Banned in Boston . 1 | Boston News-Letter . 3

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There is a city in our world upon which the light of the sun of righteousness has risen. There is a sun which beams in its full meridian splendour upon it. Its influences are quickening and invigorating the souls which dwell within it. It is the same from which every pure stream of thought and purpose and performance emanates. It is the city that is set on high. "It cannot be hid." It is Boston. The morality of Boston is more pure than that of any other city in America. Bronson Alcott, 1828.

Banned in Boston sounds like a quaint phrase from the distant past. Today it's hard to imagine anything being banned in Boston, or almost anywhere else in America for that matter. But that past is none too distant and still alive in the memories of many older residents in the Puritan city on a hill.

For nearly a century - roughly from Walt Whitman to William Burroughs - the morality of Boston, the purest in America according to Bronson Alcott, was closely monitored and censorship imposed by a private society known as the Watch and Ward. The name was adopted from an English institution rooted in the Middle Ages, that of citizen police forces charged to watch for and ward off miscreants.

Image ... Bullseye Glass, the North End.

Continues on August 22 ...

Rewarding Bad Actors | New York Times . 3

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Cheeck out the current article in today's (August 3) Times by Paul Krugman. And read some of the (current) 350 responses. The outrage he speaks of is certainly out there.

Americans are angry at Wall Street, and rightly so. First the financial industry plunged us into economic crisis, then it was bailed out at taxpayer expense. And now, with the economy still deeply depressed, the industry is paying itself gigantic bonuses. If you aren’t outraged, you haven’t been paying attention.

But crashing the economy and fleecing the taxpayer aren’t Wall Street’s only sins. Even before the crisis and the bailouts, many financial-industry high-fliers made fortunes through activities that were worthless if not destructive from a social point of view.

Curiously he doesn't seem to really cut to the chase, but the readers don't beat around the bush or mince words.

Continues here ...

Cityscape . 2

Rooftop Farms.

Kiwis | Oh snap! . 5

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Kiwis, a self-portrait by KS, edited by SB. Boston.

Raccoons | Wild Lives . 1

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The raccoons are back. And not scrawny, skimpy specimens like the one above captured from Wikipedia. Big, fat, lumbering coons.

I knew they were around and was just waiting to see a bandit mask in my window around 3 AM. Raccoons are nocturnal of course and the one's in our neighborhood, being city slickers, seem to favor particularly late night hours for visiting. After all the trash cans close perhaps.

Anyway, I knew they were around because raccoons sing, although that may be a kind assessment of their vocal abilities. In any case, they vocalize, as the shriek of hawks is described in bird books. They speak, and often they seem to have lots to say. They say a lot anyway.

How would you describe it? Well the first time I heard them I was absolutely nonplussed and had no idea what I was hearing. It sounded like an unleashed symphony of jungle fauna, from monkeys to macaws with a blues-like call and response thing happening back and forth across the yard. Later that night they were sitting and chattering in the grape vine that runs up the side of the building, stuffing their fat faces as fast as they could and I figured it out.

Coons, first described by Christopher Columbus, are now successful urban strivers much like Canada Geese and Red-tailed Hawks. They are co-dependants of our ecological niche and one of the most versatile animals in their food tastes and shopping habits. Although reportedly fastidious in washing food stuffs, essentially they'll eat anything that moves - or doesn't. The dictionary definition of omniverous has a raccoon face next to it - or surely should.

My favorite raccoon story goes as follows. I got a call from a client - back when I was a designer and builder - about a foul liquid pouring in through and collapsing their kitchen ceiling. Inspection below the roof deck above revealed that a coon had made the spot his bathroom and, being a careful creature as mentioned, tried to bury the poop by scraping his sharp claws through the rubber roof.

... To be continued.

Launch | Roofscape Reflections . 1

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Today is our official launch. But there will be no big party, fanfare or champagne breaking over the bow. In fact, I feel it's a time for some quiet reflection. Which I'd like to share, if you'll indulge me. To look back on where we've come from and and perhaps see where we might be headed.

Our soft launch, or rather re-launch as I'll explain, was on June 1. To me that feels like years ago, so much has happened so fast. At last.

I began working on Roofscape roughly ten years ago in 1999. This is also the time, I'd like to note, that Shoestring Magazine got its start, so I don't feel like such a total loser for taking so long to get things together. We've been through every imaginable up and down - and a lot of it down.

Our first launch was on New Years Eve, December 31, 1999 at 12:00 mindnight at Boston's First Night celebrations, the culmination of about a year of work. Here's how it happened.

Through the grace of a wonderful client, Ronni Casty, I had a little rooftop office on Beacon Hill overlooking the Fiedler Footbridge (spanning Storrow Drive to the Hatch Shell) and up the Charles River. It was probably about 36 square feet, but the roof must have been about 2,000 square feet, over part of which I built a deck.

I used to sit out there staring over all the rooftops and think ... there's a whole other city up above the city and it's mostly empty. As a designer and builder, one of my favorite projects had always been roof decks and gardens, so I decided to write a book about developing and settling this demanding environment to be called Roofscape. Except the Web intervened and I immediately knew that's where I wanted to be.

The original concept was Roofscape - the magazine of rooftop living. But I was pitching the project to Ronni one day over coffee at Panificio and she said, I like it, but it's kind of limited. See if you can open up the idea. Great advice, thanks girl!

Anyway, we got taken down in the great Web wipeout early in the century, came back and got slammed again, this time by being diverted from our main mission and getting involved with music - as if I shouldn't have known better. Thanks Brian!

Meanwhile, I moved to Dorchester, started a new business - designing and building again, this time in the South End - and got a life beyond sleeping on friends' floors to get this thing going. And that consumed two years of doing nothing but thinking. Which wasn't all bad, but way too long. And here we are ... again. Which is where?

Well, an absolutely gorgeous first day of August on a Saturday in the city on a hill for starters. That alone is reason to rejoice. Plus the raccoons visited late last night, someone's moving the lawn with the push mover (probably Freddie), dogs are barking and church bells ringing. But tommorow?

... To be continued.

Image ... Snowhill Street. The North End, Boston.

Sox, Skip, Songs | Boston News-Letter . 2

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Somehow the news out of Boston just keeps getting worse. At this rate we may all get invited to the White House for beers and Kumbaya.

The Sox, sure it's disappointing. But did you think Big Papi got that big by showering in Miracle Gro? They've all been juicing. And no doubt still are. Drugs in sports is like slime on fishes, it will never go away and always be slippery. Money talks and BS walks the bases.

Now that B.U. physics student who has to pay $675,000 for downloading what ... Nirvana and Beck? Please, the poor kid should have gotten paid. Naturally this will be tossed out on appeal. For better or worse the nature of the Web is that it's for free and the greatest exposure that artists (using that term loosely) have ever had. Go play out and stop whining - or for the bands cited above just get up on stage and start whining some more.