Just keeping things interesting

Day 2:

I slept in until...7:00 (which for you math whiz's out there is actually 4:00 west coast time).  It was Ross and my duty to bring his mom to the gym and then to drop her off at work and in exchange she generously let us borrow her sporty little convertible Saab for the day.  After dropping her at the gym we decided to look around Augusta a little in hunt of a paint sprayer and a pressure washer (we'll be painting the garage in a couple of days).  We found, more or less, what we were looking for and headed to Friendly's Restaurant for an "indulgent breakfast."  That's what they advertised.  Inside we discovered that meant pancakes topped with whipped cream and ice cream, french toast made from doughnuts and cinnamon rolls, and syrup in the chocolate and caramel varieties in addition to the traditional maple.  No wonder why Maine has such a high obesity rate.  They're practically begging for it.  At any rate, we eventually found something a little less "indulgent" on the menu and enjoyed a nice relaxing breakfast.  

The next part of our day called for a 60ish min trip to Portland to meet Ross' sister and her boyfriend and from there, to head down to Boston for the Red Sox game.  The scenery was beautiful, and the two hour drive went by surprisingly fast.  We parked in a garage called Government Center Parking (this became important later on).  Parking in Boston was not cheap, in addition to the half a dozen toll booths on the way down; it might have been less expensive to ride the bus.  We found the subway station and rode for a couple of stops, then got out and found some lunch.  We had a couple of hours to kill and the Freedom Trail started across from the restaurant, so we decided to follow it for a bit.  At this point it was sprinkling a little on and off.  We made it past a sculpture depicting the famine in Ireland and the Irish immigration to America, we saw a building that was the meeting place for some of our founding fathers, we by the site of the Boston Massacre, and on to the Holocaust Memorial where real gas chambers stood.  That was a disturbing and solemn memorial.  At this point the rain wasn't messing around.  We were wet.  We decided to split up for a little while, Ross and I went to a giant Boarders to wait out the weather and by the time it had let up a bit, it was time to head to Fenway Park.  My stomach also told me it was time to eat again, but now we had to try to figure out the subway in order to get to the stadium.  We took a few wrong trains and stared long and hard at the map, but eventually with not too much time lost, we figured it out.  We got to the game and found our seats at the top of the stadium behind right field.  It was a cool atmosphere and a nice view, but I was getting grumpier and less reasonable as I was getting hungrier.  Suddenly baseball was not such a cool sport and the stadium was less than ideal, and the family behind us was more aggravating than fingernails on the chalkboard.  It was sprinkling again, when Liz suggested getting something to eat.  Ross was fine, I was not.  I jumped on the bandwagon, and headed under the stadium ready to pay astronomical sums for less than ideal food.  It was totally worth it.  It tasted delicious.  It made my heart glad.  Suddenly baseball wasn't such a bad sport, the stadium was phenomenal, and the family behind us was still as aggravating as nails on a chalk board.  It began raining harder, the family behind us left.  Things were looking up.  We pulled out the umbrellas.  We saw the dog's namesake, Kevin Youkilis, hit a home run.  We saw the Marlins hit two home runs.  It rained harder.  We got wetter.  At the bottom of the 6th they called a rain delay and covered the field.  We waited about 15 minutes, but with no sign of the rain stopping, we finally decided to leave.  It was 9:15pm.  We found the subway with little effort and crowded on with dozens of other Red Sox fans.  It took us straight back to Government Center.  We thought this was perfect because we were parked somewhere in the vicinity at the Govt. Center parking garage.  As we walked out of the station, Liz asked a security guard if he could tell us where the parking garage was.  "I don't know any parking garages!"  He spat out, as if she had somehow insulted him.  Thanks for the help, Man.  So we began wandering in the general direction we thought we should go, and we walked, and we wandered, and the rain came down harder.  We asked half a dozen people to help us.  None of them knew of the place we were referring to.  We walked and walked and eventually ended up basically back where we started.  We walked into a parking garage and some employees there finally helped us out.  They gave us very detailed directions until we were all confused again because we could only remember bits and pieces of it all.  "Across from the Boston police department" was the best we could remember.  We walked the way we generally thought they were describing, hailed a couple of girls for some more help, and finally sopping wet, frustrated, and tired, found our garage right next to the subway station exit, but in the exact opposite direction that we started out search.  It was around 10:30 now and we were finally headed back up to Maine.  The whole drive it was pouring rain, but Liz got us there in one piece.  We switched into Ross' mom's car and got ready to drive the final leg.  But we got on the freeway going to wrong direction, then when we tried to turn around we got onto the wrong freeway, or at least the one that would be the long way back, but it was going toward Winthrop so we just went with it.  A little after 2AM we rolled up to the house and fell into our beds wiped out.  Then we slept and it was good. :)  

P.S. It is still raining.  I'm feeling right at home.  :-p