Bostonians Talk Funny

This week, I got to spend 3 days in Cambridge/Boston for a conference.  It was the Dynamic Systems and Control Conference (aka Nerd Conference), and I presented some of my research.  An exciting thing about this was that I got to run in Boston.  After my trip to Baltimore in June, I've realized that the best way to see a new place is to run through it.  I got to run by MIT, Harvard, the Charles River, and Boston Common.  This was also the first time I've ran with my camera, so you'll get to see some photos from my run.

First off, here was the route I took:

As you can see, I started in Cambridge, ran along the Charles River, ran by BU, did a loop of Boston Common, then worked my way back to Cambridge.

I tried to take a shot while I was running:

The rest of the photos involved me standing still (thankfully).

As I started my run, a large group of triathletes turned around just in front of me, and I ran just behind them for about a ½ mile.  As it turns out, they were the Boston University Triathlon Team.  Yes, the acronym for that is BUTT.  I knew who they were because one of the triathletes conveniently had the acronym on the appropriate part of the human anatomy (if you catch my drift).

The BUTT (hehe) stopped at this boathouse to do some jazzercise stretching.  I snapped this photo from the other side of the river.

The Cambridge skyline

This is the Harvard/Massachusetts Ave. Bridge.  It's measured in smoots.

I couldn't make a long enough route just going along the river, so I diverted over to Boston Common and did one lap of the park.  Here is the State House:

After going through Boston Common, I went back to the river, and went up to cross the river near the Science Museum.  There was some construction at the intersection, so two Boston cops were directing traffic.  They waved a woman who was running maybe 10 feet in front of me through the intersection, so I just assumed they would let me go through.  The cop was pointing at traffic, and said: "Gaw awhed, doh".  Since I don't speak Boston, I assumed he said something like "Go ahead, kiddo."  Well, what he actually said was "Stop in the middle."  I didn't and he yelled at me: "Traffic is coming!"  I darted across the street, yelled back "Sorry!", and hoped I didn't put myself on the wrong side of the law.  Whoops.

In addition to all the people running (there were lots), the Charles River is popular for rowing:

Apparently, there's a big running event that happens in Boston every year.  Not many people know about it, but for those who do, here's an important landmark:

And finally, here's a shot of me towards the end of my run.  I look worse than I feel.

I also went for another run of about 5 miles.  I was trying to figure out where to go, and thought I could run to Copley Square.  Copley Square is the finish of that big running event in Boston.  But, I decided against going there.  Why?  The only time I want to run in Copley Square is when I've earned the right to run there.  That time was not this trip.  Someday, though, I'll run through Copley Square.