Don't Fire Until Fired Upon

Alright, friends, Day 2 is in the books. Six to go.

This is the craziest thing I've ever done. You literally put your luggage outside of your room in the morning and someone comes and loads it onto the bus and then when you get back to your hotel at night, they bring your bags to you.

Which, in reality is great because I am having a hard time carrying two purses, two jackets, a backpack, and whatever else Granny B decides to bring along for the day.

One hilarious non-Granny B moment today came at breakfast, two couples (sisters and their husbands, probably in the age range of 65-75) were sitting at the next table and the younger of the two sisters says to the other, "I watched Friday's General Hospital episode. I got the ABC app on my iPad."

I almost fell out of my chair.

Today was a long day with lots of stops. It started with the city tour of Boston, which took us by some pretty cool things including the Old North Church. This church is famous for "One if by Land, Two if by Sea." While were there they mentioned that they run based solely on donations and profits from their gift shop.

Granny B tells me, "I believe in the preservation of old buildings." As we walk up to the donation box which has a suggested donation of $3 and she puts in $1. I chuckled to myself. (Later in the day, we were having lunch at the Colonial Inn in Concord, MA, (built in 1760 or something) which looks to be an old house. It had a lot of small rooms so some of the tables were a little crowded. As we walked out she said, "They need to knock some of these walls down to make more space." So much for that preservation thing...)

As you may or may not know, Granny B and I have VERY different political leanings. And while I love my grandmother dearly, she is batshit crazy when it comes to politics. She basically watches CNN all day and picks up on little factoids of information, but doesn't really comprehend them. So then at a later date, always in my presence it seems, she spouts off these facts. Only she had gotten them convoluted in her head and they make even less sense now than they did in context.

It's awesome.

But you can't argue. I have gotten really good at responding with, "uh huh," "yeah," and, "no." That usually gets her to stop talking. I do get a little embarrassed when she starts "sharing" with others though.

Surely you have heard that as you age, you revert back to being a child. Well, folks, I'm here to tell you, that is 100% true. What I didn't tell you about yesterday's plane ride was that she ordered a cup of black coffee and a glass of ice water. I knew this was a bad idea, but I let her do it.

She drank 1/3 of the coffee and luckily let me throw it away, but she wouldn't give up the water. About an hour after it had been delivered I look over at her tray and her book has tipped the glass so that it hasn't fallen over, but it is spilling water all over her tray and her. We got that cleaned up and off we went.

Today on the bus we had water bottles. With lids. We each had one and they were in the cup holder type things in the front of our seats. At one point I look over and hers is spilling all over. With the lid on. Of course it wasn't on right, but seriously, I'm thinking of picking up some sippy cups for tomorrow.

As we all know, for most people when they age, their memory starts to go, and Granny B is no exception. We will have a conversation and 15 minutes later, we will have the exact same conversation. If I had a dollar for every time I told her that I can't eat something with gluten in it, I could probably go on this trip again.

So today, after visiting the Old North Church, we had to walk up a hill to get back to the bus. She was lamenting with another woman on our tour about the walk and said, "You think they could bring the bus down here." (If you've never been to Boston, I will let you know that the streets are stupid narrow - I don't even know how two cars can fit on some of them.) So the other woman said, "They probably won't let the bus come down here." Then Granny B turns to me and says, "I was here a long time ago and the bus picked us up right down there."

Really? Did that really happen? You can't remember what we ate for breakfast, but you are going to tell me that "a long time ago" you remember where a bus parked in Boston?

Let's get real.

I will admit that I broke down after lunch and took half an anti-anxiety pill. I'm not really sure it helped, but I'm going to try one in the morning tomorrow and see if things go better.

As I have said numerous times, I do not regret taking this trip. Despite the crazy that I report to you above, we are having a good time. The sites are amazing and our tour guide is a riot!

For the sake of this being my journal, I will share with you the things we did/saw today. At the end of this, when I get back home, I'll post all of the pictures in one post for you to see, because I still haven't figured out how to post one from this iPad.

This morning we started with a quick driving tour through Boston. We saw the Old State House, the site of the Boston Massacre, the harbor where the tea was dumped during the Boston Tea Party. As previously mentioned, we stopped and got out at the Old North Church and then basically followed the path of Paul Revere's Midnight Ride to Lexington and Concord. We saw Bunker Hill and Old Iron Sides. We stopped at the Old North Bridge where the Rebel Forces turned the the Regulars back to Boston. Then it was off to Plymouth to see the Plymouth Rock. In a surprise from our tour guide, we stopped by the National Monument to the Forefathers - if you are ever in Plymouth - find this! I'm not kidding - it was awesome!

Tonight we are overnighting in Hyannis and will head over to Martha's Vineyard tomorrow where we will explore the history of whaling.