out of town

I spent Labor Day weekend in the car driving through most of the Eastern Seaboard's metropolises. Friday I left D.C. for a not-quite-leisurely drive to Providence, Rhode Island, which was the first time I could use a Rhode Island address as a final destination.

The ride wasn't quite leisurely due to a deadline (my sister and I were headed to Providence to meet our younger cousin, who was flying into Providence that night and moving into her college dorm the next day), Labor Day traffic and a lack of any extra time built into our schedule to compensate for the traffic. A two-hour wait to get across the George Washington Bridge into NYC didn't help. We ended up stuck in traffic for 45 minutes just to get to the exit to drive an extra half-hour or so out of our way to avoid the bridge.

In the end, though, we made it to Providence less than an hour late, forcing cousin to wait just a few minutes (her luggage took some time to appear). We then stayed up far too late (just because) and waking up far too early (for me) to move her in.

The traffic on campus was as bad as the traffic on the roads - she ended up waiting in line to register for her key, to pick up her ID and finally to get up to her room (shared with three others). I was only 10 years out of my depth, but I did get asked if I wanted to open a student checking account, which was a nice gesture.

The moving-in and supply run to Target completed (Rhode Island, to me, consists of the one campus and a strip of big-box stores) we left cousin and headed south to New York City, where another cousin was putting us up for the night. Again, we stayed up too late (a few corner bars and one hookah bar and all of a sudden it's 3:30 a.m.). And again, we woke up too early, to meet a friend of my sister's for brunch. Then a walk through the city, including a Brazilian street fest. Fun times, including the sunburn (who goes to New York and gets a sunburn?)

The weather was perfect, a sunny, crisp late summer day. I started to think back and realized in my mind, New York has the best weather in the country. All my trips to the city have been in the spring or early fall, and every day has been sunny, upper 70s, low humidity. Perfect. Of course, the natives laughed at this slander of their city.

We left NYC late in the afternoon to head back to Baltimore, where we finally got some sleep before helping my sister's boyfriend move into his new house. Then back to D.C., where I stayed up late packing and woke up far, far too early to fly to Missouri, thus ending the tour of the East Coast.