Early Season Leaf Peeping In Plymouth County

It's about two weeks too early, but we took to the streets to see what sort of early fall foliage we could find in Plymouth County.

Southeastern Massachusetts may be the weakest spot in New England for leaf peeping, but New England has the bar set pretty high.

One of the benefits of having a blurry camera is that, if you don't enjoy fall foliage, you can just squint at this picture and pretend that the article is about forest fires.

As you can see, we'll be working in the ROY part of the ROY G BIV color spectrum. I looked pretty hard for a purple tree without success. I may have seen a Magenta tree, I'm not sure.... never had that crayon.

Our basic route for this trip was Bourne to Wareham to Plymouth to Kingston to Plympton to Halifax to Bridgewater to Hanson to Pembroke to Duxbury back to Bourne.

I went down Route 106 after a huge yellow tree in Plympton, but it hadn't peaked yet. This tree in Halifax was up earlier.

I needed orange in my life badly enough to shoot the tree with wires in front of it.

Otherwise, a shutterbug develops  tendency to invite themselves into people's yards without permission to seek better shots. I haven't been beaten up or shot at yet, but it's only a matter of time. I have already forgiven my future assailant.

Fortunately, one of the benefits of  working with a crappy camera is that shooting out the window of a car going 50 MPH doesn't really lower the quality that much when compared to my stand-still work.

Neither of my MVP trees (the giant yellow one in Plympton and a deep red one next to the Middleboro 4H building) were at peak when I drove by.

I should really learn which types of tree are birch, cedar, maple, forsythia etc.... I only know maple leafs because they have a hockey team.

I shoot 100 pics or so, then go through them at the end of the trip. Memory issues come up, and you get captions like "I think this is Kingston."

No foliage here, but I love reflective work.

Don't let the week-old dates deter you on the pictures from Leaf Peeping. My camera calendar is  week slow.

Pine dominates our tree shots, preventing us (along with my camera) from getting those panoramic Vermont calendar shots.

Be sure to tune back in....

Because we'll be doing more of the South Shore....

And we'll also do the South Coast...

As well as Cape Cod!

I'll even drag Jessica along, as she takes better pictures than I do.

See you on the road!

Cape Cod Canal-Only Fog

This was Saturday's fog, but there was a slight release delay as I pondered the "terrible pics of a cool phenomena" question.

I lacked the testicular fortitude to dash across the four lanes and shoot through the bars. This is what I would imagine that prison looks like in Heaven. 

The fog was the result of some temperature contrast between "cold morning" and "warm water." I was shooting from the side where the sun had been shining on the Canal longer.... or the people on the Cape side be smokin' up a few bales of that sticky-icky-icky. 

I kind of one-two'd these shots quickly, mostly to show how the fog was creeping over Buzzards Bay.

I'll get a better camera some day, honest.

South Coast Shellfishing Ban

You might want to skip the clams tonight, player,

The state’s Division of Marine Fisheries has banned the harvesting of shellfish in the west side of Buzzards Bay and in Mount Hope Bay until further notice.

The ban is due to an outbreak of toxic algae. The algae is a form of phytoplankton known as Pseudo Nitzschia. If Pseudo Nitzschia doesn't kill you, it will make you stronger.... and a nihilist.

Pseudo Nitzschia leads to the development of Domoic Acid. Domoic Acid can cause Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning, which gives the person who suffers from it vomiting, cramps, diarrhea and incapacitating headaches followed by confusion, disorientation, permanent loss of short-term memory, and in severe cases, seizures and coma. Other than that.... no probba!

Harvesting or collecting shellfish from the affected areas is now prohibited. Towns with the ban include Bourne, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Falmouth, Gosnold, Marion, Mattapoisett, New Bedford, Swansea, Wareham and Westport.

I had Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning once, but I forget what happened.

Send In The Clowns

from ABC

Massachusetts is now in the full grip of Creepy Clown hysteria.  You don't have to go on Facebook very long to see that there is most likely a clown working your area. It's only October 4th, so it's probably going to get creepier and creepier until Halloween.

Reports of clowns, some of which are hoaxes, are turning up in New Bedford, Brockton, Wareham, Rehoboth (RPD is denying it), Agawam, Weymouth, Plymouth and God knows where else. Merrimack College was actually locked down after a report (that later turned out to be false) concerning an armed clown roaming the campus. There are too many sightings, too far apart, for it to be the work of one clown.

It speaks of a Clown-spiracy.

Clowns run the gamut from friendly ones like Bozo to sad ones like Pagliacci to scary fictional ones like Pennywise to outright IRL serial killers like John Wayne Gacy. You could bump into WWE personality Doink the Clown, although I think the wrestler who played him is dead. They can even be a Juggalo, who are followers of the Insane Clown Posse. You have no way of knowing which type you're meeting, although if you meet one on a side street at 1 AM, he's probably not out looking for Mayor McCheese.

Clowns scare us in ways that other circus performers don't. I have seen not one report of, say, an acrobat or a lion tamer roaming the streets of Brockton. Maybe it's the face paint, maybe it's the capering, maybe it's the frozen deathly rictus... either way, I'm down with the clown like the guy in Repo Man felt about cops... "I ain't got nothin' against no cop.. I just like it better when they aren't around."

Folklorist/cryptozoologist Loren Coleman is largely responsible for both publicizing the 1981 cases in Massachusetts where clowns tried to lure children into cars, and for keeping the concept of RL creepy clowns in the public eye. He's been saying that the phenomena is coming back, and everyone laughed.... but the only one laughing now is Loren Coleman.

Keep in mind that many of these clown sightings are going down in the Bridgewater Triangle, which is another theory of Coleman's.

So, it's just early October, and the creepy clowns are out in full force. The clown craze is already larger than life, so it's not going away. That leaves you with the question of "Well, what can I do about it?"

Here are some tips that just may save you from a ghastly death at the gloved hands of a Killer Clown.

- Dress like a clown. I say this because I'm using Zombie Apocalypse Logic... you never see Zombies fighting each other. They have some instinct that makes one walk right past the other. Maybe clowns are like that... or maybe you and Pennywise can have a turf dispute. OK, maybe this idea sucks.

- Watch out for little cars. Clowns like to pack themselves into small cars like hybrids or VW Beetles. There's no comic value to fitting 12 clowns into a H2 or a Chevy Suburban. Sh*t, I've done that a few times. If you're on a dark side street and hear laughter or bicycle horns coming from a Toyota Yarris... well, you're probably already dead.

- If a clown chases you, try to run in areas with narrow paths. Clowns tend to wear big shoes, you see... there's no shame in surviving a clown chase only because Ronald got his foot snagged under a tree limb. You'd think that a guy with size 16 feet would have better Huge Shoes jokes, but I'm a bit under the weather this morning and have very little in the tank.

- In the Six Day War, the Israelis gained a war-winning advantage by staging a pre-emptive assault on the rival nation's air forces. Before the war was an hour old, the Sons of David owned the skies, and Syria/Egypt/Jordan/whoever suffered mightily for it. Do not be afraid of launching a pre-emptive strike against the clowns. Make-up stores, joke shops, even a circus.... you just have to know what to look for, and not be afraid to kill.

- Clown weaponry tends to lean towards the absurd. You notice that The Joker rarely kills with a gun. In fact, if a clown pulls a gun on you, it will most likely have that little BANG! flag pop out of it. At worst, it shoots out a boxing glove. Also be wary of lapel flowers that spray acid, 30000 volt electric joy buzzer handshakes, crowbars, and weapons that have "guaranteed to level Gotham City" written on the box.

- Girl clowns are always sexy, but the sex appeal is just a clown trick. Girl clowns may act like they love you, but their heart belongs to whatever clown first got them to put on the make-up. Harley Quinn always goes back to the Joker, even though Batman is worth a billion dollars and is built like a Greek God. Harley usually tries to do Batman in, rather than do Batman up.

- Every police department in town is going to issue warnings that the Clown Fear is just mass hysteria and that you shouldn't worry yourself over it. Don't believe them. Many of these warnings will actually be put out by the clowns themselves, in order to lure innocents into Fairhaven or Rehoboth or wherever the cops say "Don't Worry" the most. It's a lot like Thoreau once wrote... "The more vehemently that he spoke of his honor, the more closely that I watched the silverware."  I only half-remember the quote, but the point is what matters.

- If you do decide to kill a clown without a trial, don't forget to Double Tap them. I can't tell you how many horror movies I've seen where someone knocks over Michael Myers, thinks he's dead, and then gets an axe to the dome about one murderer sit-up later. Don't go out like a sucker.

 - In the same vein, remember that- should you take out a gun- a clown who runs is definitely an evil clown. A clown who begs for his life is a really sneaky evil clown.

- With "clown" sure to be among the top Hallowen costumes this year, it will be very easy for true Evil Clowns to mix in among the trick-or-treaters. Always know how many kids are in your trick-or-treating groups, and if you come up with one extra when you count heads, be wary. Also, if you go out with 4 little children and- at some point- the kid who was dressed as a Minion is now dressed as an evil clown... well, you're probably already dead. These odds go up if the clown-child is the newly-discovered fifth kid, and he's now six foot four.

- Legend has it that once a man kills while dressed as a clown, he can never get the make-up off. It's sort of what happened to Lady MacBeth. Killer Clowns can only look human again by taking out even more make-up. So, if you see an otherwise normal person with a touch of pure white on his skin, you should probably kill him first and wonder if he just ate a powdered sugar donut later.

- There are no Black, Asian or Latino clowns. Clownery (?) is like hockey to these people. If you see a black guy dressed as a clown, he's probably Canadian and doesn't count.

Cranberry Highway Flooding Becoming A Chronic Problem

This picture was taken from where the old 99 Restaurant was on the Cranberry Highway in Wareham.

The town may have a bit of a problem here. This is the main road in East Wareham.

Granted, we had furious rainfall yesterday. However, this has been a long-running problem in the area.

I was driving in this area during Hurricane Irene, when 7 inches of rain fell. The flooding, which only covered a hundred yards of Cranberry Highway in yesterday's event. spilled into the Wal-Mart parking lot. I saw a people who were nearly washed away by it.

The road was impassable, and flooding was bad enough that a car was stranded and abandoned by the 7-11. I saw one guy stall out in the mess yesterday, and he had to shove his car out of the water.

I'm guessing at this, but Dick's Pond and Sand Pond may also be prone to sending their overflow into the Cranberry Highway, as the road flooding I have seen along this road over the years went down near each them.

This could be a major problem if a hurricane strikes us full-bore. This road, which is pretty far back from the sea and was flooded yesterday by rainwater, is the only way to evacuate Onset.

I have no idea how to fix stuff like this, but someone must. It seems to be a pretty major problem.

South Coast Gas Prices, 7/21/16

Life doesn't play fair, and the Man is always trying to get one over on you. There's not much that you can do about it, as the Man is the Man for a reason, and that reason is not gender-exclusive. Sometimes, the best thing that can be done is to lessen the intensity of the beating.

As a man who has both studied military history and who has gone toe-to-toe with a few run-stoppers in my lifetime, I can tell you that many battles are won and lost by Logistics. That's one of those Army words that can mean whatever they need it to, and it has wide-ranging civilian implications. The short definition is getting to the right place at the right time with (or, in today's case, for) the proper supplies.

Logistics broke several of history's fiercest warlords, men such as Napoleon, Hitler, the Crusaders.... America would be British today were it not for the inherent Logistical Flaws involved with running America from England. Russia would be Nazi or French. Japan would be Mongol. All of Korea would be North Korea, even South Korea.

That's what we're here today to help you with. No matter how hard I work today, you're going to pay about double what you were paying for gas at the turn of the century. Sorry about that. However, if you can shave a few shekels off the Damages, it adds up over a year.

We're going town-by-town, giving you the lowest and highest gas prices you can find there. It's pushing noon on Thursday, July 21st. The prices are whatever has been reported since Monday.

We publish this on Thursday so that you can stumble across this article and fill your tank before they jack the price up to eff over the tourists on Friday.

You don't want to get treated like a tourist in your own home town, babe... that gets old fast. The best way to avoid that is to know your town. C’est ma raison d’etre......

NATIONAL AVERAGE: $2.182/gallon of regular unleaded

MASSACHUSETTS AVERAGE: $2.211

BEST PRICE, MASSACHUSETTS: $1.88/gallon, at both Diamond Fuel and Whitman Gas, South Ave, Whitman

WORST PRICE, MASSACHUSETTS: $3.57, Shell, Sparks Avenue, Nantucket

WORST PRICE, USA: $5.88, some station in Orlando, FL

BEST PRICE, USA: average of $1.82 in South Carolina

CURRENT PRICE OF CRUDE, PER BARREL: $45.36

HEADING TO CAPE COD? Check this.

TOWN BY TOWN:

NO PRICES REPORTED: Rochester, Acushnet, Freetown, Dighton, Berkley

WAREHAM

Best: $2.19, Maxi Gas, Cranberry Highway and Speedway, Main Street

Worst: $2.25, Mobil, Cranberry Highway

MARION

Best: $2.19, Cumberland Farms, Wareham Rd

Worst: none reported

MATTAPOISETT

Best: $2.29, Gulf, Fairhaven Road and Mobil, County Road

Worst: none

FAIRHAVEN

Best: $2.06, Valero, Bridge St

Worst: $2.29, Manny's Service Station, Adams St

NEW BEDFORD

Best: $2.04, Joe's Gas, Nash Road

Worst: $2.39, One Stop Gas, Kempton Street

DARTMOUTH

Best: $2.04, Cumberland Farms, State Road

Worst: $2.39, Shell, State Road

WESTPORT

Best: $2.08, Cumby's, State Road

Worst: $2.34, Pine Hill, Pine Hill Road

FALL RIVER

Best: $2.12, Cumberland Farms, Airport Road

Worst: $2.39, Shell, Plymouth Ave

SOMERSET

Best: $2.08, Cumby's Grand Army Highway

Worst: $2.39, Shell, Wilbur Road

SWANSEA
Best : $2.09, Sunoco, Wilbur Ave
Worst: $2.26, Columbus Express, GAR Highway

SEEKONK
Best : $1.97, BJ's, Highland Ave
Worst: $2.21, Valero, Newman Ave

REHOBOTH

Best : $1.99 Exxon, Anawan St.

Worst: $2.00, Cumby's, Anawan St.

TAUNTON

Best : $2.03, Sunny's on Lawton Ave, GeKo's on Somerset Ave, Super Petroleum on Dean St.

Worst: $2.39, Mobil, County St.

Cape Cod Baseball League Standings And Weekend Schedule, 6/23

STANDINGS

Team W L T PTS Streak L10

East Division

Harwich Mariners 9 2 0 18 3W 8-2
Orleans Firebirds 7 4 0 14 2W 6-4
Brewster Whitecaps 6 5 0 12 1L 6-4
Chatham Anglers 6 5 0 12 2W 6-4
Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox 4 7 0 8 2L 4-6

West Division

Bourne Braves 7 4 0 14 1W 6-4
Wareham Gatemen 6 5 0 12 2L 5-5
Falmouth Commodores 5 6 0 10 5L 4-6
Hyannis Harbor Hawks 4 7 0 8 4W 4-6
Cotuit Kettleers 1 10 0 2 6L 1-9

SCHEDULE

06/23/16 5:00 PM Hyannis Harbor Hawks @ Brewster Whitecaps
06/23/16 5:00 PM Falmouth Commodores @ Cotuit Kettleers
06/23/16 6:00 PM Wareham Gatemen @ Bourne Braves
06/23/16 6:30 PM Chatham Anglers @ Harwich Mariners
06/23/16 7:00 PM Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox @ Orleans Firebirds
06/24/16 5:00 PM Harwich Mariners @ Brewster Whitecaps
06/24/16 6:00 PM Cotuit Kettleers @ Hyannis Harbor Hawks
06/24/16 6:00 PM Orleans Firebirds @ Falmouth Commodores
06/24/16 6:30 PM Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox @ Wareham Gatemen
06/24/16 7:00 PM Bourne Braves @ Chatham Anglers
06/25/16 5:00 PM Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox @ Cotuit Kettleers
06/25/16 5:30 PM Orleans Firebirds @ Harwich Mariners
06/25/16 6:00 PM Falmouth Commodores @ Bourne Braves
06/25/16 6:30 PM Hyannis Harbor Hawks @ Wareham Gatemen
06/25/16 7:00 PM Brewster Whitecaps @ Chatham Anglers
06/26/16 5:00 PM Harwich Mariners @ Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox
06/26/16 5:00 PM Wareham Gatemen @ Brewster Whitecaps
06/26/16 5:30 PM Cotuit Kettleers @ Falmouth Commodores
06/26/16 5:30 PM Bourne Braves @ Orleans Firebirds
06/26/16 6:00 PM Chatham Anglers @ Hyannis Harbor Hawks

Naming Post-Secession Mainland Cape Cod

When the traffic gets bad enough and pols start talking about making residents pay tolls to cross a theoretical third bridge, people who live in the mainland areas of Bourne and Sandwich start getting angry. When that anger boils up enough, you even hear talk of secession.

"We lost any financial benefits from Cape traffic in 1985. Start our own town, demand financial concessions from Cape Cod for the traffic, and dump both bridges into the Canal if the Cape says no" is the general tone of secession talk.

I'm not going to support the "dump the bridges" talk, as it is terrorism and might kill someone. I'm also not here to push Secession. It's a fun conversation piece, and it might get me some site visits, but I'm simply not the man with the answers you'd need if you wanted to get the movement going. I'm not sure how it would be done, nor am I sure if it is even a good idea.

I'll leave those questions for a future article, most likely one written in August when I just took 90 minutes to get through the Belmont Circle rotary. Instead, I will take on something that I am completely capable of doing... naming the post-secession town.

We're going to work from a fictional scenario where Buzzards Bay, Bournedale, Sagamore Beach and Scusset Beach have all broken away from Bourne, Sandwich and perhaps even whatever parts of Wareham and Plymouth (why not go for everything east of Red Brook and all of the Great Herring Pond area?) we could get our hands on.

The resultant bow-tie shaped town would need many things, but the main thing it would need is a name. We've kicked around a few, and we'll share some of them with you now. There's no ranking, even if the staff have their own personal favorites.

- Gridlock

"Gridlock" would be a form of protest. It would speak of the new town's plight, while concurrently scaring away tourists who would otherwise clutter up our roads. It would be easy to remember, it would gain us amazing name-recognition value, and might invite investment.

"Gridock" was chosen from among several staff suggestions for traffic-related town names, edging out equally awesome but less serious contenders such as "Jam City, Massachusetts, " "Road Rage, Massachusetts," "Slow Lane, Massachusetts" and "Bumper-to-Bumper, Massachusetts."

"Bumper-to-Bumper" would have a sort of Stratford-upon-Avon sound to it, and would pair us with "Manchester-by-the-Sea" as the only town names in the state with hyphens in them. We'd also join them as the only town names with Prepositions in them.


- Ripton

"Ripton" was the name of a fictional Berkshires town that an awesome western Massachusetts pol (Editor's note: it was a UMass-Amherst professor) invented. He was able to apply for grants, and even got Ripton included in the state budget. He did Ripton's work so well, he was able to obtain state funds for the fictional community. He gave the money back, as he was less interested in Fraud and more interested in pointing out that the state government lacks Western Massachusetts awareness.

Anyhow, my financial adviser- who I will admit up front is in jail at the moment- tells me that he's "pretty sure" that state funds were collected and set aside for Ripton, and that if a Ripton should suddenly appear, they would be owed both the original sum of money and any interest accrued since Ripton's 1980s inclusion in the state budget.


- Capeside

Not a lot of TV shows were set on Cape Cod and the Islands (I can only think of one other one, Wings), but one of the best was Dawson's Creek. I don't think that I saw enough DC to tell you what it was actually about, but it launched the careers of Katie Holmes, James Van Der Beek, Michelle Williams and that other kid.

If you were a child of the 1990s and didn't arc a few to Katie Holmes... nice restraint, brother.

The "Capeside" town scenes in Dawson's Creek were actually filmed in Wilmington, North Carolina, and any Massachusetts scenery used in the show was filmed in Oak Bluffs. However, why not steal the name? As you can see from the entries above and below this one in the article, it's not like we have any better ideas.

"Capeside" edges out several other fictional town names that we wished to steal from TV, movies or literature, including "Amity," "Crabapple Cove," "Dunwich, "Wallencamp," "Peyton Place," "Gotham City," "Atlantis," "Jerusalem's Lot," "Dudleyville" and "Quahog."

- Wutham

Pronounced what-ham, it would be a goof on neighboring Wareham. We'd spell it "Whatham," but we wish to avoid GPS errors with Waltham.

We'd need Marion to change their name to Whoham in order to complete the trinity.


- Sagamore

"Sagamore" is probably the logical choice, although it would be complicated in that the actual village of Sagamore is on the Cape side of the Canal.

We might have to name the town "Scusset Beach," which would force us to  negotiate something with what would most likely be a very hostile Sandwich town government.

The "Scusset Beach" thing would be unfair to the Buzzards Bay part of the new town, while a "Buzzards Bay" naming would be unfair to Sagamore Beach.


Shark City

Assuming that we are unable to cut a concession for traffic from Cape Cod, and assuming that we lack the testicular fortitude to destroy the Canal bridges.... well, not all fights are physical.

If we can't take the physical means of going to Cape Cod away, why not attack them through tourism?

There would be no way of driving a car to Cape Cod without going past the NOW ENTERING SHARK CITY signs which we would dot the highway with. I'd even post the population on town signs, and cross it out every time someone died... you know, like they do in bad towns from cowboy movies.

Sure, most of those deaths would be Old Age, Cancer and so forth....  but you won't be thinking that when you drive past the Shark City sign.

Double Bay

One thing that this fictional town would have on every other town in the state would be the fact that we would be the only town to touch two (Buzzards Bay and Cape Cod Bay) bays.

If you count Buttermilk Bay, we could even be Triple Bay.

This one is here mostly because it would make a great Casino name. If we stole enough of Wareham's eastern and Plymouth's southern forests, we could build a mega-casino right off the highway.

Shoot, I'd leave the bridges up at that point. Who wants to go to Taunton or friggin' Everett when you can instead gamble all night in Double Bay, and then dip over to Cape Cod for some daylight beach time?

Bowtie

"Bowtie" would be a play on the shape of the new town. Yes, it sucks.

Keeping the theme, but changing the shape.... this (and the Casino) would be a big motivator for the Wareham and Pymouth land grabs. If we seize the Ponds sections of Wareham and Plymouth, we'd be shaped like a mini-Connecticut.

Squanto

"Squanto" beats out "Samoset," "Metacomet," and "Massasoit" for Algonquin tribute purposes.

Squanto has the best Q Rating, and would be the best tourist-drawing name.

I don't know how we could do it, but maybe Johnny Depp or the Farrelly Brothers could be convinced to re-invent Squanto as an action hero. Maybe he goes all Seagal on invading Mi'kmaq, or perhaps he even kills a Sasquatch that was menacing Priscilla Alden. Squanto's story is an amazing one, but it needs more kung-fu and dinosaurs if he's getting his own town

Have Any Better Ideas? Let us know in the Comments...

Most Ghetto, Southeastern Massachusetts Edition

New Bedford

Eastern Massachusetts is not without her faults. However, one thing we are not is Ghetto.

Granted, we have Fall River. You can get the Fear nice and easy in Fall River. It's a tough town. Most famous resident? An axe-murderess. Most beloved? Probably the same girl.

Taunton, Brockton and New Beddy are no walk in the park, either... or they're a walk in the park where you get beaten up by a gang of thugs for no reason. After that, there is what skiers call a precipitous drop-off.

Some of the tougher parts of our region aren't THAT tough. I'm not taking about individual citizens. I'm sure there's at least one bad-ass Kennedy (found him!) drawing breath somewhere, and you can get beaten up at the Bia Bistro in Cohasset just as badly as you can get handled at a Fall River Popeye's if you cross the wrong opponent.

Still, if you put on NWA and drive around Brockton, it sort of makes sense as long as your eyes don't go to the rear view mirror at the wrong angle. Try going down King Caesar Road in Duxbury with Bring The Ruckus playing. Your own silliness might strangle you.

There's nothing wrong with this. "Escaping an urban nightmare" is a top reason for moving out to the countryside. "Good visual environment for my Nasty Nas CD" isn't.

Still, if someone establishes a scale for Ghetto, and if the numbers on that scale can be applied to any town anywhere, you can rank towns with it. Lo and behold, that's just what someone did.

They used a simple formula.

Ghetto Bird

Household income levels
High school graduation rates
Number of convenience stores
Number of drug stores
Number of discount stores
Crime
Twitter mentions of #ghetto

It's a flawed formula, but it should be fun to play with.

Here's their Top 15:

Lawrence
Springfield
Chelsea
New_Bedford
Brockton
Holyoke
Lynn
Lowell
Fall River
Worcester
Everett
Revere
Boston
Fitchburg
Wareham

Wareham

Wareham is sort of the WTF on this list, IMHO. I feel badly knowing that she'll be 4th once I start a whittlin' everything North and West of Bristol and Plymouth County out of the master list.

There are definitely some flawed criteria. Twitter references are worrisome. I was a teacher for a while, and I heard kids describe every town on earth as "ghetto." Kids own Twitter, I suppose, and may lack the seasoning to know True Ghetto and why Whitman-Hanson isn't it.

They say that they use "5000 residents" as a cutoff point. Yet, I don't see Duxbury or Bourne or Marshfield or a dozen other towns with populations over 5K. If its a typo and the number is suposed to be 50,000 residents, why is Wareham there?

I was very much looking forward to the bottom of this list, as I wanted to see how the silver-spoon towns fared against each other. It'd be fun to imagine a couple of stockbrokers arguing about whether Cohasset is more thugged out than Sandwich. Alas, the list plays out before we get to the Blue Bloods.

The convenience store angle seems to be ranked right up there with Poverty and Crime, which would to throw a wrench into things. I think that if a Cumby's opens up near the Tedeschi's in your cow town, it shouldn't suddenly make you more Gangsta than someone from Lowell.

Straight Outta Hingham!

However, only my love of Wareham and the lower ranking of Boston makes me really have any issue with the Top 15.

I may get a bit of static from my readers, and I just ask them to remember that I am merely passing along the information on this list. I'm not smart enough to factor that many variables into an equation, even with My Damned Aunt Sally helping. I am smart enough to take a Top 100 list and chop it down to just show the towns in our region, and that's just what we're about to do.

Fall River

Regional Rank  City   Crime Score Original Rank

1) new_bedford 161.7 4
2) brockton 146 5
3) fall_river 190.3 9
4) boston 155.6 13
5) wareham 115.4     14
6) quincy 169.1 26
7) taunton 143.5 33

Well, maybe they have some points after all. Some people might flip Fall River and New Bedford, Most people might see the flaws in not having Boston as the anchorman. Larger towns suffer a bit in the ratings, as the sheer number of people make for lower rates.

Wareham seems to be ranked too highly, but maybe they just try really hard. I worked Boston in mostly to knock the 'Ham down a spot.

Our coverage area showed well, taking 4 of the top 14 spots.

Now, remember when I said "precipitous drop-off" earlier. Here we are!

bridgewater 172.5 39
west_yarmouth 124 41
attleboro 116 42
middleborough_center 154.3 43
fairhaven 117.3 46
barnstable_town 168.1 48
plymouth 149.9 52

I went to college in Bridgewater, and it's more bucolic than ghetto. A great bit of the town is structured around the fact that there is a college in town. The college is not the only entity in town that may be weakening the stock. As someone on a Bridgewater Facebook page said, "The nuthouse down the road lowers our ratings, as does the mental hospital."

Just kidding, I went to BSC. Class of 2000, blogga!

West Yarmouth? How? Ah, 5% margin of error and all.

Plymouth and Barnstable have their rotten parts, but rarely would one fear to stroll through them. They do the service of grouping their poor into certain areas. Bourne is good at that, too. They stash them right by the highway.

Kingston

weymouth_town 152.8 59
middleborough 69.3 60
nantucket 115.8 61
east_falmouth 149.7 64
foxborough 62.9 64
south_yarmouth 105.9 66
kingston 80.3 69

Foxboro is plummeting down the list now that Aaron Hernandez Inc. is within the system. They should sign Greg Hardy.

I wonder if Nantucket is America's most ghetto island? I suppose that Long Island has them beat.

I have no idea what Kingston is doing there, unless the guy who made the list counted Halifax and Plympton's dropouts from Silver Lake as all being from Kingston.

yarmouth 136.5 76
mashpee 115.7 77
somerset 154.1 78
abington 85.9 78
hull 166.3 81
harwich 71.8 83
rockland 112.4 88
mansfield_center 49.4 96

We're really reaching here, and I sort of understand why the list gets cut off where it does.

Conspicuous in their absence....

Sandwich
Marshfield
Chatham
Halifax
Rochester
Scituate
Carver
Hanover
Whitman
Cohasset
Duxbury

Duxbury

Content Reblogged from roadsnacks.net

Iconic Regional Businesses: The South Shore

Be sure to check out our CAPE COD and also our SOUTH COAST versions of this article. Same intro, different businesses.

Life has bounced me from Boston to Quincy to Duxbury to Worcester (back) to Duxbury to Monponsett to Cape Motherlovin' Cod. I've seen them come and go, friend.

One thing that I noticed as I hopped around was that some business chains I got used to in one spot would either not exist in another spot, or some other product in the same field would be dominant in this new region.

I'd also see businesses that started in one spot springing up everywhere. That's always nice to see, especially with something you grew up loving... it sort of affirms your sense of good taste for you.

One other phenomena I'd see is that, while my friends and I might favor one particular local place or another, we'd have a regional default option.

To use an example with a powerful business not born of these parts... we both might want a burger. I like Schmuckburgers over on Main Street. You like Ye Olde Slaughtered Cow on the State Road. However, there's always McDonald's.

Massachusetts is a funny place. We like things a certain way. There is an impressive list of otherwise nationally prosperous franchises who flop in Massachusetts. Pizza Hut, Papa John, Little Caesar and Domino's all struggle in Massachusetts, as locals often prefer their town's House Of Pizza. Locals laugh, especially near the coast, if you ask where the Red Lobster is. You might get punched, especially in Italian neighborhoods, if you ask where The Olive Garden is. IHOP and Krispy Kreme may be the biggest names crossed off of the Dunkin' Donut's hit list.

Today, we shall examine a few businesses which have that sort of regional recognition. Some people explore the world. Some people explore regions of it. If you are a regional tourist, look at this as a sort of Bucket List. You should be familiar with all of these businesses we are about to discuss, You can get your Local card pulled, otherwise.

Someone who never went to the Cape as a kid might not know the Thompson's Clam Bar jingle, while someone from Harwich might think that Peaceful Meadows is a pet cemetery. View these places as a sort of Mendoza Line. Thompson's never expanded regionally, and Peaceful Meadows might be an ounce of Swagger away from being listed down below.

I broke this list up by Barnstable/Plymouth/Bristol County, although it could very easily be Cape Cod/South Shore/South Coast. I had to stretch up to Mansfield to fatten the South Coast category, but it's still Bristol, babe.

Here we go...

Plymouth County

Marylou's Coffee

The mocha-making mini-MILFs in the pink shirts have a strong regional presence on the South Shore coffee market, not an easy job in the state that birthed both Dunkin' Donuts and Honey Dew.

Hanover was the site of the first Marylou's, but they have scattered all over the place from Quincy to Providence. I actually fly out of T.F. Green when I have to travel, so that I can load up on Marylou's before I leave. They have two stores on Cape Cod, three if you count the Sagamore one on the mainland.

You could kick my mother in the stomach, but if you gave me a large Almond Joy with cream and sugar first, I'd try to rationalize it.

Just kidding. I'm an orphan.



Mamma Mia

You're going to get a different answer to Best Pizza South Of Boston from a food critic type like the Phantom Gourmet, and that's correct if your one of those trendy people who like getting Goat Cheese on a pizza. If you're serious about pizza, however... there's only one choice once you get out of the city.

Mamma Mia'!

Mamma Mia has expanded in recent years, and they now range from Hanover to Carver to the Pinehills. The best one of the bunch, as is often the case with great restaurant chains, is in a shack-like building in Kingston.

Founded in 1974 in Kingston by the Viscariello brothers, because Italians. Children of the owners work in the shop making pizza boxes "until they are tall enough to reach the pizza counter."

I'm not the only South Shore kid who used to ask for Mamma Mia as a birthday dinner destination, right up until they invented video games. Mamma Mia's was a godsend for Busing refugees who moved out of the city and still wanted Boston-style pizza.


Persy's Place

Being a breakfast franchise in the hard-drinking Irish Riviera means that you are a sort of Emergency Room for hangover sufferers.

The first Persy's Place was opened in Kingston, about 100 yards as the bird flies from the first Mamma Mia. They opened for business in 1982, and now have 9 restaurants ranging from Kingston to Providence to Centerville.

Much like Mamma Mia's, I think they add towns as the owner's children get experienced enough to run a place solo.

A few people tell me that the Wareham one sucks, but I also had a girlfriend who would get angry if we went for breakfast anywhere but the Kingston Persy's.

If you like baked beans served with your breakfast (you don't get much more Massachusetts than that, save for "getting into a fight at a rotary"), this is the place for you.

Ocean Spray

The first name in cranberries was born in Hanson, in 1930. It was originally three farmers looking to expand their reach by pooling their efforts. The whole is greater than the sum of the parts now and then, as Ocean Spray did $2.2 billion in sales in 2013.

They did this simply by inventing what most people would recognize as cranberry sauce, then inventing cranberry juice, then Cran-Apple, then juice boxes and finally sweetened dried cranberries. If they think of it, invest in it... it's probably going to work.

There are plenty of people in America who have never seen a Dunkin' Donuts, have no idea what the Christmas Tree Shops are and think that Papa Gino is a mobster. These people still most likely give some money to Ocean Spray, usually at Thanksgiving.

They're now based in the Middleboro/Lakeville area.

I actually wrote a shameful amount of this article, while drinking a Cran-Grape, without remembering to include Ocean Spray.


Dunkin' Donuts

DD deserves their own category. They not only rule the region, they scare away almost all competitors. Like we said, they own scalps like Krispy Kreme and IHOP. If they don't rule the Coffee Shop world, I'd like to know who does.

The first Dunkin' opened up in 1950, in Quincy. They now have 31,000 locations in 30 countries. You can get Dunkin' in Russia, China, Oman, Syria, Singapore, Peru... while the Navy SEALs who killed Osama bin Laden didn't say whether or not the Al-Qaeda el jefe was holding a Coolatta when they aerated his head, it is possible... there's a Dunkin' Donuts in Karachi, Pakistan. It's not in Abbottabad, but it does deliver.

Dunkin' just opened in California (if you go to business school, you learn that it is natural to expand into Lebanon before California), and they have lines around the block.

The section of Bourne where I live has three Dunkins within one hundred yards of each other, with a half dozen more reachable with a five minute drive..


Papa Gino's

This is a chain that started in East Boston in 1961, founded by Michael and Helen Velario. It was "Piece o' Pizza" until 1968.

Papa Gino's is one of those default chains we spoke of earlier. My girlfriend and I differ on pizza. She likes Greek pizza, which is more popular on the South Coast. I believe that Italians make pizza the best. The one pizza we agree on is Papa Gino's.

If you move to a new town, you love pizza and your local House Of Pizza sucks, you'd better find either a Papa Gino's or a realtor.

Again, Papa Gino's is a Boston chain, but it quickly became the South Shore's baby. This may because Italians tended to move north and west out of Boston when Busing hit, thus giving those towns a better House Of Pizza talent pool. I'm looking at a crowded Locations Near You map right now, and while I may have the numbers fudged a bit, there seem to be as many Papa Gino's on the South Shore as there are in Boston, the North Shore and MetroWest combined.

Pilgrims

Plymouth makes a pretty good dollar milking the Pilgrims.

You can go to Plimoth Plantation, Plymouth Rock, the Mayflower II, several historic sites and several museums to get your John Alden on if that's what you're looking to do.

I've said it before, and I'm saying it now. Plymouth's parade and Thanksgiving football game should be nationally televised events.

While Plymouth may be a hoot and a holler when compared to some of her sleepy neighbors like Plympton or Duxbury, it's hardly New Orleans or Los Angeles. Still, almost every sentient person in America knows at least a little bit about it.

You can make some money off of stuff like that.