Medford

Ever wonder how much money that bodega is making off food stamps? You know, the one where the healthiest thing is a hot dog covered in chili? Or ever debate with a friend whether Whole Foods is reaping the rewards of the economic downturn with all the overeducated hipsters needing to get their organic salmon fix?

Well, here's the spending break down for the past four years, mapped on Google so you can see exactly which cities are getting Food Stamp funds, which stores they're being spent at, and even how the Great Recession has changed the demographics of poverty in Boston and Massachusetts. Hint: The years have not been kind to Chicopee.

To preview your primary ballot for tomorrow, click on the link from the Secretary of State's website:

then enter your address and select a political party. It will show you what choices you'll have on tomorrow's primary ballot.

State to Parsons Brinckerhoff: No, we don't think so - and no, election-year politics has nothing to do with our decision.

File this under customer disservice. Stephanie Chelf reports her mother, who doesn't normally take the T (she usually takes a bus in from Andover), found herself at Wellington station on the Orange Line this morning, credit card and CharlieCard in hand, in front of a CharlieCard machine that didn't seem to want to let her add enough money for a ride into town.

"A frazzled T employee took her card and ran it without asking what she wanted," Chelf writes. Unfortunately for mom, the guy put a $60 monthly pass on her CharlieCard, instead of, oh, $1.70 for a single ride. Fine, mistakes happen, but when she complained, the guy said there was nothing he could do and she'd have to go to Downtown Crossing. Which she did, and where "they said 'write a letter' and she'd hear something in 3 months."

Chelf concludes: "WTF!"

MassDOT says I-93 north will be down to one lane tonight as crews continue to fight the Car-Eating Pothole of Doom, and suggests these alternates:

• Drivers on I-93 heading northbound toward Boston from the south should use Route 128/Interstate 95;
• Drivers leaving the downtown area headed northwest should take I-90 west to Route 128/I-95 north to I-93 north of the city;
• Drivers leaving the downtown area headed north may use the Tobin Bridge/Route 1 to Interstate 95.

This one damaged six cars this morning before State Police shut down two lanes, Channel 4 reports.

A user on Davis Square LiveJournal reports that when he got to the Dunkin' Donuts on Main Street in Medford this morning, Teamsters were outside, handing out donuts to try to keep people from going into the store. The Teamsters have no issue with Dunkin' Donuts but are embroiled in a contract dispute with one of the chain's Boston-area suppliers.

To the MBTA #108 bus driver,

You did more than simply whizz past me this morning as I was waiting at the bus stop—you started a war.

I could perhaps let it slide if you didn't see me standing there in the sweltering heat, melting on the sidewalk infront of you. But, you did see me. I saw you. I saw you see me. I saw your brain fail and decide to proceed ahead, directly to a red light. You didn't think I'd chase you to the intersection, did you? Hah! These chubby legs can fly when motivated, can't they? I was banging on your door before you could say 'soap' you filthy derelict.

The Globe reports.

Inside Medford analyzes the latest environmental report from the MBTA.

Some Assembly Required reports that when he went into the Medford Square Dunkin' Donuts for some coffee on Saturday, he passed by a woman standing outside, seeming to give a coffee order on her cell phone. And when he got in line, he stood behind a woman repeating back the same order on her phone:

... So, Woman A was giving her drink order to Woman B over the phone, while standing outside on the sidewalk. I started to let myself think about why she might be doing this, instead of just coming inside, but I realized that way madness lied and let it go. ...

Jeffrey Smith faces 20 years in federal prison on charges that also include sending letters to residents of a particular street in Somerville that his supervisor, who lived there, was a Level 3 sex offender who should be deported to England, the US Attorney's office in Boston charged today.

Between Sept. 22, 2009 and March 10 of this year, Smith allegedly sent 29 threatening letters to organizations in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and North Carolina, starting with St. Paul AME Church in Cambridge and the NAACP office in Roxbury, which he threatened to burn down because he did "not like African American or minorities in charge as supervisors of my security department at Novartis, nor I like them as president of the United States."

Smith worked for Securitas Security Services, which provided security to Novartis in its Cambridge offices.

In total, Smith sent 29 threatening letters to organizations, the US Attorney's office says, adding that the letters to the Somerville residents were signed "Heyward Dublomi," a variant on a bad journalism prank.

Innocent, etc.

Saturday at the Medford Kelly's.

This missed connection ad on Craigslist reads like a modern day love poem. Bearded men of Boston...pull your faces out of the PBR pitcher, it looks like someone has their eye on you...

http://boston.craigslist.org/gbs/mis/1567745744.html

Northbound at Roosevelt Circle, Ben Jackson tweets. Based on the comments below, sounds like everybody got out OK.

The T reports 20-25 minute delays on the Orange Line this morning due to a dead train near Wellington. At least it's not the brand-new signaling system this time.

For what it's worth, I just had a trouble-free ride from Forest Hills to State. South Orange Line represents!

Somebody at Tufts thought so: Behind one building, the university has a set of steps that were supposedly designed to let a woman outrun a male attacker.

The kids at Teen TV Somerville frame the planned Green Line expansion in a novel way - and feature the stylings of the immortal Wig Zamore and US Rep. Mike Capuano. Even better: Judges pick the best song about the Green Line (the first from a kid who thinks the whole thing is a big mistake: "It's not too late ... to give this train away" - sing it!):

Latest Green Line Extension documents from the state.
State to study three locations for trolley repair facility.

Tip o' the beret to Erin Sunderland.

Among the electric customers to lose power due to the exploding manholes of doom today is Tufts University. Students are being asked not to light candles and to walk in groups if they have to go outside at night if the lights still aren't back on. The school says lights could be out for another eight to ten hours.

Might be good to avoid towns with names beginning with M today:

Channel 4 reports flames shot 20 to 30 feet in the air when manholes exploded on Main Street in Medford around 10:30 a.m. and that several thousand people are now without power.

William Fleurant tweets traffic is, as you might expect, a mess there (where 38, 16 and I-93 come together).

MBTA Police report power went out at the Malden Orange Line station, trapping one person in an elevator.

Tufts Daily reports some university employees were forced to go home early over the weekend when the school shut down computers across the campus to try to wrest back control from hackers who managed to take over dozens of computers.

Interestingly, most of the computers belonged to Tufts professors and staffers, not students.

By moving students with flu-like symptoms into quarantine rooms and wearing masks. Oh, wait, you thought I was going to write about, oh, never mind.

Earlier:
BU sets up quarantine rooms for students with the flu.

Looks like the New England Baptist Church in Medford Square is at it again.

In 2005, the church told Katrina victims they deserved it.

An Orange Line rider can dream, can't he?

Tony tweets:

Just saw an MBTA employee dump the metro paper recycling bin into a trash can at Oak Grove. Why do they pretend to recycle? Ugh.

The T does a better job of recycling old Metros at the inbound platform on the Orange Line at Haymarket: They use bundles of Metros to sop up all the water that keeps draining into the station - and to prop up an orange cone atop the slippery spot the water creates.