The city and Channel 4 celebrated Boston's 375th anniversary on Saturday with some cake and cupcakes at Quincy Market. It was every bit as surreal as it sounds. Anchors Lisa Hughes and Josh Binswanger spent an hour or so doing live shots in a floodlit area, standing with a small "375" cake in front of some Bostonians and many befuddled tourists who had no idea who they were or why CBS was broadcasting live but who nevertheless stuck around so they could periodically wave at the camera. Fortunately, there was a local woman in a lounge chair there to explain it all to them - after first asking puzzled looking people if they were from Boston, she'd explain all about Boston's 375th anniversary. Then, when she'd satisfied their curiosity, she'd complain about how she should have stayed home because then she could watch the whole thing live in comfort. In the photo above, Hizzonah cuts the ceremonial cake while one of his grandkids (lower right) eyes the frosting.
Fortunately for the teeming masses, who occasionally broke out into a "We want cake!" chant, at the last moment, a couple of delivery guys from Mike's in the North End arrived with two large boxes of sheet cake and cupcakes. Menino, an aide and Binswanger handed out the goodies. Menino handed me a vanilla-frosting cupcake for Greta ("here you go sweetheart," he said to her). But when she saw there was chocolate, she handed the cupcake back to me and demanded one of those. Nancy, meanwhile, was having none of the cupcake nonsense - birthday parties demand cake and so she asked Binswanger for a piece and, after he handed out some more cupcakes, he cut her a piece.
One local guy seemed stunned that he could actually see Hughes' legs (besides her blue "375" shirt, she had a red skirt on) - "at least I got to see her legs!" he said a couple of times. She also had some interesting footware:
