I made it to Baltimore!! I am enjoying some bestie time with my B/F of 21 years, Becca. You might recall me mentioning previously that my wonderful hubby got me a trip to visit her for Christmas last year. I didn't want to visit in the Arctic temperatures and forty feet of snow (okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit there but I'm from Arkansas, so one foot to us is like forty feet to you Northerners!) We shot for early June so that we could go out and about and do fun things without having to be miserably hot. Wow, were we horribly wrong about that one!! Maryland (along with Arkansas) is having record breaking temperatures, with heat indexes well over 100. Insane! Today we are traveling via bus to New York City where the temperature will be 100°! YES, I SAID ONE HUNDRED DEGREES!!! Thankfully tomorrow it will only be 80, but I think that is due to rain, so I'm not sure what tomorrow will hold. But we will be seeing a Broadway show, so that will (hopefully) be air conditioned and maybe we can cool down a bit. Anyhow, I am VERY MUCH looking forward to the NYC visit. I've never been. We are spending the night there and staying in a hotel on Times Square! Whoo hoo!!! Small town girl visits big city, tomorrow's headlines. ;)
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| Hon Town Store in Baltimore. |
So, anyhow back to my Baltimore visit. Yesterday, Becca and I had a low key morning. She did some work from home while I watched television and kicked back. We met up with a friend of hers for dinner, but first we did a little bit of boutique style shopping which included
Hon Town. It is an awesomely fabulous retro-style shop. In preperation for Baltimore's Famous "Hon Fest", Becca and I tried some retro-styles. What is Hon Fest, you ask...well, I did and this is what I found: Although nowadays the city is extremely culturally diverse, the lasting image of Baltimoreans seems to be the "Hon" culture exemplified most markedly by the longer established families and residents of the Highlandtown, Canton, Locust Point, Hampden and Pigtown neighborhoods. Between the 1950s and 1970s, it was common to see working class local women dressing in bright, printed dresses with out-dated glasses and beehive hairdos. Men were often dressed casually, but with a general factory or dock worker look, as many in town did indeed have such jobs.
The name of the culture comes from the often parodied Baltimore accent and slang. "Hon" (pronounced /ˈhʌn/,[dubious – discuss] an abbreviation of "Honey") was a common informal name for someone else. Baltimore’s accent exemplifies a dialectal continuum between Tidewater American English, a southern American dialect, and Delaware Valley American English, a common coastal dialect, loosely possessing the vowel shifts of the former and general pronunciation of the latter. For instance, "Baltimore" is pronounced "Baldimore" or even "Balmer," and "Maryland" becomes "Murland," "Murlan," or "Merlin." Other common pronunciations include "ool," "amblance," "wooder," "warsh," "sharr or shaow," "dug," "couwny," "tew," and "zinc" (oil, ambulance, water, wash, shower, dog, county, two, and sink respectively). There is also a popular summertime phrase, "goin' downy ayshin" (going down to the ocean, usually referring to Ocean City, MD).
Now that you are schoold in Bawlmerese, here are a couple of photos we snapped in the store. Whaddya think, Hon?!
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| Becca with a pink haired Bee Hive |
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| It's me, Hon! |
After a bit of shopping we had dinner at
Mr Rain's Fun House located at The American Visionary Art Museum that boasts a very culturally diverse
menu pleasing not only to the eyes, but to the pallete as well! My entree of choice (after much deliberation) was the Veal Loin Chop with Polenta cakes and bayby patty pans in a demi glace. When it arrived, it was so beautiful, I almost didn't want to eat it, however that passed very quickly. The chop was cooked to perfection and full of flavor. The Polenta cakes and bayby patty pans were bursting with flavor, and I left out of there a happy woman! Of course I had to pose for a picture on the way out. No, this is not Lady Gaga in case you were wondering. Just one of many statues you will find at the American Visionary Art Museum.
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| Veal Loin Chop from Mr Rain's Fun House |
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| Outside the AVM |
We are slated to leave for NYC in a bit. I will not be taking my lap top with me there, so I am signing off for a couple of days. Look for lots of pictures to in the days (or weeks, you never can tell with me anymore!) to come. I hope you are all enjoying this
miserably wonderfully HOT summer thus far.
Welcome to Bawlmer, Hon!
http://tishblack.blogspot.com/2011/06/welcome-to-bawlmer-hon.html
After a bit of shopping we had dinner at Mr Rain's Fun House located at The American Visionary Art Museum that boasts a very culturally diverse menu pleasing not only to the eyes, but to the pallete as well! My entree of choice (after much deliberation) was the Veal Loin Chop with Polenta cakes and bayby patty pans in a demi glace. When it arrived, it was so beautiful, I almost didn't want to eat it, however that passed very quickly. The chop was cooked to perfection and full of flavor. The Polenta cakes and bayby patty pans were bursting with flavor, and I left out of there a happy woman! Of course I had to pose for a picture on the way out. No, this is not Lady Gaga in case you were wondering. Just one of many statues you will find at the American Visionary Art Museum. 
1 comments, add yours here:
looks like fun! I would love to go to Hon Town!
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