Once again, the annual January-come-freeze-your-tush-off pilgrimage to Boston. I always pretend to go out for PTC/QFD’s sake (which, yes, it actually is) but it gives me a chance to see my mom Ann and grandmother Barbara. One of these years I’ll succeed in getting Barbara speechless when I surprise them at Symphony or Woods Hole – not so this year. And I even tried twice with a second surprise trip in early February. No dice. She's a tough one. I've seen her through hip replacements, moving the contents of a three story who-knows-how-many-square-feet home in Boston to the much smaller and already lived in Woods Hole residence, one-handed driving stunts (didn't go over well), and one of my favourites - boxes and boxes of family slides from who knows when. There have been other, ah, situations, but these are the publishable stories...