This Week in WTF: Still in Weymouth

And here's my WTF Weymouth Story of the Day:

Daisy the Dog and I went to Friendly's and got a gallon of ice cream and a waffle cone for her. We waited in the pick up window line, which was a mile long. Daisy made friends with some nice girls also in line -- probably high school kids. Once I got her waffle cone, I let her show off to her new friends and we did twirls and jumps. Daisy will get on her hind legs for food and also twirl on her hind legs for food. Very cute. Not at all WTFfy. Just normal.

BUT THEN on the way back, as we walked by the gas station I stopped short. All of the sudden, a distinct odor was in the air. Musky, like Spring, only more potent, like...WEED. I looked in the gas attendant little room and there was the gas station kid, smoking a joint. I gave him a chin nod and a smirk and he waved and gave me a chin nod too. Then I shook my head and kept going. Ah, Weymouth, where people smoke js in plain sight as if this is Jamaica or something.

Welcome to New England and our messed up weather

Welcome to New England!

There's an old expression that I like to say in my best Mainah/Bostonian fishahmin grampa voice:

Welcome to New England! Don't like the weather? Just wait a minute.

Because it does change and within minutes at that. Case in point:

At 4:26, the wrath of God rang down upon us:


4:33 things slowed down


4:39 it cleared up a lot


At 445 the sky began turning sky blue


And at 4:55 the sun came out, just in time to set in the sky and leave a pretty orange pink glow

My Girl - Abigail Adams

Why is Abigail Adams my girl? Because, she, like me, is from Weymouth. It's one of the few things about Weymouth that I like - the fact the the first woman (and by far the best, comparatively speaking) who was both a First Lady and a First Mother was from this godforsaken town.

So's the guy from the movie Blow, but we don't like to brag about that.

The reason why Abigail Adams is so worthy of praise are the declarations of women's rights she made to her husband, John Adams. They were written in letters she sent to him while he was working on this kind of important document thing that we here in America like to call the Constitution.

MARCH 31, 1776
ABIGAIL ADAMS TO JOHN ADAMS
I long to hear that you have declared an independency. And, by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors.

Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands.

Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.

To see more Abigail Adams quotes on women's rights, go to this section of thelizlibrary.org.

I've just been thinking a lot about Abigail because of - duh - Hillary. You know Abs would be running for prez were she alive today, too! You go girl! (No, I'm not saying that for real. I'm saying it in an ironic way.)

Eatin' Healthy & The Adams

(see my blog entry on Abigail Adams here)

Waddup Quincy and Weymouth: home of the Adams!

Eatin' Healthy-That's the name of the little cafe I'm sitting right now. It's in Quincy Cennah (Quincy Center for those without thick Quicy-style Boston accents). I'm listening to a woman chattering rather loudly into her cell phone. She is speaking Haitian Creole. This makes me sad that I forgot my headphones to listen to my iTunes and also that my mp3 player has not yet arrived in the mail.

(Side note: I need to learn Haitian because I want to know if the kids at school are talking about me behind my back or other inappropriate things after school. I know French en peu so I get about 5.25% of what they say...)

This place is pretty good. Free wifi (hence the blog), close to work, a little more expensive than a regular casual dining place but that's what happens when there's vegetarian, healthy food available. What's funny is that if this same place were in Maine (well, there are a thousand places like this in Maine), the guy behind the counter wouldn't be a tuff Quincy kid with a wicked thick accent and backwards Red Sox cap, but some dread-locked, nose pierced ditzy dude.

What is similar is that it's close to a park. Only this National Park is in a business building in the middle of the city and serves people who love David McCullough books. (PS This link is to the Thomas Crane Library, which is down the street from the park.)

This is what I see right now:

And now it's pulled away. It's the trolley to take you to the Adams birthplaces, which is right down the street from the first house I lived in, soon to be a museum, I'm sure. As soon as one of you readers writes my Wikipedia entry, as requested on several occasions now.

Anyway, then the trolley takes you to the Adams Mansion.

Guess the name of the street where the Adams' mansion is located. Guess!

That's right: Adams Street.

You are a genius. You should be a city planner.

Anyway, the trolley doesn't take you to Weymouth, but that's where Abigail Adam's birthplace is. I should know. It's drilled into our brain every year of school while going through the Weymouth Public School system. I've been on a field trip to the Abigail Adams birthplace. In 8th grade I sang a sonata about Abigail Adams. If I were in middle school right now, I would have gone to Abigail Adams Middle School. As a camp counselor, I subjected further Weymouth youth to the Cult of Abigail by making them be quiet when the fake Abigail came to our rec program perform a biographical play about her. Abigail Abigail Abigail.

Still, she is by far the best woman in American history to be both first lady and first mother. The other one, I hear, is a real bi-atch.

Off to finally complete my assignment for good ol' grad school.