Kalona Sunset

A cold winter sunset across the little town of Kalona, Iowa, home of one of our favorite brewpubs, to end the current year.

Circles, Iowa City

I am embarrassed to admit that I have no idea where these brassy concentric circles are located, other than somewhere in the Iowa City area. I took this image early last year, and like the artistically irregular ridges, but neither notes nor context nor memory clues me to their identity.

Flotilla of geese, Waterworks Park, Iowa City

A great flotilla of geese out on the lake in the middle of Waterworks Park, bobbing around surprisingly quietly and placidly.

Geese over Waterworks Park, Iowa City

Geese circling over Waterworks park, apparently happy enough with this location as the stopping point on their migration.

Howard "L" Station, Chicago

Loops of train storage at Howard Station on the North side of Chicago.

Bangular Perspective, Iowa City

Looking straight up at a giant Christmas ornament in the Coralville Mall.

Recycled Tree, Chicago O'Hare

In the Terminal H/K split in Chicago O'Hare Airport, there are Christmas trees put together by various different departments of the terminal staff, and this recycling tree really stood out to me as unique among the group.

Christmas in July, Coralville, IA

Callback to a warmer time of year, this Christmas Eve: Santa & Mrs. Claus bringing up the tail end of the Coralville Fourth of July Parade.

4th of July, Coralville, Iowa

Fireworks are hard to shoot, and I struggle with night photography at the best of times, but I'm happy how I was able to capture the illuminated smokey strands around this burst.

Roller derby dinosaur, Coralville, Iowa 4th of July

I really can't say much that could possibly add to the title of this picture: yes, it's a roller derby dinosaur in a Fourth of July parade. What more really needs to be said?

Rain approaching over the cornfields, Southern Iowa

Heavy clouds bear rain in from the West, localized downpours visible out far across the cornfields. I never remember experiences like this from New England: the first time I remember seeing rain as a "thing" moving towards me across the land was when I visited the Amazon during high school. I think the real difference is not hills but trees: there are places enough where the land is relatively flat in New England, but no matter how flat, the trees surround you always and block your line of sight to the horizon.

A fingernail of sun through clouds

Just after totality at the eclipse last summer, clouds swept in and partially obscured the sun, allowing one to glimpse its fingernail crescent through them without glasses.

Wandering spider, Columbia, MO

A nice, big, fuzzy peripatetic spider encountered in my journey to the eclipse last summer.

Dawn at Tan-Tar-A, Lake of the Ozarks, MO

Dawn silhouettes the water-tower of the Tan-Tar-A resort at Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri.

Alternative cows, Columbia, MO

I have absolutely no idea what story leads to a painting of Normal Cow having a tea-time gossip with Tiger Cow and Strawberry Cow, but I like the absurdity of the whole thing.

Sunset near Dubuque, Iowa

Just a nice, orange layered sunset.

Sunset house near Dubuque, Iowa

House windows glowing with reflected sunset.

Icy fields near Dubuque, Iowa

Fields near Dubuque, Iowa, sparkling after an ice storm.

Catfish anatomy house, Dubuque Aquarium

A playhouse in the form of a giant catfish teaches piscine anatomy at the Dubuque Aquarium.

Ocean tanks, Dubuque Aquarium

Curving translucent wall by the ocean tanks of the aquarium in Dubuque, Iowa.

Projected fish, Dubuque Aquarium

Projected fish on the floor of the Dubuque Aquarium.

Snowmakers in summer, Sunday River, Maine

Clusters of snow-making guns, grouped for servicing during the summer months near the bottom of one of the mountains at the Sunday River ski resort in Maine.

Sunset from Deer Island, Boston Harbor

Two views of sunset from Deer Island, out in Boston Harbor, walking on the beautiful trails near the giant sewage treatment plant and watching the jets take off and land at Logan Airport.

Stylish new condos in Cambridge, MA

Stylish, multi-colored condominiums have replaced an old derelict lot near my office in Boston, all no doubt going for sky-high rates given their proximity to public transit and parkland, in the continually intensifying Boston real estate market.

Letting off steam at a Boston construction site

The steam boiling up fiercely from this giant steel pipe appeared to originate under the street, leading me to wonder just what interaction with utilities or whatnot might be happening on this construction site in the cold Boston winter.

Flooded fields in Iowa

Even slight topography of the land stands out during floods, as the small river in the upper right of the picture spills throughout the flood-plain fields below and to its left.

Ripples in the sky, Iowa

Waves of low dark cloud like ripples in the sky.

Palm trees at Stanford, California

A double-row of palm trees grace the open, airy architecture of Stanford, enabled by the (mostly) dry and warm climate of the San Francisco area.

Urban Curry, San Francisco

Alas, I didn't have a chance to try this restaurant in San Francisco, but I really liked their style.

Capped rebar in a construction site, San Francisco

Rows of red-capped rebar mark the current height of a concrete wall under construction near the docks in San Francisco.

Shedding Berkeley message board

Given the overloaded state of this message board, it seems there are quite a lot of student and community events at UC Berkeley.

Berkeley at Dusk

Looking down the hillside of the campus at UC Berkeley at dusk.

California mine

An open pit mine, on the approach toward San Francisco. The main working face appears to be the upper portion, while the lower area appears to have been transformed into a tailings pond, with floating barriers and other machinery emplaced to presumably help manage the environmental impact.

San Francisco salt ponds

On the Southern end of San Francisco Bay, the water is divided up into vast shallow parcels that turn out to be one of two major sea-salt production facilities in the Unites States. The water in the various parcels is differently colored depending on the season, the stage of production, and the organisms that happen to be blooming there at any given point.

O'Hare Sunrise

A deep red sunrise emerges over Chicago O'Hare Airport.

Quad Cities Mississippi Crossing, I-280

A bridge over the Mississippi, between Illinois and Iowa, encountered in silhouette at sunset on our way back home.

Train axles in transit, Ohio

Another view of some of these train axles: passing these on the road, seeing how they are such complete and solid forms, I came to wonder if they are even actually attached to train cars, or if the car simply rests on top of its axles, using gravity and mass to hold it all together.

Train axles in transit, Ohio

Another wonderful discovery in transit: this one rows of train-car axles, each one a mighty solid steel form.

Sunrise near Lake Erie

Another early morning on the road, this time somewhere in Pennsylvania or New York by the edge of Lake Erie. On long car drives, I love starting out before dawn: by the time we even get to breakfast time, I am hundreds of miles closer to my destination, and lunchtime is a full day's 600 miles or so, leaving the afternoon and evening for play at our destination or stopping point.

Partially assembled vans in transit, Western Ohio

On Interstate 80/90, between Chicago, Illinois and Toledo, Ohio, we passed literally hundreds of partially assembled vans going in the other direction, all neatly stacked in little rows on flatbeds like this one. Clearly, there is a factory somewhere near Detroit or Toledo that is making vans (no surprise there), but what was unexpected to me is that they would then be hauled hundreds of miles to some other factory to be completed.

Dawntrail, Illinois

On a road trip this summer, a contrail at dawn, somewhere in the middle of Illinois, with my daughter sleeping gently in the back seat.

Family Operated, Lone Tree, Iowa

I think I shall simply allow this wonderful sign to speak for itself.

Nesting Boxes, Waterworks Park, Iowa City

In the middle of the big lake in Waterworks Park in Iowa City stands this fantastically modernistic stellation of nesting boxes, all well-occupied during the summer with chirping, gossipy parents.

Lamp at night, Iowa City

An elegant web-work patterned lamp near the Hancher Theater in Iowa City.

Well-TP'ed tree, Iowa City

A few weeks ago, one of our neighbors had the tree in front of their house quite thoroughly TP-ed. Since it happened only a few weeks before Halloween, I thought at first that it might have just been some sort of awesome spider-web decoration, but pulling up closer I saw otherwise, and got to explain TP-ing to my kindergartener.

Cicada, FW Kent Park, IA

A beautiful big cicada, passed away after its brief moment mating in the sun.

Dry bridge, FW Kent Park, IA

One of the other neat things about the lake in FW Kent Park is that the trail circling around it has a collection of antique steel road bridges that have been brought into the park and refurbished. They too look quite different without water.

Green lake bottom, FW Kent Park, IA

Another look across the great green shallow bowl of the bottom of the emptied lake, this time down its long axis.