West Roxbury

The King on Centre Street in West Roxbury was shut tight at lunch today. Plus, it has a small sign in the window advertising the impending arrival of what just sounds like a Chinese restaurant. So no more good, cheap Middle Eastern food on Centre? Oh, well, there's always Al Wadi on the VFW Parkway (which is very good, but not cheap).

The rest of the family wanted Five Guys, which meant a trip down to Dedham, but I was burgered out, so we stopped first at #7 Chinese Food at Grove and Washington in West Roxbury for my evening sustenance (#1 Chinese Restaurant is in Mattapan; where are #2 through #6?). While they cooked the food, we took a walk down Washington Street. We spotted these berries growing on that huge rock outcropping just south of Grove - something we obviously never would have seen had we just kept driving down Washington toward the Dedham Five Guys.

The Jamaica Plain Progressives will host the five candidates running to replace John Tobin on Sept. 28, starting at 6 p.m. at the Nate Smith House, 155 Lamartine St. (near the Stony Brook T stop). This isn't a debate - the candidiates will speak one at a time, for half an hour each.

The guys from Wicked Sharp, a new ski and snowboard shop on Centre Street in West Roxbury, went up to the skating rink on VFW Parkway today and got enough ice shavings to build a snowman outside their store.

Mt. Washington Bank is turning the old Skara Grill where the Friendly's used to be on Centre Street into a bank branch - because if there's one thing West Roxbury needs more than another pizza place, it's another bank.

AlertNewEngland tweets the Citizens Bank branch at 631 VFW Parkway was held up shortly after 3 p.m. by a 5'10" white guy wearing all black, who ran away, rather than drive away.

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.

The district covers West Roxbury, South Brookline and a sliver of Roslindale. Incumbent Mike Rush is stepping down to run for state senate.

Web sites: Matthew Benedetti, Edward Coppinger, Bob Joyce, Pamela Julian, Paul Sullivan, Kelly Ann Tynan.

Meet the candidates to be West Roxbury's state rep - Wicked Local West Roxbury.
10th Suffolk House seat candidates spar over social issues, ability to get things done - Wicked Local West Roxbury.
State Representative Candidates Talk About National Educational Standards on the Local Level - West Roxbury Patch.
State Representative Candidates Talk About How to Help Senior Citizens - West Roxbury Patch.

Next to the dairy case in the back of the store.

Go to the back of the store to the left and through the storage room doors. Restroom on the left.

Go all the way to the back of the store, look up for the large Restrooms banner.

Turn right, walk past the cash registers.

Turn left, walk past the circulation desk.

The following op-ed was written by Pamela Julian's son Anthony Byrne and daughter Courtney Byrne:
The local community newspapers owned by GateHouse Media, Inc., particularly the Brookline Tab and West Roxbury Transcript, have insulted their readers yet again. As the son and daughter of State Representative candidate Pamela Julian, we have witnessed biased and/or negligent reporting of this campaign from the beginning. We expected either the Tab or Transcript or both to endorse Kelly Tynan or Paul Sullivan. Why? They published nearly ten op-eds between Tynan and Sullivan while ignoring the multiple op-eds submitted by my mother, Pamela Julian. In fact, the Tab did not print my mother's announcement of her candidacy. They printed all the others. The Tab even published a picture of Tynan during the Brookline forum despite my mother Pamela Julian being the only candidate from Brookline.

Wicked Local West Roxbury: Butt search yields crack.

As one of the six candidates for State Representative in the 10th Suffolk District, I have the most experience, both politically and professionally.

My political experience includes being elected a library trustee chair, the only candidate to have been elected to public office.  I authored pending legislation to establish a student voter registration system, which will allow students to register to vote on-campus. I helped win the Bellevue Hill area of West Roxbury in the 1983 mayoral campaign of Dave Finnegan.

I owned a business, developed an 88-acre site on Lake Sunapee in New Hampshire, and worked in both radio and television. These are some of my professional credentials but I also raised two children, both college graduates. Being a single parent, I know the challenges single mothers face.

Ninth District Rep. Steve Lynch and Democratic challenger Mac D'Alessandro discussed everything from the proposed Islamic cultural center in lower Manhattan to, of course, health care, in a 20-minute discussion on WGBH's "Greater Boston" tonight (Watch).

Channel 2's "Greater Boston" will air a debate between 9th District incumbent Steve Lynch and Democratic challenger Mac D'Alessandro at 7 p.m. tonight (the debate will be taped at 4:30). Greater Boston airs for 30 minutes, so that would make this twice as long as their earlier debate.

As a candidate for state representative in West Roxbury, Roslindale and Brookline, I have had the opportunity to meet several remarkable people in our neighborhood. The 10th boasts a high percentage of active and retired public safety personnel, and I am proud to count many as supporters. As a Massachusetts National Guardsman and a former 911 operator with the Boston Police, I am keenly aware of the importance of public safety.

Lynch plays his cards close to the vest in what seems like a defensive style of politics. It certainly is not leadership-driven.

Take his process on the health care bill debate last summer. From March through August we heard Rep.Lynch say he didn't know how he'd vote on the bill. At the same time, he did not take a leadership role in shaping it. In August at Curry, Rep. Lynch held a town hall meeting and said he had read the bill but still didn't know how he was going to vote. Once again, his constituents could not get a bead on where he stood.

Perhaps even more stunningly at that town hall meeting, Rep. Lynch was given the chance to answer a question about death panels (after all he had read the bill) and refudiate (sic) ;-) the meme that right wing Republican liars and Fox News had made popular. Lynch equivocated! He would not take a stand!

We got this flyer from the D'Alessandro campaign yesterday:

The new face of evil: Click to embiggen

Needham Patch reports on a Ninth District forum that featured Democrat Mac D'Alessandro and Republican Vernon Harrison. Their opponents, incumbent Democrat Steve Lynch and Republican Keith Lepor were no-shows.

You can watch it, all 15 minutes of it.

The Jamaica Plain Gazette lists the six people running for John Tobin's city-council seat - only two of them from West Roxbury (probably because everybody else in the neighborhood is running for state rep or state senator).

Al Wadi, the replacement for the old Spring Blossom at 1249 VFW Parkway, opened last week. The kidlet and I stopped by for lunch today and concluded it looks to be perfect for those nights when you want somebody to serve you your Middle Eastern food (specifically, Lebanese) at a table, instead of just picking something up at the King.