🎭😮 There’s DRAMA on the Common

It’s Wednesday, Boston.

🤩🪩 Last chance to snag a deal to Best Day Ever Fest! Tickets are 50% off for our Best Day Ever Festival for ONE. MORE. DAY. Grab your tickets before midnight to take advantage of the deal!

🤑 Speaking of deals: Consider this your reminder that Prime Day is on through July 11. Here’s our favorite deal roundup.

👀 What’s on tap today:

• Porchfest is coming to Cambridge

• Happy hour gets another shot

• Fenway goes bananas

Up first…

JULY FREEBIES

Summer deals on deck

What time is it? Freebie time! From basketball to boat parties to beach sprints, this July is STACKED. 

Here are this month’s best freebies:

🏀 Hop on the WNBA bandwagon. While tickets to see the Connecticut Sun take on Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever at TD Garden on July 15 are certainly not free (we’re talking $150 for nosebleeds, people!), the epic pre-game block party on Canal Street is! Expect DJs, pop-ups, specials at local restaurants, and general party vibes from 3 to 7 p.m. 

👯 Meet your new bestie (with a view). The Making Friends After College FB Group strikes again with two meet ups for local 20- and 30-somethings. They’ll be camping out at the Rooftop at the Revere Hotel on July 18 for drinks and bites. Less into small talk? Catch the same squad at Lawn on D for a round of cornhole and these iconic swings. 

😎 Combine two of summer’s greatest hits: A boat day and block party. This match made in heaven is exactly the vibe at the ICA’s Watershed block party on July 19. Think: Live beats, art-making activities, cornhole, and more. Oh, and the boat ride to get there is LOVELY. 

🧘 Go with the (lymph) flow. Come to our free lymph flow yoga class with Balance with Babz July 23 for the relaxing vibes, but STAY for the slate of fab on-site giveaways like a lymphatic brush kit, a month of Babz’s membership, and tons of B-Side swag. 

🎭 Grab your blankets and lawn chairs. ‘Cause we’re heading to the Common to watch free Shakespeare! The Commonwealth Theatre Company is performing “As You Like It” as part of its Shakespeare On The Common Series from July 23 through Aug. 10. Need the SparkNotes? Rosalind and her cousin escape to the forest where she discovers her love (Orlando). But she’s disguised as a boy shepherd … and hilarity ensues! Classic Shakespeare.

🚣 Watch someone else row, row, row their boat. The folks behind the iconic Head of the Charles Regatta are launching Boston Beach Sprints at Carson Beach from July 25 to 27. Beach sprints are a new(ish), fast-paced rowing event that’ll make their Olympic debut in 2028. See: Athletes literally sprinting to their boat, rowing an out and back, and running back to the finish. 

🕺 Get jiggy wit it on Boston’s dime. Missed the Donna Summer Dance Party in June? The City of Boston is coming in clutch with another round of free dance parties at City Hall Plaza starting July 25. This month’s theme? R&B night. So expect silky-smooth vibes on the dance floor, featuring DJ sets by ReaLP, IndaGo, and more. 

CITY

Quick & dirty headlines

🎸 Cambridge is finally(!) getting a Porchfest. On July 19 and 20, the city will follow in the footsteps of many Mass. towns and put together its own lineup of DIY-style live concerts. But this won’t be just any Porchfest. Instead of the traditional one-day structure, Cambridge’s edition will be spread over two days in two different neighborhoods: On porches in the more residential Cambridgeport on July 19, and at local businesses and gathering spaces in Central Square on July 20. You can still sign up to be a host or volunteer!

🎓 BU has the budget blues. This week, the university announced it’ll cut 5% from its budget, laying off about 120 people, and nixing another 120 job vacancies. Why? Federal funding cuts seem to be the big reason, but officials also cited inflation, “changing demographics,” and declining graduate enrollment. BU isn’t the only local college facing layoffs for similar reasons, but considering its high population of international students and sizable reliance on federal funding for research, it could be in for a particularly rough road ahead.

🍹 Will the third time be the charm for happy hour? State Sen. Julian Cyr hopes so. He’s asking his colleagues to advance a bill that would bring back happy hour to cities that opt-in. Sen. Cyr, who represents Cape Cod, pitched the comeback as a way to help restaurants attract customers in the offseason and help with Boston’s “fun crisis.” But this isn’t the state legislature’s first … or second … or third rodeo with a happy hour revival, as past measures have all flopped. Long story short: Don’t hold your breath.

🎨 Should art be ugly? That’s the question du jour in Cambridge as debate is heating up over this giant mesh cube in Central Square. Though it looks like, as one Reddit user wrote, “an under construction zone,” the cube is actually an art installation called “Sun Block” created by the city’s Shade is Social Justice program. The idea is for the piece to both get folks thinking about heat and climate change, and actually provide a cool place to sit in the area. But according to Reddit, for many people, it’s just an eyesore.

QUICK QUESTION!

☀️ Soooo … what do you think about the Central Square sculpture?

THINGS TO DO

Mid-week check in

🏓 Pickleball Party with Volo | Saturday, July 19 | 2 to 4 p.m. | Club Volo, Assembly Row | B-Side is teaming up with Club Volo to host a day of pickleball, volleyball, and other lawn games! B-Side Members get $5 off, a free drink, a B-Side sweat towel, and a pair of B-Side socks.

🍗 Boston Jerkfest | Friday, July 11 and Saturday, July 12 | Harvard Square | A Caribbean-style food festival featuring Jamaican jerk-spiced food and all things jerk hot. Members get 25% off their ticket.

🖼️ Community Art Night | Thursday, August 7 | 6 to 8 p.m. | Boston Public Market | Making friends can be hard. That’s why we’re hosting this watercolor painting night with BPM’s Laurel Greenfield Art. B-Side members get $5 off, a free drink, and a take-home watercolor kit!

At B-Side events like the ones above, members get perks like discounted entry, free drinks, B-Side swag, and more. Stay tuned for more meetups, and become a member to get your perks! 

GIVEAWAY

Together with Boston magazine

Enter to win two VIP Tickets to the Best of Boston Soiree on July 16. To enter, just refer a friend and have them accept your invite by the end of the day on July 12. If you have already referred a friend to B-Side (and they’ve accepted), you're eligible! Full details below*

21+. NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Limit one entry per person. See Official Rules & an additional entry option here.

ONE LAST THING

Banana Ball at Fenway

Fenway went bananas this weekend … just not for the Red Sox. The Savannah Bananas brought their sell-out show to Boston as part of the “Banana Ball World Tour.” And it was just as wild as we could’ve hoped for. 

ICYMI: The Savannah Bananas are like a baseball team meets a dance troupe meets improv comedy … sort of. Instead of baseball, the Bananas play banana ball, a faster-paced, more entertaining form of the game, with wacky surprises throughout. Think: Pitchers on stilts, players in kilts, and LOTS of dancing. Here’s a taste. 

Their two games at Fenway featured tons of cameos from former Red Sox stars including Johnny Damon, Keith Foulke, Brock Holt (who, thanks to banana ball rules, got out on a fan-caught ball), and more, an impromptu concert from the All-American Rejects, and even … some aura farming.

— Written by Gia Orsino and Emily Schario

🍌 Thanks for reading! We haven’t seen joy like this at Fenway since, well, 2018.

🏘️ The results are in: 82% of B-Siders would NOT hire a broker to look for an apartment. One reader said: “Thousands of dollars to unlock the door and stand there? No thanks!”

🥳 🎟️ Don't forget to grab your tickets to Best Day Ever, our Aug. 2 food, music, and shopping extravaganza at Artists for Humanity!

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