Dan and Britt have a new address. Last week, they signed a lease for their new apartment. This dispels my fears of landlord retribution. I guess that it really is cheaper to move than pay rent. Studying their move on a map, it looks like they are only moving a mile, but it is enough to push them out of Brooklyn and into Queens. Next month, we will be visiting them and look forward to seeing how a pair of cat-loving, cosmopolitan types live their lives—all nine of them.

Our first sojourn on this journey will be Philly. We have never really been there except to passthrough. We plan on seeing the Liberty Bell, before it is put away for good. Booking a room there I ended up going down a dark and scary rabbit hole. I was warned though, its Google synopsis said, “very secure.” Entering my data they strangely asked for my birthdate. I was initially taken aback, but in the end decided to continue anyway. Pressing on regardless, I entered the normal stuff, like home address, phone number and credit card info. Then they wanted a photo of my ID. Initially this was a problem, because I was doing this on the computer (sans camera) and not my phone, but they had thought of this and offered a mechanism to transfer this process to my phone. I photographed my driver’s license, both front and back. Then they wanted a photo of me, biometric data. I futzed with their app, failing the first few times, but eventually it was satisfied, and I was in. So much for the city of brotherly love.

In NYC, I booked at a normal hotel, on the same subway line as Dan and Britt’s new place. Then it will be on to Boston and the real purpose of this trip, Declan. Maren has a weeklong school field trip to Panama, and we will be supporting David in her absence. The return trip is still unscheduled. We will likely be sick, again, but in case we are not, there is the looming government shutdown. This would nix DC, so we are thinking the eastside of the Chesapeake instead.