Maryland

Another fun fact: The current Baltimore mayor, Martin O'Malley, fronts a Celtic-rock band in his spare time (he's got spare time?).

I grew up in Rockville, Maryland, one of the Washington, DC bedroom suburbs; this region is a lot drabber than the rest of the state.

The weather in this area is, to my mind, the worst of all possible worlds. The summers tend to be hot, hazy and humid, yet not so hot that we don't stop dressing and working as if we were in London. And as for the winters, while it can get very cold and windy, it never snows very much. Therefore we are expected to show up for work on time even though a classic nor'eastern is sleeting down on us. And yes, we do not know how to drive in weather of that nature. Midwesterners and New Englanders rightfully pick on us accordingly.

In the far western regions of the state you're in the Appalachian mountains; I haven't been there so I don't know if it still lives up to the image of something out of the movie "Deliverance."

[1] One of Baltimore's nicknames; another is "The City That Breeds," in the wake of a lame mayoral campaign to promote the place as "The City That Reads."

In the far western regions of the state you're in the Appalachian mountains; I haven't been there so I don't know if it still lives up to the image of something out of the movie "Deliverance."

Hey now. We do read and write, mostly. Though I hear that if you go down by the banks of the Potomac in some parts it is, in fact, kinda sorta like that. I guess there are plenty of rednecks, but they are in on the joke. What really stinks is the lack of decent paying jobs, and the drug problems..

A friend (western MD native) of my dad's was about to send her daughter off to college, and the kid's roommate called up from Rockville and wanted to know if she'd teach her how to tip cows! I said, uh, if you need someone to teach you how to tip cows, are you sure it's a good idea to go to college?

John Waters has been making trouble in these precincts for years. From the scatological to the homicidal, he's been churning out films that seem to come from a parallel universe to the one where good taste resides. (That parallel universe, by the way, had its Big Bang origins right around Broadway - the real Broadway, the one that crosses Eastern Avenue, near where the wig store used to be.) He made Hairspray the film way back in 1988, but it's the stage version, in which he also had a hand, that has put Charm City on the map.

And that's why John Waters is The Sun's Marylander of the Year.

We know what you're thinking. Have we forgotten Pink Flamingos? And Odorama? Do we approve of Serial Mom? Or Pecker? And what about that pencil-thin mustache?

Here's our answer: You don't have to love them all to appreciate the singular mind behind them.

Let's face it. We live in a society that's not altogether completely 100 percent healthy in every possible way. That's what John Waters is all about. Life is full of things that are a little bent or a little out of whack or that just generally need to be trued up a tad. We try to ignore them; Mr. Waters makes his art out of them.

fuck Duke

Midieval England meets NASCAR!

it's so true.

You do know that jousting is already the official state sport, right?

Also, Duke sucks.

o Maryland, my Maryland.. you are not Delaware or New Jersey!

The Crabbing Life of Smith Island, Md.

Church Point, St. Mary's City, MD. On the other side of the St. Mary's River is Pagan Point.

yup. find me a state with a cooler sport. you can't do it.

also, speaking of smith island, the cake that bears its name is unfathomably delicious.

and YES the oranges band!

(apologies, everyone else...)

but to take it back to fredneck (i love that slang), it sort of reminds me of the controversy surrounding Morrissey after he released "national front disco" and the whole madstock fiasco. (i know this is obscure, but bear with me)

im not a rush limbaugh style amurrrrican by any means. but that said, a certain type of backwards and racist person in frederick is slowly being replaced by something even more sinister. MS-13 is no joke, nor are the other gangs in the greater frederick area. my freind is a teacher at Frederick High, and she lost her best girl pupil last year when she was attacked and gang raped ON FILM by a group of kids as part of a gang ritual. things like that just didn't happen in frederick ten years ago. i get really scared sometimes that my county is going to hell fast, but then i think, should i care? i mean, the Larry the Cable guy types i went to high school never really liked me, and i never really liked them.

i dunno, theres more to this, but i have to go to work.

the bmi is pretty cool as is the nearby visionary art museum

i went to high school across the street from f. scott fitzgerald's grave and never ever visited it.

richard montgomery? the bldg between those two locations w/ the big eagle statue used to be quite the skate hangout. i got ticketed there once.

other local slang: Montgomery College a.k.a. "M.K." a.k.a. "Harvard on the Pike" heheh. in fact, it's one of the best (if not the top) community colleges in u.s.

—East River Pipe

what does any of that have to do with PGC?

i don't want that in fredneck

right, it certainly ISN'T hundreds of thousands of law-abiding citizens, nearly 2/3 of them black (unlike 90% white Frederick County), with a high school graduation rate and median household income above the state average, in sum representing the leading majority-black suburban area in the United States, and also home to a number of major federal and military facilities and one of the country's leading public research institutions (that also apparently takes in some dumbfuck undergraduates).

i know most of PG county is exactly what you are saying, most people i have met while living down here are people i would be proud to consider freinds. what i am talking about is by far the minority, but it still exists, and you can't deny that. im not trying to say that PG is some horrible county on the verge of martial law. if you live here too, i apologize, but im not going to pretend that some of the horribly shitty things that happen here don't happen, and im not going to say that it would be a good thing if frederick were to become PG. the virtues of my home county have almost nothing to do with race, it has much more to do with it being mostly rural and devoid of crime.

i had no idea cheney's bunker was there. where is it, ft detrick?

and mostly rual does have nothing to do with race. everywhere i go down here there is traffic and haze. i kinda like country life, those backwood roads i grew up driving on. i swear, thats really all there is to it. and more and more those roads and areas are being destroyed by suburban development. its quiet at night there, as opposed to the constant hum of cars or sirens or whatever you have here.

http://www.ase.org/images/lib/statebulletin/Governor%20Ehrlich.jpg

Delayed fast-food order fodder for comptroller
Schaefer serves up tirade on non-English speakers during board meeting
By Michael Dresser and David Nitkin
Sun Staff
Originally published May 6, 2004
Perturbed by his difficulty ordering food at a local McDonald's restaurant, Comptroller William Donald Schaefer unleashed a tirade against Maryland residents who don't speak English yesterday - prompting criticism that his comments showed a lack of tolerance for other cultures.

The former governor aired his complaints about non-English speakers at a meeting of the state Board of Public Works, on which he serves. Schaefer frequently uses the board as a forum to express his often-controversial views, whether or not they have anything to do with board business.

He said his comments were prompted by a recent visit to McDonald's during which the woman taking his order didn't speak English. The language barrier, he said, delayed the transaction.

"I don't want to adjust to another language. This is the United States. I think they ought to adjust to us," the comptroller complained. "The people who come here should become part of American [sic], become Americanized and speak the language."

Schaefer also vented his ire at McDonald's for distributing bags with "every language on there except English." He said he wouldn't return to that McDonald's anytime soon but did not specify which restaurant he had patronized.

McDonald's Corp. did not immediately respond yesterday to a call to its Illinois headquarters. The company is in the midst of a global advertising campaign around its "I'm lovin' it" tag line, and some restaurant bags and cups feature the slogan in many languages.

The head of a group that advocates for the rights of immigrants called Schaefer's comments "unacceptable for a politician" and said the comptroller should be held to the same rules as others who hold public office.

Gustavo Torres, executive director of CASA of Maryland, said Schaefer's remarks show "a lack of tolerance and a lack of respect for different cultures and languages."

Torres said Schaefer doesn't understand the obstacles immigrants face.

"Our Latino and immigrant communities are working very hard to improve their English. We have a big waiting list because we don't have enough space or funding to provide additional English classes," Torres said. He added that Maryland ranks behind West Virginia in its funding of language education for adults.

The comptroller's comments were not appropriate for a public meeting, said Del. Susan C. Lee, a Montgomery County Democrat who is one of two Asian-Americans in the General Assembly.

"I think every immigrant group that comes here is trying to learn English the best they can. They know that in order to succeed you have to learn English. I know that is how my grandparents felt," said Lee, who is of Chinese descent.

In his remarks, which lasted about two minutes at the opening of the meeting, Schaefer said he had a similar experience yesterday morning at the same fast-food chain.

"I went today, the same thing, only there was a lady from a different country," he said. "And one of our, one of our American citizens [was assisting her]. I gave my order to the new girl. Nice little girl. She was very accommodating. The little girl beside her had to take the order. People are wondering, 'What the heck is this?'"

Fellow board members Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele, sitting in for Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., and Treasurer Nancy K. Kopp listened to Schaefer without commenting.

i really dont care who is comfortable or not, because that isnt what i was fucking talking about. gabb, if you want the place you live to be nothing but parking lots, fast food, and congestion, then i guess you are different than me. but dont bring race into this or try to make me into something im not. if you can't see past color, its not my problem. dick.

and now, back to how great maryland is........(sorry zack)

i grew up across from a cornfield. it was rural and boring and shitty cos so many of the people were redneck shitheads

that said, i dont want to have to deal with MS-13 instead.

I'm from Alabama, albeit not rural Alabama, and not Birmingham old-money-new-money-no-money Alabama either, but the degree of discomfort I often felt dealing with Maryland's bizarro race lines was pretty fuckin' high. It gets to the point where you can start to get really sketched-out anytime you get lost or go somewhere new, because you realize that no matter where you end up, being a white liberal is going to land you in the minority basically 100% of the time.

So obviously the answer for me was to move to Arlington VA, where they have scientifically eradicated blacks and hispanics altogether by ensuring that there is NOTHING INTERESTING TO DO.

Every day I miss Columbia Heights' hanguk bodegas, mixed-clientele hip-hop nights and espanol billboards. All for a stupid tax break.

I'm from Columbia, which i know is hardly representative of typical MD (for those unfamiliar with the town, it's a "planned community" conceived in some sorta utopian post-hippie "free to be you and me" dream that's now fairly yuppified and mostly known for its unfathomably huge mall), but jeez louise, the state you're describing sounds pretty different from the one I grew up/live in.

Anyway, to get back to how awesome Maryland is:

ihttp://ticketing.ramsheadtavern.com/uplimage/o'malley%20(2).jpg

http://www.showbizireland.com/images/stars2/gigs-9-mayorbaltimore.jpg

Yeah, north Arlington, office buildings, condos and metro stops. Whitebread as it gets.

The Ram's Head is a great place to meet off-duty NSA enlisted folks, if that's what you're into.

Northern Virginia almost can be divided into discrete ethnic sectors:

Arlington, gentrified Alexandria = yuppie white
Alexandria (nongentrified parts) = black
Falls Church = Hispanic and Vietnamese, with Rt. 7 as the de facto border
Annandale = Korean

White persons: 68.9% (vs. 72.3% statewide and 75.1% nationwide)

Persons of Hispanic or Latino origin: 18.6% (versus 4.7% statewide and 12.5% nationwide)

I grant you Black or African American persons: 9.3% (vs. 19.6% statewide and 12.3% nationwide), but still.

cumberland was quite nice, in a faintly faded touristy kind of way, though it is strange, the way it is located in a dip

what are the nicest places in the eastern and chesapeake bays, to go to?

http://news.yahoo.com/death-maryland-boy-pushed-swing-three-days-ruled-212805331.html

this story is bizarre and extremely sad

People's Republic of Montgomery County, here I come!

NP: REM, "Don't Go Back to Rockville"

Are other ILXors currently in the Old Line State?

I was! Now I’m a filthy Virginian

I’m in Baltimore County!

Grew up in that very same republic and spent my teen years very eager to get out. Did so for about 10 years but I’m back in DC now. It’s not so bad.

After many years in Northern Vrginia, the wife and I are in Montgomery County, Maryland