We arrived at the Westin Copley Square a little after midnight; as promised, we had been upgraded to a “Studio Suite”. I’m not sure that it’s a real upgrade – the room is nice and big, but there’s a tiny closet and NO drawer space, so you can’t really unpack! Luckily, we use packing cubes, so we won’t have to be digging through our suitcases every day, but I have to wonder what the designers were thinking.

Jeff met us at the hotel after a late breakfast and we spent the day filling in gaps on the Freedom Trail.

We started at the Old State House; the exhibits were well-done and informative – I especially liked Reflecting Attucks, which put the life of Crispus Attucks into perspective and looked at how his story has been used over the years. The view from the Old State House wasn’t bad, either.

We had a late lunch at Falafel King – recommended!

Our next stop was the Old South Meeting House; again, the exhibits were very informative and engaging. The space itself was more interesting than the Old State House – it’s survived better, with pews still in a traditional configuration, so it was easy to put events into place in my mind.

After that, we walked to the Granary Burying Ground to look for the Boston Massacre grave marker (which, of course, includes Attucks), as well as Sam Adams, John Hancock, and much of Benjamin Franklin’s family.

We walked back to the hotel by way of the Common, the Public Garden, and the Commonwealth Avenue Mall. There wasn’t much to see in the Public Garden, but we did find one tree along Commonwealth Avenue that was exuberantly celebrating Fall.

We also took advantage of the late Thursday hours at the Boston Public Library to take a quick look at the art and architecture – here’s one of the many murals in the Abbey Room (formerly the Book Delivery Room), just as a sample.

We’d had a late breakfast and a late lunch, so none of us wanted much for dinner, but it seemed like a good idea to eat SOMETHING. There was an obvious answer – walk to JP Licks and have ice cream cones for dinner; problem solved!

We’re at SFO to fly to Boston and visit Jeff.

One of my credit cards includes a Priority Pass membership, which is mostly useful for lounge access, but at SFO, it also gives us a credit at the Lark Creek Grill – which made it the obvious place to have lunch before our flight. We each had lox and bagels with a sorbet chaser and it cost $8.42 plus tip, a real bargain!

SFO also has art exhibitions; the one across from the restaurant was Mathematics: Vintage and Modern. We didn’t have a lot of time to look at it, but I enjoyed seeing some of Cliff Stoll’s Klein bottle sculptures.

I also liked the vintage math toys – my favorite was the “Think-A-Tron” from Hasbro. I didn’t have one as a kid, but I do remember playing with it. Computers have come a long way since then!

Onward to Boston!

Today was another pretty quiet day – and then we got busy with packing, so I have nothing of significance to write about.

The neighbors who used skeletons to create very interesting tableaux on their lawn during the first year of the pandemic let them come out and play for Halloween. It was good to see Bones and Skully again!

Our trainer was on vacation today, but we went to the JCC anyway – it was our first time on the cardio machines since…well, you know. I can’t speak for Diane, but I was definitely out of practice and didn’t get into my usual rhythm. It felt good to get back onto the bike, and I actually felt virtuous about not letting our trainer’s absence stop us from exercising.

When we got home, I found an unsurprising email from Best Buy – they can’t deliver the cooktop on November 22, as planned – they gave us a new date of December 7. I won’t be surprised if that date slips, too, but I can hope….

And I finally got back to working on some photo editing – I’m now finished with our Iceland/Boston trip, just in time to head off to visit Jeff in Boston later this week and, I hope, take more photos there!

Both Diane and I seem to be over the side effects of our booster shots, and the Mac I upgraded to Monterey appears to have survived the experience (though I’ll wait a bit before I update the other machines, since they run applications I depend on).

We didn’t decorate for Halloween again this year, but we still got a few trick-or-treaters early in the evening – well, actually it was late in the afternoon, a few minutes before 6. I had candy on hand to give them, of course. One little girl (I’d guess she was about 4 and a half) asked if the candy had nuts or sesame because she was allergic – luckily, I had York Peppermint Patties instead of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, so she should be OK.

In honor of the holiday, we’re going to watch the original Ghostbusters – happy Halloween!