50 Shades of Loco Politico

The night before this week’s podcast I attended a concert at Merriweather and ended up staying out way too late for a work night. Consequently I wasn’t as sharp as I would have liked to be for the show. Even though Paul and I had worked through the sequence of news stories at lunch, I screwed it up at least twice. I even forgot to do the show closing.

Even with my missteps I think it was a pretty good show. Alice Giles, our guest, is sharp and funny. The HoCo League of Women’s Voters is lucky to have her as a spokesperson. She’s almost convinced me to become a member. I just have to get over that name thing. That isn’t a problem for Calvin Ball or Greg Fox, who are both members. Ken Ulman, on the other hand, isn’t.

And speaking of Calvin, in the loco news recap portion of the podcast we tossed around his legislative initiative to extend the term limits for council members. Paul suggested that extending the term limits would create a sort of parking lot for loco politico ambitions. If a certain councilperson decided that they wanted to sit out the next county executive race to wait for the next election cycle, they would theoretically be able to continue serving on the council while awaiting their shot.

At the end of the show we decided to randomly stop shoppers in The Mall and ask them about the banning of 50 Shades of Grey in public libraries. This is always a fun thing to do and I’d like to thank the four folks who agreed to be part of it. For everyone we asked who agreed at least one other said no. We promised all of them anonymity.

You can listen to the latest edition of “and then there’s that…” here.

It’s a Meme Dad

Back in March I decided to begin featuring the occasional video of my daughter’s choosing. Peanut is a teenager about to enter her first year of high school. She plays Minecraft and watches YouTube videos more than she watches regular television.

She has shown me things that make me laugh. What surprised me most though was the realization that I’m probably the last person on earth to see this. This particular video has been viewed by over 14 million people.

“It’s a meme dad.”

I’m still trying to get used to that word.

This Peanut’s Pick is called Trololo Sing Along.

That Was Close

Yesterday around 4:30 PM, as I sat at the traffic light at Bloomsbury Avenue and Frederick Road in Catonsville, the sky suddenly darkened as the intensity of the rain increased. My smartphone chirped signaling a new email message just as the light turned green.

I decided to concentrate instead on maneuvering through streets that were quickly becoming flooded as storm drains struggled to handle the torrential downpour.

I had almost made it home when I encountered a newly fallen tree blocking my passage on New Cut Road in Ellicott City.

A u-turn and minor detour finally bought me to the shelter of my garage. As turned off the engine, I picked up my phone to check the message that came in earlier. It was from Notify Me Howard warning me that conditions were ripe for a tornado in Catonsville.

“Take cover now. Move to an interior room or the lowest floor of a sturdy building and avoid windows. If outdoors or in a mobile home or vehicle…move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris.”

That was close.

Merriweather Rocks!

It’s been awhile since I last attended a concert at Merriweather. It’s not that I haven’t been interested in any of the shows; it has more to do with my general dislike of navigating through big crowds, particularly once a show is over.

I still don’t care for the post show exit herd but last night it was a small price to pay for an otherwise perfect evening in downtown Columbia. The weather was perfect and the sellout performance by the Zac Brown Band was as about as good as it gets.

I have a very long history with Merriweather. The first show I ever attended was The Who in the summer before I went to high school. Later I went on to work at the outdoor theatre every summer until I graduated from college. I was an usher, security guard, groundskeeper and stagehand. Working at Merriweather was the best job(s) I ever had.

It’s changed a good deal since the years I worked there, mostly for the better. Columbia and HoCo owes a debt of gratitude to Seth Hurwitz and Jean Parker for breathing new life into Merriweather after the former promoter almost almost ran it into the ground. Kudos also go out to Ian Kennedy and Justin Carlson who launched the Save Merriweather effort back in 2003. Nowadays Merriweather is poised to play a starring role in the makeover of Columbia’s urban core.

It sure bought life to downtown last night. Before the show, Union Jack’s patio was hopping with concert goers. At 11:00 PM, as we headed back to our cars, it was still going on.

Wanted: Cyber Warriors

For recent college grads that have had difficulty getting their footing in the job market, you may want to head back to school to study cybersecurity. According to this article by Alexander Fitzpatrick in The Washington Post yesterday “not enough digital experts are entering the cybersecurity field to meet the ever-growing demand.”

“The government needs to hire at least 10,000 experts in the near future and the private sector needs four times that number, according to Tom Kellermann, vice president at Trend Micro and former member of President Obama’s cybersecurity commission. Booz Allen Hamilton, a private security firm in McLean, has hired nearly 3,000 cybersecurity experts in the past two years, and that trend is expected to continue.”

In The Washington Post today, Ellen Nakishima reports that DARPA, the folks that brought you the Internet, has launched a five year $110 million effort dubbed Project X  “to develop technologies to improve its cyberwarfare capabilities, launch effective attacks and withstand the likely retaliation.”

DARPA is tapping into the “private sector, universities and even computer-game companies“ to assist in the effort.

It just might be time to reconsider that degree in Art History.

Three Things about Food

Famous Daves is open again. TW and I stopped in for lunch today to check it out. The makeover that closed the restaurant down for three weeks didn’t seem to change all that much inside. There’s some new lighting and paint plus new flooring but the layout hasn't changed. More important, the Texas beef brisket sandwich with the Georgia Mustard is just as good now as it was before.

Speaking of brisket, Mama Wordbones and I went to Kloby’s Smokehouse in Maple Lawn last Saturday night. We were both in the mood for ribs and we hadn't tried theirs yet. Ever since I saw this picture on HoCo360 I’ve wondered what they were like. I’m still wondering. At 7:30 PM on a Saturday night, Kloby’s was out of ribs.

Seriously?

The place wasn’t even that crowded. How could a barbecue joint run out of ribs that early on a Saturday night?

I ended up having the brisket instead and it was delicious but to say we were overall disappointed with our first Kloby’s experience would be an understatement.

We received our first mailer from Wegmans. The mega grocer is encouraging HoCo residents to sign up for their Wegmans Shoppers Club card by running a contest for $500 in free groceries for anyone who signs up before June 7^th.

There was no mention however, as to whether the winner could also use that credit in the proposed liquor store.

Writing Good

I stumbled across this neat little app yesterday that measures how well you write by using the Flesch-Kincaid system. All you need do is provide a writing sample and it will tell you what grade level is needed to comprehend your writing and how easy it is to read the stuff you write.

I was curious to see how some of our HoCo loco writers fare with this test. According to this chart from Readability Formulas, the lower the score the more difficult the read. This article by Sara Toth in Explore Howard earned a score of 33 (“Difficult’) at a 14th grade level while a blog post by 53 Beers on Tap on the same subject rated a 55 (“Fairly Difficult”). Both Marshmallow Man and I are writing blog posts at a 9^th and 10^th grade level respectively. My sample post also rated Fairly Difficult at 52. Tom Coale and Sara Toths writing is more college level stuff. This post by Tom was rated at a 13^th grade level with a readability score of 39 (Difficult).

Reentry Day

For most of us anyway, work returned today. After being relegated to the background of our consciousness for the past three days work roared back with purpose in my world this morning. My day went from stimulating to frustrating then bounced from exhilarating to exasperating.

Others had it worse of course like the people who work in the Three Centre Park building near Route 100 in Columbia. When they arrived at work this morning the temperature in some offices was 90 degrees. Apparently a repair job on the buildings HVAC system went awry and the building ended up without air conditioning.

“The building management came by and told us there were cold drinks in the lobby courtesy of the landlord,” one employee in the building told me. “We were a little disappointed to discover that it was only water and soda and no beer!”

At least they got out early. He told me his company let them go at four o’clock when he and his colleagues found cool refuge and beverages next door at La Fiesta.

It was two o’clock in the afternoon before I even had to time to grab lunch, much less a cold soda in a hot lobby. I decided to stop by Qdoba on Dobbin Road to grab a quick bite. Qdoba is pretty close to my office and I often drop in there for a late lunch because it is rarely busy after 2:00 PM. Today it was packed. That’s because it was Tuesday.

Until today I did not know that every Tuesday Qdoba offers half price burritos from 2:00 PM until 9:00 PM for students with an ID. This little promotion turned a normally sleepy Tuesday afternoon into a happening time at the Qdoba on Dobbin.

I never really got my head around the fact that it was Tuesday because it felt like Monday. My confusion actually began first thing this morning as I left my house. About midway to the gym, it occurred to me that I had forgotten to put the trash out before I left. Our trash day is Tuesday. Then I remembered that, because of Memorial Day, this was a slide day. Trash day moved!

According to the HoCo DPW, this week Tuesday is Wednesday!

Show the Flag, Honor the Fallen: Four

Out on Triadelphia Road in west HoCo, To2C reader Andy Liberman has a real flag pole in front of his house. This enabled him to honor the tradition of keeping the flag at half mast until noon today. Andy shares that his dad was a Korean War vet who passed away last November.

My own dad, who passed away in 1966, was a World War II vet. This picture was taken of him in England just prior to the Normandy invasion.

And although my own street was flag deficient this holiday weekend, one street over from me, on Academy Road in Ellicott City, there is a profusion of the red white and blue.

There is still time to get your pictures to me. If I receive at least one more I’ll do a final Memorial Day flag post later today.

Show the Flag, Honor the Fallen: Three

Bert and Zan live in an old stone house on Columbia Pike in Ellicott City. As he describes it “when our house was built the flag only had 37 stars.”

I can’t tell whether the colors they’re flying have 37 or 50 but the three red ones on the front of the house add a nice touch.

My sister Kelly sent me these pictures from her favorite watering hole in Baltimore. It seems an anonymous patriot decided the flanking mermaids should carry flags.

Main Street in Ellicott City was a mixed a bag this afternoon. While the area around the Little French Market was notably flag deficient, the Howard House apartments had a very impressive display, the best on Main Street in my opinion.

My favorite however was this simple display in front of Wagon Wheel Antiques on Tiber Alley.

I’ve received another picture from a To2C reader early this evening so there will likely be at least a fourth post to this series.

Send your favorite Memorial Day flag pics to wordbones@verizon.net.

Show the Flag, Honor the Fallen: Two

As readers continue to send in pictures of flags on their streets this Memorial Day weekend, I wanted to share this video I saw on CBS Sunday Morning today.

I’ll put another post with more loco flag scenes later today so there’s still plenty of time to share your photos of flags flying in your community. If you want to share, email your photos and a brief commentary to wordbones@verizon.net and I'll post them here.

Show the Flag, Honor the Fallen: One

It didn’t take long for a To2C reader to respond to my call for Memorial Day flag pictures. Andrew Kanicki reports in that the flags are flying on his street. “On my cul de sac of open meadow way in long meadow development almost every house on the street has a flag flying.”

As I was driving through Columbia this afternoon I spotted this small, but effective display at the Bristol Green apartments off Old Dobbin Road.

My sister also sent me a picture from her house in South Baltimore. “With Fort McHenry down the street, it just wouldn’t be right not to fly the Stars & Stripes!”

Keep ‘em coming…

It's Up

It’s a little tattered and the mounting bracket for the pole is loose. I debated for a moment whether or not I should even bother this year.

As I stood in my driveway and looked up and down my street I didn’t see a single one. Granted, it’s early. Memorial Day is still two days away. At the same time I'd wager that many other Memorial Day tasks like pool passes and picnic stuff have likely been taken care of before the flag even gets a thought, if at all.

I decided that a tattered flag on a wobbly mount was better than no flag at all. It only needs to make it through Monday night.

So it is up now and my street is no longer flag deficient.

One More Thing: As I sit writing this I wonder about the other streets in HoCo. Are others as flag deficient as mine?

If you are one of those who are still in town this weekend and would like to share with others, send me flag pictures from your corner of the HoCo hood and I’ll post them with your notes and/or commentary over the course of the holiday weekend. If you're game send your stuff to wordbones@verizon.net.

And One More Thing Two: I realize I asked for pics from "HoCo" hoods in the note above but if your particular hood is otherwise, please consider your input just as valued. You send 'em, with a note, and I'll post 'em. (5/27 update).

Another Plastic Bag Eliminated

This spring we eliminated another plastic bag from our household, the yard waste bag. In prior years we regularly put our grass clippings and other assorted yard waste into heavy duty plastic bags before setting them out to the curb from the weekly yard waste pick up.

We've now seen the error of our ways.

It began when I noticed that the HoCo Department of Public Works was offering free paper yard trim bags (limit 2 per family). My first reaction was that we’d definitely need more than two bags to make it through the season. Then I saw this note:

“Howard County encourages residents to use paper bags or reusable containers for yard trim.”

It was my “ah ha” moment. Why didn’t I think of using a reusable container before!

When we moved into our new home a little over six years ago we purchased two identical garbage cans. Our thought was that one would be for recycling and the other for regular trash. This was before HoCo gave everyone a blue bin for recyclables. Once we got the blue bin the second trash can sat unused.

No longer. It is now our official yard waste container.

Best SWM View in Columbia

Earlier this evening I received a text from Steve Tove. His band, Dead or Drunk, was playing at the Eggspectations Patio beginning at 6:30. Until tonight I wasn’t aware that Eggspectation even had a patio. It turns out that they do and it overlooks a storm water management pond too.

This might be the nicest looking storm water management pond view in HoCo. The developer, Merritt Properties transformed what would typically be a utilitarian runoff pond into a regular water feature with lush landscaping. As storm water management ponds go this is a Cadillac.

Maybe we should come up with some sort of HoCo Suburban Oasis guide to help people find places like this.

LA Bans Plastic Grocery Bags

Yesterday the Los Angeles City Council voted to ban the use of plastic bags in grocery stores. According to this story by David Zahniser and Abby Sewell in the Los Angeles Times, the new ordinance will “phase out plastic bags over the next 16 months at an estimated 7,500 stores, meaning shoppers will need to bring reusable bags or purchase paper bags for 10 cents each.”

Jean-Michael Cousteau must be pleased.

Predictably, the plastic bag people are not happy.

“An industry group warned that the council’s decision will threaten the jobs of 2,000 workers statewide and said it is keeping open the option of filing a legal challenge. “With this bag ban, the city chose to take a simplistic approach that takes away consumer choice instead of pursuing meaningful programs that encourage greater recycling of plastic bags and wraps, while preserving jobs,” said Mark Daniels, chairman of the nonprofit American Progressive Bag Alliance.”

Maybe they can be retrained to produce reusable bags.

It’s All about You

Regular readers of To2C may have noticed that I have not been that prolific with my posts lately. The other parts of my life have been a tad more demanding lately leaving me wanting for both time and inspiration. So tonight, as I sat down to steal a little time to scratch my writing itch, I found inspiration in you, the To2C reader.

It’s been awhile since I’ve shared what I know about you, well over a year in fact. As I have disclosed before, this blog employs three separate apps to determine readership, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and Site Meter.

So what do they tell me?

Some things haven’t changed much. The gender gap narrowed a bit from 55% male back in November 2010 to 51% male today. I may be getting older but you are getting younger. Two years ago 74% of the To2C readers were over 35. That has now dropped to 63%. Income dropped as well from 35% of readers making over $100K to 28% today.

Quantcast figures that there are a little over 4,200 of you and that 253 of you are using the mobile web when you visit. According to Google Analytics, the top three mobile devices you’re using are the iPad, Nook and iPhone. The top five places you visit from are unchanged; Columbia, Ellicott City, Baltimore, Washington, DC, and Laurel, in that order.

Many of you come here from other loco sites. The Baltimore Sun is now the top referral site for To2C followed by Google. The third highest referral site is HoCo Rising followed by HoCo Blogs. HowChow is the sixth highest referral site for To2C.

I appreciate all who stop by here, no matter who you are or where you come from, so this would be as good a time as any to say thank you for spending some time here. I’ll endeavor to keep you coming back. 

In Memoriam…Jesse Thomas

Columbia resident and former Baltimore Colt Jesse Thomas passed away last Wednesday. Jesse wore #40 and played defense for the Colts in 1955, 56 and 57. He later went on to serve as Head Coach of Morgan State University.

He also found time to give back to the community. According to this story by Jacques Kelly in The Sun, Jesse “collected food from local restaurants to be distributed at homeless shelters.”

My dad was a huge fan of the Colts in that era. He once even joined in with other fans in storming the field after a big game and tearing down the goal posts. One of his prized possessions was swatch of the Colts flag he snagged after the Colts beat San Francisco in November of 1958. A month later they would go on to play the New York Giants in the greatest game ever played. The 1959 Colts were immortalized in the movie "Diner." 

Services will be held tomorrow at 1 PM in St. Johns Baptist Church on Tamar Drive in the Village of Long Reach.

Status Challenged

The high quality of HoCo schools, and to a larger extent, Maryland public schools are often cited as justification for state taxes that are above average. Money spent on public education is an investment in our future. The consistent top ranking of Maryland and HoCo schools seems to suggest that we are getting a good return on that investment.

Then again, maybe we aren’t.

In this op-ed piece by David V. Anderson and Herbert J. Walberg in The Sun, our four year number ranking from Education Week is called into question. The two researchers suggest that, based on the National Assessmentof Educational Progress, Maryland schools are the sixth best in the nation. Massachusetts, which spends almost the same amount as Maryland per student, was number 1. 

Beer Me!

This weekend we opted for drinking craft beer at the lake as opposed to drinking wine in the woods. True, we could have done both. Many did, but we decided it would be better to stick with one type of alcohol. We also weren't quite up for the crowds in the woods. At the lakefront we parked with no problem and never waited in line for a beer sample or food. 

Clyde’s Second Annual Craft Beer Festival featured about fifty craft brews that ranged from delicious to “you call that beer?”

 Though my adult beverage of choice is usually a glass of red wine, I am finding the craft beer trend to be very interesting. These beers don’t resemble any of the beers I've grown up with. These are beers with complex flavors and finishes. Some of the ones I sampled yesterday were barely tolerable while others completely blew me away. The four ounce taste pours were perfect for encouraging folks to explore and experiment with beers like “Hell or High Watermelon.”

Seriously. And it was rather tasty. Mama Wordbones dubbed it a “hot tub beer.”

 

At Wine in the Woods I drink wine I’ll likely never buy. At the beer fest I discovered beers that I really liked but had never heard of before and will now give a them second look when I spot them in a store or on tap.

If I had one criticism of the beer fest it would be that the space was too small and there were not enough places to sit, much less dance!. Hopefully that will be an easy problem to fix before the third annual.