The Spaniard just got a new bike Saturday, so he met me at my garden in the Fenway yesterday, and we biked along the Jamaicaway to the Arnold Arboretum.  We got a bite to eat at Wonder Spice in JP, and headed back.  Our route...

The bike path gets a little dodgy between Jamaica Pond and the arboretum.  If you want to know the truth, there really isn't a bike path between Jamaica Pond and the arboretum.  And there are spotty bits along the way where signage would definitely be a help.  On the other hand, on the way back, along the Southwest Corridor in Roxbury, the signage turns a bit sinister on you, what with the strolling and cycling skeletons...


Closer inspection isn't exactly comforting, but does reveal a more nuanced, if more mysterious message...


But, as Toti says, it adds to the sense of adventure.

So we stopped for a bite at Wonder Spice after the arboretum, as I mentioned.  It's a Cambodian/Thai place.  Very reasonably priced, good eats, and that Thai iced tea hits the spot, lemme tell ya.  But the deciding factor was the patio, although technically it's more of a spruced-up cage.  Ten-foot chainlink fences with razorwire across the top are gonna be reminiscent of a prison, no matter how many chinese lanterns you hang from them.  The waitstaff there is very friendly, though, so it's like a white-collar federal prison experience.  I did drop a suggestion in the box on my way out: why not take down the fence and just issue customers ankle monitors instead?

Speaking of signs.  The sign in the john was one of the most polite and deferential, too, considering the subject matter:


I mean, you can tell this is a classy joint.

Which made the view from the patio all the more vexing...


Now, you might think that gay guys would be all aflutter over any little bit of flesh one of these str8 bois with a beard in tow wants to flash at us, but you'd be wrong.  Mostly.  To some extent. Sometimes.  OK, so it's been a long winter.  Anyway, in this case, although those melons are smooth and ripe, the rest of the package was, frankly, a little too fleshy for my taste.  The dude was kinda schlubby, if you want to know. 

There's a line somewhere between cluelessness and provocation.  I kinda wanted to go up to his girlie and ask her if she knew her man was flashing his crack all over town. And tell her to go out to Target or wherever it is they shop and get him a pair of shorts  and some underwear that fit him.  But then, I've never been a big fan of the saggy draws movement, although I'm not sure it should be criminalized. If I'm gonna be seeing this all over town this summer I might change my mind.

When I took out my camera to snap a picture Toti asked me if it was going to end up on the blog.  I said, probably.  He said, is that legal?  I shrugged.  He's the one flashing his ass cleavage all over Boston.  It's in the public domain, innit?  I'm not unscrupulous.  I have a photographer friend who's been getting a little snap-happy with his iphone on the subway, taking pictures of mostly very lonely-looking middle-aged women looking frumpy and downcast and posting them to his facebook account.  I think it's probably bad karma, although I'm not sure what the intention is.  But lonely-looking middle-aged readers who ride the T: you've been warned.  Not everyone is considerate enough to only snap you from behind.

But my point is this: if you're assing about in public, like this guy, you're obviously asking for it. 

The scenery back in the garden was better — especially now the tulips are starting to pop:


Now, flowers can flash their junk at the world and we gasp at the beauty of it.  We don't hesitate to bend down to sniff them.  I guess the lesson is: modesty's not for everyone.