The first set of data from the 2006 American Community Survey was made publicly available yesterday. The ACS puts the number of households in Boston at 231,522, which is about 1,500 fewer than the year before and about 8,000 fewer than the 2000 Census counted. That is, consistent with a declining population. It also suggests that Boston’s household population remains at about 520,000, the same number the 2005 ACS figured. However, the revised Census population estimate for Boston has the city’s population stable at about 590,000. In short, if one is to believe the Census numbers, Boston’s group-quarter population has doubled or almost doubled since 2000 to 70,000 people from about 35,000. That is - or would be - an interesting development.

Oh, yeah, one more thing: Boston might be mostly white again. But probably not.

The New England Patriots have made their mandatory roster reduction to 75 players from 80. The team cut offensive lineman Chris Patrick who was snagged off the waiver line last week. Cornerback Mike Richardson was placed on injured reserve and is gone for the season. Wide receiver Troy Brown, wide receiver Chad Jackson and cornerback Eddie Jackson were placed on the Physically Unable to Perform list, where they have been throughout training camp. “The Patriots have been granted a roster exemption for Samuel,” according to the team.

Pictures of New England Patriots cheerleaders from the Tennessee Titans at New England Patriots August 17 pre-season game.

Ms. Jen Stewart notes that the surveillance camera craze has reached her hometown Melrose.

The Brits have cameras all over the place yet their citizenry keep stooping to lower and lower crimes. Americans would do well to ask themselves what the heck is wrong with people and how they can be straightened out, not just throw up cameras on every telephone pole.

(Britain’s social deterioration has been rapid and relentless and is not easily explained. I’m sure it can happen here, too. I think it is happening.)

Boston City Council’s precious and presumably soon-to-be-deployed ShotSpotter gunshot detection system is once again providing tragicomedy in Rochester, New York:

Shalonda Simpson, 25, of Rochester was killed about 2:15 a.m. outside School 29 at 88 Kirkland Road. Police believe she was the victim of robbery.

Simpson died in a particularly violent time span on city streets. She was one of six people shot between 2:50 p.m. Wednesday and 4:30 a.m. Thursday.

The article doesn’t mention any arrests having been made in connections with the shootings, but there is good news:

[Police chief David] Moore said the city’s ShotSpotter gunfire location system also alerted officers. The system employs a series of microphones set up around the city, which can triangulate the location of a gun shot.

He said there have been a lot of ShotSpotter alerts in recent days.

So the pile of bodies with gunshot wounds wasn’t lying, bullets really have been flying over Rochester. ShotSpotter is one underwhelming piece of technology. Let me rephrase that: It’s an impressive piece of technology that has yet to be impressively put to use.

Mr. Seth Gitell writes that Time Magazine - which apprently is not only subscribed to by dentists and doctors but occasionally also read - is running a hit piece on former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. The magazine disputes the former Mayor’s claim that he has been dealing with terrorism for thirty years, arguing that he mentioned terrorism only once in his “80… major speeches from 1993 and 2001.” Off the top of his head, Mr. Gitell can recall at least two other occasions where the mayor addressed the issue.

I haven’t had time to watch the August 17 pre-season game between New England Patriots and Tennessee nearly as obsessively as I watched Patriots v. Buccaneers, so my comments will be a bit more limited this time, and I won’t rank the performance of the offensive linemen.

Quick game recap: Tennessee Titans won the game 27-24 with a last-second field goal, but New England’s first-stringers outplayed the visitors’. Brady threw a touchdown pass to Wes Welker on a broken play that had Brady scrambling to his left. Later in the first quarter fullback Heath Evans punched in the ball for New England’s second touchdown. Titans opened the scoring when a cornerback intercepted a Brady pass and returned it for a touchdown. New England’s first-string defense had the upper hand against Titans’ offense, and it was once again nose-tackle Vince Wilfork who stood out the most. The highlight of the first half was Patriots’ defense stuffing Tennessee’s goal-line offense on four straight downs at the end of the first half. Tennessee’s scrubs turned the game around in the second half and eked out a 27-24 victory.

Much post-game debate has centered on the offensive line’s at times inadequate protection of Brady. Brady threw two interceptions, both times when hurried by Tennessee linemen who stunted their way past the pass protection. I’m not making much out of those missed assignments. It’s more or less a given in pre-season football that one defensive tactic or another will overwhelm the offensive line. Now the Patriots’ offensive linemen have good game tape to watch and learn from as they get ready for the season-opener against New York Jets.

Also, it seemed to me that the Patriots had the advantage over Tennessee’s pass-rushers on more or less straight pass rushes, so it’s not by any means as if Nick Kaczur, Stephen Neal, Dan Koppen, Logan Mankins, Matt Light and Ryan O’Callaghan have forgotten how to pass protect.

Likewise, New England’s linemen outmuscled, outmoved and outblocked Tennessee in the running game. One play in particular struck me as illustrative of the offensive line’s ability. It was on New England’s first or second drive of the game. Neal and O’Callaghan double-teamed a Titan’s defensive linemen before Neal quickly disengaged to block a linebacker who was coming up to fill the gap Neal had vacated. It was a rather impressive display of athleticism and awareness when Neal spun to his inside to clear out the linebacker. Neal basically executed an inside trap all by himself. Not bad.

On New England’s second touchdown drive the offensive line more or less pushed Tennessee straight through the red zone on a succession of inside running plays. The drive was capped off by Evans’s touchdown plunge over the right side of the offensive line, where Neal and O’Callaghan punched a hole in the defensive line while Light, Mankins, and Koppen cut block the defensive line, angling to the right. Training-camp acquisition tight end Marcellus Rivers crushed Titans’ defensive end Vandenbosch. Backup center Russ Hochstein was lead blocker on the play and created nice forward momentum at the edge, but unfortunately hurt his foot while doing so.

As usual, Koppen, Neal, and Mankins crunched defenders on screen plays. It must fairly suck as a defensive back to have to tackle an elusive runner like Kevin Faulk while avoiding a wall of mobile 300-pound offensive linemen who can block on the move. Of course, if New England’s vertical passing game doesn’t improve once the regular season begins the screen-pass well will likely dry up as safeties and linebackers start staying closer to the line of scrimmage. For now, the screen pass is New Englnd’s most reliable weapon in the offensive arsenal.

Since Brady got hit a few times plenty of Patriots fans blasted Light after the game, with one proverbial tool commenting on Boston Herald’s web site that the former Pro Bowl left tackle isn’t good enough to make a practice squad. I strongly disagree.

With both Billy Yates and Hochstein out with injuries, and with Kaczur and O’Callaghan taking tuns at right tackle, and Brian Barthelmes cut, New England’s second and third offensive line units have almost merged into one (well, right tackle Corey Hilliard is indisputably third string). It seemed to me that Clint Oldenburg and Gene Mruczkowski played quite a bit better than they did the previous week against Tampa Bay. Little Mike Elgin continues to impress. I have to admit that I smiled a bit condescendingly when I heard some fan from Iowa (State? North Central Community College?) claim after the draft that Elgin’s technique and work ethic would make up for his lack of size (his listed weight - 290 pounds - is surely an exaggeration), but Elgin has held up well during the pre-season. I doubt he’ll make the 53-man roster but he could make injured reserve or - failing that - the practice squad. I doubt the Patriots will let such a solid football player go without giving him a real chance to grow up and show something.

Oldenburg is a different story. He’s got the required size (6-5, 300 pounds), but he doesn’t seem to be quite as skilled as Elgin. He has, however, showed steady improvement and he may be capable of playing both guard and tackle. It should also be kept in mind that he played tackle in college and now has been moved to guard. On the other hand, I imagine Patriots brought in rookie free agent Chris Patrick, another undersized lineman, in part because they feel Oldenburg hasn’t quite lived up to their expectations. Or maybe they’re concerned about Yates’s ability to stay healthy. Yates is good when he plays, but he gets hurt too easily so maybe the Patriots are considering bringing in one more interior lineman in case one would be needed towards the second half of the season. While Patrick played tackle in college, his body is probably better suited for guard in the National Football League.

Young Gostkowski has had an uneven pre-season so far, but considering how well he kicked in last year’s regular season after a shaky start I don’t see much reason for concern, at least not yet. Even the great Adam Vinatieri missed at least one game winning or game-tying kick in his years with the Patriots. I think Ghost will be okay. Plus, he did level a Titans kick returner with a bone-crushing form tackle. Well, not quite, but he did bring one down with a leaping wrasslin’-like move. It’s always good to have a kicker who can tackle, especially since Patriots kick-coverage units were at best inadequate last year.

One of the storylines going into training camp was the battle for the job as punter. The incumbent Josh Miller was believed to be vulnerable, with Danny Baugher the primary challenger. Miller was cut a couple of days before the Titans game and the other candidate, Tom Malone, a couple of days after the game. So the job is now Baugher’s.

Back up linebacker Pierre Woods, who’s been absurdly hyped by Patriots Football Weekly writer Tom Casale, was a massive disappointment. Woods was steamrolled by a running back, then pushed around by a tight end, and later buried by a tight-end-tackle combo block on Tennessee’s final touchdown. Only once did he hold his ground on that drive and that was against a backside seal-off block. In other words, Woods didn’t do a dadgum thing. At least Justin Rogers, a rookie outside linebacker who’s also fighting for a spot, occasionally makes a play. Woods had better be really, really good at special teams to make the roster (dumping on Woods is a bit unfair since he went undrafted last year, but I was surprised by how irrelevant he was after hearing Casale praising him and comparing him to Pro Bowler Larry Izzo, a comparison that Belichick was quick to dismiss at a press conference last week, I might add).

Store24 has vacated its Kenmore Square establishment. That’s unfortunate, since the store was considerably cheaper than the 7-Eleven store on the other side of the McDonald’s restaurant. I’m a very perceptive person: My thought when I last visited the store was “they’re really low on inventory. Maybe they’re going to remodel or something.”

Also gone is Boston Blossoms Florist at 468 Commonwealth Avenue.

I’ll be back early next week, I hope, with a couple of voluminous posts on the New England Patriots and especially the team’s offensive line. I’ve been busy with being busy the past few days and I will probably remain in that state for another few days. But all good things to those who wait, including some pretty decent pictures from Patriots’ game against Titans last Friday.

New England Patriots cut offensive lineman Brian Barthelmes and signed Chris Patrick yesterday. Barthelmes played only one drive in the pre-season game against Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He did well, but apparently hadn’t showed enough progress from last year to hang around any longer.

The team signed Chris Patrick off the waivers after New York Giants dumped him this week. Patrick was signed by the Giants as an undrafted free-agent after this year’s supplemental draft. Patrick started 12 games at left tackle, but I imagine the Patriots will give Patrick a shot at an interior position, provided the team has any interest in Patrick at all other than picking his brain for dirt on the Giants, who New England plays this season. What may indicate a small of window of opportunity for Patrick is that the Patriots reportedly were among the few teams that showed some interest in him during the off season.

The Patriots report Patrick as 280 pounds, while Nebraska had him at 280. Either way would indicate a lineman that’s a tad undersized even by New England’s standards.

Patriots also released veteran punter Josh Miller. Considering the revolver-door nature of kicking positions I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up playing for the Patriots some time later this year.