23 May 2012
    

Pasadena, California



Tomorrow is Ditch Day at CalTech. Tonight seniors will put the finishing touches on their brainy puzzles. Tomorrow--they risk getting duct-taped.



13 May 2012
    

Boston, Massachusetts




12 May 2012
    

Concord, Massachusetts



Daniel Chester French has shown up a few times in these pages, including the charming local custom of leaving a Massachusetts state quarter on his grave in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. And speaking of, if you ever find yourself in Concord on a weekend evening, with an hour to spare before the 10:31 train to Boston, I suggest a nighttime visit to the contemplation benches in front of French's Melvin Memorial there. You can contemplate undisturbed as long as you like, if you don't mind the spooky.



12 May 2012
    

Walden Pond, Massachusetts




11 May 2012
    

Boston, Massachusetts



I tap Ezekiel.



9 May 2012
    



4 May 2012
    

Salem, Massachusetts



What a kick-ass thing to see in front of kick-ass navigator Nathaniel Bowditch's house. I did a report on Bowditch in third grade and I recently reread "Carry On, Mr. Bowditch," the book I used as a reference. It: still kicks ass.



4 May 2012
    

Salem, Massachusetts




4 May 2012
    

Cape Ann, Massachusetts



The island out there is Norman's Woe, where the shipwreck in Longfellow's poem "The Wreck of the Hesperus" happened (and a long tally of real-life shipwrecks as well). I visited Longfellow's childhood home in Portland yesterday, but the real reason for the Norman's Woe detour: I'm trying to visit every place mentioned in this.



4 May 2012
    

Gloucester, Massachusetts




3 May 2012
    

Portland, Maine




2 May 2012
    
Lowell, Massachusetts

Kerouac's hometown of Lowell used to be the most important city in the U.S. during the Industrial Revolution. Now allllll of that is a National Historical Park.


2 May 2012
    
Hamden, Connecticut

This is the lookout tower in Sleeping Giant State Park. Note (which I did not realize until the summit): the tower is on the Sleeping Giant, so you will not be able to see the Sleeping Giant...