Bumming around Boston

Well, technically I spent more time outside of Boston city limits than in, but I bummed around the Boston area at least all day. I slept in a bit. I took some time to do things in the morning. My host, who was busy with a conference call, provided me a key to come and go, and I took the opportunity to walk to the grocery store and buy much needed groceries, as well as baked goods for breakfast (when I see an inexpensive muffin labeled as 650 calories, I am all over that thing). I didn't get out and on the bike until after 9:30

I biked around the extent of the Emerald Necklace, a looping bike path around the Fenway gardens, Marsh, ponds, and a sizeable lake. It was nice, though I did have a couple times where I had trouble figuring out how to stay on the path. After that I biked back to the river and its bike path. I biked on the Cambridge side for a time. I navigated the construction to go up and see Harvard and the yard. Since everyone else was doing it, I got my picture taken of me touching the founder's (well, wealthy donor and namesake's) foot. Then I biked back to the other side of the river, continued on the bike path as long as I could, and sometime before 3 showed up at the door of my friends' house (well, her mother's, technically), where they're presently staying. And that was all my biking for the day.

I got a tour of the impressive old house. We chatted. We went out for ice cream. I got plenty of time to relax. Then we went for dinner to an Armenian place they had never visited, and we got to see a belly dancer perform...which turned into a bit of a strip tease at the end. Old white women stuffing dollar bills down a belly dancer's skirt is a sight I won't soon forget. It was a good night.

And well, while today was in a large sense a rest day already, since while I biked around a fair bit, I only gained about 10 miles down the coast, I am taking tomorrow off too. There's a party that sounds like fun and I'd like to spend some more time with my friends. I have time. Sure, I envision myself cursing every choice I made that didn't get me through the South sooner, when I am down in Florida in July and it's obscenely hot...but that's future Eli's problem. Let him deal with it.