Monthly Archives: October 2010

The Daily Feed
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Mark your calendars: Tweed Ride 2010 is November 14th!

Photo courtesy of
‘DC Tweed Ride 10’
courtesy of ‘maxedaperture’

Mark your calendars, everyone, the Tweed Ride for 2010 will be November 14th, and will be sponsored by the fine folks at Dandies & Quaintrelles, who claim Redemption Through Style as their new motto.  It’s time to get out your proper tweed, tune up your ordinary, and prepare yourself for a fall jaunt through the streets of DC.  Not a bicycle person? Sir E. Channing has a treatise that you ought be reading in preparation for the ride, you’ll come round, it’s the key to a leisurely existence.

The Daily Feed
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City Paper looks into Brickskeller’s future

Photo courtesy of
‘Brickskeller’
courtesy of ‘needlessspaces’

If you haven’t seen it already, Tim Carman’s article in the City Paper about the future of the Brickskeller is worth a read, even if you’re not a beer drinker. Go read it; I’ll wait.

It’s a pity that an institution as beloved and revered as the Brickskeller has been reduced to this point- when I moved here, my friends in town spoke rapturously about it despite the fact that it was clearly in decline even then. I’m not a beer drinker, but as someone who is married to a beer enthusiast and socializes with many others, I know it’s been years since we suggested that any of our beer-loving friends from out of town visit the Brick for anything other than its landmark value.

What do y’all think? What should happen to the Brickskeller name? Should the Alexanders give up and sell the name with the place? Or do you think there’s hope for the location under a new name (and a retrofit, and possibly a fumigation)?

Food and Drink, Penn Quarter
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First Look: Cuba Libre

Photo courtesy of
‘cuba libre’
courtesy of ‘amarino17’

Although I’ve never been to Cuba, I am fairly certain that Cuba Libre Restaurant & Rum Bar doesn’t scream authenticity. The restaurant’s interior, styled as an open air piazza, feels like the Epcot version of Havana. The plaster is artfully peeling in all the right places. At any moment, a mechanized figure from “It’s A Small World After All” could pop up from behind the false windows and burst into song. But like all things Disney, Cuba Libre is a happy, cheerful place. Maybe it’s the Latin music wafting from the background. Maybe it’s the rum. Either way, the restaurant has a lively, summery atmosphere that should be welcome as winter sets in.

With locations in Atlantic City, Orlando and Philadelphia, Cuba Libre’s recent opening marks the chain’s first foray into Washington. The restaurant has made its name on “nuevo Cubano” cuisine, and dishes borrow heavily from Asia, South America and the Caribbean. More than half the menu is devoted to small plates (ranging from $5 to $13), though classic and contemporary entrées ($16 to $32) are available for those who are morally opposed to tapas.

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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Love the Salahis? Now You Can Rent Them.

Photo courtesy of
‘clown’
courtesy of ‘needlessspaces’

I know no one wants to read about the Salahis anymore. But still, it’s hard not to appreciate their continual attempts to reach new lows. Today brought another amazing tidbit from The Washington Post: like Bozo the Clown, the Salahis can now be hired to make an appearance at your event of choice. That’s right — you can rent the Salahis! I personally can think of nothing that would make a wedding, bar mitzvah or child’s birthday party sparkle like having Michaele and Tareq mingle awkwardly with your guests. Seriously, save your money on fancy catering and lavish centerpieces, and go with something that really says classy.

No word yet on the price tag for an appearance, but it will no doubt be worth every penny.

We Love Weekends
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We Love Weekends, October 16-17

Photo courtesy of
‘Colors of Autumn’
courtesy of ‘kimberlyfaye’

Max: Friday night I’ll be checking out the opening at Flashpoint for Adam de Boer’s “Finca”.  Saturday I’ll be flipping through the pages of the second issue of Worn Magazine at a preview party in Georgetown, and possibly throwing my underwear on stage at the Super Diamond show at 9:30.  Sunday I’ll be popping Advil and trying to get “Sweet Caroline” out of my head.

Brittany: My birthday falls on Saturday, so it is a pretty festive week for me. First stop is at Urban Style Lab. Jen did an amazing job overhauling my faded-out California “ombre” color and her sister Liana will be trimming my fringe this weekend so I can actually see what happens, even if I cannot remember. There will be birthday drinks with a couple of friends at The Gibson. Dress code is suits and bow-ties for the boys. Quelle adorbs, right? Sunday is the real party, though, featuring my amazing friends, djs, day drinking, and such, followed by an after-party on my friend’s gorgeous Columbia Heights rooftop. Monday, one of my fave local causes, 826DC is having a fundraiser at my fave bar, The Passenger, and Tuesday is the sure-to-be-rad Worn Magazine Issue 2 Party at U Hall. Continue reading →

Adams Morgan, The Daily Feed, WTF?!
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Bathroom you’d best steer clear of: McDonald’s in Adams Morgan

Photo courtesy of
‘IMG_8493’
courtesy of ‘pterjan’

We’ve all been there, out on the town when the urge strikes.  You can hold it, you can hope for a bathroom nearby, or you can run along home.  Today, we bring you the story of Chele, who tried to used the ladies’ room at McDonald’s in Adams Morgan in the case of a nigh-dire emergency:

After a full night of celebration at the rehearsal dinner, my Lilliputian bladder could not wait the remaining 10 blocks to the apartment before I succumbed to kidney failure.

I am not kidding. My Kidneys were locked in mortal combat with each other and sooner rather than later they were going to rebel and my insides would be shattered like an IED had exploded.

What happened next is a hilarious read, as Chele dukes it out with the Potty Cop at the Adams Morgan McDonalds late one night. Now, I know that McDonalds bathrooms are the last refuge of the desperate, but do you really need to berate and abuse the poor girl when she just needs to go pee?

Food and Drink, News, The Daily Feed
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Exclusive: Post launches new Restaurant Deal email list

Capitol Dish email logo
The Capitol Dish logo, used with permission.

The trend of 2010 has to be the perennial “deal” sites that have popped up in town.  You’ve got Living Social, Groupon, Cornerdish, So What’s the Deal, and others.

Enter the Washington Post, who thinks that you’ve got room for one more in your life. They’re starting tomorrow with The Capitol Dish, a weekly newsletter email that goes out each Friday. You’ll get three special deals for restaurants, each at least half off. The inaugural deals are Kaz Sushi Bistro ($15 gets you $30 in credit), PS 7’s ($15 gets you $30 in credit) and Napoleon Bistro & Lounge ($25 gets you $50 in credit). Each week there will be three new deals, and you get until Monday to decide if you’d like one (or more), and then each deal lasts for 6 months after you buy.

The email newsletter is a new direction for the Post, which, like many newspapers, is working with more and more digital content and doing more digital outreach. Continue reading →

capitals hockey, The Daily Feed
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Backstrom, Ovie Sink Isles

Photo courtesy of
‘DSC_7711’
courtesy of ‘bhrome’

The two biggest questions the Caps had going into last night’s contest with the New York Islanders were: “When is Nicklas Backstrom going to score?” and “Is the power play ever going to be effective?”

Both questions were answered with less than four minutes remaining in regulation; Backstrom’s deflection of an Alexander Ovechkin slap shot on the power play proved to be the game winner in a 2-1 win for the Caps.

Granted, Backstrom got an assist on Ovechkin’s second period goal, but you could tell he wanted more. Having been demoted to the second line at the start of the game, swapping places with Tomas Fleischmann, Backstrom was put back on the first line at the start of the second, and that’s when things began to click. “I thought they needed a break,” Coach Bruce Boudreau explained after the game. “And by the start of the second period, I thought they’d had a long enough break.” The strategy seemed to work. “Once (Backstrom) got the assist I just knew he was going to get more, because he never stops at just one once he gets a little bit of a roll going.”

The Caps came into the game having converted only 1 of their last 13 power play attempts. The Islanders gave the Caps plenty of chances to redeem themselves; it was the last power play opportunity that produced Backstrom’s game winner. The team now sits at converting 2 for 17, a dismal 11%, compared to last year’s league-dominating 25%.

Things looked a bit rocky at the start. The Caps were sluggish and let the Islanders dominate in their end. Even an early fight by new winger DJ King failed to provide much spark. King took on Trevor Gillies in the corner less than three minutes into the game in a rousing fight. It was an rousing introduction for the fiesty winger to the Verizon Center crowd, despite his eventual takedown by Gillies. Continue reading →

News, The Daily Feed
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Curbside Cupcakes brings home the inaugural Curby award

Photo courtesy of
‘Curbside Cupcakes’
courtesy of ‘Kevin H.’

After some disputed results in a high-tech election, it was announced late yesterday that Curbside Cupcakes brought home the first Curby award for excellence in food truckery.  Congratulations to all who participated in the great event, and to its sponsors at DCRA and elsewhere for putting on this awesome event. DCRA also posted a great photo with Cupcake Chef Samuel and the award certificate.  Congrats Samuel & Kristi!

Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Gorillaz @ Susquehanna Bank Center (NJ) 10/10/10 & Patriot Center (VA) 10/11/10

IMG_2318.jpg
all photos by Andrew Markowitz.*

Pop-music mad scientist Damon Albarn is currently touring his ever-evolving collaborative group and multimedia extravaganza, Gorillaz, across the United States. After Gorillaz climbed around New York City like King Kong at the end of last week, they took their road-show down the Turnpike to play an incredible show in Camden, New Jersey on Sunday night, and then down I-95 to perform at George Mason University’s Patriot Center on Monday. Having previewed the 2010 Gorillaz live show at this year’s Coachella Music Festival, I was determined to catch at least one of their national tour dates. As it turns out I was fortunate enough to catch two of them.

Everyone that I talk to who hasn’t seen Gorillaz live seems to have the misconception that their concerts are fully-animated affairs, with the real band hidden behind screens. If you are reading this and are skipping your area’s Gorillaz tour date because of a similar thought, let me tell you that 2010 is the year Gorillaz have come out from behind their rather silly veil to stage an extravagant stage show that features upwards of 25 people on stage at once. The live show is a head-spinning cavalcade of guest-stars and top-notch musicians with so many moving musical parts that every inch of the stage is packed with something interesting for the eyes and the ears. With the latest Gorillaz release, a concept album entitled “Plastic Beach”, and this massive tour, Albarn has finally realized the full musical potential of the novelty Hip-Hop meets Brit-Pop group that he and cartoonist Jamie Hewlett conceived nearly a decade ago. “Escape to Plastic Beach” tour is one of the most unique entertainment events of this year or any other.

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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Dan Savage to WaPo: [unprintable]

Photo courtesy of
‘rainbow’
courtesy of ‘redjoe’

Those of us who’ve long since jettisoned the WaPo’s daily pages from our lives missed it, but WaPo ran a piece from staunch anti-gay Family Research Council head Tony Perkins this week (find it yourself – I’m not linking that garbage). When criticized about it by GLAAD via twitter the WaPo twitter account said that it was a result of trying to cover both sides – after all, they’d had a live chat with Dan Savage about the It Gets Better project we mentioned here last week.

GLAAD and plenty of others have castigated the person driving the WaPo twitter account with the simple message that there’s not two sides to suicide, just tragedy. Dan Savage’s own reply was brief and on The Stranger.

Dear Washington Post…

…if you had told me that my doing a live chat with your readers about the It Gets Better Project was going to be used as an excuse to publish the hateful, bigoted lies of Tony Perkins, I wouldn’t have done your fucking live chat.

I’m sure WaPo will be sad to learn that both items came too late for Aiyisha Hassan who attended Howard University last year. The self-identified lesbian took her own life at home in California on the 5th, an action a fellow Howard student attributed second-hand to her issues with her sexual identity.

If you’d like to call the Washington Post ombudsman and express an opinion on their commitment to balance, the number is 202-334-7582

Dear Washington Post…

Posted by Dan Savage on Wed, Oct 13, 2010 at 11:21 AM

…if you had told me that my doing a live chat with your readers about the It Gets Better Project was going to be used as an excuse to publish the hateful, bigoted lies of Tony Perkins, I wouldn’t have done your fucking live chat.

Adventures, Business and Money, Essential DC, Food and Drink, Fun & Games, Life in the Capital, People, The Daily Feed, The District
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Who’s Standing Next To Me In Line?

Photo courtesy of
”
courtesy of ‘Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie’

Vox Populi has conducted an unofficial survey of those sad, sad people waiting in line at Georgetown Cupcake through hail, sleet, humidity, blazing heat, etc. The poll gives us an inside peak into the GC shopper political affiliations, average wait times, where GC shoppers are from, are they repeat visitors and how did they hear from GC. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of GC visitors were first timers and they had not heard of Baked & Wired :(

Interviews
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She Blogs DC: Date Me, DC!

This piece was almost over before I would have the chance to write it.

After running across dating blog Date Me, D.C.!, it quickly found a place in my Google Reader. I wanted to seek her out and learn more about the woman who’s “never experienced a coffee date, a blind date, a date you go on as a favor to your mom/aunt/best friend/etc., a bad date, a stood-up date — none of it!” After two long-term, monogamous relationships she found herself single- not a problem when you live in one of the nation’s best cities for single women. With a new sense of freedom and a hint of naiveté, this Cincinnati native set out to experience dating in the city head-on and decided to document her dating adventures for all of us to read.

However a few days after I interviewed her she decided to take a break from dating.

Continue reading →

News, The Daily Feed
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DC DPW suspends trash pickup citywide for Wednesday after shooting

Photo courtesy of
‘Quio #7’
courtesy of ‘Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie’

This morning’s deadly shooting in the DPW parking lot near W Street NE has caused today’s trash/recycling/bulk waste scheduled pickups to be pushed off a day while the organization regroups.  MPD has blocked off some areas of the waste processing facility and the streets nearby, which prevented DPW from serving citizens today.  This has created a bit of a scheduling issue, as trash days were already being delayed a day due to the Columbus Day holiday.

Our hearts go out to the family of Larry Hutchins, who was killed in the incident, and our thoughts for a speedy recovery go out to the injured worker, who has not yet been named.

Here’s the details on your next pickup:

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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What’s next for Michelle Rhee? Read her blog.

While Michelle Rhee announced her resignation from DC Public Schools today and everyone is wondering what’s next for her, it seems she’s also quietly answering that question.

MichelleRhee.org contains a blog, the obligatory Facebook and Twitter profiles (all of which only contain her resignation statement at this point), and the most interesting part- a “share your ideas about education reform” box and newsletter signup that both collect user ZIP codes. Continue reading →

Talkin' Transit
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Talkin’ Transit: Trains!

Photo courtesy of
‘Amtrak’
courtesy of ‘ep_jhu’

Today’s Talkin’ Transit is an homage to Amtrak. Well, really, an homage to all things train. Amtrak just happens to be our primary ride, here in the Nation’s Capital.

What is it about train travel? There’s an old world feel to taking the train. It seems more civilized, certainly, than air travel. It’s less stressful, too. And, while driving might be faster and more convenient, it’s also more stressful (and depending on route, not cheaper, either).

Obviously, a lot of you like the train, too. Amtrak says it has 65% share of the DC to NY air/rail market — which, even with the various bus services left out, still seems like a staggering number to me. It shouldn’t come as a surprise, though: every time I head to a business trip in NY, the Acela seems more and more full. A little over three hours from the heart of DC to the heart of NY, and no one has asked you to strip naked.
Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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Arenas Faked Knee Injury to Get Nick Young Some PT

Photo courtesy of
‘Arenas toes the line’
courtesy of ‘afagen’

We may not know a lot about what role Gil Arenas will play with the Wiz this year, but I’ll tell you one thing, the storylines this year are going to keep it interesting. How about this one from the first home preseason game for the Wizards?

Washington coach Flip Saunders said before Tuesday night’s game against the Atlanta Hawks that Arenas’ knee was bothering him. “His knee is acting up and is a little sore, and it looks like he’s going to sit this one out,” Saunders said.

But after the game, Arenas revealed his scheme to get Nick Young into the starting lineup.

“I told [Young] I’d sacrifice playing tonight so he can get some time in because I know he’s kind of frustrated he’s not getting a chance to crack the [small forward] position, especially since we’re going three guards,” Arenas said, smiling. “So I told him I’ll go and fake an injury or say something’s wrong with me so you can start.”

The plan worked, for both Young and the Wizards. Young started, played 31 minutes and scored a team-high 24 points to lead the Wizards to a 107-92 win.

Continue reading →

The Daily Feed
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An Early Voting Warning: Absentee Ballot Deadlines Coming Up

Photo courtesy of
‘Oh for my Pennsylvania residency’
courtesy of ‘erin m’

If you’re new to the area, you may not have had a chance yet to change your voter registration to your new home (especially if you just graduated). Given that it could be too late, you may want to start the search now into getting a hold of an absentee ballot for the various 2010 elections coming up on November 2nd.

Locally, here’s a few dates to keep in mind for the various jurisdictions:

  • DC: Request for absentee ballot must be received by October 26, 2010; ballots must be postmarked no later than election day
  • Virginia: Request for absentee ballot must be received by October 26, 2010; ballots must be received by 7 p.m. on election day
  • Maryland: Request must be received by 4:30pm (mailed) or 11:59pm (faxed) on October 26, 2010; ballots must be postmarked by election day and received by 10am on November 12, 2010 (mailed) or received by 8pm on election day (hand-delivered).

Of course, if your point of origin is a little further away, there may be different rules for your state. Cross-check your own voting district on this handy chart from Long Distance Voter, and remember, it doesn’t matter who you vote for…just vote.