We’re not quite sure how they did it.

But the Beacon Hill Civic Association and city have apparently tinkered with commercial-loading designations and times and come up with 13 new metered public parking spaces on Charles Street after 4 p.m.

As officials note, that’s a surprisingly large number of street spaces to open up for parking — and it’s undoubtably going to be most welcome by shop owners.

The plan must still get final approvals. But it looks like a done deal.

File under: Logical and welcome

The Feds say that Beacon Hill’s Church on the Hill was effectively looted by its less-than-distinguished director and his cronies. From the Globe:

The director of a venerable church in Boston’s Beacon Hill neighborhood is facing charges that he took over the church and intimidated its members while he and his associates looted its coffers.

Police arrested Edward J. MacKenzie Jr., 54, of Weymouth today after a federal grand jury indicted him on more than a dozen charges, including racketeering, mail fraud, money laundering, extortion, and bribery, prosecutors said.

MacKenzie is the director of the Boston Society of the New Jerusalem, which operates the Church on the Hill on Bowdoin Street, US Attorney Carmen Ortiz’s office said in a statement. The Swedenborgian church is just across the street from the Massachusetts State House.

Fyi: This has been a long unfolding saga at Church on the Hill, almost like a bad nightmare come true for a church that one day found out it was no longer in charge of its own workings and destiny. … By all means, read Peter’s column on Eddie MacKenzie. He’s a real-throwback character with distant ties to the entire Whitey Bulger era.

Just in time for Memorial Day and the start of the summer season, Scott has a funny post about Bostonians’ favorite vacation spots.

And the winners are … Cape Cod, in nine of the ten places where people in Greater Boston apparently like to vacation.

So to “get away” from it all, Bostonians effectively hang out with each other just in another part of the state.

Classic Boston.

No one is quite sure how much all the anti-foreclosure laws and settlements have helped people and the housing market in general.

The hunch here is that the various programs only made a marginal difference in the big scheme of things. More than anything, the markets just needed time to heal and adjust following the subprime mortgage fiasco last decade.

But the fact that Bay State homeowners received $610 million in mortgage assistance, via the huge $25 billion settlement case with large banks, is still an impressive statistic. That amount of money had to have had at least some impact on people’s lives and the market.

The potential sale of the most expensive home on the US market is being closely watched as a possible harbinger of hot markets to come.

This humble little ocean-front cottage is located in Greenwich, Conn.

Now this is news we can use: An interactive map of all the outdoor bar cafes in the city and Cambridge.

It’s almost as useful as always having a handy Red Sox schedule during the summer.

Btw, click on the story link to get real interactive map.

File under: Lazy summer days

The Bruins-Rangers showdown wasn’t the only game in the North Station area yesterday.

Boston Properties and Garden Development Corp. (i.e. the Bruins owners) have officially applied to build a 1.7 million mixed-use development next to TD Garden. The complex would have 500 residential units and lots of retail, office and hotel space.

P.S. — Bruins won in another OT thriller, fyi.

Jennifer has the latest update on what happens when there’s too many people chasing too few homes on the market in the Boston area: bidding duels.

Not to be confused with a market bubble.

The Liberty Hotel’s Alibi Bar & Lounge on Beacon Hill ranks as one of the trendiest hotel bars in the country.

Not to be confused with one of the trendiest dive bars in the country immediate neighborhood, i.e. the Beacon Hill Pub.

Well, all we can say is: OMG.

Bloomberg has a story about how there’s a housing bubble threat, not to be confused with an actual housing bubble reality, and how it’s a worrisome development.

Let’s get this straight: After five years of being in the dumps, the housing market finally bounces back, stronger in the usual-suspect areas (Boston, San Fran, New York etc.) than in other usual-suspect areas (Detroit, Cleveland, etc.), but by and large, everyone can agree there’s an honest to God recovery going on overall.

So is a recovery by definition a housing bubble threat? Is a market that’s not contracting automatically a bubble threat? Is any teeny tiny improvement in the market officially classified as bubble threat?

It’s just ridiculous.

File under: Silly