carwreck.com: around Boston harbor...

While driving home though the Sumner Tunnel this evening I was listening to 88.9 WERS, Emerson College's FM radio station. When I entered the tunnel I expected to lose the signal, but what I didn't expect was a new signal to take over.

Now we all heard about how the US military was able to take over every radio station and every TV station on the dial over in Iraq for the purpose of 'educating' the Iraqi people about the war. But are we doing the same thing here?

The new signal was barely understandable and all I caught was something about the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and something about using the left lane or the right lane. The announcement was obviously an attempt to educate drivers about what they were to expect at the end of the tunnel, what with a whole new traffic pattern going on.

Nonetheless, this was a strange experience.

I could hear the message on both 88.9 (WERS) and 88.1 (MIT's radio station) both of which are presets on my radio. I couldn't receive the message on any other frequencies.

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/176/region/Fire_draws_90_firefighters_inj:.shtml

I guess there was a good reason I was awaken by all those sirens last night.

Last night I went to see the Knockout Drops at the Knitting Factory in NY. Opening for them was Mad Larry which is Bill Ryan's band, formerly of the Bogmen. We got there right after the first of four bands played and we listened to a band called Asher Kahn. They were trying pretty hard to be something which they were not and ended up just sounding like a grungy trio with too much screaming.

Several songs into Mad Larry's set Bill Ryan announced that a guest was going to come up and do a few songs with them. Gordon Gano (singer for the Violent Femmes) had been spotted milling about in the crowd and he has performed with the Bogmen and the Knockout Drops in the past so we all assumed it would be him. We were mistaken. Onto the stage marches Billy Campion the singer, and Mark Wike the bassist from the Bogmen! They proceeded to join in on a number of Mad Larry tunes. It was pretty hype. At this point we also realized that Mad Larry's drummer looked familiar. It was PJ O'Connor who used to be the percussionist for the Bogmen.

Mad Larry finished their set and a large projection screen rolled down from the ceiling. They played the Knockout Drops' new video for "Wrong Side of Love" which will be the first single off their new album "Killed by the Lights." The video was hilarious and it appeared as if most of the cast of the video was in attendance at the show.

After the show we were all bouncing off the walls from the music. It was great. I made a point to say hello to PJ and Mark. I told them I hadn't really seen them since back when the Bogmen used to play at Seven Willow Street in Portchester. THAT was a looong time ago. They were really happy to see us.

Top things off with a drunken adventure on the Metro-North train back to Bedford Hills and call it a fantastic day?

I have moved back to the world of Nextel, combining my work and personal phones into one unit.

Contact me for new digits.

This pisses me off. A group of electricians mimic some art and it gets thrown away. Why not make light of the situation and acknowledge that even rough and tumble, blue collar workers can be fantastic artists in their own right.

Electricians try their hand at abstract art

What is important? I mean in general conversation? So often I run up against the problem of deciding whether something which comes to mind is really important to the particular conversation or important for the other party to even know about. This could be part of my secretive nature, but I'm not sure. I am constantly trying to maintain balance between what I feel a person ~should~ know about me, and what isn't really all that important to the relationship. I guess that isn't necessarily my job to determine that all of the time; that if it comes to mind, it should be presented and the other person will determine if the morsel of info is pertinent and appropriate. Who knows. I guess that's why so many of my thoughts get shortstopped before they even make it out of my mouth.

I wish every day looked like this.

My Netgear switch used to spread the wealth of Internet around my house is on the fritz. My brother noticed it first when his computer would not get any connectivity for periods of time and then inexplicably start working again. My computer wasn't having the problem because I connect wirelessly to the Speedstream router, bypassing the switch. So I took a look at the Netgear switch and it was flashing all of its lights, even on unused ports. It was also clicking and making a slight fizzling sound. It does this for about thirty seconds at a time and then the lights go back to normal, the clicking stops and the network operates properly, for about thirty seconds. Then it goes back to freak-out mode. Not good, says I. And it's too old to be considered for warrantee replacement. Ugh.

Great... Are we now going to have an even Bigger Dig?

http://www.boston.com/news/daily/31/tunnel.htm

"The so-called North-South rail link, which -- depending on who you ask -- would cost anywhere from $3 billion to $9 billion and would send trains under the city through a new passageway burrowed beneath the recently opened Big Dig tunnels."