Category: Somerville

St. Patrick’s Day

Somerville St. Patrick’s Day parade names first-ever female grand marshal

I see that the Somerville St Pat’s parade is March 14 this year, the day after my birthday. For a few years, we had a tradition going where Mom and Dad, and maybe a couple of other folks, would come up to Somerville for the parade, and we’d hang out in my apartment, have a few beers, and celebrate my birthday. I remember one year when Pat and Heather came up too, before they were married, I think. That was fun.

Since Mom stopped driving a few years back, we haven’t been doing that. I have some fond memories of St Patrick’s parades in Somerville, though.

Snow on main st


Snow on main st
Originally uploaded by andyhuey

It’s a good day to be working from home… Here’s the view outside my window right now. When I took a walk outside to see if I could get something for lunch, nearly all the stores on Main St were closed.
Here a link to a photoset with a couple more pictures I took from my window.
Oh, and not to get all maudlin again, but a couple of times today I’ve thought about picking up the phone and calling my Dad, to see how much snow they’re getting down in Whiting. Then, I remember that there’s just an empty house down there now. (*And* that I’ll probably need to shovel out the driveway and walk when I go down there this weekend to pick up Mom’s will and some other papers.)

groceries

I don’t post about Somerville very often, but I thought I’d write a quick post to mark the passing of the Somerville Pathmark. I ran over there tonight to pick up some stuff, and found out that they’re closing tomorrow. I knew this was probably coming, due to the redevelopment plans for that center, but I thought there was still a chance that they’d leave Pathmark open. Oh well. I’ve been doing most of my shopping at Stop & Shop or Wegman’s lately anyway, but it was really nice to be able to just run across the street to Pathmark any time I needed milk or something. Now, I’ve got no grocery store in (easy) walking distance.

It looks like the borough is committed to opening up a new supermarket in that space eventually, so that’s good. And there’s some mildly amusing speculation and discussion on this over at C-N’s forums.

I was never entirely thrilled with the Somerville Pathmark, but it was a decent store, I knew where everything was, and it was usually pretty easy to get in, get what I needed, and get out. I hope all the employees manage to find decent work elsewhere, either at another local supermarket or maybe somewhere else in Somerville.

Somerville

The new building a couple of doors down from mine is apparently going to be a Marriott ExecuStay. It looks like they’re almost finished with it. It seems kind of weird to have an upscale extended-stay hotel just down the street from me. Are there really a lot of people out there who’d want to rent a room in Somerville like this? I have no idea how much they’re charging, but what I’ve seen of these places is that they’re usually $99 a night, or something like that, with a 30-day minimum. I guess there are probably a fair number of people who stay in Somerset County for business reasons for a month or two, maybe working for one of the pharmaceutical companies around here, and I suppose downtown Somerville would be a nice place to stay, versus staying somewhere on Route 22 or 206.

Hey, maybe I can talk one of the maids over there into coming over and cleaning my apartment!

World Cup

Well, Italy won the World Cup about an hour ago, and the crazed, drunken fans are still running around up and down Main St., waving flags, yelling, and generally carrying on. A while ago, there was a guy running around in the middle of the street with an Italian flag in one hand and a beer bottle in another. I’m guessing somebody gets hits by a truck within the next half-hour or so.

under the weather

I’m feeling a bit under the weather today. I’m hoping I feel better by Monday, since it’s likely to be a hectic week at work. I guess it was a good day to feel a bit bad, since the weather was pretty bleak anyway.

I finished watching the first season of 24 today. I bought the DVD set off eBay a few weeks ago. I’m kind of hooked on it now. I have the season two set waiting, and I’ll probably pick up season three at some point. (I’ve seen the last two seasons on regular old TV, so I don’t think I’ll pick up any DVDs past season three.)

I had been thinking about going to Wizard World Philly today, but just didn’t feel up to it. I walked across the street to the local comic book store instead. I actually didn’t buy anything, but I was seriously thinking about picking up the first few issues of Warren Ellis’ new Marvel series Nextwave. I’ve heard good things about it.

Tomorrow is the Somerville Street Fair. I’ll probably have to avoid the gyros and other tasty treats, if I’m still feeling off. I’m hoping at least that it doesn’t rain, so everybody else can have some fun, even if I’m mostly lounging on the couch drinking herbal tea.

Well, it had been a while since I blogged, so I let this entry become a bit of a ramble. Hope I didn’t bore anybody.