Test your Chestertown demographics knowledge by guessing whether the following sentences are true or false. (Answers at bottom.)

1. People over the age of 85 outnumber young’ns below age 5.
2. There are more renters here than home owners.
3. According to the census bureau, 98.6% of all Chestertown residents belong to the human race.
4. A group of federal nerds have calculated the mean center of population as thus: a population “center” is determined as the place where an imaginary, flat, weightless, and rigid map of the United States would balance perfectly if all residents were of identical weight. “The first center in 1790,” so say the feds, “was located near Chestertown, Maryland.” Note: an official town building has a sign that proclaims this center was Chestertown. One of them might be right…

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Donald the street drummer was doing his thing in DC last weekend. A DC institution, he says he’s been at it for 20 years now and that Ben Affleck recently stopped by and gave him a C-note. He’s also got some groupies, I noticed.

THERE’S A DIRTY EVILDOER IN OUR MIDST
I stopped by a waterway in Millington MD a few days ago, and the water looked like it had been loaded up with Mr. Bubble. Upstream, downnstream, the foam was everywhere. But the stuff didn’t smell like soap. I can’t say what it smelled like exactly because I never came across it before. But I can tell you this chemical funk was so strong I had to run back to the car after two minutes to avoid puking.

So if you’re not reading this on a laptop in the laundrymat on High Street, the one next to Subway and Lewes Dairy Mart, pretend that you are and that you’re leaving. Look left, across the parking lot and you will see a new sign: BIMBO BIMBO….OPEN. Unless you’ve been living under a rock the past 50 years, you’ll know that Bimbo Bimbo is a bakery, along the lines of Pepperidege Farms, that produces Mexican goods. So this new store sells Bimbo Bimbo baked goods, and other imported items. . . tortilla presses, dubious looking calling cards, pan, produce, laundry soap. ¡Viva! Viva el mercado nuevo en chestertown, una ciudad del alimento agujerear y muerto. ¡Necesitamos tan desesperadamente opciones tales como esto!

I was out on the town with a friend/recent transplant the other day, when she approached the door of a local business and gave it a good yank. Ah, the telltale sign of a newcomer.

The door of course was locked. So she pressed her face to the glass to look in, and sure enough, people were in there and the lights were on. So she pulled on the other half of the double door–viola, it opened.

That was a ritual I often repeated when I relocated here, to the town where it’s typical that half of the double doors are unlocked. (more…)

Plenty of options for live music around these parts. Here be but a few.

Local band, Chester River Runoff Check their ever-changing calendar for the latest.

Andy’s, a music venue & Chestertown institution

Shame on me! Never been myself but EVERYBODY says it’s great: the Mainstay in Rock Hall.

Here’s a general calendar for spots nearby.

Why not the Irish Breakfast Band? Bit of a drive but looks good.

Just so you know (and recent experience tells me that if you live around here you probably don’t) there is a unique and easily accessible island not too far from Chestertown. I’ve told lots of people about my 2007 visit to Smith Island, and their replies were 100% consistent: “I’ve never been there.”

I was thinking about Smith Island today because I was out and about and noticed a few flies and mosquitoes here and there. And that reminded me that now is the perfect time to head over to Smith Island, before the insects (which in summer form large torture posses I am told) hit their population high.

Last year I took a roughly two-hour drive to Crisfield, a small town in Somerset County. There I caught a ferry to the Smith Island town of Tylerton. A sign posted on the boat warned that my bag and my person were fair game for searches by the captain, who was so good natured that I imagine you really have to be a headcase to make him suspect that you’re carrying contraband, such as liquor. But more on the liquor ban later.

Even though the Jason II is pretty basic, I found the ride extremely relaxing and pleasurable-likely because I would be far away and unreachable from the dreaded office for a couple days. (more…)

MORE NEWS FROM TOWNBALL HEADQUARTERS

Washington College is fortunate to have as a student & townball crier, the foremost flimmaker in town, Jasper Colt.

A beta version is also available here.

What a difference a day, and a culture that demands manicured lawns, makes.
Same piece of property, photographed April 30 & May 1.

Well, perfectly timed to coincide with First Friday, new restaurant the Fish Whistle (98 Cannon Street) served it’s first lunch today. The lunch menu is nearly identical to the Old Mill and will cost you $9 a plate, and dinner (crab cakes, pork, etc) averages about 20 bucks. Didn’t have a dessert, but I’m sure (based on the Old Mill’s rep) that they’re very good. Get there soon, before they run out of the nifty whistles (above). Word on the street is that fish whistle  is slang for a particular body part–perhaps that’s an urban legend? A staff member tells me the place is named after the boat owned by a friend of the owner/chef….