BPR Full Show 8/14/26: Rick Steves Joins Us

Support for Boston Public Radio comes from Cambridge Savings Bank. CSB is committed to improving the financial well-being of local small businesses through financial education and banking services. Learn more at Cambridge Savings.com, member FDIC. And MIT Federal Credit Union, mortgages designed to make your home financing journey effortless, federally insured by NCUA, Equal Housing Lender, NMLS No, 699-225. I'm Jim Browley, head on BPR and GBH and NEPM live from the BPL. The Shore is on our minds this Friday, so we'll open the phone and text lines to talk with you. With beach closers for cyanobacteria, bird nesting, and our draconian state laws, what's lost when you can't get to the water's edge, caller text. Then it's Boston Globe business column of Shirley Young and live music Friday with the violinist unlike you've ever heard, Red Price. I'm Marjorie Egan. In the second hour, it's PPS European Travel Guru, Rick Stees, just back from his own Odyssey to the Greek Islands. Then with the latest from the Lindsay Clancy Triple Murder Trial, his media maiden Sue O'Connor. We'll end the show with you and Pickleball. Over in Mashby, strong-out residents say the thacking and the thumping has gotten out of the pickleball court. What is your stance? Take a swing at it next on BPR, live from the Boston for the crowdland.

He is Jim Browdy. I am Marjoriege, and you're listening to Boston Public Radio, GBH, and NEPN. Thank you. Live from the Boston Public Library and streaming at YouTube.com slash GBIH News. We're going to have some really fantastic live music in just a few minutes. Plus, travel guru Rick Steves is going to zoom in, and Sue O'Connell is going to, she's been covering the Lindsay Clancy murder trial, well, is admitted to killing her three children. She's been there every day. She's going to give us the latest updates on that. Hello, Jim. Hello, Marjorie. As we head into the dog days of summer, we're going to open the lines to ask you about your beach-going activities. In Duxbury, Billy Baker writes in the globe, residents are vying for beach access with nesting shorebirds. All along the coast, piping plover nesting areas are often taped off, with explicit instructions for beachgoers not to disturb the area. That's great for the birds. What about us? And by the way, we should be clear. Wildlife protections, Marty and I. are generally 100% behind. We like the piping plovers. We do. We like them. Very much. There's also something, and Marjorie complains about all the time. Like 40 beaches closed because of cyanobacteria or other bacteria exceedance is the term. But that's not even the biggest problem. This is the biggest problem. There are the wealthiest among us who think they own the seashore, sometimes calling the cops on people walking their portion of the sand and sea. Here's the law in Massachusetts. In Massachusetts, property owners own to the low tide line. We, the public, have a right to fish, to navigate, and to foul. Whatever foul means. Fowl shooting. It's shooting birds. How the hell do you know what it is? I looked it up this morning. That's what it means. Okay, whatever. I don't see too many people down at the shoreline with rifles. What's navigate mean? Navigate. You don't know what that means either. It means you get in a boat, Jim, and you navigate. That's right. You can navigate. You can fish, she can foul along the shoreline. The courts have actually ruled the public right to the shoreline does not include the right to even walk, sunbathe, or whatever it is. Some legislators are trying to add the word recreate to foul fish and navigate. And by the way, if you read Chris Burrell, our colleague, has done great work on this, 12%. Only 12% of the coastline in this state is open. Well, it's not even open in all cases, but available to the public. So Beach Access and you. Have you lost out on beach time to the birds, bacteria, Brahman's, NIMBY, town managers, or some combo of the four? And what should be done about it? Give us a color text, 87-301-89-70. Okay, I just want to straighten out the meaning of fouling, Jim. It's hunting, shooting, or trapping wild birds for food. You don't see that going on very much at the beach. How many people in the audience have fouled in the last 12 months? Very many. So it's not that valuable. No, it's not that valuable. But one of the things you should be.

You didn't mention. It's places like Marshfield, situate, and Ipswich, you can't park at the beach or there's very limited parking if you don't live in Marshfield, situate, or Ipswich. What's worse than that? And the problem is that the state is paying for update of those beaches. So Massachusetts taxpayers are paying for update of those beaches and seawalls and stuff, but you may not be able to get a parking space there. Do you want me to fix that law in two seconds? Certainly. If you're getting $1 of taxpayer money beyond the borders of your city or town, you've got to be open to the public. If it's not, you don't get the tax money. However, by the way, you know who the champion of beach access has been in the, I don't know how long, 40 years I've lived in Massachusetts? Billy Bulger. Bill Bulger, brother of Whitey Bulger. He was obsessed with this thing. And there have been attempts to take some of this land by eminent domain, but then the fear is it'll be considered a taking and the state will have to compensate people. But it seems to me the proposal, I think, by the state senator and the rep from the Cape. to add the word recreate, meaning you can do fun stuff on somebody else's property about the low tide line. Why isn't it the high tide line, by the way? Why couldn't be the high tide line? If you want to walk in the beach in Massachusetts, you have to walk in the water. You do, literally, you do, or you have to go fouling. Although I see, yeah, well, yeah, that's right. Maybe, maybe a white bulger would like to do some fouling along the shoreline. I don't know. Textor is reporting that in Duxbury Beach, which I guess gets closed, a large portion of it, maybe the whole thing for the piping plovers. The piping plovers have hatched and they are migrating so the fences on the Duxbury Beach are on. 877301-8970 is the number. Do you feel deprived in the summertime that you can't go enough of the beaches, the ocean beaches, mostly that people are talking about, or even the town beaches in your town. And you know what is really terrible? We have this list of ponds that are closed. I mean, how many, this is like, what, 50 ponds are closed and lakes are? close because of cyanobacteria. It's terrible. Yeah. 8773-1-8970 is the number if you're upset about this. Property owners own up to the... They own up to the... Not the high tide line, but the low tide line. Yeah, and that's where Massachusetts is different. In other states, it's the high tide line. Well, that was my point. Why can't you change that? And again, that might be seen as it taking, and they might go to court, but then let them challenge the damn thing. By the way, it really is array. This is not faux anger. Doesn't that drive you nuts that you can't get access to beaches? 88% of the coastline of the state. is unavailable to mere mortals. What do you think of that? Well, I think if you want to go to some of these very popular beaches, especially in the North Shore, and you want to get there and you're not from there, then you've got to get there really early to find a place to park. Well, actually, remember what Katie Theoretis, who runs trustees and reservations told us last year, which my kid is used, one of my kids is used, you can now make a reservation, at least at Wingersheek, I think, one of those beaches up there. That's in Gloucester. You can make a parking reservation online and pay for it.

it and you get in at a specific time so you have to stay in line for hours and hours. 877301.89. We'll take some calls. Nick and Hartford, you're next on BPR. Welcome to the show. Hi. Hey, guys. How's your Friday going? So pretty well. Very well, actually. Thank you. Hi. What's up? No, I just wanted to say I agree that if there's any sort of public funds going to assist with trying to mitigate the effects of coastline erosion, people should at least be allowed to walk. I understand if people don't want people like leaving trash or whatever on their beach. And this is probably as much of a compromise as I'll make with these. For example, I think golf courses should all be public. There should be no private golf courses. But when it comes to our shared coastline, there should be a bit more flexibility by the legislature for this. You know what this pathetic legislature would do, though? They would say you can walk across people's property above the low tide line, but you can't pause, meaning as long as they keep moving. It's perfectly fine. By the way, that to me seems to be a totally reasonable compromise, what Nick is talking about, which is not a taking. Allowing someone to cross your property as they're walking seems to be great. But you do see. I mean, in fairness, I mean, I spent a lot of beach at the time at the beach down the Cape, and people do walk. I've walked across where there are people's private homes. Can I tell you something? They can stop you. It's not fishing, felling, or navigating. There's something wrong where it's okay to stand there with a shotgun and shoot foul, but it's not okay to walk across there. But they don't stop you in general. How do you fish if you can't stand on the property? Well, you have to stand in the water. That's the point. You got to be, you're going to be, well, yes, you have to be below. Well, I don't know about that. I don't know enough about fouling Jim, but I know that you can walk. Not about fishing, not fouling. It was the same thing. I think, I don't know enough reason that we have to stand. You have to shoot the bird from the water? I can. I guess so. I don't know. I've never seen it. But I do know, at least at the beaches I go to the big Craigville beach down the Cape, you can walk in front of people's property there. The fact that you can doesn't mean that you are legally entitled to. I just never see people being arrested or anything like that for doing it. Okay, Tom, you're in, nobody's calling from Massachusetts. They're all from Connecticut or Florida. Tom, you're in Naples, Florida. Welcome to the show. What's a deal in Florida? Well, it's the same type of thing, but my point is, can't we sacrifice anything as humans? I mean, these birds are having their babies right now. Oh, that we should do. I agree. It's like, you know, do we want to walk through the maternity ward and we get upset if we can't? So, I mean, you've got to think about the reality of these birds. These are their babies. We're fine with the bird protection thing. It's not the bird protection. It's the other protection that's driving us nuts. Well, not everybody's fine. I mean, Billy Baker's got a piece in the globe today, and that's what he's talking about, Tom, that people are upset in Duxbury. Some guy was complaining he drove up to Duxbury Beach, and he couldn't get in there because the piping plovers were there. But, you know, and the turns. Well, that's what I mean. I used to live in Duxbury. You did? And I'd go across Pard Point Bridge and occasionally parts were closed. And even as a young kid, I respected the fact that these mothers are having babies right now. Do I really have to drive?

my four-wheel drive to here today and drink beer on the beach. You should be dating Cy Montgomery, Tom. Hey, Tom. Hi, I think you're wrong about Florida. I don't mean to be disrespectful. Can you Jamie take a look at this? I was under the impression that Florida, other than having Ron DeSantis, which obviously is a real problem, other than Ron DeSantis, I was under the impression that... Beaches were pretty much accessible. No, no. Didn't you read the text? I did. Go ahead. Read it. In Florida, Donald Trump owns the sand, and you can only stay in the sand if you're inside a catering car. That's it. That's exactly right. So that's a good one. Tom, thanks for calling and take care yourself. I don't know. Oh, he's gone now. He is gone now. These oversized vehicles that riddle around the sand, do we need those? No. I don't think those are probably very environmentally good. But they have to be fishing, fowling, or navigating, by the way. Who came up with it? Who is responsible? Well, that's what's so ridiculous. Well, the colonial ordinance of 1941 to 1947, but they say this harkens back to ancient laws, to ancient Roman laws, according to the... Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone Management. Maybe we can revise that. It's been... A couple of thousand years since the Roman laws were made. I think it was. A couple of texts of bare reading. Anonymous texter. I recently had friends from college visit from California. They spent two nights in Chatham and said they never saw the ocean. You either need a house on the water or be a resident to even see the ocean. And Chatham, it's absurd. Another anonymous text was out. I heard Jim was thrown off the beach. He said he was fowling, but he was looking for fried chicken and fries. They said the fries didn't count. Thank you very much. It's a good one. Jody and Kay. and thank you for calling. Hello, Jody. Hi, love you guys. Thanks. Thank you. This subject is infuriating for me. Me too. I mean, if you have to pay taxes, why are we paying for their private beaches? Why? We should be able to use it. It should be public, like in Hawaii. Every beach is public. I didn't know that. They have to have a public access, even if it's a fancy hotel that has to be a public access. And it has to be public parking in Hawaii. That is fabulous. By the way, Jody, you know what we're going to do, you made me think, when Governor Healy is with us in September, we don't have a date yet. We're going to ask her, who would not, what leader would not support? Some compromise here, including no tax dollars for state tax dollars for a community if they don't make their beaches open everybody. Well, I think some of the leaders in these small towns, listen to this. Marshfield received $1.2 million from the state last fall to renourish a critically eroded shoreline along its Bay Avenue Beach. Situate got $2 million. Wait, and they don't let people in there, right? They have a small number of parking spaces for non-residents. So you're going to get there really early in the morning. Well, I think it probably is a problem. Situent won a nearly $2 million.

last fall to replenish all these 26,000 cubic yards of sand and gravel at the north-situate beach. There, they sell just a few hundred beach stickers to non-residents, and they cost $350. That's outrageous. It really is outrageous, says Jim. D.D. You're a NipSwitch. You're next on BPR. Welcome to the show. Hi. Hey, how are you? We're pretty good, I think. Hi, how are you? Great. Good. Very good. Very good. So I'm actually sharing the fact that I moved up at Switch in 2011, and my best part about getting here was that I got to get on the beach for $20 a year. That's great. And I have to say it's really upsetting that people don't have the same access that I do. I think it's very exclusive. anyone should be able to access our beautiful shores. I always offer people my car because I have the sticker or we have a boat and I'd love to take them out. I just don't think it's there. We have a small beach called pavilion and a person in the town actually brought, I don't know how you describe it, but they They put into legislation to be able to make our civilian beach exclusive so that only residents can be there. And I think it's unacceptable. So the car gets towed or you get ticketed. It's ridiculous. Back in May, I think it was May, the select board there voted to tighten the beach access. voting to ban non-residents from beach parking throughout the summer. Is this a switch? The zip switch and increase parking fines around that beach from $30 to $50. Hey, Dedy, before you go. And prevent non-residents from parking in the neighborhood. Listen to this. This will prevent non-residents from parking in the neighborhoods and walking to the beach, said the chief of police. Wow, they're really tough up there. There also, as an amendment says, you can't breathe near the beach either. They're trying, so they create a buffer zone. Dini, before you go away, when you say you lend your car to people because it's got a sticker, these are people who are friends, I assume. Like, yes? Well, I might let you borrow my card, Chip, if you're kind to me. That actually was my point. D.D., thanks for the call. We really appreciate it. That's a good soul, by the way, a decent human being. Oh, I'm being corrected by Benjamin Netanyahu in Brighton. What do you say? Colonial ordinances were 1941. They were 1641 to 1647 to incentivize construction of wharfs and piers in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. I don't think we have that reason anymore, do we? I'm not sure. 877330 is the number. Paul from West Roxbury, thank you for calling. Yes, thank you for taking my call. Sure. Over the years, I've been frustrated that all these pretty much wealthy beach-owned, you know, beach or waterfront properties are making all these demands that you're discussing. And yet, any time there's a hurricane.

They're the first one to the state house saying, look, we need them out. Great point. Yeah. So what would you do if you were a state legislator, Paul, and they sought help? What would you do if you were a state legislator? Not from that community. The community is damaged by a storm. They come to this, and this is a community that doesn't allow beach access to anybody except those who live there, and they come for help to the statehouse. What do you do? Well, you can't do things on the spot. You have to do it preemptively, you know, previously. Okay, so what should the law be? What should the law be? If you're going to demand people not to come onto your property on the beach, then put it into some law. A hurricane comes. Apply for your own insurance. I'm with you. Paul, thank you much for the call. Well, I think what you could do is just say that if you're going to take money from the state of Massachusetts to fix your beach, then you've got to allow people from Massachusetts to go. 8773-1-8-970 is the number. Lisa from, oh, Rhode Island has got beautiful beaches, tons of beaches. Hi. Hello, Lisa. Hello, Lisa. Hi there. Hi. Do you hear me? Yes. A few years ago, I think like three years ago, Rhode Island made all public access to all beaches, even if you own the property. Wow. So it's like 10 feet from the high tide line where it's marked by seaweed. So what do you mean? You can walk on it, you can sit on it. Nobody owns the shore. Wow, I didn't know that. The whole public is what she's saying. That's pretty incredible. Now, Lisa, you may not know this, but in Massachusetts, the argument against doing exactly that is it would be a taking under the Constitution and the property owners, and essentially your state is taking their property to which they had exclusive access and they'd have to be compensated, which would be immense. Was that an issue in Rhode Island or you don't know? I don't believe, so I can't even imagine that, no. But I know. But I know. But Lisa, that was the case, because we have a lot of shoreline. I know you do. It's beautiful, too. I think there are parts of Newport that, where you have to belong to certain parts of the beach to go or in Narragansett. There's parts of Rhode Island. You know, there's beach clubs, right? Remember Sheldon White House? That's it. Go ahead. Go ahead. But those are higher up. The clubhouse is higher, but where the high tide line is, you can walk and sit and feet above that high tide line. That's fabulous. That's great. I think that's great. And by the way, Lisa, thanks for the call. The least the Lighter could be doing is moving the... rights of the property owner from the low tide line or the high tide line. It's a lot of ground there. We're unusual. We are unusual. You know what's great? No. Most days you can swim in Boston Harbor now. If you go over to South Boston, you go over to Castle Island, you can swim there. I mean, that is a real...

happy result of all that legislation years ago, the water resources when they cleaned up the Boston Harbor. I mean, most of the time you can swim, and that's a public beach. It's open to everybody. You can usually park there, too. Can I ask you a legal question? Yes, Jim. This is from an anonymous text, and I think you're the person to answer it. For the beach access discussion, which is what we're having, why is it walking from one side of the property to the other along the water considered navigating? Marjorie, please take that. Well, I think, I'm not sure, Jim, but I think that's because you navigate in something like you're navigating in the car or on the bike or in the boat, but I could be wrong. You could be wrong. Would you like to answer that question? No, I would. But it's an excellent question, and we will refer it to our legal team in the very near future. Okay, let's squeeze in one more call here. Bob from Northborough. Thank you for calling. Hi, Bob. Hi. The lakes, a lot of these lakes around Massachusetts are locked up where owners, I can hear myself. That's okay. That's okay. It's our fault. They own all the property around the lake and you can't get to your boat in. It's horrible. It's horrible. Yeah. Why don't you organize the neighbors and, like, storm the lake, Rob? Have you thought about that? I'm serious. I mean, it's ridiculous. But don't some of the big lakes, you know, Long Pond and Harwich, I think that's the biggest lake in the Cape. They have these public access places. I mean, what lakes are you talking about, Rob? There's a small lake in Northboro. I can't think of the name right now, but it's surrounded by camps in our houses. And you just can't use it except the owners. And there's several other lakes like that in Massachusetts. Oh, there definitely are. They're absolutely. Rob, thanks for the cold. Good luck to you. Thank you, Rob. Michelle in Chatton, New Hampshire says, well, we don't have sidewalks in New Hampshire. We've made some fun of that. We have a lot of lake shoreline and a little ocean available to the public. Winipasaki is a huge lake that people can go to. I've heard of it. You heard of that, too. I have. Why doesn't the legislature do anything about this? Would you not agree that, unless you live in one of these little coastal towns, everybody in Massachusetts is on one side of this? You ask me all the time why the legislature doesn't do anything about it. You know, because they almost do nothing about almost anything, which is really too bad. But since most people don't get involved in their legislature, that kind of keeps happening. Why don't you champion this issue, by the way? I mean, I'm serious. You're like a Cape person part-time. You understand the issues. I do understand the issues. You were the only person I knew who knows the definition of fouling, which would help you if you were lobbying at the State House and a legislator said... Ms. Egan, what is fouling? You know, how long do you think you last on the shoreline of the state of Massachusetts if you were there with your rifle shooting birds? I just don't see. It isn't a rifle. It's a shotgun. Okay, well, even worse. I just don't see how that's going to work out. We're going to happen. We are out of time. We're going to move on here. Thank you very much for your calls in Texas. After this quick break, we're going to talk with Boston Globe business columnist Shirley Lange, who's back from vacation. We're going to talk about Harvard winning a court settlement against the Trump administration about anti-Semitism.

She's also going to update us on Boston's wealth gap. Shirley's lying from the globe is next. You're listening to Boston Public Radio 897 GPH, live from the Boston Public Library, streaming at YouTube.com slash GPH News. PR and GVH 998 p.m. Marjorie Egan Jimbrowdy. We are streaming live at YouTube.com slash GVH News. Live music, spectacular live music with Red Price in a couple of minutes. Rick Steves, Travel Guru, Rick Steves, will zoom in at a little after 12. And Sue O'Connell, who's been in the courtroom for the Lindsay Clancy trial every day. We'll also zoom in sometime in 12 o'clock hour. Can I say where you just were? Is that okay? Yes, yes. Freshly back from Alaska. We're joined now at the BPL by Shirley Young. Shirley's the business columnist of the globe, one-half of the fabulous Power Play newsletter duo with John Chesto, and host of the Saymore Podcasts available wherever you get podcasts. Welcome home, Shirley. Nice to see you. I love Alaska. It was... Beautiful. It was beautiful weather. It didn't rain. I was afraid of mosquitoes, but I was not bitten by one. Oh, good. The tour guy kept on saying that those of us who were there at Donali Park, we got to see Mount Donali. And he said, welcome to the 30% club, because often it's... too cloudy to see it. So you only see it 30% of the time. Is Denali the one that Trump changed the McKinley? McKinley, yeah. Biden changed it back. And now it's technically McKinley again. But our tour guy still calls it Denali. Good, good. I like that. So Shirley, Harvard is one-one against the Trump administration. Again. Yes. Tell us what happened. So yesterday a judge in Boston, a federal judge dismissed the Trump lawsuit that claimed that Harvard failed to protect. Jewish students during the war in Gaza. And so it was pretty straightforward saying that... did not prove that there was kind of ongoing civil rights violations of Jewish students on campus. And by the way, it makes Harvard you reference, three does nothing. Three lawsuits against Harvard for three different things by the feds. They've lost those three. I'm going to raise the point I raise with everybody, including Judge Gardner when she's here, Andrew Cabral, former public safety secretary and former prosecutor. There is no penalty for the Trump administration. to file frivolous lawsuits against anybody. Unlike this Olympian guy, the bikers, a normal cyclist, normal person, who went to great expense. Harvard can afford this? It is unbelievable that these judges, when they dismiss these frivolous lawsuits, don't...

issue imposed some sanctions on the prosecutors when the litigation was completely without merit. And so there's no disincentive since Trump's lawyers are, quote, free. I make it every single thing. Why couldn't they make Trump administration pay for Harvard's legal bills? They should when Harvard should ask for. That happens in a lot of frivolous. Right. Well, we've also asked Andrea Campbell, who's the Attorney General, when they've won frivolous lawsuits brought by the government, why aren't they asking for the DOJ lawyers who made false representations of the court to be held in contempt for a lie? I mean, it's just, it's, they get away with everything. Yeah, they should do that. We should, you know, the AG and everybody. I don't know if Harvard wants to poke the bear even more. They're not even commenting on their victory, by the way. Won't the Trump administration appeal this like they appeal everything else? Probably. I mean, they, but it still costs a lot of money to Harvard. And they're still going after them. As the story points out, they're investigating in their financial aid practices for foreign students and suing over alleged racial binds. and admission policies. But they've lost every one of the lawsuits so far they filed against Harvard, every one that they file. Well, it's kind of a trend. I think that, I mean, the administration has lost also. I mean, look at what they're trying to do in the Department of Justice of losing everything there, too, an awful lot of things are losing there. I know that they're going to prevail with the 86-47. lawsuit against James Comey, the former head of the FBI, or, you know, look at the thing with the algae in the pool. They lost that one, too. They lost Letitia James, the Attorney General of the Adam Schiff. They were going after Adam Schiff. They've lost a lot of these things. Well, but it's part of their strategy, right? Exactly. It's a strategy of distraction, too. And it's a chilling strategy, because if you don't have the resources of Harvard, you might not exercise rights that you're otherwise entitled to exercise for fear that you're going to have to spend zillions of dollars in court. We're talking to Cheryl. you know this is a fitting day for the reporting on this family well thing One of the people who was involved in the original version, who has been trumpeting this, Lee Pelton, his last day as head of the Boston Foundation, is today. And we've been talking to Lee for years about the update. And everybody knows about this. When originally came out of the Federal Reserve more than a decade ago, reported extensively in a series on racism in the Boston Globe, by the way, it was spectacular, I think, in 2015. The average wealth of a white family was a quarter of a million in Boston, and the average wealth of a black... family was $8 and those numbers have been updated and expanded. What do we learn? Right. So last time the study was a much smaller group and this time, an even more ambitious study. It was really a survey of...

5,000 residents across Massachusetts, a deeper dive into family wealth. And, you know, the numbers are, you know, I think for me, the surprising numbers are about Latino families in Massachusetts. They have a medium net wealth of just $1,200. Black families have more at $7,800, just a little bit more, but then compare that to white families, you know, on the other hand, have a medium net wealth of almost more than half a million dollars. And Asian Americans... Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander families are at around $305,000. So still huge economic disparities. Racial wealth gap exists in Massachusetts. I think the other startling thing is the difference between rural and urban. Rural families have a lot more money. I guess the thinking is that white wealthy families like to move out into the suburbs and have a lot of land, and then the poor families are stuck in the city. The other thing is the amount of emergency money on hand, right? A lot of families only have $400. This is heartbreaking. A third of the people in Massachusetts could not come up with $400 in an emergency. I mean, how horrible is that. By the way, forget the emergency. How about living with a thought that if there is an emergency that involves your kid, for example, you couldn't come up with $400 to do whatever it is you attempt to do. Well, I think a lot of this, too, has to do with this. the ability of white families to buy houses many years ago. Yes, homeownership. And the racism and these bogus mortgages that people got and red lighting and all that sort of stuff. So the residue is still with us of all that. And it's still continuing. Right. I mean, the ability to owe a home a home, especially Massachusetts, where real estate has gone up quite a bit, that drives your net worth up. And a lot of families can't afford to buy a home. Yeah. Well, you know, One of this stuff is absolutely unknown. I remember I was stunned when I first knew that the GI Bill was supposed to apply to everybody after World War II. Well, it really didn't apply to anybody but white people. You know, in practice, you couldn't get the same deals. And so you went off to World War, and that created a lot of wealth for the baby boomers, right? Because that was the parents of the baby boomers. And by the way, is this Federal Reserve? Yes, the Federal. Same thing. Last time, 2015, it was Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. This year, it's also, they've been working out for several years now, this study, this follow-up study. And, you know, Boston Foundation provided some money to do the study. I think Eastern Bank Foundation as well, several others kicked in money to do this study again. And I'm hoping that it will just, you know, it really, I mean, on one hand, the results. weren't surprising, you know, kind of that racial wealth gaps still exist in Massachusetts, but it's nice to have new data. And one of the other things that I thought was really interesting, this also looked at estates and number of people who have a will or an estate or think they might have an inheritance. And I think looking at that, of course you see that black and Latino families, they don't. expect, you know, far fewer them expect to get inheritance compared to white families and Asian families. And often when we look at wealth, generational wealth, it's the ability to, you know,

generations that follow have higher net worth because they're able to pass on assets to the next generation, which allows them maybe a down payment for a home. Or they're passing down them. The home itself, yeah. Which one would argue makes a case against what this legislature toys with all the time, which is eliminating the estate tax. Because one of the things the estate tax does, I know people subject to it are not happy about it, obviously, but it's a leveler to a degree. needless to say. I think this survey, this study you're talking about, says only one out of six people leave an inheritance to whomever, their kids or whatever. And by taxing it, you're sort of, quote, spreading the wealth. So let's see if the legislators get the message. You know, Marjorie mentioned one of the key things in this report, which we'll look more closely at in the days ahead, is homeownership, as you both discussed. San Francisco, which is sort of like... Boston, except maybe even more expensive, as we know, is about... To get rid of, or maybe even has, I'm not sure what the status is. They're inclusionary zoning rules, which we have here. Explain what inclusionary zoning is for people who don't understand to begin with, Shirley, if you would. Yeah. And then explain why they're doing what they're doing. So inclusionary zoning means that if you're going to build a new building, you have to set aside a mandatory amount for affordable housing. It's 20% in Boston. I think in San Francisco, it's maybe not as high. Maybe it's 15%. Yeah, it was 15, and they want to lower it to 5%. And this was part of a grand bargain in San Francisco. I'm not sure if they have to vote on it, but I think the leadership supports this. But basically, in exchange for lowering the so-called IDP from 15 to 5%, the city would also raise money, raise funds, or raise some kind of funding to build more housing. presumably that would be including more affordable housing. So it's kind of a, it's not, there's a one-two punch to this deal. You know, it's not just lowering the IDP. Right. So that, so that to get the buy-in of the affordable housing people, not all of whom are bought in there, the notion. was they'll spend money on affordable housing, which obviously, I assume most people would support if inclusionary zoning by definition is probably going to cause less new construction than without inclusionary zoning, because obviously it's less profit for the developer. And so almost everybody involved, I assume, if the state or the city could do it. But the one, was that piece in the globe, by the way? It was in the globe, and it talked about how Chelsea and Waltham have already gotten rid of these requirements. And Cambridge is thinking about it. Right, but it also posed, the key question of poses, if I remember correctly, are we going to follow?

San Francisco's lead, and so far, Wu was saying no. And we should focus on the reason she's saying no, because she brings this up every month when she's with us. Unlike in San Francisco, where they're allowed to have a tax, a transfer tax on expensive property, which they're going to use to fund affordable housing construction. Mayor Wu has been attempting for years, as she honestly and directly, when she's standing where you are, Shirley, says, asked the legislature to give her the power within Boston. She's not asking to tax them in Fitchburg, but the reps and senators from other communities have decided they know better what's good for Boston than Boston's mayor does, and she can't get it. So the money isn't there to replace the inclusionary zoning. With an investment. Right. Right. So they're set up differently from us. And also they're not reducing their IDP in a vacuum. In a vacuum. They're doing it. One thing goes down. One thing goes up. Exactly. And so maybe there's something to do here on that front. And maybe this is. But I don't, maybe we can, maybe, I mean, there's a little more political will for the transfer fee, right? Some. Right? Isn't the government, you know, there's a governor. I can't remember where her position is. Jamie, do you mind checking? Is Governor Healy and support of the real estate transfer tax? I can't remember that. But you know what? You know, it's interesting, by the way, Mayor Wu, who I have to credit for, unlike a lot of people who deal with the legislature, who are ready to strangle them, don't have the courage to confront them. She's pretty forthright about. her anger about their not allowing Boston to run Boston. But last month I asked her, why doesn't she lead a campaign to change? I think it's Article 84 or 89 or something, which is the home rule thing, which basically says you can't raise taxes, you can't do liquor licenses where you're the expert, as we know from your brilliant work on that. Why don't you lead an effort to get rid of that so cities and towns can make their own decisions? And to say that she was lukewarm at best, Was an understate? Maybe it's something you can pursue. But she's been outspoken. I mean, she's, you know, as a elected leader, she's been outspoken. We need to redo these rules. Well, but they have to do something. The way you get rid of home rule is you change in the state's constitution. Someone's got to do that. Someone's going to lead the charge. Well, she is putting pressure in other ways by putting up candidates against incumbents. Here we go. Thank you, Jamie. The so-called real estate transfer tax is one of the key planks of guns. Governor Healy's multi-billion-dollar plan to spur housing around the state. Here's the key line. It was killed in 2024 by the Speaker of the House, Ron Mariano. That's what I thought. You know, quickly because we're running out of time here, but I was kind of surprised that Mass General Brigham was talking about partnering with Planeteer, the Controversial Day of Front. Palantir. They're the ones that have helped. find undocumented immigrants who are legal or illegal and deport them faster. They're very controversial and criticized for that. What did you think of this? I was on vacation in Alaska. Oh, you're on vacation Alaska. Okay. All right. Well, a lot of people at Mass General, there's people that complain, a physician complained, was very worried about...

patient data there where they want to share patient data with ice. Oh, wow. I think there's a lot of questions. I need to catch up on that. But they say the same piece said there's no contract yet. MGH said there's no contract yet. Yes, there's no contract yet. Before you go quickly, Brian McGorry, tell him, we haven't seen him in a long time. You should respond. You're the editor of the globe. You promoted a lot of people, changed a lot of positions. You and a new business editor, who we know pretty well. Yes, yes. Oh, yes. Beth Healy. Yes, we're very excited. Beth Healy, who is a longtime business reporter and Globe Spotlight Reporter at the Globe. She left us for WBOR. She's been at BOR for a while, yeah. She's the managing editor of Local News at BOR. And she is coming back to the globe next month to run the business section and to be my boss as well. So we're all very excited at her. for her to come back. The current business editor, Greg Wong, has a new role, you know, on the masthead. And then another business editor, Deputy Business Editor, Tim Logan. He's the new Metro editor of the Globe. And so... Didn't he take the famous photograph in the seaport of wherever it was? Oh. What was going to be the location of a new big company was totally underwater? He might have done that. He certainly wrote about it, I believe. And so... In any case, tell Beth Healy in the next manager meeting and tell Brian what our phone number is. Okay, yeah. I will do that. We're out of time, Shirley. Thank you very, very much. Shirley, the youngest business columnist for the Boston Globe, one-half of the Power Play Newsletter, duo with John Chesto, host of the fantastic same word podcast. We've missed you in the podcast, Shirley. Thank you very much for coming in. Coming up after this quick break, we are joined by hip-hop violinist, Red Price. Way to hear this music. Ahead of his new album release, Renaissance Man. I'm Marjoriegan. He's Jim Brady. This is BPR, GPH, NEPM, NEPM, and NEPM live from the Boston Public Library.

Welcome back to BPR and GBH and EPM, Marjoriegan and Jim Browdy, live at the Boston Public Library, streaming YouTube.com slash GBH News. It's time for live music Friday as we welcome back to the show. Brilliant violinist, Rhett Price. You probably know Redd, and we first met him, I think 13 years ago, actually, when he was here, from his hugely successful viral YouTube videos. Playing his violin in T-Stations across Boston, here's a little taste. Thank you, Taylor Swift. Since then, he's toured the country, collaborated with hip-hop artists across the industry, eventually landing in Italy while working with great Leon Thomas, and that's the inspiration for his just-released new album. It's called Renaissance Man, which also features photos of paintings that he, as in rent, has done. More info at ReadyPants. Yes, that's true. R-H-T-T-Y-Pants. We'll talk to him in a minute, but first here he is the Renaissance man himself, Red Price, performing three rings. Welcome back.

Oh, Red Price. That was spectacular. Yep. I was performing three rings from his new album's latest album, Renaissance Man. Great to see you again. Thank you for coming in. Put that thing on your head there, Rick. Yeah. Okay. Tell us about what you just played. Oh, that's a song called Three Rings. Man, what else to say about it? I mean, I produced all the tracks on the album. I never produced any music before as far as producing beats or whatever. I always worked with producers before. So it was quite the undertaking. You taught yourself? I read all the music production. That's pretty good. Yeah, I did. It started off pretty... There were some beats that definitely didn't make the cut from the beginning. It started off pretty shaky, but... I got it together. By the way, we should say, for those who are looking at him saying, why is this guy wearing sunglasses? He's got an ideal he's trying to deal with. I got an eye thing going on. That's right. And I think going on. You know, I don't want to sound. She's the musician. I am not. I'm just the consumer. Sort of. Every time we see, it's your fourth time here. I've never heard violin play. Like, you play it. This is from Little Kid in Texas with a fiddle. Is that where this old? grew from or what little kitten texas um the middle of nowhere in texas it's it's a place outside of a place called midland texas but yeah uh i grew up playing like fiddle music you know hold out hoe down stuff like playing fiddle by ear and then i came up here to go to berkeley and Fell in love with Boston and stayed here, you know. And the thing that most people first heard from it was the Taylor Swift cover. And then you did in our studio on Brighton. You and your former colleague did Eleanor Rigby. Oh, yeah. Just unbelievable. Thank you. But you're writing all your own stuff now, right? Yeah, yeah. I had a lot of luck with covers. Like tens of millions of views. Like we did really good. Did a lot of cool things. But... It was at that, like, I had that session in Italy with Yay, Tidalas, Sign, and Leon Thomas. And watching them work, I don't know, man. I was like, like, being able to explore things in the studio when you're creating, that stops to a certain degree with covers because the song's been created already. So, like, you already have the primers written. You can't throw anything you want at the wall. So that's really, after that, I was like, you know what? You know, anyone can play someone else's song if they're good at an instrument. You know? Yeah. Well, you don't only taught yourself how to create these whole things yourself and write the music. You're a Renaissance man as well because you taught yourself oil painting. Yeah. And tell us how you coordinated the paintings with the album. Yeah. So after that trip that inspired the album, when I was out in Florence, just looking at all the art, the Caravaggio's and like all the Michelangelo's and the sculptures and everything, I don't know, that just inspired me to kind of.

That's where the whole idea came from. Originally was like to play off of the Florence, the Italian Renaissance. But then also being like a Renaissance man, you know, oh, I did every, like I did all these oil paintings. I did all the production. The oil paintings are great. They're great. Oh, thank you. We're showing some, by the way. If you're at the library or you're watching on YouTube. Isn't that neat? They really are incredible. Which song does that go with? Leave the bottle. Leave the bottle. But keep talking. Go ahead. Yeah, that was the first one I did, actually. After I did that one, I was like, you know what? Maybe I'm not crazy. I could actually do this thing. So I did a whole bunch of paintings, and there's a self-portrait for the title track. It's called Renaissance Man. And just, it didn't like come easy. On that one, one of the eyes, I couldn't just get the eye right. I painted it 38 times. Wiped it off, painted it again, wiped it off, painted. Oh, it was awful. But it looks good now. It looks good now. You know the old saying, 38th time is the charm. Can I get back to something you said a minute ago? You played with the artist formerly known as Kanye West. Is he... As big an A-hole working with him? I'm serious, as he is in the world, or is he a different kind of person? Well, my communication with him was pretty limited. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was all, so I got there, and it was mainly, I mean, even Leon was out on the balcony working on stuff on his laptop the whole time. It was pretty much just me and Ty Dollar Sign. And the engineer. Yeah, Thomas is brilliant too. Oh, incredible. Yeah, I played on his last album. Oh, you did? The opening track, Slow Down. Yeah, I played the strings on that. So when you were just getting started years ago and we talked to you, I think, for the first time, quite a long time ago. 2013. And you were still, like, busking over in Boston Common and stuff like that. What was that like? Was it, I always wonder, I mean, if you're playing really great music and people just walk by and they don't, or they stand there and watch it for a while and they just kind of don't even throw a dollar in them. How hard is that? It's pretty heartbreaking. You know, I mean, like, I've played since I was four years old, so, you know. I don't know, when you played for, you know, 20-something, 30-something years, however long at that point. And then people just like walk by and I'm like, you don't even understand what it's taken to be able to do what I, you know? Yeah. But it also gave me an opportunity to learn how to get their attention. So when I play shows now, there are things I learned from, you know, how to get people engaged that don't want to be engaged. You know, maybe they come to a show because their girlfriend or their brother or whoever wants to come to the show, they don't want to go alone. So they drag someone along. I have to like to figure out how to get that person.

engaged in the show to where they're having a good time and enjoying it. How do you do that? I mean, you know, I have to judge the crowd, but I just, I learned how to work a crowd, I guess. Oh, okay. It depends on each individual person, you know, the situation. Can you, if you have time tonight, if you could talk to us, because in the middle of a segment, when people start walking out here, we don't really know how to deal with it, and so maybe you can give us a little time. Can we get, but I don't even have a question for this. Every time I hear you, and I do listen to you when you're not here, by the way, I've really never heard of violin. like this and so there's no question at the end of that but Well, thank you. I mean, it is. Assuming that's a compliment. It is a huge. I don't mean it doesn't sound like a violin. It does sound like a violin. But we have a lot of violinists here, and it's not played like that. Well, you know what? Most of them probably all grew up playing classical music. Maybe so. And playing in school and all that. And the school I went to growing up in the middle of West Texas, they didn't even have an orchestra. So they're like, hey, we've got a saxophone. You want to? So I played saxophone. I went to college at first for saxophone performance. I didn't know that. Yeah, and so I did saxophone for a long time, also doing, like, fiddle, you know, at home. But, so I think I just picked up stylistically certain things that you might hear, like, I don't know, like, Mary Ben-R-R-R-R-E, the OG hip-hop violinist that did all the original Yeh Records. She said the same thing. She was like, I've never heard anyone play like you. And I explained that, she's like, it kind of sounds like a saxophone. I'm like, hey. Well, let me just tell you that noted music critic, Darius, standing right there. Our buddy said it's the best when you're rehearsing in the morning. He said the best of anybody here. Anonymous texter, Marjorie is making me nervous. She's getting mesmerized like she did with that Scottish comedian last week. Put her fan on. So you're going to play again in a second. Yes, you are going to play again in a second. You're going to play Leave the Bottle, which is the song that went with that painting. So what was that painting? It looked like glass to me. Was it a bottle or glass? It was a wine glass. but if you look at it, it was kind of fashioned over the creation, from the creation of Adam by Michelangelo from the Sistine Chapel. Oh, yeah. Yeah, so I kind of... Yeah, so that was, you know, to tie in the Renaissance idea, I fashioned that after that painting and then added in a wonky wine glass and, you know, did my own thing with it. ReadyPants.com for the album, where can people find you these days other than buying the album, which they, of course, should do? Where are they finding it? I mean, right now I don't have any public things announced. So, yeah, they'll have to stay tuned to, I mean, socials are the best place probably, you know, at ReadyPants, which I chose just to not take myself too seriously, you know, so.

At ReadyPants on that evening. Despite the sunglances. Okay, why don't you put your headset down gently and Red Price is going to play. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you. Oh, thank you very much. Or not or something. Okay. Well, whatever. Okay, we're going to hear Red Price. The album is Renaissance Man and was you said before. He's got oil paintings to go with every song and get more information at readypants.com. I'm going to spell it. R-H-E-T-Y-T-Y Pants, ReadyPants.com. And here is Leave the Bottle. Price's latest album is Renaissance Man. For more information, go to ReadyPants.com. Thank you very much for effort coming in. Up next, we're going to talk to Rick Steves. He's here listening to GBAH on NEPM. Rick Steve is next.

Support for Boston Public Radio comes from Newbury Court, serving Concord, Massachusetts for 30 years as a not-for-profit continuing care retirement community dedicated to older adults. More at newberrycourt.org. And the law firm of Davis-Malm. Employment laws are complex and ever-changing. Representing both employers and executives gives their attorneys a 360-degree view and a deep experience of every workplace situation. Learn more at davismalm.com. This is listener-supported GBAH. When you donate to our station. Welcome to our number two of Boston Public Radio, 897 GBAH. He is Jim Browdy. I am Marjorie Egan. We are broadcasting live. from the Boston Public Library streaming at YouTube.com slash GBAH News. We have a little breaking news here before we get to Rick Steves. The New York Times is reporting that Luigi Mangione has pled guilty in federal court to shooting health care executive Brian Thompson. You may remember that. Shot him in the back on the New York sidewalk in 2024. I shot Mr. Thompson. He told the judge. And of course, because there are no cameras in the federal courtroom, which is an absurdity. We didn't get to see it or hear it. In any case, we're now joined by one of our favorites on Zoom, Rick Steves. Rick is an author, television radio host, owner of Rick Steve's Europe Tour Group. You can watch Rick Steve's Europe weeknights at 730 on GVH2 and his radio show Travel with Rick Steve. Sundays at 4 on 897GBH. Rick, it's great to talk to you. Jim and Marjorie, good to be with you again. Yeah, great to talk to you. Before we get started with the agenda we intended to talk to you about, we started the show today, Rick, talking to our listeners about an age-old problem in Massachusetts. It's only 12% of our 4,000 mile or whatever it is coastline is available open to the public. What's the situation in Europe with public access to beaches? You know, it's interesting because I was just in Greece, and they've monetized almost every inch of a lot of beaches that used to be pristine and wide open. And, you know, people move in and try to make money off of people going to the beach. Of course, in the United States, there's a lot of lakes that are entirely private-owned. I think in general in Europe, there's a notion that beaches should have public access. In England, they've got annual mass, they call it a mass trespass. And they just say everybody can walk everywhere. If you put a fence for your animals, you've got to provide a way for people to get across that fence. And the same approach is to beaches, you know, getting back to that England example, each year one time they get out and they trespass everywhere just to reassert. their public access to the trails. And I find a lot of Europeans are just astounded that our waterways would not have public access like is the standard in Europe. Maybe we could lead that charge, Marjorie. We're talking to Rick Steves.

So, Jim is a big traveler. You know, he's always zipping in and out of Europe, hanging out in the chancel lise and all that stuff. But he talked about before the show as well, how, you know, you've done this great guide to all these restaurants. You know, talking in Florence, where to go that's great near the Pontevacchio, where to go near the Duomo. But he's afraid when he shows up at one of these places that you've recommended with his tour, but it's going to turn into a tourist trap. And I know you hate tourist traps, Rick Steves. So tell us about that. Well, I was just dealing with that, Marjorie, because the reality is if you go to Santorini, where I was just a couple weeks ago, or if you go to downtown Florence, or if you go to, you know, the Latin quarter in Paris, the restaurants there survive because of tourism. So just because it's touristy these days does not mean it's a bad listing. But Americans should remember a big part of that is time. If you go to a great restaurant at 7 o'clock, it can be filled with tourists and be quite touristy. If you come back at 9 o'clock, the tourists are gone, and suddenly all the local people come out and eat. So sometimes you want to go when it's less intense and more easy, and that would be the touristy time. Other times you want to dive into that mosh pit of the European clientele later in the evening because they like to eat later. So you can time your visit to shape how touristy it is, and also... I've noticed that in my life, I just spent 50 days researching restaurants. The reality is most tourists don't want to get in a taxi and go out to the edge of town for a restaurant. They want to walk there from the famous sites or from their hotel. And that's going to be tourist Davidson, the old historic quarters these days. But my favorite restaurants are very often the ones that are a 10-minute walk away from the center or a bus ride or a taxi ride. And for me, the stakes are kind of high there because... If I'm asking somebody to cross the street for lunch, well, that's not that big an investment. But if I ask them to get in a taxi and spend $25 to get out there for dinner, it better be a good place. You know, Rick, we often have restaurant critics on the show. We almost outed the Washington Post restaurant critic a few years ago. Oh, yeah. Unknowingly, after 30 years of having his face shielded. So when they go into a restaurant... In almost all cases, the restaurateur does not know who they are. Almost everybody knows who you are. So how do you know you're not getting a special deal? Well, I probably am getting a special deal. But I go into a restaurant. I visit 10 or 12, probably 10 restaurants a night. I can't eat at all of them. I just, I experience them. I go in and before I'm noticed, I will. I will smell, I will listen, I will check the vibe, I'll consider the clientele, I'll look at the presentation of the food, the density of the seating, the kind of music, and more often than not, I can see people with my guidebooks. You know, if I'm going to Munich or if I'm going to Toledo or if I'm going to Lisbon, and I go to one of the restaurants I recommend, invariably somebody with my book will be eating there. and they'll see me and I'll taste their uh they'll give me a little taste it just says I have a little joke of nibbling up their when they thank me for the listing but if I I can talk to them and if they say well how's it going here and they'll say oh we this is our third night here we just love this place well who might say that's not a great listing if these people on their vacation liked it so much the first time they went back the next two nights so

I'm not a sophisticated, how fresh is the olive oil kind of food critic. I list a place for tourists in, you know, in Rome. And, you know, you want to go out to a restaurant in Tastavory, or you want to go to a good pizzeria, or you want to have your gelato. And I like to mix the welcome they get, the authenticity of the place, the value of the place, how touristy is it. I really like to be surrounded by a smart local clientele rather than a noisy touristy mass tourism clientele. You know, I've got very basic ethics. You don't want to go to a high-rent place. you know, with a big neon sign that says we speak English and accept credit cards, you want to go to a place with low rent a few blocks away. You want to go to like a no-name mom-and-pop family-run place. And the basic thing is a small handwritten menu in one language. If it's a small menu, they're offering a good value and making money. If it is handwritten, it's shaped by what's fresh in the market this morning. And if it's in one language, it's the local language. That means they're catering to tourists. They're dedicated to tourists. And I mean, not tourists, they're dedicated to the locals. And tourists are welcome. I like a restaurant with some attitude. I like an Italian restaurant that says no pizza if they don't really want to be a pizzeria. My favorite Italian restaurants have a little joke. They say, no pizza. And it's just designed to remind tourists that... This is a place that honors the local specialties rather than tries to hook the tourists. Hey, before we continue, is that scene over your right shoulder, your backyard? That's my backyard, yeah. Jesus, that is gorgeous. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. It's more beautiful than that because it's so smoky right now. You can't see the Olympic Mountains and the Puget Sound, so we're dealing with a little smoke here. But yeah, I'm really blessed to live here in the northwest, and we have a beautiful environment. Yeah, the wildfires out in Washington State have been terrible, hitting a lot of the national parks there. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's a thing in Europe, too. There's fires all over Europe. And one of my most common phrases these days as I'm traveling, and we talk about the impact of climate change is... I say drill baby drill, because that's the ethic of the United States. Let's get the money now and forget about the impact on the future and people south of the border and so on. But that's a whole other interview. So before we find out about your own personal odyssey through the Greek islands, you mentioned about going to places, as you just said, that have the handwritten menu and a small menu and all that, where they...

menu is written in the language, Italy, Italian in this case. Some people, like myself, I would say, you get intimidated. If you don't, I don't speak Italian. You get intimidated. You're afraid to go to a place like that because you are, don't speak Italian. What do you find generally? That's a very good concern, Marjorie, but I don't speak these languages. I mean, I'm pretty good in Italian because I've been eating there for 30 years. I can go to Estonia, I can go to Portugal and so on. And I've never used an app or a food dictionary or anything like that. Generally, you'll have an English translation. Generally, you have a waiter who can talk to you. And always, you can have a spirit of adventure. So you just got to kind of look around and see what other people are eating. And a lot of times I'll order by pointing. I'll have what she's having, you know, that line. But what you've got to know is the general, how does the system work? You know, there's a lot of skills for eating. And my challenge is to list a variety of restaurants and describe them in a way that people can sit on their bed in their hotel room, browse through the listings, and decide which place they want to go to. So the challenge is to... to provide the listings depending on do they want a romantic place? Do they want a noisy place? Do they want a place with a view? Do they want a traditional place? Do they want modern? Do they want vegetarian? And list one of each of those or a couple of each of those. Choose neighborhoods that are great. I really think the atmosphere is really, really important. And then you get to the restaurant and you've got to know what's their format. I was just at a restaurant in Germany, in Trier. And that's all about wine in the Mosul region. And up on the chalkboard, they had wines listed number one through number eight. And it was in a range from dry to sweet. And everybody has their range where they like a very dry wine, half dry, or sous, which is sweet. I don't know a lot of German words, but I know troken is dry, sous is sweet, and hob. Soos is, or hobtroken, is half dry or half sweet. So these are key words depending on what you want to communicate. So it's just fun to take chances. It's fun to understand the process and to have the rudiments. I mean, when you go to Switzerland, you see point one L. Point one L. Well, that means a deciliter. That means one-tenth of a liter. In Germany, you get a wine and it's a fertl. That means it's a quarter of a liter, 0.25. In Austria, in Austria, it's an octal. That's an eighth of a liter, 0.125. And the greedy Swiss only give you a deciliter, one-tenth of a liter. So I'm on a personal crusade to get the Swiss to loosen up and pour wine like the Austrians, at least, an octal. We're talking to Rick Steeves. Tell us about you just were on a tour through the Greek islands. I spent 50 days, Marjorie, updating my guidebooks this year. It was just wonderful. And I did the Greek Isles. I did northern Italy. I did southwest Germany and the great Swiss cities. Because we have, I have 50 guidebooks covering all of Europe. I've got...

10 or 15 researchers out there working, and I'm one of them, and my name happens to be on the cover of these books. And our new book is going to be on the Greek Isles. So it was really exciting for me to spend nearly three weeks on the Greek Isles. And every day on my itinerary, it says G10 and G6. And that means a guide at 10 o'clock for the daytime stuff and a guide at 6 o'clock for the restaurants and the evening stuff. And for me, that gives me a friend. and an expert and a translator. And I can go through there and just produce so much when it comes to research with a good local guide. And hopefully I get to know them, and if I like them, I'll recommend them in my book. But to me, a guide is a wonderful splurge. On my TV shows, people always see me introducing my European friend. I say, here's my friend and fellow tour guide, Alfio, or my friend and fellow tour guide Christina. And I like to joke, I'm just paying them to be my friend. You know, anybody can have these people to be their friend for three or four hours. And I get that to help in my research. So I was looking in Greece. My goal was not just to cover the famous islands. Everybody wants to go to Micanos and Rhodes and Santorini. I did. They're great. You got to deal with the tourist crowds, but that's okay. But what I did was I found a wonderful backdoor island within an hour, usually half an hour or 45 minutes by ferry. from each of those famous islands. So from Rhodes, you can go to Simi. From Santorini, you can go to Foligondros, and from Micanos, you can go to Tinos. And each of those untouristic islands had no airport and no cruise port, no plane and no cruise ships, and no promotional budgets. In fact, most of those islands have laws that prohibit people from making big hotel... buildings, constructions. You can't have more than 25 units in an accommodations, for example. I believe on Semi. So there's reasons that islands are touristy and there's reasons that islands are untouristy. And if you go to a touristy island and complain about the crowds, I think it's your own problem. Well, that means because of those restrictions, Ivanka and Jared won't be building there anytime soon, Rick. You know, Rick, you just spent 50 days there. What are the people in Europe think about the people from a country whose leader treats all of them like they're the enemy of the United States? How are Americans treated in 2026 in the age of Trump? You know, I've been going to Europe, Jim, for 50 years, and, you know, there's a pendulum. It kind of goes back and forth, and different, depending on the news. I remember for a decade, I would go to Turkey. And one year, all the people I met would say, I would say, I'm an American, and they go, oh, I love America. And the next year, I'd say, I'm an American, and they would say, what was the word, they'd say, fascist imperialist, fascist imperialist. That was the... Their media had told them that we were fascist imperialists, and the next year we're friends with them. Well, it's flipped back and forth, and it's kind of superficial. But right now there's something fundamentally different that I've never encountered, and it's just the United States is the bully. The United States is insisting on this. When you turn back the covers on the art of the deal, it's just win-lose and have more lawyers and just bully your way into dominance.

And that's showing up with our relationships with the best of the world. So, having said that, what is the American's reception in Europe? I've got... I've got 30,000 Americans traveling around Europe on my Rick Steve's tour buses this year, 1,200 different tours and 40 itineries all over Europe. I'm very keenly interested in how our travelers are being received over there. And nobody, and I would hear about it if this was not true, but nobody is reporting they're treated rudely as Americans traveling around Europe. People are frustrated, bewildered. disappointed, confused at our government. They're confused that we elected this person two times after learning what he was all about the first time. We had four years to think about it, and we said we want more. So the fact is, we've got a country that is not reliable as far as being a friend of our European allies, and Europeans are very disappointed in that. But they know that every country is, you know, 50-50 or 40-60 or whatever. And Europeans know that the people they see traveling are generally. I mean, if you had to vote having traveled or if you had to have a passport before you could vote, our political landscape would be totally different. So I think Europeans realize the people they meet are not... with the same mindset about this bully approach to the world that our government is right now. Long story short, you received warmly in Europe. I was just there for 50 days. I've got 100 guides working all over Europe right now. I've got my staff in Europe researching guidebooks. It's not an issue that people don't like Americans now. The issue is, are we going to be able to travel in the future with wars and climate change and tariffs? or dollar dropping or whatever, you know, those are the issues and those are the consequences of our approach to the world from our government right now. Rick, it is wonderful to see you and talk to you as always. Thanks so much for your time. Yeah, thank you, Rick. All right. Thank you very much. Happy travel. Happy travels to you. We have been speaking with Rick Steve's author, TV radio host, owner of the Rick Steve's Europe tour group. You can catch Rick Steve's Europe weeknights 730, GBAH, Channel 2, and his radio show, Travel with Rick Steve, Sundays Sundays at 4 o'clock on 89.7 GBAH. We always love to talk to Rick Steve. Coming up after this quick break, our meeting is Sue O'Connell. She has been covering the trial of Lindsay Clancy, who of course killed her. three children. She's going to give us an update on what happened in the courtroom this week that you may not have seen because you weren't there. Sue O'Connell next. I'm Marjoriegan. He's Jim Brown. You're listening to BPR 897GBH live from the Boston Public Library streaming at YouTube.com slash GBIH News.

Welcome back to BPR and 897 GBAG, Marjoriegan, and Jim Browdy, streaming at YouTube.com.com slash Gbhages. Join now by Sue O'Connell, Courtroom Insider for Conwell's Confidential, the Lindsay Clancy trial on NBC10, and Holly Jackson now on NBCNews.com. Good day, Sue O'Connell, nice to see you. Good day to you. Good day to you. Yeah, Sue O'Connell, this has been one really heartbreaking trial. I mean, the jurors are crying. Defendant is crying. Everybody's crying. We have three little kids like this. But tell us, give us, you talk about what we may not have seen because we're not in the courtroom like you. So tell us what went on this week and what we may have missed. Well, I think the big deal is that it seems that the prosecution has rested, although they didn't officially rest on yesterday. So we're expecting that Kevin Reddington will present his case starting on Monday. I was not in the courtroom for the autopsy photos that were shown on Wednesday and the testimony from the two medical examiners. And I'm really glad I wasn't, I have to say, because I heard from my colleagues that it was absolutely horrific and wrenching and jurors were crying. And it offers the question as to exactly what this prosecution thinks they're doing. To date, they really haven't made the case that Lindsay Clancy was anything other than before the killings. a wonderful mother who was seeking, desperately seeking mental health treatment and very worried about the medication she was on. And by showing these autopsy photos, remember, she is conceded that she killed the children. There's no argument here. A lot of experts who are smarter than I think that the prosecution really went too far and that some of the jurors may feel that they were. you know abused in some way by the prosecution by having to look at these photos the judge actually uh lindsay clancy was sobbing so loudly uh during the first emmy that they abruptly ended and took her out the second emmy that ended on an objection, Kevin Reddington made that the prosecutor was impeaching her own witness, which is a crazy idea to think when you have an expert medical examiner up there. And that's how that testimony ended. So I don't know what our tax dollars are doing here, but we're definitely, I think the prosecutor's overstepped with the autopsy photos and testimony this week. You know, we should say, because just in case people don't know about this case, the children were five years old, three years old, and eight months old. She sent her husband out to get a stop at CVS and get takeout food. And while he was gone, she strangled the three children with exercise bans and then cut herself and apparently trying to commit suicide and then ended up jumping out the window. And now she's paralyzed and in a wheelchair.

Sue, you know, we have mentioned, I think we said this to you last week, we've discussed with Andrew Cabrella a couple of times. This is the same judge who handled the Latarsha Bernie Sanders situation out of Brockton where the state's highest court reversed her conviction the other day. She killed two of her children. I'm sorry, I should have said that, yeah. And Ivana Abraham and the Globe was written, both of us think terrific. pieces, particularly around Bernie Sanders, but now obviously updating it because of the commonality, not only of the crimes, but because of the same judge and the same prosecutor Cruz. I don't know if you're privy to sort of talk in the halls kind of thing, but you seem to be the talk in the holes kind of gal. And out in the street, is there discussion around the issue that Yvonne raised that I'm sure people raised even without her about why Cruz decided the DA decided. to charge her with first-degree murder rather than... Yeah, I mean, he definitely overcharged her. I mean, there is no doubt about this. We could actually make a case that they could have charged her with manslaughter. They probably would have gotten a plea deal. Yeah. He is known as being a very vigorous DA, so there's that challenge right there. As far as the judge goes... He seems to be letting just about everything in during this case. Well, explain why that's relevant. Explain why that's relevant, Fies v. Bernie Sanders. Yeah, the Bernie Sanders conviction was overturned by the Supreme Judicial Court based on the fact that the Judge Dan Sullivan did not allow her psychiatric history in. There's some differences in the cases. She was not seeking psychiatric help before she killed her children. But nonetheless, there's a TikToker out there who used to work at McLean Hospital. She's not just a TikToker. She's also, I believe, a psychiatric nurse. Who was... disputing some of the claims the prosecution was making about McLean. And Reddington, the defense attorney, Kevin Redington, said, well, let's bring her in and let's talk about the staffing at McLean when Lindsay Clancy was there. And this nurse wasn't even there when Lindsay Clancy was there. And the judge is like, well, let's have a voir dire. Let's bring the TikTok her in. Let's see what she has to say. So I think that the judge is really allowing a lot more evidence in. But the case remains that DA, Cruz overcharged this case. He overcharged the Bernie Sanders case. And again, I'll remind folks that the district attorney position is an elected position in our state. So you can have a say on how your law gets applied to women in peril. You know, I've said this before, but I'll say it again, one of the things, and correct me if I'm wrong, I've learned from this case, is that he was a woman that was hearing voices to tell her to kill her children, and yet on the very day she kills her children, she said the pediatricians with one of them, and the pediatricians saw nothing amiss, and some of the people that knew she, they knew she was struggling with depression and postpartum depression, but...

Very many people did not realize the extent of this. So this is kind of a lesson. Apparently one or two of every thousand women that give birth wind up in this situation. This is a real lesson in how difficult this is to diagnose, it seems to me. Yes, and also to, you know, some of the text messages and notes that were running court this week, you know, she indicates that she was searching for hallucinations. She was searching for psychosis. She was searching for sociopaths. She didn't share that she was having hallucinations or having visions of hurting her children with her health professionals. And of course, you make the argument, lots of people don't because if they're a pilot or a doctor or a police officer or a nurse or they share it in their children, they go through a divorce, they might lose their children. So we don't have a safe space for people to share those feelings and concerns and get treatment. and still not lose their jobs if they're able to get cured and go back to work. So that's the issue here, too, that the prosecution is making. She didn't share those extreme issues with her care team, and therefore they couldn't diagnose her with psychosis. But we also heard from a prosecution witness that there's a wider range of postpartum illness that just isn't getting diagnosed properly. You know, by the way, we've got a couple of texts. Let me read one. Anonymous texter. Lindsay Clancy, Capital Letters, is accused of capital letters, is accused of, capital letters, is accused of capital letters. She's accused of, capital, she's accused of his first-degree murder, which is a legal term of art. But for the texters who are sending us notes, she's admitted that she killed her kids. Although, you know, there's this whole conspiracy theory. all over the internet about her husband. So what's that about? Or ex-husband, I should say. Right, because people, you know, instead of trying to make maternal care better or making access to mental health care better, are busy trying to solve a case where the defendant has admitted to the basic facts of killing the children. They've got all these theories about what Patrick Clancy did or didn't do and what he may or may not have been doing. Well, let me tell you this. is a defense attorney for 40 years. He has had hundreds of murder cases. He got that doctor who strangled his wife to death, a manslaughter charged, convicted a manslaughter instead of murder. He defended Whitey Bulger's girlfriend. That's right. That's right. If he thinks that there was an ability to bring the husband in as a third-party culprit or as to bring any doubt at all that, you know, Lindsay Clancy didn't do this, he would not have submitted that, you know, conceded that she killed the children, and I guarantee that we would be investigating and hearing a lot more about Patrick Clancy. Because Kevin Reddington is not going to leave evidence on the table. No, he's a great, he's a great player. Can we say on Reddington for a minute? I learned a little factoid that I thought it was interesting about

Reddington the other day, because most of us know him, obviously, for his vigorous defense of people in murder trials, and as he said, all these high-profile people. It was brought to my attention the other day. He also was the defense attorney for former governor's council member who called our show one day called Marilyn Devaney when she was accused of assaulting a clerk with a curling iron. The hairdresser. And we were talking about that. She called in. And by the way, the end of this interesting little historical factor. guess who was the reporter who was subpoenaed in that case? Do either of you know? No. No, she's currently the press person, the communications director, for the governor of Massachusetts, Jillian Fenimore. I did not know that. She was a reporter. So there's a little stuff you thing. Yeah, it was a curling iron snafu at the beauty parlor. You know, Sue, you say on your Twitter and you say it all the time, I'm a commentator, I'm not a reporter, what does it do to a real person? who is not a straight reporter sitting in a courtroom through harsh shows like this. Yeah, I mean, it's awful. And it's not just, it's not just me. I have to say this case is so terrible that some of the veteran news reporters who have covered for years, both the print and TV. Everyone has been disturbed and moved by this case on every level. And I'm happy to say that we're all sticking together. NBC is offering counseling to NBC employees. Our bosses are sending us pizza once a week. And we're all trying to stick together to support each other. We are being paid to be there. So I want to just make sure we keep the jurors in our thoughts and prayers and minds because they're just citizens doing a really, really difficult job. So those of us getting paid there, this is what we do. But the jurors are the real heroes here. I want to pick up one thing you said before you leave. If our bosses are listening now, anytime Marjorie and I are depressed, send us a pizza, and that will do the trip. I mean, that's all we need. Sue, you're fabulous. You're doing great coverage. It's great to see you talking next week. Thank you, Sue. Thank you, Sue. You've been speaking with Sue O'Connell, our media maven. She is the courtroom insider for Commonwealth Confidential, the Lindsay Clancy Trials on NBC10, and Hallie Jackson now on NBCNews.com. Okay, we're going to go to something much lighter. Well, maybe not lighter, because people seem to be pretty worked up about this. We're going to open the lines to get your thoughts on some summer sounds. Apparently, lots of people could live without. The crack of the bat, we love that, but the thwack of the picket ball paddle, not so much. Pickleball uproar, fist of cuffs on the pickleball courts. We're going to tell you all about it. I'm Marjoriegan. He's Jim Browdy. You're listening to BPR 897 GBIH live from the Boston Public Library and streaming at YouTube.com slash GBH News.

Welcome back to BPR 897 GBIH, Mardrigan, Jim Browdy was streaming at YouTube.com slash GBAJews with Library. After years of complaints about this sound... Thank you. I love those five-second delays, by the way. That is a pick-a-ball. Okay, enough of that. That's a pick-a-ball thwacking sound. Great story in the globe today by Brian Hecht about a situation in Massachusetts. This coastal Massachusetts town has taken action, and they have instituted a quiet ball rule. It's called Marjorie. As of this week, players at Mashpee's public pickleball courts, love saying, pickleball, must switch from the classic... plastic bowls, which cost almost nothing, to a new noise-reducing foam or 3D printed bowl. The most expensive ones are 50 bucks a pop, but they got cheaper ones. They're $3 or $30. Now, but still a lot of money. Anyone who dares swag loudly must go toe-to-to-to against one man who lives so close to the courts. He hears the ball noise endlessly during waking hours. They're open 8 a.m. to 7.30 p.m. That is really an aggravating sound. Okay, can you play that one more time, please? I think I'm on his side. Okay, one more time. Okay, I mean, but that person's like sitting on the net. No, well, he is 200. Oh, my God. Okay, we heard it. I mean, we heard it. He is 200. I'm not done yet, by the way. Ernie Barrows, 250 feet from his house. Fine. Okay. So he's so fed. Good. Ernie Barros, whoever he is, is so fed up with a noise. He's retained. I love this. Marjor told me about this this morning. A pickable noise solutionist. That's this guy's job. Who tours the country taking sound readings for fed up constituents. He successfully sued the town of Falmouth. I didn't know this. To permanently close the pickable court near his home. So here's the question. Pickable enthusiasts, and by the way, it's still the fastest growing sport in America. They say as many as 48 million people, which I cannot believe are playing? What do you have to say for yourselves? And more broadly, is it time to end the tyranny of the ping and the thwump and the thwack of pickable, or are you a pickable enthusiast who would rather they pry the handle paddle from your cold? dead hands. The number's 877-301-89-7. You play pickleball? No, I've never played pick-a-ball. Do you play pick-a-ball? No, I haven't played pick-a-ball. But tensions are really high over this in Mashby. It's been Ernie Browns has been a hatred campaign against him. He's getting crucified on social media. On the other hand, 600 people have signed these petition. They do not want this to change. They're very upset. They're bishop. passionate about their pickleball, but this isn't just happening in Mashpee. Apparently it's happening in Wellesley. Last year, they have banned pickleball at certain courts in Wellesie and Killery Man. They did the same thing in Nantucket.

They floated banning picket balls anywhere on the island. Wow. People are driven insane by the pickleball sounds. He says he hears it in his sleep. Can I ask you a question? I don't mean to disparage any of these people involved, either the pickleball noise solutionist or the gentleman you mentioned. Imagine that for a job. If 48 million people have played, I know, I know. Pickle ball. What do you say to your friends? What do you do for a living on a pickable noise solutionist? Parents are very proud of this guy. In any case, I'm not questioning the honesty. Enough of the sound. It's driving me nuts. No, I love this sound. We have to get in the spirit of the thing. Okay, fine. We're in the spirit. And let me just say this. What am I saying? Oh, if 48 million people allegedly are playing pickleball. That's right. Have you ever heard the thwack of the pickleball? No, I don't live here. Neither have I. Well, that's because you live in a death. There's no place to put a pickleball where you live. No place to put a pickleball where I live. But poor Ernie here. Lives there a pickleball? Well, he built, he moved to this house. years ago, a dead-end street. Can I tell you what the solution is? What's the solution? The solution is not either banning pickleball, nor is it the expensive replacement ball. You know what it is? What? Hege. If they practiced, what's Hege again? Tell people where... Hege is like some Nordic crap. Where you like... It's a comfort thing. It's a comfort thing. That's right. Calm yourself down and you won't have to hire a pickleball noise solutionist at great expense. I think that's Ernie's point. Ernie's point that is not a very common kind of situation. By the way, because it was such upset about the $50 a piece balls, they decided that you can get cheaper balls. Did you say that? Yeah, but it's still not cheap. Three to $30 is not cheap per bowl. The actual pickle ball, which I've neither... ever played with, nor have I ever seen. It costs like sense kind of thing. How many people in the audience play pickleball? It's like five people. I mean, there's Edgar. There's a living dancer. Of course he plays pickleball. Of course. Okay. 8773-101-8-970 is the number. Who side of you on here? The beleaguered neighbor who is being driven slowly bananas by all these pickleball sounds or the enthusiasts who are so passionate about this sport that they packed meetings in Mashpee to fight for their right. That's a sore topic. I would say there are more people in Mashpee. protesting the quiet pickleball ball, then there are protesting in America, the war in Iran. Would you say that's a fair statement? Jim, we don't have time to protest. Because we're playing pickleball. Because we're playing pickleball. Okay, fine. Dan and Hopkins, I really can't take the sound anymore. That's enough. Thank you. Dan, welcome to the show. Hello. Now, that's a horse. Hello. Hi, Dan. How are you? Your first time caller? Your first time caller? Well, thank you for both. Yeah. So I'm a tennis player, and I've been playing tennis for, you know, 40 years, and every time I see a tennis court that gets resurfaced and turned into a pickleball court, I just get so angry. I understand that. Why is that? Why do you get so angry, Dan? Because they're taking away tennis courts. Yeah. And they're adding lines to tennis courts, and it's just very, very hard to...

track where the ball is supposed to go and it's just you know how do you feel inside how wait how do you feel inside when you see a tennis court that's been converted to a pickleball court how do you feel dan oh it makes me angry so you can tell you know dan you never hear anybody complaining about the sound of tennis do you know balls no you don't no why is that no Because we've got felt balls. Nice, quiet, felt balls. Yeah, nice, quiet, soft balls. Dan, that was an excellent first topic to Cole on. Cole again soon. Thank you very much for your contribution. He is wildly against the conversion of tennis courts to pickleball courts. And you don't hear people complaining about that. You don't hear people complaining about basketball courts either. Pickleball courts seem to be making a lot of noise. Maybe it's because the sound would keep playing that they're very upset about. Now, these... tennis balls that they want to replace, not pickleball balls that they want to replace the balls with. They're called the vortex ball. As you said, $150 for $3 in a pack. But the pickleball players are very upset about this. They're calling them garbage. And they're saying it's outrageous that they should be required to play with this softer ball. And they just won't have it. They're very, I mean, these pickleball people. 599 of those 600 protesters that never protested anything in their life until the quiet ball was introduced in Mashpee. And that was a bridge or a bull too far. Mia and Salem, welcome to the show. Hi there.

Whoops, we lose you already? Oh, listen to this. Wait, wait, wait. Mia's in the middle. Oh, sorry, Mia. Go ahead. You're still there? We lose you. Can you hear me okay? Yes, we can. Perfectly. Take it away. All right. Excellent. So, hi. I appreciate this. I was actually just a mashbee and can assess that there was a lot of typical ball. But I started a few years ago, saw the spanchy, spanchy gym membership just to play pickleball and had to drop the membership. But now I'll hear a.m. years later, recovering from surgery and looking to get back in sports. And I've realized more now, like, how accessible it is. like you can really set your own tone and pace depending on who you're playing with. You can either do like still like dink back and forth or, you know, it's just like a leisurely type of sport where you can set your own face or you can go hard and, you know, slam it against the other team depending on who you're playing. You know, I'm so glad you called. We should have mentioned that point. I have a friend who shall remain unnamed who is the number one ranked woman in Pickable. in New England. And she was actually a huge... You do? Yeah, she was like a world-class swimmer. I'll tell you off the year. Oh. You know, pick-a-ball, you hang on pick-a-ball players? Not really, but she's one of the most competitive people. I mean that as a compliment. Mia, what we hear from pickleball players, whenever we talk about it, is how collaborative, maybe that's not the right word, but how non-aggressively competitive it is for most people. Why is that? That's a great question. You'll have to ask the other non-competitive people in the world because I am quite competitive myself. However, again, it's just all about who you're playing with who's on your team. I've had leisurely games where I'm just looking to learn from other people who I'm playing with and other games where it's like, no, I know I can take these people down. Well, I tell you, I think the problem in Mashby is that they're over-pickle-balled. I think they're over-pickle-balled. That's the problem. They're over-pickle-balled there. The town manager in Mashby said he has never endured such an attack from the townspeople as this in two decades. Do you read the next paragraph? What? Those 600 people, none of them have been to work in years because... Once they took a pickleball, that's all they do. So wait, this person on YouTube says, and I am totally with this person, if they play the pickable noise again, I am done. And by the way, I am with that person. No, what is it? That's tennis. That's tennis. A lot of grunting goes on a touch. They don't grunt in pickleball. No, they don't grunt. No. They do really grunted tennis. Yeah, they're not going to pickleball. The Wellfleet Harbor Actors theater premiered a play two or three years ago, says a texter, called Pickleball Wars. Wellfleet is way ahead of the curve. It won a Tony, by the way. No.

I just wanted to see if you were paying attention. The play was very bad, says the texter, but they want to say that, you know, that wealthy was ahead of the game. Do you think, at my opinion, there aren't yet enough books on pickleball or plays on pickleball, no films. Do you know any pickleball films? What was that sexy movie about tennis? A couple of years ago. Oh, conversation or conversion. What was that thing called? Connection, something like that. Yeah, it was a very sexy movie back tennis. It began with the C. Not that C word. No, geez. Sheila from North Attleboro. Sheila, what's your deal? Hi, Jim Marjorie. Hi. Thank you. My kids in the neighborhood have taken to playing pickleball, so I have some empathy for the folks in Mashby. A couple of thoughts, suggestions. Maybe the tech people could come up with a soundproofing for the balls. That's an excellent idea. The expensive balls are theoretically like a lot less noise, but go ahead. Okay, well, that's one thing. One thing. And hours of operation, meaning they can only play at certain hours so you can plan accordingly. And earplugs. I don't know what else. to say. A taxpayer-funded earplugs for the population. I like that. They have put up sound dampening and fencing, but apparently it's not quite doing the job. And I think there are eight pickleball cords in Mashpee. Mashpee's not a big place. How big is Mashpee? It's not very big. And then they go from 730 in the morning or 8 in the morning until 7.30. That's a long day for poor Mr. Burroughs. There's 250 feet. Let's play this sound one more time. No, let's not. Let's play it. This could be, you could be Mr. Burroughs. This is your back deck there in Mashby where you've lived for years. Oh!

I mean, in all seriousness, you go out of your mind. You really would go out of your mind. You know what that sound makes me want to do? Become a pickable noise solutionist. When this radio thing cries up, that's next. Okay, enough, really, enough. The movie is challengers. It's not conversation. Okay. Heather from Cambridge, thank you for calling. Hello, Heather. Hi, Heather. What do you think? Hi. Hi. What do you think? Hi. Hi. I know about 30% of my friends who are between 50 and 60-something have taken up this sport in the last few years. And they love it. And it has given them so much fitness and a lot of community. And I think that's all great. And honestly, I live pretty close to part-time to a pickleball court down in Cape Cod. And I hear the kind of offline sound of the pickleball. I actually enjoy it because it makes me happy knowing people are happy. They're exercising. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You enjoy this? No, don't play the tennis grunting sound. Let's hear the pickleball sound. Don't go away. Just that. You like that? That's awful. I do because it's at a distance. And I do admit it's at a distance, but it's enough just to hear that little. Back and boy. You're a very good person. Heather, that was very nice call. Thank you for making it. Picklers have no etiquette. They run into neighboring courts during tennis play to retrieve their ball, break the tennis court net, lower it to pickle height. They're loud and obnoxious to get their own damn courts. That's pretty fierce. A lot of hostility there's a lot of hostility in Mashby. Oh, we have a Mashby caller. Frank. Hello. Which side are you on, Frank? Hi, I'm actually on neither side. I don't play pickleball and the noise doesn't bother me. Perfect. But I just wanted to mention a couple of things. One is that there is an absolutely beautiful indoor pickleball facility in Mashpee. No. Yeah, it's called Island Pickle. And it's got these stunning indoor courts. Really? It's got a great restaurant and bar. Okay. Do you own this place? And it's got indoor golf as well. Do you own it? Frank, do you own this place? Frank, do you own this place? No, I don't. Okay. So we go there a lot just for, I don't play pickleball, but we go there for dinner or we watch the World Cup there. They've got big screen TVs, and it's a beautiful spot. What is it called? Picklehaven? What's it called again? What's the name of the joint? It's called Island Pickle. Island Pickle. Now, Frank, don't go away. Frank, have you met the Pickleball noise solutionist in town or not? No. You have not. I avoid that kind of conflict. I'd rather protest the war. Okay. Very good. Thank you, Frank. Donna and Hobbson. I got one other quick question. Sure, why not? Yeah. There is a movie called The Dink.

It's on Apple TV. It's about pickleball. Oh, I'll be watching that. The dick. Okay. It's filmed at Island Pickle, if you were not aware. The funny thing is, if the pickle ball was a pickle, the sound problem would be solved. That's a great point. Now, we're done with this because every few months, the staff, in an effort to get back at me or Marjorie or both, put together a little reel of mistakes. Of mistakes. One or both of us have made. I'm told, sadly, that most of this focus is this. month on you, Marjorie, but you're a good sport. So here is what they are called. Well, I don't want to even use that name. Here's some, let's call them bloopers. The bloopers. The bloopers. The bloopers. The bloopers. From recent PPR. We're ready. Everybody's into pornography is the bottom line. No. I just want to make sure I'm not missing some big cultural change here. A lot of women are bisexual. And that was something about shoving glizzy after glizzy. I guess that's their name for hot dogs. Down my gullet. Glizzy after glissy down. Let's hope it's a hot dog. Yeah, that's right. How is the sex? It's like the number one. Not as good as you wanted to be. No heated rivalry. I like things with the bone in it. Okay, fine. They looked pretty good. It was very impressive. Well, I had a lizard once. You did not. I killed it by accident. Well, it choked to death on a cockroach. But I didn't need to kill the lizard. It was absolutely by a mistake. But, you know, I've become addicted to the sumo wrestler oranges. They're not sumo wrestler. I'm very upset. They kind of look like sumo wrestlers. There's a sumo wrestler and there's a sumo orange. Well, that's why I remember the name. That is an orange. They're big and they're juicy. Who was a guy who played that? Didn't he win? The movie. Colin first. The movie win? I don't know. I'm Jim Browdy. He's Marjoriegan. This is BPR 897 GBIH Live. What? I'm Jim Browdy. Oh, whoops. Sorry. I didn't do my breathing exercises today. So. A streaming at YouTube.com slash CBS. PBS. PBS. PBS. No, GBH news. Whoops. Sorry. Okay. Apparently, if you're going on the quoes, by yourself. On the cruise? On the cruise? By yourself. Marriage is what wings are together. You know what this show is to me? What is it, Jim? A dweem within a dweem. It really is. I mean, it's just so great. A dweem. Within a dweens. Is that it? That was not fair. Let's hear it for Marjorie Egan being a fabulous sport. Well, you know, you're going to be who you are, Jim. You're going to be who you are. Okay, thank you very much for listening to another edition of BPR 897. Thanks, everybody came down to the Boston Public Library. You can keep up with 24-7 over a podcast or check out our TikTok page at Boston Public Radio. On Monday, Jim and I are off. But Christina Quinn and Jamie Bologna, our producer, our hosting. They're going to talk with Boston Globe Tech columnist, Hiawatha Bray, plus Princeton's Khalil Gibran Mohammed. He's going to talk about the Harvard suit. I think. And we will air our new interview with Sasha Waters on this great new PBS documentary about the poet, Mary Oliver. It's fabulous. A lot of her life in Provincetown, of course. We want to thank our crew, Zoe Matthews, Handel Law, Ariana Gonzalez, our engineer John McClough, our executive producer, Jane Belonia, the BPL staff, Maddie Guy, Patrick Lally, Colin Cockrow, Juan Jose Cadena, our security team, Darius and Derek, and our host of the News Feed Caffe in across the street.

at the Lennox Hotel. Did you read this curiosity just thing? Because I wasn't listening. That's pretty interesting. Did you read that? No. Go ahead. Anyone years ago on VJ. Day, just a few blocks from here, a woman left a baby with a teenage boy. I'll be back in a couple of minutes. She never returned. Edgar is going to talk to that baby's daughter about her search for answers. That is great. That's pretty great. Edgar's it right after us on The Culture Show is here at the library. Everybody's at the library. At 2 o'clock, it's the culture show. I'm Marjoriegan. Thank you for listening. Bye. Bye.