February is rearing her ugly side again, and may leave an inch of snow on us today, starting in about an hour or so. So, because DC can’t handle more than a single flake without some sort of traffic casuality, get ready for a crappy evening rush.

DC Loses $250,000 in Emergency Radios

Apparently, the DC Government can only account for 73 of its 151 emergency radios, and given that some of the radios have turned up for sale in DC, it’s probably not a bad assumption that the other 78 (valued at over $3,000 apiece) are pretty much gone. So, next time there’s an emergency, look out for those other 78 people fucking with the EMT and Police crowd. That’ll just be awesome.

Goodbye Awakening

The Awakening is leaving DC today, being dug up from its home at Hains Point and moved to the National Harbor project (Warning, Annoying Music) in Prince George’s County. We’ve known this was coming, but it’s still jarring to think that it’s finally going. Thanks much to Christopher Dale for the use of his amazing long-exposure shot.

No More French in 9th Grade in DC

I know in my educational path, foreign language was an option as young as 7th grade. Apparently not in DC, where it’s not until 10th grade that you can take a foreign language. I’m no pedagogue, but I’m fairly sure that kinda screws over the students, no?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

There are few sweeter words than “Pitchers and Catchers Report Today.” As Andy Ihnatko said the other day, seeing the team’s gear come off the plane in Florida is like the joy of a three year old espoused by a big, bright floating red ballon. This is the Lent of baseball. We wait in patient hope for the return of the game that brings us summertime joy and no shortage of rollercoaster moments.

The Nationals face an uphill battle this season, but with their off-season moves to pick up some additional power in the outfield, and starting pitcher Odalis Perez has just now accepted the Nats minor-league offer and will join the club for spring training shortly. In addition, Hill and Patterson look good on the mound according to early reports from Viera, Florida where the Nats make their springtime home. Nick Johnson’s back from that nearly-career-ending leg break in 2006, and put on a batting display for press down at Space Coast Stadium the other day. There are reasons to be please with the Nats right now, and hopeful in the long-term.

So, the big questions:

Are Hill and Patterson really healthy? If so, they’ve got three fifths of a decent starting rotation, but no real ace to guarantee a win once every five days. Who’ll start opening day? No telling.

Who’s On First? Dmitri Young or Nick Johnson? Both have incredible power and good average, but neither has the speed or the reflexes to play elsewhere in the infield. The outfield is pretty full, as well, with Lastings Milledge (Thank you, NY Mets!) and Elijah Dukes (Thank you, Free Agency!) and Austin Kearns and Wily Mo Pena splitting three positions across four bodies. In addition, they’ve got a solid fifth outfielder and late replacement in Rob Mackowiak. So, what happens to Young and Johnson? Do they select one and trade the other? Platoon? Pray for a transfer to the AL so Young can be DH?

Who’s behind the plate? The Nats picked up both Johnny Estrada and Paul Lo Duca this off-season, which bumps Jesus Flores back to the #3 spot on the depth chart. I was really looking forward to see more of Flores this season, but I expect that Lo Duca and Estrada will split time behind the plate and we won’t see much of Flores unless either is injured, or, in Lo Duca’s case suspended for buying HGH a few years back.

Can we best .500 this year? Vegas says no. Vegas says we’ll win just 72 games, losing the other 90. But I take the bull position on this one and say the Nats will turn the tables on Vegas, and will come out 85-77 and finish in the middle of the pack in the NL East. The new park will be a significant improvement for the club, and while it’ll be new for everyone, I suspect home field advantage will be quickly conferred to the Nationals.

Position Players report to Viera tomorrow, and games for the Nats start in 8 days. The Lent of Baseball is here. Embrace it.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

If you’re jonesin’ for some live music tonight, check out Jeremy Fisher (Warning. Plays Music. Loudly.) at DC9. Doors are at 7. Make sure to bring a little extra emo with you, as the pictures on his website indicate that you may wish to cut yourself after the show because no one understands you, man! It’s cool, though, his acoustic sounds are generally poppy and uplifting, so it seems to be that Jeremy’s going for more of a “misunderstood in the vein of Bob Dylan, on he can hold a tune in a bucket and doesn’t sound like he needs sinus surgery.”

Oh, and thanks to the generosity of Cornerstone Promotion, we have two spots open on the guest list! Email tom at metroblogging dot com if you’d like to see Jeremy rock out with his bad self tonight at DC9. First to email me gets those two slots. Second gets to cry in their beer. Third? Well, you get the satisfaction of knowing how to hit Send.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Yesterday was phenomenal, at least the first half. I hope you all had a delightful President’s Day. We took the day off here, we’re sorry if you had to work and we left you with nothing to read. Such is the way. We’ll try to make up for it today.

Thousands of Gallons of Diesel into the Potomac

Way to go, fuel truck driver guy. You backed into a dumpster and busted your tank, causing thousands of gallons of diesel to head straight for the river. Nice work, jackass. As if those guys at Mirant didn’t have enough problems with the locals, you have to go be a moron and make their lives worse. Well played.

DC to crack down on meter feeders

If you park downtown and feed your meter every two hours, the police are coming for you because you’re fucking up parking near retailers downtown. Now, frankly, I’ve not had a problem lately getting a space on the street in the middle of downtown, but I welcome anything that’ll make it easier. This, along with the enforcement of Logan Circle parking is wonderful.

Shoot a Kid, Get Six Months Paid Vacation

Two DC Police Officers involved in the September shooting of DeOnte Rawlings are still on paid leave five months after the shooting. Five months vacation? Really? is that necessary? That seems gratuitous to me, or at least put them at a desk, or something.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

So according to an article in today’s WaPo, the District is looking to stop ‘meter feeders’ who plague our fair capital’s streets. With ‘mobile camera eyes’ that frankly, to me look more like a Terminator’s pre-proto prototype. (And yes, I just watched T3 the other day. I’ve got advanced AI on the brain, along with three different game designs at the moment.)

Ok, so I’ll admit it. I was one of the ‘scofflaws’ they’re trying to bust. But only occasionally! As in, “only when I worked a half-day” did I even attempt navigating the parking lot known as I-395N to park in town. With garage fees at a near-insane level of $15-20 for weekday parking, feeding a meter for six hours (to the tune of $6) was a no-brainer. Especially if I landed a spot right in front of my building, which cut down on the “I need to feed the meter” interruptions during my daily work routine. So yeah, I admit I’m a scofflaw – though I never pulled the old “meter broken” trick. I always paid.

But I don’t do that anymore – since I work in Vienna. Where parking is free.

Still, I have to wonder – what about tourists who come to town and street-park. They feed meters, too. Especially along Smithsonian Row. Will the Parking Police patrol there with their mobile camera masters? Or will they train their future conquerors (I’m sorry, I’m still stuck in sci-fi mode) to discern between VA/MD/DC plates and the rest of the country? If they enforce this, are they going to be uniform across the city in doing so, or will they only focus on certain areas? And is that really ‘fair’?

I don’t know. I want to say “all right!” to this program, simply because it makes sense, especially for those residents and shop owners downtown. I know *I’d* be ecstatic about it if I had a shop in DC and consistently saw obvious commuter parking taking up valuable customer real estate. But on the flip-side, it just seems…an excessive waste in the approach? I remember back in my college days at NIU, the parking militia there used chalk sticks to mark car tires to see if the car had moved from a ‘timed’ spot (such as a “one hour max” zone). Is that really so hard here? For a city that looks to have some serious budgetary issues at times, I dunno, it just makes better fiscal sense to me. Chalk vs. expensive mobile scanning platforms…. Tough choice.

Maybe I’m just terrified these Mobile Parking Cameras are going to go sentient and blow up the world somehow….

We’re sorry, we’ve temporarily removed the author to a Starbucks location nearby, where he’ll receive the proper caffeine hydration and get these silly sci-fi notions out of his head. *As if* robots are going to someday war with humanity….

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Well, probably not anyway. Tickets are sold out and they claim your odds of getting one of a few spare slots at the door are poor. All is not lost, however, as the Mortified website has a fair amount of free material for you to sample and determine if you want to join their mailing list. I was convinced by the video of Will Seymour writing about his miserable high school drama experience… which included being insulted by the local paper.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

photo credit: sexyfitsum, from the Metroblogging DC pool

“Grime! In DC!”

Shortly before midnight Sunday night, that was the Twitter my boyfriend posted. About two hours later, as we were getting ready to leave Jimmy Valentines Lonely Hearts Club, he posted again.

“My hair is full of ceiling debris shaken loose by bass.” High praise, indeed.

While grime actually comprised only a small portion of the set performed by SF/UK based dj BreakBeatBuddha (I will forgive the silly, silly name only this once) – which also included plenty of dubstep, and noisy, distorted, sometimes glitchy, party music – it was still a bit of a surprise to hear the British sub-genre played in a DC club

The Dive and Lie Wrecked night – presented as the final event in a weekend-long “mini-festival” called Forward – actually followed through on the claim that the generally enthusiastic audience would get a variety of styles, unlike many a DC club night where one can generally expect to hear 90% drum and bass, even at nights like Modern’s which puts dubstep right on the flyer.

In addition to BreakBeatBuddha, the popular Baltimore dj Joe Nice was on the bill, and was really the name that drew us up to the club in the first place. While we have never actually seen him live, he is most cited as one of the first American djs to become keen on the developments in the English scene in recent years, and bringing those styles more to the mainstream.

Credit is certainly due to the 88 DC promotion group for throwing the event. They have earned some success for their recurring and one-off events around town, and hopefully will keep putting on nights like this one.

Having been to their monthly X at BeBar initially only because a friend was performing (the whole “art happening” thing was off-putting to me, I will admit), I found myself pleasantly surprised and have gone back. It is less of a dance-oriented event, to be sure, but that is alright – and it certainly seems to be just fine with the slightly-older crowd it seems to attract, who are as interested in seeing interesting things on the walls and chatting with friends as they are in the music.

Jimmy Valentines is a delightful place in itself. No sign on the door, and on a quiet block, so it gives off just a whiff of exclusivity, even if it really is no speakeasy at all. The smallish, long room is painted and lit all in rosy red, making the faces of the patrons glow attractively.

We were pretty surprised by the quality of the system for a room of its size, which was clear and intense. It was strong enough to jostle a few chunks plaster out of the ceiling, which fell on to Craig’s head and the bar area, and for hours after leaving the club I had such a ringing in my ears that I think I may finally have lost some hearing.

Having never been there prior, I did not really know what to expect from the crowd. It was somewhat more mixed in terms of age and “style” than I might have expected, seeming to skew from collegey to late-30s, with several groups coming in suits to mingle with the heads in hood-up-hoodies and the like. I should point out, though, that Jimmy Valentines is principally a bar and was, last night at least, decidedly not all-ages. The woman working the door was clearly quite serious about ID-taking, and even scolded me for still carrying my vertical minor’s license even though I have been of age for some time (it still has a year before it expires!) because they are easier to forge.

All of the staff seemed to be girls, in fact, which was kind of intriguing, including perhaps the coolest security-type I have seen lately, with her mohawk and DC pride tattoo. She was clearly a total sweetie if you were cool, but I suspect could turn bad-ass if things got rowdy. One of the bartenders was among the prettiest I have ever seen mixing drinks, and I genuinely pitied her when some low-life in a plaid shirt was clearly putting the sleaze on her, thinking that she probably gets that a lot.

In short: I think Jimmy Valentines is now my third-favorite bar in town. Good music, super-cool space, a beer selection that, while short, still finds room for Brooklyn, Delirium, and Youngs, mixed-drinks served with bendy-straws with paper decorations, and some cool kids. Awesome.

In DC!

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Further proving the theory that bad behavior caught on tape once likely indicates a hundred incidents not recorded, ABC news has managed to come up with more tape of infamous Baltimore cop Salvatore Rivieri abusing the public. Yep, he’s wearing the shirt that says BALTIMORE’S FINEST on the back in this one too.

Billy Friebele is the person being abused by Officer Rivieri in this video, and he’s identified in the video as being one of ours, though his ties with the Baltimore area are apparently strong as well. He does interesting-sounding art. I wonder if this video project that Officer Unfriendly punted ever turned into something?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs Continue reading →

I’m a baseball apologist. There, I said it. I love the game, I love what it means to my family, I love what it means to my baseball playing friends. I’ve come to love the Nationals, our newest sports franchise, despite their abysmal record and the creaky stands and crotchety ushers out at RFK. But I will not apologize for the royal screwing that 20-game season ticket holders just got.

We re-upped our 20-game season tickets plan over the winter, and all six of us were ecstatic about sitting in the new ballpark for the opening night. Though our 20-game plan didn’t include opening night seats, season ticket holders have all been given the chance to buy opening night seats, knowing we’d be sitting somewhere other than our usual seats. We were fine with it.

However, then we found out what the Nationals’ plans were for us. We could buy two seats. Not six. Two.

Okay, tickets are constrained, I get that. But then why are full-season ticketholders allowed to buy two MORE seats than they have tickets for?

Enclosed beneath the cut is the excellent letter that my co-ticket-holder Adam wrote to Stan Kasten. We hope the Nationals choose to honor the allegiance that we have had to their franchise with the option to buy all six of our tickets for Opening Day.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs Continue reading →

News from my alma mater last night threw me into a lot of shock and put quite the damper on an otherwise wonderful Valentine’s Day.

There are a lot of kids from my family’s friends (my family resides in Naperville) who attend NIU; I’ve not heard any bad news from that end of the story, thankfully.

So why am I writing about something that happened out in Illinois in a DC-centric blog? Well, it does affect me in a way. But more importantly – and this really sucks, honestly – NIU was able to handle the incident relatively successfully due to a new security plan put in place after the Virginia Tech tragedy last year. For that reason, I think, the tragedy was less severe than it could have been, and I am thankful for that.

Though it still bugs me that all this still happens. This is the fourth college shooting in a month – what the hell is wrong with these people?

While NIU’s plan isn’t perfect – many students never got a text from the school but several from friends – doubtless it was better than whatever the plan was before. The school was closed and locked down within about 20 minutes. Notifications went out just as fast, and I commend the school’s administration for acting quickly.

Let me posit this question, then, to our local college attendees: with all the recent violence on campuses lately, do you feel safe at your school? And are you aware of what the security plan is? Share your thoughts in the comments box.

And if you have a moment, offer up a moment of silence for the NIU victims (now seven dead, nearly 20 wounded), faculty and students during their hour of need. Hopefully this is the last college tragedy we as a nation have to deal with.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Good morning DC, I hope you’re all blissful this morning. Going to be downright pleasant for February out there, high in the low 50s before a weekend that may require an extra blanket.

Metro Considers Large Plasmas for Stations

Metro’s giving a good hard look at plasma screens for all the platforms, and if you’ve seen the plasmas at the Gallery Place station, you might have a good idea what the prototype may look like. In addition, the displays would show content from a new “Metro Channel”, designed to provide a platform for live announcements and display of system conditions.

Virginia Dumps Smoking Ban

Despite strong support from the left, the Virginia House of Delegates has killed the smoking ban for the fourth straight year. Since Virginia’s legislature holds most of the power in the State, cities and counties can’t independently ban smoking, and thus it continues unabated in many of the bars and restaurants in the state. Who was responsible? Why, look, it’s Virginia’s favorite son, David B Albo, of the egregiously stupid $1000 moving violation fines! Hooray.

Final Amount in Revenue Scam is $43M

Forty-Three Million Dollars is what several DC Department of Revenue employees stole from the city coffers as part of their years-long scam. My general hope is that they spend some serious time in a federal pen belong to the guy with the most cigarettes.

When in Doubt, Don’t Trust the Flower Guy

Some suspects were caught red handed on Thursday, but a Sheriff’s deputy dressed up like a flower delivery guy. They used a sheriff’s van made up to look like a flower delivery truck, and a deputy in a delivery guy’s uniform to put the cuffs on 12 suspects who had been dodging the police for some time.

Do you think they make fun of you extra if you got caught because you were monumentally stupid?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Let me just start with the good part. My good friend Mike got engaged to his lovely girlfriend Monica tonight at Paolo’s in Georgetown. I got to watch this week as my friend went through a lot of the same steps that I did two and a half years ago, visiting the jeweler (Boone & Sons on Connecticut for both of us), talking over settings and stones, stressing about the arrangements and all manner of logistics.

When he invited us to join them in the tap room of the City Tavern Club on M Street, we accepted. I knew that it was not a place I could show up in jeans and sneakers, but I was surprised tonight when I was asked to leave when I merely wasn’t wearing a collar. Sure I had $140 tailored slacks, and a $130 cashmere sweater from Lands End on, in addition to my black Italian-made wool great coat that was a gift from my father at Christmas two years ago. But all I was missing was a $7.50 Polo Shirt from Wal-Mart, as the Tavern Club doesn’t allow patrons without collars.

So, instead of being able to toast our friends on the day of their engagement, we had to settle for a hug and an embarrassed trip back through the club to the street like so much riff-raff.

Never mind that we were guests of a member.

Never mind that we certainly were not shabbily dressed.

But all because I hadn’t had the foresight to wear a cheap-ass polo shirt from Wal-Mart under my sweater… out on the street, riff raff!

So, we will have to take Mike and Monica to dinner some place in the near future, but all of this leaves me wondering: What the hell is the purpose of a place like that in this day and age? Sure there was a time for that, but what purpose is there for me in a club like that? If I can’t go in dressed as I normally do (my winter attire is a nice sweater and jeans or khakis) then what’s the freakin’ point? Surely if they can’t pitch themselves to members of the younger generations (and I don’t just mean Thad, Chad, Lad, Cad and Brad) then they will go the way of the dinosaur. And if they can’t figure out someone who’s dressed appropriately from someone who’s not, then I’ll vote with my feet.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Get your cameras ready, local photographers. A new exhibit, Butterflies and Plants: Partners in Evolution, will be opening tomorrow at the National Museum of Natural History. According to their website, the flippy-flappies and the greeny-weenies will be hosted in “one hall, two exhibits”. The first exhibit, Partners in Evolution, is free just like every other Smithsonian offering and is an “exploration into”…*yawn*…”how insects and other animals have co-evolved with plants”. The Butterfly Pavilion is where the real fun begins, however you will have to pay $6 if you’re an adult like I am (sometimes), $5.50 if you’re a senior like Carl, $5 for members, and $4.50 for groups of 10 or more. But wait! If you can somehow swing into the exhibit on a Tuesday, it will cost you nothing. Be prepared to be swarmed by lots of beautiful butterflies.

If you thought the National Geographic frog exhibit was cool, wait until you check this out. From a photography standpoint, I’d recommend a fast, long lens (maybe a 70-200mm f/2.8 or a macro lens if you’ve got one) and a high ISO setting. Sometimes you’re lucky to find a butterfly at a complete standstill at these types of exhibits, but usually you’ll need a fast shutter speed to get a clean shot. And please, post any and all of your shots to our Metroblogging Washington DC Flickr Pool!

Photo by Mangiwau

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone. We know that not everyone has a special someone, but today, know that we here at Metblogs love you. Yes, even you creepy stalker girl. And you, too, Poo Poo.

Another Crazy Lawsuit

Except that this time, it’s Best Buy being sued, and not a Dry Cleaners. A woman is suing Best Buy for $54 million for losing her laptop. She took it to the Tenleytown Best Buy for repair, and they promptly lost her laptop. Of course, they bought her a new laptop and she got a $500 gift card for her trouble. But that apparently wasn’t enough. So she’s suing. For $54M. Ridiculous. C’mon people, this is stupid.

VDOT Says “Oops, My Bad”

VDOT is apologizing for their complete fuckup on the roads on Tuesday night, that ended up shutting down multiple interchanges on the Beltway due to ice. However, really what they’re doing is putting the blame on the weather forecast, which is a load of horseshit, and Bob Marbourg from WTOP is calling them out: “We would only hope that the highway departments would put the forecasts down, look at the real time temperatures and look at the radar off in the distance and anticipate, ‘Hey, the forecast is going out the window.'”

United Stadium at Poplar Point?

Looks like the City wants to keep its only good sports team after all. The City is floating a proposal for a 27,000 seat soccer stadium at Poplar Point, costing between $150-230M, which is chump change in comparison to the new Nationals stadium. If successful, it’d be the largest publicly funded soccer venue in MLS history.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

I was annoyed by the Express’ crappy headline writing, but who knew the big-boy paper had retarded photo editors? How else to explain this article on the passage of the FISA bill with included bans on waterboarding, accompanied by a photo of long-time torture opponent John McCain. As he stridently clenches his fist, below is a quote of him saying “Staging a mock execution by inducing the misperception of drowning is a clear violation.”

Too bad he actually voted against this amendment.

Don’t get me wrong, WaPo didn’t get the fact wrong. Wayyyyyyyyyyy down in paragraph 11 they state he opposed this and sided with the administration on this one. You’d just never know it from this misleading picture and quote.

What’s up with that, WaPo?

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

I just wanted to give a shout-out to my friends at Murky Coffee who will be competing in this weekend’s Free Pour Latte Art Competition happening on Saturday at the Washington Convention Center as part of the Coffee Fest trade show at the Convention Center.

Good luck Allie, Anne, Randy and my favorite, Marianne. May all your pours be perfect!

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

It’s cold, icy and snowy-ish outside. Ready for some red-hot hockey?

Yes, yes, I know – me, a diehard Penguins fan blogging about the Caps. Well, hey – though I love to hate on the local hockey boys, I love and respect the game more. And considering that Olaf Kolzig (right) recently played his 700th career NHL game on Sunday – with a 3-2 OT win over the flagging Rangers, I think it deserves mention. Even from a black-n-gold supporter like me.

I recognize talent and tenacity when I see it. And the Caps’ recent tear has a lot to do with the Man in the Mask as much as it has to do with Ovechkin’s stellar play. If the Caps retain their 3rd seed (and SE Division title) to the end of the regular season, it will be in no small part due to Kolzig and his solid, stalwart play.

Ollie the Goalie entered the NHL during the 89-90 season, appearing only twice and allowed 6 goals during those 120 minutes. Sixteen seasons later with the same team he started with, he’s still going strong. By far, he’s been a pillar of all the Cap teams since he became the go-to goalie in the 97-98 season; I know many Pens fans (myself included) continue to see him as our nemesis between the pipes whenever these two rivals meet.

Over the course of his workhorse days, he’s compiled a 296-290-21 record, with 63 ties and a 2.71 GAA. Not bad with a team that’s seen more dips and heights than Space Mountain during that timespan.

And I’ll give him this – in today’s modern sports world, it’s rare to find a player sticking with one team for (what may be) his full career*. I tend to root for such loyal players more than the ‘for rent’ guys who shuffle back and forth between teams during the gear-up to the playoff season.

So while I still love to dis the Caps, I’ll reserve a beer-hoisting to Ollie the Goalie the next time I get to the Verizon Center (which’ll be in March…because the Almighty Penguins are due one more time this season).

Congrats, Kolzig, on a great run so far. Here’s to a few more – just make sure to take the day off when Crosby and gang come to town, mmmkay?

*Rumors of a last-minute trade aside, I hope more for Kolzig’s sake that the Caps hold onto him until he retires. He deserves that much respect, at least.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

A friend of mine sent me this but suggested I might want to check with my darling girlfriend first.

I told him I didn’t think she was skilled enough to do virus repair.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs

Georgetown Yoga is offering you the opportunity to accomplish three goals in a single Sunday afternoon: take a yoga class, make a donation to a worthwhile charity, and help someone move forward in their career. A reasonably productive hour!

Multiple studies have confirmed the many mental and physical benefits of yoga. Incorporating it into your routine can help enhance your health, increase strength and flexibility and reduce symptoms of stress, depression and anxiety. Finding the time to practice yoga just a few times per week may be enough to make a noticeable difference when it comes to your health, learn more from The Yoga Nomads.

Hot yoga has become a popular exercise in recent years. It offers many of the same benefits as traditional yoga, such as stress reduction, improved strength, and flexibility.

But, with the heat turned up, hot yoga has the ability to give your heart, lungs, and muscles an even greater, more intense workout.

The charity yoga classes offer students who are working through the Yoga Works yoga teacher training program an opportunity to work with members of the public. You get an hour-long mixed-level class at the popular Georgetown studio, for a donation of $5 or more.

Money raised from the donations will be given to a charity selected by the students, The Wendt Center for Loss & Healing and Pediatric AIDS/HIV Care. The Wendt Center says it “is a premier resource for addressing grief in adults and children. Pediatric AIDS/HIV Care works to preserve, assist and strengthen the well-being of children ages 5-18 infected and affected by HIV/AIDS in metropolitan Washington, DC.”

Charity-slash-training yoga classes will be held on Sundays, from 5:30-6:30 on February 24th, March 30th, April 27th, May 25th, June 15th, and June 29th.

For those who have been thinking about trying yoga for the first time this seems like an especially great opportunity – no commitment, and if you decide it is not for you, at least you made a difference for the student and for the charity.

This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs