A Bit Of April Snow For You?

Maybe we were a bit hasty with that Last Snow headline in late March...

It seems that we have not one but TWO snow events coming at us... and that's just through Monday morning. Although some April snow is newsworthy, the real story will be the combo of wind and cold heading for us.

We were pushing 70 degrees around here on Thursday and Friday. We'll be in the 20s on Sunday, with places north of us diving into the teens.

We also want to tag in now to let you know that there is a chance of coastal flooding at the end of next week. We'll get to that in a second.

Why not let the National Weather Service explain? They just published a detailed forecast for the whole active weather period. They use ALL CAPS, so it is obviously important stuff of which they speak:

RAIN TODAY WITH THE POSSIBILITY OF ISOLATED THUNDERSTORMS ACROSS
THE INTERIOR. INTENSE STORM SYSTEM EARLY SUNDAY MORNING. BURST OF
ACCUMULATING SNOW LIKELY. HURRICANE FORCE WINDS POSSIBLE. THEN AN
UNSEASONABLY COLD AIRMASS OVERSPREADS THE REGION SUNDAY AFTERNOON
AND NIGHT WITH BLUSTERY NORTHWEST WINDS. ANOTHER LOW PRESSURE
TRACKS OVER OR NEAR THE SOUTH COAST OF NEW ENGLAND
MONDAY...BRINGING THE RISK FOR ANOTHER ROUND OF ACCUMULATING SNOW
TO THE AREA. DRYING TREND TUE BUT REMAINING UNSEASONABLY COLD.
MODERATING TEMPERATURES MID TO LATE NEXT WEEK BUT ALSO THE RISK OF
WET WEATHER.

&&

.NEAR TERM /UNTIL 6 PM THIS EVENING/...

7 AM UPDATE ...

NOT MUCH CHANGE FROM PREVIOUS FORECAST. RAIN SHIELD /MAINLY LIGHT/
CONTINUES TO OVERSPREAD RI AND EASTERN MA...WITH LITTLE IF ANY
RAIN NORTHWEST OF BOSTON TO PROVIDENCE CORRIDOR. FOR WHAT IT/S
WORTH THE 06Z NAM AND GFS BOTH TRENDED HEAVIER WITH RAINFALL LATER
THIS MORNING AND EARLY AFTERNOON ACROSS RI AND EASTERN MA. LOW
CONFIDENCE ON THIS SCENARIO WILL CONTINUE TO LEAN TOWARD LIGHT TO
PERHAPS MODERATE RAIN AT TIMES...HEAVIEST RI AND EASTERN MA WITH
LIGHTER RAIN ACROSS CT AND WESTERN-CENTRAL MA.

ONLY CHANGE TO THE FORECAST WAS TO LOWER HOURLY TEMPS A BIT AS
RAIN HAS LOWERED TEMPS CLOSER TO THEIR WET BULB VALUES. OTHERWISE
PREVIOUS FORECAST ON TRACK. EARLIER DISCUSSION BELOW.

===================================================================

INITIAL LIGHT TO MODERATE RAINFALL EVENT FOLLOWED UP BY A SWEEPING
COLD FRONT AND SOME CONVECTIVE SHOWERS.

SO WITH THE FIRST SYSTEM...WAVE LOW DEVELOPS ALONG THE STALLED
FRONTAL BOUNDARY OFFSHORE PARENT WITH STOUT MID LEVEL ENERGY AND
FORCING THROUGH THE OVERALL BROAD CYCLONIC TROUGH. GREATEST POP
CHANCES AND RAINFALL S AND E CLOSER TO THE SKIRTING WAVE LOW. MUCH
OF THE ACTIVITY EARLY MORNING INTO MIDDAY.

THEN SECONDLY...ATTENTION TURNS N/W WITH THE FIRST IN A SERIES OF
LOW PRESSURE CENTERS THAT BEGIN THE PROCESS OF DRAGGING COLDER AIR
ACROSS OUR REGION. IN TANDEM WITH A SWEEPING COLD FRONT WILL SEE THE
BOUNDARY LAYER COOL AND BECOME UNSTABLE UP TO H6. IF THE 24-HR HRRR
IS CORRECT...LOOKING AT CONVECTIVE SHOWER DEVELOPMENT AHEAD OF THE
FRONT ESPECIALLY ACROSS THE N/W/CENTRAL INTERIOR. STRONG LOW-MID
LEVEL FORCING TO THE TOP OF THE LAYER AROUND -20C COULD RESULT IN
GRAUPEL / SMALL HAIL WITH THESE SHOWERS ALONG WITH LIGHTNING...AS
WELL AS 20-30 MPH GUSTS. THREATS EXACERBATED IF WE SEE CLEARING
BETWEEN THE S STREAM WAVE LOW AND N STREAM SWEEPING COLD FRONT. WITH
ANY THUNDER MENTIONED IN THE FORECAST WILL APPEND GUSTY WINDS AND
SMALL HAIL. THREATS SWEEPING NW TO SE DURING THE LATER HALF OF THE
DAY INTO EVENING. INSTABILITY NOT AS ROBUST AS FRIDAY...SO THINKING
STORMS WILL NOT REACH WARNING CRITERIA.

OVERALL A MOSTLY CLOUDY AND COOL DAY IN ADDITION TO THE WET WEATHER.
HIGHS INTO THE 50S.

.SHORT TERM /6 PM THIS EVENING THROUGH 6 PM SUNDAY/...

TONIGHT INTO SUNDAY...

 * STRONG TO DAMAGING WINDS NEAR HURRICANE FORCE POSSIBLE
 * WIND ADVISORY / HIGH WIND WATCH POSTED
 * CONVECTIVE SNOWS POSSIBLE WITH ACCUMULATIONS 1 TO 3 INCHES
 * STORM FORCE WINDS ACROSS THE WATERS

SNOW BURST EARLY SUNDAY MORNING INTO MIDDAY ACCOMPANIED WITH STRONG
TO DAMAGING WINDS. WILL BE AN UNPRECEDENTED RARE EVENT INCORPORATING
RAPID CYCLOGENESIS...INTENSE LIFT...AND ACCUMULATING SNOWS AS WELL
AS THE LIKELIHOOD OF THUNDERSNOW. SHOULD SEE IMPACTS TAPER DOWNWARD
LATE AFTERNOON INTO SUNDAY EVENING. AFRAID MANY ARE GOING TO BE
CAUGHT OFF-GUARD WITH THE LATE SEASON SNOW. WILL HIT ON THE DETAILS
BELOW AS BEST AS POSSIBLE.

POTENT VORTEX OUT OF THE GREAT LAKES REGION CYCLONICALLY DIGGING S
OF NEW ENGLAND INVOKES INTENSE CYCLOGENESIS ALONG THE S-SHORELINE.
THIS WHILE DRAGGING CONSIDERABLY COLDER AIR ACROSS THE REGION WITH
H85 TEMPERATURES FALLING -10 TO -15C NEAR RECORD BREAKING PER LOCAL
SOUNDING CLIMATOLOGY. STRONG LOW TO MID FORCING ABOVE SURFACE INFLOW
AND BENT-BACK WARM FRONT WITH COLD AIR ADVECTION REARWARD RESULTING
IN THE ATMOSPHERIC COLUMN BECOMING SUPER-ADIABATIC / UNSTABLE UP TO
H6 BENEATH THE TROPOPAUSE FOLD. ENSEMBLE CLIMATOLOGICAL PERCENTILES
SHOWING THIS EVENT TO BE NEAR OR AT ALL-TIME HISTORICAL MINIMUMS...
IMPRESSIVELY ANOMALOUS.

TEMPERATURES / PRECIPITATION INTENSITY....CRITICAL WITH THIS EVENT
IS THE PRECIPITATION INTENSITY DETERMINING PRECIPITATION TYPE...AS
WELL AS 2M SURFACE TEMPERATURES. WILL DRIVE SUCH TEMPERATURES CLOSE
TO IF NOT AT THE WET-BULB DURING EXPECTED TIME-FRAME OF INTENSE
PRECIPITATION. INITIAL RAIN WHICH HAS INSTABILITY TO WORK WITH AS
THE COLUMN BEGINS TO COOL TO COULD YIELD GRAUPEL/SMALL HAIL WITH
ANY THUNDERSTORMS. BRIEF BEFORE CHANGING OVER QUICKLY TO A INTENSE
SNOWFALL.

SNOWFALL...ALONG SHORES EXPECT LITTLE IF ANY ACCUMULATION ADJACENT
TO WARMER WATERS. LOW ELEVATIONS EXPECTING SLUSHY ACCUMULATIONS ON
ELEVATED / GRASSY SURFACES WITH WET ROADWAYS. AND FINALLY N/W AND
ACROSS HIGH TERRAIN WITH COLDER TEMPERATURES THERE IS A GREATER
OPPORTUNITY AND MORE CONCERN FOR SNOW ACCUMULATION ON ALL SURFACES
WITH HIGHEST SNOWFALL AMOUNTS ATOP BERKSHIRES / WORCESTER HILLS.
SNOW EXPECTED TO OCCUR QUICKLY...IN A SHORT DURATION...ON THE ORDER
OF 1 TO 2 HOURS. STORM TOTAL ACCUMULATIONS 1 TO 3 INCHES AWAY FROM
THE COASTAL PLAINS.

THUNDERSNOW...PRECIPITATION SHOULD BE INTENSE CONSIDERING THE SUPER-
ADIABATIC / UNSTABLE LAPSE RATES. BENEATH THE POTENT VORTEX YIELDING
RAPID CYCLOGENESIS...LOOKING AT LIFT OF 50 MICROBARS PER SECOND IN
SNOW GROWTH REGIONS. DEFINITELY A SIGNAL FOR THUNDERSNOW. WILL PUT
AN ISOLATED MENTION INTO THE FORECAST. INTENSE ENOUGH...WOULD EXPECT
SNOW ACCUMULATION ON A MAJORITY OF SURFACES...EVEN AT THE LOWER
ELEVATIONS. COULD SEE 1 INCH PER HOUR SNOWFALL RATES. COMPLEX TO
FORECAST.

WINDS...INTENSE PRESSURE COUPLET YIELDING HURRICANE FORCE WINDS AT
H925 ACROSS NJ / DELMARVA EXTENDING ON UP ACROSS SE NEW ENGLAND AS
THE STORM EXITS LATE MORNING TO MIDDAY SUNDAY. WITH INCREDIBLY STEEP
LAPSE RATES...UNDOUBTEDLY A MAGNITUDE OF SUCH WINDS WILL MIX DOWN TO
THE SURFACE. 35 TO 55 MPH WINDS ACROSS INTERIOR NEW ENGLAND N TO S
WITH 50 TO 70 MPH WINDS ACROSS RHODE ISLAND AS WELL AS E/SE MASS.
HIGH CONFIDENCE FOR WIND ADVISORY CONDITIONS OVER ALL S NEW ENGLAND.
LOWER CONFIDENCE ON WHERE EXACTLY HIGH WIND WARNING CRITERIA WILL
BE MET. WENT WITH A WATCH OVER E/SE NEW ENGLAND.

.LONG TERM /SUNDAY NIGHT THROUGH FRIDAY/...

HIGHLIGHTS...

* VERY ACTIVE WEATHER PATTERN NEXT 7 DAYS

* TEMPERATURES - UNSEASONABLY COLD FOR EARLY APRIL SUNDAY THROUGH
  WEDNESDAY...THEN MODERATING LATE NEXT WEEK

* PRECIPITATION - ACCUMULATING SNOW LIKELY MONDAY ALONG WITH OCEAN
  EFFECT SNOW SHOWERS EASTERN MA TUE MORNING. OTHERWISE DRY TUE INTO
  WED FOLLOWED BY WET WEATHER LATE NEXT WEEK

SUNDAY NIGHT ... MODELS HAVE SPED UP THE ARRIVAL OF THE NEXT SYSTEM
WITH SNOW POSSIBLY BEGINNING BEFORE SUNRISE MONDAY ACROSS WESTERN
PORTIONS OF CT AND MA. THUS TEMPS SUN NGT WILL NOT BE AS COLD AS
PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT. ALTH STILL UNSEASONABLY COLD. OTHERWISE DRY
WEATHER PREVAILS MUCH OF THE NIGHT WITH A VERY COLD AIRMASS IN
PLACE WITH TEMP ANOMALIES AT 925 AND 850 ABOUT -2 STANDARD
DEVIATIONS COLDER THAN CLIMO. THIS WILL RESULT IN TEMPS FALLING
INTO THE 20S REGIONWIDE ALONG WITH A FEW UPPER TEENS ACROSS
NORTHWEST MA. NORMAL OVERNIGHT LOWS SHOULD BE 30- 35 FOR EARLY
APRIL.

MONDAY ... AS MENTIONED ABOVE MODEL GUIDANCE HAS SPED UP ARRIVAL AND
DEPARTURE OF SNOW FROM FRONTAL WAVE. 00Z GFS IS ON THE NORTHERN EDGE
OF THE GUID WITH SFC LOW TRACKING ALONG THE SOUTH COAST...RESULTING
IN PTYPE ISSUES /RAIN & SNOW/ ACROSS CT/RI AND SOUTHEAST MA.
MEANWHILE REMAINDER OF GUID INCLUDING 00Z NAM/ECMWF/GEFS AND 12Z EPS
ARE FARTHER SOUTH AND COLDER. GIVEN TIME RANGE HERE AND SMALL
FRONTAL SCALE SYSTEM A MODEL BLEND IS LIKELY MOST SKILLFUL. THUS
WILL USE A BLEND APPROACH HERE. REGARDING QPF...00Z ECMWF/GFS/GEFS
AND 12Z EPS SUPPORT POTENTIAL QPF OF 0.20 TO 0.50 INCHES ACROSS THE
REGION. PRELIMINARY SNOW FORECAST VERY DIFFICULT AT THIS TIME RANGE
ESPECIALLY WITH SMALL FRONTAL WAVE IN ADDITION TO POTENTIAL PTYPE
ISSUES. FURTHERMORE ACCUMULATING SNOW ON PAVED SURFACES IN APRIL SNOW
EVENTS /HIGH SUN ANGLE...WARM GROUND AND LONGER DAYS THAN NIGHTS/
HINGE ON INTENSITY OF QPF. IF INTENSITY IS LACKING MOST ACCUMULATION
IS CONFINED TO THE COLDER SURFACES/HIGHER TERRAIN AND SECONDARY
ROADS. JUST TOO EARLY FOR ANY INSIGHT WHERE HEAVIER SNOW BANDS
WOULD POTENTIALLY SETUP. STAY TUNED.

MON NIGHT AND TUESDAY ... VERY PROGRESSIVE SYSTEM SO A DRYING TREND
THIS PERIOD. THE EXCEPTION WILL BE OVER COASTAL PLYMOUTH
COUNTY...CAPE COD AND NANTUCKET WHERE NORTHEAST WINDS AND STEEP LOW
LEVEL LAPSE RATES LIKELY RESULT IN OCEAN EFFECT SNOW BANDS. THIS IS
COURTSEY OF VERY COLD AIR ADVECTING IN ON BACKSIDE OF DEPARTING
SURFACE WAVE. IN FACT THIS AIRMASS WILL BE JUST AS COLD IF NOT
COLDER THAN SUNDAY/SUNDAY NIGHT/S AIRMASS WITH H85 TEMPS DOWN TO -
15C 12Z TUE! OTHERWISE EXPECT A VERY CHILLY DAY TUE WITH MUCH OF THE
AREA DRY WITH THE EXCEPTION OF SOUTHEAST MA AS MENTIONED ABOVE. VERY
BLUSTERY IN THE MORNING ACROSS SOUTHEAST MA WITH DEPARTING WAVE AND
1033 MB HIGH ENTERING THE GREAT LAKES.

WED ... LOOKS TO BE A TRANSITION DAY WITH COLD ANOMALOUS TROF
MOVING OFFSHORE AND HIGH PRES BUILDING INTO THE REGION. OFF TO A
COLD START BUT AIRMASS MODIFYING DURING THE DAY. DRY WEATHER
SHOULD PREVAIL BUT RISK OF PRECIP WED NIGHT PENDING SPEED OF NEXT
UPSTREAM SYSTEM.

THURSDAY AND FRIDAY ... COLD ANOMALOUS TROUGH MOVES OFFSHORE SO
TEMPS WILL REBOUND TO MORE SEASONAL LEVELS /50S/. HOWEVER MEAN
TROUGH RELOADS OVER THE GREAT LAKES AND OH VLY. THIS RESULTS IN A
STRONG FRONTAL BOUNDARY APPROACHING THE REGION WITH STRONG WAA
PATTERN INTO SRN NEW ENG. MODELS THEN DIFFER ON LATITUDE OF FRONTAL
WAVE DEVELOPING ON THE FRONT. NONETHELESS UNSETTLED WEATHER LATE
NEXT WEEK. ALSO WILL HAVE TO WATCH INTENSITY AND DURATION OF ANY
COASTAL LOW/FRONTAL WAVE AS ASTRONOMICAL TIDES ARE VERY HIGH...12.0+
FT AT BOSTON. HENCE RISK OF COASTAL FLOODING.

Headless Alligator Found In Westport, And Alligators Up North In General

Some cold-hearted SOB cut off an alligator's head and dumped it in the woods of Westport yesterday. This is an astonishing act of animal cruelty, and the Westport police are asking for any help that the public might be able to offer. Call them at 508-636-1122 if you know something.

Why would someone own an alligator? Why would they cut off the head from it like it was MacBeth or something?

Well, I can see why someone would want to own one. Alligators are cool. Its like having a baby dinosaur. However, there is immense difficulty in having a gator around the house, and only serious people should consider it.

When non-serious people own them, they end up headless in the forest.

I did a bit of research on decapitating alligators. I thought it might be a Santeria thing, but nothing I dug up on Santerian animal sacrifices includes alligators. My sources might just have a passing interest in Santeria and not be aware of the Santeria Alligator Sacrifice Ritual, but I don't have enough to even start slurring Santeria people.

Headless alligators turn up in Florida and Louisiana now and then. Several sources are mentioned... poachers, trophy-hunters, fishermen who hooked a protected species and didn't want to talk to the park ranger about it... and even some guy who was injured (or perhaps had a relative killed) by an alligator, who now holds an Ahab/Quint-style grudge against the species in general. It could have been the work of a Florida State fan trying to send a message to his Florida fan neighbor.

Of course, not a lick of that makes sense in Westport, Massachusetts. The alligator poaching scene here is somewhat limited by the fact that alligators are not found in the wild in Massachusetts. Not many fishermen hook them up here for the same reason, and that low number is even bested by the paucity of people who come to Massachusetts looking to kill wild alligators for trophies. Ahab or Quint would know better than to hunt Gator here, and the 'Noles/Gator argument looks like a long shot.

That leaves one obvious answer, and one wild guess.

Wild guess first... has anybody ever had alligators fight? You know, like pits or chickens? Starve them, tell them one gator said something about the other's sister... get 'em mad enough to fight? Bet on it? Sort of like Jacco Macacco meets Wally Gator, while filming Bloodsport.

The animal lover in me beats it down, but before it goes down, the part of me that would like to see two alligators fight gets a few words off.

OK, two wild guesses... alligator meat sells for $19.99 a pound.

The more obvious answer is that somebody went all Sleepy Hollow on a pet. You can buy alligators easily enough. You can get one here (when in stock) for $149.99, no questions asked... at least not at the alligator store. Your wife or landlord may not share your enthusiasm for a pet alligator when it is as large as the sofa, eating X pounds of meat a week, sh*tting wherever the f*ck it wants, and maybe kinda possibly most likely might be responsible for the missing Schnauzer.

A decent man, when faced with that scenario, will try to sell the alligator through whatever channels used alligator sales move through. If that fails, he should man up and call the town's Natural Resources Officer to get the gator taken care of. It is illegal to own a gator in Massachusetts.

At that point, the less than decent man has to resolve the Ol' Yeller quandary... sure, you can lock Ol' Yeller out in the barn and let the rabies do him in... or you can do the humane thing, take him out behind the barn, and put a hole in his head like Dig-Dug.

I don't think that alligators get rabies, but if the wife issues an ultimatum, the effect on the gator's longevity is similar to that of Ol' Yeller. You can loose him into a Massachusetts lake in March to slowly freeze to death, or you can make the ending quick and painless.

That scenario gives too much credit to the man in the Westport case, who may also have killed it just so he could make a trophy of the head or jaws.

I have no idea, which is why they pay detectives to figure out stuff like this.

How about a quick quiz? The answers will be at the end of the article.

Which Sorts Of Wildlife Can You Own In Massachusetts?

1) Tilapia?

2) Piranha?

3) Northern Leopard Frog?

4) Fathead Minnow?

5) Red-eared Slider Turtle?

6) Boa Constrictor?

7) Reticulated Python?

8) Anaconda?

9) Ridge-tailed Monitor Lizard?

10) Komodo Dragon?

11) Emu?

12) Ostrich?

13) Southern Flying Squirrel? (I won't give it away, but owning the moose is illegal)

14) Water Buffalo?

15) Wolf-Dog Hybrids?

Imagine if the Westport alligator's owner got the speech from his girl in July, and decided to just let it loose into, say, Long Pond in Lakeville?  As we kick it around here, remember that I'm not a herpetologist, and that this is more Edutainment than an actual expert speaking to you.

Alligators, according to my 45 seconds of research, can be active in temperatures as low as 40 degrees. 40 degrees may kill weaker alligators, while a stronger one will seek a warmer microclimate in which to do his alligator stuff. When he gets chilly, he brummates... which is a sort of less torpid version of hibernating. A lake gator in Massachusetts wouldn't live long, but for a spell, he'd be unchallenged on the top of the food chain... unless he went swimming with a great white shark.

Long Pond is a warmwater pond, covering 1700 acres. It's the largest pond in our region, and one of the largest in Massachusetts. It's the drinking water for New Bedford.

Long Pond was last surveyed in June of 1990 when fisheries crews found largemouth bass,
bluegill, chain pickerel, yellow perch, white perch, pumpkinseed, white sucker, alewife, blueback
herring, brown bullhead, golden shiner, tessellated darter, lake chubsucker and bridle shiner. A few
walleyes are occasionally taken in Long Pond River. Thanks to Mass,gov for the pond map.

I have no idea how cold or warm Long Pond gets (this chart shows what sort of fish prefer which temperatures of water, and you can sort of cross-reference what the summer water temperature may be in lakes that they inhabit), although I have read tales of released pet alligators surviving in southern Ohio.

I don't know how much fish an alligator needs. I have read that a meal goes a long way with a gator, and that a 1000 pound alligator will need less food in a year than a 100 pound dog requires.

The horror movie starts when he can't catch enough fish to survive. He might be able to snatch a deer as it gets a drink, but this isn't an Africa savannah with herds of antelope all drinking at once. Deer are also nocturnal, a time when Ali Gator would be brummating. No local animal has a defense mechanism response set for alligator attacks.

There are also families living in houses on the lake. Alligators have killed 26 Americans since 1970, and have maimed even more people. Even a 7 footer is perfectly capable of dragging away and killing a full-grown man. Alligators generally flee when humans approach, but if he's hangry or something... hey, time for some People Food!

An alligator in a Massachusetts lake with an acquired taste for human flesh would launch a bigger manhunt than a Chechnya brothers APB. We would be unable to call upon Steve Irwin. We'd have to solve this problem ourselves.

QUIZ ANSWERS!

1) Illegal

2) Illegal

3) Legal

4) Legal

5) Illegal

6) Legal

7) Illegal

8) Illegal

9) Legal

10) Illegal

11) Legal

12) Legal

13) Legal

14) Legal

15) Illegal

The Most Isolated Roads In Eastern Massachusetts

While Jessica and I are finishing up work on the South Coast Compound of our media empire, we thought that we would take to the countryside and see what we could do for you all...

This article could have had several titles. I've erased several of them myself, and Jessica vetoed one. Among those titles that we considered and discarded for one reason or another were:

"Where To Hide A Body In Eastern Massachusetts"

"Where To Have A Sasquatch Run In Front Of Your Car"

"Where To Teach Your Clumsy Daughter How To Drive"

"Where To Smoke A Joint And Drive 27 MPH With No One Behind You"

"Where To Illegally Dump Your Washing Machine"

"Where Old People Who Just Now Bought The '57 Chevy That They Always Wanted Go To Drive With Elvis Playing And Not Have Modern Kids Laugh At Them"

"Where UFOs Look To Scare Isolated Individuals Whom No One Will Believe"

"Where To Stumble Onto A Satanic Ritual"

"Where To Bet Your Car's Pink Slip On A Drag Race"

"Where To Introduce The 'Put Out Or Get Out' Dating Quandary" 

"Where To Be Mistaken For A Deer And Shot By A Hunter"

"Where To Go If You Feel Like Driving But May Have A Warrant Out For Your Arrest"

Among the contributors to this website... Stacey, who is a soccer mom, came up with "stashing a body," "Satanic ritual" and the date rape joke. Her daughter, who is in her teens, came up with the Elvis joke. Non-hunting Stephen came up with the hunting joke. Abdullah, who has no kids, came up with the Clumsy Teen Driver joke. Stephen had Stacey's "Where To Stash A Body" joke as a working title for this article before Jessica intervened.

A nice, isolated stretch of road is a wonderful thing, and it gets more and more rare every passing day. In other parts of the world and even in other parts of Massachusetts, a lonely run of street isn't a rare thing. Eastern Massachusetts isn't other parts of the world, however.

As my friend Beth once noted after leaving New Jersey, "You forget how accustomed you can be to white trash, overpopulation and air pollution."

As people diffuse throughout America, these empty spaces will become harder and harder to find. Our elderly residents can no doubt recall when somewhere with a busy mall used to be a back road to nowhere.

We all have our own reasons for seeking an isolated road to drive on. We listed some up above, you may have other reasons, and no one is here to judge you. We're just here to guide you to some cool places to drive.

We'll use some of those aborted titles as logic for including certain streets in the list, and we will also try to point out where certain practices might prove impractical. We try to be inclusive to anyone who might stumble onto our humble web page, even chronic litterers and serial killers.

So, without any further ado, we give to you but a small sample of some places you can go in our area to have the road all to yourself.

courtesy of Sara Flynn

Gurnet Road/King Arthur Road, Duxbury

I use the dual designation here because, even after growing up there for 30 years, I'm not 100% sure where Gurnet Road ends and King Arthur Road begins. Google Maps says KAR juts out just a few hundred yards from Saquish. Other people, maybe more for convenience than for authenticity, use the Powder Point Bridge as the dividing line between the two roads.

Gurnet Road implies the residential section of Duxbury Beach, while King Arthur Road would be very handy for describing the road south of the bridge. However, I'm fairly sure that it is Gurnet Road right up until you get to the actual Gurnet, at which point it gets named after the silly English king.

The differences are minimal, however. What you have here is about 5 miles of sand road, as bumpy as a golf ball, and probably the best coastal scenery in non-Cape Massachusetts. 4WD only, at least once you get to the bridge.

You can very easily pull over on this road somewhere and, if you see no approaching headlights, be pretty sure that the closest person to you would have to swim across Duxbury Bay to say "hello."

Bournedale Road, Bourne

There is no truth to the story that "Bournedale" is an Algonquian word for "Shortcut." That may have been made up by a Bournedale-area website content generator guy.

Other than a few dozen houses, Bournedale Road is uninhabited. It's little more than some gorgeous scenery, and a way for Buzzards Bay and Wareham residents to get home from Route 3 without messing around on the Scenic Highway.

This road can be fairly busy at certain times of day, but you can have it to yourself if you pick your spots.

This is a terrible road to train a teen driver on. It winds a lot, has numerous high-angle descending S curves and is lined with sofa-sized boulders right at the road's edge. It isn't a very challenging road, but it is very unforgiving.

Added bonus: The Buzzards Bay end of it has a farm stand and a horse farm.

West Wind Shores, Plymouth

Not a lot of people know about this area, as there is really no reason for anyone to use it. "If you ain't from here, you don't come here" applies to this tiny Plymouth village.

Essentially all of Plymouth 1) west of Cedarville, 2 ) south of The Ponds Of Plymouth, 3) east of Wareham and 4) north of the village of Buzzards Bay, it's a unique spot on a political map. You can fire a gun from certain spots in the area and have it be heard in 4 towns, 3 regions and 2 counties.

West Wind Shores is fed by what is either Bourne or Plymouth Road, depending on what town you're in. There are some side roads which veer off into extreme southern Plymouth's lake region.

Where the mentioned-earlier Bournedale Road is a shortcut which Wareham and Buzzards Bay people use to skip the main road traffic when coming and going from Route 3, West Wind Shores is what they use when traffic is bad enough to snarl up Bournedale Road.

If you're reading this to find a place to illegally dump a sofa, this is a bad spot. The road, perhaps owing to her shortcut status, is busier than it should be.

However, once you got the sofa off the road and into the woods a few dozen yards, even God might have trouble finding you.

Just be careful that the locals don't see you... you can get a smack for that.

Glen Charlie Road/Agawam Road, Wareham

It is somewhat interesting to note that of the first four or five roads we mentioned, only Duxbury's contribution is not in a fairly linear run of roads, separated by mere meters of forest.

West Wind Shores, Bournedale Road, the College Pond Roads and Agawam Road are really only kept apart by there being no real need for a shortcut from an isolated Plymouth lakes village to an isolated Wareham one. They wouldn't be isolated if they cut out a road to them, right?

Some people, myself included, even pay to be isolated.

The Myles Standish State Forest and her adjoining regions provide a great portion of the areas we'll explore in this article. It's the Swamp Yankee hinterlands.

Glen Charlie Road, while sticking out into the middle of nowhere, isn't that isolated. If you really need to pour some lime on a former human, you want to veer off onto Agawam Road.

I have no idea who Glen Charlie is/was. I know the road is named after Glen Charlie Pond, which used to just be called Glen Pond. If you know, hit us up in the comments.

Lower/Upper College Pond Road, Carver/Plymouth

That's actually Barrett Pond, not one of the College Ponds. It's off one of the College Pond Roads, so it's good enough.

These roads punch into the Myles Standish State Forest, and you can pretty much go from Carver to the Pinehills on them.

This one is the #1 seed if we break this down to brackets. It is one of or perhaps the only road that goes through the seasonally uninhabited MSSF region. The MSSF makes neighboring towns like Plympton or Freetown look like the lights of Paris.

There are probably some serial killers in the region who have buried two or three generations of victims in this area.

This is as much road as you can have to yourself in Eastern Massachusetts, to my knowledge. It would be awesome for a very brief and hotly-contested NASCAR race. I might have to make some calls.

Old Indian Trail, Marion

This road isn't that long, but it does have the look that we were seeking. I was creeped out driving down it, and it was 2 in the afternoon. There was definitely a chance of Yeti Attack on this street.

There is no Young Indian Trail in Marion, or anywhere that I'm aware of. That might be in regular India.

This was our bumpiest road, and you wouldn't want to try it with an open beer or mixed drink. It's not the road to try in a Dodge Stratus. There were a few potholes on this road in which, if it rained, you could float a battleship around. If your girl isn't having any nonsense and you both know it, this road will at least bounce her around a bit. You gotta take what you can get sometimes, player.

Fortunately, we only needed to go 20 yards from the last house on the street to get the shot above. We went deeper, but that shot did the trick.

Quanapoag Road, Freetown/ Braley Hill Road, Lakeville

There's actually a road or two between Q Road and Braley Hill Road, but the differences will only matter to locals.

This is actually a very nice drive through some beautiful Lakes country. If you're here looking for nice country drives as opposed to somewhere to get rid of a refrigerator, you can do a lot worse. I intend to return with a camera next October, during foliage season.

After researching this project- which for some time had the title Where To Bury A Body In Eastern Massachusetts- one thought kept hitting me. Whitey Bulger used to dump bodies on the banks of the Neponset River. He was about 100 yards from one of America's main highways. He must have been able sit on his own balls.

I suppose some audacity is a must in his line of work, and nobody knew the dark spots of the town better than Whitey Bulger... but we'd be driving 10 minutes in isolation on some roads without being 100% sure that we could get a (theoretical) body out of the trunk and into the ground without being seen, even in a Nowhere Land like Lakeville.

That's why I got into Journalism, folks. I just murder time. Mine, yours, Jessica's... whatever pays.

Lingan Street, Halifax

The lakes region of the interior South Shore has been used as a dumping ground by numerous killers. The killers that I'm aware of used the Chaffin Reservoir in Pembroke and Bartlett's Pit in Pembroke instead of the wastelands at the end of Lingan Street in Halifax. They also got caught.

This road punches through the swamplands on the south side of West Monponsett Lake. It ends at a former campground, if you are willing to circumvent some gates. It looks exactly like where they should have based the Friday The 13th movie.

I used to teach in the city, and I'd take my little Hood Rats out into this area for field trips. Several of my students, far more used to an urban environment, were nervous about being in such a remote area... even in broad daylight.

"This is the s**t where Michael Myers kills all those white girls," one kid from Roxbury told me. "Black people have more sense than to go to places like this." I really couldn't argue with him.

I used to date a girl from Lingan Street. "Date" may be the wrong term, as I do believe that she could barely stand me. She looked like she could scrap some, too. I'm probably lucky that I'm not pushing up daisies at the end of Lingan Street.

Thompson Street, Middleboro/Halifax

You know that you're in the boondocks when you can host drag races on one of the main roads (Route 105, nonetheless) in this area without getting caught or endangering innocents.

I don't want to say that I have gone out early on Sunday morning and seen crude START/FINISH lines painted a quarter mile apart on a straightaway here... but would you look at that, I just said it!

This road is also full of farms. It's a great place to buy flowers, as well as a great place to go if you have never seen a cow in person.

Much like that Camp Murder from the Lingan Street section of this article, this is another spot that I used to field trip my city students to when I lived in Monponsett. Even a genuinely dangerous thug student becomes a cute 7 year old when he sees farm animals for the first time.

This is a beautiful road for the most part. I just shot the scariest part of it.

Will's Work Road, Mashpee

I fished WWR off of Facebook suggestions, and we here at CCM thank the readers for their help.

We'll use WW Road (which I didn't feel like driving to) and this awful screen cap to illustrate a few things this list is looking for.

It's easier if you highlight "Will's Work Road" and Google up the map, but we can see enough here for the basics.

Isolated area? A beach? A marsh? No houses? Minimum expectation of police interference, perhaps a border area of two towns? Plenty of road? Chance of wildlife? In our coverage area?

Will's Work Road, off of Waquoit Bay meets all of those criteria. She'll hold a nice rank on this list if we decide to get competitive.

Oyster Way/Seapuit River Road/Indian Trail, Osterville

This is another reader submission, much obliged!

Oyster Way has a lot of the same features that Will's Work Road enjoys, such as a tidal bay, some nice road to work with and a lot of forest cover.

Working among the wealthy neighborhoods entails a certain set of risks. For starters, you have to get by a gate. Also, the kind of guy who is disposing of a washing machine illegally might stand out in Osterville. Calls to the police will be investigated promptly. There is the chance of video surveillance.

Added bonus: After burying that body, why not unwind with 18 holes at the neighboring Oyster Harbors Golf Club? Not a member? Hey, you've already buried one body today, why shirk at adding a bothersome golf course employee onto your tab with God? God may even take your side on it, there is little guidance in the Bible concerning golf etiquette.

Big ups for being the second Indian Trail to make the list.

Service Road, Sandwich

You could actually classify this as anything between Sandwich and Shootflying Hill in Centerville.

This one requires a Bulger level of testicular fortitude, as you are 50 feet from Route 6 when doing whatever it is that you're up to. However, with the cover of darkness, some foliage... may as well be the deepest, darkest part of the forest, right?

It can also be highly-used, and that usage can spike unexpectedly if there is an accident on Route 6 and people start seeking alternate routes.

This is a nice, safe road that is fine for teaching the teen to drive on. However, the people you do encounter there may be in a great hurry.

Navigation Road, West Barnstable

The Cape is dotted with fire roads, roads that were abandoned after hurricane flooding, Indian trails and service roads. The minor width of the Cape prevents you from getting too isolated, but it can be done... especially in the off-season.

On this road I visualize a guy with every possible sort of infraction on his driving record who just needs "Deer Strike" to win a sort of Irish Lottery with the insurers.

Don't let the name of the road intimidate you... it's a straight line. "Forward" is all the navigation you'll need.

This was another FB suggestion, many thanks! The comments around the FB suggestion include "I drove down there, and my gas tank fell off the car."

Collins Road, Truro

This was the stomping grounds for the Beast Of Truro, who tore up a bunch of livestock in 1981-82.

The Pamet Puma was neither caught nor identified. There were numerous sightings, including one by a Truro policeman.

Some people said it was a pack of dogs, some thought it was a cougar, some thought it was a monster like The Beast Of Bray Road.

He eventually just went away... or did he?

If a monster, mythical or not, roamed your road... your road is going to be on this list, my friend.


Bonus: 

Not Massachusetts, but here's what Stanley Kubrick did with the Isolated Road theme....

We hoped you enjoyed.... here's some more Duxbury, Plymouth and Halifax , below...

via Kerri Yanovitch Smith

Did we leave any roads out that deserve to be on this list? Let us know!

Sexual Deviance In Colonial Plymouth

Keep in mind... Al Capone died in his bed, albeit in a jail cell. Jeffery Dahmer only got the death penalty because it was meted out by a prisoner. Charles Manson still draws breath, the Tsarnaev kid is still kicking, Whitey Bulger will most likely die of old age and Sirhan Sirhan still applies for parole.

However, America saw fit to put Thomas Granger up on the gallows.

I first became aware of his case when someone was trying to identify the grave of Myles Standish. They narrowed it down to a pair of graves, and even got some ground-penetrating sonar to make sure that they had a short guy (Standish, although more man than most, was about 5 feet tall). They then dug up the body, and because it didn't have some old Standish leg injury, they knew that they had mistakenly disinterred the previously-unknown grave of the kid who was put to death for, and I quote from memory via the Duxbury Reporter article from the late 1980s, "having gained carnal knowledge of the Brewster livestock."

Granger's crime? "Buggery with a mare, a cow, two goats, divers sheepe, two calves, and a turkey." He was caught in the act, with a horse.

E-I-E-I... Oh!

We're delving into Buggery (aka Bestiality, a term not invented in 1642) today because Granger is one of my homeboys, from Duxbury.

Granger was the second person (after murderer John Billington, of Billington Sea fame) to be put to death by the Europeans in 'Merica, and he was the first juvenile to go up a rope. He was an indentured servant to Love Brewster, and was 16 or 17 years old. He didn't make 18.

Granger's 1642 sentence came straight from Leviticus, and, in keeping with the Bible's commands, the animals that he tenderized with the Meat Hammer were slaughtered in front of him. They were then buried, with no use being made of any of them. After that, they had a Thomas Granger necktie party.

There was probably a 0.0% chance of a casual sexual encounter for a white-slave farm hand in Puritan America, and even The Scarlet Letter (based in the same 1642 year that the Granger trial was) story had to be based in the more hard-partying Massachusetts Bay Colony. History is quite clear on what happened in Colonial Plymouth when you let the freak flag fly freely, friend.

Plymouth was Freak City in America for a while, and probably shamed Sodom on a per capita basis. John Walker was tried but released on charges of "laying with a bitch." It could have been a dog or a lewd women (both uses for "bitch" were common in 1642), history doesn't specify. William Honeywell skated in 1655 on a Buggery case when no evidence could be put against him.

Thomas Saddeler lost a Buggery case in 1681, but he avoided the death penalty by being branded with a P (for Pollution) on his forehead. He also had to sit atop the gallows with a rope around his neck, to remind him that he was getting off easily. Saddeler, ironic name joke coming, was caught buggering a horse.

People tend to think of the Colonial-type people as dour, prudes, and sexless. However, they did have children, and that involves sex. Now, this was pre-YouTube, and Larry Flynt's great-great-great grandfather was still a few hundred years from being born, but love will find a way. Granger has a resume that would shame any modern porn star, and he built it up 375 years before Sinn Sage was born.

To keep it Duxbury for a bit, let's examine the case of Mary Mendame, of "Duxburrow." She snuck off on her hubby one day a whole bunch of days when what I shall call Forest Fever took over, and she entered into a dalliance with Tinsin, a local Wampanoag with a taste for The Other White Meat. There were numerous and, yes, diverse dalliances, and "the act of uncleanness was committed."

Mary was lashed for these dalliances, and was forced to wear some sort of scarlet letter thingy. If she was caught without it, she was to be burned in the face with a hot iron. Tinsin, who drew some sympathy as the seductee, just got whipped with a halter for going Five Hole on the colonial cutie.

The Native Americans come up if you research this topic, but they also come off looking pretty conservative. Colonists were amazed to learn that rape wasn't a part of Native American culture, and that they didn't rape their war prisoners. To my knowledge, there was only one instance of a Native raping anyone of any tribe or ancestry.

"Sam, The Indian" was convicted of raping Sarah Freeman in 1682. Rape was one of three crimes (murder, rape, and I'm assuming Buggery... Adultery too, but the Big A dropped down into the minor leagues by the 1680s) that had the death penalty back then, but Sam,who was noted to have "limited capacity," was given some slack because they very progressively felt that he may not have been aware of the concept of rape. "Given some slack" in this case means a lashing and exile.

Sam pulled off one of two rapes recorded in early Colonial history. The other case involved Ambrose Fish and a Lydia Fish. Ambrose escaped the gallows because there was only one witness (Lydia), and Ambrose refused to confess. He got a whipping instead. Ambrose and Lydia, of Sandwich, may have been brother/sister. It beats a sheep, I suppose...

Now, we started off with the heavy freak stuff for a reason. I don't think that too many people these days would bemoan the execution of a rapist, and a good beating is probably what a buggerer needs more than anything but therapy. I feel badly for Tinsin, but American blacks were being lynched for lesser interracial sexual "offenses" 300 years after Tinsin skated with a whipping. The Pilgrims don't really look that extreme at this point.

Where the colonists start looking somewhat overbearing is when they start judging less-spectacular sexual offenses. If the big three are murder, rape and buggery, there is a decided second tier of fornication, adultery, homosexuality, propositioning and a sort of shepherd's pie of lesser offenses like "frequently kisses a woman who is not his wife," "fails to be properly motivated to find a wife," and "enjoying a quick scrappe."

OK, I made up that last one. I found no information on solo flights (Woody Allen, when told he was a great lover, replied "I practice a lot when I'm alone."), but I'm also doing concurrent researchin/writin'. I'll rely heavily on a research paper that I stumbled across.

Adultery, as you recall (if I'm right), is what the "A" that Hester Prynne had to wear stood for. Puritans viewed Adultery as any sex act with a married or betrothed person who you weren't married or betrothed to.

Adultery was viewed as worse than Fornication, as marriages often involved a dowry that could make or break a family. Leviticus demands death for the A, but Deuteronomy provides a little wiggle room if the woman protests during the shagging. However, the onus of the punishment fell on women for their infidelity against their husband, because Dark Ages.

There were 9 cases of Adultery brought up in colonial Plymouth courts. Three involved straight philandering, three were brought up by someone seeking divorce, one was Tinsin and Mary Mendame, Two were "other," and I saw a reference to "whoredom."

Anne Linceford was caught riding the D Train with Thomas Bray when Mr. Linceford was out on the town. They were sentenced to lashings in both Plymouth, where the court was, and Yarmouth, where the deed went down. Anne had to wear an AD scarlet lettering (they feared that just an "A" would be taken by people as if she was wearing it for "Anne," like LaVerne DeFazio used to do with her "L" sweaters), for ADultery.

Katheren Aimes also got a two-town lashing for doing the shagnasty with William Paule, getting tiiiiied to the whippin' post in both Plymouth and Taunton. She also had a scarlet B, for (I think) Behavior. Aimes' husband, who may have abandoned her, was also punished, and did some time in the stocks.

Many times, the proof of Adultery was in the form of a baby. Mary Attkinson and John Bucke were charged with Adultery that resulted in a child. They weren't even sure if Mr. Attkinson was alive when Mary got Bucke Wild. They each paid a ten-pound fine and avoided a whipping.

Other cases involved sailors/whalers being gone for a year, coming home to their wives, and somehow having a newborn baby in a crib.

People were feeling the Bern even in 1681, when John Glover petitioned for divorce from Mary Glover because she took pipe from another man and then infected her hubby "with that filthy & noysome disease called the pox."

In some cases, even where divorce for Adultery was granted, the woman was not punished. Perhaps they felt that the shame was enough punishment, who knows?

Fornication was sex outside of the covenant of marriage. A baby being born 4 months after a hastily-arranged wedding was enough to merit a whipping and a scarlet letter.

A mutually-pleasing 69 cases of fornication were brought before Plymouth courts in the colonial era. They actually have some stats for this, which appeals to the fantasy-football geek in me. 48% involved people who were never married. 46% involved people who were not married or betrothed, but who eventually (and perhaps at the end of a musket) were betrothed, and 6% involved people who had entered into a wedding contract and just couldn't wait until the wedding to hit skins.

Punishment was generally a fine or a whipping, but they played it case-by-case. John Tompson paid a five shilling fine and skipped imprisonment for an out-of-marriage hippy hippy shake. Jane Powell, who put in work with a fellow servant, had her name cleared, as she was "in a sadd and miserable condition," and thought that the servant would marry her. Sarah Ensigne, convicted of whoredom, got the worse than usual penalty of being "whipt att cart's taile." Thomas Burge got a double-whipping for his sack time with Lydia Gaunt.

In fornication cases, it was not unusual for a man to get corporal punishment while the woman got a fine or a scarlet letter.

Two cases of Incest were recorded. Both were Daddy's Little Girl cases. Thomas Atkins was whipped in 1660 for propositioning his daughter Mary while drunk. Martha Hewitt's 1689 baby-sans-father was blamed on her own father, especially when Mary threw her name in the gully by refusing to name the baby's daddy. Pops skated when some paperwork was lost.

"Attempts and Propositions" sounds like where Patrick Bateman works, but it was a crime in Plimoth. You couldn't just walk up on a girl and go "Yo baby, wassup?" in 1650. Plymouth courts had 15 such cases in Funny Hat times.

John Pecke was fined fifty shillings for not leaving a maid alone. Edward Crowell and James Maker were lucky to slide with a four-pound fine after trying to break into a house while the man was at sea and demanding sex from his wife and sister.

My favorite was "Richard Turtall... presented to the court ... for laciuiouse carriage toward Ann Hudson, the wife of John Hudson, in taking hold of her coate and inticing her by words, as alsoe by taking out his instrument of nature that hee might prevaile to lye with her in her owne house" History does not record his punishment.

The oldest profession was practiced in New England, but at least one web page says that it wasn't as bad as we think it was. Of course, that page is called Doing The Nasty In Colonial America. False charges of whoredom were common, and could be made without a scrap of evidence. A charge of whoredom could be used as an economic weapon against females who owned property.

The type of rampant prostitution that you see in Jack The Ripper specials was more of an Industrial Revolution-era thing, and tended to be urban in nature. However, there are always women of the trade working any town where sailors come ashore.

There were a few cases of Child Support that made it to court, at least indirectly. In one case, Nathaniel Soule was sentenced to both a lashing and a child-support payment of ten bushels of Indian Corn. The payee, a Wampanoag girl, was also whipped for Fornication. A similar punishment was meted out to a male slave, who was assigned an 18 pence per week payment to a female slave named "Bonny" for one year, to be put to the maintenance of a child.

"Lascivious and Suspicious Conduct" could mean a lot of things, often where intercourse could not be proven. Hugh and Mary Cole were fined for LaSC, but the court could not prove Fornication. Johnathan Hatch and Frances (or Francis) Crippin escaped from being busted in a mutual extramarital affair with a warning for Hatch to stay away from the Crippin household. Ann Savory (awesome name) had to sit in the stocks just for being drunk in public with a man who she was not betrothed to.

LaSC was also used to persecute homosexuals of any gender. The wife of Hugh Norman and a Mary Haimmon were caught in bed together. No lashings went down, but Mrs.Norman (and maybe Mary Haimmon, I couldn't find her punishment) was forced to make a statement before the court.

So, in the end, those Pilgrims weren't so boring after all.

Just don't order the lamb chops.

"Ranch House Revisited" at The Jetty

While rumors regarding the sale of the former Ranch House building proved to be unfounded, the South Shore's nastiest bar ever still manages to exert some Authority on local nightlife.

The Jetty, a newer place located at 278 Ocean Street on the Brant Rock esplanade, has a unique and awesome marketing idea. They're celebrating the former Marshfield den of sin, with a week of Ranch House-themed entertainment. The Ranch House was described by Stephen Bowden in this very column as "sort of like the C&W bar from The Blues Brothers meets the Double Deuce from Roadhouse, except that the Double Deuce was nicer."

Starting April 11th, the Jetty will run a week of bands that former Ranchers will know and love. You can see them on the posterboard shown above, but a little bird tells me that they are in the process of booking additional acts to fill out the week.

The Jetty, owned by Richard Vaughn, has a bit of hardcore history herself. It is housed in the building which hosted the notorious Breakers bar back in the proverbial day. However, the Ranch House was the hardcore icon. Vaughn, who has to be at least somewhat local, recognizes and respects the local history.

Here are some of the acts coming to The Jetty, starting on April 11th.

Hypercane is a South Shore band with 15 years in the game. A four-piece outfit, they do a lot of cover songs. I'm a bit deaf and have never been good with music (US Grant was in the same boat, and once remarked that he had two favorite songs... "One is Yankee Doodle, and the other isn't"), but I did hear them covering Unchained by Van Halen in their promo video. They'll be playing at The Jetty on April 13th.

Raw Deal is a Stoughton-based band which I pray is named after the Ahhhhnold movie. You know, the one where his wife (not Mrs. Shriver) throws a cake at him, and he chastises her with "You should not drink andt bake." The band is based around the Kane brothers, and will be on stage at The Jetty on April 14th.

Mark Morris And The Cat Tunes (aka "Catunes") are Southie's greatest band... which is funny because Whitey Bulger, for all we know, may have waited until the Cat Tunes were rehearsing to murder people, as the din of the band would cover up the gunshots and screaming. I worked at a gas station in Sagamore once, and it was robbed one night while Italian Soup (a wedding band based around the Gallo family, who own half of the Cape side of the Canal land) was rehearsing next door. There may be a Nine Lives cat food joke in the Morris/Cat band name. They'll do a show on April 15th at The Jetty... and who doesn't need a drink on April 15th?

The Fat City Band has been a South Shore giant since the 1970s. While someone else actually owned the building and the property and all that, these guys owned the Ranch House. Anyone growing up in the area in the 1980s or 1990s most likely saw TFCB in action at some point. They have the Saturday night show at The Jetty, on April 16th.

Clutch Grabwell And The Lead Foot Horns (they may just be Clutch Grabwell now, it's tough to tell) finish off the week's fun with a Sunday night show. Clutch and the boys are a Worcester band, I believe, maybe Lowell. They were a constant at the Ranch House, and they play at The Jetty on April 17th.

Some bands we would like to see if The Jetty tries this idea again in the summer...

Jim Plunkett

The Injurys

The Steamers

The Fools

Duke And The Drivers

Feel Thing

Cats Ass

D'Spayre

Southbound

Madcow

Entropy

Draw The Line

Crystal Ship

Conrad And The Pickups

The Rude Dogs

Stiff Nipple

The Speed Lizzards

The Well-Endowed Gentlemen

Slant Six

The PsychoRelics

Bluestime

Who did we miss? That's not a band name, it's a question for you to answer in the Comments.

Truck Broken Down In Bourne Rotary

Hi!

Just a quick note to let you know that there is a box truck broken down in the Bourne Rotary.

It's occupying two lanes, straddling the line. It's right in front of the new Dunkin Donuts, right before where you get on to the bridge.

Cars have to wiggle around the breakdown and it is causing delays.

Winter's Last Snow? Pictures And Snowfall Totals

Cedarville

MASSACHUSETTS

...BARNSTABLE COUNTY...
   BUZZARDS BAY           2.7   930 AM  3/21  SPOTTER              
   EAST SANDWICH          1.8   500 AM  3/21  NWS EMPLOYEE          
   EAST FALMOUTH          1.5   703 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   HYANNIS                1.5   730 AM  3/21  MEDIA                
   WOODS HOLE             1.0   600 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   CHATHAM                1.0   800 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   CENTERVILLE            1.0   600 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   SOUTH SAGAMORE         1.0   619 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   FALMOUTH               0.5   725 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO          

Aimed At Sandwich

...BRISTOL COUNTY...
   REHOBOTH               3.9   905 AM  3/21  NWS EMPLOYEE          
   NORTON                 3.6   700 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   DIGHTON                3.5   928 AM  3/21  NWS EMPLOYEE          
   TAUNTON                3.5   700 AM  3/21  NWS OFFICE            
   SWANSEA                3.2   950 AM  3/21  SPOTTER              
   FALL RIVER             3.0   915 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   MANSFIELD              2.5   738 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   NEW BEDFORD            2.0   511 AM  3/21  AMATEUR RADIO        
   ACUSHNET               1.8   620 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   NORTH ATLEBORO         1.7   840 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   FAIRHAVEN              1.5   625 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   WEST ACUSHNET          1.5   642 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO        

Plymouth, The White Cliffs... lol

 

...DUKES COUNTY...
   WEST TISBURY           1.3   629 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   EDGARTOWN              1.0   900 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER    

Bournedale

...NORFOLK COUNTY...
   MILLIS                 4.5   900 AM  3/21  SPOTTER              
   DOVER                  4.0   815 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   BRAINTREE              4.0   522 AM  3/21  AMATEUR RADIO        
   FOXBORO                3.2   815 AM  3/21  NWS EMPLOYEE          
   MILTON                 3.2   830 AM  3/21  BLUE HILL OBSERVATORY
   SHARON                 3.0   839 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   FRANKLIN               3.0   700 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   NORWOOD                2.7   736 AM  3/21  NWS EMPLOYEE          
   WALPOLE                2.6   737 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   NORTH WEYMOUTH         2.5   638 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   FOXBOROUGH             2.5   716 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   RANDOLPH               2.5   545 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   BROOKLINE              2.4   845 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   WRENTHAM               2.2   811 AM  3/21  NONE                

Sagamore Heights

...PLYMOUTH COUNTY...
   WHITMAN                5.3   957 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   HANOVER                5.0   534 AM  3/21  GENERAL PUBLIC        
   N. SCITUATE            4.8   657 AM  3/21  MEDIA                
   BRIDGEWATER            4.0   700 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   ROCKLAND               4.0   720 AM  3/21  SPOTTER              
   WAREHAM                4.0   933 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   HINGHAM                3.6   928 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   MIDDLEBORO             3.0   700 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        
   KINGSTON               2.5   731 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   CATERVILLE             2.5   908 AM  3/21  NONE                  
   PLYMOUTH               2.0   524 AM  3/21  AMATEUR RADIO        
   DUXBURY                2.0   721 AM  3/21  HAM RADIO            
   WEST WAREHAM           2.0   745 AM  3/21  TRAINED SPOTTER      
   ROCHESTER              0.7   800 AM  3/21  CO OP OBSERVER        

Cape Cod Canal

I'm hardcore enough that I got in 18 holes today at White Cliffs. I also golfed.

Sammich

Scusset Beach jetty

Inland Cedarville

Spring's comin'....