Boston

There are 401 posts tagged Boston (this is page 3 of 41).

Politics as usual

Monday again. Pi Day.

Tom Brady is pulling a Garth Brooks. That was one short retirement.

I used to think Elizabeth Warren had her feet on the ground. This endorsement makes me think otherwise.

Swedes have traditionally been cool to the idea of joining NATO. But now, as Thomas Lassi reports, almost half are warming up to the idea.

Drew Litrell gives us some history on the first computer virus. MIT. Fall of 1988.

And for Nantucket, an island 30 miles off the coast, UPS is critical infrastructure. Too bad they forgot to buy a ticket for the ferry.

Play ball!

Saturday. The word for today is uncouth.

An asteroid hit the earth this morning. Ground zero was somewhere near Greenland.

Marty Walsh’s guide for resolving a union dispute: Stay at the table and keep talking.

Holger Roonemaa and Michael Weiss write about the sorry state of the Russian effort so far. Francis Fukuyama doesn’t think there’s any possibility of a negotiated peace in Ukraine but he does there’s a decent chance that Russia will actually lose the war on the ground. Lucian Kim believes it was a massive intelligence failure that got Russia to this point.

The battle over free/low cost fares on the T drags on. The system General Manager says it could cost $50-$100 million dollars.

And honesty is the best policy in Japan. It’s absolutely un-American.

Fearing fear itself

Friday. Today is World Plumbing Day.

Some members of the People’s Convoy—who’s stated intention was to create traffic jams—are disappointed that motorists in the DC area are not welcoming them, but instead flipping them off. “We go around the Beltway, birds are flying. Birds are flying everywhere. That’s the kind of people that live up there.”

Sure, there’s a lot going on these days. We’ve just come out of a pandemic. War is raging in Ukraine. Russia is blustering over nuclear weapons. Gas is expensive. Inflation is rising. The country is politically polarized. So it’s no wonder that people are stressed, right? But really, back in the sixties… There were lines at the gas pumps. Fuel was so expensive people put locks on their gas caps to prevent it from being siphoned. We had a war going on in Vietnam for which any one of us could be drafted and sent to die in the jungle. There was a cold war. The world was on the brink of nuclear annihilation. The President was killed by a sniper! MKL and RFK were shot. Inflation was rising. There were riots in the streets, bombings, kidnappings and domestic terrorism. A quiet time. Despite all of this I don’t remember people being as stressed then as they are now. But then again, we didn’t have social media or a hyper-speed breaking news cycle reminding us about it all every second of the day. Old guy, just sayin.

Tilting at windmills. Literally.

That big influx of federal assistance cash will only help the MBTA in the short term. Once it’s gone things are going to start breaking down again.

And it’s ‘game on’ for the Mayor’s Cup street hockey tournament, coming in April. It’ll be played at Garvey Playground in Neponset so no one will have to be on the look out for CARS!.

Stating the obvious

Today is March 9th. A Wednesday.

There’s nepotism and favoritism in City Hall, according to the Globe.

Today’s headline is that Russia is leaving the Internet. Reports say that they will cut the line at the end of the week. Next month’s headline might be that ransomware attacks in the US seem to have disappeared. So there’s that.

At the United Nations, words and language can be important. But this seems a little nit-picky to me.

If you park at the commuter rail station in Cleary Square you’ll pay $6.50 to get into Boston. Or you could take a short walk over the hill to Fairmount station and pay two bucks less. Both routes take about 20 minutes to get to South Station. Or you could drive a couple of minutes down the street to Readville—and pay even more. Bruce Mohl highlights this weirdly inconsistent fare setting.

And after 106 years, researchers have found Shackleton’s Endurance. Amazing.

A hard landing

Today is Sunday. Is that spring knocking on the door?

From BU, Grace Knoop has some tips for dining out on a college student’s budget. Lots of soup, salad and water. (Tip: the nearest Olive Garden is at South Bay.)

Russian airlines lease more than half of their fleet from foreign companies. Many of those companies are located in the EU. Per sanctions, those leased planes must be returned by the end of March. The remaining Russian commercial aircraft, those owned by the Russian airlines, will have trouble keeping up with regular required servicing. Aeroflot, the largest airline in Russia, has its maintenance hub in Germany, which is now out of reach. Even within Russia parts needed for servicing aircraft will be hard to obtain because of sanctions. A lot of planes will be grounded. As a result, some believe that domestic Russian aviation could pretty much shut down in the coming months. Not good for a country as large as Russia. Mentour Pilot has more here.

Ruby Cramer had to wait on a list to join the newest social media app, Truth Social. Now that she’s in she’s wondering where everyone else is. There are reports that Trump is angry that his platform is failing but why should he be? That was the plan from the outset.

Even though you’re using your bank’s app and communicating with people who appear to be from your bank, you’re not immune from being scammed. I’ve always been skeptical of the whole Zelle thing. Venmo seemed way better.

And if your GE oven needs a wifi connection to unlock some features like, you know, cooking, then you are effectively synergizing backward overflow.

The dog that didn’t bark

Wednesday. The peak of the week.

The craic is back… Boston Irish reports.

We all expected a cyber attack from Russia. But it hasn’t happened yet. So far only Ukraine has been hit and that attack was largely mitigated. One reason may be that some hacker groups are siding with Ukraine. But that can’t be the whole story. Brian Krebs writes about what to expect going forward.

Nigel Gould-Davies thinks Putin has painted himself into a corner. Yuval Noah Harari says that even though the war could go on for a long time, it’s already over for Russia. And Justin Bronk, a specialist in air power and military science, wonders what happened to the Russian Air Force.

Beth Daley (late of the Globe and now managing editor at The Conversation (and no relation)) writes about Jeff Bezos’ quest for immortality.

And the Boston accent has been voted as the most annoying accent in the country. That can’t be true. But if we’re talking about non-Bostonian actors trying to affect a Boston accent, which is what most people have the biggest exposure to, I would have to agree.

Full scale attack

Today is Thursday. The word of the day is utmost.

It’s a good day to quit the news.

Russia is now engaged in a wider invasion, going beyond Donetsk and Luhansk. Also, we’re seeing some of what the future of war will look like with more malicious and destructive cyber attacks taking place. The stock market is tanking on the news. And crypto may be a way for Russia to evade the pain of sanctions.

The Times covered a US-based truck protest from California heading to Washington DC, illustrated with some particularly good photographs by Meridith Kohut.

Last week the Dorchester Reporter ran a column proposing the elimination of the School Committee. Not just getting rid of the elected committee but eliminating the committee entirely, putting the schools directly under the Mayor. Here’s a followup, with reader reaction.

And I sympathize with Owen Williams over his frustration with his ‘smart home.’ The current state of home automation is only for people who are willing to work very hard at making their life easier. It sort of defeats the purpose.

Old man yells at cloud

Monday. A quiet President’s Day.

Covid protests, snowstorms, tent cities… so far Wu has survived the gauntlet. But the next big test will prove her mettle: Will her jokes make the grade at the revived, in-person St. Patrick’s Day breakfast?

What’s wrong with the Internet? I’ll tell you what’s wrong with the Internet. Poor quality, risible algorithmic stories like this one, allegedly about Boston, which rise to the top of Google results. Before you know it we’re awash in this type of crap.

I’ve been highlighting strategic dysfunction among Democrats recently so it’s nice to see that Republicans are having some of the same problems.

The state budget is in great shape. Baker is putting some of the ‘extra’ money to good use. Makes sense.

And Daniel Kolitz informs us of all the bad things that are going to happen. Happy Monday.

Smooth descent

Today is Saturday. The word of the day is nonchalant.

For Gretchen Whitmer, success is the best revenge.

There were less than 2000 new cases reported yesterday, down from a precipice of almost 30,000 a little over a month ago. Boston is lifting its vaccine mandate. Good news all around.

Space junk is starting to become a real problem.

Mike Allen reports on more calls for Democrats to shift towards the center to forestall a potential Republican sweep. If it’s not too late.

And although it was 60 degrees this week, we’re in high winter. Matt Dinan reflects on the season and Jessica Wapner searches for strategies to stay warm, or even hibernate through to spring.

Effectively progressive

A stormy Friday. Trees down and no power.

Here’s a full breakfast. You won’t even need coffee.

The Times looks at how voters have pushed back against progressive prosecutors around the country when crime began to increase. San Francisco, Manhattan, St. Louis, Philadelphia and Chicago are mentioned. But not Boston. Rachael Rollins certainly had her detractors but because crime didn’t rise here, that kind of opposition didn’t take hold. Credit her work with, not against, the police.

It’s budget season in city government. In Boston the process is going on the road.

If you’re waiting for your frozen-berry metallic Porsche or Bentley to arrive, you may have to wait a little bit longer. Thousands of luxury cars on their way across the Atlantic are burning in a cargo hold fire.

And if you’re tracking your sleep with some sort of device, poor sleep may be a forgone conclusion.