It's meat on the outside AND meat on the inside

The Baltimore Sun

With that wacky Charm City Cakes guy on The Food Network all the time, people across the country might have gotten the impression that Baltimore is a little odd.

Thank goodness American foodies were set straight the other night, when they saw Attman's Deli serving up a good, old-fashioned hot dog with, well, bologna.

Beef, it's what's for dinner. And at Baltimore's landmark Jewish deli, it's also what's on your dinner.

The circular lunchmeat is, Marc Attman tells me, a perfectly normal, if somewhat redundant, condiment for the tubular dog.

"The bologna is really the same meat that's inside [the frankfurter]," said Attman, who oversees the family deli his grandfather started in 1917.

Which isn't to say Attman didn't get a double-take when he dished out the meat-on-meat treat to George Duran, host of the network's The Secret Life Of ... program. The show delves into offbeat food histories, but this one - bologna-wrapped wieners go back decades at Attman's - apparently was weird even by Secret Life Of ... standards.

"He was shocked," Attman said. "He had never heard of that before. It's just been a staple of ours. ... [It's] a little extra meaty. A little more bang for your nickel."

No better than a party crasher

Martin O'Malley made an appearance in Bel Air on July 4, and the political fireworks are still popping.

A Republican named Paul Magness is ticked off that a fellow Republican not only tolerated the governor's presence at a post-parade party, but actually seemed to enjoy it!

"I was disappointed to hear Wednesday evening that current Governor O'Malley attended the annual 4th of July party given by [Republican State Central] Committee member Wayne Norman," Magness wrote in an e-mail to the committee. "While I initially thought perhaps Mr. Norman begrudgingly accepted the current Governor's presence, the attached photos posted on the Governor's website suggest otherwise."

The incriminating pictures show Norman and O'Malley smiling and holding red plastic cups. (There's also a shot of The Gov with the grinning Bel Air mayor, Terry Hanley - another Republican!)

"[I]f behavior such as this from a standing committee member goes without some type of sanction, I will re-evaluate my level of support for Central Committee functions and activities in the future," Magness wrote.

Norman told me that he "worked very hard for Bob Ehrlich" during last year's election and that he didn't invite O'Malley. But he wasn't about to turn the governor away when he showed up with someone who had been invited.

(Who took the governor as his guest? Norman wasn't giving anybody up. He also wouldn't say if he's gotten flak from anyone else. "I don't want to say too much more.")

"The governor showed up. Big deal," said Norman, who even let O'Malley play two songs with the band. "I'm not going to tell him he's gotta get off my property. No way."

O'Malley apparently never felt like the skunk at the garden party. Spokesman Rick Abbruzzese said the governor "had a wonderful time."

A mystery easily solved

Baltimore County issued a press release the other day reporting that "huge orange number 8s" had mysteriously appeared at intersections across the county.

"Several anonymous callers reported seeing a large orange and black-feathered figure with an Oriole hat at various intersections around the county with a paintbrush in hand," it said. "The description immediately led to speculation that the Oriole Bird was on the loose. Baltimore County Executive Jim Smith could not confirm or deny those rumors."

The No. 8s (and corny release) apparently were the county's way of celebrating soon-to-be Hall of Famer Cal Ripken, who also gets a parade July 21.

Either that or The Bird, with his team in the tank, is looking for work with a county road crew.

Connect the dots

Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown gets a mention in the July 16 Newsweek, in a short piece about black leaders said to "appeal to all races by stressing consensus over conflict." The article, "After the Trailblazers," also mentions Newark Mayor Cory Booker, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick and D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty. ... At a community meeting to trot out Baltimore's new schools chief the other night, all of the VIPs in the audience got the obligatory nod, but state Sen. Nathaniel McFadden was nearly forgotten, The Sun's Sara Neufeld and Brent Jones report. When McFadden was finally acknowledged, he pointed to someone else he thought had been overlooked, City Councilman James Kraft. But it wasn't Kraft. It was Ara Shishmanian, assistant principal of Harford Heights Middle. ... Kriti Gandhi, an 18-year-old from Ellicott City, will appear in the Jeopardy! Summer Games Teen Tournament, which begins next week.

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