More Boston ....

Dear Congressman,

Since I leave for Boston tomorrow, here are a few more fun facts courtesy of Boston.com. Well, parts of the comments are from Boston.com.

Everyone knows about the Boston Tea Party and Paul Revere. There are a few guys in eastern China who have read about them at the library once.

But did you know that Boston is home to the country's first public school? School lunch ladies all across America salute you, Boston!

Check out these interesting facts about Boston that you might not learn from your tour guide. Why, are they instructed to hold back the good stuff?

From 1659 to 1681, it was against the law to celebrate Christmas in Boston because the pilgrims thought it was debauched. Instead of now, which it is pretty much just crass commercialism with only a little debauchery mixed in.

Logan International Airport is built almost entirely on top of land that, before a landfill project, used to be Boston Harbor. So, before it was Logan, it was land called Boston Harbor? Boy, that's confusing. Why wasn't it simply called Bostonland?

If you don't include college students, only about 600,000 people reside in Boston. Why not include college students? I know they can be a bit irritating, what with all the binge drinking and loud music, but last time I checked they were included in the US census.

The average price for a bowl of New England clam chowder in Boston restaurants is $4.40. Another $2.50 if you want a spoon and $3.75 for a bowl ....

Nearly 70 percent of housing units in Boston are occupied by renters rather than owners. And let me guess, all of them are maintained perfectly and the renters are all solid citizens, or at a minimum they are rented to all those college students I keep hearing about.

A two-bedroom apartment in Boston costs $1,343/month, on average. Them is some pretty affluent college students living in them apartments.

At 90 feet below the surface, the Ted Williams Tunnel is the deepest in North America. Did they bury him in it? Except of course his head, which is in a cryonics chamber in an undisclosed location, probably near Dick Chaney's undisclosed location.

Before a landfill project started in 1857, the Back Bay area of Boston was a 570 acre body of water. And tea, no doubt....

Only 34 of Boston's 840 restaurants serve fast food. The rest take their sweet time to get around to serving it to you, because their employees are all disinterested college students.

About 250,000 college students live in Boston. Again with the freakin college students. I am beginning to think the author of these fun facts goes fishing for co-eds on the weekend...

The Big Dig created about 80 miles of underground lanes in a 7.5-mile corridor. And if my math is right, for 1 mile of Big Dig costing $275,000,000, you could rent the average apartment at $1,343 a month for about 17,000 years....

More than 18 million people visit Boston every year. Probably to gawk at the 250,000 college students.

In the fall and spring of 2002, the Boston Parks and Recreation Department planted 622 trees citywide. A little suggestion here, if you had planted 63 trees a year for 10 years you probably would have saved on all the overtime pay...

March 10, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell made the very first phone call in history from his Boston machine shop. The call was to his assistant, Thomas A. Watson, in which Bell chimed, from down the hall, "Watson come here, I want you!" And the next time he made a call, the Boston city government had already figured out a way to tax it!

So now that I have fully dissed Boston, I will have to visit and see if I have to eat my words!