Boston Trip: Thursday Gloucester and Home

We drove to the Fisherman's Memorial Statue (1925) along the Gloucester coast, just about 15 minutes away from our inn in Rockport. Names of those who had perished at sea are engraved along the surrounding low rock wall.  Many of the men had the same last name and made us realize that wives, mothers, sisters, and cousins often lost all male members of their family in one fell swoop. More names had been added as late as the early 2000's. We took our obligatory photos of Frank and me at the site.

Me in front of the statue of the classic sea captain.

I think Frank looks as noble as the man steering the ship.

We then got back in the car and continued the 50 minute drive to Logan airport, returned the rental car, and waited for our direct flight back to SFO. Since I had read everything I'd brought with me I browsed the magazine stores at the airport for a book to read. I chose Low Pressure, by Sandra Brown, mainly because it was one of the cheapest ones at the news stand and everything else seemed to have such dark themes (cancer, drug addiction, divorce). It also involved a tornado and with Robin living in tornado alley in Oklahoma, it piqued my interest. It was a very gripping book and you do need gripping to pass the time on a flight. It certainly was not the opposite of dark, but I liked it a lot.

I recommended this gripping novel.
It probably does not count as high literature but hey, it was a good read.

I digress, but I want to relate this short story. Yesterday morning I was telling Frank that I had just come off reading three good books in a row: The Tale of Halcyon Crane, The Fate of Mercy Alban, both by Wendy Webb, and Low Pressure by Sandra Brown.  Wendy Webb has a third book but it is not coming out until January 2014. I was lamenting that I was not into anything good right now. Frank checked e-Bay for books by Sandra Brown. Wow! Was she ever prolific! Closing within 16 minutes was an e-bay auction item for 30 of her books, a mix of hardcovers and paperbacks with the current bid at $12.50. The coincidence was so uncanny we figured it was word from above. Frank put in a last minute bid and won them all for $15.50 + $12 shipping.  For less than $30 we got 30 books. This deal even beats the $0.01 books on Amazon since each of those has $3.99 shipping. I suppose the library would be even cheaper yet but I am notorious for racking up late fees. The library will get them as we finish them, though.

The plane flight west is longer by an hour than the flight east due to prevalent wind direction. The mini-TVs in seat backs were non-functional so we did not get to capitalize on that little perk to pass time. Maybe next time we fly I will load a video onto the iPad. Anyway, although the flight home seemed long, I had that good Sandra Brown book to absorb my attention.

It was a relatively smooth flight and we landed on time and undid our steps to get back to the car in Long Term Parking. We'd written down our parking space but I was glad I'd taken this photo with my cell phone so we knew where to get off the parking lot shuttle bus.

Taking a photo with your cell phone is a good way to remember where you parked the car.

It is good to be back home. Getting home reminded me of the old nursery rhyme. I don't know why.  Maybe it is just stream of consciousness technique- as if I have a technique.

To market, to market, to buy a fat pig, Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.

To market, to market, to buy a fat hog, Home again, home again, jiggety-jog.

This post concludes my blog series on our Boston trip. What I initially determined to be three posts for three sections of the trip turned into nine posts. It is a little over two weeks since our return so I guess I did OK, not great.

Today is Labor Day. Holidays have much diluted meaning when you are retired. After I figure out Dropbox for the photos I am going to go sew. Autumn needs her grandma to bring her at least one new dress when we visit this month to help her mommy and daddy move into their newly purchased bigger home.