Celebrate the Season!

No, not that season.  The one we’re in right now.  Autumn.

Somerville is celebrating the final SomerStreets of the year on Sunday October 19th with the Monster Mashed UP Festival.  Major streets will be closed, ghosts and goblins will walk among us, and fun will be had by all.  Also, there will be pumpkins, face painting, a parade, costume contests (for pets and their people) and, you’ve probably guessed it by now, craft vendors.

I’ll be there in my tent with all sorts of things to tempt you.  Things that make great host gifts, things that make gifts for yourself, and yes, things that make great holiday gifts as well.

Details are here.  Please come!  It’s a rain or shine event.  We’re hardy New Englanders after all, and this is only Autumn.  Winter is, as they say, still coming.

See you there!

~Kelly

SomerStreetsAd

A Gentle Reminder as We Approach the Holiday Season

I know that there are a lot of people who follow this blog who understand this.  I also know that there are a lot of people who follow this blog who might not.  I’m asking you to read this post and try to understand before you ask the dreaded Holiday questions of one of us who works in the Service Industry, Retail, is in Food Service, or is a Professional Musician of some type.

Why I Can’t Spend the Holidays With You – A Guide

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Back to School Shopping with Local is for Lovers

Somerville Local First, Local is for Lovers, and Arts at the Armory bring you:

Local is for Lovers Market- Back to School

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Today’s Craigslist Horror

Regular readers will know that I use the Free section on Craigslist to amuse myself.  As today is a sort of vacation day for me, I popped over there just now to see if there was anything funny worth tweeting.  I found something absolutely totally and completely NOT worth tweeting.  It was so awful, especially in light of all of the horrible racist atrocities happening in Ferguson, MO and elsewhere right now, that it merited its own blog post.

What could possibly be that bad you might ask?  I’ll show you.  Be prepared.

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Whitesplaining- don’t do it

I’ve been in a couple of situations lately I’ve witnessed the racial equivalent of Mansplaining.  That is, Whitesplaining.  In short, it’s when a white person explains to a non-white person how they should react to the use of a particular racially loaded term or epithet.  It also happens when a white person explains how non-white people should react to said to said terminology in an all white group.  In short, “this should offend you/them more or less than that” or, “that shouldn’t offend you/them at all.”

Awesome.

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Greater Boston area people – we need your help!

When you think of creepy, spooky, or cool and mysterious, what do you think of?  Is it the Ether Dome at MGH?  One of the chapels in Mount Auburn Cemetery?  Or something else entirely?

Here’s why we’re asking.

One of the music groups I work with is planning a very cool and very creepy Halloween concert.  Several concerts, actually.  And we’re looking for the creepiest, spookiest, and coolest places in the greater Boston area for these concerts.

I know it’s July and way to hot to be thinking about falling leaves, a chill in the air, and ghosts and goblins, but we’re planning ahead.  If you have any ideas about a place that would be cool for a concert of music about things like severed heads and possessed vegetables, please leave a note in the comments.  Thanks!

~Kelly

Live, Work, or Play in Somerville? Wanna be on TV?

Somerville, formerly known as “Slummerville” has the most artists per-capita of any city in the US second only to NYC.  That’s not bad considering Somerville is a suburb of Boston (though functionally it is as much a part of Boston as Cambridge.)

If you’re a resident of Somerville, if you work in the ‘ville, or if you make art, play in a band there, or spend a lot of time doing Somerville related things, this post is for you.  (If not, you should read it anyway, it’s about communities and people working together.)

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Boston & Cambridge area people- big freecycle event in July

Harvard University and the Harvard Square Farmer’s Market are having a huge freecycle event on July 8th, 2014 on the Plaza in front of the Science Center.  There will be tons (ok, maybe not tons, it depends on how much is donated) of stuff there for people to take and reuse.

Donations will be accepted as early as 9:00am.  Details on the website are here.  You can bet I’m going to be there to drop off the growing pile of stuff Geoff and I have in our “To Donate” corner of the guest room.

Harvard Square Famer's Market Freecycle event poster
Harvard Square Farmer’s Market Freecycle event poster

Tell your friends, coworkers, family, etc.  I’ll see you there.

~Kelly

ETA: Month fixed.  I was tired.

Boston! Live Jazz near YOU

From the always awesome David Scott comes a list of performances in the greater Boston area that you, yes you, should attend.  Dave is an amazing performer and he’s always working with amazing performers.  If you haven’t heard him before take a moment to check him out.

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Please, please read this Arthur Chu piece on “misogyny, entitlement and nerds”

Any of you people reading this blog, please go read this magnificent commentary in the Daily Beast by Arthur Chu (a fellow geek and historian famous for his Jeopardy appearances).  It says so much that I could not possibly put into words myself, especially touching on the horrible event on that college campus in California and some of the strikingly awful responses to it generated by people who are overwhelmingly white, male, and angry, not to mention misogynistic on a scale that is literally hard for me to even comprehend.

If you are a nerd, and especially if you are a male nerd, you really must read it.

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