{"id":499,"date":"2010-04-26T18:05:45","date_gmt":"2010-04-26T18:05:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html"},"modified":"2010-04-26T18:05:45","modified_gmt":"2010-04-26T18:05:45","slug":"notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html","title":{"rendered":"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Was out all day down in Baltimore, or driving between there and Philly. Julie and the boys had some business downtown, so Nora and I hung out at the harbor &#8212; mostly in the Aquarium, because it was raining. A few short notes:<br \/>\n1. An ill omen! Driving into the city, we passed next to a life-size doll&#8217;s head lying in the middle of the freeway. Scawy!<br \/>\n2. The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.aqua.org\/\">National Aquarium in Baltimore<\/a> is way too expensive. Nora and I enjoyed ourselves, but we didn&#8217;t enjoy ourselves $45 worth, which is what the least-expensive tickets for the two of us cost. Add $18 for parking to that, and it&#8217;s hard to conclude that the Aquarium excursion was worth it. The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dwazoo.com\/d\/\">Dallas World Aquarium <\/a> &#8212; the only other aquarium I&#8217;ve ever visited &#8212; is also expensive, but it&#8217;s a much better value.<br \/>\n3. I actually heard a man say &#8220;Baldim&#8217;rr&#8221; today. If only a woman had called one of us &#8220;Hon,&#8221; my trip would have been complete.<br \/>\n4. Wow, look at that fancy <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Baltimore_Sun\">Baltimore Sun printing press building<\/a>, which cost hundreds of millions, according to Wikipedia. Wonder what&#8217;s going to happen to it when the Sun dies. Judging by the skeletal thickness of the newspaper, we&#8217;ll find out soon, alas.<br \/>\n4. Eleven dollars in tolls between Baldim&#8217;rr and Philadelphia? <em>Really?<\/em> Really.<br \/>\n5. What do they call people from Delaware anyway? Why aren&#8217;t all places in Delaware named for the greatest Delawarian (?) of our time: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dogfish.com\/\">Sam Calagione<\/a>? I think they should call the whole state Calagionia. Anyway, people should think about what they call their cities, in case the city becomes a big deal. Take Wilmington, <strike>the state capital<\/strike> (dang, I have subsequently been informed that Dover&#8217;s the state capital, not that cesspool of fleshpots, Wilmington!). Nothing against Wilmington, which I&#8217;m sure is filled with many interesting, noble citizens and their above-average children, but people elsewhere are never going to really respect a town called Wilmington. It sounds like all the men there wear cardigans. A positive example is Bryn Mawr, Pa. Know what it was called before the town fathers opted for the cool Welsh name? Humphreysville. True. People in Wilmington should change their city&#8217;s name to something cooler. Like &#8220;Calagione.&#8221;<br \/>\n6. Did you know there&#8217;s only 2 1\/2 hours&#8217; drive separating me from the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dogfish.com\">Dogfish Head Brewery<\/a> in Milton, DE, home of Sam Calagione, a great American? Must start rationalizing family vacation to Milton now&#8230;<br \/>\n<b>UPDATE:<\/b> A reader sends along a snapshot of an edifying message seen along one of the Baltimore motorways:<br \/>\n<span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"baltimore[1].JPG\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/199\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG\" width=\"307\" height=\"230\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"text-align: center;margin: 0 auto 20px\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Was out all day down in Baltimore, or driving between there and Philly. Julie and the boys had some business downtown, so Nora and I hung out at the harbor &#8212; mostly in the Aquarium, because it was raining. A few short notes: 1. An ill omen! Driving into the city, we passed next to&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-varia"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts - Rod Dreher<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, nofollow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts - Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Was out all day down in Baltimore, or driving between there and Philly. Julie and the boys had some business downtown, so Nora and I hung out at the harbor &#8212; mostly in the Aquarium, because it was raining. A few short notes: 1. An ill omen! Driving into the city, we passed next to&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-04-26T18:05:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/files\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rod Dreher\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts - Rod Dreher","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"nofollow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts - Rod Dreher","og_description":"Was out all day down in Baltimore, or driving between there and Philly. Julie and the boys had some business downtown, so Nora and I hung out at the harbor &#8212; mostly in the Aquarium, because it was raining. A few short notes: 1. An ill omen! Driving into the city, we passed next to&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html","og_site_name":"Rod Dreher","article_published_time":"2010-04-26T18:05:45+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/files\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG"}],"author":"Rod Dreher","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html","name":"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts - Rod Dreher","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/files\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG","datePublished":"2010-04-26T18:05:45+00:00","dateModified":"2010-04-26T18:05:45+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/#\/schema\/person\/0eb55fec41ac37c5cdc76396861852db"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/files\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/roddreher\/files\/import\/baltimore%5B1%5D.JPG"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/2010\/04\/notes-on-baltimore-and-thereabouts.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Notes on Baltimore and thereabouts"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/","name":"Rod Dreher","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/#\/schema\/person\/0eb55fec41ac37c5cdc76396861852db","name":"Rod Dreher","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2e1\/2e1e526772cb318f0168aec327715d02x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2e1\/2e1e526772cb318f0168aec327715d02x96.jpg","caption":"Rod Dreher"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/author\/rdreher"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/roddreher\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}