That's the way the cookie crumbles

Anyone from/living in Boston knows that the city is run by about 6 competent people and about 6800 total boobs.

A handful of these boobs work at the BRA (Boston Redevelopment Authority).

The BRA should been dismantled - it is mostly corrupt and out of touch with the needs of the city. Criticism of the BRA has come up recently due to the fact that they've made some questionable approvals with regard to university expansions in both Roxbury and Brighton.

On a personal level, yesterday they awarded a parcel of land to a neighbor. Let me just say that of all the people in the neighborhood there are two people I don't like and this neighbor is one of them.

Over the years I have watched him as he has slowly turned his house into a dilapidated sh*tbox.

First there was the "roofdeck" he installed. Cobbled together with stair balusters, bits of string, and odd ends of wood, it is mostly now rotted and threatens to blow away in a stiff wind.

Then there was the time he woke everyone at 2am by jackhammering the cement steps off the back of his house - in boxer shorts of all things. Then he built in wooden steps and added on a long corrugated shelter over the stairs, like a big slide off the back of the house.

Not done with the jackhammer, he then turned his attention to the side of his house, jackhammering a big rectangular-ish hole in the exterior wall. Which he then filled in with a piece of wood (to brace the space) and glass block and a wooden shutter.

When the building department came by, they asked him to close it up. He said he would but never did and that was about 5 years ago now. They also told him to sort out the "roofdeck" and that is still there.

So now the BRA looked at his application and decided he was clearly the best candidate for the vacant lot. And yes, I applied also, just to see what would happen.

The BRA has put restrictions on the parcel. It has to remain an open greenspace. And if he wants to build anything on it he has to submit architect plans for approval, and he can't use it for parking - among other things.

If he doesn't comply with these restrictions he will forfeit the property. At least that is what the BRA claims.

I say that is bullsh*t.

He is planning on adding more windows, a deck with an overhang, and a six foot chain link fence.

If it were any number of my other neighbors, I would be more enthusiastic. But because it is this clown with a jackhammer doing the work himself, I am kind of bummed.

As for the permits and plans he needs, I doubt he will complete that part since he has a serious disdain for city authority unless it serves his needs. When they started the street sweeping program, he ran out to the city workers, screaming at them that they were Nazis and took photos of them as "evidence" of their Nazism. Did I mention he is from Germany himself?

He will wreck the parcel just like he has done to the exterior of his house and to the apartment he rented over the winter and like the house he bought in western Mass when he thought he was going to move away.

Way to go BRA!