EVERYONE’S RECEIVED AN an e-mail making an emotional plea for help, money or both. Usually, it’s a get-rich-quick scheme from, say, a fictional Nigerian government official, but when the following plea started circulating online on Jan. 2...

‘TIS THE SEASON for holiday gift guides, and in the current economic climate value is the emphasis. For those of us with limited funds and a long list of people to shop for, even “Stocking Stuffers Under $15″ can add up quickly. Sin...

IT’S FINALLY HAPPENING: The hard-fought battle between John McCain and Barack Obama is in the hands of voters like us. So after an election awash in sprawling tales of the economy, health care and global climate change it all comes down to this...

WEATHERED COBBLESTONES IN FELLS POINT. Mount Vernon townhouses that look zapped in from “The Age of Innocence.” Creaky-yet-chic Victorian rowhouses in Federal Hill and Canton. Everywhere you look in Baltimore, there’s character and ...

FORGET ABOUT FACING the hassle of packing, international air travel and the ridiculously low value of the dollar. Instead, head up I-95 to Baltimore, where globe-trotting is as simple as walking a few blocks — Little Italy famously greets anyon...

ERIN TSCHANTRET, HANDS hands on her hips and a glint in her eyes, stands on the deck of a 52-foot-long ship anchored in Fell’s Point. In her tricorn hat, short leather vest, gray skort and red sport sandals she looks like a cross between Captai...

Editor’s note: This piece on the dedication of the memorial to victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack at the Pentagon was originally published on Sept. 12, 2008. YESTERDAY WAS yet another 9/11. It wasn’t like the original, which was a flur...

TOM MURPHY BALKS at my use of the word “intimidating” to describe the chess players at Dupont Circle. Then again, I have to remember to take what he says with a grain of salt. One of the most skillful players at Dupont, Murphy claims to k...

IF YOU’RE READING this, you almost certainly work in the D.C. area. And that means you probably work too much. Yeah, you get out of the house — on your walk to and from the Metro or, when you’re feeling extra energetic, to and from ...

IT HAPPENED JUST a few days ago. I’d let my hair grow too long and I wanted to get it cut. My critical mistake: I was impatient. The woman I usually went to was on vacation, so, rather than go to another stylist in her shop (I was for some reas...

SURE, MANY PEOPLE head north to Baltimore lured by old-fashioned pleasures — Berger cookies, cobblestone streets in Fells Point. But there are many new reasons to visit. » Hampden Haute Fashion John Waters‘ ‘hood used to be a ...

IN ITS 250-PLUS-YEAR HISTORY, Baltimore’s Harbor has drawn shipbuilders, sailors and pirates. But water of an indoor sort attracts Olympic swimming team hopeful Katie Hoff, 18. She practices 10 times per week at Mount Washington’s North B...

UNTIL RECENTLY, it seemed like the faux fur-upholstered headboards and Pop Arty nightclubs of the boutique hotel boom might have passed Baltimore by. But in upcoming months and years, more than a dozen new properties are slated to open in Charm City,...

“WOODBERRY IS NESTLED on a tract of land known as ‘Come By Chance,’” reads the plaque next to the neighborhood’s light-rail stop. And although the area has been inhabited since 1790, that original name still holds true &...

In wry novels, Madison Smartt Bell has chronicled everything from slave rebellions in 18th-century Haiti to the misadventures of a country rock band in the age of Nirvana. But while his stories range far and wide, Bell’s been based in Baltimore...