02138.com blog

News, Views, & the Muse from the world's most opinionated zip code

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Entries Tagged as '02138 and environs'

Cambridge Tapped Out

September 20th, 2012 · No Comments

The morning’s email reminds me that things are humming along, same as it ever was, in my old home town. Nothing like moving away (not to mention moving to what is likely the closest spiritually antipodal venue to Cambridge: Philadelphia; going from tight-ass village to cloacal flood plain) to get some needed perspective. Like being […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Invidious comparisons · local · Not News · Politics · reminiscence

I stand expanded upon…

September 30th, 2011 · No Comments

I used to like to say, to friends (who were always far more indulgent of the, OK, sometimes obnoxious personae, as my friend Ezra Pound would call them, that I would adopt from to time), “God I hate to be right.” Well, the following doesn’t make me right, but it does substantiate (and give permission […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · News · Personal · reminiscence

Plus ça Papelbon… plus c’est la même Buckner

September 29th, 2011 · No Comments

No regrets here, as the news reaches me finally, mid-afternoon (because I’m now in another market—one with a team that clinched its division, has killer pitching, and an even better record than the Yankees… the pitcher business should tell you all, all by itself), and the NYTimes, which is my print news source (paper, the […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Invidious comparisons · local · national · News · Politics

Who cut the cheese?

September 8th, 2009 · No Comments

…Yes, there’s a smell emanating from West Cambridge, and it isn’t goats. But more later, after I look into it.

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · Invidious comparisons · Local Food · The French &...

Dinner last night

August 6th, 2009 · No Comments

Jody’s Lemon & Rosemary Chicken with herbs and garlic Haricots verts with kalamata olives and garlic sautéed in EVOO Heirloom tomatoes with local mozzarella [Fiore di Nonni] 2006 Jean-Luc Colombo Viognier “La Violette”

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · local · Local Food · national · Politics

What is strange

August 6th, 2009 · No Comments

[written 2009 July 31 Co-posted on the Per Diem blog] What is strange about produce shopping in France were all the apples available throughout the summer. I don’t know where they were coming from, as I didn’t buy anyway. My cling fruit juices were flowing as is appropriate. The pears were only barely beginning to […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · Invidious comparisons · Local Food · The French &...

Review of The Biscuit from Yelp…

March 24th, 2009 · No Comments

The preponderance of the reviews here [on Yelp] appear to be from transients. This isn’t surprising as the neighborhood immediately surrounding The Biscuit is a haven for graduate students mainly from Harvard and Tufts. Though they’re smart enough, God knows, they make up for abundance of brains by a deficit of taste.

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · Local Food

super Super88

January 25th, 2009 · No Comments

Thanks to my friends Tse Wei and Diana, I got a little bit of heaven in the gritty wilds of Allston-Brighton.

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Local Food

Quick Meal

July 18th, 2007 · No Comments

Today’s NYTimes has 101 very quick (ten-minutes or less) “summer” meals (registration required to read NYTimes online)—one or two-line recipes—from Mark Bittman, the self-styled “Minimalist.” Basics are a necessity in the repertoire of anyone who makes any claim to being able to cook, but even the basics are elusive to a great many people. Bittman […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · Local Food

Welcome Name Change—One Less Toscanini

July 11th, 2007 · No Comments

The local bakery, located just over the line in Somerville (zip code 02143), has changed its name. Originally “Toscanini & Son” (the first name change after the founding owners, who called their place Panini—yet didn’t sell sandwiches, even from their yeasty breads, until the very end of their tenure—sold to the present owners), the name […]

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Tags: 02138 and environs · Food · Local Food · News