This Is Framingham

Going through some pictures at my mom’s house I found this photo from July 1983 of me, my sisters, our friend Kim and her little brother.  I think Kim, who is dressed in all red, just came from dance class or something involving a costume, as she often did.
I forgot how much we liked playing on that thing.  I haven’t been to Farm pond in forever so yesterday I went to check it out and see the snail.

Most of the yellow paint is gone but those red eyes are hanging in there.  In all, it’s a pretty sturdy structure.  I wonder if it had ever been repainted at all or it’s been left untouched (by paint) since it was installed.  I also liked the late 70’s/early 80’s simplistic jungle gym in the background.  Nothing fancy but it kept us busy.

The snail has a cousin, the catepillar, down at the other end but it was too muddy to go near.  The catepillar seems to be in much better condition since it’s blue paint can be seen from the street.
Some more shots of  the playground:

I took a cooking class last night at Keefe Tech High School through their continuing education program.  The course was called “A Fine Bistro Meal”.

The class took place in the school’s restaurant “The East Side Room” which is open to the public for lunch on weekdays.

Inside is just like a professional kitchen, actually it’s better because there is so much room.

The instructor Michael Shammus, is a professional chef and a great teacher.  He showed us proper/more efficient ways of slicing, prepping and cooking/baking.
I met some wonderful people and after 2.5 hours we got to sit down with the fruits of our labor.  On the menu was:
-Grilled marinated skirt steak
-Scallops with couscous and bacon in a basil-cream sauce
-“Pomme frites” (fries)
-Salad with toasted candied walnuts and gorgonzola
-Bread with Gorgonzola butter
-Chocolate pot de creme

I could have arranged the plate a little nicer but at that point I was really hungry and just wanted to dig in.  Everything was fantastic, (and Ethan was impressed with the leftovers I brought home too)
I also got certificate for taking the course. Maybe I’ll bring it to my mom’s house and put it on her fridge : )

I highly recommend Keefe Tech classes, I took a yoga class there last year and was happy with that too.  The classes are also less expensive than other continuing education courses at other schools.

The giant CVS at the corner of route 9 and Temple street used to be Finally Michael’s, a restaurant that had great food and pretty classy interior.
I only went there a few times but from what I remember it was somewhat of a special occasion place.

One of the best bar mitzvahs I ever went to was there in 1987. My Hebrew-schoolmate, Mitch had a chess themed reception with giant styrofoam chess pieces, huge (or what seemed to be huge) dance floor and an unlimited make-your-own Shirley Temple bar.  Shirley Temple’s (or simply “Shirley’s”) were just one of many benefits of going to bar/bat mitzvahs. In fact, that is one way I would remember a bar mitzvah, by shirley quality.  If you had to wait a while for a waiter to come around and tell them you want one and to put extra grenadine and/or extra cherries in it (as most kids did) and it came out with just a drop of grenadine and one cherry that wasn’t as good a time as say, the help-yourself-as much-as-you-want-as-long-as-you-want smorgasbord like Mitch’s bash.
We were out of our minds with sugar and took over the dining room, the dance floor and at certain times the parking lot just to cool off.  I can tell you everyone did indeed Wang Chung that night to the wee hours of probably 11pm.

Also, my sister and I had our High School graduation dinner here, although I think Mitch’s Bar Mitzvah out shined it by far. I debated posting this picture on here but, it’s one of the few photos from graduation day taken inside Finally Michael’s.
This is me, my aunt and my sister Elaine in the dining room with bookshelves. 

Please, PLEASE keep in mind that (besides being a little chunky) this was 1992, I had a lot of mousse in my hair and it was 90-something degrees that day but for the sake of this post I thought it’d be nice to share the interior of the building.
My little sister also authorized this picture from our table.

ANIMAL COMP:  RP REPORTS A RACOON IS ON HER PORCH AND WILL NOT LEAVE. 

ANIMAL COMP: RACCOON WALKING IN THE ROAD

SUSP ACTIVITY:SAMPAN RESTURANT:  RP STATES THAT PEOPLE ARE SMOKING ABOVE THE SAMPAN AND ACTING STRANGE.

SUSP ACTIVITY: RIVERSIDE MOBIL: BLK VW 2DR HATCH,DROVE OFF WITHOUT PAYING, GAS PUMP WAS RIPPED OFF PERSON LEFT NOZZLE IN TANK BY ACCIDENT RETURNED PRIOR TO OUR ARRIVAL AND FIXED PROBLEM

SUSP ACTIVITY:RP  REPORTS UNKNOWN PERSON TOOK HER IDENTITY.

FAMILY PROB: RP STATES EX MOVED OUT AND IS COMING BACK TO “THROW HIS CLOTHES OUT”

WELL BEING CHECK: FRAMINGHAM PUBLIC LIBRARY CALLER STATES HER FRIEND MAY BE SLEEPING AT LIBRARY

Jerk of the week:
ANIMAL COMP: BLUE MERCURY, PARKED BEHIND MOLLY MALONES, POODLE INSIDE THE VEHICLE, FOR OVER 8 HOURS

According to the building permit I found on the town website, the old Honey Dew Donuts on 135 is going to be a drug store.  I think this will be interesting seeing that CVS is right downtown and a Walgreen’s will be moving in a little further down 135. 
I think those are really the only drugstores I see around outside of pharmacies in supermarkets (besides the occasional Osco Drug) and since it’s such a small building I wonder if this is a small business that will try to compete with the major chain drugstores. 
If it is, good luck little guy! : )

This Bed Bath and Beyond used to be the Marshall’s Mall.  I forget if that was the official name of it, but that’s what we called it.

In the late 90’s it was turned into the BB&B that it is today.  It’s an ok store, I don’t really have anything against it besides the fact that it’s there instead of the mall. It’s kind of an overkill too.  Since when did we need a store the size of a small mall for bed and bath products?  Ok, I know it’s goes “beyond” to kitchen stuff but still, it just seems like there should be room to share the space with some other shops. 

Although I didn’t have the foresight to take pictures when it was there, I’ve wasted about a half hour on the computer creating what I remember the mall looking like (and this was the best I could do):

 The Marshall’s Mall was great because it was small enough that it wasn’t super hectic, parking was easy and was it well lit (I think they had sky lights).  Plus it had a nice variety of stores.  Along with Marshalls, some of the tenants were a card store, shoe shop, hit or miss and Bop City comics had lived there for a while at one point too.
Even though I never made it into either of these, I distinctly remember the Pewter Pot restaurant and the Big and Tall men’s store that got street exposure.  I also remember in the late 70’s/early 80’s there was some sort of health food cart in the middle of the mall and they had soft serve frozen yogurt.  My mom asked me if I wanted some and I said ok because it was in a cone and looked just like ice cream but this was before frozen yogurt tasted like it does today.  I took one lick and was disgusted/shocked that it was so sour.  That turned me off of health food for a while.

It’s too bad a lot of the small malls have been turned into mega-stores, it’s nice to have a little variety. 

For me, anyway.  I was at the Asinayo Market downtown getting some soy sauce and sauce and shiritaki noodles when I came across these tiramisu snack cakes. 

I though it was odd to find them in an Asian grocery store, even more odd that next to English, most of the words on the package were in Russian, on the back there is a drawing of people sitting outside an Italian cafe but all the signs are in Russian.

Also intriguing was the “It’s NOW” statement/label, along with a nice diagram to show you what part is the cake and what part is the “cheese cream”. 

The company name is Orion, I don’t know what “It’s NOW” means (maybe It’s NOW that I will I give in to an impulse purchase).  The curiosity took over and I just had to try one!
I got home and opened the box to find it full of 12 little packages of individual cakes. 

 I split one in half to see if it resembled the drawing on the box and sure enough it did.

Now for the taste test.  I love tiramisu but wasn’t expecting much from this packaged, Russian/Asian(?) mock Italian snack cake that didn’t resemble the dessert at all, but I was pleasantly surprised.  The cake was moist and flavorful and the “cheese cream” was a lot lighter than I thought it would be.  It actually wasn’t half bad.  Obviously this is not a substitute for the real thing but for only 100 calories it was a nice little treat.  
 Ethan even tried one and said he liked it, and he doesn’t like too many experimental foods I’ve brought home over the years, so it must be good 🙂

Another grocery adventure at Asiyano!