dear boston: you're a lovely american city. splendid. all your boston tea partying, your "athens of america," your newbury comics, whatever. lots of good stuff. i even think i saw a sign that advertised dunkin' donuts pizza.
your system of roadways sucks a big fat piece of richard simmons. streets going every which way but loose, intersections devoid of signs, and your damnable, stupid, irritating tunnels. the delightful and charming ms. westra accompanied me on a trip to beantown this past sunday for a beastie boys show, and its frustratingly chump-headed street design left much to be desired. no wonder people love the red sox so much; they can't find their way out of the city to get to yankee stadium.
here is the route that we ended up taking to get to the boston opera house:
your system of roadways sucks a big fat piece of richard simmons. streets going every which way but loose, intersections devoid of signs, and your damnable, stupid, irritating tunnels. the delightful and charming ms. westra accompanied me on a trip to beantown this past sunday for a beastie boys show, and its frustratingly chump-headed street design left much to be desired. no wonder people love the red sox so much; they can't find their way out of the city to get to yankee stadium.
here is the route that we ended up taking to get to the boston opera house:
monday, while making our way from concord to jamaica plain, we ended up crossing a very nice looking bridge and finding ourselves in chelsea. lost and losing our patience, we stopped to ask a chelsea police officer for directions. he gave us a route to take, with the destination being the tobin bridge (we would stop in the city and call our friends to meet us rather than try and make it to j.p.); once back on the road we found our way to the tobin bridge, but along the way found none of the streets the officer mentioned.
what an idiotic place.
now that all that's out of my system, on to the deets: the charming and delightful ms. westra - a beastie boys fan since day 1 - scored tickets to the aforementioned beasties show, which happened to coincide with mca's 43rd birthday. a gala event, no doubt. an adventure, to say the least.
what an idiotic place.
now that all that's out of my system, on to the deets: the charming and delightful ms. westra - a beastie boys fan since day 1 - scored tickets to the aforementioned beasties show, which happened to coincide with mca's 43rd birthday. a gala event, no doubt. an adventure, to say the least.
the tickets said "dress to impress," and there were many people at the opera house who acquiesced; the place ran the gamut of interpretations of said directive. there were those looking shive in tuxedos and dresses (like the two impressive people above), those who were rather amusing (we saw cochise from the sabotage video, complete with lamb chops), those who hip-hopped their well-dressings (in other words, wore sneakers and their fanciest red sox cap askew), and there were complete chumps (look, buddy. a sport coat and a leopard-print hat isn't chic, it's downright stupid).
the opera house had just gone under a renovation, somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty-eight million dollars. worth every penny; the place was amazing. all this, and beastie boys as well? it was shaping up to be a most triumphant evening.
the greatest thing about the beastie's show - for me - was that it encompassed every single aspect of their career; hip hop stuff, punk stuff, instrumental stuff...they even had money mark strap on a guitar and sing "mark on the bus." a great, great show. and by the way: don't the beasties look boss in their skinny ties? and isn't "off the grid" exactly the reason the word "awesomeness" was invented?
now, i hate to take away from such a great show, but here's a question: why shall nyc always triumph over boston? because, as we left the opera house, we wanted to get something to eat. but there wasn't anything we could find open. what? a major american city, devoid of nightlife? i don't care if it's sunday. even rochester has jay's diner. open up a pizza shop, or something. for fuck's sake.we ended up finding some irish pub where the bartender was surly, irish, taller than patrick ewing, and bald. drinks, recaps of our favorite parts of the show, and then out of boston...for the time being.
recharged after a fine sleep in braintree (and seriously, greater boston area: what's up with the rotaries?), we went out to concord to meet up with bffs eric and brandi - both of the franklin park zoo - who just moved to the home of transcendentalism. walden pond, ralph waldo emerson's house...totally sweet.
at walden pond they have a replica of the shack that thoreau stayed in and wrote all that great stuff about simplifying, keeping your accounts on a thumbnail, and, if i remember correctly, achtung baby.
mr. thoreau takes me for a walk and drops knowledge and explains some shit to me.
back at eric and brandi's we shared a bottle of wine and met benson and otis; benson being the great dane and otis being a saint bernard. and, as you can see, they're frickin' huge. they're like, dinosaur-size. it ain't right. the charming and delightful ms. westra decided to play with the dogs, and we had to get tongs to pull her out of otis' mouth.
then we took the aforementioned bumblefunk drive to jamaica plain to see teri and jon. a great time; it was teri's 27th birthday on tuesday so we saw 26 out with some dinner, alcohol, and then the greatest ice cream in the world at j.p. licks (i recommend the cake batter flavor with chocolate sprinkles). we walked around jamaica plain, a cozy little borough that has that "we're the hip section" feel.so long, boston. maybe i'll be back. if not for my friends, then perhaps for the dunkin' donuts pizza. good luck with all the...you know. stupid roads and baseball teams.