Coffee

Every morning, Monday through Friday, blogger Matt Vensel will hook you up with reading material -- mostly on the Ravens but with some other Baltimore sports stuff, too -- to skim through as you slug down coffee and slack off at the start of your workday. That way he'll have an excuse to do the same to start his workday, too. RUNNING IT BACK Quarterback Joe Flacco expressed confidence in himself Wednesday and about his chances of getting a new contract with the Ravens . ... Increased playing time is a possibility for offensive tackle Bryant McKinnie, says Bryant McKinnie.

Meagan Shipley, a nurse in the Baltimore City Health Department, works at a family planning clinic during the day and helps provide health care to workers on The Block in the evenings. When she was contacted by photographer Carolyn Jones to be part of a new coffee-table book, "The American Nurse," she agreed, hoping to publicize the work the city is doing to help workers in Baltimore's strip-club hub "A lot of people want to write off [Block workers]," she says. "I hate this attitude.

I hope your holiday gift-giving included some books, and if you're still looking, here are the best coffee-table books I've seen in the past month of so. These are the sort of photo- and graphic-rich editions that look great in a living room -- and that overwhelm Kindles or other e-readers. Some favorites: -- "History's Greatest Images" by TIME, is billed as a compilation of "the World's 100 Most Influential Photographs. " The classics are all there: the flag-raising at Iwo Jima, Babe Ruth, JFK, school desegregation, the World Trade Center.

The Park Plaza building, which was ravaged in a December 2010 fire, has lined up a new tenant. Dooby's, a coffee shop, will open in the former Indigma space in spring 2013. Mount Vernon residents noticed signs announcing Dooby's on the space's windows. A message on doobyscoffee.com says, "Our vision is to create a fun and welcoming place where friends and neighbors can gather over coffee, pastries, sandwiches and beer from morning to night, right in the heart of Mt. Vernon. " None of the Park Plaza tenants that were ousted by the fire are returning.