Vacation, two days at a time...The First
Sunday: Easter Sunday was fantastic. I mean, I don't celebrate Easter or anything, but that's still what you call the day, and it was still a particularly good day. I woke up at 11 from my sister hopping on top of my bed with a big funky bag full of assorted chocolate eggs and caramels. Every single year, well my family doesn't celebrate Easter but my cousin and aunt and uncle do, so every year my aunt and uncle have made Easter baskets for me and my sister; it's so sweet. And they're always really big with tons of candy and chocolate and some special items-- for example, I'd been needing a bag for wallet+keys+stuff so I got a bag, and my sister adores cooking utilities so she got some cooking something-or-others in her basket amongst the chocolaty goodness.
We all bundled up in multiple layers because even though it was in the 40's outside, we were going to the beach where it's a bit more blustery no matter what. I know that going to the beach this time of year sounds crazy, but it's really lovely going during the off-season because it's so serene and beautiful. Plus, they allow dogs during the off-season, so we brought Chloe and she absolutely adored the beach. She ran and ran and ran, and it's so funny the way she reacts to the waves of the ocean. The first time we ever brought her to the beach, she was nervous about even putting her paws in the damp part of the sand, and the when even the wimpiest little waves came at her she would freak out-- not by running away, but by charging towards the wave for a brief second, trying to bite the wave, and then retreating back to defense position. It was a pretty amusing spectacle. This time when we went to the beach, she was much braver, but still just as fun to watch. Chloe was generally more excited about the water, and about actually going into the water up to her belly. It took a little coaxing sometimes though; often I would say in my my-voice-is-high-pitched-now-so-get-excited! voice, "Chloe! Chloe, look, water! Come on, let's go in the waterrr!! Wooo!" and we would both charge towards the ocean. Sometimes she went in the water and I stopped right before reaching it. Other times, sadly, she would change her mind at the last minute and stay dry while I would, in my enthusiasm, end up with soaked sneakers and socks before realizing I'd gone too far for nothing and cursing as I retreat far from the damp sand.
Overall we had a really nice walk. As usual we did meet one wheaten terrier enthusiast who marveled at how calm our dog seemed (calm?! Chloe?! Hah!) given wheaten terriers' reputation as really hyperly affectionate dogs. Which they are. He just saw her at a lucky rare calm moment, I guess. After we'd had our fill of beachitude we went back home, and 4/5 of the family collapsed (if you count the dog). I was the 1/5 of the family that didn't collapse because I'd come close enough to nodding off during the ride home. My sister curled up on my bed (we have recently discovered that it is the perfect napping bed, since it's so squishy and cozy and has 5 million comforters.......5 million meaning two, of course...). My mom took the living room sofa, as it is her usual napping spot. I think my dad took the porch sofa, since it was probably sunny enough out there to not turn one into an icicle, as is usually the case any time before June and after September. Chloe curled up in her dog bed, or bagel bed if you want the real name. As for me, I plopped down in front of the booshimentary on the computer and was all set.
We did Lotus Blossom (Chinese food) for dinner, which was dee-lish. Hadn't had Chinese food for a while, and it really hit the spot. Except for that pork dish that was practically neon orange...left that one alone...urp... My fortune cookie said, "Sometimes even love shows a rerun" which made me smile. But I am D-O-N-E DONE with Gustavo, don't worry!
Monday: Monday I faced my phone awkwardness and called Maayan back, which ended up being around 10 phone calls because we had a lot of coordinating difficulties, but it was totally worth it because we had a nice get-together. I'm usually so skiddish about getting together one-on-one with my friendly-friends, do you know what I mean? But I was glad that I did it. Also, do you know what else I did? This was a big day for Julia Pulia (pudding and pie, kissed the boys and made them cry). I took public transportation, FINALLY, all by myself!!! I know, I know, it's about time, little Framingham freakum. Well I don't take the T very often anyways because I live in Framingham where you have to drive a minimum of 20 minutes to get to a T station in the first place, so THERE. I was overly precautious, of course, and wrote down on a little piece of paper every single stop between Riverside and Brookline Hills, but hey, it doesn't hurt to be careful just in case. I also wrote "GREEN LINE" and "D LINE" a bunch of times all over the paper. I drove myself to Woodlawn with direction from my sister so I know the route for future travels. I missed the first D subway that went by, but caught the second. While I waited, a group of stupid young college-age guys were standing nearby, smoking and talking about hiding drugs from the cops. I couldn't help eavesdropping on them a little, just because they sounded so cocky about being all bad-ass when really, they were a group of unintelligent-seeming, plain old ugly guys who were probably really insecure about themselves and trying to sound cool. A middle-aged shlumpy woman asked me if there was a mall nearby, and I felt sort of stupid because I did tell her about the Chestnut Hill Mall but I'm so bad with directions that I couldn't really give her any specifics except to point and say you drive that way along that road for around ten minutes. At least I wasn't as bad as when a British couple pulled over and asked about the same exact mall (this was a few years ago) and since I was in West Newton and don't actually know anything about West Newton, all I could say was that I knew it was somewhere around 15 minutes within the general vicinity of Newton. Sorryyy!
Maayan and I almost missed each other, because when the subway that I was on stopped at Brookline Hills, I saw him standing by the tracks and waved to him, but he didn't realize it was the right line until it started moving away. But everything turned out fine, after several more phone exchanges and such. So once we were safely united, we went to the Garment District in Cambridge and literally waded around through a wide, tall spread of random articles of clothes on the floor of the shop. There was a lot of crap, but I mean it's loads of donated clothing; big and small, strange and ugly, cool and pretty, bizaare and puzzling. Maayan found a large coat that fit surprisingly well, and I found two scarves that were kind of cute...only cost 90 cents total! I was glad that I got the scarves because the weather forecast was wrong: it was COLD outside. Then we had fun exploring the costume section...Maayan almost bought some big pirate-y boots, and I secretly wanted to buy these tall heeled boots that looked like they were right out of the Mirrorball collection. After more browsing and whatnot we decided to go get ice cream in Newton Center, which was really tasty. I realized that I hadn't eaten good old cookie-dough ice cream in years, so I got that, and it was well worth it. Then we were both sort of sleepy, and I headed home on the T...by myself! :D Maayan made me call him when I got back to make sure I made it safely. What a gentleman!