Victory Lap

Ed Reed and Jacoby Jones returned to New Orleans, the site of their gridiron triumph a little over a week ago, to celebrate Mardi Gras. Yesterday morning, as Mama Wordbones and I watched the Zulu parade, we were pleasantly surprised to see our hometown Super Bowl champs and those familiar purple jerseys.

Overall it appears that Baltimore fans and their team made a good impression here in the Big Easy. Waiters in restaurants and natives alike went out of their way to compliment Baltimore. I suppose it didn’t hurt that Ravens purple is a popular color here too, it being the primary color of Mardi Gras and LSU.

It was nice to see Ed Reed sporting an Orioles baseball cap too. Maybe some of that Raven mojo will pass on the other birds of Baltimore this spring.

Postcard from the Road

Yesterday we were among those 883,000 Marylander's on the move for the Thanksgiving holiday. Yesterday afternoon Peanut and I flew out of BWI airport for our annual trek to my sisters home in St. Augustine Beach. According to this story by Candy Thomson in The Sun, approximately one in six Free Stater's is on the move for a feast with friends and family this year. Unlike us, most are driving.

                                                            

“Driving remains the way to go here in Maryland," said AAA spokeswoman Ragina Averella. "We're in a really good location on the East Coast, with many destinations two to four hours away. For a family with two or three children, it's cheaper to drive than fly."

I can attest to that. Even with taking advantage of early discounts, the round trip cost for Peanut and I to fly south was almost a thousand bucks.

It’s worth it though. We’ll spend a few days here with family and head back home before we've had a chance to do too much damage. As my mother used to say, “after three days, out of town guests and fish start to stink.”

Happy Thanksgiving. 

Wedding Weekend

Regular readers may have noticed that I took a blog break this weekend. My nephew got married in Baltimore on Saturday and it was the first time that all my siblings, a brother and five sisters, have been together at the same time in almost ten years.

It seems that the older I get the more quickly the years go by.

We had a blast and it was picture perfect fall weekend in Baltimore.

 Even though I took a little blogging hiatus, I was still thinking about To2C, particularly when I saw the 1936 Rolls Royce 20/25 that the bride and groom hired to shuttle them from the church to the reception.

This beautifully restored limo is owned by Dean Ray who is also a professional photographer. He even wore white gloves for the occasion.

Reunion Weekend

When I informed a colleague that I was traveling to Cleveland this weekend to attend my 35^th college reunion I was met with a half smile and a quizzical look that said “really?”

Really.

Like graduations, spring is also a time for college reunions. I understand that reunion programs can vary widely from school to school, particularly in the larger ones but when it comes to hosting a reunion weekend, my little alma mater does a pretty bang up job.

I haven’t attended every reunion in our quinquennium reunion cycle, but I’ve been to more than a few and I’ve always had a great time. Not only do I reconnect with old classmates, I also get to interact with other generations that passed through the same halls and grounds on their way to adulthood. We share a common bond from a formative time of our lives that allows us to relate to each other across the decades that separate us. 

This year the oldest class in attendance at my reunion was the Class of 57. The initiates to our five year tribal gathering were the Class of 2007. Like my own clan did thirty years ago, the twentysomethings kept the party going until the wee hours of the morning.  At the other end of continuum, the thinning ranks of classes older than ’57 were consolidated into a “golden” group. The oldest registered attendee was from the class of 1936.

This morning, in the courtesy shuttle back to the airport, four generations of alumni were represented. There was a guy from Los Angeles from the Class of 1962, a couple from Fort Lauderdale from the Class of 2002, Ellicott City from the Class of 1977 and with our Cleveland native shuttle driver, the Class of 2013. Though none of us had ever met before, in no time at all each was sharing stories and experiences. By the time we arrived at the airport everyone wished each other a safe journey home and expressed a hope that we’d meet again in five years.

Experiences like that are what keep me going back.

A Book is a Book is a Book….

“Aren’t you packing your NooK” Mama Wordbones asked as we got ready for our recent trip. She had given me the Nook for Christmas.

I told her I had just started reading what some now refer to as a “tree” book. My sister Pat sent me “Matterhorn” by Karl Marlantes for my birthday at the end of January. When it arrived I was already about midway through “The Big Short,” by Michael Lewis, my very first eBook. It's a tale about a few investors who figured out the absurdity of sub-prime mortgage underwriting and made a boatload betting against conventional wisdom.

I put Matterhorn on deck until around mid February. It’s a big book, 566 pages. By the time we were ready to leave for Curacao, I was only about a third of the way through.

And so I left my shiny new eReader back home while tree book made the trip. I can’t tell you what it is like to read an eBook on the beach, by the pool, and on the plane. I did enjoy a moment of smugness with old tree book when passengers were instructed to turn off their electronic devices. It was a guilty pleasure though. There but for the grace of literary timing I would have been one of them.

Then there’s the security thing. I thought nothing of leaving tree book on a beach lounge whilst I wandered off for a beer. I doubt I’d feel as cavalier about leaving my Nook lying about. I’d probably take it everywhere with me.

Just like this guy.

Anyway, I wrapped up Matterhorn on the flight home. It was the best book I’ve read about the Vietnam war since reading “A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam,” by Neil Sheehan. If you have an interest in that conflict I highly recommend both of these.

Ignoring the two tree books awaiting on my night stand, I instead find myself trolling the Nook bookstore for my next read. The bottom line is that reading a book on an eReader is just better, in most situations. Reading a book on my Nook is a treat for my eyes. The lighting is always perfect, just right for me and I never lose my place. I flew through The Big Short, flipping pages with my finger, never having them flap back.

I’ll still read tree books of course. A book is a book is a book after all. There are two of them sitting next to my bed that will beckon me back to the good old days.

It could be awhile though. I downloaded a free sample of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” by Stieg Larssen. It’s the first 76 pages of the book. I’m on page fifty something. I feel the hook gently sinking in.

Rent a Duck

The first time I vacationed in the Caribbean I stayed at anall inclusive resort just outside Montego Bay in Jamaica. We were advised by our travel agent not to venture beyond the resort gates unless we were part of an organized tour. The State Department website advises that “Crime, including violent crime, is a serious problem in Jamaica, particularly in Kingston and Montego Bay.”

I haven’t been back. When I travel to another country, I want to experience the country beyond resort walls on my own without being hustled at every turn. There are plenty of places in the Caribbean where you can do that. Curacao is one of them.

For venturing beyond our hotel in Curacao we decided to rent a Duck.

Ducks United calls itself “a nostalgic holiday car rental company.” On Curacao the company rents out a small fleet of Citroen 2CVs. The Dutch nicknamed them "Ducks." 

We got a green one.

It turned out to be an excellent way to connect with the locos and fellow tourists too. The car was a people magnet.

Kids loved it too.

Cramming

It is often said that your worst days at work are the day before you leave for vacation and the day you come back. That’s why we came back yesterday. We needed today to gird for the reentry to reality.

Arriving home in the late afternoon, we commenced with the usual stuff like unpacking, sorting through a weeks worth of mail, and discovering that the kitchen faucet is no longer working. Last night we ate sushi. I later fell asleep watching Game Change. That wasn't a statement on what I thought of the film. I had been up since 5:00 AM. A day of schlepping through airports, a glass of wine at dinner and a second back at home did me in. 

Today was more productive. We even fixed the faucet thanks to Mama Wordbones tenacity and somewhat amazing plumbing skills.

I also have to carve out time to get caught up on the latest HoCo news. Since I was some 1,500 miles south on our normal Friday podcast day last week, we went ahead and pushed it to Monday afternoon.

That’s like tomorrow Monday.

And we have a guest, Dr. Calvin Ball. We last had the good doctor as a guest almost exactly two years ago.

We originally thought it be interesting to hear what he has to say about the new park in his District, Bridge Columbia and how it felt to be the only council member who didn’t have an alternative plan for councilmanic redistricting.

Now that I’m home I found out that he was also on the losing side of the vote for the plan that the council has passed on to the exec. This is high loco politico drama for HoCo. We have a council appointed redistricting commission recommendation that nobody seemed to like except the Dem politico operatives. We have people in Ellicott City who don’t want to be a part of a Columbia district and people in Columbia who don’t want to be part of an Ellicott City district. As if that wasn’t enough fun, the plan that the council passed has pissed off the people in Elkridge, not this is all that unusual lately.

The stuff going on in Annapolis is pretty scary too. The budget that the state Senate is about to approve has some heavy baggage. According to this story by Aaron C. Davis and Michael Alison Chandler in The Washington Post, it “is an even more fundamental change to the way government works in Maryland.”

“The state would assume authority to seize county tax revenue and to hand it directly to school boards to ensure that counties maintain what areamong the nation’s highest levels of per-pupil spending.”

I’ve got some reading to do.

Now Returning To Regular Posting

I’m back. Did I miss anything?

I know, that’s a stupid question. Of course I missed stuff. I’ll try and get caught up over the next few days.

We spent last week on the island of Curacao, forty miles off the coast of Venezuela. It has been four long years since we were last in the Caribbean and I was long overdue for a healthy dose of island time. I purposely limited my exposure to the online world in order to fully immerse in the island one. It took a day or so but by Friday I was fully disengaged, just in time to pack up and return to HoCo

We slept late. We explored. We ate. We drank.

I made a few observations I'll be sharing over the next few days, interspersed with the usual postings about stuff around here. It was good to get away but its good to be back home too.

Marylanders On The Move

In case you didn’t notice, there is a mass movement of Marylanders going on right now. According to this story by Ryan Sharrow in the Baltimore Business Journal “Some 871,000 Marylanders are projected to travel 50 miles or more for Thanksgiving, a 3.5 percent increase over last year…”

The movement is starting earlier too. As Michael Dresser wrote in The Sun, “Tuesday before Thanksgiving is becoming the new Wednesday before Thanksgiving.”

It was for Peanut and I. We caught a flight out of BWI yesterday for Florida. Our early departure may have been fortuitous. As reported in this story by Olivia Katrandjian at ABC News, “Two forecasted storms are expected to make air travel rough across parts of the country, causing delays and cancellations at airports.”

I can’t imagine that it will be any easier driving. Rain has almost the same effect on Maryland drivers as snow.

Be careful out there.

Back In the Saddle

Tuesday evening, Mama Wordbones and I were in downtown Kennebunkport scouting out places for dinner. It was a cool New England evening and I was wearing a wind shirt from the Iron Bridge Wine Company.

“Excuse me,” a stranger on the street said, “Where did you get that shirt?”

It turns out that my fellow traveler was not only from HoCo, he was from Ellicott City. As they say, it’s a small world but I wouldn’t want to paint it.

It was good to get away but it was also somewhat comforting to run into someone from home when home is over four hundred miles south.

I’m back now and, though we had a nice time, it’s good to be home again in HoCo.

Did I miss anything?

I’m Outa Here

I’m going to take off for a few days. For the past two and a half years I have posted to this blog practically everyday. I’m overdue for a break.

I also haven’t gone away for a summer vacation in two years as I stayed home with our aging dogs. The dogs are gone now so I’m leaving too.

I’m not closing down completely. It is quite possible that I’ll put up a post here and there as I shift into vacation mode, but I am putting my normal routines aside, if only for a week.

That’s what summer is for after all.

Stay cool. See you in awhile

A Good Model

Friday night Mama Wordbones and I took a road trip to check out Black Ankle vineyards in Taylorsville. Since first tasting one of their wines back in March I’ve become a big fan. I also heard from friends that a trip to the winery was well worth the half hour drive from HoCo.

They were right.

Though the vineyard is relatively close by it feels like a world away. Turning into the vineyard after traveling down a tree shaded country road the first thing you see are rows of vines along rolling hills. The Tasting Room itself is a model of sustainability. From the living roof to the straw bale insulated walls it is arguably one of the coolest tasting rooms I’ve ever been in and I’ve been in few including several in Napa and Sonoma valleys.

For those considering setting up wineries under HoCo’s newly established wineries legislation, Black Ankle provides a pretty nice model to emulate.

The Bounty of the Bay

I spent the better part of yesterday on the eastern shore. After taking care of some business at our project in Centreville I headed over to Stevensville for an afternoon on the bay with Captain Tilghman Hemsley.

Fishing and crabbing with Tilghman is a unique experience. His sixty year old boat, the Breezin Thru, is real bay boat having been built in Rock Hall by AJ Stevens back in a time when boat building on the eastern shore was a thriving industry.

We began our trip by crabbing with a trot line in Price Creek. Prior to yesterday, I had thought that May was a little early for bay crabs but apparently the crabs didn't know that. In short order, after tossing back the females and the little guys under five inches, we had collected about fifty of the crustaceans. Kathy, Tilghmans mate, tossed them into a pot and started steaming them as we headed out to deep water in search of rockfish.

After setting our lines we sat down and enjoyed some of the freshest steamed crabs I’ve ever had.

While we were eating Tilghman showed us a bottle of vodka called Sloop Betty. Sloop Betty is produced by Blackwater Distilling, the first new distiller in Maryland in thirty five years. In consideration of the fact that I had to drive home when we returned to shore I took a pass on sampling it yesterday. I intend to pick up a bottle if I can find it in HoCo and try it out in the comfort of my own home.

After we snagged a couple of rock, Kathy once more retired to the galley and began preparing a second meal. We feasted on fresh rock, crab cakes, corn and cookies as we watched the sun go down on the bay.

It was a perfect way to kick off the official start of summer.

UPDATE: I found Sloop Betty at The Wine Bin in Ellicott City...thirty four bucks. She's already in the freezer...will review later...but not likely tonight.

Return to Campus

We spent the weekend in Chestertown at Washington College. We traveled to the eastern shore to bear witness to and celebrate CG’s commencement. It is truly astonishing how quickly these four years have blown by.

For the people of Chestertown, it’s just something that has been happening every spring since 1783.

Today’s commencement speaker was sports columnist Frank Deford. Frank proffered that the graduates should allow themselves to be surprised in life. He lamented that in a world where we know who’s calling before we pick up a phone, instantly know if someone had their eyes closed when a picture a is taken, and because of facebook, blind dates aren’t really blind anymore, we’re continuing to pave over opportunities for surprise.

It may have fallen on deaf ears, at least amongst the guests of honor. Frank also said that a University of Chicago study found that 97% of college graduates can’t recall who spoke at their commencement, let alone what they said.

I remember mine but mostly because, as seniors, we were very disappointed. The class before us had Bob Hope. We had Archbishop James Aloysius Hickey. I have no idea what his speech was about.

Snow Time for Goofing Off

It never seems to fail. You decide to take a day off so you can get all these things done and before you know it the day is done and there are still items on your list that you never got to.

Sigh.

After putting up a short post this morning I was about to head out to the grocery store when Paul Skalny called. Paul and I are planning on doing a podcast on New Years Eve and we had hoped to have HoCo mega church preacher, David Anderson as our guest. We want to focus the show around loco New Years resolutions and we thought it might be fun to have some spiritual perspective. Unfortunately we learned today that the good reverend will be out of town and unable to join us. This led to a lengthly discussion about who we could get instead. Names were bought up, bantered about and discarded. We finally reached consensus on an old Wilde Lake High classmate of mine. I called him on my way to the store. I was now about an hour behind.

I don’t know what the situation was later in the day but this morning the Giant in Lyndwood was relatively calm. The store manager was directing one of his staff to bring more snow shovels out of the back. Shovels were selling like hotcakes today.

By the time I left the store the road situation had begun to get dicey. It wasn’t so much the snow as it was the ice. The roads were pretty slick and though I saw a few cars doing the old slip side, I didn’t see any accidents. Back home I unloaded the groceries. Making chili was on my priority list today and now at least I had the necessary ingredients.

Next stop was the Wine Bin in Ellicott City. This is no time to run low on wine. In fact Dave Carney says that his business does very well when these winter storms hit. People stop in on their way home from work before hunkering down for the night. This afternoon however, there was only one other customer in the store and it wasn’t long before Dave was uncorking a bottle of wine for us to taste. We toasted the holidays. I love this store!

Leaving the Wine Bin I crossed the street to Classic Interiors. During Midnight Madness I noticed Mama Wordbones taking special interest in an item there and so now Santa was circling back to pick it up. I ended up speaking with the store owner, Carolyn Gaughan. It turns out that Carolyn has made quite a retail journey in HoCo. Her original location was in The Mall some thirty years ago. When then mall anchor store Woodward & Lothrop closed up shop, her business took a hit and so when it came time to renew her lease she opted instead to move to Savage Mill. After several years in the mill, she moved her store to a new space in Ellicott City behind Su Casa two years ago. It’s a very unique space that seems to fit her wares well.

She said that business is good, much better than last year.

Nobody had a good year last year.

Back home I realized that I needed to clear the driveway before I did anything else. That took me right up to 4:00 PM when I needed to have a phone conference with a developer about a clients lease renewal. I didn’t get started on my chili until five o’clock.

Now, with the pot of chili slowly simmering away on the stove, I’ve poured a glass a wine and pulled out the laptop. All in all I'd have to say it was a good day; I may not have accomplished everything I set out to do but right now it seems that it was just enough.

Preemptive Snow Day

For the past week I’ve been meaning to take a day off of work to get caught up on Christmas stuff. Inevitably, the day I pick ends up being the only day that some meeting or another can be held and I end up going to work.

Last night, as I looked at my calendar, I realized that today was probably my best shot so I took it. I sent an email to my colleagues telling them I was taking a preemptive snow day.

Unfortunately, since I had to get Peanut to school this morning, I still couldn't sleep in.

Back Home

We wrapped up our Thanksgiving trip yesterday and arrived back in Baltimore at eight o’clock last night. After five days of warm and sunny weather the blast of cold air that hit us as we stepped off the plane was a fitting reminder of our return to reality.

Once again, our journey through the security checkpoint at the Jacksonville airport was smooth and unremarkable. The body scan machines were in place but weren’t being used. I did not see any pat-downs.

It turns out that the travelling public opted out of the National Opt-Out Day as well. According to this story by Jeffrey Rosen in The Washington Post, “many appeared to have opted out of opting out. The TSA reported that few of the 2 million people flying Wednesday chose pat-downs over the scanners, with few resulting delays.”

I suspect that the TSA may have gotten the message anyhow.

Since all of my sisters Thanksgiving guests had flown in for the feast, the subject of airport screening was a topic of conversation. No one reported any issues with their own screening. A few suggested that the TSA should use profiling like the Israelis. I think that is easy to say for a group that likely wouldn’t fit any threat profile, but it is an idea that seems to be gaining some popular support. The dust up over Juan Williams firing from NPR after his comment to Bill O’ Reilly on Fox News about profiling has only added to the debate.

"Look, Bill, I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."

Rosen also reported that the current use of full body scans and pat-downs may actually violate our constitutional rights.

“Although the Supreme Court hasn't evaluated airport screening technology, lower courts have emphasized, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled in 2007, that "a particular airport security screening search is constitutionally reasonable provided that it 'is no more extensive nor intensive than necessary, in the light of current technology, to detect the presence of weapons or explosives.' "

And therein lies the problem. The full body scan technology hasn’t proven to be that effective in detecting explosives.

“A member of Britain's Parliament who evaluated the scanners in his former capacity as a defense technology company director concluded that they wouldn't have stopped the bomber who concealed the chemical powder PETN in his underwear last Christmas.”

I wonder if they would have noticed it had they touched his junk.

Airport Angst

Yesterday we flew out of BWI as part of the holiday hordes moving around the country for Thanksgiving. Peanut and I arrived well ahead of our scheduled departure in order to allow time for anticipated delays in the security screening process.

That didn’t happen.

We breezed through the process with minimum wait and perhaps the most notable thing was that neither of us was subjected to the full body scan nor a pat down. I didn’t see anyone else getting this intensive screening either. We simply walked through the regular old metal detecting arch and were on our way. When we finally reached my sisters home in St. Augustine and settled in with a beer, I compared notes with another sister who had flown down on Monday. She had the same experience.

Could it be that the recent uproar over TSA screening practices has resulted in a more selective screening process?

I’d love to hear if other airport travelers had a similar experience.

As it turns out the security screening wasn’t my biggest gripe with BWI yesterday. Instead it was their Wi-Fi setup.

BWI does not provide free Wi-Fi. You need to subscribe to Boingo and pay ten bucks for a one time 24 hour access to the web. I think this is gouging. Considering that even Starbucks now offers Wi-Fi at no charge, the fact the airport still charges for this service really raises my fur. I mean for godsake, its not like they aren’t getting enough money from the traveling public already in parking fees, landing fees and retail rents so high that a small smoothie and a pretzel for Peanut cost me $6.23. I felt like I was at Ravens stadium.

And here’s the real kicker.

I am not a frequent flier. The last time I flew out of BWI was back in April when we made the same trip. Again on that trip I allowed ample time for security delays and figured I’d use any extra time to hop on my laptop at the gate, perhaps even write a blog post. I sucked it up and signed on to Boingo.

Yesterday, when I decided to go ahead and pay the Wi-Fi toll, Boingo recognized me and asked for my username and password. I remembered my username but the password had long been forgotten. In order to get password assistance I had to call an 800 number which in turn resulted in waiting on hold for about twenty minutes. When I finally got the password thing worked out and got online, Southwest announced a gate change. No problem, I simply closed my laptop and moved down the terminal to the new gate. When I reopened my laptop, the connection was lost and I had to login to Boingo all over again.

As it turns out I spent about fifteen minutes online before having to pack everything up and get on the plane. That's hardly enough time to get caught up with my loco blogging brethren. I didn't even have time to really read Sarah's excellent post much less comment. 

Boingo blows.

Surviving Holiday Travel

This year I will be part of that great migration of holiday humanity passing through BWI airport to all points everywhere. Though I’m no stranger to this experience I approach this years trip with a bit of impending dread. As if it there isn’t already enough stress on the system, the latest backlash to the increasingly invasive security checks threatens to only make matters worse. A nationwide protest dubbed “Opt Out Day” is planned for this Wednesday. Thankfully, we’ll be traveling on Tuesday.

And just in time for our impending visit to BWI, The Sun has published a BWI Survival Guide.

Thirty-five Minutes Away

I did my best to pretend not to care that I was missing the Ravens game today. I told Mama Wordbones that it wasn’t really a big game. I told her we were expected to win…easily.

I should know better by now than to say something like that. The games you dismiss as easy wins are usually the games that trip you up and of course that is almost exactly what happened.

It was really too nice of day to sit inside and watch television and going to a Ravens game was not on Mama Wordbones birthday weekend activities list. Biking in Frederick was so we loaded up the bikes, grabbed a couple of cups of coffee for the ride, and headed out west.

I should note here that Frederick is a very bike friendly town. We parked the car on and unloaded our bikes on Church Street, taking advantage of the free street parking on Sunday. From there we navigated our way down to Carroll Creek Park. We rode along the canal up through Mullinix Park to Baker Park where the bike path dead ends at the Catoctin Mountain Highway (US 15). 

On the return trip we exited the parks and meandered through the streets in the historic district, working our way back to the canal. We enjoyed lunch at an outdoor café where I was finally able to check in on the Ravens game with my NFL Mobile app.

It was hard at this point to pretend that I didn’t care. The game was destined for overtime.

That being said I still have to admit that I thoroughly enjoyed our day trip to Frederick. The historic town is full of neat places to eat and drink and plenty of places to explore and discover on a bicycle.

And it is only thirty-five minutes away…just enough time to finish our coffee.

Bonus points to any reader who can identify the antique cars in the picture.