some moments

Instead of a running stream of consciousness recalling the events of my past weekend I am going to bullet point some lovely moments from the past week/weekend. This is a better representation of my mindset anyway as I have let go of my obsessive list making of places to travel to for a focus on the defining experiences that I am having.

- Last Thursday I attended the first meeting of the Zimmerman House docents (a Frank Lloyd Wright house that the museum owns and docent means a tour guide) as the house's tour season is starting this week. It was delightfully akin to a meeting of Ten Chimney docents and made me long for home a wee bit. This feeling was strengthened 10 fold while I was cleaning up and chatting with one docent in particular. She asked if I have ever been to Spring Green (Frank Lloyd Wright's birthplace) and since I know quite a few people from there and have indeed spent some time there, I started peppering her with questions of the places I know to see if she had been there too. Of all the places I mentioned, the one she had been to was an amazing breakfast place called The General Store. We exclaimed over how delicious the food is and how lovely Spring Green is. I must say it was not until this interaction that I realized how much I miss Wisconsin.

- Friday I went out to dinner in the North End of Boston with the brother and his girlfriend to a place called Picolla Venezia. I remember the name because Eric kept saying it in a high pitched Italian all the way there in excitement to go back. He didn't over hype it-it was truly a perfect Italian place for dinner. Warm, dimly lit, walls covered in pictures and the BEST part was the violin and accordion player that walked around. I know-totally wonderful.

- Saturday we went on the Freedom Trail walk and it was lead by not 1 but 2 colonial dressed men because our guide was in training and he didn't do half bad. It was really interesting/a tad awkward at times as he stumbled over his words an forgot a few facts (he said "2 if by land and 1 if by sea" the his shadow guide called out from the back "strike that, reverse it!" hilarious). I loved it aka I love going on walking tours and learning facts about a city.

-During the tour it got wicked cold out so when the tour ended we hoofed it to a restaurant called Zoup. It was literally the best meal I have had in Boston. We got a giant bowl of tomato bisque soup and I got a grilled cheese sandwich made of 4 difference kinds of cheeses. It was the perfect cold weather comfort meal, warming me all the way to my fingertips.

-That night we curled up in sweatshirts in front of Bridesmaid the movie and laughed our faces off.

-Sunday we chilled out until I went to Boston and before I got on the bus I went to a coffee shop to grab coffee and a croissant to eat in the park. I may or may not have written this before, so I'm just going to say it again-I love just sitting in parks and drinking coffee on a peaceful Sunday morning. It offers great people watching and is just wonderful :)

lazy mornings

This weekend was one of lazy mornings filled with wonderful people and coffee. Always lots and lots of coffee.

Friday night I went to Portsmouth and got dinner with Jane before we went to the Hunger Games. LOVED it although we did have 30 minutes of previews. Then the next day we walked to the Friendly Toast i.e. the best brunch place in the world. Then I drove back to Manchester to finish making the champagne cupcakes that I was taking to a girl from the museum's bday party that night. That's right champagne cupcakes-look it up and make them. They are heaven. I actually thought all I had to do was add more powdered sugar to the frosting and then frost the cupcakes but when I was making the frosting a few days previous I started without realizing I didn't have enough powdered sugar and then I may have dumped a bit too much champagne into the mix. Anyway I actually had to start the frosting over. Then I went and ate dinner at the my supervisor's supervisors (Leah) house (the maple syrup people from last weekend) since they were driving me to the party. Also her husband (Martin) loves german hip hop music and once he found out that I too like it and had a whole cd he wanted it. This resulted in us driving to the party in Concord blasting said music. But the best moment of the drive was when we left. Martin slammed on the gas while pulling out of the driveway so we pealed out of there in a roar of engine and squeal of tires with Leah shouting "We have a babysitter, wooooo!!" (they have a 3 year old). It was outstanding!

So the party-it was lovely. We took a field trip to the bday girl's house because she talks about how shitty is all the time and how skunks live underneath it and well we just had to witness it. I honestly couldn't believe it was real. First of all it is enormous-if I knew anything about square footage I would put out a number that is obscenely large and very impressive. It is like two regular sized 2 bedroom sized homes put together PLUS there is a full size barn attached to the back with real horse stalls in it. And it is in a regular neighborhood. It's completely crazy. Also the entire place is in a state of decrepit disrepair. Most rooms don't have dry wall, everything is crooked and it is just a disaster, but it was built in the 1800s so it is really old and beautiful if someone could devote years and thousands of dollars to fixing it.

Anyway the party was fun. Then today I went again to Leah and Martin's house from which we walked to this great bakery about 2 miles away and got lunch/heavenly desserts and lazed about drinking coffee. Then we walked back and their 3 year old was on a ridiculous sugar high. She was running ahead continuously yelling "I'm running slow!!!!!" then stopping turning and telling us to freeze and then running again. It was hilarious!

That is all. I am spending the rest of the day skyping and watching movies. This is why being out of school is so friggin wonderful-I have actual free time in which I have literally no obligations or things to do. Well there are things to do but it's stupid stuff like laundry and dishes and researching grad schools. I just can't get over the blissful lack of papers/studying/business text books/flashcards. Love it.

it's April already

It is April on Sunday and I can't quite believe I have been here 2 months already. I feel I have been here forever or a week-this changes depending on the day. In reflection though I can tell the passage of time by the following things:

-my giant size shampoo and conditioner are half gone

-I can't see over the stack of books I have accumulated on my desk at the museum

-I have used up 3 legal pads

-my coffee supply is dwindling to 2 options instead of 4

-I don't get blisters from any of my dress shoes anymore

-my pile of rocks from the places I travel is more like a small gravel pit than a collection

-I used up an all of the ink from a pen

-I have almost caught up on watching all 5 seasons of 30 Rock

observation of a single lady and her dog

I don't understand why a single woman would have a dog, here's why:

Firstly she can't go on vacation/anywhere for over 8 hours because the dog needs her. Now I really see an advantage of being a single woman in her 40s is the lack of responsibility and resulting freedom to jet about and have adventures. The dog crushes all chances of these.

Secondly she never knows when a murderer is near her house. The dog is silent until there is someone across the street so when it starts barking wildly I get freaked out certain that the person causing such agitated behavior from said animal is a threat. It is unnerving. I get freaked out enough in this house alone I don't need a dog adding extra anxiety by identifying non-threats.

Thirdly she can't walk around her house unaccompanied. Again the advantage to owning your own home and living alone in it at 40 is the peace and quiet. Well not here folks, that saliva spewing dog is gonna be right at your shins when you turn around blanketing you with guilt for not paying attention to it. Just let me make my lunch in peace!

Now I'm sure to a dog loving person they defend these inconveniences with the fact that it provides companionship blah blah blah. Well not worth it I'd say. Ok I'm sorry to all of my friends who love dogs (right so that is most of you...don't worry I'll pretend to love your dog like usual when I get home, really I don't mind them as long as I don't have to live with it), I know you hold them in great esteem. I just can't handle the constant demand on my attention and slobber. Oh the slobber *shudder*.

This is about where you are probably expecting me to rise up in favor of an alternate animal to have as a pet i.e. companionship, like a cat. Wrong. I have decided I don't like having any pets. Last year when I borrowed my parents kittens at school for a month it was all fun and games until the second week when they started tearing shit up and demanding I play with them or they would spill their water everywhere. I have enough stuff to deal with, let's not add on cleaning up animal vomit (the dog just barfed. awesome.), picking up dog poop/cleaning litter boxes, etc.

from cape cod to maple syrup

This past weekend exceeded all expectations in terms of greatness.

1. I FINALLY got to Cape Cod on Saturday. I bused down to Rachel in Cambridge and she drove (what an angel) the 2.5 hours to Provincetown (known as P-town) which is as far as you can drive into the Cape Cod area. It's off-season in the cape so all sorts of wonderful things result. We parked easily and for free, we could move around the sidewalks with ease, everything was on sale, stores weren't crowded, food was cheap and it was nice and cold :) So we ate lunch at this delightful place called the Purple Feather-it was entirely purple inside and once we sat down in our window seats we were bombarded with an entire wall devoted to breast and penis shaped cookies/cupcakes/baked goods. Too weird. Then we went wandering about/shopping and oh the things I bought! First we went into a tiny used book store that upon entering wallops you in the face with the musty/dusty/book smell of my dreams. After running about exclaiming over the amount of books I found a copy of Wuthering Heights that was in a box, bound in navy blue with gold embossed lettering for $4. Outstanding. Then when I went to buy it the guy was telling me how to clean the dust off of it and surely having overheard my adulations of joy earlier, stopped mid-sentence and said "or maybe you want to keep the dust for ambience" and I said "why you are quite right!"

Then we went to an antique store where I got a Sadler tea pot (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) for $35-a STEAL! I blame Rachel because this is the exact transaction that went down:

Me-"oh look at that tea pot!" scamper over and caress it, check the price to dissaude myself as I was sure it would be crazy expensive. Seeing it was $45 started to persuade me then I told Rachel she needed to persuade me not to buy it.

Rachel-"well how much is it?" (upon hearing the price) "Oh get it!!"

So I did and the lady discounted it, probably because I was so excited and was the only person in the store. Then we went to some touristy stores and got sweatshirts that were crazy cheap and a store owner told us to a nearby beach to spot some whales. First walked along the dock-there is something just beautiful about a port aka fishing town in New England. Boats are everywhere, the buildings are all victorian architecture but with gray shingle siding and bright colored trim. It's all easy-breezy-sit on the dock and eat lobster and drink beer. Sigh.

Anyway we get to this beach and it is gorgeous. Now there were a huge line of cars facing the waterfront with people looking through binoculars so needless to say we did not see any whales but we did tromp around in the sand and I stepped into the water to experience the mythically frigid water. It's not a myth, that shit is cold. Then we climbed a mini-sand dune thing and gasped in awe at the sweet view. Finally we started our drive back taking the scenic highway this time and stopping at a seafood place for dinner on the way. All in all a fabulously wonderful perfect day.

2. On Sunday it was part two of Maple Syrup Weekend here in New Hampshire (who knew such a thing existed? most people apparently at least judging by the reactions I got from every native I told about it). Anyway my supervisor that lives near me called to see if I wanted to join her, her husband and daughter as they went to a few different Maple Syrup Farms to get samples and stuff. Naturally I said yes so they picked me up and we went and consummed more maple syrup than I have ever had in my life. This is due to the fact that I never had maple syrup till last year and didn't like how sweet it was but really all I needed was REAL maple syrup. Oh. My. God. It is so good I can hardly believe it. But what is even better is that they make it in something called a sugar shack aka a log cabin that has this giant metal trough-like thing in it full of boiling syrup with a huge wood-fire under it and letting off great giant streams of smoke. Basically it's awesome-it's all cozy and smells like campfire/maple syrup and they were playing country music and drinking coffee. My kind of place.

From there we went onto 3 other places. At all of them we got to try their different grades of maple syrup and get a tutorial on how it's made. We also got a variety of maple-themed foods all of which were shockingly delicious. They were maple popcorn, maple hotdogs (that's a hotdog boiled in syrup), maple candy and biscuits covered in maple butter. Oh yeah. I think I need to marry into a maple syrup making family.

To sum up-one of, if not the best weekend to date. It was cold and rainy (my kind of weather), I got to walk on a beach, eat fish, sip coffee in a sugar shack and eat real home made maple syrup. OH and we took a tractor ride that gave us a view of real honest to goodness mountains! New England: exceeding expectations on a daily basis.

out and about

I must admit I have become quite terrible at mid-week posts and there is some reason behind this. Mostly it is due to the fact that writing about how much I love what I am doing becomes tiresome to write and surely tiresome to read so my thought is to spare both me and you the reader. Also it is sheer forgetfulness and laziness - when I a get home at about 5:30, I catch up on facebook and emails, then make dinner, watch something on netflix or catch up via skype with a friend, read and go to bed by 10:30pm. Thrilling, I know.

As far as the internship goes, I am (surprise surprise) still completely enamored with it. My public programs supervisor is letting me create the docent training for next week and it is about the subtle differences between modern and contemporary art. I'm still researching the wallpaper but it's just for me now - the librarian thinks I should write an article about it. There are all manner of other projects I am deep into but really what has my undivided attention is my attempt to find a job/figure out what I want to do/where I want to live/whether any of that matters or if I'm willing to take literally anything available. This whole not knowing where I will even live in May is horrifying to me and realizing it is already mid-March, I am getting anxious about traveling to all the places I want to travel to in New England. Well quite frankly that is everywhere and is impossible, which I realize and am coping with.

I did finally get to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston this past weekend and it was wonderful because they have things like an entire room devoted to John Singer Sargent and one devoted to Winslow Homer so yeah it was HEAVEN. Admittedly, it would have been grand to have someone to espouse my joy upon and squeeze their hand in excitement, but still good. Then the next day I had no plans as my brother and his girlfriend were continuing car shopping so I packed up my backpack, went into Boston, got some coffee, a croissant and sat in Boston Common. It was heavenly-I think all I will require in a place in which I reside a good coffee place with an adjacent park with benches. That is all. I blame London-some of my most treasured memories are getting up early, walking to ISH for breakfast and getting coffee to go then walking through Regents Park in the hushed foggy morning. I do so miss it, like an achy little hole in my chest. It's not so much the place but the freedom of possibilities that London afforded me. Ok it's definitely partly the place (I mean come ON London is so damn beautiful! Walking anywhere in Manchester feels like a punishment because it is so ugly), but mostly the opportunities available. I feel that in Boston and it's wonderful/awful because it reminds fiercely of my time abroad and the carefree time I spent there.

Anyway, once I finished my coffee I just wandered around Beacon Hill because it is all cobble stones, gas lamp posts, brick buildings and wrought iron - completely beautiful. Then I headed back to Manch for some thrilling cleaning and laundry.

tugboats

Another weekend has passed in a blur of delight. Saturday was wicked cold and rainy so I curled up with some coffee and finally applied for two jobs I found that I am actually qualified for - woop woop! Then I made some tea and read for pleasure, I still forget that I can just read any book I want whenever I want to *sigh* It's the little things you know? Anyway then I packed a bag and drove to Portsmouth to my supervisor's apartment to spend the night. We went for a walk in her neighborhood and it is official, New England has the most beautiful houses I have ever seen. They are all old victorians with rap around porches and one had a widow's walk and they are wonderful colors and the molding! Bah! My ridiculous excitement was perfectly reflected in Jane which resulted in a mutual gushing over the houses; a direct quote from Jane, "Break me off a piece of that house!" Basically we are old-house loving soul mates.

After the walk we had a Parks and Recreation marathon and she came to love Ron Swanson, as any sane female would. The next day we had brunch at the wonderfully hipster restaurant The Friendly Toast where the food is all of these ridiculous flavor combinations i.e. pumpkin pancakes with raisinettes (to DIE for and you would never guess). Then we walked to the ocean and I saw some tugboats and well the ocean which is such a wonderfully enjoyable thing to do here because it's so second nature to New Englanders but so note-worthy and exciting to a midwest girl. After stopping in a jewelry store where I got a compass necklace Jane drove us to Boston (seriously I will NEVER drive there-I would die) to go to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Art Museum since it all renovated. It's a heavenly museum, but made even more enjoyable by Jane who used to be a tour guide there. All I want to do in my life is talk walks with people who teach me things, I could have stayed there for hours. Then we met up with her old roommates for dinner and I loved them and I formed another theory about differences in New England and the Midwest.

So the two women (?girls? what do you call a 30 year old?anyway...) and Jane are all 30ish and either single or dating someone. The only married women I have met out here are 40+ and those women have young children. You can imagine that when I mentioned that most of my friends are married/engaged that they were baffled. Now I just thought that I happen to have friends that are getting married, but now I think it is a cultural difference. As in girls/women (really we need an inbetween term) in the Midwest get married/have families earlier than girls/women out here. Now that I write that down it actually seems like a conclusion I should have come to sooner as it is stereotypical that women in cities would be more career driven/less family oriented. It's just weird to be so surrounded by it. Also I just discussed this at length with a woman who's cubicle is near mine. I am continually fascinated by the subtle differences from the Midwest when so many things are simultaneously so similar.