2003-09-06 - 4:10 a.m.

Think about that episode of the Simpsons where Richard Geare and Lenny and Carl are meditating at a Buddhist monastery, and Lenny and Carl say something silly I can�t remember, and Geare (laugh all you will) says those guys are way off.

I like that. Way off.

The street where I work (and don�t forget, I work late) has gotten more and more stupid clubby at night, and I�m sick of those fucks and everybody pandering to them. I hate what my city has become, but I have no memory of what it once was--no memory of my inheritance save the clues I experienced firsthand as best a kid can, and those I dug up later as an ad-ult.

Yesterday I had to jump over the an hour ago�s party puke to leave the building where I work (don�t forget, I work late). The college kids have just gotten back, and I did the right thing and missed a train to find a cop, so could tell him the location of a (most likely) recently imported college freshman girl who was passed out sleeping in front of Store 24. I hope she got a wake-up call.

I get boiled up every time I think of what Boston is now. A freakin� no-smokin my first city for college folks who are way off, who have no memory of what this place was supposed to be.

I mean, Boston. Townies and liberal college students who like really good music, and the underground that bridges that gap.

That dream got immensely perverted, and slowly, and nobody put up a fight. And you can blame so many people for it, you can�t really blame any one person, and that makes my heart hurt. I complained, but I didn�t do anything about it. The Weekly Dig and the Phoenix complained, but at least it counted.

So what do I do? Move? No. This is something that�s happening everywhere. Starbucks and Gaps and Wal-Marts and all of those save-you-two-dollars-and-twenty-minute places are squeezing out local merchants. This horrible let�s sell our soul attitude pervades every city, and it�s almost to the point where they�re trying to outdo each other.

I think the big problem is that the leadership of a city thinks hey, this is an artsy-cool area. It�s famous for that. We can totally get a ton of revenue outta this area�s image if we squeeze out these folks and move a bunch of our crap in..

Short term solution, and then five years later there�s no way to fix it, but nobody who counts complains.

I dunno.

This is my city.

It is.

And nobody seems to mind what happened, �cause they like it or they moved.

So is it me who�s way off?

I think it might be.