Salem, MA - Minus the Witches

Decided to kick off Labor Day weekend with a day trip to Salem, MA. Famously the Witch City, I should confess that I didn't visit any of the assorted witch-themed attractions this trip. There is too much to do in one trip, and I figure witches, pirates and graveyards are best appreciated in the fall, ideally on an overcast day during leaf season.

This trip, wandered down to the House of Seven Gables, past a number of really cute older homes and shops. I was persuaded to stop in at Ye Olde Pepper Companie - the oldest commercial candy store in the US. They had a great selection, and I was sorely tempted to just say "Yes", but restricted myself to a few things, some fudge, a couple of peppermint patties and some chocolate-peanut butter varieties. So much better than mass-produced candy. While I would highly recommend the place for the atmosphere, they do have an online presence and will ship.

We decided to wander back to the car (I decided on a parking garage spot, so the car was shaded) to drop our stuff off so it wouldn't melt in the mid-day sun. On the way we stopped at several different shops, mostly variations on the witchcraft and New Age theme, though highly variable in quality. My favorite things tended to be the bumper stickers ("Cats, Not Kids", how appropriate) though they did have quite a number of items that spoke to my inner Goth. Aside from the historic witch trial tie-in, you can tell there is a very active Wiccan community there. Kind of ironic, the town that became famous because it allowed its paranoia and isolation to explode into a fiesta of false accusations and executions is now home to a plethora of the very people they were trying to hunt down and eliminate. Not that things have entirely changed, there is a church in town that hosts "Holy Happenings" every October to compete with Salem's Haunted Happenings events. It hasn't exactly caught on.

Lunch was Salem BeerWorks. I am not a big beer drinker, so I went for the tasting menu instead of a regulation size beer. Still not a beer person, but even I enjoyed the selections. I give them credit, the menu is definite pub food, but well executed. I particularly liked the unexpectedness of the potato, cheese and bacon spring rolls. Sort of like a twice-baked potato in a spring roll shell. I also compliment them on making Pepsi tolerable. When I made a face at the "Is Pepsi ok" query, the server suggested she add an extra spritz of seltzer to cut the sweetness. Not exactly coke, but tolerable. I'll have to remember that trick for later. 

Last stop in town was the Peabody-Essex museum, which is great. Not "great for a little town" great, but really fabulous. The architecture is very light and airy and the collections are extremely well curated. They are currently hosting a selection of Ansel Adams work that is fabulous. Unlike his more famous mountain west photographs, this one focused on his pictures of water. Very unusual, and absolutely stunning. The museum also has a Chinese house, moved here in the 1980s I think, that you can tour. It was really interesting to see the architecture, and to hear the history on the audio tour. The upstairs is getting pretty rickety, though, so definitely watch your step there. 

About that parking garage - cost to park for basically the entire day in a garage in the middle of town: $1.25. Cheaper than a meter, and much more convenient. One note on getting to and from Salem, even though it sounds easy (just take 128 to 114), what that doesn't tell you is that 114 takes all sorts of turns and jogs. I know most of the streets and routes in Massachusetts follow old cow paths and such, but whatever cow blazed this trail was very, very drunk. My GPS (a TomTom) kept up with all the turns, so recommend you either go with a native or bring a digital navigator.

Dating and the Olympics Effect

While I'm a huge fan of the Olympics, why is it that suddenly every time my friends try to fix me up with someone he "looks just like Ryan Lochte"? It's so cute that they're still trying to get me married off, the dears (note: I am still 2 cats shy of the Crazy Cat Lady mark), but even if all these Lochte comparisons were accurate, that still isn't necessarily a good thing. Oh, he's cute enough and has great abs, but he also seems shallow and immature. A grill at the Olympics? Seriously? Rochester is not the Hood and while he is a great swimmer, its kind of hard to be gangster in a speedo.

Anyway, getting marginally back on topic, while I'd much rather a Chris Pine or Jake Gyllenhal type, my friends have thus far suggested three Lochtes in the past two weeks. I had my first date with one last night. No stupid grill, but not a lot to recommend him otherwise.  I would really like to be able to sit down and talk to someone about topics other than a) the Red Sox (I think baseball is pointless and dull) or b) the Patriots (American football is really wimpy rugby). Have I mentioned I'm not from New England and thus have non-standard team loyalties for those sports I do watch? Alas, it seems all he's good for is Boston sports. Couldn't even think up any hobbies that didn't involve "his" teams. I've had more interesting conversations in elevators.

The real killer, though, was the drinking. While I have no issues with a little social drinking, I don't go for sloppy aging frat boys who drink 14 (yes, I was so bored I counted) beers in under 2 hours. I particularly can't stand sloppy drunks who think I'm going to sleep with them on the first date. Ugh. Maybe he really is channeling Lochte. The best part of this date was laughing about it with the girls over lunch today.

In happier news, I've been changing up my workout lately. I hate, hate, HATE intervals, but they seem to be working. My little black dress is a little too loose. Gives me an excuse to go shopping for a new one before next Friday's blind date. *sigh* I am so not looking forward to it after this last one. Maybe I should just get another cat.

Boston 3-Day for a Cure Weekend!

In late January 2008, my stepmother Kathy died after her metastasized breast cancer reached her brain before her doctors could build her up enough to withstand another round of chemo. No complaints with the doctors, she had a particularly aggressive cancer. After crying hysterically for many days and being generally miserable, I got angry. It wasn't fair that a terrific person (no evil stepmother, she) could be taken so long before her time. So, I decided I had to do something to fight back, since she no longer could. I started out that first year as a crew member on the Boston 3-Day (Pit Crew, whoot!). I have participated, as crew and as a walker, in at least one walk each year. This year, I got my 5 year anniversary pin.

I just crewed Boston and (work permitting) will be walking in Philadelphia. This past weekend, pouring rain, thunder and all, was 3-Day weekend. No amount of soggy sneakers can dampen the spirits of the happy pink people, and it is so uplifting to spend a weekend with my 3-Day family. The whole community gets involved in some towns:

And you get to spend time with all sorts of characters:

Even the occasional stray alligator.

Sure, the soccer fields we were sleeping on flooded, turning air mattresses into water beds, yes, the mosquitos have a particular love for my blood, and no, I don't like using port-a-potties (in fact, I spent the entire weekend doing everything in my power to avoid using them), but it's all worth it, and it does make me feel like I'm doing something to reclaim my voice. I didn't have a choice about losing someone I love to cancer, but in some small way, I feel like I'm helping to make sure that some day, no one will have to face this disease or the gaping hole it can leave in families.

Each year, with my feet quaking in my sneakers knowing what's coming, I hope that this is the last year we have to walk, that we'll get the call saying that they've found a cure and we can hang up our sneakers. Maybe there could be one last 3-Day... just a party in pink tents, no walking required. Didn't happen this year, at least not yet. Here's hoping that day comes soon.

A Dark Knight Rises and a New York Weekend

This week, my second must see movie of the year, the Dark Knight Rises, was released. A group of us scored tickets to a midnight screening to the final chapter of perhaps the greatest superhero movie trilogy that has ever, or will ever, be made. I absolutely loved the movie (yes, it plods a teensy bit in the second half, but the ending is amazing) and the experience of seeing it with a theater full of fellow fans. While the entire case is amazing (Gary Oldman is perhaps the most under appreciated living actor), I have to give special points to Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who really is the main reason that the plot manages to hold together. Of course, Christian Bale is an amazing actor and he and Michael Cain play off each other so well, as always, but there are enough plot gaps that they needed an assist to make the movie work. I won't go into details, since this isn't a movie blog, but the quality of the acting was astounding.   Our post-film euphoria was short lived, though... while we were having fun watching a movie, a different theater in Colorado was having a very different evening. Even though we were on the far side of the country, there's a little bit of survivors guilt (why them, and not us).

Already, the newspapers are talking about how dark and violent the movies are, etc. The thing is, people all over the world have watched these movies, and loved them, and only one person stocked up on guns and gas canisters, dressed up in body armor, booby trapped his apartment and killed people. Shouldn't we all be trying to find out what caused this one person to commit mass murder, and not trying to blame it on a movie that millions watched without killing anyone? Also, why is it that someone can go out and buy multiple guns, and explosives, and gas canisters, and gas masks, and body armor and no one anywhere pauses to think maybe he might be planning something violent. I know the NRA would have kittens at the thought, but just maybe it would make sense to have a system that generates a "This looks weird" alert when a cluster of purchases like this is made. Because, not for nothing, but Mexico is in the middle of a drug war, and you're still statistically twice as likely to be shot in the US, and I think that's a problem.

On a different note, last weekend, I took a quick hop down to NYC. Not really time for a full-up trip report, but who would have guessed you'd see something like this:

in the Bronx? New York is full of contrasts. Also, is it really that unusual to cross stitch on a train? I had about seven people come up to me and comment about how strange it was to see someone not my grandmother's age sewing. I guess the hard rock, sci-fi fangirl, engineer cross stitcher demographic is a bit sparse.

Hogwarts in the Office Basement

A surreal experience at the end of my day today. I had stayed late to take care of some things and, around 6:30, headed down to the lab to finish up. That late, the offices are mostly dark, and (since it's been raining most of the day) the hallways are kind of shadowy and vaguely creepy. As I was heading down the (also dark) staircase, I heard someone whistling the Harry Potter theme. Whoever it was actually had really good pitch, but the whistling faded away into the creepy empty offices and I never saw who it was.

It was an interesting if mildly surreal experience, and surprisingly good atmospherics to make it work. Since I'm 100% sure I'm a muggle, I guess I should start keeping an eye out for lurking Slytherins in the halls after hours.

Sharing the pain isn't always the right strategy

Why is it it that you're only a team player if you don't have a life?

The immediate back story - last year the company thought there might be a slowdown and they didn't want to have a bunch of people on overhead for a few months while they found new contracts because that would lower our profit margins and by extension, decrease the executive bonuses. So they laid people off, in weekly rolling waves. Fast forward a few months, and all the contracts we leads said were coming in have arrived. And we are short staffed at least 50 people in one particular area that was hardest hit by the layoffs. And, in an apparent shocker, no one is willing to work uncompensated overtime.

So, a multiple choice quesion. Does our fearless leader:
A. Put pressure on our HR people to speed up the hiring process
B. Allow paid overtime
C. Ask for voluntary transfers
D. Spread the pain around by pulling people off their assigned tasks to backfill the program she didn't think was worth the overhead money

If you chose A, B or C... I would really like to work where you do. But, alas, our brilliant automaton chose option D. Which leaves me in an impossible position - the other program asked for me specifically because of some work I had done for them in the past, but my current job takes up all of my time (including a sickening number of my days off) and Dr. Evil sees no reason why I can't be all things to all people and simply do both jobs. I vetoed that and got the "We need you to be a team player" speech. Shockingly, I remain unpersuaded. Seriously, I don't mind taking one for the team, but this is just too much to ask.

On a happier note - my new favorite cross stitch pattern place just had a big sale. Ok, I have more projects than I can finish in a lifetime - they're still really cool.

Oh, Sudafed, How Do I Love Thee?

Let me count the ways:

1. Because with your help I can breathe through my nose. No one, no matter how sincerely they may try, can breathe through their mouth without looking rather like a trout, which honestly isn't my best look
2. Now the balloon in my head is smaller and more manageable (though I still think my head is at least the size of a large pumpkin)
3. No one wants to go to work and be "that" person snorfling and sneezing in their cube all day
4. While you make me sleepy, you don't make me so sleepy that I spontaneously pass out on the couch and wake up the next morning crackling like a bowl of rice crispies

In somewhat related news, I have found cross stitch nirvana (because nothing says I'm home and sick and feeling sorry for myself like an epic cross stitch project). The site is called Heaven and Earth Designs and if I live to be around 300, I can actually finish all the projects I want to do. A minor problem, I know... I'll have to work on that whole "live forever".

Catching up on vacation news. Chicago stopped only a very little short of being a total disaster. It was totally my fault, though. I had somehow managed to miss the fact that the one weekend I was free to go was also NATO conference weekend. Even after I found out, I thought it would be OK (the conference wasn't scheduled to start until the day I was leaving). But no. Most of the major museums were closed that Saturday. So, no famous Art Institute, no Field Museum, no great views of the city from the Aquarium. *muttering*

The Chicago City Museum was, very fortunately, quite nice and it was still possible to see a lot of the architecture. I also got to see Millennium Park (the bean is actually really, really cool) and the waterfront and do some shopping. A note on being a pedestrian in a city expecting the NATO apocalypse - when you see a platoon of mounted police heading to the place were all the helicopters are hovering, it's best to head the other way.

Stayed at the Intercontinental Hotel - the pool alone is worth a trip to this hotel. It's also right next door to the Tribune building. Chunks of stone from all over the world are embedded into the tribune building, so you can see pieces of the Great Wall, the Taj Mahal, I think I saw a plaque for the pyramids, etc in the facade of the building. I know, nerdy, but I love rocks.

Also loved, despite the New Yorker in me screaming bloody murder about my treachery - Chicago deep dish pizza. Ate at Gino's East (worth the wait, both standing outside for a table and inside waiting for the pizza) - as a hint, unless there are at least 3 of you (or two if one is a sumo wrestler), do not order an appetizer if you get even a small deep dish pizza.

Ultimately, it's not fair to compare Chicago and San Francisco. I saw one on a tough weekend, the other on a perfect weekend, though it was much easier to walk around Chicago... fewer hills. Here are some other good things about Chicago: the people are really, really friendly. The architecture is amazing, and there's a lot of variety, from sky scrapers (Sorry, Willis Co. it will always be the Sears tower to me) to Frank Lloyd Wright. It has great park spaces, and they're spread throughout the city so each one has a slightly different character. Public transit is efficient and convenient, so you can save your rental car money for a nicer hotel or shopping, etc. Pedestrian friendly and great downtown core.

Highlights: Millennium Park, deep dish pizza (I will deny everything if confronted about this back home), City Museum