Welcome to another installment of Good Mourning, it’s Monday! This weekly blog looks to cover various topics in the news, along with personal stories or encounters from the past week at home and work to help you through your first day back at work (unless you don’t work). Hopefully my seven followers like this and share this to make it eight. Enjoy…

Clocking In 

Weather: Ok, but not the beach
Traffic:  Stupid, I’m not at the beach
Breakfast: A sip of coffee, banana with almond butter
Zach arrival time: Decent timing, I think

Monday Mourning Metaphor

In the office with a lingering sunburn like….

Starbucks planned for Boston’s North End axed

[Source] – Plans for a Starbucks as part of a major retail development at the gateway to Boston’s North End, right across from the Rose Kennedy Greenway, appear to be dead.

In a July 6 statement, Mayor Marty Walsh asked developer Charter Realty & Development to withdraw its application to open the Starbucks as part of its retail project at 198 Hanover Street. Since the developer lacks the necessary city permits for the project, Walsh’s opposition is probably enough to tank it.

“After hearing the concerns from residents about sustaining the culture and historic nature of the North End, I encouraged the applicant to withdraw the proposal to locate a Starbucks at the entrance to the North End,” Walsh said in the statement.

Some residents’ pushback had been particularly scalding. They said that such a presence at such a prominent spot in the North End would spoil the feel of the neighborhood. It would also encroach, they said, on the caffeinated turf of existing North End coffee shops.

But the Starbucks would have joined a national coffee chain that’s already on the block: Peet’s at 50 Salem Street. And the Starbucks would have replaced a decidedly pedestrian Citizens Bank branch.

Charter’s Hanover Street plans stretch back to 2016, and the final composition is unclear. Stay tuned.

You might have read that excerpt above and thought to yourself “here goes Zach again being a Starbucks hater for the sake of his blog.” Well, two things: 1) Shut up, my hate is real. 2) You’ll probably be surprised to hear that I am actually team Starbucks on this one. Continue reading →