--Beware of the bears in Worcester. A 108-pound bear was found up in a tree yesterday. It was as probably as scared of animal control as animal control was of him. [Boston Globe] --Speaking of animals on the loose, watch out for Black Angus cows roaming through Groton. [WCVB] --Don't eat the tomatoes. And if you're wondering where the "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" joke is, Fox 25 beat us to it. [Boston Globe,......

The Harvard Lampoon has a grudge against the trees at Mount Auburn and Holyoke, and an editor was busted hacking on a tree in October. Now, the Crimson reports that the Cambridge Department of Public Works had to take down the rest of the trees on the same island James Powers allegedly vandalized because they were damaged so badly. Three Japanese maples and a crabapple were removed. Poor trees. If they could be reached for......

Street-cleaning day is dreadful on so many levels because it is all too easy to forget to move one's car. And then there are the annoying repetitive announcements that are boomed into homes: "You will be tagged and towed, you will be tagged and towed." But Boston has announced that they will start a program that sends e-mail reminders to residents when they need to move their cars. Matt Viser of the Globe reports, The......

Update: Mayor Menino and the Department of Public Works are investigating how this accident happened. Just when you think it is safe, manholes decide that you will be their prey. After a brief quiet period, manholes are taking it out on the masses again. Yesterday afternoon, two women were driving on Columbus Avenue in Roxbury. A car in front of them drove over a manhole, which popped up and flew into their car. Luckily, the......

When you see a city employee driving a street sweeper or a snowplow, you might want to give that person a wide berth. Either that, or run like hell. The Globe reported yesterday, "Of 178 Boston Public Works employees licensed to drive commercial vehicles in 2006, about one-fifth had drug or alcohol violations on their personal driving records." We're all for giving people second chances. Maybe even a third chance. This is liberal Boston! But......

Bostonist seldom delves as deeply into the weather as our big siblings at Gothamist, not least of all because we don't have a trained meteorologist on staff. One thing we do have, though, is someone who observes our city's pavement from close up. Based on these observations, it appears that, just as snow and its accompanying fender-benders have definitively arrived, so too have potholes. Usually, "pothole season" is said to begin with the spring thaw,......

If you have a pulse and have lived in the Boston area for any significant period of time, it's hard to miss the fact that things are changing. As the powers-that-be taut "New Boston" initiatives, revitalization efforts have been focused on our urban centers with the effect of -- whether intentionally or not -- accelerating gentrification in once neglected neighborhoods like Roxbury, Charlestown, or Dorchester. Perhaps one of the most effected has been Somerville --......