i'm running sound tomorrow night for our vacation bible school, which has a secret agent theme. i am enjoying this email excerpt with betsy.

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subject: options

me: spy #1: cool rock star spy [black corduroys, black t-shirt, black denim jacket].

spy#2: [wo]men in black spy [black business suit].

of course, i haven't worn the business suit in well over five years so it might not even be an option.

b: I would go with rock star. I mean, you are soundwave [ed. note: sound operators' code name for the week].

You have black corduroys?

And a black denim jacket?

Are you sure you aren't a spy?

me: i can neither confirm nor deny that.

b: And you wonder why people are intimidated.

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and later... 

me: i'm playing with outfits here. i don't really look like a secret agent per se, but if we're going for Depressed Angry Teenager or Goth Biker Chick, we are SO totally in business.

just found this in part of a patient's claim note:

"This was for a blood drawl."

ah, southern ohio. 

no, not me.

rachel and ali are coming.

very soon.

sweet.

"I once mused, via Francis Shaeffer, that I think the sovereignty of God is best found in that he keeps us from falling off the edge. No matter where we sail in this life, we can ultimately rest secure in knowing that there's no abyss waiting to swallow us up, however much we may feel like there is. We are hard pressed, but not crushed. Perplexed, but not despairing. Persecuted, but not abandoned. Struck down, but not destroyed.

Though I seldom give him credit for it, God really is faithful to us. Seeing my life go past me in superfast motion, I couldn't believe all I've made it through. I couldn't believe all that I thought would crush me or destroy me, and yet here I am."

[via meegs]

i've actually been dragging this out just to torture lindsay.

just kidding.

OR AM I?

after all the peepiness, katie and i packed up the car, said our goodbyes, and headed for Final Destination: Maine. we followed the new hampshire-dwelling gwyn out of boston, and you know? it's a LOT easier with the navigation that way. i believe we passed the smallest Welcome to Our State sign ever ["uh, was that it?"], but never fear: katie captured the new hampshire liquor store sign. unfortunately we didn't actually buy anything in new hampshire -- no sales tax? what? -- but we were there much longer than intended after coming across a bottleneck that funneled EIGHT LANES? down into one. wtf. the pace finally picked up, and i am very sad that it was too dark to get a picture of the best sign ever: "Welcome to Maine -- The Way Life Should Be." while searching for mark and lindsay's house, we found that maine does believe in street signs; they just like to cover them up with foliage. also, we pulled into their neighbor's driveway for a few minutes before realizing the mailboxes on the street didn't necessarily match up to the houses the way we thought they should. after getting to the proper house, we all hung out on the porch for awhile, catching up, before turning in for the evening.

friday was designated as girls' day out while mark was stuck at work. after some coffee and freshly baked blueberry muffins, we ventured north on i-95 [what IS it with the east coast and all the toll roads??], past portland and on to freeport, home of l.l. bean. i don't know what i was expecting of freeport, but it wasn't this. for you ohioans, the best description is that it's like easton, with lots of cute shops and outlet stores... only not so creepy, because freeport seems to be an actual town and not just a manufactured consumer empire. we spent plenty of time at l.l. bean, explored some shops, and found some seafood for lunch; i had my first lobster roll. pretty tasty. then we headed back down the road to portland, where there are apparently lots of nice people. and lots of miscellaneous shops, which made me sort of feel like i was in athens every now and again. took some random pictures on the wharf and then it was back home for our last new england beach of the trip. the beach was sandy, the water deep blue, and the temperature a welcome reprieve from the sweltering heat of our time spent in boston. this appears to be a nightly ritual for mark and lindsay [and sydney], and i can see why. kt and i made our own sign, and after walking the plank and listening for the ocean, we were off to dinner. lindsay and i each had trout, and mark and katie each had a new kind of fish? what? by the time we returned home, it was a little too chilly for the porch, so we bravely enjoyed some red wine while lounging on their Brand New Just Delivered The Day Before living room couches. i believe our cue for bedtime was when i began falling asleep on one of said couches. as we all got ready for bed, sydney decided to redecorate with the bathroom trash [kt, upon exiting the bedroom: "there are things in the hallway that i don't think should be in the hallway..."]. ahhh. our last blissful night in maine.

saturday morning was a wonderful repeat of coffee and muffins, and the realization that yes, we really did have to head home that day. you can only be so leisurely when you have a fifteen hour drive looming, but we did our best. we packed up, said our early morning goodbyes, and headed west. our return route was a little more interesting as far as driving and paying attention to interchanges, and included but was not limited to: more blurry and/or non-pictures of road signs; a particularly long and frustrating stretch of i-84 wherein the speed limit was 55mph; me picking bad food/gas/potty exits; creating a vacation quote list; somehow losing track of an entire travel plaza ["it was implied"]; and entire conversations consisting only of -- "um, we were in maine earlier today." "yep." -- repeated every hour or so. we finally made it to katie's apartment under a fuzzy, cloudy moonlight [kt: "the moon has great bokeh tonight"], and just sort of collapsed upon entry.

we had a slow acclimation process to normal life again, deciding to forgo church in favor of blessed, blessed sleep. we did some picture dumps and photo assessments and lounged for awhile before i decided it was time to head home.

after being within three feet of someone for an entire week, you'd think i'd be overwhelmed. and i suppose i was. but in a good way.

thanks to katie for putting up with me all week, and thanks to everyone for putting us up all week.

and if you're STILL reading this? goodness. thanks for putting up with this extended vacation recap series. i applaud your perseverance.

the end.

can someone please tell me how i missed this story?

poop on a plane.

ew. 

okay, now this is funny.

if you don't get it, you probably don't get the "how many indie rock fans does it take to change a light bulb" joke, either. tragic.

we awoke sunday morning to find that katie sleeps well on the floor with merely egg crate foam stuff and the bottom half of a sleeping bag? so weird. we were headed to watertown to meet up with katie's cousin and his wife, at their church. the trip was supposed to be twenty minutes.

"give it forty-five," was rachel's take.

we made our way around the fens and had to circle the block before hitting the actual off ramp to i-90, but we were on our way. paid the $1 toll [again, WTF?] and made it into watertown. after a series of perfectly executed but totally incorrect turns, we somehow looped back onto i-90... headed back into boston. as i recall, there was a lot of agonized sighing. after an unsuccessful attempt at avoiding the toll, we ended up wandering and driving around and landing on mit's campus. after a call to michael, we conceded to missing church and pondered following us-20 out to watertown. we ended up taking the original route and finding our way to their church, and only half an hour late for the service [score!]. apparently this particular church has taken on a bit of a midwest escapee feel, and one of the speakers was actually from ohio. go figure. michael and jennifer took us out to lunch, then back to their place for a leisurely afternoon of chatting, ice cream, and euchre. after observing the cousins' similarities for awhile, and then a short jaunt to buy our weekly t passes, we said our goodbyes and managed to make it to back to rachel's without getting lost [a victory for us!]. this may or may not have been the night we started on a rather tart magnum of wine that, upon tasting, rachel pleaded with us to help drink. [for the record, i didn't really think it was that bad]. i pleasantly observed my worlds colliding a bit, as i chatted with my friends and they with each other... twins of mine, in totally different aspects. eventually we settled in for the night, preparing for a full day in boston.

after a slightly late start, and confusion regarding parking and street cleaning ["is today the third monday??"] we began our day, psyched to conquer the freedom trail, a two and a half mile trek showcasing some of boston's historic sites. after rachel's nonchalant "oh, you're going to do the whole thing? yeah. most people don't finish" comment, i of course took this as a personal challenge. we did some pre-trail exploring of the public garden and boston common before starting our journey. several churches and burying grounds later, things certainly tapered off as far as the crowds. of course, this only gave us more motivation, since we would no longer have to dodge large tour groups with rather annoying tour guides. we crossed into charlestown and eventually had a snack and a slight rest near old ironsides before heading to the last site: the bunker hill monument. i was not expecting the ice cream truck parked at the bottom of the hill, nor was i expecting just how winded i would be walking the 294 steep winding steps to the very top of the monument. the view was pretty spectacular. our legs started getting shaky about halfway down, and after reaching the ground again, we collapsed on the grassy hill after a few select pictures signifying completion of the freedom trail.

we walked back through the north end, searching for mike's pastries and some cannoli. imagine a store with a pastry nazi feel, chock full of customers, and two tired sweaty introverts with huge backpacks lumbering around. feeling like overwhelmed bulls in a china shop, we decided to forgo the cannoli, and instead got some iced coffees [dunkin donuts, of course] and sprawled on boston common. we met up with rachel at central square, then went home for some pantry reorganization and preparing random food items from rachel's stash. we met rachel's friend kristen in the midst of all this, and after our dinner we headed to jamaica plain for some ice cream. and also... some tigerlily. then it was back home for wine and organizing rachel's life, and time for bed.

part three coming soon...