A headline that made national news was the killing in a prison in California of Boston mob boss Whitey Bulger. Now of course I knew who he was but that's about it. He was the head guy of the "Winter Hill gang" Winter Hill is a part of the city Somerville, that borders my city, south of here bordering Boston. Somerville is a small but densely populated city of a bit over 4 square miles. Population of 81,560 or over 18,000 per square mile. I just included that to satisfy my own curiosity. The 16th most densely populated city in the country. Anyway I worked part time in a supermarket, the Winter Hill Star Market, which closed in 2007. It was right across the street from a club called Pal Joeys which was the hangout of the Winter Hill Gang of mobsters. It used to be run by Whitey Bulger. Well eventually it was taken over someone called Howie Winters. It was the early 70's I can't remember exactly what year it was. I was in my early 20's. I worked in the deli. Here's a shot of the store.
Now across the street, to the right, was the night club Pal Joeys, now a bakery.
Now I include this shot of the inside of the closed store for nostalgic reason as I spent 9 years in the deli.
And now back to our story. On one particular night I was scheduled until midnight. It was about 10 p.m. This guy came to the counter.
"May I help you sir?"
He was very soft spoken. "Yes I'd like to order a party platter."
"Sure." I replied, "When would you like it?"
"Now."
I gave him the company speech, "I'm sorry sir we require 24 hours notice on party platter orders."
He didn't look happy. "You mean I can't have one now?!"
"I'm sorry sir but that's the company policy."
He stood there for several seconds and then said, "I'll be right back."
Maybe a couple minutes later the evening manager came rushing down like he was shot out of a cannon.
"Whatever he wants! Make him a platter!" So I made a platter. The customer was back in about 45 minutes. I gave him the platter. He was very polite to me.
A while later the evening manager came down to the deli.
"Do you know who that was?"
"No." I replied.
He then explained that it was Howie Winter and the whole mob connection deal. Who knows what Mr. Winter said to him when he initially left the counter and went up front but Kenny was acting nervous and very upset.
On Monday night I was at my friend Dave's house watching some stupid movie basically so we could fun of it. Now as we cracked wise, though it certainly wasn't like the Algonquin Nights of the Round Table, we were amusing ourselves the subject turned to names. We both wondered why certain names had a second version that wasn't anything like the original name. Namely how do you get Jack from John? Bill from William? I once worked with a woman whose name was Margret but she was called Peggy. These are some of heady topics that we get into.
Ok I've droned on long enough and as I always end it,
I'm outta here.
