Well, we’re here. It was a treacherous drive to Maryland on a dark and stormy night; following the Internet driving directions left us wondering for a while if MapQuest was secretly run by demons whose job was to lure unsuspecting travelers to their doom in a desolate and windy forest.

Some thoughts:

Western Maryland is an odd and occasionally uncomfortable locale for three wandering gay New Yorkers and their little dogs, too. There are no traffic lights and no traffic, either . . . more people live on my block in Manhattan than in all of Garrett County. And yet, there is a church every hundred feet, and not something relatively normal like Catholic or Episcopalian, but scary snake-handlers like Southern Baptist and Assembly of God. Roadside shops bear signs reading “Welcome Hunters,” and just about every male one encounters is wearing camouflage. (If people wore camouflage in New York, they would stick out like a sore thumb, largely because there is nothing green with which to blend in. To be remotely effective, it would have to be the color of soot-covered cement.) The only movie theater in town is playing only crappy films, but that’s actually fine, as they cost only $4.50 for the matinee. The real excitement is over at the Wal-Mart anyway. I understand that this is a new addition; before it was built, people around here didn’t know what to do with themselves. Hence, one supposes, the churches and the hunting, two of the most violent institutions going. Put a boxing ring over by the Women’s Underthings section and the snakes would get lonely and the deer would run wild in the streets.