twelve hours in boston.

i will gladly admit that i was nervous en route to boston, though it's possible that had more to do with the fact that i'd gotten a 7:30 am bus bookless, with a juicless ipod and no chance in hell of getting to sleep. either way, i was in a questionable state of repair when we arrived, exhausted and travel worn but looking forward to the events at hand.

having taken the chinatown bus, we arrived about an hour earlier than we'd anticipated and took the opportunity to jump on the T and catch a late coffee and breakfast combo in harvard square. we watched the chess players as i shared my croissant with a very gregarious baby sparrow, and then strolled slowly to the venue. immediately before entering, i got a bad case of the shakes, having not seen al in several years and with no idea if meeting again was going to be horribly awkward to the point of severe pain. unsurprisingly, however, it was nothing of the sort.

al remains the same charming gentleman i knew, and it was lovely catching up--we had lots to talk about, and i was excited to meet his bride-to-be, who was every bit as warm and intelligent and delightful as i'd expected her to be.

we saw some old friends, and new faces, ate frighteningly yummy cake and drank champagne; dom and i were laughingly accused of spending the whole reception making eyes at one another, which we gave the obligatory denial though we have readily accepted this as our default state.

we excused ourselves a little early from the reception, however, as we had a city to explore and a bus home to catch. so we wandered; i photographed obsessively; we saw a falcon in the public garden, as well as a wedding which featured men in all-white tuxes with white top hats and canes; i oohed and aahed over the swan boats and the very cute puppy that sang in response to her owner's 'where's iris?'; there was proper clam chowder and walking down newbury st., a stroll through beacon hill, and near exhaustive collapse when we arrived to catch our bus at south station.

i managed to sleep on the way home, but it was still an exhausting trip; it took an hour longer than the way out, due in no small part to the fact that we took a detour through elmhurst, queens to drop off the driver's friend. we arrived back in chinatown just after four, and home fifteen minutes later...and yet never quite recovered on sunday, which was a fest of sleeping late, flolloping on hillsides in prospect park and finally finishing the movie we'd been watching...

and all in all, really, the weekend was pretty bloody fantastic, i must say.