So I'm in Cambridge, Maryland...

[Goodfella]

You were probably in Bethesda or Rockville. Cybrxkhan, do you know any places that match this description?

 

[warpus]

We just spent the last half hour trying to figure it out.

We are 85% sure that it was Gaithersburg, Maryland. That's where the hotel was.. it seems.

I can also confirm that there was a smelly mall wherever it was where we couldn't find booze.. Potentially somewhere in Washington or maybe even near Gaithersburg or somewhere else entirely. We even attempted to find documentation on old ftp sites (pictures from the past, etc.) to solve the mystery, but that's as best as we can remember.

 

[Goodfella]

A fair number of areas near DC match that description, the other side of the river included. I miss Virginia now.

 

[BvBPL]

Cambridge, MA is where Harvard and MIT are, so it's most definitely known for its universities, just not eponymously.

It is also where or near where some cfcers live.

 

[cybrxkhan]

Hmm, warpus, by chance was the commercial district named Rio (or Washingtonian, as it's occasionally known)? And was the restaurant either Romano's Macaroni Grill or Red Canyon Grill? (Forgot which was which)

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I assume you're stuck in traffic commuting towards DC/nova

Why else in maryland?

HAH. Fun fact, most of the state is not in the immediate area of the DC-Baltimore metro-clusterfudge.

I'm heading to Maryland today too. I also know nothing about it except what I learned from The Wire.

A show revolving solely around inner-city Baltimore, where you will almost surely never find yourself.

What brings you to MD?

On my first trip to the US I was informed that no-one in Maryland has any idea what Chicken Maryland is.

As an Englishman, I was reduced to agreeing that we didn't know what an English muffin was either.

Such were the glories of cultural interchange.

Maryland Cookies are also not named after us. So many Brits responded to hearing where I was from with "oh, where the cookies come from!" lolnope

I am unsurprised. The English are a peaceful, gentle people.

As far as I know, there actually weren't any wars between settler and Natives, at least in the non-Western parts of the state. The mountain areas might have joined up with the French in 1756.

We just spent the last half hour trying to figure it out.

We are 85% sure that it was Gaithersburg, Maryland. That's where the hotel was.. it seems.

G-burg is a nice town, I used to work there.

It is also where or near where some cfcers live.

Indeed!

Hmm, warpus, by chance was the commercial district named Rio (or Washingtonian, as it's occasionally known)? And was the restaurant either Romano's Macaroni Grill or Red Canyon Grill? (Forgot which was which)

Do you live in the area too? Copper Canyon was the first thing that came to mind as well, with the flames outside, and there is indeed one at The Rio, but I would never describe it as cheap!

 

[cybrxkhan]

Do you live in the area too? Copper Canyon was the first thing that came to mind as well, with the flames outside, and there is indeed one at The Rio, but I would never describe it as cheap!

Oh, is it called CopperCanyon? I've only visited Maryland once since I moved away ~4 years ago, so I've forgotten, maybe I'm mixing it up with some other place. Lived about ~10 minutes from there, in the Dufief area, so it was usually a short and convenient drive to Rio - did go there a lot with my family when I was younger and then later with my friends in high school.

 

[Camikaze]

A show revolving solely around inner-city Baltimore, where you will almost surely never find yourself.

But TV tells me gang warfare is the only thing that happens in the US.

What brings you to MD?

Firaxicon is on this Saturday in Hunt Valley, and 2K are paying my way. I'll then be sightseeing in DC for a few days.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

But TV tells me gang warfare is the only thing that happens in the US.


Firaxicon is on this Saturday in Hunt Valley, and 2K are paying my way. I'll then be sightseeing in DC for a few days.

Ah, cool. Is that because you're a mod here?

Never been up to Hunt Valley, but when I lived in Towson I would catch the light rail at the Timonium fairgrounds if I was going into town. Worth the trip to the Inner Harbor if you get the chance; see the ballpark, the aquarium, eat at the bangin Irish place next to the USS Constellation...

 

[Paul in Saudi]

In front of the courthouse in Queen Anne's, Maryland, the county seat of Queen Anne's County, is statue of Queen Anne sitting in a Queen Anne's-style chair. It is ... remarkable.

 

[warpus]

Hmm, warpus, by chance was the commercial district named Rio (or Washingtonian, as it's occasionally known)? And was the restaurant either Romano's Macaroni Grill or Red Canyon Grill? (Forgot which was which)

We think we are pretty sure that it's just south of where the 270 meets the 370. There's a Target there, hotels, etc.

I can't remember the restaurant, but I had really good steak with mashed potatoes and gravy. And a Newcastle brown ale. The exact sort of meal one should have after hitting a deer.

 

[cybrxkhan]

We think we are pretty sure that it's just south of where the 270 meets the 370. There's a Target there, hotels, etc.

I can't remember the restaurant, but I had really good steak with mashed potatoes and gravy. And a Newcastle brown ale. The exact sort of meal one should have after hitting a deer.

Yup, that's Rio. It has the big Target (no pun intended).

Nice big shopping/entertainment/whatever complex, one of the best in Montgomery County, in my opinion.

 

[Antilogic]

Anti, what on earth are you doing in Cambridge?

One of my best friends from undergrad is getting married, and I'm granting myself the honorary position of bridesman since bride's side is the best side. I'm going to rock that pink tie LIKE A BOSS.

Was the joke.

You saved yourself this time, good sir.

One of the 13 colonies, founded as a haven for Catholics from England, wound up being a general haven for people from England (and thus one of the first colonies to legislate religious tolerance). Annapolis served as the national capital during part of the revolution. Baltimore was the biggest port city on the East Coast for a while, and remained a major player up until the 1970s or so (although it's still a large port, but deindustrialization hit it reeeeeally hard). The first railroad in the US was in Maryland as well as the largest steelworks in the world (Bethlehem Steel at Sparrows Point). Part of the state was given up to create the independent Federal District, aka Washington D.C. The National Anthem was penned in Baltimore harbor during the War of 1812, and both a major victory (North Point) and major defeat (Bladensburg) were fought there, as was the bloodiest day in American history (Battle of Antietam, 1862, during the Civil War). The state sport is jousting, our culinary specialties include all manner of seafood but blue crabs in particular, and we have one of the better state flags out there.

EDIT: Yes, glorious history with Amerindians (spell it right). English settlers generally took the side of local Natives (Algonquins) against the Susquehannock (Iroquois) to the north (from the PA, Lake Erie vicinity) who were their chief antagonists. Many of their descendants still live in the area, actually. They've lent their names to a lot of rivers, landmarks, and towns, because their interactions with Europeans were generally before the Europeans could overwhelm them with force, and so had to learn to live alongside them in peace and (general) cooperation.

Baltimore was larger than New York? I could believe the port there was larger than Boston or Philadelphia (both significant ports in their own right until deindustrialization), but I'm having a hard time believing it was #1.

I'm heading to Maryland today too. I also know nothing about it except what I learned from The Wire.

Same here and I have been more disappointed than when I first went to Philadelphia after watching several seasons of Always Sunny.

I have a story about Maryland.

In 2006 or 2007 my friend and I went on a road trip from southwestern Ontario, Canada to Hatteras, North Carolina. Right outside of DC, after it was already dark and we were thinking of starting to look for a place to crash for the night, we hit a deer while travelling in the leftmost lane, right by the median.. The deer jumped OVER the median from the left hand side, right onto the car. It bounced off the hood and hit the windshield right in front of me. I experienced a very strange split-second sensation of being in danger and not being able to do anything about it.

The weird at the time thing was that the car took it very well.. It felt like we hit something small. My friend, who was driving, thought that we had hit a cat or some other type of small animal. I didn't feel much of the impact either, but I did see something large travelling right at my face. The windshield held.. A whole bunch of lights came on right away and he had to pull over. The car wasn't going to be taking us any further on this road trip.

It was an Audi A4, a very nice car.. I pretty much attribute the fact that I'm alive to German engineering.

So we were stunned.. Just standing there on the side of the road.. Calls were made right away.. And off we went to look for the deer.. but it wasn't anywhere. We found the grill and that had some deer hair on it, but the deer must have been thrown very high into the air. There is no way it lived, and it just wasn't anywhere to be seen.

The state troopers that showed up were pretty awesome. My friend's insurance people were giving him a hard time for some reason. In the end the cops ended up driving us to a hotel. Probably the nicest cops I've ever had the pleasure being served by.

So turns out this hotel is in a very strange part of DC. Well, it wasn't DC, but at the time we didn't know that. It was some weird place in Maryland that has a couple hotels, shopping malls, lots of stores, some restaurants, walkways, statues, park benches, ponds, and it just looked like a strange fantasy dreamland built specifically for business travellers.

We went to a restaurant with flames outside and had steak and mashed potatoes and beer. The bill was super low and the taxes were almost not there, and even with the generous tips we left the meal was very cheap. Like I said, we were in a fantasy dreamland. The service in the restaurant was amazing, the food delicious, and the beer options agreeable.

We got a discount at the hotel for one reason or another.. and a large one too - 50% off I think. But I think that was my friend's doing.

At some point while in Maryland we tried to buy beer and/or liquor, but couldn't find any stores that sell alcohol. I forget if this was in DC or Maryland, but alcohol was nowhere to be found, for quite a while. We even asked random people where we could buy some beer, and some looked at us like it was the most unreasonable question in the universe, but most people just looked confused and couldn't think of anywhere except bars. Eventually we found booze for sale, but it took up way too much time.

A car was rented and we ended up making it to Hatteras a day or two late, I forget now. The GPS took us though to a "bridge" that turned out to be a ferry service, which at 11pm was not running. So we had to track back 70 miles north to get to the bridge to all those thin islands, or whatever the hell that is, then go down them 70 miles to get to Hatteras. It was a stupid detour.

On the way back home we ended up again using the GPS in a stupid way. It took us through the backroads of Pennsylvania, through crazy hilly roads, in the middle of the night, with fog everywhere. WE ALMOST HIT A DEER. My friend was ready to snap. The border crossing back to Canada was sort of tense, and after that it was an hour ride to my place and another hour to his..

He had more problems with insurance, but they ended up paying for his plane ticket there (to pick up the car) and for everything else, I think. I still hate deer, but like Maryland, except for the apparent lack of alcohol.

Man, you should have driven the route I took southeast out of Baltimore. I had over an hour and a half drive in a cramped economy car, and I didn't eat at the airport but I should have because there was no food for miles. But I passed by two or three liquor stores and a random Amish mart amongst the corn. Kinda flew by them too quickly, the sign said they had farm-fresh egg yolks and I might have found something good to eat there.

Finally got a sandwich at a Panera in Easton.

It is also where or near where some cfcers live.

Yo!

Wha wha?

(We need to do another meetup and drag out Inty.)

Ah, cool. Is that because you're a mod here?

Never been up to Hunt Valley, but when I lived in Towson I would catch the light rail at the Timonium fairgrounds if I was going into town. Worth the trip to the Inner Harbor if you get the chance; see the ballpark, the aquarium, eat at the bangin Irish place next to the USS Constellation...

I'll have to visit that when I have some vacay time between jobs.

 

[warpus]

Man, you should have driven the route I took southeast out of Baltimore. I had over an hour and a half drive in a cramped economy car, and I didn't eat at the airport but I should have because there was no food for miles. But I passed by two or three liquor stores and a random Amish mart amongst the corn. Kinda flew by them too quickly, the sign said they had farm-fresh egg yolks and I might have found something good to eat there.

We did a lot of things wrong on that trip.. Fortunately our friend in North Carolina had a sweet house and a lot of activities to keep our minds off what had happened. I think we spent most of the time playing Worms Armageddon on his giant TV, of course leaving some time to explore the surroundings.

Is Maryland a religious place? I never thought so, but the lack of stores selling alcohol made me wonder otherwise.. Very possible we just got unlucky, but it seemed very strange.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Baltimore was larger than New York? I could believe the port there was larger than Boston or Philadelphia (both significant ports in their own right until deindustrialization), but I'm having a hard time believing it was #1.

The port was. Baltimore often was the final destination for coal and steel coming from Pittsburgh, Cumberland, and West Virginia, and was the eastern terminus for the National Road, together making it the a destination for many Midwestern and Midwest-bound people and products.

In terms of population, Baltimore was never as large as NYC after independence.

Is Maryland a religious place? I never thought so, but the lack of stores selling alcohol made me wonder otherwise.. Very possible we just got unlucky, but it seemed very strange.

It is as religious as any other part of America, but Maryland is not a "dry" state by any means. It has normal liquor laws - if anything, they are more liberal than some places like VA, where all liquor is sold from state-owned ABC's.

 

[Lohrenswald]

Is Maryland one of those swing states?

 

[Goodfella]

They haven't voted red since 1988 I believe so no, I don't think it's considered a swing state by anyone really.

 

[cybrxkhan]

Is Maryland one of those swing states?

Maryland generally goes Democratic generally, I think, but it differs from county to county. In the western, more rural counties, for instance, they tend to swing Republican.

 

[Antilogic]

Just got back from the party a bit early because I'm tired, have to pack up, and got a long drive to the airport to look forward to tomorrow. It was a great ceremony, and I'm happy the guy isn't a total tool.

 

[Rashiminos]

They haven't voted red since 1988 I believe so no, I don't think it's considered a swing state by anyone really.

The eastern side of the bay is a lot more red than the western side, bar some hinterlands.