and now, the rest of the story (6.16-6.17)

the final installment...

6.16 935am
yesterday was a blast and to prove the point i am sore from head to toe. i finished the FT around 7, then i took the ferry back to boston (was in charlestown) but not before having a nice convo w/m since i missed the first ferry by 30 seconds. she lost another tooth, no surprise. cracked before i left. soon she will have no lower teeth. :/

today i'm going to cambridge for a festival and just to check the town out. possibly go to a museum but can't say. i blew some of my 'museum' money on photo stuff ($25 or so) so not really sure we can afford that.

but i'm not going to worry about $ now, just enjoy being here. which i am, SO MUCH. i think i would adore living in new england or the east coast (especially mid/north) because of the history. i could tell i started to tune out a little yesterday, basking in so much, but even so i felt in love with the whole wide world. everywhere i looked i saw something beautiful. which is why i used 3 rolls of film yesterday. :-p

ok time to get going.

checked my email downstairs, then went to cambridge. only partly on the subway though, due to some unexpected construction i believe. the good news is that a bus ride to the MIT stop, though slower, let me see more of the city, and i bet you can guess how i felt about that. ;-) anyway, once i got to cambridge and oriented myself, i spent oodles of time in the cambridge coop (a delicious bookstore). got some sunglasses (i lost them during the farmers market debacle the day before), and some lunch. walked down JFK street to the festival, and after i'd walked all the way thru, sat down to write.

6.16 322pm
well i just sat down to comment on how awesome the diversity of community vendors was, when i got asked do to a survey on the festival! so i got to give feedback on that (albeit briefly) but still. how cool! and i got two starburst as reward, which i am now enjoying. my favorites actually, lemon+strawberry. =)

the view here is amazing. i'm under two large trees overlooking the charles river, a very large, old building on the other side, and a groovy old bridge just down to my right. earlier i had lunch at a great little bakery called au bon pain. scrumptious little roast beef and herb cream chese sandwich on tomato parmesan bread, right in the middle of harvard square. i'm going to go over that way again later today, almost done with the festival here but i'm glad i came.

back to the point that led me here - the community groups were amazing. sure, women's groups, homeless, cultural - the usual. but we also had ones about archeology, linguistics and a few other ologies i forgot about already. criminy! i'm so jealous of this environment. and it's so lovely. no wonder i'm enjoying it so goddamn much.

i know it would be difficult to live here. i'm sure very expensive, and i can tell it gets muggy as shit. it's only supposedly in the mid 70's today but the humidity makes it seem like mid 80s. i forgot what that was like. this would be hard on my skin long term although i've done ok so far, amazingly.

incidentally i've also noticed a preponderance of white people and i mean WHITE. just as white as me. it kinda cracks me up. but as i said, makes me feel a little more 'normal', not that i let that get to me much in general.

being here also makes me really glad we plan to move. because being somewhere new is really doing wonders in the whole AG department. as in not thinking about her, because i'm not surrounded by the places where i have a history of musing in her direction. at any rate, this makes me hopeful. i know it's avoidance but that's all i've got. i am a total sucker for her and i know it.

ok enough. i got some more walking to do, sights to drink in.

even though i was in the shade when i wrote that, i got pretty hot a few minutes later so i stopped for what turned out to be badass ice cream. standing in line for the ice cream led to yet another incident of me being pleasantly surprised by how nice everyone was. not like i think everyone in california is a brat, but..my whole trip, everywhere i went, people were randomly talking to me, so i'd end up talking to them. just about mundane, nice little things, but still. it made me feel very welcome.

made my way back to JFK. found a badass comics shop, walked around harvard and its wobbly sidewalks, then ambled my way back towards the main subway stop. en route i hit another bookstore because at this point i was on the prowl for a new book. i knew i would finish my snoozer in short order. didn't find a cheap+interesting enough book for me there, but a block from the subway was a man selling tons of books, propped up in 20 or so boxes, on the sidewalk. all books, $2.

this is a man after my own wallet. so i browsed and browsed and finally found this. i read a brief interview with the author a long time ago and it struck me as being interesting, but obviously not enough for me to get it until today. i did my usual -- back flap, inside flap, a page in the middle, a page at the start -- and decided it met my standards for wicked observations. i started it on the way back to the hostel and immediately felt crabby that i still had the other book to finish first (i can be methodical).

back at my room, i couldn't decide what i wanted for dinner, so i consulted an area map and then started wandering. i came upon a whole foods and was very disappointed, but did procure an extremely yummy peach. circling back on massachusettes ave, i landed at a burrito place i'd seen before. had a very tasty but too-spicy mango burrito. lucky for me a wendy's was down the block, where i discovered the tastiest frosty known to mankind. back at the hostel, i said hi to y'all then crashed upstairs, hoping to finish my mediocre book.

6.17
sunday my master plan was to explore newbury street for several hours, get lunch around there, then zip over to the airport, but holy shit. mugginess off the charts. had a crappy lunch (johnny rockets) at the airport and then my plane got delayed. so:

329pm
interesting how i keep writing around the same time each day even though i'm doing something different every time.

well it's my last afternoon in boston. i'm at the airport and have been here much longer than i planned because it was too damn humid to lug around my luggage all day. i'd planned to lunch and shop on newbury street. instead i barreled through half of it at a breakneck pace in order to get to the closest subway stop and hightail it over here.

and i'm grateful i did, just to stop sweating. and keep my bag from tipping over.

i got checked in, gave my subway pass to a family of 5, and finished reading that dreadful iles book. ok, it was fair. but there were no real surprises and several of the characters were annoyingly stupid. the only thing i really liked about it were the illicit possibilities with the protagonist and his hot babysitter. sure, it had SOME suspense but not nearly enough for my taste. and the writing style - so bland. but it really takes an atrocious book to make me stop reading. the atrociousness, in this case, stopped about page 20 so i kept on.

i am reading a more interesting book now. girls guide to hunting and fishing, which i heard about a long time ago. i got it for $2 in cambridge yesterday, from a street vendor with way too many books. this book is interesting because it skips around but more so because it is funny in an offbeat, unplanned kind of way. which is the way a lot of my humor works so i like that. also, it's rather real in its vignettes -- like seeing a series of commercials, or getting the cliff notes version of a relationship (or series of them). it's mostly coherent, plus witty and insightful enough that i am devouring it. well that and just being a fast reader helps.

the protagonist in this one is a girl who grows up (at least at this point) to be an associate editor at a publishing house in NY. so of course i connect with this fairly well as a writer and someone who, at one point, could've gone that route herself.

i have thought that a couple times this weekend -- about what would've happened if we'd moved to NY like we talked about at one point, for grad school. so many paths my life could've taken. the astronomer, the engineer, the psychologist, sociologist, the recording engineer, producer, writer and journalist, and the one i fell into, the webhead. which works but the former and most persistent one, the writer, keeps rearing her pretty little head.

i know i will come to that eventually and by that i mean, give more of myself to it as time goes by but i must say i long for those days to come. when it envelops me more fully, like now. it makes me realise - remember? - how complete i feel inside myself. how i'd probably be fine with part time lovers rather than a wife, just due to my need for solitude. how much i actually enjoy it! enjoy and delight in these isolated forays, which then often lead me to writing.

but that is not the life i have. and there are many things i like, love about that life. things are going pretty well between the two of us. way better than they were. not perfect of course - what is - but sooo much better than before.

ok time to read. things are filling up around here, and jeez if i'm not surrounded by pp/eb employees! but that's amusing, too, in its own way.

i ended up reading the rest of my book while waiting for that 2nd airplane. then i jet blue'd home (getting to watch the mediocre 4400 season opener) and then here i was.

so that's it. not too shabby really, especially considering i spent about $250 for the whole deal (not including the airfare, which was free to me). and in case you were wondering, i heart boston. for me, it was full of delightfully friendly people, wonderful food, rich history, gorgeous architecture, and i would go there again in a heartbeat. and thanks for slogging thru my recaps. ;-)

let freedom ring (6.15)

the bostonian adventure continues...

6.15 10am-ish
i slept so hard. which i needed.

i hope i remember to take a pic of the view from (one!) of my windows. but the view du jour is across the street, a brownstone with endless bay windows and flower boxes, and little trees.

it's quaint in words i don't know how to describe. but it's the kind of thing that makes me think i could've been at home here or in NY since at one point that was an option. anyway it seems soothing and makes me look forward to today, when i will be seeing so much more of the same on the Freedom Trail, with some deviations of my own intent. we'll see what i have time and energy for after that. =)

there is a free 'breakfast' here but for me it sucks. raisin bagels, weird prepackaged muffins and sad looking coffee. so i had an energy bar - thank god m thought of me bringing some! and now i'm trying the cookie/bars i brought from ebay live last night. cookies - breakfast of champions!

so, got up, showered, made my way down boylston street, heading towards boston common, which is where the FT starts. i was not yet upon trinity square when i realized i was perilously close to closing out my current roll of film. still penny pinching, i got one roll of film at a CVS pharmacy. i had another backup for the day, and another one back at the hostel, so i thought that'd be enough. hit starbucks and a few blocks later, south church/trinity square. which is where i seriously started falling in love. snap snap snap.

back onto boylston, then hit the boston public garden (enjoying history en route), then onto the common and the beginning of the road i would follow carefully for the next several hours. first up was the massachusetts state house, which i enjoyed much more than expected with all the stained glass windows, and wishing i could've seen an actual house or senate debate. apparently they were in session, but NOT for me.

next i went past park street church (renovating), and down to king's church, which was less thrilling than i expected, although i did enjoy seeing the oldskool velour boxed seats. if someone knows the proper name for those please tell me, i'm really curious. the church was pretty full with tourists, but it wasn't loud. there was a quiet, reverent energy, which perfectly matched how i was feeling about my day.

afterwards i was going to stop at the athenaeum (history! books!) but i was getting worried about time, light, and wanting to make my way over toward faneuil hall before having lunch (had picked a restaurant out ahead of time) but a few blocks down, near old south meeting house, i realized i was going to collapse if i didn't eat NOW. so i plopped down to eat and write:

6.15 345pm
i just finished lunch. not where i wanted, although my heart wasn't set on it (black rose?), but i was hoping for something more interesting than a bagel sandwich. some local outfit called brueggers, near the old south house. tasty but a little boring.

i'm only 5 stops into a 14 stop tour (FT) and it's taken me about 3 hours, give or take. at this rate i'll get back to the room by midnight. and shit the official tour takes 90 minutes. 90!!! i'm glad i didn't shell out, i'd be annoyed at not getting to dilly dally. i waited too long to stop is how i ended up here, and because of the sugar crash, i'm trying to give myself a few minutes to recoup. before i get my coffee across the street, that is. SBC! mmm.

i am having the best time, wandering, taking pics of whatever takes my fancy. i only get annoyed at my capacity and the limitation of my cameras. i just had to buy more film (3pack) but i figure this is better scrilla spent.

i'm still too tired. every time i stop i realize i'm jelly. but that's what coffee is for.

seriously, Best Time Ever.

got my coffee, then back on the trail. it's late afternoon now so by the time i make it to some of these places the museums have closed. oh well, i probably wouldn't have shelled out anyway. for some reason i feel especially charmed around the exterior of the old state house.

i continue on to faneuil hall, which has charmingly turned itself into a touristy shopping center. however it did have some modestly priced, modestly tolerable trinkets, so thank you, city planners. while attempting to continue, our little trail ran right into a farmer's market. on the other side of it was a wide expressway. hrm.

after trudging through the market, i cannot find the trail, and consult several of my maps (most have the FT on them). i come upon a probable course of action, at which point a friendly local asks if i need help.

'i just figured out where i am!' i say.
'great!' he replies, 'you've got GPS built into your brain!'

which for the record, is true. anyway, it took a few blocks to get back on track but then voila! magic red bricks appeared and i was shortly in the north end.

the north end is just beautiful. seriously. well, almost all i saw of boston was beautiful but the north end and charlestown (coming soon) were just cobblestone dreams. i only took one shot of the paul revere mall on my phone, but honestly, it was a perfect intersection of history and nature. peaceful, and again, reverent, which is good since it was right next to the old north church.

which was also closed, so i trotted downhill and over the charlestown bridge, into the blinding sun and down towards the shipyards. surprisingly even this area kept me entertained, both with humor and interesting textures. then i backtracked a bit to go up to bunker hill, winding thru more adorable neighborhoods with their flower boxes, gold doorknobs, and weathered lampposts. even just walking past random houses, i was filled with a sense of walking through history. probably because of all the 'historical registry' signs.

made it back downhill to the docks and narrowly missed the ferry back to boston. good time to try calling home again! had a good talk with m, then hopped on the new ferry. spent the ride back enjoying the sunset and picking a dinner locale using guidebooks.

found a couple of possibilities, which all seemed too expensive once i got there. so i wandered down the street to the place i'd wanted to go earlier in the day -- the black rose! an irish place, where i gambled with fate by having my first whole lobster, and a beer. the beer sucked. tasted like garbage. but the lobster...drool. then popped on the ubiquitous subway back to my hostel room, where there was again, much reading and then zzzz.

leavin on a jetplane (6.13-6.14)

ok folks here is part 1 of my boston adventures. the rough draft for the whole trip? 5259 words. that's why i'm breaking this shit up, for you AND me. there are some repeats between what i wrote out here, plus what i included from journals on my trip. hopefully they are entertaining, and still read well the 2nd time around. :-p

also i must say, it's been a lot of fun writing this on independence day, since so much of this trip's history revolved around the american revolution. to visit so many sites from such a formative period in our country...it truly filled me with patriotic pride, and believe me, that's saying a lot.

wednesday, june 13
god what a crazy day this was. i wisely arranged to work from home, both due to my nighttime departure and that min was getting an endoscopy that day. although the endo took much longer than planned, it was also MUCH smoother than the previous time (which was almost a complete disaster) so even though it messed with my planning for the day, having her test go well was a real blessing. even if the results of the test were not great (she's probably going to need more surgery on her esophagus).

after that we got her sister lori (who stayed over while i was out of town) and we got home maybe 2 hours before i had to leave for the airport and i wasn't even packed and showered. somehow i pulled it off and we got to the airport at 720pm, 90 minutes or so before my flight. it was baking hot that day so i couldn't stand the thought of eating dinner, at least not until i got into that air-conditioned food court.

i did this trip on the cheap, in the extreme. we had just spent a lot on our cambria trip so i was a little strapped. anyway i mention this now because i started off cheap: a kid's meal at burger king. :-o

that was more about being mildly hungry than frugal, but believe me, i can pinch pennies. i have been poor, i know how to squeak by. afterwards i figured i might as well get the security checkpoint business over with. i'd left everything questionable out of my carryon bag, although i got points deducted for forgetting to take out my cell phone on the first pass, as well as not remembering to take off my shoes.

Security Chick: Shoes.

Me: Yes?

SC: [points to my feet]

Me: What about them?

SC: Take them off.

Me: [blushing]

blushing because this is when i remember liz telling me to wear shoes that come off easily, because i will need to be sansashoes. oops.

on the other side of security was my boarding gate. at that point there were plenty of seats so i decided to write.

6.13 750pm
i'm waiting at gate c8, flight leaves in an hour. meantime i'm having fun people watching. got the burgeoning female exec with her laptop and too many bags trailing behind, plus a baggy floral print shirt drenched in sweat. now there's another female exec, buttoned-down, trim with 2 tiny, expensive bags hanging from her hands, and white blonde hair striking against her uber-tan skin, bordering on red.

i am a little red today. my veins are still popped out from the heat, which was an unwelcome surprise today. it must've been at least 90 degrees today, but whatever the temp, it just about killed me with all the running around we had to do. min had her endoscopy today and as these things go, it went swimmingly. she didn't feel anything during, barely even the IV since they got her in one poke. one! she's starting a trend, i believe that's the 3rd time in a row.

just saw a budding rock star - or more likely, country. cool, blonde hair, goatee, and a good sized guitar case, which means acoustic. no metallica for you.

the girl behind me is resting her head on my shoulder. it's an accident of course but it's sweet.

this really is a good way to see a cross-section of folks. at least, folks who can afford to fly, which i have to imagine is a $100 minimum.

well, now a woman just walked by who looks like she couldn't even afford that. disheveled hair, long and greyed, older than old sweatshirt and bag, muttering to herself. hmm.

a puppy! terrier or maybe griffin? i forget the name, but tiny (smaller than pearl), shaggy and grown. mom was holding her close, now she's in a soft carrier. so cute.

so we have everyone here. young, old, short, tall, wealthy, poor and critters.

time to fly. and so i say: jetblue, i love you. you are comfy, you have good snacks, and you let me watch the best shows ever without leaving my seat. also later, while unsucessfully trying to sleep, i also found out how to make money on the internet. a truly compelling program.

thursday, june 14
finally we arrived in bostonia around 6am. since i planned to subway my way around, i got me a 7 day pass outside the baggage claim and headed over to the subway shuttle. the subway station was actually kind of nice. high glass ceilings, beautiful light coming in, and down where the trains came in, endless brick. my first taste of bricky love.

while waiting, i see that my line's final destination is wonderland. i really wish i would've gone there, i was so curious what it was like. i'm grooving on the names of everything, they're so old. like alewife. then i think, ciderspouse rules?

since i've never ridden the subway before, and i have to take 3 lines to get to the hostel, i was a little nervous. it really was so simple though, they really do a great job with the directions. by my middle stop (switching to green, government center i believe?) i have already seen my 5th dunkin donuts shop. those guys were everywhere.

exiting the subway and into the light again, i am loving the smell of the city. sure it's a little dirty, old, and tired - but there's also this reverberation of energy. the pulse of life zooming and angling around me.

i check my map like crazy to make sure i'm going the right direction. see the berklee college of music where my college roommate kelly went briefly, i believe. i hope she is still playing music, i haven't heard from her for a few years.

i turn down the block, another left and voila - hostel! i register, check out my bunk and locker, freshen up briefly then out the door and back on the train to do my service!

and by service i mean the convention i'm supposedly out here for, eBay Live. security incorrectly routed me and several other folks to the wrong side of the building for registration. finally got there though, and met more...inefficient planning in the self-registration booths. anyway, that complete, i called the other coworker who's on this trip. she's running late, so we agree to hook up later. i went to a class, then down to the booths to meet Coworker. we chat, and talk about meeting for dinner (we never did). i go get lunch, attend another few classes, then hit the booths. since now i'm killing time until the keynote ceremony, i sit down to write:

6.14 227pm
well just like yesterday we have an amazing amount of diversity here at the show. people are determined to affix Every Button Possible to their shirt, coat, suitcase, lobster hat or colonial outfit. or maybe stick it to a crazy tall hat with dangly things on them. apparently this is the place if you want to dangle.

there is a preponderance of significantly overweight older white women here. sure there's kids, couples, white, asian, everything under the sun. but there are a TON of the chubby older white women in their gaudy floral print shirts, roller backpacks trailing behind them, blinking away with swag.

there are also just a lot of people who are really excited to be here. crowds hovering intently around a new credit card booth, others fixated at the possibilities offered by a drop shipper, and still more entranced by keyword optimizers. all completely uninteresting to me, but they are riveted. in that way, this is about what i expected and i am definitely bored, so i'm glad i never bothered going to this before. i'm glad i came of course, just to see it. this other world is stunning.

at lunch i overheard a couple discussing what they'd learnt so far that day. mostly the man was being pedantic to the woman ('everyone knows how to do 'x'') but beyond that arrogance it was fascinating the attention they were giving this topic -- idiosyncrasies of international shipping and their payments -- as if it were the most compelling topic on earth.

which it is not. at least not to me. but wow.

oh and additional swag is ribbons! indicating your ebay prowess as a buyer, seller, whatever. some of these ribbon banners go to the floor. pretty awesome.

finally it was keynote time, through which i got free dinner, woo! score one for the penny pincher. and finally got to try dryer's (edy's) nibs. oh my. those are dangerous. i found out that there are people with over 100k feedback. holy shit.

got bored to tears with the wooden speeches and value adds, plus hi, i'd been going nonstop since yesterday morning at this point, so i bailed at the end of the paypal speech. subway'd back to my room where i thought i'd crash but apparently i needed to wind down. and wind down a lot because i read this for at least 2 hours before going to sleep.

compelling book? not really. in fact, i almost put the book down because of tedious dialogue and a typo (their/they're) on page 9. yes, even 3 weeks later i remember it was on page 9. that's how much typos cheese me.

i also talked a bit to my lower bunkmate, a fellow conference attendee and budding ebay seller, from philadelphia. she said in the latter part of the keynote, they kept talking about win-something.

me: what?
her: you know those things you get when you feel real good?
me: ...
me: you mean, endorphins?
her: yes! but they called them windorphins
me: somebody's been thinking too hard.

anyway after talking and reading, i finally crashed. sleeping wasn't too bad although going to the bathroom in the middle of the night was tricky (down ladder, don't forget room key, amble down hall, come back, remember how to use key, grab ladder appropriately so as to not fall, put key back in easy to remember spot). then i woke up and it was time to write again.

adventures in camping

it feels *so* very long ago, but yes, we went camping the first weekend of june, at san simeon state park. i had not camped since i was a teenager and while for the most part it was just like i remembered, the one thing i'd forgotten about was bugs.

now, i am officially the Bug Killer in the house, so it's not like i'm deathly afraid. however there is a difference between an errant bug on the wall (when you know it's an anomaly) and having to fight to keep all of God's Winged Insects from flying into your polyester abode everytime you need to take a leak. incidentally i was worried about how hard the tent would be to put up -- it wasn't that bad, which is good since i did it twice (moved to cozier site).

anyway. i did not anticipate these critters and their relatives would constantly hurl themselves at the tent, presumably moving toward the all-night lantern because i was caught in the throes of an entirely too gripping book. i witnessed not only the sound, but the sight of the miniscule indentations in the tent where these Foul Creatures relentlessly pounced, inches from my face.

note to self: if camping in an area with a lot of bugs, take a boring-ass book. you will fall asleep instantly, instead of being ruthlessly yanked away from your otherworldly thriller, only to assure yourself that there are no demons inside your cage.

bugs aside, we had a very lovely trip. i discovered the edible joys of butterfinger frappaccinos, i kid you not. well, their equivalent anyway, at a local coffee shop. i had one every single day because i just could not resist. well that and i wasn't sleeping that well due to a badly chosen floor mat. why yes, a better one IS in my future!

we sort of went to hearst castle. the park ranger told us that on monday (or whatever the hell day it was, i've already forgotten), Tour 1 was free. so we rolled in around 3 and due to the joys of Rental Cars That AutoLock, the keys (and min's wallet) were accidentally locked in the car. due to the joys of sending in our AAA renewal late (again accidentally), there was much confusion as to whether or not we were actually still members. so after an hour or so of phone calls and paying the renewal fee again, we finally got a guy out there about 20 minutes later. around 5pm we went inside to enjoy our free tour and hey too late. however we had a good time in the gift shop (a lot of pretty stuff) and enjoyed the ocean on the way back.

there was much, MUCH enjoyment of smores. omg seriously. so much so that we whipped out the at-home smore maker upon our return. yes it works. slower than using a campfire, but it still works. really, anytime you have ghirardelli, you can't go wrong.

so that sums up the trip. bugs, smores, ocean love and a too-good-to-put-down book. well, and i got a sunburn because i wasn't paying attention with the sunblock but hey - molting is sexy, right?

wagons east

as some of you may have seen on ba-scrappy, i'm going to boston next week. parts unknown! at least unknownst to me. either due to the late hour or my being lazy, i'm at a loss for words to describe how excited i am about this trip. it's not because i've been nursing the unbidden flames of boston love in my heart. no, i'm excited because:

- the trip offer was a surprise
- boston is full of history (i have a mild history fetish)
- i haven't been to boston before

and to a lesser degree, i'm excited because i'm going by myself. sure, i'm going for work, and i'll put in my time... but it's unmetered time. there's a conference and over the few days, i just need to show up periodically. which means i get the rest of the time to explore, go wherever i want, whenever i want.

speaking of want, while making dinner tonight a fantasy excursion popped into my head. how far is it from boston to new york? could i attend a taping of my favorite show, hosted by my secret man crush? ok maybe not so secret now. alas, this excursion was not meant to be. it's too far away and unsurprisingly, almost impossible to get tickets for. the man is hot. yes i am 99% speaking metaphorically. altho judging by the last picture, in the eyes of jane fonda and gloria steinem, the hotness is more literal.

moving on! i already have a long list of places want to explore in boston -- more than i have time for. however, if any of you have suggestions for what is must-see-or-do, please let me know. i adore discovery.

this is unreal

i don't know how this happened:

You Are 0% Homophobic

You're open minded, tolerant, and accepting. And you're not homophobic in the least :-)

Are You Homophobic?

speaking of unreal, min and i went for a VERY last minute trip up to oregon over the weekend! i like spontaneity but normally our unexpected outings occur within a 50 mile radius and only last a few hours. being a last minute idea, we didn't leave until about 330pm saturday. due to traffic and weather we didn't arrive to salem (where my parents/sister live) until around 430am. good thing my family tends to sleep in.

we had a great time visiting with them - playing games, talking, having grilled cheese and marionberry cobbler. we also ended up going to our beloved rose's, which closed in the 90's (much to our dismay) but reopened a few years ago. yay! sadly the food wasn't quite as magical as it used to be but it was still damn tasty.

oh! and i had the best. coffee. ever. holy crap. so rich so creamy so tasty so why can't they have some down here??? wah!!

per wen's suggestion that a visit might be helpful in addressing these feelings of wanting to move: great idea. now i want to move even MORE. apart from enjoying being with my family - which meant a lot - i loved revisiting my past. here's where i did blah, there's the HS i graduated from, etc. it was fun. and while i think california, esp the bay area here, is beautiful in many many ways, i fell totally in love with oregon again. also i never realized how much parts of it - esp between salem and eugene - looks like middle tennessee. which yes, i sometimes wax nostalgic for (altho not for its summers).

because of all this we left late coming home, too, and didn't get back until 4am. so with that plus fighting off a cold, my ass is dragging. time to apply more toffee crack.

thank you

to everyone who sent condolances on min's mom. so very sweet. min is now en route to tucson, but in a vehicle rather than a plane. she lost her wallet near the end of her Great Escapade and thus only has a temporary replacement license. they won't let you fly with those (requires a passport or other ID that she doesn't have).

so, with a little scrilla from her sister wilma, we turned in one rental car and got another for her next expodition. amazingly even that was fraught with technical hijinks but i'm too annoyed over the whole thing to write it out. end result: new car. fine.

had considered going with her (and pearl, who loves the car so of course went with min) but i needed to stay here today and tomorrow. for everyone who sent me good vibery, danke schon, i think it helped! hopefully it'll carry over to tomorrow's adventures in richmond. when i think richmond, i pretty much think of their oil refineries. if anyone has recs for good but cheap dinner up yonder, gimme a holler! i'm sure i will be peckish afterwards.

tonight i was at the stanford mall, getting some dinner and blithely looking for christmas presents. i have decided i don't really care for that mall anymore. it has some decent restaurants for a mall, i'll give you that. but the rest is pretty much upscale, predominately bland yuppie. midrange, moderately bland yuppie, i'm used to and usually it includes some unusual places as well. and i remember more of that the last time i went - admittedly, a good 5 years ago or so. i was hoping to stumble onto some excellent gift ideas but no luck. ah well. Ye Olde Internet, don't fail me now!