a delivery!

Hooray!  I love getting stuff, especially when I've been shopping online.  Courtney and Robert gave me a generous gift card for Eataly for my birthday last month, and I was so very happy to spend it.  Fun times.

At the end of my remote workday today, I got Olive into the car (she LOVES to go for a drive)

and headed back up to the condo.  I had received a notification of a parcel delivery, and I wanted to be sure that it was inside, out of the heat, no matter what it was.  When I arrived, we discovered it was the Eataly shipment. 

I eagerly got it inside and unpacked it.

Pastas and sauces and some other goodies. 

Nothing perishable, lots I can have fun with down the road.  I'm so looking forward to it.

And then back in the car with us, another ride for the little girl. 

basic pasta

Conrad is in Chicago.  Van is under the weather.  Peter threw together a basic pasta dinner.

The underlying recipe involves caramelizing some cabbage and some onion, adding some pasta water, tossing in the pasta, and serving it up.  But I want to add a little protein, so I topped it with some peas and pancetta and Romano cheese.  Simple, tasty.

And hooray!  Leftovers for lunches the rest of the week!

spring break vacation, Day 7

Day 7 we left New Hampshire.  Sigh.

It was a nice drive down to the Boston area, and thanks again to Ed for driving us.  We set out at a decent time of the morning, enabling us to stop in Lawrence, an outer Boston suburb, so that Conrad could visit a museum there and see a specific piece on exhibit.  The Lawrence Heritage State Park was a nice stop en route, I have to admit.  A fine little museum about the industrial history of the city including labour strife, disaster, and the growing presence and influence of a Latino community. 

And, sorry, but the person staffing the park welcome desk was a friendly and handsome mature guy.  Sue me, I'm gay!  ;-)

It wasn't long after that that we arrived at our hotel in the Seaport area of Boston.  I hadn't been in Boston in ten years, and the last time I was there, the Seaport area was rather less developed.  I'd had to stay out that way for a conference at the new (at the time) convention center.  This time I chose it because it is relatively easy to get from there to the airport across the water.

We were able to check in right away,

then we took Ed for lunch nearby (mocktail, shrimp tacos)

before sending him on his way home to Rhode Island.  We spent the rest of the afternoon napping (not pictured) and strolling around the area a little. 

Such beautiful spring weather!

I was excited for dinner.  No, not for the food, but for the company. 

I first got to know Robert ages ago, I think it was on Flickr.  We met once for dinner back on my last trip to Boston in 2016 (I had a cassoulet that was nowhere near as good as what I would have at Yoshi's), and I'd looked forward to another chance to meet again.  Oddly enough, we were both in Palm Springs last month at the same time but not realizing it.  We almost missed the chance to have dinner in Boston - Robert was booked to be in Hawaii on vacation.  However, the torrential rains that Hawaii has received in recent times had him reconsider, and that meant he was in town and free for dinner. 

Yay!  Conrad got to meet him, too, which was a bonus.

We met up at Woods Hill Pier 4 not far from the hotel, a nice little walk.  Robert was already enjoying a drink when we got there, and we soon joined him in that pursuit once seated.  The dinner was good, and I liked the food, but the only thing that stuck with me was the salt-roasted celery root.  The star of the meal.  Everything else was great, though. 

I confess, after a week of dining out and drinking, I was looking forward to getting home and maybe trying a little more of a regular diet again.

Anyway, a lovely dinner.  Robert is a character, and that is a compliment.  Stylish, a raconteur.  It was fun conversation. 

We walked him partway to where he could get transit

then headed the other way back to our hotel.  There was no rush for us the next morning, so we knew we could wind down and sleep as late as we liked. 

Tuesday evening

I am so mixed up.  Tuesday evening last night?  Was it?  Really?  I could have sworn it was a Sunday.  Life will get back to normal at... some point.  Conrad heads out of town on Saturday, and then exactly one week later, after his return, he and I head out of town together.  I think that maybe by late April there will be some semblance of routine again, but who knows?!

Anyway... Tuesday night.  Having let loose this weekend, I decided we'd have some wine with dinner (I'll go back to greatly tempering drinking the rest of the week, more or less, and then beyond!), and I made us some dinner out of things found in the fridge and cupboards rather than going shopping.  A simple tomato sauce, some pasta, burrata, crispy prosciutto. 

Not the most refined dinner, but it tasted fine and used up some burrata that was at risk of getting past its sell-by date.

Conrad and I sat outside, watching Drag Race and appreciating having a pleasantly mild evening.  The recent heat was unwelcome, and then we had the heat of Palm Springs, so a relatively cooler (but not at all chilly) evening was welcome.  Plus, the heat has the jasmine in the back courtyard on the verge of blooming. 

Hooray!

Onward with the week.... 

Monday in Vancouver

Sigh.

So every good intention to blog this week hit up against what turned out not to be sniffles from seasonal allergies but an actual cold.  Always fun.  I've been in bed an awful lot the past few days and eaten little and have done absolutely nothing of note beyond, perhaps, watching one more Oscars contender (Sinners, good movie).  But I'm feeling better today, happily.  100%?  Nope.  But I'm sitting here, sniffling a bit, half-watching Monday's American Idol, and digging into another blog entry.

Jeepers, it was a month ago that I was in Vancouver, right?  Still, let me do my duty and check in on the Monday there.  And what do you know, it starts off with a morning walk.

I love my morning walks.  With Conrad or others or alone, I just love that peaceful part of the day.  It will be interesting to go up to BC in the future now that they have changed their time zone to favour light evenings (meh) and find myself walking in darkness more, but ah well.  I still had a nice walk to start off a quiet-ish holiday Monday.  So once again, a photo dump from a walk that took my west and then back along the waterfront to the hotel.

But that's not all!  I was meeting Bryan for lunch, and I decided to do a bit of a stroll before that, taking myself almost right the way around Canada Place and getting some shots

before meeting up with him at Nightingale.  It was threatening rain later, and I wanted some step count before that.

Good to see Bryan. 

I made the right choice in giving myself one more day in Vancouver to catch up with people.  It meant getting together with him for a tasty meal of charred cabbage (so good!),

a vegan pizza with squash and peppers (nice and light),

and a carrot cake dessert (pretty but not as good as many carrot cakes I've had). 

What was especially cool was that in all the years I have known Bryan - 6 or 7 by now - I didn't know about his figure skating past.  So we were able to gab at length about Winter Olympics stuff, and it was great to hear his perspective on the performances and judging and personalities.

I came back to the hotel after lunch and chilled with the three-part ANTM documentary series before girding myself to head out into the rain and walk to dinner.  Hotel umbrella, thank you for your service!

I met Sherri

at Tavola for dinner.  She knew the GM well, but he didn't realize that I was meeting her when I arrived.  I liked the place.  Good neighbourhood spot with interesting food and good drinks.  I got served the wrong drink first, but they let me keep it while they made mine, and that was kind.  Her friend also topped up our wine, so that may have been the booziest meal we had.  But I very much enjoyed our food

and the seating at the end of a long communal table.  Also, Sherri and I had so much hometown gossip and more to get through.  It was a blast.  I think we were together for over 3 hours, not at all rushing and not at all being rushed.  I think Mark told me that he and Linda go there sometimes even though they don't live at all close, and I could see being a regular there if I lived nearby.

Sherri dropped me off back at the hotel.  My day of walking was done.  I put on some more ANTM and headed off to bed, very happy with the day that was.