"Sometimes I feel like my job is Captain Obvious, " says danah boyd, sitting cross-legged and shoeless in a neon-green chair at Microsoft Research's office overlooking a frozen Charles River in Cambridge, Mass.
The practice of inviting guests to sit in the House Gallery is a tradition dating back to 1982 when president Ronald Reagan recognized Lenny Skutnick -- a good Samaritan who pulled a survivor out of the frozen Potomac River in Washington after an Air Florida plane crashed into the 14th Street Bridge.
In summer, hikers follow a muddy footpath that parallels the creek, but winter skiers slide directly up the frozen snow-encrusted river in eerie silence.
Blondy was like a skater up his own river, a frozen ribbon the rest of us might have glimpsed through trees, from within a rink where we circled to tinny music.