In a 10-by-20-foot plot at Goshen Farm’s Sharing Garden in Cape St. Claire, my family has built a little organic city. Furgurson’s Folly, my father dubbed it.     On one end are tomatoes, fat to the point of splitting, interspersed with basil plants. On the other, two trellises host green beans, one so abundant the trellis teeters over our plot’s edge.     Between them on one side thrive jalapenos and carmen peppers. On the other, cucumber and...

Nothing may seem amiss, but the entire western half of Maryland is now a quarantine area. In 14 counties west of the Chesapeake and Susquehanna, Maryland Department of Agriculture has found evidence of the emerald ash borer. The destructive Asiatic beetle, which has conquered the west in nine years, kills ash trees from the inside out.     The threat the half-inch-long bugs pose is grave. Ash are shade trees for much of urban Maryland. Ones that have fallen prey to the borers...

After what she calls a “long history of being a really annoying amateur film critic,” Bay Weekly’s own Diana Beechener is now a member of the Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association.     The Washington, D.C. Area Film Critics Association keeps its membership select with “stringent” criteria. Its critics must have history — at least 50 reviews in a year. Their publication must have scope: 50,000 readers a month for print.   ...

Marc Goodman followed a link on Facebook to the set of the big-budget television series House of Cards.     The first series produced by Netflix, House of Cards remakes a 1990 British series set in the last days of Margaret Thatcher’s administration. This updated take transplants the story to American electoral politics. Director David Fincher is no stranger to Maryland, where he shot part of his 2011 Academy Award-winning The Social Network.     Fincher is...