Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Decided to spend my evening in Boston last night. The plan was to get some long-overdue sheets for my bed and take some shots of the skyline.

Bought the sheets, discovered that payphones no longer exist, shadows are against copany policy in the Apple store, there isn't a single place in that unholy monument to consumerism that sells musical keyboards and chalupas kinda taste like shit if you don't eat one for a long time.

Subway back to Kendall, walked ten minutes and set up my tripod on the bank of the Charles. It was fucking freezing. Cold enough to make you fingers no longer responsive after only a minute of exposure. Spent about :45 in 20°F plus wind to snap off a 9-frame HDR panorama.

Thought to myself, "I wonder if I should check the time? Naaah. ... Hm, maybe I should..." And so my cellphone reads 10:15PM and I stare at it for a few seconds doing the math. "That can't be right" but it is because cellphones don't lie.

I do the math. Twenty minutes to get all the way to North Station. The walk back to Kendall will take 7-8 minutes, the ride from Kendal to Park St. is maybe 2 minutes, the ride from Park to North Station is another nine. That leaves me six minutes of wiggle room to catch my train. I start jogging.

A cab passes which reminds me that cabs exist. I flag the next one down, get to the train with time to spare. Eight bucks. Ow. Cab fares always make me wince.

I process the pics on the train once I convince my fingers to return to active duty. The pictures all suck. The HDRs suck and the pictures won't stitch anyway.

I get home, so happy to be mere minutes away from lala land. I rip open the new sheets, start to put them on and ...they're the wrong size.

Six hours later I wake up for work.

95% of the time I shoot the left side of the train. It's more scenic and there are far less powerlines in the field of view. It also has the benefit of almost always being at right angles to the sun. But sometime around Bevery Farms I look back and see this:



All things being equal, this view is pretty much the most photogenic shot on my entire trip on any given day. This morning it was lit up perfectly with a blanket of cotton candy clouds floating over the water's surface. It was like the sky had landed on the water and it would have been one of my best pics to-date if I'd been set up for it. All I could do is snap off two shots with my camera settings all wrong and watch it float by.

Almost got off at the next stop. Came as close as you can without actually doing it.

My day had better get better. =)

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