Articles by Sandra Olivetti Martin

Competitive BBQ Raises Big Bucks for Kids

Naptown barBAYq hands out more than $40K

The smell of barbecue rising from the grills of 41 competing Kansas City Barbecue Society teams drew 12,000 people to Annapolis for Parole Rotary Club’s second annual Naptown barBAYq Contest and Music Festival. A good time was had by all. The weather was fine. Families ate well and extended their fun with live music on two stages, activities for all ages, arts and crafts vendors and cooking demonstrations. Chefs earned competition points and renown for their slow-...

Article - News; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 6/7/12

Bay Restoration Update

The Skinny on TMDL

Are you still paying attention to TMDL? Or have acronyms driven you to distraction? We’re here to tell you there’s good news about Total Maximum Daily Loads: The big top-down plan to get every state in the Bay watershed working hard on restoration is on track and now well into Phase II. Each Bay jurisdiction has now finished its Phase II Watershed Implementation Plan, the Environmental Protection Agency declared last week. The plans detail...

Article - News; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 6/7/12

The Poltergeists of Spring

They’ve had plenty of fun upsetting our order of things

Halloween is known for ghosts and spirits, but it’s this time of year I expect poltergeists smashing onto the scene to upset the order of things. Washers spin like whirling dervishes, cups and spoons and cartons of cream go missing, auto windows and windshield wipers stick motionless. Naturally, that’s the time we chose for Bay Weekly to move our office. The transfer was swift and sweet; Run Moving & Storage had our boxes swathed in tape...

Article - Letter from the Editor; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 6/7/12

Mermaids, Pirates, Privateers and You

When London Town throws a party, it’s a mari-good time

You don’t forget a visit to Historic London Town and Gardens. The archeological dig site and people dressed like colonials are memories children hold onto. “I thought it was the coolest thing I’ve ever seen,” says 19-year-old Robert Lee, of Edgewater, of his visit a decade ago to “this place hidden all the way down Londontown Road.” Adults are just as susceptible. A wedding in the garden on a June...

Article - Good Living; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/31/12

Anne Arundel Trash Pickup Goes Weekly in Garden...

If you’re eating fresh, it’s composting to the rescue

How does your garden grow? Ours is behaving like it’s on steroids this prodigal summer so eager to outdo the season of Barbara Kingsolver’s eponymous book. We’re picking daily, for our greens — arugula, cabbage, lettuces, mustard and Swiss chard, some from very late plantings last year — are a forest and bolt for the sky when we turn our backs. My herbs want to take over the earth. We’re eating a...

Article - Letter from the Editor; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/31/12

Memorial Day Weekend

Time to Look Back and Ahead

We’re on the verge of big things. Memorial Day weekend opens not only summer but also our hearts. Our national habit of making holidays of our holy days gives us fun, on the one hand, and I’m a fan of fun. But Memorial Day does an honor we must not forget. American soil was still stained with the blood of Union and Confederate soldiers when Decoration Day was conceived to pay them...

Article - Letter from the Editor; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/24/12

Bring in the Wasps

To stop emerald ash borers, you’ve got to think like a bug

To stop a thief, you’ve got to think like a thief. To stop a bug, you’ve got to get more basic. That’s what Maryland Department of Agriculture has learned in its 10-year effort to stop the inexorable march of the emerald ash borer. In the early years of the 21st century, Agrilus planipennis escaped from China, likely stowed away in a pallet in the hull of a cargo ship bound for the Great Lakes. Since then, the insect has gnawed its way...

Article - Creature Feature; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/24/12

Moving Day is May 25

Sorting out our stuff takes many more days

The move in Bay Weekly’s future is an 800-pound gorilla making a big mess in the here and now. 1629 Forest Drive is still our office, and will be until Tuesday, May 29. We’re doing business here, and putting out the paper as we’ve done every week for 19 years. At the same time, we’re letting go, demolishing the space we’ve worked in since December, 2007. We’re only moving across the street, literally, but that doesn...

Article - Letter from the Editor; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/17/12

This Week’s Creature Feature ... New at the Zoos

Baby warthogs, prairie dog pups, small-clawed otters and zebra foals

Yes, panda infertility is a problem. But while we’re waiting for the experts to solve it, plenty of other babies are looking adorable in our regional zoos. At the Smithsonian’s National Zoo (nationalzoo.si.edu), a new family of Asian small-clawed otters (Amblonyx cinereus) is making up for Mei Xiang and Tian Tian’s cublessness. Eleven otters — two parents and two litters of their offspring — are happily playing, swimming, foraging for bugs,...

Article - Creature Feature; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/17/12

This Week’s Creature Feature ... Thespians of...

Avenue Q’s puppet actors are ready to steal the show

The human actors who’ll bring Avenue Q to the stage of Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre from July 5 to 29 are already hard at work. They’ll invest over 100 hours in the production before the high intensity of tech week begins June 28, according to Theatre president Carolyn Kirby. But, she says, you’ll hardly have eyes for them. Your eyes will be on actors of another species. Despite their striking resemblance to the species whose trademark is held by Walt...

Article - Creature Feature; by Sandra Olivetti Martin; 5/10/12