By the Book

For a town that can find the majority of the riders on the subway with their noses stuck in a book, it was surprising that Boston had never had a book festival. Well, that all changed. The Boston Book Festival was a great way to spend a rainy Saturday. It took place in Copley all around the Boston Public Library. There was a great color coded chart of the various events and speakers. The best part, it was free. (There were a few ticketed events but those were identified on the chart).

The events I wanted to see was going to result in some speedy sprinting from point A to B but I had faith I could do it. I started out at the Old South Church to see the delightful John Hodgman being interviewed by Tom Perrotta. The church was packed and I was lucky to squeeze into a seat. It was a great interview with a ton of laughs. Even the oft annoying audience questions were entertaining.

I then had to sprint over to the library to attend the The Future of Reading: Books without Pages event moderated by David Pogue of the New York Times. It was insightful to see learn more about the massive book digitization project Google is undertaking. While there are now several e-book readers on the market now, I was surprised to learn that that no matter which brand of e-book reader you use, the market for material is limited to only a few providers of content. That seems to narrow the playing field a bit. While the technology is impressive to me (imagine thinking of a book, downloading it on the spot and reading it) I have issues with the DRM constraints and the fact that, as a very tactile person, I love feeling the pages beneath my fingers.

It was a long day but I managed to get a head start on my Halloween costume. It took a few stores to find just what I needed but I was ultimately successful. I credit the organizers of the book festival and truly hope this is an annual event.

Where to Begin

I once again have had quite the last few weeks. I attended a great concert that saw 2,000 people go completely silent for a completely unplugged song. There was an Oktoberfest charity event at the Sam Adams brewery. An amusing belly dancing class, a few heart to heart talks, non-stop work and yet more drama there, lack of sleep, cat still on the mend, jury duty and I was frankly at the end of my very frayed rope.

So what's a girl to do? This girl picked up the phone and called the lovely people at the Spa at Norwich Inn. I decided to ship myself off for a night away. I could not contain my excitement about going. I left on Thursday morning and had my trusty Google maps to guide me. I had been to the Spa once before with Mom but it had been awhile. I didn't think twice that perhaps Google was wrong until I ended up in Groton on the water. The Spa, being in the woods and in Norwich, was clearly not showing up correctly on Google Maps. So I got to the spa a little later than I planned. But I was thankfully not late for any of my treatments.

A scrub and body wrap, facial, pedicure, lunch, tea and scones, wine tasting and a fabulous dinner had me extremely relaxed when I finally made my way back to my giant room. The surprise of the day was how cold it was outside and the fact that it snowed! It was the perfect day to be in a robe, in front of a fire reading a book and drinking one of many cups of tea. It is always funny to see how people react to having to wear a robe all day. Do you strip down completely? Leave something on underneath? Change in front of the entire women's locker room and leave modesty behind? It was fun watching ladies wrestling with their decisions. I did not have a quandary being a regular attendee of spas and the gym.

I continued my time off with a nice dinner and catching up with a friend on Friday night and to cheer a friend on who was rowing in the Head of the Charles this weekend. It was actually not as cold Saturday as originally forecast, standing on a bridge looking out over the Charles. I do love watching to rowers. It's such an elegant sport with everyone moving in unison.