<< January 13, 2005 >>
nat friedman

i remember well the first day i met nat friedman in person. it was actually . i was in the last row on the flight from pittsburgh to boston, so it took a while for me to get off of the plane. nat was jittery and impatient as ever when i saw him at the gate (you could wait for people at the gate then!). he had written my name on a piece of paper and was kind of tapping or shaking his leg to some internal rhythm while he relaxed and then pulled taught the paper, in time with his leg.

matt loper and chris lahey were also there. as we waited for my luggage, they discussed the pros and cons of gob. this discussion would continue well into breakfast the next morning at the greenhouse cafe.

from there we ran through the airport to the parking lot. he carried one of my suitcases with a little too much zeal and the handle ripped a bit. he explained to me that all of boston was pedestrian bridges and walkways, i think. we got in the car (the tahoe! i should grab a still from the video i have of it) and then were in a tunnel; i forget which one. what i don't forget is nat blasting the spice girls on the stereo as we were stuck in traffic under the boston harbor. he said it was his sister's cd. i didn't believe him then, and believed him even less the more i got to know peach.

after we got out of the tunnel, we were on the pre-big dig turnpike. since nat had never had a car in boston before, and had just moved to brookline, he didn't really know how to get home from the airport yet (these were pre-gps days, you see).

we grabbed some dinner: pizza (of course) at the garage (we had yet to discover noch's), after running through urban outfitters to avoid the rain. then we went to nat's old apartment to get internet (nobody had wireless yet) and so we could get to work. i think i committed a patch that night from john harper (formerly of sawmill fame, more recently of X11.app fame, last i heard).

the next morning (or maybe the morning after that?) nat had to meet the VCs early at the office, so i got to ride the T for the first time. i was confused between kenmore and kendall, so it took me a few trips before i ended up at the office.

then to harvard square to set up bank accounts and breakfast at the greenhouse cafe. the bank has gone through 2 renames; the cafe is largely unchanged (although i have been back there maybe twice since then).