If you've been a faithful reader, you may recall that occasionally I'll stick a phrase in quotes and mention that I'll likely come back to that theme at some point -- recall "Interesting Jobs That Lawyers Have" -- but as of yet haven't. Well, here's another first in a series that may only be one installment long. I'll call it a "Cambridge Travelogue," only because I can't think of a wittier name that still indicates what I'm talking about.

Today's "Cambridge Travelogue" will focus on "North of the Law School."

Heading north of the law school I've found to be generally easier to deal with than heading South, because really there's only one street to head North on (Massachusetts Avenue) and it's really hard to get lost. Heading South into Harvard Square presents all sorts of problems involving underpasses, diagonal streets, locked gates, disorienting 5-way intersections, and a general lack of street signs. But heading North on Massachusetts Avenue presents none of those problems. It's hard to get lost walking up and down a 4-lane road with a big concrete median in the middle (is "median in the middle" redundant? Or perhaps it's the name of a TV show on Fox). Heading North one encounters a wide variety of restaurants and shops, none of which I've visited. One of the first things you pass when heading north (I'll stop capitalizing "north" now because it looks weird) is a Starbucks. When you see the Starbucks, it's reassuring, because you know you must be in civilization and you haven't accidentally wandered off into the woods. The unique flavor of Boston is reflected in ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about the Starbucks, which of course is a carbon-copy of every other Starbucks in the world. A few blocks north of the Starbucks are some ethnic restaurants -- Mexican, Indian, Korean -- that may or may not be good. A few more blocks and you arrive at the Porter Square Exchange, a small shopping mall with a particular focus on Asian food. It's actually quite interesting and unique -- there's an low-priced Asian food court I tried once (the noodles with seaweed were good... I didn't have my glasses so I couldn't read all of the menu, but squinting I saw noodles and seaweed and figured that sounded safe), a Japanese supermarket with all sorts of interesting (and cheap) food items, along with sushi-grade fish, a stand that sells bubble tea (good stuff -- see weblog entry from about a week ago -- although after just three trips there I'm kind of sick of it, which may indicate the novelty has worn off), and the world's smallest Barnes and Noble bookstore, which is really the Lesley University bookstore run by Barnes and Noble, complete with perhaps 5% of the selection of a normal Barnes and Noble (or the super-duper Harvard Coop in Harvard Square that's also obviously a Barnes and Noble, with what looks like a great selection) as well as Lesley University paraphenalia (the official colors of Lesley University are lavender and teal -- no, they're not, but imagine if they were!). Further north is the Porter Square shopping center, with a hardware store, a big Star supermarket -- with these awesome self-checkout stations I'd never seen before. You scan your own stuff and bag it and are outta there in a jiffy -- it's way cool -- and some other stores I can't remember. Further north are the woods. Maybe. I don't know. That's as far north as I've gotten.

In the next "Cambridge Travelogue," whenever that might be -- we head south towards Harvard Square, get lost, and have to buy a map to find our way back (don't laugh).