Day 115: Opera at the Parish

Today was quite the atypical day, making me feel like I was living in parallel universes at the start because I tried to work from MIT instead of heading out to BBN (I was tired, didn't feel like biking that far nor fighting the traffic in a car, and thought it might be fun to work around other people).  Was sort of bittersweet... story of my summer.  So very melodramatic these days!

The rest of the day was really fun, a happy contrast to the gloomy weather brought upon us by some mid-summer rain (apparently the center of the country is in a drought, but I can assure you that Boston is not).  Perhaps the most atypical bit was attending an operatic production. D. has had a boarder staying with him for a couple of weeks for an opera workshop (also atypical, I'd imagine -- someone affiliated with Calliope emailed out searching for such spots for boarders some time ago - but I digress).  The workshop (unsurprisingly) culminated in a performance put on by its participants, and we decided to go watch it.  For me, it involved a trek by T to the United Parish in Brookline, a place I strangely had been once before for a board meeting of the Boston Choral Consortium on behalf of Calliope.  Kind of cool way to feel a part of one's community, joining a community chorus.

Anyhow, the operatic vignettes we saw were really nice - D's boarder being the best, of course.  He did a bit from The Elixir of Love (I'm not so up on my opera so it didn't surprise me I hadn't heard of over half of operas on the list).  Post-opera, we headed to Zenna's (no, not my roommate but a delicious Thai place in Brookline) and then to post-dinner karaoke at good ol' Charles Playhouse with Calliope.  Good people, good times.

Day 19: The Best Fries in Boston

Sometimes Boston magazine writes about crap. But other times, it writes about the best French fries in Boston. And apparently it's spot-on. After a cue from a friend, many of us followed to the Publick House in Washington Square in Brighton for a delightful afternoon filled with moules frites (or in my and my roommate's case, seafood stew and multiple sides of fries). For us, the trip also involved a misguided foray into Boylston St. to Citizen Public House and Oyster Bar -- to be fair, it looked great, but it involved neither my friends nor Boston's best fries.

However amazing the moules and fries were, however, there were even better highlights of the day in the form of playing the game Risk at home and venturing to the art gallery in Cambridgeport where a friend was helping to host a silent auction and after the Risk adventure, the art gallery after-party involving so, so much singing. It was quite festive, I must admit.  Like... until 5am festive (note the clever back-dating of this post). And I have left with a renewed appreciation and better understanding of the Goldman variations -- and a renewed desire to own a good piano.