How can you not love an animal who actually smiles at you?  BTW, the way I got this photo was by putting the camera on the ground and composing from the window on the back turned upwards.  Camera smoke and mirrors:

Yeah, probably not.  But there is always that moment.  Something is going to happen.  The town casanova is going to get his comeuppance.  The long lost prodigal son will return.

That’s how I feel when I go to the North End for the annual carrying of the dollar bill covered saint.  Like I’m reliving that moment.

Let’s go to the movies — Italian style:

There are a few universal truths in life.  First, never mess with the people who touch your food.  Second, never trust a person who does not like dogs.  Third, if there is some kind of crazy event with people in costumes, music and homemade flying anything, I will surely be nearly capturing the unfolding chaos.

Ever since I saw a video of one of the multiple Flugtags in the world, I have wanted to attend.  Who doesn’t want to go to an event where a bunch of people attempt to pilot some kind of paper mache chicken into a body of water????

The event was tons of fun but I did think the paper airplanes and fake trains were going to go a bit further than they did.  To be totally honest, I wanted to be up there with the people piloting the homemade aircraft and falling into the water.  But those are just ambitions for the future, I guess.

Flugtag, there is be, what is was:

Sitting in a plastic bag!!!!

One time I was talking to a former coworker of mine and I mentioned how Gandalf was my favorite character from Harry Potter.  Now people all of my blog reading public (27 and counting!!!!) please do not write to me at the same time.  I did realize my error and I know that Gandalf is the wizard from the Lord of the Rings movies.

I just open the blog entry with this short anecdote because it illustrates how little I actually know about the world of fantasy and science fiction.  I know next to nothing about it.  So why do I attend Comic Con every year???  BECAUSE IT IS A TON OF A FUN.

The people at Comic Con are obviously dressed really interestingly.  Cosplaying, they call it.  And you run into all sorts of interesting people.  Oh and those interesting people talk.

Below here there is going to be a picture of Mr. Spock, Vulcan (I think) not world famous baby doctor.  Mr. Spock, played by Cambridge native Leonard Nimoy, was a person that I even knew.  Leonard Nimoy is one of my favorite people of all time, simply because his voice is used to test the surround sound speakers in the theater at the science museum.  Who put the bomp, sho, bomp, bomp in the bomp sho bomp bomp, Mr. Spock intones over the loud speakers.  Somehow I imagined all Spocks (Nimoy or not) to be totally friendly.

Now the Spock I encountered at Comic Con was not unfriendly, but let’s just say he was a bit demanding.  First, he wouldn’t let me take his photo until I observed the rule on the sign above his head that said cosplay is not permission to take a photo.  Then he asked for a contribution so I could take his photo.  Then he ran away when I tried to take our photo together.  I mean he finally played ball when I handed over a couple of bucks.  It was all in good fun though.  He was raising money for epilepsy and hey, whatever.  It was all for a good cause.  Gotta give Spock points for enthusiasm.

Actually, everyone in fact:

Is he a time traveler?

Are we meant to be together?

Is this how the story ends?

I visited Peddock’s island on Saturday.  Did I say exotic places?  Well, I guess.

The place though was pretty phenomenal.  It had this kind of wild abandon and decay about it that reminded me of a kind of a movie set like with long lost uncles or aunts living in the middle of nowhere.  You gotta kind of make up your own movie in these places, I guess:

Whale watching.  An activity I have a love-hate relationship with.

Long ago, actually eons ago, I went whale watching with my parents.  This was probably in the mid-1980s, when we’d come to Massachusetts on summer vacations for the “nature.” We went on a little whale watching trip off the Cape.  I honestly don’t remember how many whales we saw that day, but I do remember getting ridiculously sea sick.  My mom told me not to go inside of the boat but I did anyway and got incredibly sea sick.  After that experience, I think I didn’t go whale watching for another 20 years or something.

I went whale watching in 2014 and we saw a lot of whales.  And I went today again.  Today did not portend well.  It was raining and I was late with my little charges.  Its Saturday and even this honey badger needs sleep, so I kinda overslept, Starbucks kinda took a long time in getting my coffee and the green line was kinda slow.

Then we got on the ship.  It was cold and rainy outside and inside, again, made me kinda seasick.  Kinda really seasick.

Then we go out into the open sea and the animals took over.  The animals really put on a show for us today.  I’ve never seen such a thing before.  There were so many of those whales and they were popping up left and right.  There is something really wonderful about seeing whales out in the open sea, animals in general in their natural habitat.

In the end, I kind of forgot about all of my sea sickness.  Ok let’s look at that them there whales:

Good artists copy.  Great artists steal.

The original:

My $2 version:

All these lines in my face getting clearer: