Christmas 2007 Update from Boston

We've had a nice Christmas holiday so far. Instead of buying tickets back to the US, we used miles to book a Club (business class) ticket on British Airways and then combined it with a voucher from American Express to get one ticket free. So we were able to get two Club tickets to Boston for the cost of some miles. When we boarded the plane at Heathrow and sat down in our seats, a family of four came over and asked if we were in the right seats, since they had boarding cards with our seat numbers on them. We both had boarding passes with the same seat numbers. After a few minutes, the cabin service director from the flight came over and said that she would be "moving us to another cabin" - and proceeded to move me and Troy up to FIRST class! It was a great way to begin the holiday travel. British Airways has four classes of service - economy, premium economy, club (business) and first - so the service in the top level is amazing, complete with pajamas to change into, a mattress for the bed that sleeps a 6'2" comfortably, and fantastic service. I remember on my first trip when I was upgraded that the flight attendent asked me what I'd like for breakfast. I hadn't seen a menu, so I asked if there was a menu and she said something like "oh, we can make most anything. what sounds good to you?" I chose blueberry pancakes, orange juice, a glass of champagne, fresh muffins and fresh fruit. It was pretty yummy. I don't want to forget our experience starting out at Heathrow when going through security. Both Troy and I freely make fun of stupid people who go through security, get pulled aside, and wind up asking things like "you mean I can't take that loaded gun with me on the plane?" Mostly, I'm stuck behind those people. Anyway, Troy walks through the metal detector and sets its off. We have a pre-arranged agreement that if one of us gets stopped, the other one keep going and waits far enough away that the screeners don't decide to hand check both of us. So I step away and watch this from afar. After a long wait, the security woman and Troy have a conversation where I can only hear Troy's side of this: "oh, I'm so sorry. I'm really sorry, I feel so embarrassed." It turns out you can't bring a giant metal wrench with you onto the plane - who would have known! In Troy's defense, he had handled the final check-out from our old flat the day before and needed the wrench to take down a satellite dish and left it in his bag by accident. Hehehe.

For the last week here in Boston, we've spent most of the time around the house and making it to the gym a few times. Right around Christmas itself we saw both both sides of the family and relaxed and caught up with everyone. It's also been nice that we've been able to see some friends, although not everyone we had hoped to see. One day we drove up to Pepperell to visit a friend from high school and his family. I'm actually godfather to his son, so that was fun to see them again. It's amazing how quickly kids grow! I was also able to connect with two friends from West Roxbury that I hadn't seen in years. My family lived in West Roxbury until the summer between 8th and 9th grade. On Friday night, we spent the evening with friends in Arlington and shared in some good wine and cheese fondue.

Tomorrow we head down to Florida for about a week with Troy's family. He has two nephews that are about 9 years old and 4 years old. I want to buy them lots of loud toys with sirens and horns, play with them for a few days and leave them with all the toys when we head back to London. But Troy says his sister would disown him if we introduce that level of sustained noise. Oh well, maybe some day. We have some miscellaneous pictures that we'll be sure to post once we get a chance. Hope everyone had a nice Christmas.

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