Village Green/Town²

  This is not a new article (February 19th) but somehow it caught my eye for the first time this morning as I scanned the Howard County stories on the Baltimore Banner website.  Columbia’s figure skating pioneer is 86 and not about to quit , Lillian Reed, Baltimore Banner With a stellar photo by Kaitlin Newman: Pat Muth, 86, skates on the ice at Columbia Ice Rink. Murth has been skating since she was a child and now teaches young kids how to be confident on the ice. (Kaitlin Newman/The Banner) This sentence about Muth’s connection to the Columbia Ice Rink intrigued me: I found out there was an ice rink being built at the end of my street.  So that means that she lived in Oakland Mills, which automatically makes her story more interesting to me.  The rink was built in 1970. The quadplex community where we live was built in 1972. So the rink predates our house. I wonder what Oakland Mills looked like back then? Yes, I’m digressing a bit. (But don’t come at me with you...

On my morning scroll through Bluesky for a blog topic… Maryland mentioned? SUPERMAN On the planet Krypton, Kal-El (Kryp-tonese for "Star-Child") was the son of scientist Jor-El and his wife Lara. Discovering that Krypton's core was unstable, Jor-El warned the Science Council that planetary destruction was imminent. But due to too much time spent in deliberation, it was not possible to build a space ark to evacuate any of Krypton's population. As the planet underwent its death throes, Jor-El sent his four-year old son, Kal-El towards planet Earth aboard an experimental rocket. On Earth the child was found and adopted by Jonathan and Martha Kent who called him Clark (Martha's maiden name) and instilled in him a high moral code and Earthian values. From the beginning the Kents knew of his otherwordly nature, and it was not long before they discovered his otherworldly capacities: he was incredibly strong, seemingly impervious to harm, able to float in the air, and was...

It is not Howard County Government’s fault. It is not the Columbia Association’s fault. It is not the Wilde Lake Village Association’s fault. The Grocery Outlet parent company has made the decision to close 36 stores. One of them is the one in Wilde Lake.  Companies like this do not make it their business to know the history of this individual site. They do not know how long Wilde Lake was without a grocery after the Giant closed. They probably don’t know about the work that went into the building to create the perfect home for an expanded David’s Natural Market. Big companies know spreadsheets and profits, earnings, losses, demographics, projections…But Jay and Rizwana Mirza, who have operated the Wilde Lake store, probably understand far better how much the people of Wilde Lake wanted their own grocery. They tried to give it to them. I went googling for a photo of the old Wilde Lake Giant and found this article in Columbia Patch instead. Image from Columbia Maryland Archives, us...

  Three things. 1. Wellness checks should be performed by people who can not kill you. Police fatally shoot resident of Columbia complex that supports adults with disabilities  2. Routine traffic enforcement should be done in a way that will not kill you. Attempted traffic stop turns into deadly crash in Howard County 3. AI chatbots should be regulated in such a way that they have much less power to kill you and can be held liable if they harm you.  New York considers bill that would ban chatbots from giving medical, legal advice That’s it.  If you have any other ideas for “doing no harm” today, I’d love to hear them. Since I’m still at my home away from home, I’ll be engaging in a well-known (but new to me) activity which involves cleaning the house to get ready for the cleaning ladies. I sincerely hope to do no harm. Village Green/Town² Comments

  This is the Peter and Elizabeth Horowitz Visual and Performing Arts Center. This is a map of the building that shows the Rouse Company Foundation Gallery. (Find the word “performing”. Go straight down. See the blue shape that looks like a lake? That’s it.) This is the exhibition on display in the Rouse Company Foundation Gallery until March 15th. goog_608975793 This is the artist, Lusmerlin Lantigua. Artist Lusmerlin Lantigua talks about the elements she incorporated into “The Big Rip,” a monumental work on display at Howard Community College. (Rick Hutzell/The Banner) This is the article in the Banner by Rick Hutzell that you should read whether or not you are able to attend the art show.  Hutzell: In ‘The Big Rip,’ an artist shares today’s immigrant experience , Rick Hutzell, Baltimore Banner About the art, Lusmerlin explains: “It is about this moment,” artist Lusmerlin Lantigua says. “It serves as a way for me to cope also, and it has, I think, that general sensation I h...

  I knew him from what we call The Other Place. You know, the social media platform that was X-ed out by the big, bad billionaire man. He was intelligent, witty, politically savvy, and - - best of all - - musical. Here he is: Musicology Duck. I was thrilled to reunite with this account after I moved to Bluesky. But something began to nag at me. Was this sparkling, observant narrator of DC life actually…a woman? She was. I mean, she is. But all that time I assumed: someone confident, knowledgeable, and unapologetic about who they were must be A Man. Oof. Well, I am over sixty and I was raised with sugar and spice (and the ABCs of being a girl.) But for heaven’s sake I was ten years old at the outset of Women’s Lib and my whole life has been infused with the awareness of women’s issues.  But… I was trained to be polite and entertaining, to make pleasant cocktail party conversation and to smooth over conflict to make other people comfortable. Taking up space? Extremely hard for ...