After the VC residency, I jaunted to South Burlington with a couple of fellow faculty members for some R&R at the Doubletree. After a dinner highlighted by clam chowder, we watched "Failure to Launch" and laughed out loud more than once. It's a cute, upbeat romantic comedy. I was most taken with Kit, in my unusual trend of zeroing in on secondary characters.
On Wednesday, my fellow faculty took off in the morning, and GLS joined me that afternoon. On the recommendation of the front desk clerk, we headed to the Rusty Scuffer on the Marketplace for dinner. It looks like a sports bar, so we were skeptical walking in and decided to try an appetizer first. That went well and the service was great, so I ordered French onion soup and a lobster. GLS ordered lobster and steak. Everything was wonderful, except GLS' steak (I pointed out that Vermont isn't steak country anyway), so we indulged in splitting a second lobster since they're practically free there anyway.
We drove to Cambridge on Thursday morning, through Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. The Northfield Mountains were awash in wildflowers, lush green grass, and covered in a forest of evergreens. The deer-, moose-, and bear-crossing signs also caught my eye, and I studiously scanned the scenery for any of the above to no avail.
Once we got into town, I worried we might be late. Cambridge is darling, quaint, and historic, with a lot of red brick, and I could tour houses there for ages. But there also are a lot of one way and poorly marked streets. We spent a while getting lost as the seconds were ticking.
No worries, though. We arrived by noon at the O-so-magical Candlewick Press where we were treated to a tour of the house. It's a hip, open Massachusetts Street loft--brick walls, exposed beam ceilings. Various books are displayed on shelves and the coffee table in the entry. I spotted such titles as Wand in the Word: Conversations with Writers of Fantasy edited by Leonard Marcus (2006), Sock Monkey Goes to Hollywood: A Star Is Bathed by Cece Bell (2003), Queen of Cool by Cecil Castellucci (2006)(author interview), and Pirateology: the Pirate Hunter's Companion by Dugald A. Steer (2006). There were Maisy pillows on the sofa. A copy of My Father The Dog by Elizabeth Bluemle (2006) was displayed on the table.
We had lunch with D and J at a Thai restaurant just down the street. I can't seem to recall its name, but I had chicken in a garden, which consisted of chicken with broccoli over white rice with peanut sauce. Yummy, especially the sauce, and excellent conversation.
GLS and I then checked in at the 1927 Sheraton Commander Hotel (the commander is George Washington, who is prominently featured via statues and portraits), near Harvard Square.
We walked around the Harvard campus that afternoon and decided to go to the Harvard Museum of Natural History the next day. It was no hotter than Texas but much more humid than Austin. GLS had brought with him reinforcements to my wardrobe, though, which helped. Exhausted, we had a snack of mixed cheeses in the dining room and then dinner in our room (chowder again for me).
On Friday morning, I was delighted to discover a canis dirus skeleton in the entry of the museum. It's the species of Ice Age wolf that I nodded to in Tantalize (Candlewick, 2006) as a "distant cousin" of my werewolves. I chose it because its the largest dog that ever lived, and I figured that would help, logic-wise, with the mass issue in shapeshifting. I decided that this was a sign that the trip would be fantastic. The geology exhibit reminded me of Jerry Wermund's books, Earthscapes: Landforms Sculpted by Water, Wind, and Ice (Rockon, 2003) and, even more so, The World According to Rock (Rockon, 2005). We continued on to a display about Peru. All of the indigeneous people exhibits were balanced with portrayals of contemporary folks, including some recent art, which always reassures me (I sometimes worry that kids will move from dinosaurs to Native people and conclude that we're extinct). The glass flowers exhibit from the Ware Collection of Blaschka Glass Models of Plants was fascinating, too. A little creepy--hard to believe they were glass--but wow. Nifty.
Lunch that day was at Bertucci's. It's a narrow, deep, loud restaurant, and there was a short wait to get in. Loved it. I had the chicken marsala with a garden salad and a side of linguine topped in tomato sauce. They forgot to bring my fried cheese, but I was too full from the rest of the meal to have enjoyed it anyway.
Shopping followed. I had fun at Urban Outfitters, though flipping through the clothes, I decided I had to leave immediately or register for AARP. I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that we lingered at Curious George Goes to Wordsworth, a children's indy bookstore. Book sightings included: Semiprecious by D. Anne Love (Simon & Schuster/McElderry, 2006)(excerpt) (author interview); Jim Thorpe, Original All-American by Joseph Bruchac (Dial, 2006); Penny from Heaven by Jennifer L. Holm (Random House, 2006); and All Hallows Eve: 13 Stories by Vivian Vande Velde (Harcourt, 2006). Among staff favorites, I spotted Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata (Atheneum, 2004)(author interview). We continued on to the Harvard Coop Bookstore. I must confess to a bit of rearranging here. On the theory that fans of Robert McCloskey's Make Way for Ducklings (Viking, 1941) might not be the same target audience as Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan (Knopf, 2006), I did prop up the latter for better visibility all around.
Dinner that night was the best of the trip. The Craigie Street Bistrot is intimate, refined, and a bit off the path as it's located in the basement of an apartment building. I had the portage of local butter and sugar corn with scallions and olive oil (as well as some kind of fish), followed by soy-and-butter braised line-caught striped bass with rock shrimp, pea greens, peanuts, and eggplant puree. I didn't order the "roasted bone marrow" ("treat it like a meaty butter"), but I did carefully consider it.
On Saturday we took the T (clean, easy to use) to Boston to visit the New England Aquarium. It's built around a wonderful penguin exhibit and a mega tank filled with all manner of sea life. I was most taken with the giant turtles. Sightings at the aquarium store included Blackbeard The Pirate King by J. Patrick Lewis (National Geographic, 2006)(author interview).
We had a late lunch-early dinner across the street at Legal Sea Foods. I ordered chowder with the scallops in mushroom sauce and requested it be put over brown rice instead of bow pasta.
(The food in Cambridge-Boston was excellent overall, but I found it hard to eat healthy on the trip. In Austin, it's easy to find whole grains and what not on every menu, so I tend to forget that's not the norm.)
We spent much of Sunday back in Boston at the Museum of Science. I most enjoyed the butterfly garden and seeing R2D2 in an N-1 Starfighter suspended from the ceiling. Also, in the computer exhibit, there was a displayed copy of the comic "Superman's Girl Friend Lois Lane" (Apr. 1961, No. 24) for 10 cents. The computer apparently is telling Lois that Clark would be the "perfect husband," but alas, she still dreams of Superman.
Afterward we took the train back to Cambridge and stopped for lunch at Uno's. I was disappointed in my chicken chilli and cheese fries, though the marinara wasn't bad, and will likely restrict future visits for the original Uno's in Chicago.
We ducked into the Harvard Coop Bookstore again. Having fretted about Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, I must confess that I moved three copies of it to "new and notable" at the front of the store, at least one of which had sold before I left. I also was pleased to see An Na's latest, Wait for Me (Putnam, 2006) prominently featured on the staircase heading down to children's-YA. In that department I spotted several more familiar bylines, including Julie Anne Peters (author interview), Scott Westerfeld (author interview), Nancy Garden (author inteview), Libba Bray, and Austin's Keith Graves.
We'd enjoyed the Legal Sea Foods in Boston so much that we decided to try it for dinner in Cambridge. I had lobster, corn on the cob, and brown rice. I would've had the chowder again, but by this time, I was starting to chowder out.
On our final day in Cambridge, we decided to relax until I had my appointment to visit Candlewick again. I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to meet with my genius editor as well with a fiery, funny, and fierce marketing team. I also read about ten minutes of Tantalize to a crowd of Candlewickers. What an amazing house!
GLS and I celebrated the end of the trip at Harvest Restaurant, which was second runner-up for best chow. I had corn bisque with rock shrimp, followed by scallions with braised lima beans.
We got up early to drive back to Burlington. I flew out on Jet Blue to JFK, but the plane left Vermont a few minutes early and so I missed my connection. Long story short, I should've been home by 4 p.m. and instead got in after midnight. GLS and I grabbed a couple of chicken burritos at Taco Cabana and called it a morning. Whew.
As always, it'll take me a few days to catch up from being gone. But I should be posting to Cynsations again very soon.
