courtesy of Me

Crystal City has been promoting their couture week for a while now; events will include t-shirt printing, various design competitions and a multitude of hair and skin consultations. You can check out the full list on their website along with an improvement over last year’s events: more precise timetables.

I enjoyed taking pictures of the body paint last year – my favorite picture is above –  but today’s announcement is even more pertinent to my interests: deals on food and booze.

Morton’s, Hamlet’s, King Street Blues and San Antonio Bar and Grill will all be running specials starting Monday the 1st through the 6th when the Couture week concludes.  You won’t fund your retirement with the savings but a few specials sound fun – King Street’s etouffee in particular.

‘Levitating Lunch (187)’
courtesy of ‘dougww’

The Washington Times has a story today examining the relationship between DC Public Schools and Chartwells, the company providing school lunch/breakfast services. DCPS pays Chartwells nearly $30 million a year, but has a spotty track record for food quality and safety. The most disturbing incident was failure to warn school officials about a tortilla recall after serving those same tortillas to students in Racine, WI. 100 students from 5 schools became sick in connection to the recalled food.

The Slow Cook also recently spent a week in a DC Public School cafeteria kitchen, observing the food quality and preparation. While I agree with their overall premise that pre-cooked “beef crumbles” and nacho cheese heated up on a steamer table still in its plastic bag does not count as “fresh cooked” the way Michelle Rhee wants it to be, I think the real scandal is that so many schools don’t have kitchens in them and therefore couldn’t brown their own ground beef or cook their own vegetables if they wanted to. (And to be fair, The Slow Cook sees this as emblematic of a larger problem of school nutrition standards, and not an issue at DC Public Schools specifically.)

‘Spring Onions’
courtesy of ‘Amberture’

Tonight the National Building Museum will play host to a roundtable discussion with leaders and activists involved with urban agriculture from across the country. They will be discussing the conversion of what are effectively deserts (many urban spaces) into “oases”, or more specifically, urban gardens. Tickets are $12 for members, $20 for the public, and students get in free.

‘Deer II – Rock Creek Park’
courtesy of ‘architeuthis dux’

After spending a few years growing my own food and buying from local farmers, the next logical step, for me, is to learn how to source the ultimate in local meat: Deer. Jackson Landers, a Charlottesville based insurance broker, started teaching a class last fall and got some coverage in the New York Times about it. He’s just announced a weekend condensed class in February that covers everything from deer anatomy, natural history, gun safety (as well as a trip to the range), field dressing, and final butchering, cooking, and tasting. The course costs $380.

I’ll be packing up my trusty Winchester Model 70 (in ’30-06) and heading down to Jack’s weekend course “Deer Hunting for Locavores” in Charlottesville on February 20-21. There are still a few slots left as of this writing.

‘DSC_3434’
courtesy of ‘Ghost_Bear’

Javaris Crittenton, the less famous gun criminal on the Wizards, plead guilty to a misdemeanor firearms possession charge in District Court yesterday and received a year’s probation for his punishment. In addition, the Wizards’ guard will pay $1,250 in fines, and perform some local community service.

Is this a preview of Arenas’ sentencing in March? Given that Arenas is facing a more serious felony charge, I suspect that the probationary period, fine and service requirement may be larger and longer.

‘Eastern Market Manhole’
courtesy of ‘Kevin H.’

What a fustercluck on Georgia Avenue yesterday. The foul odor coming from the sewer system brought out the Hazmat teams to figure out what exactly the smell was. It closed lanes on Georgia Ave in Montgomery County for hours. But that’s not what was horrifying.

Imagine that you’re driving along on a busy street, when all of a sudden, the manhole flies up from the street and shatters your windshield and cuts up your face. That’s gotta put a serious dent in your day, not to mention a claim in your insurance. Whew. I can only imagine how messed up I’d be after that. Yikes. Makes Metro look safe, doesn’t it?  (Editor’s note, this post was written last night before the accident on the Red Line, we apologize for any who took offense.)

If you looked at the weather forecast last night, you might’ve been expecting something of a torrential downpour during the night, and boy would you have been disappointed for the most part. Instead, we rode the storm’s “dry slot” (I swear to God that’s a real meteorological term) and picked up just a third of an inch, instead of the expected 2-3″ of the wet stuff.

Oh well! Sorry weather guys. The flood watch continues, though, as the upstream areas of the Potomac watershed still got pounded pretty hard last night to the tune of 1-2″, which can lead to a swollen waterfront through the city today. So clean out those drains anyway, last thing you want is some unexpected moisture in your lower level.

‘Cigars at Union Station in Washington, DC’
courtesy of ‘dc-hulls’

The owners of Landini Brothers Restaurant on King Street in Alexandria are opening  a new, private cigar lounge opening in Alexandria this spring. Landini Brothers had previously been cigar-friendly until the Virginia smoking ban. It will include all of what you’d expect from a private cigar club with a $5000 membership fee- private humidor lockers, special house cigar blend, state-of-the-art ventilation system, etc. as well as more contemporary features like free WiFi. But there’s also the decidedly retrograde “all female waitstaff” on the list of amenities. Way to embrace the stereotype, guys.