Universal Hub

Among the items volunteers pulled out of the Neponset and its banks in Hyde Park on during an annual clean-up drive on Sept. 24: Two cash registers (empty of cash), a Boston Herald honor box dumped near the river in 1995 (based on the date of a newspaper still inside it), a house oil tank, a wheelbarrow, computers, a highway sign, 12-foot sections of iron fencing, baby potties, TVs, radios, cinder blocks, bricks and other construction material, 18 shopping carts, 49 tires and lots of spaghetti that appeared to have been recently made.

Miles on the MBTA, who usually tries to find the good in even the dowdiest T stop, finds absolutely nothing worthwhile about pitiful Hastings, a tiny little stop on the Fitchburg Line in Weston, right down to the Sharpie-drawn station sign on a plank of wood:

They...they even drew a little sign around "Hastings" and gave the MBTA website and everything! So...this is the signage. THIS IS THE ONLY INDICATION THAT PEOPLE ARE WAITING AT THE HASTINGS COMMUTER RAIL STATION ON THE FITCHBURG LINE IN WESTON, MASSACHURSETSTES! HASTINGS? MORE LIKE HATE-...

dd808 watched the Steaming Tea Kettle get re-installed today on its perch over what is now a Starbucks on the edge of City Hall Plaza.

The kettle - which can hold 227 gallons, 2 quarts, 1 pint, and 3 gills - was badly dented in May by a truck whose driver was heading into the neighboring Government Center T stop construction site.

Geocomeau looks up: Read more.

The Massachusetts Appeals Court today tossed a lawsuit by Harvard students who wanted a judge to make Harvard sell off its endowment's holding in fossil-fuel companies. Read more.

The Boston Licensing Board today rejected requests from several restaurants in the North End, Chinatown and the South Boston waterfront to serve hard liquor, saying there's no public need in an area already full of places to get a drink. Read more.

When obnoxious delinquent hooligans bellow their way on to the Green Line at Babcock Street after school (not to point a finger at the Match Charter Public School, but yeah), are the drivers allowed to tell them to STFU? Can T cops or real cops be summoned? Do intimidated senior citizens and full-fare-paying commuters have any recourse other than jamming into the front of the car and ceding the rear to the brats ? Sadly, this is not a hypothetical question.

The Boston School Committee voted unanimously tonight to urge a no vote on Question 2, which would expand the number of charter schools in Massachusetts.

Boston school officials first began pondering a no vote in July out of concern over the impact of the loss in state aid that could come if students move to new charter schools.

Natick Patch reports the principal has banned clown costumes and masks.

Three Massachusetts pediatricians and groups representing pediatricians across the state and the country say the FDA is dragging its feet complying with a 2009 federal law requiring cigarette makers put graphic images of the effects of smoking on their products - and are hoping a lawsuit might spur some action. Read more.