goatee

highlanders feed

°2025.04.22.Tue | New Orleans, LA

Newport RI beach

We’re back from NOLA, where I presented at the 2025 Popular Culture Assocation Conference. I didn’t care for the French Quarter (too many tourists and addicts) but I did note a few things, that can be seen in my photos.

  • We made much use of the 12 and 57 tram and bus lines, respectively.
  • The RTA public transit ferry ride to Algiers Point was a nice and inexpensive way to float on the Mississippi.
  • Stores were more casual about dogs than those in Boston; the buses were okay and the trams more strict—even when we had Nixie in a bag, as permitted by policy.
  • Folks there like their floats! Weekend nights are lit by open air buses and floats full of women drinking and partying (in Ward 7 at least).
  • City Park is not a nice walking-about park; rather, it’s a bunch of athletic fields.
  • Audubon Park is a lovely place to walk about (designed by an Olmsted).
  • The Garden District is beautiful.
  • I enjoyed Oak St. neighborhood, in Ward 14.
  • Breads on Oak is one of the best vegan bakeries I’ve ever been to.

°2025.03.10.Mon | Newport, RI

Newport RI beach

We took a weekend trip to Newport, RI. It wasn’t freezing, but it could be windy. Nonetheless, we enjoyed some beautiful views, including those from cliff walk, the sunset from old observation tower at Brenton Point, and of the bay at Fort Adams.

°2024.08.26.Mon | The lost rock of Lake Michigan

While visiting Michigan for a family wedding, we came across the Lost Rock of Douglas Beach, Lake Michigan.

beach holland_MI

°2023.07.27.Thu | Pittsburgh visit

by_nora pittsburgh

Given we are thinking about the next stage of our lives, we visited Pittsburgh as a place we might move to. We enjoyed the city. There was plenty to do and see, we got around easily on bus and POGOH shared bikes, and we were taken with some of the neighborhoods. Our favorite were:

  • Lawrenceville
  • Friendship
  • Point Breeze North (near East End Food Co-Op)
  • Mexican War Streets in Central Northside
  • (Bloomfield and Garfield are also okay)

°2022.08.30.Tue | Sunday River, Maine

Visiting a ski resort in the summer makes for beautiful views. We took chair lifts up the mountain and hiked along a trail.

Barker Mountain, ME

°2022.03.14.Mon | Caladesi via Clearwater

In 1985, Hurricane Elena filled in the Dunedin Pass, separating Clearwater Beach from Caladesi Island, though it is a bit of a (lovely) hike.

You know you’re near the boundary, when you see the shell trees.

park caladesi clearwater shell

And you know you should hurry back, when the tide starts coming in.

°2022.03.13.Sun | Gulf Coast Sunset

sunset clearwater

Something that tickles me, as a New Englander, is an aquatic sunset.

°2021.09.07.Tue | North Shore, South Shore

This labor day weekend, we got a car and explored the coast around Boston.

On Saturday, we explored the North Shore and happened across Gerry Island, for which there is a path when the tide is out.

Marblehead island

Monday, we explored the South Shore, and enjoyed the rocky beach of Webb Memorial Park.

Webb memorial park detrius

°2020.12.21.Mon | What counts as meat?

Rebecca Schuman’s Schadenfreude, A Love Story reminds me of my favorite zines from the naughts, and I’m enjoying her stories of high-school angst and collegiate travel from that era.

Last night I laughed with recognition when she learned, as a vegetarian in Germany, that the little cubes of ham on her broccoli and cheese was not meat but ham (“Das ist doch kein Fleisch – das ist Schinken.”)

I’ve had similar experiences traveling the world as a vegetarian:

  • In Europe and Asia, ham, chicken, and fish are not necessarily “meat.”
  • In Asia, a “vegetarian” dumpling can have fish sauce.
  • In Asia, asking for “vegetarian” food can also mean no onion or garlic because the diet is closely associated with Buddhist monastics who swear off pungent vegetables.

°2019.07.18.Thu | Goose Pond Lake

goose_pond lake

We had a lovely long weekend in New Hampshire.

Casper isn’t keen on swimming, as he was when younger, but he still loves the water. Kayak or canoe, he rests his chin on the gunwale and watches the water go by.

We tried paddle boards on this trip, and he contentedly climbed on and lounged as his tail dragged in the water. Once, when back from a trip across the lake, he climbed back aboard as if to say, “okay, let’s go back out.”