the goat farmer's almanac

Jen and I picked up brother Bob in Baltimore and headed down to Rockville to catch Mamajama at the Hometown Holiday festival yesterday.

Rockville Hometown Holidays

If Rockville were my hometown, I'd probably have a hard time recognizing it. Old growth suburbia has been eradicated. In its place is a "town center" of multi-use mid-rise buildings so new as to be largely vacant. The overall effect is a vaguely Continental street scape patrolled by Segway mounted police officers.

It's often easier creating a future than covering up a past which helps explain why edge city development has a vitality often absent in traditional urban renewal projects.

Creating a future, at least in the United States, also seems necessarily cosmopolitan. For a bumpkin like me, yesterday was something akin to a trip to Manhattan. Granted, you'd be hardpressed to find a "Hometown Holiday" festival in, say, Union Square but much as I do while negotiating the polyglot streets of New York I caught myself playing "name that language" while people watching in Rockville. This clearly ain't Cheever territory.

Maybe it was just Mamajama karma but there was a good vibe in Rockville yesterday. Fifteen or so years ago I could never imagine living in the 'burbs. Even 'tho I still can't, I'm coming to better appreciate why so many people do.

The "Cost of the War in Iraq" counter running under the Almanac comes courtesy of the National Priorities Project. The amount of tax dollars this figure represents is nearly incomprehensible to most of us. But, the good folks at NPP are doing a brilliant job making it real.

For example, check out the "How your Taxes are Spent" tool where you can plug in the amount of Federal taxes you've paid and receive a breakdown of where those dollars are being spent in actual dollar amounts as well as in a lovely pie chart like you see here

There's also a "Trade-offs" tool which allows you to see the opportunity costs of our "investing" in certain forms of spending like the Iraq War. For example, taxpayers in our own Congressional District 6 (Bartlett) will pay $1.1 billion for the cost of the Iraq War through 2007. For the same amount of money, we coulda had the following:


Play with the NPP tools long enough and you might start wondering if it's not time for some sort of budget plebiscite on the Iraq War in particular and the way Federal budget priorities are skewed in general. At the very least you might want to consider a tax deductible donation to the National Priorites Project.

Labels: budget priorities, Iraq War, National Priorities Project

Here are a few snapshots from Depot Day in Union Bridge where there's an interesting dynamic bulding over what it means to be a small town. At one end of Main Street, we have the Lehigh cement plant, the employer in town for as far back as anyone remembers. At the other end, we have the "Villages at Union Bridge" a soon to be built housing development which could introduce 1,500 strangers to "small town" living.

Town burghers talk about the housing development in terms of preserving the "small town" atmosphere of Union Bridge. Everyone seems to agree this is a worthy goal but there's clear differences of opinion not only in how to achieve it but what the concept means. For some of the local merchants "small town" means more customers on main street instead of in the aisles at the Walmart in Frederick, our nearby "edge city." Housing development proponents use the small town concept as a selling point for people seeking whatever it is the traditional surburbs no longer offer -- space, community, safety, apple pie and motherhood or ...[name your need]. The former harkens a past that can never again be while the latter promises a future built on elusive ideals.

There remains, of course, the small town which Union Bridge has been for the past hundred years or so: a company town. And, down at their end of town, the company seems settled in for a lengthy stay. About five years ago Lehigh built a huge kiln, the largest in North America. It's difficult to overstate the scale of the thing -- a 30 story erector set looming over the town and surrounding countryside like the Cathedral at Chartre -- only with lots of lights and loud whirring noises. As with Pittsburgh, things are a lot cleaner in Union Bridge than they used to be. Most long timers appreciate this fact but it's one sometimes lost on newcomers who regularly voice their complaints about the noise and dust, polluted wells, and cavernous sinkholes. A source of recent concerns is Lehigh's plans to burn biosolids -- human wastes.

The implicit deal struck in all company towns is one where the company provides the jobs and in return the residents pretty much take life on the company's terms especially when it comes to the environment. I'm not so sure folks chasing some ill-defined small town idyll will notice that big erector set looming over the backyard patio in the "Villages" before they buy. I'm pretty sure some of them will notice after they buy. And, that's when things will start getting interesting in Union Bridge.

Labels: company towns, development, small towns, Union Bridge MD

Papa Joe's Deli and Dogs just moved from the Westminster Antiques Mall to Main Street rechristening themselves as just "Papa Joe's" and advertisting the "best authentic" Mexican" food in the area. I should know better after 30 years living on the East Coast, but I'm still a sucker for those words: "authentic Mexican". So, Jen and I clipped a 10% off coupon from the Carroll County Times and headed on down to Papa's new digs the other evening.

I'm not trying to set myself up as the arbiter of utlimate authenticity here. I don't speak Spanish and the closest I've been to Mexico is a short gig in the first grade in Tuscon back when my vagabond parents were running a step ahead of the truant officer. That said, spending a good part of my youth hanging out in Kansas City's barrio eateries at least qualifies me to express an opinion on the matter.

Ok. Some benchmarks. If menudo isn't on the menu, then you're probably not in an authentic Mexican restaurant. Further, if it's on the menu and it's not spicy enough to blow off your head like a steam whistle, then you're probably not in an authentic Mexican restaurant. The enchiladas are made with corn tortillas dipped in lard, filled with pork or white cheese or potato and served swimming in gravy. If you want lettuce you order a tostado and pick it out of the beans. The beer you fetch yourself out of a cooler with flip top doors like an ice cream parlor freezer. The chips are greasy enough to add flavor and light enough to dissolve in your mouth -- the only crunch being the first bite. Anyway, anyone who's ever been to an authentic Mexican restaurant gets the picture. Pardon my Calvin Trillin moment, but to my way of thinking Las Chiquitas in Kansas City is an authentic Mexican restaurant.

Now, back to Papa Joe's as I think we all know where this is heading. The good part is the place was packed which tells me there are a lot of people in these parts hungry for authentic Mexican food. For the not so good part we need go no further than the enchilada platters we ordered at $12.99 a pop -- about double the price you'd pay for an enchilada combo in most Mexican restaurants. Delusional to the end, I told Jen that at these prices those enchiladas must really be something special. And they were! They just weren't enchiladas unless Chipotle's now has enough market clout to make us believe that huge, overstuffed "burritos" (read: bland, flour tortilla "wraps" ) are enchiladas.

I could go on but the point is not to trash Papa Joe's as it is what it is. It's just that "authentic Mexican" is not part of the is. If you would like a Chipotle's or Salsarita's with table service and a full bar then Papa Joe's is probably not a bad spot to hang on Friday evening. As it is, Jen and I celebrated Cinco de Mayo, that ultimate American holiday, at Taco Bell trying to decide if we have time for a trip back to Kansas City this summer.

Labels: Mexican food restaurants