Day 14: A Stabbing Good Time

The WF woke up and slumped downstairs where he chatted with some friendly Baltimore police in the breakfast lounge of the hotel. They were very excited for the the Fool's journey and were highly impressed with his progress so far. They had many more questions to ask but were suddenly called away by the dispatch to go to a 102 in progress. They said goodbye and dashed out, clutching their weapons.

The Fool left the hotel and wandered around outside, getting lost in the massive tangle of off- and on-ramps, and over- and under-passes. He finally found his way to Route 40, which took him into central Baltimore. After a quick stop at a library branch near Patterson Park, he crossed into the downtown waterfront neighborhood. He looped around the downtown area and reserved a room at the upscale Hilton, near the harbor.

As night fell, the Fool went into historic Fells Point, with its cobbled stone streets and its picturesque waterfront landscape. He went on a self-guided "bar crawl," having beers at many of the charmingly old and rickety pubs. At one such drinking establishment, he met and joined a small, jovial crew of folks out for an evening of social entertainment. Heather, one of the Fool's new gleeful, good-natured companions, admitted to him that she was secretly a stabbing addict. She explained that she, along with a small fringe group of others, enjoy getting stabbed for pleasure. "Pen knives, letter openers, nail clippers... anything small and sanitary," she explained to a stunned Fool. Then, after showing a deep scar on her belly, she added, "Of course, I'm just making all this up. That scar is from when I got my appendix taken out."

"Oh yeah, I knew that. I knew you were just joking," the Fool lied. He then sheepishly hid in the corner to chug several lagers... or ales... or... at that point, he didn't really care.

Route thus far