The ‘Slice of the City’ spring meet-up series is an opportunity to connect and engage with City leaders and staff as well as neighbors, all while enjoying Somerville’s parks. The series continues next week with a meet-up in Ward 2.

The parade will step off at 11:00 a.m. from Davis Square, proceeding west on Holland Street through Teele Square and onto Broadway, ending at the Veterans Cemetery between Alewife Brook Parkway and North Street. 

Friday, May 24, 2024

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Monday, May 27, Memorial Day, is a holiday. City buildings will be closed. Trash, recycling and yard waste collection will be delayed by one day. No street sweeping on Monday.

— Photo by Bobbie Toner

The Somerville community is invited to celebrate the city’s Nepali community at a free festival showcasing Nepal’s vibrant and dynamic culture on Saturday, June 1, starting at 4 p.m. (rain date Saturday, June 8) at Union Square Plaza.

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries and letters to the Editor of The Somerville Times belong solely to the authors and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville Times, its staff or publishers)

By Ian Halim

In biology, little things make big things happen. Take, for instance, the spike protein that projects from the virus that causes COVID-19. Despite a length measured in mere billionths of a meter, it is this spike that allows the virus to attach to our cells and infect them, much like a mosquito extending its long snout to prick us. The spike protein is also the target of the COVID vaccine. Indeed, the mRNA COVID vaccine gives our body instructions so that we can make copies of the protein, get to know it, and thereby recognize the peril when confronted with the actual virus. Virtually everything that happens in living things, in fact – the action of drugs, the genetic information encoded in our DNA, even the flexing of our muscles – is thanks to tiny machine-like structures within us. And the power of penicillin – the first antibiotic, and the subject of this essay – arises from its tiny patterned structure too.

Life in the Ville by Jimmy Del Ponte

My sister Christine (Somerville High class of 1970) planted an evergreen tree in the front yard in 1969. It eventually grew too big to avoid hitting up against the house. It couldn’t maintain its traditional symmetry so we had to have it removed in 1983.