Brick

When the chance to buy a historic 19th-century home in old Ellicott City came about five years ago, Don Reuwer Jr. and his partner, Lisa Devries, snatched it up. The couple chose the home, known as Burleigh Manor, for its traditional beauty and country-setting feel. "The home sits on 10 acres, so you feel like you're in the country, but you're also in the heart of Ellicott City," Devries said about the house, which was built in the early 1800s by the Hammonds, a family listed among the founders of Howard County.

The Old Brick Church has earned that name during its 200-year history. That anniversary is being observed by Christ Episcopal Church in Columbia, whose present building was constructed in 1993 and hence qualifies as an architectural newcomer. Such an event calls for music, which will be supplied by the Columbia Pro Cantare performing the world premiere of Howard County composer Tom Benjamin 's "Old Brick Oratorio" Saturday, Oct. 15 at 8 p.m. The composition packs a lot of musical and historical material into its approximately 60-minute running time.

The centuries-old church affectionately known as "Old Brick" is far from imposing. It more closely resembles a one-room schoolhouse than it does the newer, larger building that has housed its congregation since the 1990s. Yet Old Brick's historic role as a witness to the development of Howard County and Columbia looms large in the hearts of many, and has inspired its congregation at Christ Episcopal Church to restore the red-brick building on what is now Oakland Mills Road to a close facsimile of its original.

In Sunday's Harford Men's Summer Lacrosse League title game, the Hinder Ford squad came through with a 12-8 victory over the Brick Bodies side to capture its second straight league crown. Holding a narrow 7-5 lead at the halftime whistle, the winners exploded for five goals in the third frame to put the game away. Hinder Ford failed to score in the final quarter, but Brick Bodies' two-goal effort proved not to be enough. Hinder Ford goalkeeper Brian Vierheller, who was named finals MVP after the game, posted 13 saves in the championship match-up.

A knock rarely brings the owner to the front door of Stemmer House. It is more likely that she will emerge to greet you from her gardens, wearing her trademark galoshes, tool belt, work gloves and sun hat. Though Barbara Holdridge has lived in this historic Baltimore County home for nearly 40 years, it is her gardens that demand her time and attention. More than six of the 27 acres that surround the home are formally landscaped, and if they don't need to be weeded, they need to be watered.

In the last regular-season action of the Harford Men's Summer Lacrosse League, the Hinder Ford, Just Extreme Graphics, Bill Bateman's and Brick Bodies squads earned victories on Sunday afternoon. The closest of Sunday's contests saw the Hinder Ford side edge past the Main Street Tower men 9-8. Owen Jordan and Brian Zink led the winning squad, with each finding the opposing net three times. Luke Phipps had two goals and one assist in the victory, while teammate Thomas Hinder netted one goal.

Baltimore may be the Charm City, but there is nothing charming about its treatment of the city's fledging food truck fleet. To protect existing brick-and-mortar businesses from competition, the city recently cracked down on food truck owners who want nothing more than to earn an honest living by selling delicious food to hungry Baltimoreans. The crackdown began two weeks ago, when a city bureaucrat began aggressive enforcement of a city law that restrains food trucks from competing with brick-and-mortar restaurants by requiring them to stay 300 feet — the length of a football field — away from any retail establishment that sells similar food.

Rick Ross is the most consistent — and arguably the most important — rapper working today. Hip-hop's crown changes heads with swift regularity (ask me tomorrow and I could say Kanye West or Lil Wayne based on whatever new leak was liberated). But on Monday, May 23 — the day Ross and his Maybach Music Group drop the compilation album Self Made, Vol. 1 — the Miami behemoth is king, thanks to an unrelenting onslaught of crisp, expertly edited lifestyle videos and less-engrossing-but-still-entertaining low-budget music videos.

Workers began to knock down five long-vacant rowhouses in Northeast Baltimore's Woodbourne-McCabe neighborhood Wednesday, part of an effort, city officials said, to draw new residents to an area where tidy brick homes stand next to boarded-up houses. The demolition was the first under a program established by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake to address the more than 30,000 vacant homes and lots in the city. As a light rain fell Wednesday morning, workers nudged the front of a brick house with the claw-like arm of a hydraulic shovel.

The words "beer food" bring to mind items like pretzels, peanuts and pizza. But at Red Brick Station in White Marsh the term means mussels steamed in ale, fish dipped in a beery batter and meat marinated in stout. Here, the beer is often in the food. It works, in part because the beer is fresh. There is a brewery on the premises, between the bar and the dining room. It also works because the kitchen has a nice touch with spices. The concept here is to serve English-style ales and English pub fare.