you really have to be careful.... during the day it warmed up a bit, and this pile of snow became a slushy-mess. yuck!! so high waterproof boots are really a must!!

over the weekend it got warmer, and in no time all the snow has melted again... now we got quite some rain, so i still get to wear my boots.. :D

Friendly reminder

apparently, the dumping of used oil, antifreeze, paints, and other awful (household) chemicals are the primary source of pollution of the charles river. so.... most stormdrains have a sign like the one above, reminding people not to just carelessly dump their sh*t, as it will go straight to the charles river etc...

this one is actually on the bridge that i showed you yesterday.

as a kid, i sometimes used to make "soup" in such drains. we would throw in sand, mud, leaves, anything we could find and then stir it with a large stick... i guess that was one of the reasons they sometimes got clogged and all the rainwater accumulated at the little "playground" behind our house.... ooopss!

Neglected bridge

this is the longfellow bridge, connecting boston and cambridge. its for cars, the subway, bikes, or you can walk.because of the shape of the 4 towers in the center, as you can see here, the bridge is also called the salt and pepper bridge. hmmm. well, would never have thought of that, but ever since i read it, i guess i can sort of see it... unfortunately you cannot climb those towers. there was a time you could walk around them, they sort of stick out of the bridge, but as long as we live here the entrance has been blocked by fences.

this year they will start some major repairs on the bridge. the subway will not run during several weekends and the lanes for other traffic will be significantly reduced as well. according to wikipedia, the bridge has been neglected for a long time. the bridge has been there since 1906, but some  major repairs were only done way back in 1959 and lesser ones in 2002. they expect to spend almost 270 million dollars for repair. had repair been done regularly, it would have been "only" 81 million.... 

Such sights...!!

this is what we saw somewhere in page, arizona. just driving on a road, suddenly we drove between 2 mountains, and next thing we saw was this. if i remember correctly, in the back you see the vermillion cliffs.... 

it was frustrating, we arrived when it was already dark in page. and while we were driving that last part in the dark we sensed we were driving through amazing scenery, but couldnt see it!! so, the next day we drove a little of the same route, and, as you can see above, we did indeed miss quite a bit the night before. this country really has so many amazing sights to offer... and im glad we saw (some) of it already!!

Not really

some advertisement on the floor of a subwaystation in boston.... the weather defenitely is not getting hotter just yet! its quite stormy since yesterday, and today it snowed pretty much the entire day. not that much on the ground though... maybe that happens tonight, lets see.....

Ancient cottonwoods

while we drove around in texas last december, we saw quite some cottonwood trees. so very pretty! just this weekend i went through the photos and tried to make a selection that i can make into a photoook someday (the actual doing is the problem. the plan is there since a while, but at least now i started). its frustrating how fast you forget details of a trip!! yes, it was all pretty and impressive, but then you see some photos again and cannot even remember exactly where it was. or maybe thats just my problem.....

anyways. these trees had a sign warning you that you should not come too close as the trees were very old and limbs could fall off any moment.....

Bye bye.....

above a picture of the fung wah bus that has brought us to new york and back to boston quite a number of times now. going through my blog i see the first time i wrote about the fung wah was already in 2011! just a few months before i had taken the greyhound bus to montreal, and that wasnt much of a success. as it involved crazy driving, hour in traffic, annoying annoucements, too many stops in between, and expensive tickets, i thought we could just try the cheap chinatown bus (many people had warned us that whatever we do, we should never take the chinatown bus), as in fact ALL bus drivers drive like idiots. by now we have seen it so often on the road... being passed by a huge bus going well over the speed limit.

and so we did.... we quickly learned that its best to arrive on time, as you never ever want to sit in the back of the bus; thats where the toilet is (i guess thats enough explanation). we also learned that its really the cheapest and fastest way to get to new york and back. often under 4 hours, often without a pit stop (who needs that anyways when the destination is new york!!), always on time, and it was never a problem to take a bus earlier if you happened to be there and there was still space on board (try that with the other companies that require you to be there well in advance, and then just let you wait). taking the fug wah also turned out to be quite amusing at times. once, when we did stop at the mc donalds along the highway, one annoying passenger was not back within the 15 minute-limit, and our driver agreed with us passengers, and just drove off without him. another time (or was it the same?) we sat right behind the driver and while i was dozing off, i was first woken by the driver singing, quite loudly, and later eating sunflower seeds. also, they do slow down, full on the brakes, when they see a police car along the road, and yet another time, when going back to boston, the bus driver suddenly stopped. just alongside the road. walked to the back, used the restroom and drove off like crazy again.  without a word (they never ever say anything! except when they stop. "15 minute, you be back!") so yes, we took the bus numerous times, and even made it a habit to just go to new york for one day. 8 hours of chinatown bus included.....

but.... no longer. for now, the federal officials shut down fung wah entirely. a first inspection "just" took out the buses that were deemed unsafe; 3 out of 4, on a fleet of 28 (!!). that didnt deter fung wah; they just rented other buses and continued their crazy schedule of (i think) some 24 trips a day. the inspectors found badly maintained buses and cracked bus frames. pretty scary indeed. and when fung wah refused to cooperate (letting the inspectors see their safety records), their operating license was revoked entirely. buuuuuuhhhhh. it has been a while since we last were in new york......

Pretty tree!

today i was going through the pictures of our road trip in december, and found this one. it was in dalles, texas, at a cemetery. the trees were so pretty, and i didnt know how to take a picture of them. but tim did, i saw today, and now you can see that as well...

Fish-eye view!

we went to the beach for a bit today. it was a bit chilly, but not too bad.... we walked and i got to test this cool new lens tim got me. yaaaajjj!!!!

the snow is mostly gone (except at the places where they piled it up), and im wondering if we will get more this season. i dont think so, but you never know....

Self portrait

friday evening... time for a self portrait... :)
havent been taking a lot of pictures lately, hopefully tomorrow!!

Not real!

at first glance, you think....hmmmmm....? but no, its not real! this is somewhere along the high line in new york... must be pretty annoying having so many people walk by your window every day. taking pictures. of everything and all... including the fake man. or, especially the fake man....

Woods! Closed!

it has been raining. all day. lots and lots of rain. had it been a little colder (as was expected earlier), then it would have been snow... but no, we got rain... :(((

so, i looked at some summer pictures, and found this one again, its somewhere around gloucester. yep... in the us of a the woods can be closed. hahahhahaha!

Apartment building

this is in new york, but actually in the netherlands you very often see people hang their blanket (from the bed) outside their window. i always find that strange... hanging it out like that will make it dirty, no?

as we live in a corner apartment, we have a lot of windows (the reason we decided to take it; so much light!), but all windows have an (insect) screen, so when you open the window, there is still the screen that cannot move. thats pretty common here, but i find it soooo weird! what if you want to throw something out of the window? ;) stick your head out, or just get the crumbs from the tablecloth? 

In line

these people are waiting to eat something in the center hall of the museum of fine arts in boston. we were there a few weeks back. its always amazing to see the restaurant being entirely full, and having people wait like this. its just in this gigantic open space that connects the different parts of the museum. somehow those eaters are part of the collection too, if only for just a while.....

we never ate there and do not have the desire to ever do so... :)

Snow man!!

this is a picture of tim in the snow after the blizzard. now 2 weeks ago. tim thought it funny to jump into some snow, and well... i took the picture when i almost entirely disappeared in it... :)

the piles of snow are still alongside the roads everywhere. not white at all anymore, and melted partially, but still, so much snow had fallen during that blizzard that its still lying around!

now its snowing again, the entire weekend we had mostly rain, and only now, when its dark, its finally sticking to the trees. so very pretty!

lets see if the coming week i can get into the blogging routine again. the past week i obviously was not....

Nice ad

i was lazy the past 2 days, and i still am... but here is another picture! this is from a while back, when we were in new york... (as you can see by the water tower up in the corner). i liked this ad, even though i do not like such shoes.... i think they are very american! such high heels you never see in the netherlands (or at least, thats what i think. maybe things have changed by now?), but here shoestores are filled with them. i love shoeshopping, and am often disappointed when i see a nice looking shoe, only to take it out of the box entirely, seeing that it has such an impossible heel on it....

ah well, probably better for me. saves me some money... :)

More snow!

well, this is from last weekend, after the blizzard.... normally there is a road between the 2 traffic cones, but not last weekend...... we got some more snow today, very strong winds, and its very cold! in fact, its so unpleasant that we decided to stay home. we baked bread, cooked, watched some soap series. nothing special... somehow its now 1 at night and really time for bed! hope this time i can sleep despite the crazy winds....

Forgotten car

i showed you pictures of this place before. it was somewhere along the road in florida, dec 2011. several cars were standing around at various levels of decay.... 

here in boston we had some snow today, but nothing that remained on the ground. we do still have mountains of snow alongside the roads; they arent very pretty and white anymore, as you can imagine...

In Austin

on a wall in austin, texas, where we were last december. i thought this was a really cool graffiti.

in the subway today i saw a lot of men with "some flowers". normally you never see that. funny.... perhaps tomorrow all the valentine's candy is on sale? (the shops were full with chocolate etc). maybe i should check..... :D
as a valentine's gesture, the mayor of boston decided that parking was free today, so that everyone who wants to go out for dinner can do so without having to think about paying for parking.... although that didnt make parking in the center of boston any easier, i guess, especially since there are still huge piles of snow that are also taking up some spaces.....