a surprise weekend getaway to boston!

About a month ago, Zan asked me to take the Friday before Valentine's off work and to pack warmly and for a 4-day weekend. Besides so many jokes about Branson, Missouri that I started to get excited about heading to the middle of nowhere, I had no clue what we were doing. For me? Nothing beats a good surprise.

He kept me in suspense up until the day we left. On Friday morning, I was giddy with excitement and my guesses were running the gambit from Vermont (realistic) to Alaska (probably not). We took the metro - and I knew at that point that we'd either be taking a train or flying, and it'd depend on which line we were took as to which we were doing. We switched lines at Gallery Place, and I knew for sure that we were headed to the airport.

As we stepped into the security line at the airport, Zan handed me my ticket; we were heading to Boston. I was worse than a kid in that airport - excited, jumpy, full of energy, and overflowing with anticipation. My ultimate travel fantasy is showing up at the airport with no clue where I'm going, no ticket, and just going. And that's exactly what I got to do. It was the most loving, special gift.

Just like that, we were off to the land of snow, ice, ivy league schools, and home of my longtime best friend, Melanie. The last time we saw Mel and her boyfriend Mike was for Mel's and my birthdays in September in New York. This time, they were (unfortunately!) spending the weekend in Philadelphia, but that didn't stop them from transforming their beautifully decorated apartment into a bed and breakfast for us.We got to spend most of Friday afternoon and evening with them, and then we were left to our own devices.

(Later, Zan let me read his and Mel's email exchanges planning the whole thing, and it made me laugh and cry and just about burst with love.) 

It was such a fun weekend, complete with wandering through the city during a snow storm, eating delicious food, meeting up with girlfriends I haven't seen in far, far too long, buying enough books to last me months, and drinking hot tea until I had to pee every five minutes. Perfection. I tell you what.

Here's a fun top 10 list we compiled at the end of the weekend for Mel and Mike.

10. The speakeasy outdoors store - Hilton's Tent City near the North End is like a divey outdoors store. A speakeasy outdoors store! Some kind of awesome 4-story, narrow, hole-in-the-wall, in a rowhouse, outdoors store. I was wearing Frye's in a snow storm. We stopped in here to get me some Sorel's. I felt like a real New England woman.
9. Fawning over Beacon Hill  - we met up with my JET girlfriend Rachel (whom I haven't seen since 2010!) for pho. We talked nonstop, gave Zan all the JET gossip he could (n)ever want, and then Rachel took us on a tour. We saw the Boston Public Library (gorgeous), the Boston skyline right in the golden hour, the Boston historical park, and Beacon Hill. John Kerry lives up there, the alleys look like England, the homes are $5 million or so, and can I live there, please?
8. Finishing the Boston Marathon without running at all! The finish line is painted and still visible! Even luckier for us, a group of Bostonians were waiting for a friend (who was running? in a snow storm?!) with a "finish" sign so we got further proof of our pretend athletic prowess ;)
7. The bacon parm dipping sauce at Saus - Saus, a Belgian street food and artsy/modern/European restaurant space has 15 different kinds of sauces for their frites.
6. Italian men yelling at each other in Italian in North End - I fell right over my heels into the snow in love with North End. What blows my mind is this hyper-Italian neighborhood is dubbed as touristy, but the food is the best in town. That never happens!
5. All the books at Harvard Bookstore - (my Sorel boots cost me $80 at Hilton's... they were $170 at a store in Harvard Square!) I've been to Harvard Square every time I've visited Boston. It never loses its charm. It's a beauty of a campus. But the best part of that area is Harvard Bookstore. Head downstairs for half-the-price, still-in-new-condition used books.
4. Secret bread and butterscotch pudding at Row 34- One of Mel's closest girlfriends runs the beer program at Boston's hottest new restaurant - Row 34. I've met her several times, and she went out of her way to spoil us when we came in for dinner. Make sure to ask for the bread. Skip the brussels, get the cauliflower or the carrots. Get two orders of pudding.
3. Harpoon Brewery - Clare is one of Mel's college friends, and now she's one of my firends. Clare and I lived together here in DC for a year before she moved back to Beantown for grad school. We caught up over beer and sparkling cider (yummmm!) at the gorgeous, huge, open beer hall at the Harpoon Brewery. It's a 15 minute walk from Row 34 - combine them for a great evening!
2. The elusive, always closed "Mapparium"  - I got unruly in my excitement over seeing the Mapparium. Downright unruly, I tell you. I would not shut up about it. Supposedly, it's a 3-story, stained glass globe of the world from the 1930s with fascinating acoustics - it echoes so clearly it's kind of freaky how you hear your voice, is what I hear. And I have to rely on rumors because it's never open! It's closed all weekend and only open during the week until 4pm. So let's all just take off work so we can see the Mapparium.
1. Mel and Mike's B&B/all of east Cambridge - Mel decorated the bed with felt hearts, left fresh towels with a bowl of m&ms on top (plan, no peanuts, she knows me so well!), and made homemade cinnamon rolls for us for breakfast. It was luxurious. Their apartment is nestled off Cambridge street, and I love their neighborhood. It's local in the best sense - thick Boston accents, Italian home-cooking, and friendliness all around. They may not take reservations quite yet, but I'd definitely recommend staying in Cambridge.

a run through central park | new york

A few weeks ago I emailed my friend Ellie - one of my closest friends from college and former DC roommate - about visiting her in Brooklyn. Within a few hours, I'd picked out buses and started planning our weekend. What I didn't know is that Melanie and Pam - my two other closest girlfriends - were going to be in town the same weekend from Boston and Kansas City, respectively. The luck! I could hardly contain my excitement.

I rolled into town near Penn Station around 11:00pm on a drizzly, gray Thursday night. Ellie and I devoured slices at a local pizza joint and began the long trek back to Brooklyn.

Let me say that very time I visit New York, I spend the first 24 hours so enchanted by it that I start imagining my soon-to-be life there. When the clock strikes 36 hours, I remember how big it is. The city is ginormous, and it takes approximately forever to get anywhere. That's why bars stay open until 4am - it takes all night to get to a destination and the rest of the day to return home underground. NYC is grooming vampires, is my theory.

But back to the first 24 hours. We crashed around 1:00am, and for the first time in weeks I slept past 8:00am, and it was glorious! Forget the city that never sleeps, New York is the city of soundless sleep! Ellie and I hopped on the subway for a 45 minute trip to the Upper West Side, where I promptly fell head over heels in love with everything, but mostly with Central Park, luring me in for a run.

Since taking nearly a month off of running to recover from a stress reaction in my right tibia, I've been adhering to a vigorous training plan. I work out six days a week, but I only run on three of those and only on tracks and trails to protect that leg. Unfortunately, two weeks into training, the injury is back. I have another ortho appointment next week. I've been battling with myself over whether to keep training until then. I'd decided to stop, but when I knew I'd be near Central Park, I brought my running clothes anyway. 

I hemmed and hawed standing under shaded trees in the Park until I couldn't take it anymore. I'm not in New York very often, and it's Central Park - the world's most famous, beautiful urban park! I ran along a shaded path with rolling hills for about half a mile before cutting over to a track that runs around a reservoir. The track is soft - gravel and worn from the runners before me. I took it easy, stopping twice to snap photos of the incredible Manhattan skyline reflected in the water. The track is 1.58 miles around, bringing my total run to just over 2.5 miles back to where I started.

The weather was a breezy 70 degrees at 10am, my leg felt better than it had in weeks, and I had an entire weekend with friends I don't see often enough in front of me. I got lost in the views of skyscrapers and decided if I lived in New York, I'd run in Central Park every day. Or at least as often as I could commit to the commute.

where to eat in atlanta | brunch at rosebud

Let's get the bad news out of the way: By Atlanta law, restaurants cannot serve alcohol until noon. That's an improvement over my years serving tables in Newnan, Georgia back when Coweta County was dry on Sundays. But it's a disappointment coming from DC, where brunch isn't complete if it isn't preceded by the words "bottomless mimosas." The food at Rosebud in the hip Highlands neighborhood of Atlanta far makes up for its champagne deficit.

I'm fortunate to have two friends from high school middle school that I still call my closest. Melanie is one, of course, and the other is Randall. I wrote about our mud hike and delicious lunch at Thai Square after his last visit to DC. I have a picture of Randall and me hanging in my room from a 7th grade science nighttime "trip" outside of school to look at the stars, or an eclipse, or something in the sky. We both have braces, and we're happy, typical 13-year-olds. I smile every time I catch a glance of us back then.

The three of us are rarely in the same city at the same time, so we took advantage of us all being in Atlanta a few weekends ago to catch up over brunch. Randall, the only one of us who lives in the city, suggested Rosebud and got us reservations. Rosebud serves a twist on a traditional southern-style brunch, complete with cheese grits and bread pudding french toast, and fried chicken so good I'd have just about eaten it off the floor.

We decided on sharing the bread pudding french toast as a "starter." Spoiler alert: we never finished it. We tried our hardest, though, and we did make a substantial dent in it. The portion sizes are generous, to say the least. It was, hands down, some of the best french toast I've ever had. In fact, I'll just say it - it was the best. The texture of the bread pudding made the dish creamier than it is traditionally, and the rich, warm real maple syrup had me sticking my fork back in for "just one more bite" more times than I needed. I loved the addition of the fried egg on top, the yolk adding another level of flavor that I've craved ever since leaving the poor remains on that table.

I'd like to be able to tell you about the various other brunch dishes Rosebud serves, but we all ordered the same thing. Great minds think alike, and all that. But honestly, when there's an option for fried chicken on homemade biscuits with sausage gravy and a fried egg to top it off, who sees anything else?

We would have done well to order two of these monsters instead of three. Melanie and I barely made it through half of ours (Randall didn't have a problem finishing his). It was so good Melanie and I took our leftovers to our hotel for Ashley's wedding and snacked on them while we got ready. We couldn't stop. It's no surprise that an Atlanta restaurant has mastered fried chicken, but it doesn't mean I appreciate it any less. This chicken was decadent - juicy on the inside, crispy on the outside, and the key - flavorful. It's so easy for fried chicken to come out bland or tasting like the oil in which it was fried. Rosebud's take on it is moist without being greasy and seasoned to perfection.

The dish is served with grits or potatoes, and as true Georgians, we all went for the grits. Randall and I opted for cheese on ours. I've ordered grits at every brunch I've been to in DC that offers them, and I've been disappointed every single time. I grew up on Mom-made, homemade grits. I know the real deal. It should be bursting with flavor - peppery and savory, the cheese adding a punch of saltiness. The grits at Rosebud reminded me that they can be done right.

We finished eating at 11:50. Don't worry, we saved room for a round... or two... of mimosas for dessert.

if you go... 

rosebud

1397 n. highland ave ne atlanta

price range: $10-$15/entree

$7 mimosas or a $27 for a carafe of oj & a bottle of bubbly

menu highlights: fried chicken, "big nasty" (fried chicken sandwich)

Beantown, frosting included

I visited my best and oldest friend, Mel, this weekend in Boston. In case there's any question of authenticity on this blog, I bussed up there - we're talking $80 roundtrip, 10 hours both way, sleeping with my head inside my sweatshirt because it was so cold, cost-saving measures. But it was worth it.

She and her boyfriend recently got a place together. Right after they signed the lease, they celebrated her 26th birthday. When she offhandedly invited me to come celebrate both at her new apartment, I surprised us both, I think, by saying yes. The last time I went to Boston was almost two years ago (why is time moving at WARPED SPEED?!). The morning I got there (at 5:00am!) off my overnight bus, she laughed as she hugged me and introduced me to the guy she'd been talking to for a few weeks and gone on her first date with the night before. Fast forward to this weekend, and I finally had the chance to get to know that guy.

With us, it's so easy to be reunited.  There's no pomp and rarely are there extravagant plans; we're at our best in PJs. We were at our best a lot this weekend. We baked, shopped, baked some more and talked our way through the two days we had together. As Mel said, "I'm glad this isn't a one time thing." That's exactly how I felt about the chocolate espresso cake we made from scratch, frosting included.