The First Pictures . . .

     B and I went on a long weekend, and I thought I'd use our getaway as an opportunity to try out the camera on my new smartphone. I took about a hundred photos. To be honest, many were close-ups of the street or the grass. I got a few good pictures of my foot. But along the way I did see this sign in front of a bar in Pennsylvania, and so I had to stop and take a snapshot. How can you not like a saloon keeper with this dry sense of humor?

Better than the other way around?

     Anyway, we went to Philadelphia for the Chestnut Hill Fall for the Arts Festival, held every year in October. (This the first time we've gone.) Now, some of you might think that the cheesesteak capital of the world is an old rundown industrial city that has seen better days, and that it is no place to take a minivacation.

The restaurant was empty Sunday morning, but packed on Saturday night when we ate there

     In fact, Philly probably has seen better days, but it is still the fifth or sixth largest city in the country, depending on how you're counting -- bigger than Washington, D.C., Miami, Atlanta, and San Francisco. And there are still many good things about the city -- the music, the art museums, the historic sites, several top colleges and many other schools of various forms and functions. And there are some nice neighborhoods, too.

The band kept everyone hopping

 
     Chestnut Hill is considered by many to be the nicest neighborhood in this city of neighborhoods. But actually, Money Magazine recently selected its next-door neighbor Mount Airy as one of the top urban neighborhoods in the country -- while Rittenhouse Square is a place where you can buy a $1 million condominium, the nearby Fitler neighborhood is an up-and-coming area, and Manayunk, a little farther up the Schuylkill River, is where the 20-something hipsters live.

The garden store was decked out for fall

 
     But I don't pretend to be any sort of expert on Philadelphia. I was just there with B to enjoy the arts fair, which featured around 150 tents and kiosks where artists, craftsmen and others plied their wares.

Something for the kids

     We arrived in Chestnut Hill on Saturday evening, and it was plenty warm enough to dine al fresco and watch the crowds walk by. But the real crowds arrived Sunday morning, and stayed all day.

Yes, it was crowded.

     There was music, and rides for the kids and all kinds of food. The weather was perfect -- partly cloudy and warm enough to walk around without a jacket. And best of all, we stayed another night so we didn't have to fight traffic getting home on Sunday evening.

Mistake? No way ... this is art!

     We had a lot of fun . . . but to be perfectly honest, I have a lot more learning and a lot more practice to do before I can rightly say that I know how to use the camera on my new smartphone.