A week in Boston...a week late. Blame jet lag!

...everything that has been awkward or hard to achieve this week is blamed on JET LAG. A few minutes late to work? BLAME JET LAG! No money? BLAME JET LAG! Didn't update the blog in a timely manner....yep, JET LAG!!!

For reals...now that I'm over the jet lag, I think I can more accurately recount all the fun that I had in Boston!

It started with The Shug:

We met in the airport and immediately discovered that we were both big dorks and had taken pictures out of the plane window. Mine was of Newfoundland:

We stayed in a really cute hotel in Cambridge and wandered around until we found the Middle East and had some delicious MIddle Eastern food and a few much needed beers. Then we got stuck in a one way conversation with a Russian writer enthusiast/weirdo at a used bookshop, but that was all made better by the nice coversation we had with the friendly bookshop girl behind the counter--who, it turns out, was from Ohio! Eventually we wandered on to Harvard Square, where we saw some strange guy wearing shorts (it was about 20 degrees out) and then moseyed back to our hotel, where we took this fabulous picture before crashing at 9:45 (I blame Jet Lag...this time it really was jet lag).


While I was trying to realign my internal clock, Jessie and Steve were recovering from the creeping death and Andrea was trying to avoid them at all costs because of her pregnancy, so we waited until the next morning to meet for brunch. Ani has grown a lot since she was six months old!

Andrea has grown a lot, too!


The Arlington Gang:


Ani loves Umba (see tail--at Andrea and Danny's house):

Ani loves Banjo, too. But Banjo doesn't love Ani. When Ani's around, Banjo looks like this:

Couch pileup:


And of course we had to say "Peace!!!" in Dr. E's voice in memory of the old days:


After all the excitement, Jessie and Andrea went to Baby's R Us and I found The Shug and her friend Terry in Harvard Square, eating Thai food. We headed down to the North End to meet Jess and Zappa for Italian food! (Do you see a pattern?)

They brought JACKSON!!!!


I looked angelic:



Happy to be with Jess!


It was a night of reuniting with old friends (and too much red wine).

It's hard to tell that these two are related:

Jackson has incredible powers over adults. Everyone gazed adoringly at him.

Jess has mad skill in the dancing/singing department. As does the Shug. APologies for the sideways-ness of this video clip. I am still learning how to hold the camera the right way while videoing.


Sadly, the day after all of this excitement, The Shug had to go back to Cleveland...but not before I dragged her to the MFA and all over a part of Boston that I used to know but no longer do (translation:I got us lost). We parted ways at South Station...sniff! And I headed to Jessie and Steve's, where Ani was wearing her new PJs and feigning interest in her dinner. Really she just wanted muffins.


The next day, Steve and I went to the mall, which is not a very exciting place to take pictures, I'm afraid. We also had clam chowder and the waiter showed us the revolutionary credit card machine that is brought to the table, which has been used everywhere in Europe for the past three years. ho hum.

On Wednesday, I headed to Jess, Zappa and Jackson's house! I learned really great songs like, "Walk along! Walk along!" and "Fruit Salad! Fruit Salad!" and, my favourite, by The Wiggles, "Wake up Jim! We need you for the band!" with a real live Jim snoring in the background.


Barley was feeling kind of awkward because she had recently had knee surgery and had to wear a satellite dish on her head. She looked cute, I thought.


This is frightening:


Jackson loves bath time...and his frog towel.


It snowed the day that I left:


Back at Jessie and Steve's, a party was brewing. Andrea, Danny and Alex arrived in the snow:


After Andrea slammed a few beers, Jessie checked the position of Baby Lucas:

(not to worry...the beer was non-alcoholic!)

Hmmm....is that what apple bottom jeans are?


Tim and Bob were in town, too! Reunion!


Future parents of Baby Lucas!


Ani skipped supper and went straight for the cake:


Then she danced it all off with Steve, Tim and Nigh Nigh.




For some reason, the green bear on the couch made it into a lot of pictures. As did Tim's shoes:


I'm not sure who these people were:


A bouquet of roses offered many opportunities for artistic expression.

Coy:


Lazy:


Dumb:


Despite the years that have passed, our maturity levels have stayed the same.

Alex led us in a riveting and age-revealing game of "Guess that 80's song!"


Yay for the next morning!


Since I put a picture of Jess in her spider woman outfit on the blog, I feel obligated to include this lovely one of my hair, as styled by Jessie:


Some bitchin' dance moves.


And then all hell broke loose when we were informed by some masons who were working on the roof, that there was a very large racoon living in the chimney. Steve went up to investigate and almost fell off in the process. Here is the site of the invasion:


We found something on the internet that said that loud talk radio and bright lights would deter the racoon. This was the scene for a while until we couldn't take it anymore. We found the most obnoxious talk radio there was in Boston and blasted it up the chimney:
I have to say that if I were a racoon in that chimney, I would have moved right now. I'm not really sure how that saga unfolded because racoon be damned, we had to go to a baby shower.

Jessie, Andrea and I shared a pose:


ANi wasn't feeling it at first:


But then I gave her some chocolate and a sugar cookie (made by Jess! YUMMY!)and someone gave her some Mexican dolls to play with...and then she had some cake. SO she cheered up.

Andrea looked beautiful!

Ani loves her Tio:

Hooray for Lucas!


After all that fun, it was time to head home. Jim and I barely talked during the week because of time zone issues and I MISSED HIM! I was so happy to see him when I got off the tube:

Jim got a new bike!

After the moment above, we headed out on an epic bike journey around London, with only one near death experience! (I came very, very close to being hit by a black cab).

We rode our bikes through Hyde Park. I almost ran over two very small dogs.


We stopped at the "Round Pond" and watched mini sailboats being competetively sailed by concentrating men:

They wore some strange mitten type things over their controls. To protect them? It was weird (or interesting, depending on which viewer you were) and they were really into it! Jim proclaimed that learning to sail a mini sailboat was to become his future hobby. Learning to sail a real sailboat was "too much."

Me watching the sailboats:


We ended up in Chelsea, where the Chelsea football fans were getting ready (drunk) in anticipation of the Chelsea/Liverpool match. We veered off into the Brompton Cemetary which is HUGE!


After lunch at a noodle place, we peddled on to Westminster. It was fun to see Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and Buckingham Palace from our bikes. They shut down the roads around St. James Park on Sundays, so we could ride around without having to worry about traffic.



On our way out of Hyde Park, we passed through Speaker's Corner, where local preachy types can get on their soap boxes. Pretty much all you have to do is bring your stepladder and an agenda along. This guy was preaching against Allah:


This one just wanted a hug.


No outing is complete without a visit to the pub! Is drinking and biking a good combination? Probably not, but we made it home.

Oscar in the House

I would like to begin this blog by confirming what you already think--we are cat people. We're not extreme cat people, but now we have four cats in two countries and we are prepared for the day that sometime we'll have all four of them at once. But for now we have two in America and two in England. Introducing....OSCAR!

Finchley was being so bad and acting so lonely that we thought it might be a good idea to get him a friend. We left our house with Maddy and Joe in tow, on a quest to find a young, playful cat to be friends with Finchley.

On the way to the shelter (a new one because the one where we got Finchley had a fire and is still under construction), everyone was peering into our cat box. Our invisible cat wasn't too keen on that. Here he is with Maddy, Joe and Jim...still invisible.


The wait to see the cats was REALLY long and boring. We were forced to entertain ourselves. First we watched all the lame videos that the shelter had on the TVs in the waiting room. After we got through that entire cycle, we ate candy and drank coke.


Finally, things got desperate and Joe was forced to play with the cat toys we bought.


Eventually we made it through all the channels and got to visit with the cats. At that point there was a mad rush to get a cat and the only cat who was available and ale to live with other cats was Oscar, a ten year old black cat with snaggle teeth and dandruff. Of course, we loved him. He purred and purred and purred, even in his cat box on the way home. Then he totally freaked out and stayed under the bed for about 24 hours. He still mostly stays under the bed, but he ventures out every once in a while and likes to snuggle up with us when we go to bed. And Finchley loves him (not sure the feeling is mutual).



He has snaggle claws, too.


Despite his senior status, he likes to play!


And he tolerates the ever curious and playful Finchley:


And now...a video: Jim and the cats.