He looks hot, but he's taken

May 16, 2008

You live by the biceps, you die by the biceps. The good news for Martin O'Malley: A national magazine has put him on one of those lists of top governors.

Recent columns

• A sad story of thwarted love

  May 14, 2008

  A Maryland tourism ad has gone over big in a Fairfax Station, Va., barn. Too big.

• He knew just what he liked

  May 11, 2008

  Frank Zappa gave Maryland more than just the first 10 years of his life. He also gave his home state one of its most memorable moments in legislative history.

• Not blowing in the wind

  May 9, 2008

  Seen the wind turbines atop the Inner Harbor's Power Plant? Must admit I'd missed them until someone sent me the link to a video posted on the official city tourism Web site.

• The object of their affections

  May 7, 2008

  Seems like you'd need special legal authority and uncommon nerve to dupe William Donald Schaefer into moving to a retirement home. But it looks like Lainy LeBow-Sachs only had nerve.

• They put away the crayons

  May 4, 2008

  No less an authority than Rolling Stone declares that Baltimore has the nation's best "scene." Really. "Hotbed for rap and art rock," it says.

• First, don't kill all the editors

  May 2, 2008

  First, Princeton University Press issued the book, Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District. Then it issued the news release recalling the book.

• Clothes didn't make the man

  April 30, 2008

  If Anthony Brown ever gets his fill of politics, he might consider a second career as a tuxedo model. The lieutenant governor has already appeared, decked out in a snazzy penguin suit, in a magazine ad for Kustom Looks Clothier.

• The final test of a gentleman

  April 27, 2008

  Before Friends School students leave their leafy campus for the real world, they'll need some life skills. Which is why upper school Principal Peter Gilmore led a tutorial the other day in tying a bow tie.

• The littlest officeholder

  April 25, 2008

  How many bigwigs can live under one roof?

• Slots foes bag a literary lion

  April 20, 2008

  What the Maryland slots debate really needs is a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer, and luckily, Taylor Branch is up for it.

• Guess they're maybe gun-shy

  April 18, 2008

  MSNBC has seen fit to protect the American public from this political shocker: All three presidential candidates agree on something.

• Don't take your guns to town

  April 16, 2008

  Mayor Sheila Dixon appears in a TV ad that's running around the country. In it, she's identified as a Barack Obama supporter. But the Illinois senator isn't likely to welcome the gesture.

• A little chocolate in the swag

  April 13, 2008

  The mother-to-be wore a black evening gown to the afternoon tea, and the paparazzi snapped away. Those aren't the only things that set Jessica Alba's baby shower apart from yours and mine. There's also the matter of the swag.

• Uh, not so fast, 'Mayor' Dixon

  April 11, 2008

  So is Sheila Dixon really mayor of Baltimore or what?

• No, not stripping -- 'layering'

  April 9, 2008

  Maybe the Red Cross should change its name to the Red Hot! Hot! Hot! Cross.

• A light on a family's dark side

  April 6, 2008

  A new documentary tells the story of a white Annapolis mayor and a black burglar whose long and unlikely friendship helped keep the city calm 40 years ago, after the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

• It's just a little surgical procedure

  April 4, 2008

  Jayne Miller has been off the air for most of the past two months, and not because the WBAL-TV reporter has been working on a big story. She had brain surgery.

• Not just the paint that's flaky

  April 2, 2008

  Keiffer Mitchell thought he was done with City Hall when he lost last year's race for mayor. Then came the notice from the housing department, ordering him to fix the "defective" paint on his brick Bolton Hill townhouse - or face a criminal misdemeanor charge that carries $500-a-day fine.

• A room to chill the blood

  March 23, 2008

  The marble on the walls of Baltimore's spectacular, circular courtroom came from the Vatican quarry. The fancy-schmancy coffered dome, modeled on one in the Library of Congress. And the ghost? Nobody's quite sure where he came from.

• Even cops can't get a break

  March 21, 2008

  Nice to know cops can't talk their way out of speeding tickets, either. Though not for lack of trying.

• Supper good, the singing, too

  March 19, 2008

  Sheryl Crow joked about getting a "boob job," sang about the Dalai Lama and downed some Cindy Wolf lamb chops. In so doing, she helped raise about $225,000 for the Ulman Cancer Fund for Young Adults during a benefit concert Sunday at Baltimore's Pazo restaurant.

• Even a delegate knows love

  March 16, 2008

  Has Del. Melvin Stukes ever had any bones broken, like the woman who was brutally beaten on the No. 27 bus? He didn't let on. But the former Baltimore city councilman let it be known that he'd had his heart broken. Which is why he could relate to Sarah Kreager's attackers.

• Should've asked John Waters

  March 14, 2008

  For its commencement speaker this spring, Goucher College has snagged Matthew Modine, an accomplished actor, director and screenwriter who's made some admirable personal choices. (He doesn't own a television or a car, according to the Internet Movie Database and ForbesAuto.com, respectively. And, in a fruitless attempt to save moviegoers from dorky Cold War cinema, he turned down the Tom Cruise role in Top Gun.)

• O'Malley: chauffeured in style

  March 9, 2008

  The state troopers who drive Martin O'Malley around can be trusted to know where they're going, but not to flip on the windshield wipers when it rains.

• Wassup? Approach the bench

  March 7, 2008

  Judges on Maryland's second-highest court, having mastered dense legalese, have been puzzling over the phrase "What's up?"

• A national figure -- just barely

  March 5, 2008

  Mark Halperin, Time magazine's senior political analyst, came out with a list of boldface Dems yesterday, and Martin O'Malley was on it, whether he liked it or not.

• The court czar is a rock star

  March 2, 2008

  John Prevas has found a way to shake off the world of stuffy court briefs and sober judicial robes. It starts with Steely Dan's "Cousin Dupree," the Baltimore City Circuit Court judge's signature karaoke song.

• Schaefer's on the loose again

  February 29, 2008

  William Donald Schaefer has kept a low profile of late, but he is scheduled to give a lecture about his days as City Councilman and mayor on Sunday at the Baltimore Museum of Industry. He'll speak there again March 16 about his tenure as governor and comptroller. Both times, Schaefer will share the stage with C. Fraser Smith, the WYPR senior news analyst, Sunday Sun columnist and author of a Schaefer biography.

• The enduring power of print

  February 27, 2008

  Never mind all the naysayers who say newspapers are only good for kitty litter. From Annapolis comes proof that papers are also good for murder investigations, albeit by way of the litter box.

• Don't ask - you can't afford it

  February 24, 2008

  An acclaimed HBO series that tells the story of Baltimore with brutal murders and f-bombs aplenty has spared viewers this much: Billy Murphy's legal fees.

• Kids with their crazy music

  February 22, 2008

  A couple of Park School grads, Christopher Keating and Anand Wilder, seem to be making good with their band, Yeasayer. They appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien last week, then headed off on a European tour.

• Eat your lawn out, Baltimore!

  February 20, 2008

  Los Angeles architect and artist Fritz Haeg is trying to help people garden and eat better. Along the way, he's also having great fun raising the hackles of homeowners associations.

• Maybe it's for the XXX Games

  February 17, 2008

  Michael Phelps and Katie Hoff aren't just showing off their swimming in Missouri. They're showing off their new Speedo LZR Racer swimsuits. And that means they're showing off their birthday suits, too.

• Art imitates life imitates art

  January 25, 2008

  Felicia Pearson did time for murder, then went on to play a hitman named "Snoop" on The Wire. Now she finds herself caught up in another real-life killing - this time as a witness.

• Hey, Oprah-ize me!

  January 13, 2008

  Baltimore sports agent, attorney and author Ronald Shapiro has a new book out. He also knows Oprah Winfrey. Sound like a straight shot to the best-seller list?

• Fake newsroom, real anger

  January 6, 2008

  Forget what you've heard about the fifth and final season of The Wire, which begins tonight on HBO. Officially, what some critics have called the greatest show in the history of TV wraps up with a meditation on the evils of corporate newspaper ownership. But really, it's all about revenge.

• Poinsettias on the march!

  December 9, 2007

  In a town born just before The Brady Bunch and burdened with Mike Brady-esque split-levels, people hold fast to what traditions and beauty can be had. Which is why some Columbia "pioneers" will arm themselves with poinsettias at high noon today and march on The Mall in Columbia.

• Halloween goes all tasteful

  October 31, 2007

  Martin O'Malley's critics say he's a spender. Can't prove it by the Halloween decorations at the governor's mansion.

• They gasp at the doorway

  September 23, 2007

  Awoman born to antiques dealers and steeped in classical music has the hippest office in town, backstage at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

• It's a free press when you own it

  March 18, 2007

  From the pecan cabinetry to the flagstone patio, no detail about the Roland Park charmer featured in The Examiner's real estate section goes unnoticed, but for this: The guy trying to sell the place, Examiner Publisher Michael Phelps.

• Ain't the urn cool!

  September 30, 2005

  Chuck Thompson wasn't just a Hall of Fame sports announcer. He also was a husband, the kind who parked himself on a shopping mall bench while his wife roamed the stores. So his final resting place -- in the courtyard of a revamped shopping mall -- could not be more fitting.