Look­ing for some­thing to do this sunny week­end, Charm City and D.C. metro read­ers? Then why not check out the High­land­town Spring Art­fest this Sat­ur­day from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Held at Mag­no­lia Designs Gallery in the Skylofts, the Art­fest promises to be a fun way to wel­come the new sea­son and sup­port local artists and craftspeople.

Artists at Saturday’s event will include: Adorn­ments by Ate­lier Beads, Elisa Shere Jew­elry, Joe Den­ni­son, Lana Bella, Robert Funk, Tigerlilyshop and many others.

Sat­ur­day 20 March 2010, 10 a.m. — 3 p.m. at Skylofts 3701 Bank Street, Bal­ti­more, MD 21224, check it out

Today finds Charm City buried once again, in a blan­ket of sparkling white. The effect is beau­ti­ful, bewil­der­ing and even a lit­tle inspir­ing though at some point after hours of shov­el­ing, the snow will become less than charm­ing. In the mean­time, here is a piece of visu­ally stun­ning eye/brain candy straight from Japan for you, dear read­ers, snow­bound or otherwise:

Doesn’t this just make your eyes smile and the snow a lit­tle more fun?

This morn­ing, I was not feel­ing ter­ri­bly moti­vated– it has been a bit­terly cold, WINDY win­ter day in Charm City and my inner bear just wants to hiber­nate this time of year. But I’ve kept my favorite mug full of fresh cof­fee and even went so far as to pull together a playlist to keep myself moti­vated. If your moti­va­tion is wan­ing or you just need some new music, you can find most of my playlist avail­able through iTunes as an iMix here.

How do you stay moti­vated and pro­duc­tive at work, dear readers?

Recently, I’ve been doing a lot of net­work­ing; and one of the fre­quent top­ics of con­ver­sa­tion has been the City itself, Bal­ti­more. Peo­ple inevitably want to under­stand why I left sunny Cal­i­for­nia and adven­tur­ous Col­orado for what is often per­ceived as a hum­drum, quirky lit­tle town on the Chesa­peake. And my answer is always the same– “I love Bal­ti­more;” I do.

There is some­thing inex­plic­a­bly won­der­ful about this funny lit­tle town. It is, admit­tedly, an acquired taste, one that is sub­tle and, in some ways, com­plex very much like blue crab– not every­one gets it or likes it, but those who do are are devoted to the fla­vor. As a crab lover and a proud Bal­ti­moron (or Bal­ti­morean for the more gen­teel) I gladly preach the gospel of the City, but am not ter­ri­bly sur­prised by those upon whom the cause is lost.

This evening, while catch­ing up on the long thread of blogs I read, I came across a post that included a thought­ful video of David Simon, dis­cussing Bal­ti­more. It is so right on the money, that I had to repost it here. For those who share the love of the City, hope­fully you’ll nod your head in agree­ment with some of his tongue-in-cheek obser­va­tions. And for those new or still unfa­mil­iar with the City, per­haps it will inspire you to learn more and take a visit to Charm City.

One of my favorite quotes from the video: “If you come from D.C., you sort of have to admit you’re not from a real place.”

Go check it out, the video is eight min­utes of thought­ful insight.