Democracy In Action

I found this sign outside Government Center in Boston. I assume there was some kind of protest and this was left over. I've been to tons of protests, and the one thing that unites them all is that in the end people leave their signs all over the place.

Anyway, it really is Ted Kennedy's public office number. The most unusual thing about this sign is what's on the back:


At first glance it's an ordinary memo sent home with kids at school... but it's from 1975. I mean, I re-use paper, but as much of a pack-rat as I am, I don't even have school memos from recently, much less from 33 years ago!

YMCA directions

I had no idea there was a YMCA in downtown Boston. Whoa, looking at their website, they have a pool and everything. Rock on!

Unfortunately, 14 Beacon St. is the Congregational Library, not the YMCA. Maybe the writer of this glaringly yellow sticky note was simple listening to the Village People?

Call Higgins

If you were to diagram my brain, it would probably look a lot like this note. It has everything-- telephone numbers, random scribbles, to-do things, appointments, the works. The thing that sets this rather untidy note apart are the descriptions of the people whose phone numbers are on here. For example, Marie Claire has "short gray hair" and "glasses" (underlined).




Another person is 5'11" and has a short, blond girlfriend who's 5'6". On what planet are either 5'11" and 5'6" (for a girl) short? The writer of this note must be 7 feet tall.

Blowhard

This is a flash card of some sort. What kind of class/seminar/training session would require one to know the word "blowhard."? Is it an SAT Vocabulary word? I don't think I've ever used the word "blowhard" in my life. Perhaps I should start. Also, I always thought the lined side of the index card was the *back*. Perhaps I've been getting it wrong all these years.

3 Norm

This is a sticky note haphazardly folded in half. I've tried to speculate on what is "really short" as opposed to "norm," but I can't even think of anything entertaining enough to write here!

Special Pass

I found this note stuck to a bench near South Station. It's at the place where you get the shuttle bus to take you to the concerts being held at the Fleet Pavilion or Bank of America Pavilion, or whatever they're calling that tent thing with overpriced beer now. Perhaps the bearers of this Special Pass weren't able to get backstage since they left this behind!

Cookies for Luke

I don't know why I'm fascinated by people's grocery lists. Maybe because you find contradictions like this-- rice milk (eeww!) & tofu, along with chicken fingers and sausage.

James P. Walsh

Sear God? Sean God? I'm not sure what this sticky note says. There are a lot of James P. walshes out there, including an economist who wrote several books, a couple of lawyers, someone who directed a short film in 1998... I'm not sure what this note was about. Alas. We probably shall never know.

Yellow Box = 016, 354

Most of the fun of picking up other peoples' lists is trying to decipher what they mean. Grocery lists are generally fairly straightforward, but to-do lists and whatever this is are usually more of a puzzle.

I can't read this person's handwriting too well, and I can't begin to guess what this is about. I thought maybe it was a list of books in a library to find, but the numbers don't correspond to the Library of Congress cataloging system. If it were the Dewey Decimal system, there are too many numbers...

Whatever this person needed to do, it looks like he or she did it all, judging by the X's. Good job!

the dreaded FAFSA

I don't envy this person's life one bit. Filling out the FAFSA (a financial aid application for college; you have to fill one out every year) is one thing I'm glad I will never have to do again as long as I live.

This poor soul has job classwork to do (correct papers, finish grades), his or her own schoolwork (research, outline) and still find time to pay rent and pay off a student account. Ah, the life of a budding academic.

Found in Kenmore Square a few weeks ago

Re-Enter Long Island

Jermaine C. can re-enter Long Island now. Well, I hope he still can even though he seems to have lost his paper. Found on the Common, Boston.

I recomend this book to people who like fantasie

This looks like a pretty cool book. I may just read it! I found this report on my way to the train a few months ago.

ANDREW, ANDREW, ANDREW!

I found this drawing on the ground on my way to the train a couple of weeks ago. It is on flourescent pink paper with black electrical tape holding it folded shut. Andrew may not the greatest speller yet, but at least he has a sense of color and texture!

S I love You

I found this orange sticky note on the floor of the store where I work today. I don't think it belongs to any of my fellow employees, as none of their names begin with S... I like the stylized heavy metalesque "S"-- it adds a certain charm. The fact that the "You" is capitalized makes you know that the writer of this note really meant the words he or she jotted down in pencil.

A Weekend In the Life of Jacob

Jacob E. lives a very busy life, and seems to be very organized. I mean, he types out his to-do lists (albeit on extremely colorful paper) and even puts his name at the top (the JACOB is not part of the paper's design). I often wonder what life would be like to be this organized. He seems to even schedule his social calls!

Adult Birthday

I had called this photo "adultbirthday.jpg", but Blogger wouldn't let me upload it. Perhaps they thought it was going to contain risqué imagery... Don't you think if I was going to upload nekkid pitchurs, I'd be smart enough to call them something else? Anyway, I found this wee sticky note on the floor of the store I was working in in Natick, MA. I thought it was amusingly cryptic. I think it originally was on the greeting card rack, meant to denote the particular subcategory. I could be wrong...

Your Tax Dollars At Work

I, for one, am glad that Social Security workers at least have good taste in music. I found this sticky note on the floor of the music store where I work today. That particular Ladytron song is on the CD The Witching Hour, which is their latest one. Being the music store dork that I am, I recognized it immediately (I'm also a giant Ladytron fan). I hope the government worker who dropped this CD found what he or she was looking for; it wouldn't be too hard as we carry that CD, and it's pretty much always in stock.

Cootie Catcher

When I was in elementary school, we called them "fortune tellers." Others inform me that the actual scientific name for them is "cootie catcher." Whatever the name, I found this one on my way to the train the other morning. The maker of this, however, never filled in anything beyond coloring the front (a nice touch, I usually just wrote in colors) and adding numbers. Bound by the lack of colored pencils, I wonder what he or she called the color in the upper right hand corner? Blue-Violet?

Wash #3

I found this note on a seat of the Red Line train when I was on my way to work. I stared at it and read it over and over, but I still have absolutely no idea what it's about. Apparently #3 is going to be pretty clean, though, as it gets washed 3 times.

Magnet Shape Choice

In our free country, we are lucky to have the freedom of choice. This freedom extends to the choosing of magnet shapes. Some Communist was trying to take away that freedom by forcing (albeit politely) the recipient of this note to take the round one. However, this country is still so great that the note-getter was able to choose a magnet shape of his heart's desire for the first one, I presume. This is a Post-It I found stuck to the stairs leading to the Outbound Red Line in Downtown Crossing T station today.