Needham grocery store Sudbury Farms has caught Aly Raisman fever. It’s now selling specially designed “Aly Raisman” cakes and 12-inch cookies. There’s a front-lobby table with cakes that read “Go Aly!” as well as Aly Raisman-themed cookies with her face in the middle. The store also plans to update its window painting of Aly Raisman to reflect her recent gold-medal finish in the women’s team final on Tuesday. “I’m from Rhode Island, but I know there was a rally and I saw the big billboard of Aly Raisman,” said baker manager Tom Young, who said he noticed a recent issue Continue reading >>>

Welcome to Visions for Vacancies, a Patch feature and a place where you can weigh in with your ideas about what kind of businesses you’d like to see occupying empty storefronts around Newton. Each week, we’ll highlight a vacant building, storefront or structure around the city. Then, we’ll leave it you, the Newton community, to sound off on what you’d like to see there. This week we're at 81 Union Street in Newton Centre, the former Big Picture Framing location.  This empty storefront, which is above the Sapporo Japanese Korean Restaurant, is in the Newton Centre shopping district. Continue reading >>>

First Olympic champion for 1,500 years: James Brendan Connolly with the American flag in Athens 1896. Ronnie O’gorman The south Bostonian, James Brendan Connolly, was once described by Joseph Conrad as the ‘best sea-story writer in America’. He wrote 19 novels and short stories about ships and sailors at sea, the US navy, submarine patrols in World War I, and the heroic struggles of the Gloucester fishermen on the treacherous Grand Bank and Nova Scotia regions hunting for cod and halibut. Connolly Continue reading >>>

Just as the world finished watching the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games on July 27, Procter Gamble and Gillette used digital signage projection technologies to promote U.S. Olympians and Gillette's special Olympics edition of its Fusion ProGlide razor. Gillette projected video images of Team U.S.A. athletes Tyson Gay and Ryan Lochte onto buildings around Boston and sprays of water over Boston Harbor. According to Gillette, which posted video of the event on YouTube, "(t)he event was a spectacle of light and water featuring 60-foot holograms of Team USA athletes Tyson Gay launching Continue reading >>>

As part of Gillette’s Global ‘Get Started’ campaign, the company had been gearing Bostonian’s up for the big event through a series of smaller projections throughout the city on well-known buildings.

The event itself used multiple projectors to display the video images of swimmer Ryan Lochte and sprinter Tyson Gay in action on massive screens of particulate water vapor, sprayed into the air above the surface of the Boston Harbor.

The men’s grooming brand’s video can be seen below:

Mike Williams and Rudolf Rojahn, Co-Artistic Directors of Guerilla Opera comment: "We are truly honored to be recognized by The Improper Bostonian in its "Boston's Best 2012" issue. To us this means that we are succeeding in our efforts towards artistic excellence. We are proud and humbled to be included, and look forward to bringing you many more dynamic performances." Guerilla Opera was founded in May 2007 by a group of Boston-based professional artists lead by Co-Artistic Directors Rudolf Rojahn and Mike Williams. Performing in small, black box settings, and employing a trim retinue Continue reading >>>

Written by Katie Blasl A 19-year-old man fell asleep by the wheel and crashed his car into a Tanger Outlet store Thursday afternoon, according to police. William Vazquez, an employee at Clarks Bostonian shoe store, was on his way to work shortly after 1 p.m. when he fell asleep while driving, police said. Continue reading >>>

Reality TV loves Bostonians. “The Real World’s” CT, “Survivor’s” Boston Rob and “Glee Project’s” Alex Newell are just three notables who’ve popped larger than life on the screen. This summer, locals continue to make their mark on the tube. If you must watch one show about strangers forced to live under one roof and compete in stupid challenges while mastering the art of betrayal, then make it ABC’s “The Glass House” (Mondays at 10 p.m. on WCVB, Ch. 5), the unabashed ripoff of CBS’ -comatose “Big Brother.” Viewers control almost every aspect and ultimately decide Continue reading >>>

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WILL AURORA KILLINGS BREAK THE SILENCE ON GUNS? By Derrick Z. Jackson Twelve people were killed and 59 were wounded early Friday at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo. Earlier this week, 18 people were wounded in a shooting spree near the University of Alabama. What is America waiting for? In a nation of common sense, these tragedies would break the national silence over our insane acceptance of guns. But the 1999 Columbine school massacre in Colorado did not do it. The 2007 Virginia Tech massacre did not do it. The 2011 Tucson massacre that severely wounded Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords Continue reading >>>