Cheesecake & Traditions

Day 6

Oh my gosh, this is the morning to top all mornings! It's Independence Day, and we're having birthday cheesecake...FOR BREAKFAST! The cheesecake, as mentioned in a previous blog, wasn't baked early enough to have time to cool, so instead we have cheesecake topped with strawberry pie filling for breakfast.

I love birthdays!

It has been, for as long as I can remember, a tradition to go to Newick's restaurant for lunch at some point during our New Hampshire vacation. Grandma protests, stating that Newick's has become too expensive and that it's not worth the money. But stubborn, I tell Grandma that it's not a New Hampshire vacation unless we go to Newick's. We tell her that she has no say in the matter, that we are taking her to lunch at Newick's. We hear nothing more after that.

We arrive, and the restaurant is busy but more quiet that usual, probably due to the holiday. Now, before I continue, it should be known that every time I have ever been to Newick's, which is every time that I've been to New Hampshire, we always have to order onion rings. They are some of the best I have ever eaten.

We order our drinks and massive order of onion rings, and enjoy the heck out of them until out lunch arrives. Clint and Grandma order the lobster rolls,as if their lobster the night before weren't enough. I, foolishly, order the seafood platter. Why foolish, you ask? One, because it isn't the lobster roll. Two, because it is enough food to feed half the population of Somalia.

Holy cow, I am SO full! AND, I still ahve a doggie bag full of deep fried crustacaens to take home. But boy oh boy, full or not, overeating at Newick's is what makes or breaks the vacation. This particular trip is MADE!

That afternoon, Clint and I go for a swim until dinner time. Dinner is a lovely grilled steak and caesar salad, followed by the Boston Pops and the Charles River esplanade fireworks show. Now, we were invited to attend a rooftop party in Boston to watch the fireworks and hear the Boston Pops, but we thankfully declined and spent the night with Grandma. After all, that is why we were there.

The fireworks were amazing, and the Boston Pops...Fantastic, as aways. It was a wonderful day and a great way to spend Independence Day!

Birthday Lobsters!

Day 5

Today is my birthday! I am now, officially, a quarter or a century! The last major birthday I had was four years ago, at 21. Now I will have to wait five more years until the next significant birthday, and then every decade thereafter. The good times are over, and now I just wait...

Yeah right! The good times are just beginning. "Why?" you ask; because today is going to be AWESOME! We make special scrambled eggs this morning, with bacon, onions, bell peppers; the works! They are delicious and nutritious; good thing, too, as we have a full day planned!

In the morning we accomlany Grandma to the house in town to run a few errands, take out the garbage, etc. When we return, we realize that it's time for Shannon Adams (formerly Shannon Smith) to come over with Chloe, her yellow lab whi is BFFs with Mandy, Grandma's golden retriever. Shannon joins us as we are finishing up lunch and together, with her sis-month-old son Jonathan, we call for a dip. Jonathan loves the water, and Clint and I, well, let's just say that being my birthday, he had to be nice. He didn't seem to like this arrangement as much as I did.

We end our visit with Shannon because Grandma has physical therapy this afternoon. She drops us off in Portsmouth, which is a cute harborside town with lots of little boutique shops and...Annebelle's Ice Cream Parlor! Guess what was our first stop! Oh, I love ice cream! And what's better than ice cream on a hot day? Ice ream on a hot day that is your birthday!

Clint and I become unsticky and walk the streets, poking our noses into the little shops that we pass. We don't buy anything, but it's nice to poke around. When it's time for Grandma to come pick us up, we run out to the corner, hop in the car, and make our way home.

Now this is where the day get really cool. When we get home, we start making dinner. Why is this so exciting? Because dinner tonight is 2 lbs. of mussels, and LOBSTERS! Oh my gosh, I live for lobster! Yum yum yum! Grandma makes an awesome coleslaw, boils the mussels, and I start the lobster water.

Lobsters need to be cooked alive, which just kills Grandma, so she can't do it. When it's time for the lobsters to go in, she leaves the kitchen, and I dunk them in head first (to quicken the death). Twenty minutes later, dinner is served! Oh man, I can't even write about this part because it will make my mouth start to water uncontrollably. The gist is that lobsters are awesome, especially fresh maine lobsters! YUM!

The idea for dessert was cheesecake, but it didn't make it into the oven in time to be done tonight, so instead we have brownies, which I also LOVE! Full, fat, and happy, I start to doze on the couch and decide that I've had enough fun for the day, and head off to bed.

Shippin' Up to Boston, Whoa-oah-oah!

Day 4

It's Wednesday, July 2nd, and we're heading into BOSTON for the day! We leave the cottage at 7:00 a.m. and Grandma drives us into Portsmouth to catch the coach that will take us right into downtown. The bus ride into Boston takes about an hour and a half, so we arrive in Boston at roughly 9:30 a.m. Perfect time to figure out our plan for the day!

I call Lew, who is the father of one of my coworkers, and who lives in Boston. Lew recommends that we take the trolley tour of the city. We inquire about said tour and decide that this is the way to go! We buy our tickets, hop outside, and away we go.

The trolley tour is an all day, hop-on, hop-off trolley bus that runs a circuit all around and through the historic areas of Boston. You can get on or off where ever you want, all day long. The trolley tour also includes an hour long harbor cruise. Being about 10:00 in the morning, we decide to do the harbor cruise now, as to avoid as much potential for sunburn as possible. We board the boat, make our way to the topmost deck, and away we go!

On the harbor cruise, we see the Logan Int'l Airport (or at least we see the planes taking off and landing just at the edge of the harbor), we see the old historic piers, we get a fantastic view of Boston disappearing behind us, and lastly, we pull up along "Old Ironsides." This is the U.S.S> Constitution; the oldest active duty military ship in the country. Old Ironsides is called this because the hull of the ship is 21" of solid oak, and in battle, other ship's canons would just about bounce off the sides of the ship. The other battle ships were convinced that the U.S.S. Constitution must be made of iron.

We do not get off the cruise at the Constitution, but rather make our way back to the boat launch where we first caught the cruise. We get back on the Trolley and ride it over to near Faneul Hall ad Quincy Market at the north side of town. We walk around Faneul Hall and through the market place looking for a restaurant that Clint ate at the last time he was in Boston a couple of years ago. Clint remembers this restaurant as having the best prime rib that he has ever eaten! We walk and walk and walk, and we cannot find this said restaurant. We leave the Quincy marketplace and start walking toward little Italy in search of lunch and canoli.

We find a great trattoria with outdoor seating and decide that this looks promising. Part way through our meal, the skies get dark and a wind comes through that just about pulls the umbrellas right out of the tables! A few minuets later, though, the sun reappears and we are comfortable enough to finish eating out lunch. Afterwards, we find Modern Pastry with the most amazing canolis I have ever seen. I must break my diet, and Clint and I share a canoli. Holy canoli, this canoli is amazing!

Minutes later, we are walking past some of the points of interest on the Freedom trail, such as Paul Revere's House and the bronze statue of Mr. Revere. As we are in the plaza with the statue, I tell Clint that I want to buy a hoodie from Boston, and we find a vendor just a few feet away. As we walk up, we notice that the guy is gathering up all of his products and covering everything with plastic bags. Hmmm, strange. Clint and I each find a cool hoodie, pay the guy and walk away.

BOOM! CRASH! Not thirty seconds after purchasing our hoodies, the sky opens up and thunder and lightning crash down on top us. Literally RIGHT on top of us. IT starts pouring rain, and we run like crazy to find cover. The closest place that we find is the Old North Church. This is the church that Paul Revere allegedly rode from, where the lanterns were hung to notify the army that the British were coming by land or by sea. "One if by land, two if by sea." This meant that in the steeple of the church, they would hang one lantern if the armies were coming by land, two lanterns if they were approaching from the sea. From this point, the story of Paul Revere's Midnight Ride appears. In actuality, it was not Paul Revere who rode to alert the armies, but it makes for a good story.

We listen to the story about the Old North Church, Paul Revere's ride, etc. When the presentation is over, we check out the front door, and, well, it's still pouring rain. Being from Seattle, we shrug our shoulders and decide to head out regardless. After no more than five minutes, we realize that this was a BAD idea, as we are soaked to the bone. Oh well, too late now.

We take shelter in some brink archways in the buildings, but this is little help. We find our closest trolley stop, board with the other damp and soggy riders, and return to the bus station where we decide that we've had enough fun for one day, and head home.

Das Boat

Day 3

It's July 1st, and today Clint and I need to figure out what our plan is for the rest of our vacation here. Today, Grandma has a physical therapy appointment in town, and we decide to go with her and have her drop us at the mall while she's in rehab. She lets us off at Kohls, where Clint finds some new shorts and I get a T-shirt. With about 45 minutes left until Grandma comes to pick us up, we decide to walk across the street to the other mall nearby.

Now, by mall I don't mean giant shopping center with lots of stores and eateries. The malls here that I am referring to are strip malls with no internal access to one another. So, we begin walking toward the other mall and very quickly realize that this is the hottest and muggiest day that we have experienced since our arrival. We walk for a couple of minutes, and sweat starts forming down our backs; yuck! We finally reach JCPeneny, and just sit inside the cool. air conditioned store and wait for Grandma.

When we get back to the cottage, Clint and I take the canoe out for its first trip of the season. Having no idea what the lake looks like other than directly behind the cottage, I take Clint on the scenic tour of the lake and head toward the other end. It was a beautiful day, about 10 degrees cooler at the lake than in town, so the weather was perfect. Perfect except for the looming thunder cloud that has appeared over the course of our trip to the other end of the lake. When we reach the dead middle of the big end of the lake; BOOM! There is thunder right over top of us. Now, when there's a thunder storm, generally it's a good idea to get off of the water as soon as you can. In a canoe and at the other end of the lake, as soon as we can takes about 30 minutes. Clint and I start paddling like crazy to make for the dock and get out of the water.

On our way back to the dock, of course, the sky opens up and starts raining. It's not too hard of a rain, though, but enough that with the wind, it makes the hairs on my arms stand at attention. By the time we return to the dock, the thundering has been reduced to a low and distant rumble, the skies have cleared, and the sun us starting to return.

So we jump in.

Hot, sticky, and dirty...

Day 2

The date is June 30th; Monday. Clint and I sleep in until about 8:30 and begin the day with some hot scrambled eggs and bacon; just the thing to prepare our jet-setting bodies for our first day of vacation! After breakfast, we discuss our plans for the day; go into town with Grandma, go for a swim...Wait; no luggage! Well, that really puts a clinker in the works! We cannot leave the house for fear that our bags arrive and we are not able to claim them!

Grandma goes into town to run some errands, and Clint and I decide that, instead of waiting around inside the cottage, we will go for a walk. Clint's travel clothes include shorts, a T-shirt, and his Chucks. My travel clothes are less convenient for such a hot and humid day; jeans, a button-down top, and uncomfortable sneakers. Awesome.

We take Mandy for a walk around the end of the lake and back, and by the time we reach to cottage again, I am so sticky and hot I want to rip my clothes off and jump right in the lake. It's times like these that I wish I was less inhibited! Alas, I keep my clothes on and Clint and I decide to take the Canoe out of it's holster up and underneath the deck. This, in and of itself, was an adventure. The canoe is held, up-side-down, under the deck by two loops of rope, one around each end. This way, the canoe is protected (somewhat) by the elements during the winter. However, there must have been quite the wind storm this past winter, as one of the ends of rope holding up the canoe had become absolutely frayed and entangled in the mesh seat of the canoe. After some cursing and much finagling, we decidde that the rope must be cut to free the canoe from it's twine entrapment.

We cut the rope and the canoe is free; now we need to get it into the water. The hillside leading from the deck to the water is quite steep, and when covered in dry pine needles as it was, it quite slick, not to mention the rocks, railing, purch and patio furniture to navigate. Clint, the engineer, evaluates the situation and comes to the conclusion that the best way to get the canoe into the water while navigating all obstacles is to carry it over our heads. Right...

After much complaining, a few stubbed toes, and a lot of laughing, too, the canoe is in the water. Mission successful, although not as easy as the proposal made it sound! Just as the canoe went "Splash!," Grandma returned home. We lunched, lounged and laughed until (at last!) our luggage arrived! So happy to have our belongings and swim suit, we donned our bathers and jumped in the lake for this year's maiden intertube voyage!

Our bags are packed, we're ready to go...

Day 1

The date is June 29th, a Sunday. Clint and I wake up at a grueling 3:45 a.m. We shower, grab our bags and leave the house at 4:40 a.m. We drive and drive, and eventually we reach our destination: Sea-Tac Airport! We're embarking on our first (together) New Hampshire trip to visit Grandma Marilyn!

Our flight from Seattle into Minneapolis/St. Paul is on time. Exhausted from seasonal allergies and a cold that just came on this morning, I sleep the whole way there. Our flights are planned perfectly; just enough layover to get from one gate to the other. We board our Manchester-bound plane in perfect time! New Hampshire is now only hours away! Or, so we thought.

After several minutes of sitting on board the plane, out Pilot announces that, due to a severs stretch of thunderstorms all across the East Coast, our flight has been delayed 40 minutes. Now the end of the world, we stay on the plane and wait out the time. Not ten minutes later the Pilot comes back on the PA and announces that all Eastbound flights have been cancelled. Awesome.

Clint, being the awesome guy that he is, immediately gets on the horn with the Northwest Airlines reservations rep and gets us booked on a flight two hours later flying into Boston. Alright, not bad! Still on our way, set back only a couple of hours! This will put us at the cottage at roughly 9:30 p.m.

Well, as you can probably imagine, things didn;t go exactly as planned. We arrive in Boston and head to the baggage claim area. We are hoping to get our bage ASAP to catch the bus to take us into Portsmouth where Grandma can pick us up. The carousel starts turning, and bags are appearing. More and more bags, and then slowly, the feeder tapers off and the same few bags keep going around the carousel, none of which belong to us. Of course, our bags didn't make it to Boston despite our request both with the Northwest reservarions rep. and the rep. at the airport tat we talked to. So once again, we go to Customer Service for Northwest and report our missing bags, which takes enough time that we miss our bus to Portsmouth, the next bus coming in little less than an hour.

As you can probably imagine, in my tired, sick, and exhausted state, I did not bear the situation well, and I lost it at the airport. I couldn't keep my tears choked back and I just had to let loose. Clint consoles me and reminds me that nothing that has happened is life threatening, and that, in fact, despite the troubles, things turned out pretty well. My tears subside for the time being, and together we sit and wait for the next bus to take us to Portsmouth...

Coming Soon!

I just created this blog for folks who don't have myspace or facebook accounts and want to know my 4-1-1. I will try my best to post whenever something noteworthy happens, or when I have cool things to share. I will also post pictures on here so y'all can see my smiling face whenever you want!

So sit back, relax, and enjoy the stories!