Sport

Maryland's professional sports teams are: the Baltimore Ravens for football, and the Baltimore Orioles for baseball. The Washington Redskins are officially the Washington, DC team, not a MD team, but their home stadium is located in Landover, MD.

Besides the presence of its professional teams, MD is also known for its love lacrosse. Lacrosse is a very popular sport in MD schools, particularly in private preparatory schools and in colleges and universities. In my "Official" post, you see that the official state sport of MD is jousting. This matches nicely with the lovely state flag, which has a very medieval, family crest, coat of arms look, because that's basically what it is.


Baltimore Ravens logo, featuring a play on the MD state flag.

For me, a person that isn't a huge sports fanatic, sports is more about the window dressing of the team colors and mascots. Luckily, I really like the team colors for both the Baltimore Ravens (purple) and Baltimore Orioles (orange). I happen to loathe the color red, so there's no way I will be cheering for the Redskins anytime soon. Also, I don't like the name "Redskins" and I hope they do end up changing it.

"Redskin" is a negative racial term used in reference to Native Americans. Several Native American groups have taken the matter of the Washington Redskins trademark to court over the past few decades, most recently in the case of Blackhorse et al v. Pro Football, Inc. In discussions about the Washington Redskins eventually moving to a stadium in DC, the DC Mayor, Vincent Gray, believes that the team name should change. I couldn't agree more.

Alphabet

The DMV. To me that used to only mean the Department of Motor Vehicles, as it is known in California and other states. Now some people use it to denote "DC/MD/VA" or the "Metro" area of Washington, DC, Maryland, and Virginia. In the map below you can see the little diamond that is DC with the surrounding counties in the metro area. Montgomery, Frederick, Howard, Anne Arundel, and Prince George's counties are in MD and the other counties are in Northern Virginia, also known as NOVA.


In Maryland, the Department of Motor Vehicles, where you go to get your license, is the MVA (Motor Vehicle Administration). As I mentioned previously, when you go to the MVA you can get a license with a blue crab on it! Similar to this sample:

Cookie

Keeping with the Maryland dessert theme, there is another sweet, fudgey treat that is unique to the state: Berger cookies. I have only tried them twice, and the reason is because they are EXTREMELY rich. The first time I tried them, they were from a guest treat bag in my hotel room when I attended a friend's Baltimore wedding. I literally got a toothache after eating 4 bites of the cookie. They consist of a relatively innocuous, crumbly butter cookie featuring an extra, super thick, rich chocolate ganache layer.


This article from the Washington Post explores the lore and lure of the iconic Baltimore cookie treat.

Conveniently, Berger cookies can be found in grocery stores all over the DC/MD/VA, or "DMV" or "DC Metro" area. There is no other cookie like 'em. Try them if you're feeling decadent, or if you want to get a real taste of Baltimore cuisine.

Neighbors

My husband and I live in a super-cute (my own bias, although many people have told me this) house in a "typical" MD neighborhood in the Metropolitan area of Washington, DC. To me, "DC Metro" means that a lot of its residents either work in Washington, DC or are directly or indirectly affected by the bustling and relatively stable economy of DC. Our house was built in 1935, and it has a "twin house" caddy corner to it because, as the lore goes, two sisters had these houses built around the same time. The twin houses do have a similar style. To me they're kind of in between Victorian and Cape Cod in architectural style. The roof slopes sharply in the 2nd floor rooms, and there are plenty of windows. Unlike Victorian homes, the house doesn't have a lot of embellishment. The rooms are spacious and bright.  

We can use public transportation (and walking) to get to work and back. There are some tasty restaurants around (especially of Asian and Latin American cuisines), and there are people from all economic and ethnic backgrounds. A neighbor couple invited us over to their house on Christmas Day. I thought it was so kind of them to open their house to others, especially "strangers," on a family holiday. Come to find out, we share a lot in common. The husband is Chilean and the wife is from California, just like us. The husband has been in the US for 12 years, just like my husband. Their other guests were also mostly from Latin America, and we spoke a blend of Spanish and English as we talked about our jobs in the international and academic fields, and places in Latin America that we have visited. There was even another woman that attended the same graduate school as me, but several years earlier. 

Our neighbors have origins in the Middle East, Africa, Europe, Latin America, and Asia. The houses immediately surrounding us have folks from India, Iran, Togo, and Chile. Just a typical MD neighborhood.

Sandwich

To add to my previous post on official Maryland things, the MD legislature will soon consider a bill to make the soft-shell crab sandwich Maryland's official state sandwich. I have tried and enjoyed soft-shell crab on several occasions, but sometimes I find it too fishy for my taste. That may be when the establishment serving the crab isn't using the freshest ingredients, so I would recommend only trying soft-shell crab at reputable restaurants, during its peak season. 

The concept of soft-shell crab is very Alien-esque. It does not refer to a different species of crab, but a normal crab that has molted its exoskeleton and is still soft before developing its replacement exoskeleton. But you have to act fast to catch them at this moment, because apparently the shell remains soft for only a few hours. The best time to enjoy soft-shell crab is from May through the summer, as this is when you'll find them fresh from the famous Chesapeake Bay.

The below image is from a New York Times article on how to cook and eat this Maryland treat. 

Double

Last Sunday, January 6, MD hosted two NFL playoff games - on the same day! The Baltimore Ravens played (and beat) the Indianapolis Colts, and the Washington Redskins played (and lost to) the Seattle Seahawks. My family loves the Ravens, so this is great news for us. The Ravens now face the Denver Broncos this afternoon, this time in Colorado. I'll be wearing my new Ravens jersey (Ray Rice, #27) and cheering for my new home team!

MD is part of an elite club of only one of 8 US states to host two NFL teams. MD hosts the Ravens and the Redskins, with the Ravens playing at M&T Stadium in Baltimore and with the Redskins (I'm not a fan of the name at all, it refers to Native Americans in a crude way) playing at FedEx Field in Landover, MD. Yes, pretty much all American stadiums are named after companies these days. The other states with two NFL teams are: New Jersey, Ohio, Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, California, and Missouri.

According to my brief research, MD has the lowest population of these two-teamed states, which helps me understand why a lot of people's common perception of MD is that it's the state of crabs and football. Sounds like a fun state to me! (And it is).

On a side note, I can't believe that Missouri has more residents than Maryland. The only Missourians I know are my younger brother's in-laws, but they have all moved to California now.

Eve

This was a great Christmas Eve. I spent the first two hours of December 24th baking cookies and making treats (pictured below) for my family's consumption and for my neighbors. Then I went to sleep. When I woke up, I finished the treats, had family over to see our house, then it suddenly started snowing which was unexpected and a was a perfect backdrop for the day, went to a Thai restaurant for a yummy lunch, distributed the treats to the neighbors and got to know them a little better, ate some cookies, watched Elf (quite possibly my favorite Christmas movie), went to a Christmas Eve service, ate more cookies, and now I'm gearing up to open some presents.

Speaking of getting to know the neighbors better, as I was finishing up packaging the treats for distribution, we had a knock on the door. It was our across-the-way neighbors inviting us to their open house party tomorrow, Christmas Day. We are definitely going to try to make it - such a nice offer. The neighbors are a couple that remind me of me and my husband - she's Caucasian, he's Latino. We found out that they are even more similar than we thought - he's actually Chilean, which is the exact same tiny, distant land that my husband originally hails from. It's a small world, indeed. Here's to finding excuses to get the know the neighbors in a typical Maryland community.

One of the greatest things about living in MD is the possibility of a White Christmas, or at least a lightly frosted Christmas, as was the case today. Even if it only lasted for a short while. Here's my ironic hipster photo to commemorate this great day.