Sail Boston’s much-anticipated Tall Ships event officially began Thursday, when thousands took advantage of the perfect July weather to soak in the sights of the grand sea vessels.

Some of the ships, located at the Charlestown Navy, Fish Pier, and the Seaport World Trade Center, will be open for public tours. Others will only be viewable from the docks at locations such as Rowes Wharf, the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse, and Aquarium Wharf. See Sail Boston’s web site for a complete listing of ships and locations.

Also, check out some photos from the event, which will take place through Sunday.

Photo by Eric Wilbur

Sausage and sauerkraut to celebrate a French national holiday? OK, I’m game.

Sure enough, the normally-perceived German food will be on the menu Sunday - aptly classified as “choucroute and sausages” (pictured) - when the region’s largest Bastille Day celebration takes place in Harvard Square. There will be an outdoor beer and wine garden, French food vendors, local artisans, live music, and the traditional French waiter’s race.

The free event, sponsored by the Harvard Square Business Association and Sandrine’s Bistro, a local French restaurant, begins at 3 p.m. on Holyoke St. It will party on into the wee hours of Monday morning, ending at 1 a.m. For a full schedule of the day's events, click here.

Photo courtesy Sandrine's Bistro

Bostonians are wasting less time in traffic, according to the latest report from the Texas Transportation Institute.

In its annual urban mobility report, TTU cites data from 2007 that shows peak travelers are spending 43 hours annually in road and highway congestion, down one hour from 2006. Still, that’s three hours more than drivers were spending in 2002, a surprising trend considering that the Big Dig was still ongoing at the time. The one-hour gain from 2006 to 2007 is consistent with what researchers found on a national level as well.

Other highlights from the research showed that:

• The overall cost (based on wasted fuel and lost productivity) was approximately $945 per Boston area traveler.
• The total amount of wasted fuel was around 29 gallons per area traveler.
• On a national level, the amount of wasted time totaled 4.2 billion hours – nearly one full work week for every traveler.

Even though some numbers have leveled off, TTU doesn’t expect to see that as a trend, or a greater use of public transportation. Rather, the institute cites the economy as impacting some of the numbers, and expects to see the traffic problems rebound when the economy does.

The full report for the Boston area can be found here.

Photo © Texas Transportation Institute

Call me a lightweight, but one serving of prime rib is usually about all I can handle on any particular day. Still, Ken Oringer’s KO Prime strives to give those with a more hearty appetite one of the best meat deals running.

The downtown steak house offers a $24.95 all-you-can-eat prime rib dinner Mondays through Wednesdays. It's the sort of deal you might expect at Ponderosa, not an establishment owned by a James Beard Foundation Award recipient. The price is solid enough for one serving, never mind as much as you can handle. So, maybe that fact can justify not pushing it to the brink to get your money’s worth?

This isn’t the only deal you’ll find at an Oringer restaurant. La Verdad, on Lansdowne St., offers $1 chicken tacos, $1 carnitas tacos, and $1 pork pastor tacos on Tuesdays when the Red Sox aren’t in town.

KO Prime is located at the Nine Zero Hotel, 90 Tremont St.

Photo by Eric Wilbur