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the original plan was to meet eliza in boston in the afternoon to hang out and catch up. but after dropping off theo at her father's place in westwood, she decided to have some lunch. when she called me again around 2:30, it was already a little late to be strolling through the city. besides, the much-talked-about snowstorm had already started south of boston and it'd be a matter of time before it arrived in the city and surrounding area. since eliza had a rental car, i suggested she swing by cambridge and we'd just hang out at my place. nothing but the calmness of forced air heating and a few dozen variety of teas.

this gave me time to ride the bike down to harvard square to deposit a check from client N. it was only half the amount of work i finished back in september, but better than nothing. it was just starting to flurry a bit, but the over-anxious city road crew had already caked most of the main roads in a thick layer of rock salt. riding the bike on the street, all i could hear was the crunching beneath my tires.

since i wasn't in a rush to get back home, i wandered harvard campus, making a pilgrimage to sever hall, one of the two romanesque buildings designed by h.h.richardson. it's not as ostentatious as his typical style, but does have some interesting details, like the rounded brick work around the arched western portal entrance.

the snow had picked up its pace by the time i rode back home. these were big snowflakes too, large enough to easily see its intricate crystalline patterns. i put the bike away in the basement before coming into the house. no reason to leave it out and get buried by the snow.

eliza arrived about an hour later after her previous call. it took longer than usual because of the falling snow. she brought the remains of a chocolate birthday cake her father had given her. it'd been a while since she was at my place, but not much has changed. she went with an indian spice tea while i had some vanilla hazelnut tea. we chatted in the living room before she left around 5:30 to meet up with her father, we was bringing back theo at her apartment in jamaica plain.

it continued to snow throughout the evening. the last time we had any significant snow in the area was back in january 2012. it was only a few inches and that was it as far as snowfall went for the entire winter.

unlike rain, snow falls silently, so it's hard to gauge the severity without looking. unlike rain, snow accumulate into shapes depending on which way the wind blows and the type of snow. approaching midnight the precipitation was already tapering down. i went out and shoveled the sidewalk before it had time to freeze.

i then grabbed my camera (with wide angle lens attached although i also had my 18-200mm in my bag which i didn't use) and walked around the neighborhood to take some photos. i bumped into these 2 guys who were throwing snowballs; turns out they were my upstairs neighbors steve and paul! steve was taking photos with his iphone.

this was a heavy wet snow that tends to clump and stick to branches. not sure what's the official cambridge snowfall amount, but it varied anywhere between 2-4". i walked in the streets because most of the sidewalks hadn't been shoveled yet. i also had my umbrella because i didn't want to get the lens wet; when i wasn't shooting i tucked the camera inside my jacket. i headed in the direction of harvard square. most of the university properties had already been plowed, a combination of snowblowers, trucks, and sidewalk plows. occasionally i'd see some like-minded folks out enjoying the snowy landscape and taking photos. there weren't that many people though since the students are all gone on winter break.

i learned something about night time photography using the 60D. normally i nearly always shoot in aperture priority, but for low light situation, it's better to shoot in shutter priority. what happens when i shoot in aperture priority with autoISO is the camera has a tendency to use a really slow shutter speed for balance, which results in a bright photo, much brighter than the intended exposure. so i just have to remember to shoot in Tv mode in low light situations if i want more honest exposures. so for the rest of the evening, i shot mostly at 1/10 sec shutter speed.

i returned home about an hour later, with several hundred photos on my memory card. i spent the rest of the evening sorting through them all.