No, there's no punchline:

... But by 10 a.m., dozens of police had surrounded the bank and were waiting for equipment to cut through the chains and the bicycle lock looped through the door and around one protester's neck. ...

The story also raises that perennial question: Is Copley Square part of downtown?

Milan Kohut had been charged with peddling without a license when police objected to him standing outside a Financial District branch of the Bank of America with a pile of nooses and a sign reading "Nooses on sale."

On Friday, a Boston Municipal Court judge dismissed the charges, the Dig reports. Kohut had argued he was making a political comment about the mortgage crisis, not actually trying to sell downtown workers a way to hang themselves. He's now asking for his nooses back.

This deserves exactly what the photo says it deserves!

Boston Police report arresting a woman yesterday afternoon for scrawling graffiti inside a Bank of America ATM on Tremont Street in Roxbury. No, not Pixnit - this woman was 60. Alas, BPDNews did not report what she wrote with her red marker.

Meanwhile, police also report that somebody tried holding up the Dunkin' Donuts at 510 Southampton St. last night by threatening to inject the clerk with an HIV-filled needle. The clerk refused and the alleged perp fled in a dark-colored vehicle. And over in Charlestown yesterday afternoon, a woman kicked and bit another woman in an effort to convince her to hand over her cell phone and cigarettes. The gambit worked, but the toothy terror was arrested after a brief foot chase.

On Soho the Dog, Matthew does some back-of-envelope calculations and concludes the bank pulled its $600,000 annual donation not out of any sense of tough love for the series (bank officials talked of forcing the series to broaden its base of support) but because it simply gets more of a marketing bang out of similar donations to the MFA and BSO. And it will only get worse, he writes:

... As corporations get bigger and bigger, and are frequently operating far away from their own home base, corporate visibility and brand promotion will become the main goal of all non-operational activity; the personal relationships and local civic pride that support smaller, less splashy causes will become more and more abstract until they disappear completely. And if visibility is the key, let's face it: music is not the most visible of art forms. It would appear that the transitory, elusive nature of music has a real-world financial cost, at least in a society where the free market reigns, and philanthropy is just another front in the war for eyeballs. ...

Joel Brown discusses Bank of America's decision to stop funding the Celebrity Series, started by predecessor FleetBank:

...Both sides make nice with quotes about how important it is for givers and getters to diversify and blah blah. But basically this is the now out-of-town bank yanking major support from an arts series that has been a mainstay. ...

It's another reason to patronize a locally owned bank, Leslie Turek writes.

Josh Ourisman begins to compile a list of banks to consider now that he's leaving the clutches of Bank of America. Jason Legg offers some additional alternatives.

Imagine you've just added $11,000 to the $9,000 you already had in your account, then checking your balance and seeing the bank thinks you have a balance of -$6,000. You might not be very happy. Even after they figure out what happened and fix it.

A Parkway Transcript article makes you go "Hmm, wonder how long before they file a lawsuit?"

Seems police arrested two Rozzie guys, one 22, one 15, for a botched hold-up attempt at the Bank of America branch in Roslindale Square after a bank security officer fingered the pair.

Police, however, quickly released the two after noticing they looked absolutely nothing like the two Virgil Starkwells on the tape and learning that the security guard was not even in the bank at the time of the failed holdup.

Jason Feifer does so enjoy his monthly chats with the always polite Bank of America phone people:

... We've developed a routine, you and I. You might say we keep in touch well. Every month, you charge me $25 for my account. When I get the monthly statement, I call one of your representatives to remind you that, in fact, I'm not supposed to be charged that fee. After some research, the representative agrees and refunds the money. The following month, I'm charged the fee again, and the cycle repeats. ...

Do be sure to read his account of how Bank of America won't even let him close the account.