The Cavalier and His Christmas Crabs

After Seth’s final exam on Wednesday (the end of his first semester teaching), we spent the following day hanging out in downtown Boston. We first walked through Chinatown and then heckled the squirrels in Boston Common before catching a show, Dinosaurs Alive!, at the Omni (IMAX) Theater at the Museum of Science. Considering we hadn’t seen a movie together in the theaters in about a year and a half (Tales from Earthsea, in Perth, Australia), it was a particular treat to go to the IMAX.

After the movie, we killed time (and froze!) in Downtown Crossing before buying student rush tickets to see the Boston Ballet’s The Nutcracker. For dinner we then headed to Chinatown to eat at the Gourmet Dumpling House, which was totally packed even though it was earlier than 6pm. We noticed that most of the people in the restaurant had ordered these gorgeous, gigantic hot pots and bowls of soup. Being a chilly night, we were very, very interested in getting one of these soups, but the menu was long and confusing, and the waiters spoke little English, so we got two “safe” dishes (noodles and dumplings), and went for one unfamiliar dish we hoped might be a soup. It turned out to be a plate of smallish whole crabs, with no utensils or hints on how to eat them. We spent an hour wrestling with the little buggers, navigating through lots and lots of shell, trying to find little morsels of meat (which, of course involved crunching on tiny pieces of additional shell). We are still puzzled over several pieces of crab anatomy, including the orange blob in the body, the green paste in the shoulders, and the random spots of yellow goo, and are still wondering if they truly were edible. We didn’t get terribly bad stomach aches afterwards, so they must have been ok.

After dinner, we went to the Opera House to see The Nutcracker. I love the Christmassy-ness of this ballet, and Seth had danced the leading male role for multiple years with the Triangle Youth Ballet, so it was fantastic to see it. The only bad thing was that the seats in the theatre were poorly laid out and it was hard to see much of the stage, but we eventually moved to good seats about halfway through the second act.

The rest of the night involved getting a Dunkin Donuts coffee while waiting for the bus, then falling asleep on the bus and nearly dropping that same beloved coffee. The perfect end to the day.

The squirrels of Boston Common

Frog Pond

Perhaps not as big as the tree in NY City, but far more majestic.

So what are we supposed to do with these??

Building a gingerbread house Seth's parents brought for us. Notice Seth's house-nipples.

Somehow this gingerbread tree transformed into a gingerbread man.

Just like the picture on the box!! (Well, not quite.)

Seth out running in the first snow storm of the year. I decided to do yoga indoors, instead :o)

Bush gets a fond farewell

Watch as Bush exercises his ducking skills (he seems quite good at it by now!)

The Weather Outside is Frightful

Last weekend Mom and Dad came up for their first visit--Dad was brave and drove all 13 hours from Raleigh, NC (in one go) to bring up a car-load of my stuff from home. This was mostly composed of books, CDs, Seth's chair and stool, and six gigantic plants Mom and Dad took care of for two years while we were abroad (one of the plants, a spider, Seth has had for about 11 years!!). While my parents were here we ran a few errands (Costco and Ikea, wooo!), walked up to the summit of Prospect Hill, and drove out to Lexington and Concord. We unfortunately had to save going to downtown Boston for a longer visit.

The morning they left was the first snow of the season--it was pretty light and didn't stick around for too long, but it was just enough to make everything look white and pretty. The next day, however, the weather dropped, and Seth and I went for a run while the temperature was about 8 degrees (Fahrenheit)--we had to wear ski masks to keep our faces from freezing off! Two days later the sky clouded up and the morning low was in the mid 50s! After that was two days of steady rain with lots of ice and power outages further west. I think it is supposed to get really cold again tomorrow... ergh...

On a different topic, today (well, I guess yesterday) was my official graduation ceremony at The ANU. Although I submitted my thesis in May and it was accepted in early July, I didn't quite make the deadline for the Winter graduation. It doesn't really matter to me, just as long as I didn't have to pay tuition those past few months! Even though it is exciting to officially have my degree, I am reminded of how long it has been since finishing my thesis, and I still have not written any papers for publishing! Shameful! :o(

Here are a few pictures from the past couple weeks:

Thanksgiving dinner at Seth's uncle's house near Cape Cod. This doubled as a small birthday party for three of the kids.

Seth and Princess Adah helping Gina with the cranberries

Mom and Dad on Lexington's Battle Green (the first battle of the American Revolution was fought here)

Busy and bustling Concord

OK, time to work on those papers now!