Beverly's offensive Horribles parade float that made fun of Gloucester's recent spate of teen pregnancy may have been sour grapes. It turns out that the much wealthier Beverly only lags 25 teen pregnancies behind its Cape Ann neighbor for the title of Preggers City, MA. Meanwhile, despite recent headlines, Gloucester's teen pregnancy rate has actually declined 45% over the past decade. [Herald]......

Some people in Beverly Farms who think they are funny decided to make fun of the abundance of pregnant teenagers in Gloucester during their "Horribles" parade. Horrible, indeed. The parade includes women with pillows stuffed onto their tummies mocking the teenagers in Gloucester who got pregnant. Now, that could be considered satire, and mild satire at that. If they stopped there, no one would have written a word. But whoever designed and planned the......

-- A 16-year-old boy was shot dead in Roxbury last night. Neighbors have identified him as Quamaine Williams. He is Boston's 27th homicide this year. No suspect has been named in the case. [Globe] -- A Gloucester couple pleaded guilty to charges that they photographed their 8-year-old daughter having sex and posted the images online. [Globe] -- A New Hampshire man faces charges that he raped five prostitutes in Brockton. [Herald] -- A convicted sex......

--A doctor and a nurse at Gloucester High School would like to give contraceptives confidentially to students, but Addison Gilbert Hospital refused, so the doctor and the nurse have quit in protest. They should do something, as the high school has had 17 teen pregnancies this year. [Boston Herald, WBZ] --Former Red Sox pitcher Geremi Gonzalez, who pitched for many, many MLB teams and was recently pitching in Japan, was struck by a bolt......

The Gloucester woman who struck the car that Sandra Bullock and Jesse James were riding in over the weekend is still feeling her 15 minutes of infamy. 64-year-old Lucile P. Gatchell pled not guilty to driving under the influence today in Gloucester District Court. She will return to court June 6. The police report said Gatchell's "blood alcohol level registered .20, which is more than twice the legal limit." The report added that she also......

A quick-thinking restaurant owner in Gloucester learned that a frozen ham can be an effective defense against a robber. On Wednesday, the restaurant owner came upon a man who was in the process of liberating meat from the owner's fridge. Not sure why he went for the meat instead of the money, but alleged robbers aren't always the brightest of bulbs. A waitress asked, "Who's that guy carrying meat down the street?" (We ask this......

--More snow on the way tonight! Get your space-savers ready! [WBZ] --Danny Ainge and Robert Kraft are Mitt Men. [Boston Herald] --Another fire, this time at a nursing home in Jamaica Plain early this morning. But a heroic rescue team managed to get a resident who was suffering a heart attack out of harm's way, and no one else got hurt. [WHDH] --Police are still looking for the remains of the man who died......

--After the panic, let's think about the fun aspects of winter--sleighs, end-of-year parties, presents, twinkling lights, and the general atmosphere of coziness. --This just in: The Patriots win, and the world learns that referees are sensitive about snowballs. More from the Redux tomorrow. --In Massachusetts' ongoing effort to get as far ahead of the political primary process as possible, the Globe has endorsed Barack Obama as the Democratic nominee and John McCain as the......

--Another storm is on the way starting tonight and running through Sunday evening. [WBZ] --One person died in a terrifying 8-alarm fire in downtown Gloucester last night. The fire also destroyed an apartment building and a synagogue. [Boston Globe, WCVB] --Regarding fires, b0st0n LiveJournal posted some fire safety tips. A lot of it is common sense (you really don't want to put the space heater by the curtains, ok?), but the reminders are useful. [b0st0n......

In the Oddly Enough story to beat all Oddly Enough stories, a bracelet that 31-year-old Aaron Giles, of Gloucester, lost in a Minnesota barn as a child has turned up again 25 years later and in a chicken gizzard. Giles told the AP that he probably lost his bracelet playing in his grandfather's barn. The barn was dismantled and moved to the town of Elmore, and workers in Elmore who were cutting up a chickens......

Massachusetts State Representatives Charles Murphy, of Burlington, and Patrick Natale, of Woburn, who are running against each other for a Senate seat, got all snippy with each other in the House chamber last Thursday. Murphy and Natale generally acted like two brothers who do the "Ma! He's touching me!" routine in the backseat of a car on a long road trip. Murphy told the Globe, "Natale employed a four-letter word or two and poked his......

Honest-to-goodness Nobel Laureates, along with a few non-Laureates, indulged their silly sides on Thursday night when Harvard University hosted the 2007 Ig Nobels ceremony. The Annals of Improbable Research magazine (that sounds like something Dave Eggers would have thought up) grants the "Ig Nobels" for achievements in "unusual and imaginative scientific discovery." Here's a list of this year's winners in all the Ig Nobel fields from the Guardian UK: Medicine: Brian Witcombe of Gloucester and......

The turf wars aren't limited to Boston. The Globe reported on an internal fight within the Gloucester PD that should make you feel a little better about the BPD's petty tiffs. A lieutenant for the GPD accused police chief John Beaudette of "running into him stomach-first during a recent confrontation over the deployment of officers." We looked at the Globe's picture of Lieutenant Jerris Cook, along with ones the Gloucester Times took of chief Beaudette.......

Gordon College, a Christian nondenominational liberal arts college in Wenham, received a massive influx of cash - $60 million dollars. That's nothin' compared to the bills that line Harvard's pockets, but, proportionally, this gift is a blessing, so to speak, for a school with an endowment of $33 million. Dale E. and Sarah Ann Fowler made the donation, and the campus will be named in their honor. In a phone interview with the Gloucester Daily......

Whew! We're so glad all those officials said that our bridges are safe. What's that? You meant safe to drive ON, not UNDER? Oh!! Silly us, our mistake. Thanks for clearing that up. The Tobin Bridge, Boston Authorities were clued in to a potential problem when Dan French of Londonderry, N.H., said last month a softball sized-chunk of concrete smashed his 25-foot boat's windshield. The debris from the Tobin Bridge has not hit anyone,......

Update: Good Blotter news! Thank you, tipsters, for spreading the word. Police found Starsha Tupper through bank records, and she is safe, according to the Gloucester Times. --If you're a robber, and you're looking for the big bucks, where are you gonna go? Isn't it obvious? The Yankee Candle store! Some robber dressed all in black held up the Yankee Candle at Quincy Market yesterday afternoon. Boy, he must be a thug – he wears......

What do you do ten days after Christmas when you've gotten a gift and you're still not sure what it is and you've really got to get that thank you card out to Grandma? Bring it into the office and start asking around. It will be an amusing game for everyone. This morning a teeny tiny shirt showed up with a co-worker, looked sized to fit a Cabbage Patch Kid. It had been received in......

When we first heard about Johnny Cupcakes, Bostonist was thrilled to hear about a new shop devoted solely to the art of the cupcake. (After hitting up Magnolia Bakery on our last trip to NYC, we are kinda obsessed with the 'cake.) Then we realized that Johnny Cupcakes isn't a bakery but a Hull, MA based brand of funky tees, sweatshirts and accessories that take the cupcake icon and integrate it into fashion. With a......

Bostonist became somewhat obsessed with the Boston Strangler case after reading A Rose for Mary which chronicles the case from start to finish with such detail that you are instantly taken back to that frightening time here in the city. Written by local journalist and nephew of one of the Strangler victims, Casey Sherman, the book definitely led Bostonist to question if Albert DeSalvo was indeed the Strangler as he confessed to being. When we......

Bostonist heard about the menacing incident on Marlborough Street between Fairfield and Gloucester. On Thursday, March 24 at 1 pm, a woman was screaming because she had been attacked. She was visiting from New York and was unloading her car. With a 5 month-old in tow and her purse on the trunk, a man approached to snatch her purse. She tried to grab it but he got it and when she went for her......