Irene, who invited YOU?
Our Boston adventure has been unnecessarily eventful so far. (Kicking back? What's that?) First the reservation for the B & B was fubared. I thought it might be my fault, but I looked back at the website that listed the B & B and allowed me to make a reservation, and it wasn't me. The website had me enter the dates were were checking in and out, the number of people, and the button you click after that says, "Make reservation for these dates." So it wasn't me, but technically it wasn't the B & B folks either. It was the website programmer(s), so this means there's going to be a problem for anyone making reservations for any B & B on that website. Lovely.
As a result, we decided to check out yesterday morning, since our booking ended up being for only one night, thanks to the bad programming, even though the B & B folks said they could move us around to various vacant rooms over the five nights we'd need accommodations. There were problems that did attach to the B & B, so it didn't seem worth it to make them jump through those hoops. The internet was spotty to nonexistent, there were only two room keys available, instead of three, so each of us could have one, and with Irene coming it just seemed more practical to be in a place with more services, like the hotel we passed that sits RIGHT NEXT TO the subway station we got off to walk to our B & B (a couple of blocks away but not a bad walk).
So now we're in that hotel and will soon go downstairs for brunch, since we missed the cut-off time for room-service breakfast food. There's also a fitness center on this floor, so I can go work out later and Rachel will probably also use one of the treadmills. And all of this is slightly less expensive per night than the B & B. Go figure. (Although our breakfast yesterday morning was lovely and probably would have run us more than $30 or $40 if we'd eaten out.)
They even let us check in at the hotel early, which was great. Then, about 12:30, I was picked up by nuclearpolymer and her husband and friend and we went out to Brookline for a lovely Thai lunch and ice cream. It was great to see them again and we enjoyed a nice afternoon with only intermittent rain.
After they dropped me off at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum I spent a peaceful few hours wandering those beauty-packed rooms, during which time the storm worsened considerably. It slacked off by the time I decided to leave, close to 4:30, and I was able to walk to a nearby T-stop and get a train to a stop where I could transfer back to the train that would take me to the hotel.
The rest of the evening involved dinner across from the hotel at a Japanese restaurant with very pretty sushi and then getting the T up to Boston Common to the AMC theatre there to see Horrible Bosses. (Why, oh WHY, didn't I try harder to talk Ben into Rise of the Planet of the Apes?)
After we got out of the movie it turned out Chris had been calling me about the house, which is leaking like a sieve in places. I sort of expected the bay window to be a problem, since it has been in the past (is there some reason that roofers can't adequately flash where the roof of a bay window meets the brick wall?) but I wasn't expecting the rain coming in through one of the laundry room windows, which evidently has led to rain dripping from the top of the bathroom window, which is right below it. And I don't even want to know yet if the water damage in the northeast corner of the living room is any worse than it was...
At least it doesn't seem to be as bad here in Boston as was originally projected. We may be able to leave the hotel for dinner if the winds die down later. I don't especially relish the idea of walking around in 35+ mph winds; anything above 20 is absolutely no fun at all. But it is supposed to be pretty nice tomorrow, and on Tuesday Rachel and I may even take a train to Providence to meander around the Brown campus. We'll see.
As a result, we decided to check out yesterday morning, since our booking ended up being for only one night, thanks to the bad programming, even though the B & B folks said they could move us around to various vacant rooms over the five nights we'd need accommodations. There were problems that did attach to the B & B, so it didn't seem worth it to make them jump through those hoops. The internet was spotty to nonexistent, there were only two room keys available, instead of three, so each of us could have one, and with Irene coming it just seemed more practical to be in a place with more services, like the hotel we passed that sits RIGHT NEXT TO the subway station we got off to walk to our B & B (a couple of blocks away but not a bad walk).
So now we're in that hotel and will soon go downstairs for brunch, since we missed the cut-off time for room-service breakfast food. There's also a fitness center on this floor, so I can go work out later and Rachel will probably also use one of the treadmills. And all of this is slightly less expensive per night than the B & B. Go figure. (Although our breakfast yesterday morning was lovely and probably would have run us more than $30 or $40 if we'd eaten out.)
They even let us check in at the hotel early, which was great. Then, about 12:30, I was picked up by nuclearpolymer and her husband and friend and we went out to Brookline for a lovely Thai lunch and ice cream. It was great to see them again and we enjoyed a nice afternoon with only intermittent rain.
After they dropped me off at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum I spent a peaceful few hours wandering those beauty-packed rooms, during which time the storm worsened considerably. It slacked off by the time I decided to leave, close to 4:30, and I was able to walk to a nearby T-stop and get a train to a stop where I could transfer back to the train that would take me to the hotel.
The rest of the evening involved dinner across from the hotel at a Japanese restaurant with very pretty sushi and then getting the T up to Boston Common to the AMC theatre there to see Horrible Bosses. (Why, oh WHY, didn't I try harder to talk Ben into Rise of the Planet of the Apes?)
After we got out of the movie it turned out Chris had been calling me about the house, which is leaking like a sieve in places. I sort of expected the bay window to be a problem, since it has been in the past (is there some reason that roofers can't adequately flash where the roof of a bay window meets the brick wall?) but I wasn't expecting the rain coming in through one of the laundry room windows, which evidently has led to rain dripping from the top of the bathroom window, which is right below it. And I don't even want to know yet if the water damage in the northeast corner of the living room is any worse than it was...
At least it doesn't seem to be as bad here in Boston as was originally projected. We may be able to leave the hotel for dinner if the winds die down later. I don't especially relish the idea of walking around in 35+ mph winds; anything above 20 is absolutely no fun at all. But it is supposed to be pretty nice tomorrow, and on Tuesday Rachel and I may even take a train to Providence to meander around the Brown campus. We'll see.