Despite the horrid weather today, some of my friends and I headed out to Congressional Cemetery for a good game of Tombstone Poker. It seems odd to say I spent all day in a graveyard, looking at stone after stone that date back some 200 plus years, including John Philip Sousa, Mathew Brady, and J. Edgar Hoover. Our instructions made us wend our way all over the cemetery, which has 66,000 constituents and some 18,000 headstones in varying degrees of repair. It was nice, though, that they had the chair of the board of directors of the cemetery foundation to give us the history of the cemetery and a brief tour of the chapel we were in.

I don’t know how that whole Rat Race went today, but, we did run into a couple of contestants from the other event looking for pictures to take. Did you come to either event this weekend? Let us know what you thought.

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After watching vampires suck down blood for two hours, we needed some libations ourselves! I?m not really familiar with Rosslyn, where we were for the “Dracula” performance, but luckily I was with friends last night who are Arlingtonians, so it was off to Clarendon to the Eleventh Street Lounge.

The bouncer could stand a bit of talking down to keep the vibe more relaxed (please sir, you are not guarding the Taj Mahal. It?s a hallway in Arlington. Settle down…) but once inside people are happy, talkative, and friendly.

Eleventh is a long, seemingly narrow space, the front half dedicated to small tables and the back to the bar. Though it was extremely crowded at 10pm on a Friday night, apparently it?s a really relaxing lounge to stop by for food and drinks during the week. The scene was the usual – flutter-topped girls in flared jeans escorted by men in button-downs – everyone was clearly on the make and it seemed a prime place to meet people. The d飯r is punctuated by rich red walls and gold wallpaper accents, with little crystal chandeliers giving it a Russian Tea Room Light feel. It helps that the bartenders were on-the-ball and very nice. Overall, a fun lounge that I definitely want to return to on a mid-week night. I bet it?s very cosy in the winter…

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If you

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What a dreary, grey and gloomy day…

The perfect day to get spooked up proper for Halloween!

Yes, I continue to seek out scary goings-on in the days leading up to October 31st. Washington is supposedly a very haunted city, and Decatur House has the reputation for being one of the most haunted houses around. (Well, certainly one of the more famous – I intend to seek out some of the lesser known stories in the week ahead!).

Commodore Stephen Decatur was killed in a duel in 1820 and is reputed to haunt his former house ever since. His ghost was seen so many times from outside a window that it had to be bricked up to stave off hysteria.

On Thursday, October 27th, Decatur House will host the DC Metro Area Ghost Watchers, presenting the results of their recent paranormal investigation of this historic home. Should be a fun way to raise the hairs on the back of your neck, and get in a little Washington history too.

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As we were trying to keep the trip low-key, I hadn

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Life in DC sometimes means taking a break from it all and heading out on a long weekend. Usually we fly out to another city or travel out of the country all together, but in the interests of exploring the (relatively) immediate vicinity and keeping it low-key, for last weekend

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FSM on Metro

Originally uploaded by brownpau.

Who knew that Pastafarians had made such inroads into DC’s own subwayculture? Well, apparently Flickr photographer Brownpau does. The lovely orange seat on this Metro car now bears the sign of his noodly appendage!

Though, I’m sure this is just ironic seat-art, I’m wondering what funny neologism WMATA would have us call this? Would this be conseaterate? Not sure. What do you call funny metro grafitti?

Be sure to also check out the next photo in the photostream, for the caption is absolutely priceless.

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PLAY is a new bar two doors down from Lucky Bar on Connecticut Avenue. Thing is PLAY isn’t so lucky, “pretentious” is more the word. We’re talking NYC pretentious where the bouncer makes you wait so he can check the guy/girl ratio and then chides me for not wearing a jacket over my styling shirt. Unequal pretentious where men pay $10 and women sail through, which for me is a shocking twist. I’m used to gay bars worldwide where men are gratis and women pay.

Once inside PLAY, the music was way too loud and the d

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We’ve had a few authors depart for greener pastures early this Fall, and while we’ll miss them terribly, we’re hopeful that we can find new writers to come join our merry band. Are you interested in writing for us at least times a week? Do you love this city (or hate it to pieces) and just want to tell someone? Do you love music or art or cycling or kickball or drinking or monument surfing or riding metro or museum hopping or pub crawling? Do you love/hate The Black Cat or Adams Morgan or U Street or Clarendon or the White House or Metro Center or Anacostia?

Come Join Us!

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I didn’t win the Powerball yesterday, which is a huge bummer, but someone in DC is taking home some $850,000: New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg. He got five of the six numbers correct and split the 2nd prize with 48 others. You may remember him from when his wife got kidnapped by some inept bank robbers a few years back.

Congratulations, Senator!

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“Police Activity” has closed 15th Street between Constitution and Pennsylvania Avenue, between the White House/Treasury and the Commerce Department. More info as it comes.

I really have come to hate that phrase, “police activity” can be so many things, but it’s designed to cause fear and “trust in authority,” of which I have little left to spare for what is likely just another box of paper napkins.

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Today we salute you, Mr. Bouncing-Hydraulics-Open-Laptop-with-Diplomatic-Plates Guy!

Most people abandoned the hoopty in the late-90s from whence they came. But not you. Your aging black caddy bounced at the light at Bank & M Streets as you plunked away on your laptop, nestled next to you in the middle of the leather bench seat. Your diplomatic tags proclaim, “I am untouchable!” as you wardrive through Georgetown, hydraulics pumping, searching for free wifi.

So as we pass you in a silver Ford Escort, we tip our hats to you, Mr. Bouncing Baby Diplomat. You don’t set trends, you extend them.

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Metro’s open late tonight, so booze it up, courtesy of the Maryland-V.Tech football game. Of course, it doesn’t look too good for the Terps, as they play against the number three ranked Hokies tonight, so please, just promise me this, when you lose, don’t burn down College Park, mmkay? And, if on the off-chance you DO beat undefeated-third-ranked-Hokies-with-Vick-light, please also, don’t burn down College Park.

Either way, no burning, mmkay?

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Just in time for Halloween, the Post is reporting on a story about a real estate investor finding a man’s skeleton in the tub of a house he purchased at auction. Creepy, and sad.

It reminds me of a story a few years back about a DC couple who found a suitcase in their stairway crawlspace. Inside was the skeleton of a baby.

Though we’ve done a lot of work on our Victorian house, we’ve yet to find any ghoulish remains. Though everytime I do laundry in the basement, the hair on the back of my neck rises. There’s a hole in the wall, covered with ripped chicken wire, that leads to a long, dark crawlspace under the kitchen. Apart from pipes and cobwebs, it seems empty. But the floor is earthen, and I always wonder what’s really under there.

We start kitchen renovations in January…

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At about 2:30pm I started getting the most insane craving for Cafe Phillips’ tuna salad, so I finally gave in and just walked down to the 12th & E location to beg the nice lady cleaning up the lunch selections to please pretty please dig some out for me.

Next door at Washington Wine & Liquor there’s a huge line snaking around, as has been the case for the past couple of days, filled with eager-eyed hopefuls buying Powerball tickets. In case you’ve been under a rock, the pot is currently at $340 million.

I almost succumbed and bought one myself, the hysteria, ah, excitement, was so palpable. But I didn’t. It’s never someone like me who wins, always some old fogey out in the sticks. And they always buy only one ticket, and it’s from a run-down Mom-n-Pop shop out in the boonies. Sigh…

(Of course having written this, I’m convinced now someone will win from that store!!)

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While I thoroughly loathe the term McMansion, I can understand the angst they cause as people buy smaller homes on medium-sized lots and rebuild or renovate to make the dwelling bigger, faster, stronger, better because that’s the american way dammit. But, Montgomery County is doing something that other folks aren’t: putting Height Limits on neighborhood houses. Now, this is just a clarification of an earlier law that has loopholes so big you could build a spire through them, but this kind of backlash is only sure to continue as folks with money try to make their DC goldmine, er, house, into something more than it already is before the bubble goes pop.

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I went out to get my Powerball ticket today, it was off to the little convenience store on 12th street a block from office. The line was epic, winding around the candy tower, and right past the dirty magazine racks. I had honestly no idea there were THAT many porno mags. Seriously. I mean, the obvious was there: Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler, but there were six shelves, on two racks, with porno mags six deep. Folks, that’s a lot of pornography. This may well be the kind of shop that caused John Ashcroft to create the Porn Taskforce.

The question definitely crossed my mind: Wow, do you really need THAT much porno?! I mean, who hasn’t discovered the pornucopia that is the internet? Good lord people. We need to get on this digitalization thing, stat. If only so I don’t have try not to see the guy pick through which schoolgirl magazine he wanted. Ick.

But, I suppose, all of this won’t matter when I win the lotto tonight.

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So, NBC 4 decided that googlebombing was news. On tonight’s 11pm broadcast, they featured a story about the “miserable failure” googlebomb, which seems to originate originate back in 2003. Hey guys, I realize this internet is newfangled and whatnot, but could you at least check that your news is in fact, well, NEW?!

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So my partner and I were headed back to the office after meeting a candidate at a sandwich shop for an informal interview-thing. The sun was shining, the weather was warm, and we had the windows down. Suddenly she says to me, “Wow, that guy in the next car is skeezy.”

Skeezy he was, but then he rolled up next to us at a light.

“Senoritas, buenos tardes.”

I look over and wave at Skeezy McCreepington. He smiles and says, “We’re single!” indicating his friend in the passenger seat.

I smile just as big and yell, “We’re not!”

“We are married too!”

I notice the small child in the back seat of his car as the light changes and we pull away. Wow.

But what I want to know is… are there people who actually succeed at picking up women by yelling out a car window? Like, is it like spam, where the opportunity cost is so low that it’s worth trying just for the .001% of positive responses you get? I don’t understand…

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“Did you just say that you felt emasculated by your grilled cheese sandwich?!”
– One coworker to another, on the topic of the size of the portions at The Daily Grill

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