This Is Boston, Not LA

As I sit in sunny Long Beach, waiting for my car to be delivered, here are a few things that I'll miss about home:

-Stump Trivia at Joe Sent Me. The Tuesday ritual. It took a while, but it was finally a place for me where people knew who the hell I was when I came in. What I liked to drink. What I liked to eat. Cute, familiar waitresses. The best trivia jockey in the biz. And many well played games by the team. I wish we had kept track of the winnings over the years.

-Sports. The stereotype is that Californians don't really have to care all that much about professional sports because there's so much to do all the time. Why bother rooting for a team that could crush your spirits when you could just go to the beach? Then again, lax interest in baseball around here means that I could get bleacher tickets on the day of the game for probably $10.

I'll also miss WEEI, obnoxious warts and all. It was the loud background chatter to my day.

One other thing: I'm not looking forward to getting up at 10:00 am on Sundays to watch the Pats play.

-The seasons. Man, I'll miss the seasons. I won't miss the torrential rain that's been coming down on New England this past week, but I'm gonna miss the fall, when the air is cool and crisp and you can smell the leaves for the last time. I'm gonna miss the winter and the cold, cold air. The beginning of spring -- what Massachusetts has of it -- when baseball starts and the sky is sunny and blue. Out here in California the weather is great 90% of the time. I find that a little boring.

-Dunkin Donuts.

-The Bull & Finch. Ah, what a place. Remember that time when Norm sat there and drank beer? Or when Woody was dumb or Sam was charmingly incorrigible? Oh wait, I hate Cheers.

-Most of all, I'll miss my very excellent friends and my terrific family. Stay well guys, and I'll see you all in September. Until then, Qapla'.

Jesus H. Fucking Christ

Enough with the 93 Detours in downtown Boston. ENOUGH. It's bad enough that they've gone on for weeks now (as far as I know), but tonight was the absolute worst. I had to go through fucking downtown Boston and drive all the way into Southie before I could hook back onto 93 South. Of course I got lost three hundred fucking times trying to figure which detour sign was for what and somehow ended up at Logan (the $3 toll to get out of the airport was pretty sweet). And of course on the way back up north we got detoured again. Thank God I know my way around the South End/Back Bay, thus giving me the ability to circumvent the rest of the traffic and safely hit Sturrow. What should have been a 15-20 minute ride to Quincy ended up being an hour and a half/two hours. ENOUGH.