Boston: Day 1

I love this city. The second I stepped out of the subway I knew I just went ya, this is cool. There were people walking around... past midnight... not scared out of their minds. As we walked towards North End, where James and Rebecca live we walked through a good part of of down town and North end and everywhere we went there were people walking around, corner shops open selling ice cream, baked goods, and whatever else you would like. More downtown there were tons of bars open that were packed with people all just sitting around and talking. Most of them had tons of seating outside.

The next day we got up and went to a produce market at Haymarket. It was pretty cool, very similar to west side market only not chock full of yuppies. The prices were very good although all the meat places smelled like rotten garbage.

Next we went and had lunch at the Union Oyster House, aparently the oldest restaurant in Boston. The fish sandwich I had was good and definately fresh fish cooked well. I tried some of James' Clam Chowder. It is worlds apart from anything I have had in the Midwest. I didn't order it myself because of many tramatic experiances I had while working at the retirement home cleaning pots in which the clam chowder had sat all day at a steamy 180 F. *shudder* Before I leave though I will get some :-)

Samual Adams Brewery was next. A relatively easy subway ride and we were there (public transportation here is beautiful). The tour itself was pretty blah as they only showed us some example setups and didn't take us into the factory. However, they did give us a free glass before letting us into a room where for basically about 20 minutes they gave us free tasting of 3 different kinds of beer. I drank my first full glass of beer (only 7 oz. but hey... ) and I have no urge to ever do that again. It was better then any beer I have tried so far but still tasted like piss to me (I found out that is the hops at work). I also tried their Octoberfest beer (actually not as offensive because they added sugar but after a full glass of the lauger... oye) and an oatmeal stout (still gives me goose bumps... and not the good kind). Over all though they treated us very well and I would recommend it to anyone who actually likes beer.

On the way back we got of the subway down town and walked back stopping in several shops and this cool grocery store that was in this building built of granite. Come to think of it granite must be cheaper then water here because they use it all over. In the midwest I suppose the equivilent is limestone... but limestone doesn't hold a candle granite. In anycase we got stuff to make home made pizza which is what we ate for dinner.

There is a lesson to be learned here... do not bake home made pizza in a 800 ft^2 efficiency in the middle of a heat wave. Holy crap was it hot after we were done. We went for a walk after dinner (see previous sentance) and got some gelato. I have a feeling this was real gellato as oposed to the stuff we get in Cleveland. The Italian population here is still going strong compared to Little Italy. After stopping by a fountain/pool to cool are feet we closed off the night watching Shawn of the Dead. A very good movie that I highly recommend.

I have decided that Boston keeps the prices of its subway tokens at a $1.25 just so people can practice their Boston accents and say buck and a qwarta. And on the way from the airport the operator had a pretty good accent and said "Last stop, collect your belongings and exit the train." Which was pretty funny. What I love most about the way they talk here though is something like that sounds like "Last stop, get your stuff and get the f@#k off my train."

Note: I am going to try to post pictures within this entry but we will see how that works out. Did I mention how much I freaking love this city?!