🍂 Is this year a foliage flop?

It’s Thursday, Boston.

🪩 The first episode of Dancing with the Massholes … sorry, Stars, premiered this week. We won’t spoil anything, but between our four New England notables — Ilona Maher, Stephen Nedoroscik, Jenn Tran, and Danny Amendola — one of them nabbed one of the night’s highest scores.

👀 What’s on tap today:

• Mass. Swifties in their voting era

• Mattapan trolley shutdowns

• A $10,000 lobster roll

Up first…

FALL FOLIAGE 

A leaf peeping plot twist

Leaf-peeping season is fast approaching. But after being primed for a near-perfect display this year, Mother Nature decided to throw down a last-minute Uno reverse card. Translation: This year’s foliage forecast just got … interesting.

Here’s what to know:

🍁 All year long, conditions for fall foliage seemed fabulous. “I was as optimistic this year as I have been in years,” said Jim Salge, a foliage expert and author of New England.com’s Fall Foliage Report. Spring conditions were ideal, summer wasn’t too wet or too dry, and other factors like bugs, caterpillars, and even fungus (last year’s problem child) seemed to be cooperating. With some solid early fall conditions, experts were predicting a banner foliage season with bright, long-lasting color right on schedule.

😬 That is, until this past month or so. Right after those predictions dropped, the most inconvenient thing that could've happened, happened. September brought a record-breaking dry spell to the region. It’s Boston’s fifth-longest stretch without measurable rain on record, and one of the longest dry spells ever during this time of year. “It's absolutely unprecedented,” Salge said, and it brings this year’s forecast into totally unknown territory.

🍂 The impacts of the dry spell could be less-than-ideal. Drought isn’t “inherently” bad for fall foliage, he said. In fact, since drought-like conditions “concentrate the sugars in the healthy leaves,” this could actually make for brighter leaf colors. But the sheer length of this dry spell will likely also have some not-so-great consequences, like the leaves changing earlier, the colors lasting for less time, and even leaves falling sooner. 

🏙️ Urban trees may have it even worse. The effects of this stress can be particularly rough for urban trees, which “don’t have networks of trees to work together with,” said Salge, leading them to turn earlier in response.

🍃 Long story short: unprecedented conditions = unprecedented foliage. As for exactly how much or how soon that’ll all happen, Salge said it’s “hard to say.” While we’re just starting to see the impacts in northern New England, Boston’s foliage fate is tough to predict right now, both because our peak foliage is forecasted for late October, and because our “microclimate [and] the urban heat island definitely changes things,” he said. 

📲 You can stay updated on the latest foliage forecasts by checking in here.

TOGETHER WITH SNOWBOUND EXPO

Winter is coming … (and we can’t wait!) 

❄️ 🏂 Start gearing up for powder days at the biggest snow sports event in the Northeast: Snowbound Expo! Whether you’re a pro shredder or just snow-curious, this is your ultimate winter kickoff. Explore the coolest gear and tech, tackle an indoor mega slope, catch a live rail jam, and hear from famous athletes (including Maine’s own Donny Pelletier) from Nov. 15 to 17. Plus, for a limited time, you can save 50% and make a saving of $8 on day tickets or save $16 on weekend passes when you book with code: BSIDE. 

CITY

Quick & dirty headlines

💃 Mass. Swifties have entered their voting era. Just two days after Taylor Swift famously endorsed VP Kamala Harris for president, the number of online voter registrations in Massachusetts surged. Seriously, this graph is giving 2021 Omicron spike. Since Swift’s viral IG, the average number of September voter registrations per day climbed from 1,340 to more than 4,300. And sure, there could be other factors at play, but FWIW, there were 337,826 visitors at vote.gov the day after the post, solely from the link Swift shared.

🚇 The MBTA grim reaper is coming, and Mattapan trolley riders are next. Starting this weekend, the trolley will see some small-scale shutdowns and shuttle bus replacements in the name of routine track maintenance between Mattapan and Ashmont. The shutdowns will be from 11:30 p.m. until end of service each day from Sept. 22 to 26, and Sept. 30 to Oct. 3. Rinse and repeat starting at 8:30 p.m. on Oct. 4 through 6. The good news? That’s the only Red Line disruption slotted for the month. And boy, do y’all deserve a break.

🥐 Boston’s pastry and ice cream scene just got bigger. First up, Lakon Paris Patisserie (the bakery known for these viral cube croissants) just announced plans to open a third storefront in the Seaport on Sept. 23. And on the ice cream front, Van Leeuwen Ice Cream is also set to open its Seaport storefront on Sept. 26. Bonus: You can get $1 scoops from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on opening day. Need a flavor suggestion? You can’t go wrong with their honeycomb.

🏓 Local tennis players are in a pickle. Literally. In Boston, there’s high demand to play pickleball, and little space for new courts. So now, one in three Boston tennis courts have pickleball lines drawn over them — and tennis players are having some mixed feelings. While some welcome the sport (or even play it themselves), there’s a cohort of purists who are bringing some “get off my lawn” energy to the courts, which has consequences from angry glares to full on physical fights (for real!).

QUICK QUESTION

🎾 Are you on team pickleball or team tennis?

MEDIA SPONSORSHIP

B-Side Presents College Fest 2024 

B-Side is a proud sponsor of Citizen's College Fest being held this Sunday, Sept. 22 from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Hosted at House of Blues Boston, this event will offer college students a chance to interact with top brands, receive free swag, and enter to win exciting prizes. Entry is free with a valid college ID. Don’t miss out—get more details here!

ONE LAST THING

Boston’s priciest lobster roll

You might want to sit down for this one, folks: Pauli’s is offering a $10,000 lobster roll. Yes, you read that right. But the price isn’t about the lobster … It's about the diamond ring.

OK, let’s back up. Pauli’s, the North End sub shop, is offering a new promotion described as “a true Boston proposal experience.” For a whopping $10,000, you can get a giant lobster roll (we’re talking 28 ounces of lobster meat) topped with a certified 1 5/8-carat round-cut diamond halo engagement ring to use for a proposal.

Why this? Why now? We truly don’t know. But what we do know is if you’re interested, you only have until Sept. 25 to place your ring and roll order by emailing [email protected]. 

— Written by Gia Orsino and Emily Schario

🦞 Thanks for reading! It’s giving a whole new meaning to “he’s her lobster.”

💜 Special shoutout to today’s sponsor, Snowbound Expo, for supporting local journalism and already getting us hyped for winter 2024. 

☕The results are (finally!) in: 53% of polled B-Siders say they make their daily coffee bev at home. One reader said: “If you're paying more than $10, you're not going to Dunkin’ ... in that case, what are you doing??”

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