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Caption:
I don’t usually post non-heroin related posts but this is too good to pass up. My last post reminded one of my readers of this map for visitor to Baltimore which is so on the money I had to share. Enjoy!
ELECTION SPECIAL COVERAGE:
For the 2012 election TGOH decided to take it to the streets of Baltimore to interview the average Baltimore voter to see how they cast their vote on controversial state ballot initiatives. Looking out our back window we found an average Baltimore voter and put her to the test.
Question 4 - Dream Act:
“I voted against this because illegal immigrants entered our country illegally. I don’t want to give anyone who breaks our laws my tax dollars!”
Question 6 - Same-sex Marriage:
“I voted no because gay marriage offends my strong family values. No one wants their kids exposed to that.”
Question 7 - Gambling Expansion:
“I voted for this one because there has never been a well-documented case in America where gaming was allowed in a state for a beneficial reason like raising money for education and the completely gutted of it’s original intent and pilfered by the state legislature for costly pet projects.”
Location: Baltimore, MD
Rating: Honorable Mention
Description: This submission came with the following caption:
Decided to get a picture of the new Baltimore City welcome mat displayed out front of my work.
Awesome pic, the enthusiasm from the submitter is priceless! I still get that feeling when taking pics for this blog and I love that there are a solid following of Baltimoreans just as excited as I am about Baltimore’s most under-utilized natural resource.
I feel bad but this guy is not only passed out but looks so damn natural in doing so I had to give it an honorable mention. I find it hard to believe that a veteran junkie like this guy just so happened to pick up a hot shot that floored him, and definitely not one where he landed in such a comfortable position. This zombie looks so at home I almost feel bad about posting this because it’s like we broke into this guy’s house…
Location: 6:15AM West Hollywood, CA
Rating: 4.6/5
Description: Children advert your eyes! I don’t know where this guy thinks he is but this is completely unacceptable for polite society. I mean SOCKS WITH SANDALS!
It’s not even like these are dark socks which attempt to blend into his otherwise low-key footwear, but instead he has the balls to wear bright white socks with a pair of house shoes on a city street in America. What has this world come to!
My first submission from California and this is definitely a strong showing! Even though he has obvious support on this one, I’ll give him some credit and take his stoop-slump as just an attempt to cover some naughty-bits for the kids.
Not only does this raise the question of how exactly this guy ended up pants-less on a front stoop at 6AM, but it also raises the more interesting question of how did lose his pants without losing his shoes?! This guy needs an agent, because I haven’t had this amount of intrigue about anyone in Hollywood since Brittany Spears was blowing her roadies.
Location: Westport Light Rail Station, Baltimore, MD
Rating: 4.5/5
Description: When the 100M hobble-around-on-smack becomes an Olympic event Michael Phelps won’t be the only Baltimorean with 8 gold medals! Great leans, and the synchronization is worth a medal in itself.
These two athletes are in an area of Baltimore heralded as the Inner Harbor of the West only five years ago. In complete Baltimore fashion, and reminiscent of the “Super Block”, the main developer hyped it for years and then soundly disappeared, leaving an amazing zombie training ground where there once were buildings and people. Unlike the “Super Block” this development is actually starting to happen, however just give it time and some historic group will halt the entire project because David Hasselhoff (bet you didn’t know he was from Baltimore!) once took a shit there.
Location: President Street and Eastern, Baltimore, MD
Rating: 4.2/5
Description: Small-timore strikes again! This is the first time I received a submission and immediate thought “Hey… I KNOW that guy!” I couldn’t give you his name or address or tell you where he went to high school, but I’ve seen this guy on so many occasions that he’s kind of become a landmark of sorts that I’ve even used for out of town visitors. My directions to Canton would go something like:
“Take 83 south until it ends and then take a left at the guy nodding out holding the cardboard sign and go straight.”
This guy has become a living barometer I use to tell the purity of the last shipment of H into Baltimore, and by the looks of this pic that last shipment was some good shit. Usually he sticks to the median and has a small nod between sad looks into cars, but in this pic he’s full-out directing traffic in the middle of the street and nodding out so hard he can’t even hold his sign. If you ever wonder where the money goes that you give people standing the median, wonder no more.
Amazing submission, the inner harbor in the background of the zombie attack makes this picture pure Baltimore gold.
It’s rare that I reblog anything I find on Tumblr, but this one is priceless. The flasher O’s bird and the drunk Boh man in the gutter definitely hit home, but the Edgar Allen Poe in a junkie lean is what makes this fine art in my opinion.
illustration for an in-class magazine spread on how to brand a city i.e. BALTIMORE gouache on shitpaper
this would be more poignant if the bird had some vicious bird junk to exhibit
first ever poe heroin lean?
Location: Corner of Paca and Fayette St., Baltimore, MD
Rating: 4.6/5
Description: The submitter for this one made it really easy for me. About the only thing they didn’t do in the description is rate it! Extra points for this amazing description:
After leaving the zombie dance party inside of Lexington Market, this woman just had to reread that hysterical text she sent to a girlfriend the night before. She’s probably leaning forward with her head at belt level because the lighting is better. Either that or she just applied a near-lethal amount of H directly into her blood stream. Extra points for her half-collapsed right knee, also known as the heroin curtsy.
Location: Washington Blvd, Westside, Baltimore, MD
Rating: 4.5/5.0
Description: In the spirit of Thanksgiving I wanted to post something which shows how people in Baltimore can come together during the holidays and share the one thing which brings all Baltimoreans together… smack!
This pic came with the following caption:
Ebony And Ivory Live Together In Perfect Harmony …
Damn right they are. Baltimore gets a bad rap about our violence and murders but I’d like to point out that most of those murders happen because people AREN’T getting their dope. All the Baltimore City police have to do is start giving away smack and our murder rates would plummet.
Daniel Redd was doing just that when the FBI arrested him and sent him to jail for life for the minor infraction of selling heroin on the job as a Baltimore City cop. Stupid feds, do they know how many lives that man saved!?
So Baltimore, this Thanksgiving I’m giving thanks to Daniel Redd, along with the countless other Baltimore City Police officers who are diligently keeping us safe from crime by perpetrating it themselves in their own very special way! Happy Turkey Day!
Location: Southbound Light Rail, Baltimore, MD
Rating: 4.1/5.0
Description: Another solid lean coming from the MTA, this one coming from a reader with the following caption:
This woman was hovering like this on the light rail from the convention center until I got off the train at Linthicum. You can’t see in the photo but in her other hand she had a can of “soda” that she somehow managed not to spill the entire time. It almost looked like she bent over to sit down, but didn’t make it to the seat so she just decided to hover. Enjoy.
What makes this submission so amazing is that there are a TON of empty seats on the train. Instead of sitting down and strapping in for the ride like a newb, she’s shredding a tidal wave of H on a surf board made of don’t care.
I was a little torn about taking some points off for her obvious use of support, but I figure it is a moving vehicle and so who am I to give the Big Kahuna anything less.
Location: Lexington Market, Baltimore, MD
Rating: Priceless
Description: In the words of the submitter:
Only Baltimore can be so proud of their addiction heritage and put it in lights.
EDITORS NOTE: I’ve gotten a lot of questions about this one so I’ll give you a hint… Read the letters that are lit up and don’t mind the spaces: U-S-I-N-G SINCE 1782
The next couple of posts are going to be a series in which we highlight each council district in Baltimore and showcase some of the unique talent from each. You will then have a chance to vote on your favorite district on our Facebook page and let us know which district most deserves the title of best zombies of 2012!! Thanks for reading and let the Heroin Games begin!
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: Charles St and North Ave, Baltimore, MD
District: 12th
Known For: Hopkins and Hipsters.
Councilman: Carl Stokes
Rating: 3.9/5
Description: When not running for mayor Mr. Stokes likes to encourage his residents to take walks with their children. Maybe he should also encourage them to not be pussies and use their kids strollers like training wheels. On a positive note there is a very high chance this stroller was stolen, so this guys gets a few points back to cover that possibility.
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: Smitty’s Liquors, Federal Hill, Baltimore, MD
District: 11th
Known For: Pretty much anything people come to Baltimore for other than heroin and hookers.
Councilman: William Cole
Rating: 4.2
Description: Wow, this guy must be a tourist. Look at the way he’s strolling around on zombie-juice showing off his money and chain! Only in the 11th will you see such extravagant wealth. I mean we’ve had some people showing off some pretty extraordinary wealth in the past, but I mean come on, this guy has money, a chain AND shoes!
If you’re going to run into this kind of wealth it’s going to happen in the 11th district, which is one of the few districts in Baltimore nice enough that you don’t doubt that the councilman lives in their district. Actually, it’s nice enough that they have TWO council-people living the district, with 5th District Councilwoman Rikki Spector choosing to live in an inner harbor condo over the hellhole Park Heights area in which she governs. I agree with her decision though. I mean she should live somewhere that there is leadership and vision instead of her district where the city councilperson is a clueless ‘tard phoning it in for a paycheck.
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: Capone’s Ink, Belair Road, Baltimore, MD
District: 2nd
Known For: This video
Councilman: Brandon Scott
Rating: 4.9
Description: Holy shit… this may be the perfect lean… The squat, the zombie walk, the coat that is only on her right arm so she can inject in the left, the complete disregard for people recording her less than one foot away…
I couldn’t give this a perfect 5, I don’t really know why I feel some sick part of me (well… sicker) is reserving it for the video where the guy actually injects themselves before stumbling around or where they fall over dead after a zombie stroll through Lexington Market or something. Barring any major news events this is the Mona Lisa of the Baltimore junkie lean and is the one that all others will be compared to. Bravo.
Coincidentally and on a side note. I had just watched the entire second season of the walking dead in a three day marathon prior to receiving this video and the part where she starts walking towards the camera seriously scared the living shit out of me!
Just to happen to be watching the movie Putty Hill tonight and in one of those small-timore moments it turns out one the main characters is the tattoo artist from Capone’s Ink*…
The video is definitely worth checking out, and now I want to visit Capone’s to see if that really is the owner!
*same place that sent the last video for those of you that are slow on the uptake
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: Dean Street, Brewers Hill, Baltimore, MD
District: 1st
Known For: Yuppies bullying junkies and old people out of their waterfront homes.
Councilman: James Kraft
Rating: 2.7
Description: In the last 15 years this district has flipped the whole “Baltimore food-chain” on it’s head. This guy is a perfect example of how backwards the 1st district is - we have a fat, white guy in a collared shirt passed out at 2PM on a strangers stoop so f’d up that getting smacked in the back of the head with the door doesn’t wake him up. Three times…
It used to be in Baltimore that some minority would move into a neighborhood and all the white people would flee for their lives to the suburbs in an old fashion practice called “block busting”. The 1st district is experiencing just the opposite as boozed up yuppies, and beefcake bros have made the area almost uninhabitable to anyone over the age of 25 and not working at T. Rowe or Excellon. The few elderly that are somehow holding on at least get the added experience on any given Sunday morning you could be stepping over the prone body of the children of Baltimore’s “who’s who” crowd on their way to church.
That might explain why I get such a high volume of pictures from the 1st district, but honestly most of them are just passed out brosky’s after 25 cent Miller Lite night on the square. For that reason I took major points off of this one because the guys is obviously passed out, and I’m also willing to bet the only H he can blame for his condition is Heineken.
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: Franklin Street just West of downtown, Baltimore, MD
District: 9th
Known For: City Councilmen who SHOOT at people who helped them canvas neighborhoods… Seriously.
Councilman: “Pistol” Pete Welch
Rating: 3.7
Description: Believe it or not, this guy is not pan handling, his sign is just a large handwritten last will and testament he carries around so it’s easy to find after his inevitable violent, heroin-soaked death in the 9th district.
This district used to boast the finest housing stock in Baltimore and was the envy of every city on the east coast. H.L. Mencken kept his residence in Union Square throughout his career, riding the train back from New York every weekend to enjoy his garden and the fine living of Baltimore’s west side.
That was of course prior to the 30 years of “leadership” the west side has seen under the Welch family, 27 of which occurred under the watch of Pete’s mother Agnes Welch. While some leaders are criticized for managing decline, the Welch family full on embraced it, making an art form of turning unique historic neighborhoods into heroin dens and prostitute havens. Under Agnes the famous “road to nowhere” was built which took once vibrant city communities and eviscerated them in a fashion which ensured that there would be no investment for decades to come.
Unfortunately, in spite of their best efforts, the Welches couldn’t stop some of the recent revitalization in Union Square and SOWEBO. I mean there is just something about complete despair that draws hipsters in to start fixing shit up. Who knows, if voters read the ballot next time instead of voting for the person who gave them testers that morning, there is a chance that real change could come to the 9th in the next few years and I won’t be writing about how this guy with the sign is better qualified to be on the city council.
***BALTIMORE DISTRICT CHALLENGE***
Location: 1376 N Gay Street, Baltimore, MD
District: 13th
Known For: The OTHER city councilman who keeps getting arrested.
Councilman: Warren Branch
Rating: 3.2
Description: Back in May a reader submission found a special Easter Egg in Google Maps, transforming me from a hipster, trend-setter into a try-hard. Unsurprisingly, Google outdid me again with this Google Maps masterpiece of a zombie dance complete with spotter.
I actually took some points off because of the spotter. Sure, I mean spotters make sense for a lot of innocent recreational activity, say… auto-erotic asphyxiation. I might not be an expert in Heroin use, but if Heroin is anything like the old double-clutch than someone else standing around making sure you’re safe takes away all the fun!!
As for District 13, there really isn’t too much to say. An area of town that has been on the decline for the better part of 50 years, the last 20 years of which were under the leadership of someone named Branch. While the leadership has been underwhelming and often absent from voting, there are few things worth pointing out on this blog. Even the arrests of the councilman are less fun to pick on, it’s hard to poke fun when the accuser has to do so behind a lawyer from the House of Ruth (spousal abuse is way too heavy for this site…).
Even I understand that there are limitations on how much can be done with a snarky blog about the hilarious heroin addiction problem US cities. Sure, this blog is a great way to get a sneak peak at what your life would look like a year or two after you make the decision to start that opiate addiction you keep putting off, but it’s not really doing a lot for the people who are currently featured on it showing their amazing ability to keep vertical against the odds.
As you may well have guessed, a good number of these people on my blog would actually very much like to be able to stand completely vertical without passing out, but addiction is a bitch to break. Just ask Lindsey Lohan, and she’s not trying to do it on SSI. Thankfully, America has invented this thing called M-O-N-E-Y, which has allowed us to turn AIDS from a death sentence to an over-the-counter remedy in just under 30 years. With your help I’d like to get Baltimore to start taking our addiction seriously and treating the disease which ails us.
So, this Holiday season (sorry Jews, Hanukkah is over so I pretty much mean Christmas at this point) take a moment to give to one of the many local Baltimore addiction counseling groups. This group was suggested by my readers from suggestions on our Facebook page. Share this post, and lets see if we can’t make a difference in Baltimore and have one less person on my blog next year.
Thank you in advance, and I wish you happiest holidays.
Tuerk House:
Tuerk House transforms lives by providing help and hope for enduring recovery to individuals, families and communities in the Baltimore metropolitan area who are struggling with addiction to alcohol and/or drugs.
https://www.tuerkhouse.org/civicrm/contribute/transact?reset=1&id=2
Helping Up Mission:
Helping Up Mission provides hope to the poor and homeless. We do this through programs designed to meet their individual physical, psychological, social and spiritual needs. The average homeless man we serve has survived two decades of substance abuse and years on the streets. He comes to us addicted, destitute, and dysfunctional — with no realistic capacity to recover on his own.
https://www.helpingupmission.org/sslpage.aspx?pid=440
Teen Challenge of Baltimore:
Our purpose is to provide adults and families with an effective and comprehensive Christian faith-based solution to life-controlling drug and alcohol problems in order for them to become productive members of society. By applying biblical principles, Teen Challenge endeavors to help people become mentally sound, emotionally balanced, socially adjusted, physically well, and spiritually alive. We have sent countless thousands of successful men and women back into their communities and workplaces, equipped to help others.
https://co.clickandpledge.com/sp/d1/default.aspx?wid=41560
Healthcare for the Homeless:
Health Care for the Homeless (HCH) works to prevent and end homelessness for vulnerable individuals and families by providing quality, integrated health care and promoting access to affordable housing and sustainable incomes through direct service, advocacy, and community engagement.
https://secure.qgiv.com/for/homelesshc/restriction/Special+Mothers+Day+gift/
Back on My Feet:
Back on My Feet (BoMF) is a national nonprofit organization that is dedicated to creating independence and self-sufficiency within the homeless and other underserved populations by first engaging them in running as a means to build confidence, strength and self-esteem.
http://www.active.com/donate/backonmyfeet
