🦪 Just say shuck it!

Happy Friday, Boston!

🍻 And a happy International Beer Day! To celebrate, LoLa Burger in the Seaport is offering a fun pairing where customers can get four 4-ounce summer beers with four of their most popular sliders. And it’s only $35.

👀 What’s on tap today:

• 2024 ballot questions

• Beach bacteria tracker

• City Hall death slide

Up first...

SUMMER FRIDAYS

Shucks, sake, and slam poetry

It’s summer and it’s Friday, baby. You know the drill.

Here’s how we think you should spend your weekend:

🦪 Take advantage of the $1 shucks on National Oyster Day. This Saturday is for the mollusks. You can get $1 oysters ALL DAY at The Dubliner and Carrie Nation on Beacon Hill, and Waypoint Oyster in Harvard Square. $1 oysters will also be available during Bambara’s dinner service. And just a friendly reminder that these deals aren’t just a one-day-a-year thing: Here’s Eater’s list of where to find $1 shucks around Boston.

P.S., Speaking of seafood, the Charlestown Seafood Festival and the Nightshade Clam Shack pop-up in Lynn are also this weekend.

🤸 Feel like a kid again in Allston. Remember Field Day in elementary school where you got your face painted, tie-dyed shirts, and wound up soaked in a water balloon toss? You can do all of the above at the Charles River Speedway’s Field Day on Sunday. But instead of Capri Suns, there will be sake pops from The Koji Club. Admission to this fun afternoon of music, food, drink, and friendly competition is free, but sign up for the scheduled activities — spots fill up quickly!

✍️ Hear from award-winning poets at the Roxbury Poetry Festival. The second biennial fest kicks off Saturday featuring several writers, panelists, and curators, and includes a keynote address from 2022 MacArthur fellow Hanif Abdurraqib. Even better: It’s free and open to the public. You can see the schedule of talks and headliners here and register here.

🧘 Find your zen outside. On Saturday, you can find a free tai chi class on Castle Island hosted by Harbor Fit, a yoga and meditation session at the Arboretum, and yoga along the Charles. But if you prefer to get your heart rate up, Sam Adams Brewery is hosting a HIIT class on Saturday — yes, it comes with a beer — or try a Bollywood dance class with the Rumba Y Timbal Dance Company on Sunday.

🏮 Get lit at the Franklin Park Zoo. OK, not that kind of lit. The lantern kind of lit. The seasonal exhibit, “Boston Lights: A Lantern Experience,” is officially open, where the zoo’s 72 acres will be covered in exquisite light displays, including an 80-foot dragon tunnel, a 33-foot sphinx, and a coral reef featuring glowing marine wildlife. Timed entrances to the zoo grounds are available every day on the half hour from 6 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Grab tickets here!

🎊 Hit the North End for the Feast of Saint Agrippina. Feast szn is a magical time in the city when Italian societies honor the patron saints of ancestor towns with masses, parades, food, and music. The first feast this month will be honoring Saint Agrippina di Mineo now through Sunday. You can see the schedule of events this weekend here.

🐀 Celebrate Allston-Brighton artists at the Rat City Art Festival. This event elevates artists in the community while raising awareness about Allston’s rat problem (hence the name, Rat City). The fest is free to all, and food and bev is available for purchase from Roxy’s Grilled Cheese and Aeronaut Brewing. You can see the full festival lineup here.

CITY

Quick & dirty headlines

🗳️ It’s more than a year away, but the 2024 ballot questions are coming into focus. Forty-two ballot initiative petitions were submitted to the Attorney General this week with the hopes of getting the thumbs up. Big questions include: Should gig workers (think Uber and delivery drivers) be classified as independent contractors? Should the state do away with MCAS exams? Should psychedelics be decriminalized? If AG Andrea Campbell certifies a proposed initiative, organizers will need to get 75,000 names this fall to move forward, so stay tuned.

🌩️ “All good things must come to an end.” — Friday’s forecast. The incredible stretch of sunny, dry weather is ending today with lots of thunderstorms, downpours, and humidity. That said, the whole weekend won’t be a wash. There’s only a slight chance of showers on Saturday, and Sunday is looking spectacular. Speaking of downpours, Boston had its second wettest July on record. We normally get a little over three inches of rain on average in July, but last month, we got a whopping 10.43 inches (July 1921 holds the record with 11.69 inches).

🏖️ There’s a new tool to track Mass. beach closures. Instead of sifting through a massive list, the Department of Public Health just launched an Interactive Beach Water Quality Dashboard that lets you search for a specific beach and see its water-quality testing results. If it’s open, you’ll see a “thumbs up” emoji, and if it’s closed, you’ll see a “no entry” emoji. The dashboard will be updated twice a day at 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. As of Thursday evening, more than 50 beaches were closed.

ONE LAST THING

City Hall Plaza death slide

The slide at the City Hall Plaza playground is Boston’s hottest attraction.

It all started with a video that you shouldn’t laugh at (but probably did) of a Boston Police officer whizzing down the slide on his stomach before being met with a faceful of pavement. Don’t worry, he’s fine.

As a result, some sadistic adults have descended on the now-TikTok-famous “cop slide” to give it a whirl. And after a disappointing run, many are perplexed on how the Boston cop “attained warp speed.” WBZ’s Matt Shearer briefly got stuck.

Moral of the story? If you’re over 12, you should probably skip the death slide (as the signs suggest). Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

QUICK QUESTION!

💀 Do you want to try the death slide?

😅 Thanks for reading! Emily “Risk” Schario has a nice ring to it.

🥟 The results are in: B-Side readers were most interested in trying Nan Xiang Express in Chinatown, which recently opened. But Hobgoblin was a close second. “How can you not want to go to a place named Hobgoblin?!” one reader said.

💃 Keep up with us @BostonBSide on IG, TikTok, and Twitter. Send comments and suggestions to [email protected].