The Best News in America

I lived in Baltimore for a brief time just before the Great Recession, when the city seemed like a great experiment in gentrifying can-do — the wealth spillover from Washington, D.C., funding youthful forays in exposed-brick living, top-to-bottom renovations of long-abandoned townhouses, tapas restaurants and gastro pubs springing up just blocks from zones of dereliction. (Ever since, I’ve had a weird nostalgic response to the middling rom-com “He’s Just Not That Into You,” which was filmed against this backdrop.)

One night a friend reported an inner revelation at a lavish happy hour near the Inner Harbor.........

© The New York Times