I'm back in Boston. I had a great deal of fun with My sister, niece, brother-in-law, and mom. Maddie is a little ball of energy. Well, not little, she's quite big for a 7 year old. Smart and creative, but I just can't keep up with her.

The day I arrived, Thursday, we pretty much stayed around the house and relaxed. My mom had already been there for several days and was already settled in.

Friday, Christian stayed home while Maddie, Bridgette, my mom, and I went down to Georgetown. We hit Lush and Godiva and went to Dean & Deluca for lunch. While I've seen central meter machines in parking lots, I'd never seen a central machine for street parking before. I guess it is more efficient than having a separate parking meter for each spot, I'm just not used to it. The biggest disadvantage I see with the central machine system is that if it breaks down it disrupts the use of a number of parking spots at once.

Saturday we drove into Virginia through wine country and went to Linden Vineyards (nothing to do with Second Live). That was my favorite part of the trip down. Relaxing doesn't even begin to describe the place. Surrounded by rows of grapes and vine watching the clouds shadow-dance on the Blue Ridge Mountains. The cigar Christian gave me to smoke at the vineyard not only went perfectly with the cheese and wine, but also with the surrounding tranquility.

Sunday, I got up later than I had planned, but not so late that it caused any hassle in catching my flight. Upon leaving, Christian gave me some cigars, along with a 15-pack of Rocky Patel vintage 1992s, one of my favorites. My mom gave me a wonderful dragon cane when I arrived at the house and I was a bit worried about getting on the flight with 2 canes, but I didn't have any hassle and the return trip from Reagan National to Logan went smoothly.

I had hoped to get some good bird pictures, but unfortunately my birding camera is not working. I noticed it my first day there. It seems to be a connection problem with the battery prongs, which should be repairable. But, I was glad to see that Maddie loved birds and birdwatching despite her father's hatred of them.

I took purpleglitter's camera along with me on my walk this morning. This is what I saw:


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i got two packs of bertie bott's every flavor beans on the way home
purpleglitter and i are going to try them tomorrow
fun fun
they come in black pepper, blueberry, booger, earthworm, cherry, cinnamon, dirt, ear wax, grape jelly, grass, green apple, lemon drop, toasted marshmallow, buttered popcorn, sardine, soap, spaghetti, spinach, tutti-frutti, and vomit
i'm very excited

I met riga_mortia at the Diesel Café this morning, at around 11:00am. We had coffee, then I went to the Social Security office to hand drop off papers and hopefully meet with someone. After waiting in line for about 15 minutes and being told that I'd talk to the caseworker over the phone tomorrow, I met up with riga_mortia again at Goodwill.

At Goodwill I found a fabulous blue dress that looks right out of the 50's. It goes perfectly with my cat's eye glasses.

riga_mortia and I went back to my house, I changed, and we went to the Great Meadow. Decided to wear a pair of shoes that have been lying around the house for some time, but were falling apart. I very quickly screwed them back together before we left. Unfortunately on the way to the Great Meadow, the screws started poking up into my foot (the flat ends, not the pointy ends, but it still hurt my feet).

We had a very nice picnic of oranges, grapes, green olive tapenade on mini toasts, and green tea. The clearing we chose was very peaceful, sitting on the side of a hill with a nice view of the sun drenched meadow.

Getting up after the picnic, I learned a very important fashion lesson: white nylons are a poor choice if you plan on sitting on the ground..

On the way home, walking by Mal's Towing, one of the workers looked at me and said "How's it going?". Thinking nothing of it, I nodded and walked on. Annoyed he said that he was just trying to be polite because we were neighbors. I didn't recognize him as one of the downstairs tenants. I apologized and said I was just spacey. But, honestly, I still didn't recognize him.