Monthly Archives: March 2009

The Daily Feed
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Expanded recycling starts in Arlington

Photo courtesy of
‘recycling (pizza box only)’
courtesy of ‘m hoek’

The amount of things and materials that are going to be accepted for recycling in Arlington is going to dramatically increase tomorrow. New, larger wheeled bins will be delivered to all homes over the next eight weeks, but expanded acceptance starts with tomorrow’s pickups – customers should simply keep using their existing bins.

They might have trouble fitting everything in, however. Plastics will expand to include numbers 1 through 7, and cardboard boxes no longer need to be broken down. Added to the list are foil (trays and used sheets), milk cartons, rigid plastics (flower pots, etc), empty aerosol cans and plastic bags.

It’s a big jump and excellent news.

Special Events, The Features
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Scribblings: Terry Crowdy

Photo courtesy of
‘2007-07-28 08-04 Paris, Normandie 0687 Arromanches les Bains, Mulberry Harbour’
courtesy of ‘Allie_Caulfield’

Tomorrow (April 1) at noon is another author debriefing at the International Spy Museum, this time featuring Terry Crowdy as he discusses his new book, Deceiving Hitler: The Masterman Memorandum.

As Britain entered its second winter of World War II, nightly German blitzes rained fire on its cities and the threat of invasion had not yet passed. Britain stood very much alone. Yet wartime recruit and Oxford University professor, J.C. Masterman, had the confidence and foresight to predict a time when the tables could be turned against the Nazis. Since the outbreak of war, the British Security Service MI5 had been collecting a group of double agents. The Germans appeared to trust these spies and pressed them for more information. This presented an enormous challenge for MI5: how to preserve the credibility of their doubles without giving away vital war secrets? In a secret memorandum of 1940, Masterman presented an amazing solution. Crowdy’s new book reveals the content of the now-declassified memorandum and explores to what extent the Allies were able to realize Masterman’s plan to pull off an elaborate hoax on Hitler.

Continue reading →

Technology, The Daily Feed, The Mall
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Mars Vehicle on the Mall!

Picture 3.png

I have no idea how I missed this. But, yesterday, you might’ve seen the Mars Capsule, the Orion, on the Mall over near Air & Space. It’s pretty similar to some of the gear we’ve seen before now, specifically dating back to the Apollo era, but it’s still pretty freaking cool. It seats six, or double what the old era stuff carried.

The Daily Feed, We Green DC
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Help Create Green Jobs

Photo courtesy of
‘DC Energy Audit’
courtesy of ‘Wayan Vota’

Green jobs are real–and they’re coming soon to a neighborhood near you. Can you lend a hand?

On the first of May, 300 young adults and blue-collar workers will start training through the Greater Washington Green Jobs Corps. Soon they’ll be ready to weatherize homes and workplaces, install solar panels, and perform energy audits–and save millions in energy costs in the DC area.

Project sponsor Green DMV is seeking partnerships with contractors and suppliers who can hire these trainees. If that’s you–or someone you know–contact Green DMV.

People, Special Events, The Daily Feed
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Terps Tearful on Exit

Photo courtesy of
‘toliver’
courtesy of ‘caciadoodl’

As the other Maryland players lined up to shake hands with Louisville, senior star duo Kristi Toliver and Marissa Coleman sat on the bench, overcome by tears. Their college careers and quest for a second NCAA title in their tenure had just come to an end at the hands of the Cardinals, 77-60 defeat. 

Louisville’s Angel McCoughtry, who calls Baltimore home, posted 21 points and 13 boards in the contest and claimed the outstanding player award for the region. For their efforts, Louisville receives the dubious award of being matched up (most likely, game is tonight at 7 p.m.) with far-and-away-favorite UConn in Final Four play on April 5. Good luck with that one…

Entertainment, Music, Special Events, The Features
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Wynton Marsalis jazzes up the Kennedy Center

Photo courtesy of
‘Sketches of Gill Evans’
courtesy of ‘vitelone’

The affection was clearly mutual:  hundreds of arts advocates stood on their feet, applauding wildly for a full ten minutes. Jazz virtuoso Wynton Marsalis, flanked by a five-man band, stood staring back at them, tears streaming down his face. He has just spent an hour weaving the tale of music, art and American cultural identity, rendering all present effectively speechless. 

Last night at the Kennedy Center, Marsalis gave the Nancy Hanks Lecture, the evening component of the 22nd annual Arts Advocacy Day, organized by Americans for the Arts. The lecture was established to honor Nancy Hanks, former President of Americans for the Arts and chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, and has featured many of the bright lights of the arts, including Maya Angelou, Dr. Billy Taylor and Robert Redford. 

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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I Think God Loves DC, Too


Dude, Phelps Is SO Gay
Originally uploaded by M.V. Jantzen

You probably heard, even if you weren’t unfortunate enough to see them, that the Westboro Baptist Church was in town yesterday to protest… well, pretty much whatever they could think of. High schools whose mascots are the “Rebels,” because God hates rebels, or something. And of course, their favorite object of hatred, gay people.

I couldn’t decide if I wanted to blog it, because on one hand, it’s newsworthy, but on the other hand, the WBC are so much a band of screaming toddlers who throw tantrums because it gets them the attention they crave, and why do I want to feed into that? Also, being part of a Christian tradition that emphasizes love and inclusiveness, I’m pretty much personally heartbroken by WBC (but that’s beyond the scope of this blog).

So I was pleased to see this photo of a counterprotest show up in our Flickr pool. Smiling people, messages of love, and an amusing little poke at Fred Phelps, leader of the WBC.

Thanks for meeting hate with grace, DC.

The Daily Feed, WTF?!
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Oops… DC Scout FAIL.

DC Scout Fail

My friend Rebecca and I had a good laugh this morning when we both got our DC Scout monthly e-mail. Click the above picture to enlarge and you’ll see that the subject line of the email says “DC Scout Test Subject Line – CHANGE BEFORE ACTUAL MAILING” – oops. I’ve totally been there before.

I hope your day gets better, WaPo, cause we all know what it’s like to stick your foot in your virtual mouth. If you were my co-worker I’d say “at least it’s Friday soon” but uh, it’s not. At least there’s happy hour in like, oh, 8 hours? …Right?

Food and Drink, We Love Food
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We Love Food: Brunch @ Kramerbooks & Afterwords Cafe

Photo courtesy of
‘Kramerbooks Glass House’
courtesy of ‘Wahig’

There are days in DC that I forget we are in a recession. Last Sunday’s brunch at Kramerbooks & Afterwords was one of them. The book shop was stuffed full with people, and every table was filled, the air abuzz with excitement for spring. I was worried that the wait for two would be at least an hour when we walked in, but we actually only waited for 15 minutes! Afterwords Cafe has lots of little parts, the glass house, the outdoor patio, the upstairs – they take advantage of not a lot of space, and stuff it full with people.

Kramerbooks is definitely a DC institution, ranking up there with Ben’s Chili Bowl and the Brickskeller as a place everyone has been at some point while living in the city.  I actually had not, but was eagerly awaiting checking out both the bookstore and the cafe – I had heard mixed reviews, from horrible to mediocre, to a favorite.  I was ready to decide for myself. So… the food? Well… you’ll find out after the break.

Continue reading →

24 in DC, The Features
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24 in DC: Episode 14 (11:00 to 12:00)

Photo courtesy of
‘Jack Bauer stares down a threatening-looking bug.’
courtesy of ‘tiffany bridge’

This week’s recap is probably going to be a shorter

11:03
Jack’s getting a very special shower out on Not-Duke Street as we start this week’s episode. They make some comments about pathogens and neurotoxins, but it’s all pretty unclear. Nerve agents tend to be pretty much fatal or harmless, without much degree of in between. But, maybe the writers of 24 know just about as much about bioweapons as they do about DC geography.

11:07
And now, Tony and Jonas are facing off at the Fauxwater headquarters in suburban Virginia where they’ve brought the bioweapon. It strikes us as odd that Fauxwater would have a small military installation inside the Beltway where land is so brutally expensive, but, I suppose, if the CIA can do it, so can Fauxwater. Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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Cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay

Photo courtesy of
‘opening up’
courtesy of ‘philliefan99’

NPR’s Joe Palca is moderating a panel at the National Building Museum tomorrow night called “Water Knows No Boundaries,” about the 40-year effort to restore the Chesapeake Bay. He’ll be sitting down with the president of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, a landscape architect from Catholic University, and DC Councilmember Tommy Wells to talk about the challenges in cleaning up watersheds that cross multiple municipalities.

Adventures, The Features, The Great Outdoors, Weekend Flashback
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Weekend Flashback: 3/27 – 3/29/09

Photo courtesy of Somewhat Frank
Cherry Blossoms in DC, courtesy of Somewhat Frank

It’s here, our ‘official’ herald of spring in the DC area – the Cherry Blossom Festival! Despite a narrow window of peak flowers this year, thousands of photos will be snapped by throngs of tourists in and around the DC area. And finally, the weather is beginning to cooperate, with a nice and somewhat warm weekend behind us (despite the rain).

Katie and Jasmine have much of this past weekend’s festival covered with kites and opening ceremonies; Flashback steps back and takes in the great photogenic city we live and work in every day, as captured by you. Enjoy.

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed, The District, WTF?!
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Can I get your number?

Photo courtesy of
‘ow’
courtesy of ‘Ryan Forsythe’

I spent some extra time on the Metro this morning (left my computer at home, only to realize it once I got to my desk. ugh.) and for once, I read both the Express AND the Examiner. What caught my eye this morning was the lead story in The Examiner – staff members from some of DC’s restaurants have been committing identity fraud by taking credit card information from customers.

Timely, since I’ve recently started paying close attention to my reciepts. I’ve started regularly checking for my credit card number to be printed on the copies of my reciepts along with the expiration date, and making sure to scribble it out. I’ve noticed it in tons of places – Guajillo, Summer’s Sports Bar, to name my most recent two – but not just at restaurants – Tschiffely Pharmacy in Union Station does it too. I take the time to scratch out my numbers and expiration date, but I imagine I’m the exception.

Where have you noticed this? Do you scratch out your numbers?

The Daily Feed
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Fireball over the Mid-Atlantic Coast

Above: news report from WAVY TV 10.

Update, Tue 3/30/2009 9:50 AM: There’s been some word from Geoff Chester at the USNO that the fireball might have been a reentering Soyuz booster from Russia, but the latest info from the Joint Space Ops Center at VAFB is that they have been tracking Russian rocket fragments among other space junk and the east coast fireball was not a manmade object:

The JSpOC tracks over 19,000 manmade objects in space. The “bright light” that was reported on the East Coast on Sunday, 29 March at 9:45 p.m. EST was not a result of any trackable manmade object on reentry. Natural phenomena are not tracked by JSpOC professionals.

So at the moment the likely explanation is a small meteor. Continue reading →

24 in DC, The Daily Feed
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24 in DC Extra: WaPo finally catches on


This officer tired of our shenanigans.
Originally uploaded by tiffany bridge

Apparently the Post has JUST NOW NOTICED that 24 screws up DC geography.

Even though the writers have a big ol’ map of DC on the wall, apparently they don’t consult it that often. Or watch the news, ever. (edited to add:) Oh, and apparently only people with “too much time on their hands” care about this stuff. Well, okay, I probably do have too much time on my hands. But people LIVE in DC. This is our HOME, and we care about having it portrayed accurately. 

Shameless plug: We’ll be back at our 24-snarking tonight as usual. Oh yes, we’re committed to you, our readers, to slog through every episode this season. Come watch with us in the chat room, and we’ll have a recap up afterwards.

All Politics is Local, Essential DC, Fun & Games, Life in the Capital, Special Events, The Daily Feed
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Kite Festival In Pictures

Photo courtesy of
‘Flying a Kite’
courtesy of ‘InspirationDC’

It may have been a gray and drizzly Saturday, but that didn’t stop Inspiration DC‘s Rebecca and I from heading out to take pictures of the Smithsonian Kite Festival on the Mall.

Packed with kids of all ages, flying kites of every variety, the turn out was more than I expected. Even with the grey sky, the kites dotting the air made the mall festive and full of life. To live vicariously through us (and the WLDC flickerattzi), click on through. Continue reading →

Entertainment, Essential DC, Fun & Games, Penn Quarter, Special Events, The Features
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Cherry Blossom Festival Opening Day

cherry-blossom-festival-2009

The Cherry Blossom Festival kicked off this past Saturday with a family day and the opening ceremony at the National Building Museum. The interior space of the National Building Museum is always pretty overwhelming, but you could see the stimulus overload on people’s faces the minute they stepped into the great hall. The fountain in the middle of the hall is drained and giant pink (and I mean pink, as you can see above) inflatable cherry blossoms are suspended above it, and all around are booths with activities and crafts for kids and people offering information and selling Cherry Blossom Festival-related wares. Continue reading →