Bahston

Jake and I had a good time in Boston, but it was fairly exhausting. It was a long drive there and once we got there, we did lots and lots of walking.

I was glad that we got to meet up with Matt (from Triangle). Here's a picture of Matt and Jake out at the bars. We parked the car at Matt's place for the week (and no, his place isn't in Hahvard Yahrd...it's in Medford, one of the suburbs north of Boston). Matt was around the first few days of the week and went out with us those days. On Monday night after we arrived, we went with Matt to the North End and ate at an Italian restaurant for dinner. Then we hit up a couple of bars.

On Tuesday, Jake and I spent the day walking the Freedom Trail. We were pulled aside by a cameraman for the local Fox station and asked if the problems with the Big Dig interfered with our travel plans or if we were worried about it at all. I think our responses were pretty boring, so I doubt they actually showed us on the air. I don't know...I guess they could have, though. We met up with Matt in Harvard Square Tuesday night. He hangs out at a bar there and sings karaoke on Tuesdays. I drank copious amounts of beer and then Jake, Matt, and I got up and sang "Swingtown" complete with the "Fuck you"- "Eat shit" chants ala Camp Randall. I think we confused all the Cambridge folk with our antics. I got in line for the bathroom afterwards and these girls asked me, "What were you guys shouting at each other? Fuck you?" and I was like, "Yeah, and 'Eat Shit.'" And they were like, "Yeah, that was funny..."

Wednesday, Jake and I went to the top of the Prudential building. We also toured the Sam Adams brewery. We got to try a beer called a "rauche" (sp?) beer. It's not being distributed currently and Sam Adams is just trying brewing some of it right now. They told us that they're considering putting either this "rauche" beer out or a Honey Porter as a seasonal brew. Anyway, "rauche" (however you spell it...) is German for "smoked". That beer was really interesting because it tasted just like bacon. I hope it wins out over Honey Porter, but I doubt that it will. After Sam Adams, we went to the Museum of Fine Arts because admission is free after 4pm on Wednesdays. Wednesday night, we met up with Matt again and tried out candlepin bowling. Apparently, in that area of the country, "bowling" involves wooden balls about the size of your hand which are rolled toward skinny pins. It's tougher than regular bowling (which Matt told us is called "big ball bowling" in Boston), so you get three balls per frame. Here's a picture of me holding one of the little balls.

Thursday, Jake and I spent most of the day in Cambridge. We walked around Harvard and MIT and looked in shops. We had burgers at Mr. Bartleby's for lunch, which were delicious. We went to a Brazilian restaurant for dinner that served rodizio, which involves waiters coming up to you with random meats on skewers over and over. Matt left that day to go back to Wisconsin, so we didn't go out at night. We were tired anyway and wound up watching "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" on tv.

Friday, Jake and I took a walk around Beacon Hill in the morning. We ate at Durgin-Park (a really old Boston restaurant) for lunch. We took a walk and looked in shops on Newbury Street in the afternoon. I wound up buying a skirt at H&M because it was the first skirt that I've tried on in a while that I haven't hated. It's just a plain white linen skirt and should match a lot of stuff. We wound up getting rained on in the evening. We stopped at a bar for a drink and I tried a beer that tasted like blueberries. Good stuff.

Saturday morning, we walked forever looking for Matt's place. It's a long way from the subway stop and we weren't entirely sure where we were going. Then, we took forever figuring out how to get back on the interstate. It turned out that we didn't get on the road until nearly noon. We hit lots of rain on the way back, too, so that slowed us down. It was nearly 9pm when we finally got back home.

Home. That's so weird to me. This place still doesn't really feel like my "home". I can't believe we have to move fairly soon, too. Jake already talks a lot about where we're going to move next.