Ball Square is home again to the breakfast clubs (or wars, depending on who you talk to) and is also the new center for mayoral campaign headquarters with two offices across the street from one another. Even though Rick Scirocco and Joe Curtatone have set up shop there, we don‚Äôt see Suzanne Bremer‚Äôs office. Maybe she‚Äôs smart to stay away and be by herself in Union Square? Mayor Joe opened his headquarters last night Aug. 14 to a large gathering of supporters. We still have our bet on Mayor Joe winning by a huge majority, but you never know, or do you? 

                                                                         *********

Also on the local political scene, we keep seeing Joe Lynch out there knocking on doors in Ward 5. We hear Sean O‚ÄôDonovan is also out there but we haven‚Äôt seen him yet.  Then there is Charlie Chisholm in Ward 6 knocking on doors all day, one family on Highland Avenue stopped and talked to him for half an hour and seemed pleased with what he had to say. On the other side of things is Alderman-at-Large candidate Fred Berman, who apparently needs to be escorted around the city by fellow progressive candidate and Ward 5 School Committee Member Mark Niedergang. Guess Fred needs someone to help him knock on doors. That‚Äôs encouraging.      

                                                                           ********

Redbones is at it again, raising money for a good cause by holding its Sixth Annual Pig Pick-in and Benefit with a block party on Chester Street Monday. The event attracted hundreds of people and helped raise more than $6,000 for the Somerville Homeless Coalition. Redbones did a great job giving back to the city and served some awesome food in the meantime.

                                                                             *********

Congratulations, honors and praise was given out at the Board of Aldermen meeting last week to Somerville firefighters for their heroic call to duty at the two-alarm fire on Henderson Street last month. Congratulations as well to all our heroic men and women in uniform from The Somerville News.

                                                                            **********

The Somerville Politics blog seems to have run its course.  It has not been updated in more than two weeks and seems to be finished.  Oh well, more voices and opinions in the Somerville dialogue are great, but we always thought it was kind of strange that the person or people who ran the site insisted on preserving their anonymity.   Say what you want about the Farm Team Paper or us, but at least names are attached to our work. 

                                                                              ********

Congratulations to Harvey Alvarez, a 2005 graduate of Somerville High School, who just graduated from basic training with the U.S. Army at Fort Jackson in Columbia, S.C.  Harvey, of River Road, finished the rigorous program as an honor graduate, and we wish him well in his military pursuits.

                                                                             *********

That garden at Ciampa Manor that was started and taken care of by one of the tenants is coming along real well. The fruits of Charlie‚Äôs labor have begun to show.   Charlie has done a majority of the work himself with some help from another tenant, Lillian. Charlie plans on sharing the harvest with the rest of the tenants in the building. Charlie paid for the loom and many of the plants and flowers himself. We think it looks great. Say hi to Charlie when you see him, and thank him for his effort to make Ciampa Manor a better place for everyone. 

                                                                             **********

It appears that we have a connoisseur of fine beer living amongst us here in Somerville, we‚Äôve been tipped off that some anonymous person recently paid $503,000 for one antique bottle of beer on eBay. We‚Äôre not sure yet if this guy is for real or just a prankster, but we know one thing ‚Äì in a city with bars in all the squares, that‚Äôs some price to pay for one bottle of beer.   

                                                                                **********

On a sad note, Somerville lost another long-time resident, Carolyn (Manzelli) Heniffent died Aug. 10 after a very brief illness.  She was 59 and will be sadly missed.

                   
                                                                                 **********

Remember the emergency inspection by the Inspectional Services Department (ISD) of a house on Boston Avenue that was once classified as unfit for human habitation? Remember, the city forced the owner to move out of the unsafe building? Well, the owner, an elderly women, a longtime resident finally applied for and is now receiving housing and other assistance that has made it possible for her to sell the property to a new owner who has fully done it over and brought it up to all state codes! Nice to see George Landers, head of ISD, and his office do another fine job. We think George is the best.

                                                                            ***********

Well, you got to hand it to the Board of Aldermen for putting on their boxing gloves to fight for “No more delays of the Green Line Extension!” Our Aldermen want everyone to make noise and let the state know that we mean business and no further delays. Let’s hope our Progressive state delegation makes noise as well on this issue. Let’s see if their clout at the state house, along with the BOA, can make the governor stay on track.

                                                                             ***********

Isn‚Äôt it funny that when the so-called progressives here in Somerville get attacked, they resort to playing the race or gender card? They just can‚Äôt take the heat whether it‚Äôs in our paper or at the Farm Team. We‚Äôre wondering who said, ‚ÄúIf you can‚Äôt stand the heat get out of the kitchen?‚Äù (We‚Äôre sure Ron Newman knows and will attempt to correct us, lol).   Hey boys and girls, politics is tough and it should be. And when someone does something wrong or stupid then it‚Äôs his or her own fault. Sometimes it‚Äôs just better to take your lumps and be big about it and move on, instead of sending in your troops to bring out the race or sex card all the time. It gets sickening.         

                                                                               ************

The Somerville News is again happy to announce that we are getting closer and closer to 1,000 visits almost every day, and web surfers are visiting more pages on our site for longer periods of time. To see the progress for yourself, contact Bobbie in the office and she‚Äôll be glad to give you specifics. Speaking of the office both at the News and at ERA real estate ‚ÄúThe Secret‚Äù has been distributed to quite a few employees and they like what ‚ÄúThe Secret‚Äù has to offer, if you‚Äôd like to know more about ‚ÄúThe Secret,‚Äù Google it and enjoy or call Cam.