By Don
‘It’s a Puppy!’
courtesy of ‘A. Davey’
Petworth’s Eric Nuzum has a nice story about neighbors and dog owners showing support and solidarity. They may not be good poop scoopers (maybe it’s just the pitbull owner and his buddies?) but they know how to show each other love and support.
By Katie
‘Opening Soon – Wagamama, Chadstone Shopping Centre’
courtesy of ‘avlxyz’
First there was Pret a Manger. Then…then there will be WAGAMAMA! I cannot tell you how excited I am for my two favorite London establishments to descend upon DC.
The Washington Business Journal ran an article that Wagamama has set a May 2010 date for their new Penn Quarter eat place, and let me tell you, I’ll be the first in line.
Until then… food dreams of Yaki Udon and gyoza.
By Tom Bridge
‘Mocha’
courtesy of ‘box of lettuce’
Congratulations to baristas (baristae?) from Murky Coffee and Peregrine Espresso who swept the top four spots at the Mid Atlantic Regional Barista Competition. Katie and Allie rocked out the top two spots, representing Murky, and David and Jeremy rocked out 3rd and 4th from Peregrine. If you have any doubts about a well-poured cup of coffee in this town, stand assured, our baristas are best.
By Amélie
Yes boys and girls, it’s the annual start of the conference season for hackers, geeks, nerds and security people (and those are not mutually exclusive titles). ShmooCon, in it’s fifth year, has grown to 1500 attendees in an effort to spread the gospel about information and physical security and other novel topics that you’d be surprised to see any any con. While last years’ con had interesting neighbors (a CosPlay convention), the sheer size of this years has people scrambling to see how to make a homebrew UAV (members of HacDC), how the Srizbi BotNet was taken down (aka “The Day The Spam Stopped“), how your local Home Depot is selling you insecurity (“How To Defeat the Kwikset SmartKey“) and the keynote speaker, Matt Blaze, more famously known for helping defeat the use of the Clipper Chip and open up the government’s attempt at putting encryption backdoors into almost everything. There are some great talks planned for Saturday, which we’ll cover on “Day Two”, but if you’re in the Woodley Park area and see a lot of black t-shirted individuals crossing the street, trust me, they won’t hurt you…they just want your base. (If you want to view past conferences, the videos are located here – c’mon learn a little bit!)
By brownpau
‘ohne Worte’ courtesy ‘macreloaded.com’
Hey Apple! So the Old Georgetown Board hates your store designs. I have a suggestion to make your Georgetown problems go away.
By jasmine
‘Superbowl Sunday (36 of 50)’
courtesy of ‘seantoyer’
Yes, it’s true. Last Sunday, inmates at the Prince George’s County Jail were pissed about being on lockdown during the Superbowl (among other things, I would wager) and busted out of their cells. The Washington Post calls it a “coordinated attack,” which is pretty darn frightening to me. I wonder if they would have accepted the Puppy Bowl as a compromise…
By Tom Bridge
‘brown is the new clever’
courtesy of ‘solidstate.’
Some days just call for quality profanity.
You know, the kind that peels paint from walls, or causes old ladies to blush and then hit you with their handbags. Or maybe the kind that caused your mom to get out the extra large bar of soap to wash out your mouth. But some days, well, some days require elegant profanity. The kind from a previous era.
Or, from, say, the mouth of Barack Obama (warning, NSFW language in audio and text).
That’s the kind of day I’m having.
By Don
‘The surgery changed Theo’s Life’
courtesy of ‘chris.loxton’
WTOP reports that WMATA’s funding issues are causing the Jurisdictional Coordinating Committee to discuss potential cutback strategies that include 10pm closing times on the weekend. This isn’t really as interesting as it sounds – the JCC is an group comprised of regional transportation leaders and they’re simply putting together suggestions to bring before the Metro board next week. Their role is to advise, not decide. From the 2006 WMATA Board of Directors procedures [pdf] “The Jurisdictional Coordinating Committee has been established by the Board to facilitate the exchange of information and viewpoints between jurisdictions and the WMATA staff and among the jurisdictions.”
That said, is this a productive use of an advisory committee’s time? Sure, we could theoretically solve the homeless problem in about 24 hours by sending out the police force to shoot each one of them in the head, but most of us accept that such a cure would be unacceptable. So is it really necessary to list that as a possible solution to the problem? WMATA needs to provide solutions that are useful to people, and if you’ve ever waited the interminable period of time it takes for a train to show up at 1am on Friday night you know there’s a demand for Metro services. Kick Groktor off that committee and come up with some real solutions.
By Katie
Fashion in Motion
Originally uploaded by maxedaperture
Apparently, fashion is heading towards Crystal City, the magical sky-scrapered part of NoVa that us true Arlingtonians don’t like to claim.
And I quote: “Join the Crystal City BID for Crystal Couture, a two week extravaganza of fun and fashion. The event will feature sample sales, runway and trunk shows from designers, local boutiques, and area salons. Each night will feature a theme with unique drinks, food tastes, and exciting fashions and music. The event is free and open to the public. Event hours will be from 6-10 p.m. weekdays, with special daytime events on Saturdays, Sundays, and Presidents’ Day from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.”
The events this fashionista would consider heading to? Glam Garments Gone Green, Work Wear Wednesday, and Cocktail Dresses.
By Don
‘New Year Resolution’
courtesy of ‘Pete…E’
Say it ain’t so, Camel Joe! The Washington Post reports that the Virginia GOP has found a compromise position with Governor Kaine and there may be a bill passed limiting smoking in public places. Civil libertarians, rejoice grit your teeth a little less – this is a compromise better than the ban in the District: facilities that wish to do so will be able to build private rooms for smoking, provided they follow some sort of air handling standard.
Personally I’d rather that simply be a air handling standard for all public facilities and not have seperate rooms, but the Governor seems to have lost my phone number. It’ll be interesting to see what the details will be on this bill when it’s fleshed out.
By Katie
White House Through Lafayette Park
Originally uploaded by kimberlyfaye
Newsweek has created a HILARIOUS spin-off of MTV’s The City and The Hills, and created… THE DISTRICT, featuring lovable Barack Obama as the series protagonist.
You probably have to have watched one episode of the City and one episode of the Hills to pick up on the nuances, but GRADE A, Newsweek, GRADE A.
By Katie
‘Misc DC – Presidential Flyover – 9-1-08’
courtesy of ‘mosley.brian’
So we’re looking at making THE BIG MOVE, and I need some advice from all you Realtors and leasing agents out there.
My lovely roommate and I are going to be striking out to find a new apartment along the Wilson/Clarendon (metro accessible) stretch and are wondering – how are the prices out there? We had a HORRENDOUS time snagging our current apartment during the summer a few years ago, but are hoping with the economic downturn, and the dead of winter, things might actually play out in our favor.
I’ve noticed so many more advertising yard signs (Parc Rosslyn and Vista, I’m looking at you!) and random people on the street corner doing tricks with big arrow signs than I did last year – so I ask…is it a renter’s market out there? Can we bargain? What is your advice (or experience, if you recently made a move) for apartment shopping during these winter months in a crap economy?
By Don
Katie thinks you should get yourself out and about to enjoy this weekend’s warm weather, but if you’d rather hunker down in the dark and watch some flickering lights there’s options for you too. DC Shorts will be running a screening of 14 of the best submissions from their 2008 festival this Friday and Saturday evenings at 7p. 14 films in 3 hours.
Personally I like the sounds of How My Dad Killed Dracula: “On Halloween night, a father recounts the harrowing tale of how he fought and killed Dracula” but those of you who like Tiff’s comedy writeups might enjoy Funniest Feds: “The stand-up comedy competition featured over 30 contestants — all of whom work as federal employees in the DC area.” At $10 it’s hard to imagine not getting your money’s worth.
By Don
Sometimes it seems like there’s a lot of conflict between DC, VA and MD, what with talk of car taxes and arguments over Metro funding. It’s a new time in America, however, and Arlington County is apparently trying to turn over a new leaf and be inclusive of new DC employees. So if you’re up for a cabinet post in the Obama administration, Arlington wants to help you.
You probably need it.
By Katie
‘Try to remember…………..’
courtesy of ‘LaTur
So, folks, it looks like this weekend will be (fingers crossed, knock on wood) WARM! Say whaaat? That’s right, it’ll be a reasonable temperature to be outdoors. So dust off those walking shoes, oil up your bike chains, and head out for some much-missed vitamin D.
I’d recommend heading over to Roosevelt Island, going for a run down the Mount Vernon Trail. Or head down to the national mall to take a stroll through the US Botanic Gardens‘ outdoor garden. Or, you could head out on your bike to the various area trails.
Here’s wishing you some happy sunshine this weekend…
By Tom Bridge
Hearty Congratulations to DC CIO Vivek Kundra, who is the latest victim of Obama Abduction. Well. I suppose it’s not exactly Abduction if they ask and you consent, right? Okay. We need a new word for that. Anyhow. Mr. Kundra is headed to the OMB as administrator of e-government and information technology. Not quite the cabinet-level CIO position that he was suspected to be considered for, but not exactly entry-level work.
Kundra will see Government-wide IT budgets of something on the order of $70,000,000,000. First task? Maybe some Macs for the Obama staff at the White House? I hear they’re jonesin’ hard.
By brownpau
(This is a video. You can play it. Listen for the horn!)
Piled on top of this morning’s Red Line woes, this train on the Red Line appeared to have its horn stuck in “VERY LOUD ON” mode, constantly blowing without stopping. (Insert clever ‘your mom’ joke here.) I got on at Union Station, got off at Metro Center, and that horn never stopped blaring through the tunnels and stations the whole time. Anyone else get to ride on the Eternal Horn Metro train this morning?
By Tom Bridge
‘Coming and going’
courtesy of ‘philliefan99’
Oh, Red Line. I wish you were better. But I’m hearing from all over that you’re nothing but a Charlie Foxtrot this morning. Between the Escalators at Dupont’s North Entrance freezing up, and the stuck train Union Station, and all manner of stopped up traffic jams, it’s a bad day to be at Metro Center.
It strikes me as hilarious, though, that of all the lines, only the Red Line has a Twitter Account to talk about all the issues.
By Carl Weaver
Moonstruck chocolates
Originally uploaded by eszter
The Fairfax, VA Chocolate Lovers Festival is this weekend, Feb. 7-8 in the Old Town part of the City of Fairfax in our fine Commonwealth of Virginia. It has been going on since 1992, is held the first full weekend in February and looks to be quite a big affair. From the festival’s web site:
Among the events planned each year are the Taste of Chocolate, featuring chocolate vendors selling their wares; the Chocolate Challenge, an arts extravaganza where the medium is chocolate; the Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast featuring chocolate chip pancakes; historic re-enactments; children’s activities; a craft show at Fire Station 3 sponsored by the Auxiliary to the Fairfax Volunteer Fire Department; open houses at historic buildings; and much more.
So who’s going? I know it’s all the way across the river for those of you in MD and DC, but it’s a celebration of nature’s most excellent resource. How can you not go?
By Don
Zathras knows that Zathras not as interesting to people as Numfar was. Not like Zathras has a version of Whedonesque. Who would go to Zathrasesque? Nobody. Probably would be broken all the time anyway, eventually crash alone and unnoticed. This way Zathras not expecting anything other than inevitable doom and obscurity. Either way, it is bad for Zathras.
