Philly Over Boston

The beauty of the Internet is that it presents a whole new world of places that will let you work for free. With the Flyers-Bruins series coming up, Dave Beard at Boston.com wanted to know if I could cook up eight things a Bostonian needs to know about Philadelphia.

(I grew up there, and while my Rally hockey skates bear Bobby Orr's signature, I've been a Flyers fan since the time I saw Ron Hextall protect his crease with a broadsword. (What can I say?)

1. Philly's where Bostonians go to achieve greatness. See: Ben Frankin, polymath, and Bernie Parent, goaltender.

2. If you come, try one of our beloved sandwiches. Just get over Pat's or Geno's or Jim's and find Paesano's. Get the roast suckling pig with broccoli rabe. Leave the yellow and black jerseys in the hotel.

3. Boston may have the Museum of Fine Arts and the Fogg, but we've got the Stoogeum — the world's only Three Stooges museum. We've also got the Insectarium, the Mummers Museum and the Mutter Museum. The latter features a giant colon, the soap woman and "The Secret Tumor of Grover Cleveland."

4. You'll find your way around here a little easier. William Penn's surveyor laid us out in a grid — an improvement over the cow paths that became your byways. Like you, we've got a lot of Indian names. Manayunk still means the place to go drink. Schuylkill is what our rivers used to do to the fish.

5. Don't yiz go asking for directions. We won't understand you, you won't understand us. Practice to yizselves: Fluff-ya Floiers. Still confused? Ha-ow na-ow bra-own ca-ow.

6. Bring cash. The Philadelphia Parking Authority starred in a TV series for a reason - they're brutally efficient. But there are tricks: For some reason (having to do with political muscle) cars park in the middle of Broad Street in South Philadelphia. Don't even try doing that in North Philadelphia.

7. We're no dummies — we've got 65 colleges and grad schools in the metropolitan area, and that doesn't even include Princeton or the Ralph Amodei International Institute of Hair Design & Technology.

8. We hate New York as much as you do.