pausing briefly in passing...

[lagilman]

After some mild excitement on the trip up yesterday, I am posting (Boston? Again?) from Readercon, which isn't really in Boston but close enough for folk who can't keep the names of the towns around here straight ("are we in Cambridge? No? when does it stop being Cambridge and become ---? how can you tell?"), Many folk seen, been seen by many folk, panels went well, bar discussion was literary and scurrilous, often at the same time, the ritual lobsters (and in my case, crab) have been dismantled for dinner, and I went to bed at a reasonable hour (midnight). And I have Bought Books. Many Books. You'd think I was on vacation or something.

Now, am off to the gym and then my reading and the rest of the day. There may be pics later, depending on payments made.

Oh, and speaking of which, I just learned that my major freelance client is going to direct deposit. And the sound of gentle yayyyyying was heard throughout the hotel...


(oh, and e-mail informs me that a good friend's surgery has gone best case scenario and he should be home on Wednesday. *offers up burnt sacrifice to the gods of hospitals and cranky patients*)

Comments

[lagringa.livejournal.com]

when does it stop being Cambridge and become ---? how can you tell?

HA HA HA HA HA HA! Sorry, that was hilarious. That was exactly my reaction the first time I went to Boston and Cambridge. Hilarious!

[juliannef.livejournal.com]

I think the way you can tell you are entering Cambridge is by the sudden overwhelming impression of intellectual superiority and cultural snootiness. It wafts over you like a heady perfume accompanied by a tremendous amount of hot air.

Gotcha somethin'

[sff-corgi.livejournal.com]

http://xkcd.com/c115.html

[ckd]

In most metropolitan areas in the US, the central city annexed the first (and second, and maybe third) ring of suburbs before the burbs stopped allowing themselves to be annexed.

In Boston, this process stopped fairly early when both Cambridge and Brookline rejected annexation. As well, many of the areas that did become parts of Boston have kept their own identities that seem to me to be stronger than the usual "neighborhood" concept.

The fun part is when you cross a barely-marked line and the street name changes abruptly, and you find that the Beacon Street you were going along in Somerville is nowhere near Boston's Beacon Street...and it just became Hampshire Street when you crossed into Cambridge.

[lagilman]

interestingly enough, working on a project set in pre-Revolutionary Cambridge, and the time it took to travel via the roads from Boston to Cambridge was...

well, about as long as it takes now with rush hour traffic, actually. but that surprised me, because I always thought of them as being "well, just across the river." I forgot the river wasn't always bridged in as many places as it is now.

[anisosynchronic.livejournal.com]

New England got its very own census category, NECTA, which stands for New England City and Town Area, indicative that the designations used for most of the rest of country don't fit.

Except for Massachusetts Avenue, one way of telling one has crossed a locality boundary is that the street name changes--Waltham Street in Lexington turn into Lexington Street when crossing into Waltham, and vice versa. Cambridge Street in Burlington turns into Boston Road over the line to Billerica. Woburn Street in Lexington turns into Lexington Street crossing into Woburn.

[lagilman]

It was always a lot of fun going from Boston proper to my grandparents' place in Belmont to my sister's in Brookline.... at rush hour. NYC has nothing on it.


(or, as we say, nahbudy pahks in Hahvad Yahd because there t'ain't pahking in Hahvad Yahd -- you taek the T!)