No More Temping!

As of 2:45pm on Friday, October 31st, 2008 I am no longer a temp. The college I was temping at has hired me on as a full employee and my first day as such will be Monday.
Not only does this mean some added job security, it means health benefits, a retirement fund, and other great benefits.
So Happy Halloween to me!

More Photos

Last time, the photos seemed to be pretty popular, so here's some from our trek around town on Sunday.

Park St. Church
One of the beautiful old homes in the Beacon Hill area of Boston.
Another home.
And old carriage house.
It's officially autumn!!


Reflection.
The Starbucks at Government Center. There's actually steam that comes out of the teapot.
We ran across a Latin Music festival in Government Square.

Jared standing outside the restaurant in the North End (Boston's Little Italy) that we splurged on a few weekends ago. I had pumpkin ravioli there... and it was DELICIOUS!
Romantic moment overlooking the bay.
Great architecture on Washington St downtown.
It's Hah-vahd Yahd!

That was our Sunday. Fun times.

Je comprends pas!

So there's something about Boston that I really don't understand. I take that back. There's a LOT about Boston I don't understand, but there's one thing that really bugs me. And that thing is skateboards.
Maybe I've just lived in Ohio for too long, but last time I checked, using a skateboard as a legitimate means of transportation was only cool if you were under the age of 12. Or Tony Hawk, but he uses it as a career, not transportation, but I digress.
The 18-25 year old male demographic in Boston has a thing for skateboards. Granted, it's mostly college students, but I did once see a man in a suit on one, and some of the guys look to be at least graduate students. I fail to understand the draw. Not only does it not really seem significantly faster than walking, but the noise is terrible and then you have to look even stupider by carrying a skateboard around with you when you're indoors.
And to really top it off, these are not small skateboards. I would estimate the average one at about 4.5 feet long. Seriously. I'm just waiting to see some poor old lady carrying her groceries home get plowed into by some careless 22 year old idiot who thinks he's cool enough to ride a skateboard on a crowded city sidewalk.
I have news for all you Tony Hawk wanna-bes. You're not cool. In fact, your "coolness rating" goes down in correlation to the size of your skateboard. If you wonder why you're single it's because no self-respecting woman is going to hop on your skateboard to ride off into the sunset. So go back to your upper middle class upbringing in the suburbs and ride there, brooding about how cool you look and where you can pick up some great guyliner.

Photo Mania

Fall is just starting to show it's colors here in Boston, and it's only going to get better. Because we had some hurricane rain a week ago everything was soaked, which apparently equals a nice colorful autumn.
Since this weekend was the first one in about 2 or 3 weeks with decent weather we headed out to take in the sights. And, since I was informed today that the blog is sadly lacking in photos as of late, here's a pictoral recap.
We started by taking the T all the way downtown to Government Center. This also happens to be the tourist section of town, where the Freedom Trail winds around, there's lots of history and shopping and, of course, tourists standing in the way gawking and taking photographs. Instead of trying to beat them, I just joined them. Here's a photo of the Old State House. It's funny to think that it was once large enough to hold the entire state legislature.
Then we walked over to the Haymarket. If it weren't so far away and so crowded after 9:00am we'd be there every single week. As it is, we go when we can, especially when we needs lots of produce. It's often a hit or miss with the quality, but it's so cheap it doesn't matter if it goes bad. And it's not just a normal shop. It's outdoors and the vendors are something else. Let's just say the vendor below tends to be more conservative. I didn't even notice him in the shot because I was focused on the light hitting the citrus. I considered cropping him out, but then it would just be a photo of food, not the Haymarket.
The Haymarket is just across the road from the North End. This is Boston's version of Little Italy. It's amazing. I could walk through for hours and hours. It has little shops and expensive restaurants, but it still feels like a neighborhood. There are always people stading outside of shops talking, or smoking a cigar over a cappucino. And of course, it's known for it's Italian pastry shops. The most famous is Mike's Pastry, but on weekends there's always a line for miles. We stopped at Modern Pastry so Jared could get a fresh-filled canoli.
Then it was on to the Greenway Festival. Boston's main highway used to run right through the outskirts of town, making it loud and polluted and hard to navigate. So, a few years ago, they undertook The Big Dig. Now the highway runs underground. Bad for claustrophobics, great for the rest of us. But what to do with all that old strip of highway? Turn it into a park! Now the Greenway runs in a thin strip along several miles of the city, between downtown and the ocean. It goes from the North End all the way to Chinatown. And Saturday was the grand opening festival of the park.

Weather was beautiful. It's still odd to me to see skyscrapers sometimes.
But right next to the huge buildings now there's a park with amazing flowers and bushes and trees. So pretty.
At one of the main squares of the park there was a farmer's market with everything from produce to artisan bread, seeds to jams and jellies and everything in between. It was great. So here's a few shots of the market goods.

So that was most of Saturday. But here's a few final shots of our neighborhood.
Our front door:
Again...
Where we do our laundry.
Row of restaurants across the street. Haven't tried any of them yet.
Commonwealth Ave is the big 4/6 lane road next to our building.
If you have requests for other types of photos let me know!