Nipper

He's an icon of advertising. Nipper the dog, hearing "his master's voice" on a gramophone, the symbol of the RCA company for decades. This four-ton statue of him, without the gramophone, sits atop the old RCA building in Albany's North End industrial district. He's become an adored icon of the city.

Nipper sits atop the old RCA building on Broadway in North Albany.

That's pretty much all the photography I did on this trip. I didn't have much time to wander, and the weather was not good. My aunt's burial was on Tuesday. The cemetery was beautiful, almost like a Hollywood set, shrouded in a dense fog with old leafless trees towering over us like skeletons. I wish I could have a photo of that, but that just wasn't appropriate. After the ceremony, my uncle and aunt hosted a luncheon at a local Italian restaurant.

On Wednesday I spent some time with my cousin and aunt on my dad's side. She, too, is in a nursing facility, but she was alert and we had a good visit. That night I went out for dinner with L & L again to a fine Indian restaurant they know. Thursday morning was breakfast at a local diner with my uncle and aunt before catching my flight out.

That flight was not without its drama. Our plane was late arriving in Albany, so it was consequently late getting out and to Washington Dulles, where my plane to Paris was waiting. When we finally landed, I had 15 minutes to get to the Paris flight, in another terminal. I ran much of the way. When I got to the gate they had already closed the door. The gate staff said they would have to re-book me, but when they tried to verify that my bag had been removed from the plane (I was surprised it made it on in the first place), they learned that it hadn't, so they told the flight crew that if the bag was still on the plane, they intended to board their passenger. So I made it onto the plane just before it departed. Phew! The flight was good and my bag was among the first to show up on the carousel in Paris. My train from the airport was on time and I made it without incident. Ken and Tasha were waiting at the train station to drive me home. There's no place like home!