There is irony in each story, irresistible irony that serves, I suppose, to break up the bleak monotony of news from the alt-Baltimore of poverty and hardship, of guns and drugs, of young men killing and dying. Those of us who watch from a distance -- from a few blocks away, or hundreds of miles away -- see a Baltimore that exists parallel to the one we know and savor, the Baltimore of work and play, of bars and restaurants, of bike lanes and farmers markets, of construction cranes and waterfront apartments -- the struggling, striving, livable but deeply flawed city.