I'm Shipping Up to Boston

I'm leaving on Friday afternoon to meet up with Earthdog.  He is picking me up in Providence.  We are going to see the Welch Boys and the Blue Bloods on Saturday in Boston.  Looking forward to drinking some Boston beers and listening to some Boston punk rock.

Boston Bruins v Washington Capitals 2013-03-16

We went to Boston for St. Patrick's weekend again this year to see the Dropkick Murphys play.  On Saturday, I met my friend Edog in front of the TD Garden at the Bobby Orr statue, and we bought some scalped tickets to go to the hockey game.  The Bruins had more goals, more shots, more hits, and won all of the fights.  Great game!  I started off the afternoon with a Molson Canadian and an Italian sausage sandwich.  This was the start of a very long day as we met my cousin Jody and his girlfriend and her sisters after the game for a few drinks.  Later that night we met up with Edog's wife, his brother and his girlfriend.  More pictures can be found here.

Post Game Activities
Wendy and Jody

 

Jody, Edog, and me

Edog and wife

Pakky and girlfriend

Pakky, Edog, and me

Me and Wendy

Pakky

Novakane - the band who played at the bar we were at

Hard Rock Cafe - Boston

Before we shipped out of Boston, we hit the Hard Rock Cafe and the Warf.   I had passed by the Hard Rock on St Pat's Day on my way back to the hotel from the Bruins v Flyers game.  Little did I know that Wendy had stopped there for lunch to start off her day.   Little did she know that was the first stop of the official Boston St Pat's Pub Crawl :).

Go figure that there was a Dropkick item!!

That Cobain guy thought he was Townsend.

The Texan pork shoulder sandwich with tobacco onion rings and jalapenos.  Yum!

Shipping Up to Boston

We had a great visit, but I wish it lasted longer.  I did not get a chance to do too much site seeing with all of the punk rock shows and sporting events that I attended.  Here are a few pics of the Financial District, and the Irish bars that many frequented on St Pat's Day.

Off to Church

My loving wife willingly let me head back to the Fenway area to join Sean for yet another punk rock show at The Church.  Before the show, we took in dinner and a few drinks at the semi-posh restaurant.  I had an awesome meatloaf sandwich.

The venue was next door.  It was quite small, but had a really good sound.  There were probably 150-200 people that were in attendance.  It was nice to be in attendance in such a small venue on St Pat's Day in Boston.

I believe there were supposed to be five bands at this show.  There ended up being 3 and 1/5th.  A band from Troy, NY opened up.  I forget their name.  They were a good opening act, but the 45 minute set was about 25 minutes too long.

The Pinkerton Thugs were supposed to play next.  Apparently, only one of their band members could be convinced to play on St Pat's Day.  He played an acoustic guitar, and played some solo songs and PT songs.  It was quite an admirable event.  I was pleasantly quite fine with this after he played.

Up next were Refused Resist who I was very interested to see play.  They did not disappoint.  They made it official that I made the right decision to come out to this show.  I recall them playing the following tracks.

Don't Get in My Way
Stop Them Now
Still in Massachusetts
Captain
Middle America
Socialized
Sunday Matinee
We're Not Gonna Take It (Twisted Sister cover)

The Swaggerin Growlers were the headliner. They are a Celtic Punk type band.  Unfortunately, I was not in the mood for their poor man's Flogging Molly set.  We left midway through their first set.  They did play "Drunk Before Noon" which is a song I enjoy by them.  To be fair, it was a long weekend, and I was too tired for their style by then.

I picked up the first Refuse Resist CD and a t-shirt to support the band.

Flyers v Bruins 2012-03-17

Silly me, I did not realize until Friday morning that my favorite team would be in town for a game.  I must be an idiot!!  Fortunately, my wife is very understanding.  How often would I be in Boston on St Pat's Day when the Flyers are in town? Probably never again!  Wendy didn't have to tell me twice that she was OK if I went to the game.  I went.  She walk all over the city.  After all, it was St Pat's Day!!

The Flyers got off to a slow, disappointing start.  They picked up the pace in the 2nd period, and were able to get 1 point in a shoot out loss.  Great venue, great crowd, great game!!

Post Game

After the show, we headed over to McGreevy's which is owned by the bass player of the Dropkick Murphys, Ken Casey.  Unfortunately, Sean came down sick and didn't make it to the post game show.  As his family attested later, something had to seriously be wrong with the boy for him to leave a show before it ended.

Fortunately, his wife, Kathryn, was a trooper, and would not let us go back to the hotel.  She was determined to take us out to experience Boston.  Hats off to her!!!

We had a short wait in line to get into the bar.  They did a great job of not making the place shoulder to shoulder crowded.  I commend them for that especially on a week where tourists like us where there and they could have easily pushed another 100 people or so inside to make some more $.  I hate crowds.  This was awesome.

Once inside we listened to punk rock tunes played over the loudspeakers.  We met a couple from Ireland (pics below) who flew over earlier in the morning to see the show and head to the bar.  They were heading to NYC very early the next day and were to be married soon.  I believe some folks shared some Irish style shots with them.  Good times were had by all.  Thanks Kathryn!!!

The crazy Irish couple!!

The tourists and the trooper!