Day 14: Rest Day
Welcome
Yesterday we enjoyed a day off and went to the movies.
I woke early because of the jet lag and headed out to the hotel lobby for breakfast. The café had several options, one of which looked okay, so I ordered it, a bacon and egg sandwich which came on a brioche bun, with a side of rocket, a slice of tomato, and some fresh berries.
This was a rest day, but it was also a day with a fairly busy schedule, as we were hoping to complete a Barbenheimer - a back-to-back viewing of two of the hottest films of the summer. We took a taxi up to Massachusetts where there was a cinema located in a multiplex just across the state line. As much as we had been told to go to an Imax, we didn’t have it in us to go all the way to Providence so we ended up at Picture Show, a tidy theatre with a regular sized screen and comfortable armchairs that reclined with the push of a button. We gathered as much popcorn and frozen coke as we could carry and settled in for the next three hours as Christopher Nolan battered us with his efforts at storytelling.
Chapped lips and a sugar crash were the two sensations I felt coming out of the theatre, and it was nice to get back out into the warmth and the sunlight of this beautiful southern Massachusetts afternoon. We had 90 minutes before the next feature, so we walked a few blocks to a T-Mobile store to purchase sim cards. One of the joys of shopping at T-Mobile, and I’m sure this extends to other mobile phone providers, is trying to figure out how much a plan will cost. No matter how many times you ask the salesperson for the bottom-line figure, and ask them to include all the taxes, activation fees, and regulatory charges, the number always changes when it is time to swipe your card.
At 4.20pm we began our second film of the day, Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, a hilarious and razor-sharp feminist masterpiece. It was a perfect foil to Oppenheimer, and we were in good spirits when we emerged from the cinema. There was a deep need for healthy food so we found a Vietnamese restaurant and enjoyed fresh and aromatic dishes, revitalising our bodies and our spirits.
The perfect end to a stimulating day of viewing was found back at the hotel where we ventured into the pool for some light movement, which was about all our bodies were capable of by this point.
The indoor/outdoor pool at our Sonesta Select. A brilliant innovation.
Art Corner returns this week with a couple of pieces found in the corridor of our Sonesta Select. Themes of escapism, wine, and ghosts, are apparent on these two canvases, sadly both of which are artist: unknown.
I will leave you with Tristan’s latest creation that follows us through the last couple of days’ activities.