Village Green/Town²

  Imagine my surprise when I Googled “Columbia, Maryland” this morning and this turned up first: Will you look at that? The Chrysalis gets pride of place less than ten years after its dedication.  On the other hand, AI has labeled Columbia as a “village” which is legitimately cringeworthy. Although…we are complicated, aren’t we? I’ve been told by someone who knows that Columbia was deliberately laid out to encourage the joy of discovery. Sadly, this may be the same reason that I am always getting lost. When I saw the following post it reminded me of “the joy of discovery” and of Rouse’s Disney connection. I haven’t watched it yet but I’m going to. What if the streets in your neighborhood were designed like a Disney theme park? Here's how community designer Zach DeBoer says cities can create spaces that people actually want to explore : Why Cities Should Be Designed Like Disney . My last discovery this morning about Columbia did not bring me joy. In fact it felt more like horro...

  At the time of writing it’s still dark out. The day will begin wet but should clear up for your Saturday activities. For some reason I’m feeling the dark rather keenly this morning, as though it might just stay dark all day.  Still… The Clarksville Commons and Old Ellicott City markets are still a happening thing. The season will soon be over, so don’t miss these last few weeks to get out, buy fresh, and support local farmers and businesses. Elsewhere in Columbia/HoCo today… Open House Day in Old Ellicott City , 9 am - 6 pm: Columbia Plein Air Paint Out 2026 , 7 am - 7 pm: EcoWorks  Native Plant Sale , 10 am - 3 pm: Hispanic Heritage Festival , 12 - 4:30 at The Chrysalis: And, this evening: Howard Astronomical League Public Star Party , 6:53 - 11:00 pm Looking ahead to Sunday… Clarksville Commons (rescheduled) Book Festival , 11 am - 3 pm: And the Columbia Orchestra Pops Concert at the Chrysalis, 4:00 pm: A little light is beginning to peek in at the windows over here ...

  The truth is: it tickled my brain. It’s visually creative, full of word play, and just a little bit…naughty.  It’s an IKEA advert. It’s one minute and forty seconds long. You have time. “Get Cheras to IKEA Cheras” IKEA Malaysia, 2016 This was the ‘gateway’ video, as it were, that prompted me to search YouTube for all the short IKEA videos I could find. Was I looking for more twerking? Not necessarily. Whimsy? Absolutely. It turns out that I was in for a bigger adventure than I had anticipated. IKEA operates more than five hundred stores which are located in sixty countries and three territories.  A deep dive into their adverts took me around the world. Different races, ethnicities, cultural celebrations, housing options, climates, family structures.  I went for the cute adverts. I was immersed in cultural diversity. One of the the things that annoys me about YouTube is its mathematical commitment to keep offering me a narrow range of things that it thinks I want. N...

  The Banner asks an interesting question: What happened to Howard County Republicans? It’s a good question. I’m not entirely sure that they asked the right people.  What Happened to Howard County Republicans? We Asked Them. , Lillian Reed, Baltimore Banner Why did they ask? Well… No GOP candidates entered the race for county executive, Howard’s top elected position, or most other local offices such as state’s attorney, register of wills and sheriff. Out of more than a dozen people who pursued County Council seats this spring, just one had an R next to their name. It’s a fascinating article largely because the responses from the Republicans interviewed are just plain all over the place. Either they honestly don’t know or they do know and they have no intention of going on the record with their answers.  Among the responses are a good number of references to something they call divisiveness. Essentially this boils down to complaints that “the other folks are being mean to...

  Well, I took one day off and my page views have gone up dramatically. Not just for the last post I wrote, but for every single one in the recent past. It’s as though someone in an office somewhere discovered a backlog of page views that had never gone through and awarded them to me retroactively. Go figure. ***** Folks, we’re having a rash of the following behavior in Howard County. Aside from the influence of national politics, which is probably another whole post altogether, the influence of social media in this behavior cannot be ignored.  Social media’s business model is dependent upon clicks and engagement. Therefore it’s not enough to share information, feature images, or promote events. The machine feeds on clicks and engagement and it doesn’t matter whether it’s truthful or helpful.  And that’s where it intersects with our worst impulses. It tells us - - no, begs us - - to have and express an opinion on things which we don’t know enough about and don’t really ha...

This piece originally ran on October 11, 2021. The Biggest Lie and Its Undoing Today is Indigenous Peoples’ Day in Howard County and in a growing number of places across the US. County Executive Calvin Ball made the announcement of the change in September of 2020. Howard County replaces Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples’ Day “Indigenous and Native American history is embedded in our nomenclature and our geography — Patuxent, Potomac, Kittamaqundi. And yet there is a clear erasure of their history and their connection to our land,” Ball said. “Indigenous Peoples’ Day presents an opportunity of all ages and backgrounds to learn more about the people who were here before Columbus and colonization. Representation matters, but it must be more than a rallying cry.” It can be difficult for some of us to let go of the tales from our early years about brave explorers who discovered new lands. But all those stories are rooted in the basic falsehood that any places that Western Europeans didn’...