babes for boobs

If you were at Whitlows right now, you could be bidding on Wayan. Well, not right this second, but the bidding is about to begin. If my darling girlfriend is much later I might just bid on Christina here… Nice eh?

posted by Don from Wayan’s phone

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Special to Metroblogging DC from contributor Mik

I went to The Arlington Cinema and Draft House last Wednesday evening for their Wine Night at the Movies. This was my first visit to the Draft House, and although in an easy enough to find location, parking was a pain. Employees of the Draft House recommend parking behind the 7-11 to prevent being towed from the lot behind the Draft House or from the lot across the street. I of course illegally parked in the lot behind the Draft House and was not towed, but not being one to tempt the towing gods, wouldn’t recommend it.

I was excited by the opportunity to finally see Office Space on the big screen and really looked forward to the wine tasting. Amongst many the Sideways pun, the five wines sampled were:

The first wine of the evening was a Schmitt Söhne Relax Riesling. Apparently the Riesling of trailer park trash according to most reviews read. They dumbed down the label so as not to confuse the American market with often times hard to pronounce foreign names. Tastes very much like their Blue Riesling Auslese.

The second wine of the evening was an offering from Guy Buffet (no relation to Jimmy), and artist cum wine connoisseur and his 2002 Merlot. By far the best offering of the evening.

I’m not a big fan of Greg Norman and his stupid sharks and I’m even less of a fan of Chardonnay, so it goes without saying that the third offering of the evening from Greg Norman’s wine estates of Chardonnay was worse than drinking Earl Grey tea.

I do not aspire to be Miles from Sideways. I don’t care that the wine world was not prepared to have a 300% increase in Pinot Noir sales once Sideways was released. I wouldn’t feed Pinot Noir to my dog. Needless to say, the fourth offering of the evening a Pinot Noir from the Louis Jadot vineyards was worse than pig swill.

As a self-confessed wine snob, I am appalled to learn that the fifth offering of the evening, a L de Lyeth Cabernet, is a domestic wine. One of only a handful of domestic wines I have enjoyed since residing here, I found this wine to be full of velvety tannins and just to my liking. Definitely an A+ in my book.

Washington Wine Academy put on a great wine tasting check out the Draft House’s schedule and try to make it out for the next Wine at the Movies night.

Excuse me? Excuse me, senor? May I speak to you please? I asked for a mai tai, and they brought me a pina colada, and I said no salt, NO salt on the margarita, but it had salt on it, big grains of salt, floating in the glass…

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Happy Hour

While it doesn’t have outdoor seating and so therefore isn’t on the Definitive Patio Bar list, I noticed a great new DC Happy Hour addition today – Chef Geoff’s.

Usually thought of as a swanky lunch or dinner spot, their happy hour specials rank right up there with Fox and Hounds in cost per drink.

Add to it the snazzy air and this is a place to bring a date and impress, on the cheap.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Looking for a book? Want to help DC Public Schools? How about the Carpe Librum Book Sale? Put on by Turning the Page, and benefitting DCPS, the sale is on now through May 12th, Monday through Friday from 10a to 7p, then again Saturday from 11a to 6p, and even on Sunday from 11a to 5p, all over at the iBEW building on 7th St. NW. Go on over and pick up a book. It’s been too long since you’ve read anything anyway.

Many thanks to Laura Hart for pointing out the story!

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

C’mon McDonalds – With the DC city council on a rampage about drug paraphernalia is this any time to encourage the ravers?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Special to Metblogs from contributor Mik

For those of you who don’t already know, it’s Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry’s. What’s better than taking a little time out of your day, standing in the sunshine, chatting to coworkers, donating money to a good cause whilst waiting for a free ice cream cone? Nothing you say? Then clearly you weren’t waiting in line at the M Street location about an hour ago.

I’m not sure if all of the DC area B&Js are supporting the same charity, but there were volunteers from My Sister’s Place at the M Street location this afternoon. If you’ve wanted to get involved with volunteering but have lacked the right charity to volunteer for, please, please, please check out the website. My Sister’s Place is committed to helping battered women improve their lives, and the lives of their children. Giving just an hour of your time would mean so much to many people.

A volunteer walked the long line of people awaiting their free cone, collecting donations in a bucket. She approached a frail, hunched-over, old man standing to ask him if he would like to donate money to a shelter for battered women; his response: “No, I’m a batterer.” The volunteer handled the situation extremely well and told the old man that she hoped he was able to find help. My friends and I stood in shock whilst the volunteer carried on down the line not bothered by this crotchety, old man.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

The end result

DC is special in many ways, and one I’d like to say is related to our non-State status is the eviction process.

In most states, evivictions are handled by the county sheriff’s office. In DC, a U.S. Marshal is present to enforce the eviction, but landlords are responsible for providing labor for the eviction.

And in a great twist of logic, guess who eviction companies in the area and independent landlords have been calling on to provide the mover muscle to toss boxes on the street for the last six years? Homeless men!

According to the Street Sense’s great article Homeless People Hired To Evict Tenants, while two companies, All American Eviction and East Coast Express Evictions, deny the practice, several homeless people, including many Street Sense vendors and a good number crunching of the companies’ financial data, say otherwise. In addition, they’re accused of being cheap and paying way below minimum wage.

I’d say that Caroline Lansford, the CEO of All American, and Nelson Terry, CEO of East Coast, deserve a good spanking or a whole house full of irony. Either way, and no matter who they hire, persons employed in private industry in the District of Columbia receive at least a
“>minimum wage of $7.00 per hour, effective January 1, 2006.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

…they won’t even play softball together. Seriously, the Republicans aren’t playing softball with the Democrats anymore after a dispute over the playoff format for the summer softball league. I am literally without words. So much of this town is becoming charged with the rancor between the parties that there seem to be no shelter for those who wish to seek it. So much for coming to DC to settle the differences like gentlemen and ladies, and come to appropriate compromises to suit the needs of the people.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Mark your calendars, drunkards, as DC’s Beerlympics is right around the corner. This year’s event sponsored by NAKID is going to take place on May 13th at a bar to be named later. Of course, you could just save yourself the hangover by chugging ipecac…but that’s not nearly as much fun as flipcup, boat racing and beirut. Stay tuned for more details.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

It’s hard to believe that a day that ended so beautifully started out so disgusting, but it did. This is Eastern Market yesterday at noon when we were in the middle of our Seattle impression. Luckily most of us had tents up, though dead in the middle you can see where woodturner Aaron has simply thrown tarps over all his stuff and gone off for coffee.

However if you don’t like our Spring weather, just wait an hour. By 2:00pm my darling girlfriend and I were pondering taking the tent down completely. We probably would have if it wasn’t so unwieldy. Here’s hoping all of you got to enjoy all the sunshine and suffer less of the rain.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Steel flying in

If you’re hoping for smooth right turn off K Street eastbound onto 15th Street southbound this afternoon, good luck to ya.

The fiber optic cable layers are slowly rebuilding the street and to protect their newly poured concrete, will be laying big steel plates on the street right in front of CVS.

Tomorrow – no parking in front of Georgia Browns.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

This might explain why some people feel such a need to have an SUV to navigate the bumpy wilds of their development community – more room for ribbon magnets.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Hasbro is retooling the classic board game Monopoly to add landmarks from various US cities, including Washington. They’re allowing folks to vote on three choices from the District: The Washington Monument, The Lincoln Memorial and The White House. Reducing any one city to a single location seems to me to be a fairly interesting choice to make. Are we more than just the memories of single great leaders? Why not choose the Capitol, which is the house of the people? The Supreme Court, which is the seat of Justice? Union Station, a great transportation hub?

That said I voted for Lincoln.

Go Vote!

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Have you ever seen people sold for charity? Do you know if it’s legal? I’m not really sure, but I do know I am for sale!

See, 20 talented, smart, charming Babes will be up for auction to the highest bidder this Wednesday to raise money for breast cancer research. So if you have a hard time approaching Babes without getting shot down, avoid the embarrassment and BUY your date – cash, check or charge!

Preeti for sale!

Winning bidders will receive not only an introduction to the Babe, but a bona fide DREAM DATE. Each Date is sponsored by a local business, including free passes, dinner or special deals. Me, I come with DC Improv tickets!

You can even join a pre-auction “Babe Mixer,” at 7pm when you will be able to meet-and-greet the Babes. Then get your game face on, and be ready to bid!

Babes for Boobs
Wednesday, April 26th @ 7:00 PM
WHERE: Whitlow’s on Wilson, Clarendon, VA

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Summer. How do you know that’s arrived in DC? Maybe tourist hordes? Or what about sticky, sweaty hot? Hmm… No, I think the best way to say when summer starts in DC is to look on the Mall.

If you find kickball on the National Mall, it is summer alright. And if you hear of a kball controversy then you know its Washington DC.

This week you can find these two to the right on the National Mall, kickball in hand, smile on face. Summer is here!

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Well, Arlington County has finally gotten around to looking at the real estate tax for 2006, and their choice to decrease the rate by $0.06 per $100 to 81.8¢. Last year, my tax bill was $2,370.60, roughly, and with my new assessment and the new rate, I’ll be paying a whopping $2,854.82. Thanks for raising my taxes, Arlington. Adding insult to injury, they also raised the Personal Property Tax Rate from $4.40 to $5.00 per $100 of assessed value. Though, it’s not all bad news in Arlington, as the Homeowner’s Grant Program will put an additional $100 in the pockets of households whose income is less than $77,407.

Fairfax county lowered their tax rate by 11 cents, though their rate is a good 7 cents more than Arlington. However they also voted themselves a $16,000 pay-raise for elected officials. Alexandria is expected to vote their budget tomorrow, with real estate tax rates looking to come down there, as well. However, with rising assessments, we’re still looking at effective tax hikes for residents in most of these communities.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

After appearing on the Post’s Saturday Morning Radio Show, former Wonkette Ana Marie Cox has an editorial in today’s Op-Ed section of the Post. Is Cox parlaying her career as a blogger to a job at the new Washington Post? It does certainly make me wonder…

Either way, good to see Ms. Cox getting some much-deserved placement. Better still, though, is her comparison of Scott McClellan to a baby panda:

I ‘ve always had a soft spot for departing White House press secretary Scott McClellan. Watching him give his choked-up goodbye on the White House lawn last week, I realized why. The jowls he’s grown, the hair he’s lost and the dark circles that have grown under his eyes in two years and nine months on the job have made him resemble Washington’s other helpless diplomatic pawn: Scott McClellan is the baby panda of the press corps.

That said, who would win in a bamboo eating contest?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Check out the Americorps progress!

On Eye Street between 14th and 15th, they’ve added new trees to the sidewalk mix. Aww.. how nice! They even supplied the water bags that allow you to water a tree over hours, slowly.

Now if only our building management can remember to water the trees, some day, long after I leave this job, there will be shade on Eye Street.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs