Boston was wicked cool

Hi,
I thought I'd summarize this past week for the hell of it, even though I
wasn't really biking or doing anything all that spectacular.

It actually worked out really well that we stayed with our friends in
Boston, because it was Maria's birthday on the tenth. We went out on
Saturday night to celebrate and Maria lent us clothes so that we could go
out and hit a club. Unfortunately no one in the house had shoes that could
fit me, so with the borrowed slinky skirt and tank top I wore my clunky nike
sandals . The best quote of the day was Maria saying, "if anyone asks you
about your shoes, tell them you have a condition." Some of you who know me
are probably thinking, "Maria must be a pretty good friend to get leigh to
spend the entire night in the hip hop room and not complain." Yeah, she is,
but I actually had a really good time. It was pretty interesting comparing
the contrast of people there to our nights the prior week.

Our friend Nicole works at Harpoon Brewery and they were having a big event
on sunday night for all of the bartenders in Boston. It turned out that
they needed people to work at the event, so Melissa and I screamed out,
"we'll pour beer!" Then we found out that we would get paid and for a
moment everything was right in the world. We had a ball pouring pints of
hefeweizen for people with the best Boston accents (besides John Fuller)
that I've ever heard. My favorite quote, "Ladies! When are we gonna
pahty?!" After cleaning up we went inside the brewery and had a couple
beers with the Hahpoon sales guys and then performed some rugby songs upon
request.

On Wednesday friends of mine, Dorothy and Scot, who are starting their own
cross country adventure (you've got to love the economy when about 50% of my
friends are out travelling on severance...well, and some without severance)
came up to hang with me during the day around Boston. I finally got to see
Shackleton's adventure at the omnimax and recommend it to everyone (it's at
the museum of natural history in nyc also) or at least read the book
Endurance for a true adventure and test of strength.

Nicole had another Harpoon event on saturday, this time up in Quichee, VT at
the Quichee hot air balloon festival. The event was supposed to draw 30,000
people, but only about 500 showed up (and that includes all of the vendors).
It was still fun to see all of the balloons launch and to talk to the few
people that did go through the beer garden. Probably the most interesting
guy I talked to was Doug who just retired, moved up to Vermont and started
working at a winery that makes only non-grape wines (like pear, apple, and
rhubarb wine). Granted most people call that expired apple juice, but
apparently if you slap a fancy label on it you can make a nice profit.

So, I've watched a few videos (gotta love a house that owns Mallrats and
Tommy Boy), did some laundry (ahhhh, blessed, blessed electronic washing
machines and dryersssssss), ate about 6 chili verde enchiladas from Anna's
(you've got to go to anna's if you are ever in Allston/Brighton) and hung
out with really good people. It was nice too b/c I got to see a lot of
different neighborhoods of Boston. Thanks again to Maria and Nicole for
entertaining us and letting us crash at their house for an extrememly long
time!

I'm about to go meet Melissa at the bus station to catch a bus up to
Plymouth. The plan is to stay at Tyler and Mike's tonight and be off
tomorrow with our bikes. However, if there is one thing I've learned so far
on this trip is to not waste too much time making plans, b/c they never
actually happen.

And thank you to everyone who pointed out my spelling error on Bob Dylan in
my last email - I apologize to anyone who was offended by my act. I could
blame it on automatic spell check... but then i'd be lying. Hey, I'm on
vacation, I'm allowed a mental meltdown.

Thanks to everyone for sending me emails of encouragement, they really mean
a lot!
cheers,
leigh