... yeah, that's highly sus.

There are busses.

It is illegal to even touch an electronic device (e.g. your phone) while driving a motor vehicle.

​

EDIT (because the OP is a snowflake and blocked me for not jumping on his bandwagon):

u/raabbasi - even using them. You can turn them on or off while driving, but nothing else.

Stop driving into and through Boston. Take the commuter rail in bad weather, ride a bicycle in good weather. :)

Remember, you're not stuck IN traffic, you ARE traffic.

One thing to do, that can test this without any cost? Hang up a comforter or a heavy blanket across the door. If that improves things, you know you need those heavy curtains.

:)

All those tapestries in castles? Hung for exactly that reason (and also to deal with drafts). :)

The door is the culprit. Either rearrange things so you can sit further away (hard in a small floorplan, I know), or insulate it somehow. Try hanging heavy curtains across it, for example.

This.

My thermostat is downstairs (single family home). I dial it to 64 during the day, and it hits ~70 upstairs. At night, I turn it down to 50, and it's still 55-60 upstairs.

If I get cold, I put on a sweater or a light jacket. If I'm STILL cold, then I'll go turn the heat up 2 or 3 degrees.

Damn, that really sucks.

>Mass Central

Eventually, the BFRT will come within a couple blocks of that one, at the very least. Likely it will be connected, by bike lanes if not directly. :)

Good points, all around.

And with a front-loading cargo bike, like the Yuba Supercargo CL ... they could even forgo a car entirely for most of their trips. :)

Very true. They're all good walking paths, too.

I focused more on the parts that would take them back out of the urbanized areas, though, given they're coming from a rural area. :) Less car noise, more actual nature. :)

Some birds fly gracefully, like ballerinas dancing on the air.

...

Then there are turkeys.

:D

Fun fact: turkeys DO fly. They roost in trees overnight. :)

If you are "outdoorsy", you will want to check out hte Minuteman Commuter Bikeway, which runs from Alewife Station (in Cambridge, but near the border of Arlington), through Arlington and Lexington to Depot Park, in Bedford.

From there, the Narrow Gauge Trail - mostly unpaved - runs another couple miles north, almost into Billerica.

The Minuteman, meanwhile, is going to be extended into West Concord over the next few years, by incorporating what is now the (as yet largely unpaved, I think) Reformatory Branch Trail. It's a short distance from there to pick up the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail, which runs south into Sudbury ()and in a few years, Framingham), and north through Acton, Carlisle, Westford, and Chelmsford, ending within steps of the Lowell city border.

Along the BFRT you can find Nara Park in Acton, and Heart Pond in Chelmsford; both have beaches ... Nara costs money, Heart Pond is free (but also muuuuch smaller). No lifeguards at either, AFAIK.

In Lexington, the Minuteman passes literally adjacent to Lexington Green (birthplace of the American Revolution!), and that's maybe two miles from the Minuteman National Historic Park, and the Battle Road trail.

There's also the Dr. Paul Dudley White Bike Trail, along both banks of the Charles River.

...

Less outdoorsy stuff, but: your 5yo will love the Boston Children's Museum, and probably also the Museum of Science (that was a perennial favorite when I was 3 and 4 years old, and my parents still lived in Boston). Franklin Park Zoo was also a favorite of mine at that age. Harvard University also has a bunch of museums that may interest your kiddo when s/he gets a few years older. Or you and your spouse, right away. :) The Museum of Fine Arts is a must-see for adults, but less so for younger children IMO.

Human sacrifice at an alter to Satan might help.

When does the lease actually expire?

Legally, until the lease expires, yes you absolutely can insist that they continue to pay rent until replacements are found (though in return, you would be expected to expedite the process of finding those replacements), up until the lease expires.

Mind you, "insist" and "actually make them do so" are not the same thing. You might end up having to take them to court to get that money out of them.

...

OTOH, if the lease is up next week, and they didn't sign a renewal ... you're out of luck, unfortunately.

But I am not a lawyer.

You need to speak to one, to be absolutely sure of anything.

Are we really going to start seeing Chinese spies under every bush and behind every tree, now ...?

SMH

... no, it didn't.

The park ticket had already been paid for, and Disney doesn't make the room free just because you're sick. Nor does being sick mean you stop needing to eat, so I still had to pay for meals.

... and here I am, on the tail end of actually having caught COVID. Most likely, while in an airplane on my way to Florida ... and despite wearing an N95 mask for the whole trip, except when eating or drinking. Guess it only took those few short moments, eh? :'(

Lost an entire day and a half in the parks at Disney World due to this bloody thing.

>everyone

That's a silly, nonsense argument.

Plus, if you want to bring tech support into it?

Paper billing needs mechanics to fix all those machines. Warehousing for the paper & ink, and staff to handle shipping and internal deliveries. A mail room - and staff - to handle the outgoing mail.

I still say, if a company offers a discount for paperless billing that is less than the cost of a measly fucking stamp, then they're ripping their customers off.

That customer-facing website will exist regardless of whether the customer gets their bill in paper form or not.

To send out a paper bill, you need:

• Paper
• Ink
• Envelopes
• Machines to print the bill
• Machines to fold the bill
• Machines to put the bill into the envelope
• Postage

...

To send an electronic bill, you need:

• Software to arrange the information in a human-readable format
• An email server

If the discount for declining a paper bill is less than the postage to send it to you, the company is ripping you off. Period.

... only a $0.38 credit for a paperless bill? That's less than the price of the STAMP to send you a paper bill ...!!!

>they have effectively made it more likely that I will die in a fire.

No, YOU have made that more likely. You have chosen to ignore them as an annoyance.

Whereas me? In one apartment building I lived in, I remember more than once frantically stuffing my cats into carriers, and rushing out into the winter cold wearing only a pair of pants - no shirt, no coat, no shoes, not even socks. Was I annoyed if/when it turned out to be a false alarm? Yes.

Was I any slower to do the whole thing all over, the next time it went off? NO.