Just saw your WTF post about my suggestion.

There's a couple of 7-11's nearby but if we are talking about the one on Mercer Street getting hit first then the riots were right there in the tourist zone. Cops abandoned that area?

The reason why the world needs your guide: I went to visit Poe's grave but it was a Sunday morning. What do all the Medical and Law students do? I think I saw some residences by there but they must batten down the hatches at night and only come out in the day!

Thing is I went to Baltimore to see a show at the Hippodrome Theater, right next door to the grave, the night before and just went there mission minded like you write about; being aware and a fast pace down W. Baltimore St, there and back. Is the drama by Poe's grave at night predatory, meaning thugs come there to purposefully hunt soft targets like tourists and students or is it just spill over from nearby neighborhoods and that's where they are hanging out and it is a tense time for locals and students alike?

Finally, the area you described the kids are keeping under observation for entrepreneurs is right there in the tourist zone and business district. Another WTF? Who are they selling to? I'm guessing many of the middle class tourists or "straight" office workers are customers, i.e. the same people that are also afraid and complaining about the kids and crime.

Please don't feel obligated to answer my questions directly as it could be some good topics for your upcoming series.

My final unsolicited suggestion: I do think that The Poor Tour or whatever it will be called would make for a good stand alone book, a la' Stuart, and I'll buy the MF as soon as it comes out but hope that the book would contain information not already published on your web page.

-Scott

Scott, I am going to take all of your suggestions and answer all of your questions, except one. The entire book will be published for free, one chapter at a time, on this site. This has become part of my editorial process. What will not go up for free are the photos of the locations.

I shall call the book The Poor Tour.

It will be dedicated to Scott C., as you have inspired it, and when complete, I’ll send you your complimentary copy.

The Poor Tour shall be photographed and published by Mescaline Franklin, gonzo publisher of Forever Autumn Press, and urban blight tourist, from the rival urban canker sore of Camden New Jersey, who has expressed a vague interest in publishing such a book, as he too went looking for Poe’s grave.

As for the Hippodrome Theatre, back in the early 1980s, a former boss of mine, named Glen, saw a movie there. He then went to his parked car and realized it was blocked by a line of men filing down an alley. They told him that they were standing in line to receive a $50 blow job from Puerto Rican porn starlet Vanessa Del Rio, who was waiting at the end of the narrow alley. So, Glen said, as related to me, "What the fuck. I've got fifty, I'm in! And you know what, I think I was number fifty! There was like twenty guys behind me. She was seated on a milk crate between two uniformed cops. I'm really not sure if it was her, but whoever it was she could have sucked the chrome off of a trailer hitch, so it was fifty well spent!"

As you can see, Scott, cops do have a history of protecting illustrious visitors to our great city!I just thought you would appreciate having been so close to such rich Harm City history!

Fortunately for you and others the local victims of white oppression do not know who Edgar Alan Poe was, and that stoned white dudes have been dying of exposure in Baltimore for far longer than they realize.

What do our out of town university students do that live in such areas as Charles Village, Govans, Gwynn Oak, Canton, etc.?

Why they sometimes are raped and killed like a young lady in Charles Village, or beaten into a coma like a graduate student in East Baltimore. Mostly, they play FBI 100,000 Wildebeest Roulette. Basically, stupid white people survive black predation the same way that stupid herbivores survive lion predation, by flooding the hunting matrix and emerging as one of the 90,000 out of 100,000 college students who are not mugged, beaten, raped or killed in Harm City!

As for your 7-11, it was the Howard Street one that got hit. The one you went to, in the same tourist zone, did not, as far as I know. I can tell you that there was no police protection in the tourist zone, and that bouncers and doormen and ball park ushers did most of the security work. A friend of mine’s wife was beaten into a coma within sight of police lines and they did not even try and retrieve her body. The hub of tourist activity in Baltimore is the corner of Light and Pratt Streets next to the Baltimore Convention Center, across from the Leg Mason Building, and in sight of the Falon Federal Building and the waters of the Baltimore Harbor. That is where this middle aged lady was dragged from her car and beaten by black men, and where I documented numerous incidents in When You’re Food. It is the place where I encountered The Seven Dwarves Of Pratt Street.

The Baltimore Police Department does provide tourist security for some events, like the Tall Ships Celebration, but not for others, like Saint Patrick’s Day. It takes planning to pull off that kind of security, and since the only people planning during the riots where the gangsters and hoodrats the tourist zone was overrun, as depicted by my interview with Boomy the Hero Cabbie in War Drums.

The drug customers in the tourist zone are often not tourists. The way Baltimore is laid out most of the bus lines cross at the Inner Harbor or within three blocks. The #64 bus from Anne Arundel County, south of the city, intersects with the #19 bus that comes from near the Baltimore County Detention Center and Courthouse to the north of the city. The #64 dead ends at North Avenue! Look, never get caught on North Avenue, and avoid bus lines that end in the ghetto. These bus lines intersect at Light and Pratt. These two lines constitute a wholesale drug pipeline, with the #19 passing the two major Baltimore City Court Houses and Detention Centers, where many of these deals are arranged.

Thank you, Scott, for the inspiration to do some location based writing. As the project moves forward, you, or any other readers, may feel free to suggest a location that should be investigated with an eye toward affordable survival, for the tourist, student, or visitor to Harm City who is not content with playing FBI 100,000 Wildebeest Roulette. If you are soon scheduled to visit our wonderful town, give me the date of your arrival so that I can make sure my post precedes it. I’d hate to have you reading about not—never, ever—heading West on North Avenue just as The Sand Town Crew begins to swarm over the hood of your rental car.