21 November, 2008 (23:05) | Music | By: DaveO

Although my schedule is quite difficult, I have managed to see a fair amount of live music lately and this post is a run-down of some of the more interesting acts. Most of these performers are not local to the Boston area, although one is. Read on to find out which one and to hear my brief review of Calexico at the Somerville Theater last week.
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Tags: Alter Ego, Betty Soo, Caleb Hawley, Calexico, Kayo, Nicole Berke, The Acorn, The Boston Phoenix, The Burren, The Lizard Lounge, The Somerville Theater, Toad | No comments
15 November, 2008 (20:39) | Guitars, Music | By: DaveO

Yes, that’s right. You too can be just like David Gilmour for just under five grand. How? By purchasing this David Gilmour Signature Stratocaster Guitar from Guitar Center.
I find this whole thing to be really amusing. Isn’t the whole point of music to create your own sound and identity? But there must be people who pay this kind of dough because they keep coming out with these instruments - this isn’t even the worst offender.
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Tags: David Gilmour, Fender, Guitar Center | No comments
15 November, 2008 (15:35) | Medford | By: DaveO

It’s a rainy, dreary day here in eastern Massachusetts and much of New England. Still, there was a break in the weather this afternoon. Enough for me to run up to Wright’s Tower with the kids and take in the view of downtown Boston. The skyscrapers are all clipped by the clouds.
Tags: Wright's Tower | No comments
8 November, 2008 (19:37) | Green Stuff, Medford | By: DaveO
I had to get out of the house today with the kids. Even though it was threatening rain, we decided to take a walk in the woods. We often go to the Middlesex Fells Reservation and today we decided to walk around Wright’s Pond in Medford. This is a great little jewel of a pond hidden behind Elm Street near the Malden/Stoneham line. The road noise from Route 93 is a little loud in the fall and winter, but we still really enjoyed ourselves. Best of all, we ran into this little guy - an Eastern Painted Turtle. It was clearly used to people as we got up and close to it.
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Tags: Eastern Painted Turtle, Wright's Pond | No comments
8 November, 2008 (08:10) | Medford, Trains | By: DaveO

How do you replace one railroad tie?
I mean, I knew this was going to happen because I’ve written about it before. But I have to admit, I didn’t expect them to just replace one tie in the middle of the track. I went to the West Medford commuter rail station last week with Alex a few times and I just had to scratch my head at this.
How do you replace one railroad tie?
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Tags: Trains | 1 comment
26 October, 2008 (12:43) | Medford, New England Baptist Church, politics | By: DaveO

My most devoted readers know that I’ve spent over four years covering the sign in front of the New England Baptist Church. Since I’ve moved the web site around, that content is harder to get at. I’ve moved all the posts so that the permalinks work, but I don’t have the content imported here yet. This is, in fact, the 19th time I’ve written about the church. I first became interested back during the Democratic National Convention in 2004 when they posted a very similar message to the one above about John Kerry.
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Tags: abortion, Barack Obama, Thomas Michael | 3 comments
22 October, 2008 (18:05) | Media, politics | By: DaveO

And here we are. Just a few days after dumping on CNN for a poorly written headline, we have here ABC news exposed. This appeared on my mobile phone this morning. I understand that the folks who write the headlines are not those that write the articles, generally. I also can understand playing around with a headline to convey something catchy that still represents the article. In this case, there was some confusion about what Obama did, but whoever prepped this headline needs to learn a bit more about their publishing system. It’s embarrasing.
So what is it ABC? Was it a revision, a tweak or what? The article didn’t really clarify it for me. (snicker).
Tags: ABC, Barack Obama | No comments
20 October, 2008 (18:59) | Media, politics | By: DaveO
I was reading the headlines on my phone this evening when I came across this gem. The headline was Analysts: Powell endorsement more a rejection of GOP, McCain. Thinking that would be an interesting read, I checked it out. Can you guess what the first sentence was?
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Tags: CNN, Colin Powell | No comments
19 October, 2008 (22:09) | Arlington | By: DaveO

There’s this one building in downtown Boston that catches the light at sunset just so. Late this afternoon, I was driving around looking for a view so I could take some pictures. The clouds were looking interesting and I thought I might get a good sunset. The sunset turned out to be ho-hum, but I did manage to snag some nice shots of it lighting up this building.
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19 October, 2008 (13:50) | Arlington, Thompson School | By: DaveO
The results of the 2008 MCAS tests for the Thompson School have been reviewed with parents several times. At the start of the school year, principal Sherri Donovan discussed them in an orientation meeting. There have also been letters sent home to the parents from both principal Donovan and Interim Superintendent Kathleen Bodie. However, the information in those letters has been slightly different. Like many parents, I’ve looked up the data independently. Here it is.
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Tags: Kathleen Bodie, MCAS, NCLB, Sherri Donovan | No comments