As is Boston’s grand tradition:

 

 

These gents are going to help us.  And then this is the view:

 

If any of you ever went to the other part of this blog, you’d read I used to do some kind of journalism type stuff.  I guess you’d think journalism was about getting the inside story about different interesting subjects.  If you think that, you’d be wrong.  It is about calling people day in and day out and getting no comments and occasionally writing something that doesn’t get torn apart.

But thankfully the journalism part of my story is long over so I can enjoy getting real stories about real things on my own.  Like for example, this thing:

 

No, this picture isn’t from 1948 because I wasn’t alive but the rain sure makes Boston look dreary and old, doesn’t it?

Actually, we aren’t talking about that whole thing.  Just this part of it, that I also made to look like it was shot directly after World War II:

 

No, I didn’t sand blast it.  I just kind of made it look old.  Anyway, the clock has long fascinated me.  OK, any clock pretty much fascinates me so that isn’t much of a surprise.  But what came as a surprise was that walking by the Customs Tower the next day with a visitor from afar, I decided to go to the top, where I had been before.

The Customs tower is now a hotel, where you can go to the top for a small amount of money and see a big view.  As an extra added bonus, the lady told us that we could stop and see the inner working of the clock.  I smiled quite broadly when she said this, so I went up to see.  I was expecting to see giant gears and the ringing of a giant clock.  While I didn’t see that, I did get to see this:

 

 

 

Yeah, mechanics and gears, that’s pretty cool.  But the next part is by far the coolest.  I got to see the clock numbers from inside.  Check it out:

 

I mean they look weird, but not for the reason you think.

First:

 

Now this is a gnome and I get that is not weird in and of itself.  I always thought gnomes were possibly German or Dutch but for sure not Scandinavian.  But the gnomes’ name seems to be Sven, indicating that he may have come from Sweden, Norway or Denmark.  I’ve visited all of those countries and I don’t remember seeing gnomes named Sven, so this is a bit weird.

Next we have:

 

 

This has to be one of the ugliest pieces of “art” I’ve ever seen.  And I’ve been to Florida. Not to mention, this thing is bolted to the ground, leading me to believe that either the owners think it will get stolen or that it has been stolen.  I mean I’d steal such a figure.  To prevent myself from being attacked by mongrel hoards.  And pretty much for no other reason.

And third:

 

No, I have no snark for this one, but it does seem out of place in a New England seaside town.  But I guess exactly in place in a way too.

I didn’t even have to ask:

Urban Honey Comb:

Any self respecting man cave has to feature something like this:

I guess you can this an installation.  Maybe a multimedia piece.  Possibly just video art.  Nevertheless, I saw this stuff at a bowling alley and it was really art.  Really cool art not made by a guy named art.  But like art art like you’d see in a museum.  But I saw it at a bowling alley:

 

 

 

When I was up on the Prudential Tower today, I thought to myself “those cars really does look like bugs from up here.”  Hence here’s A Bug’s Life: