‘Train exiting – 167/365, 3/12/10’
courtesy of ‘vpickering’

It’s official: Metro has appointed James M. Dougherty of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency its new Chief Safety Officer. His first day will be April 19th, when he’ll be knee-deep in orientation to Metro.

While credited with improving SFMTA’s safety record, he’s only occupied the top safety job there for a year. He’s held safety positions with two other transit agencies before that, however, and was a police officer for 22 years.

‘Kermit’
courtesy of ‘NomadicLass’
So just in case you didn’t know, April is National Frog Month, and Alexandria’s Buzz Bakery is ringing it in with all the froggy food you can imagine.  Pastry Chef Josh Short has created a dessert menu that I’m sure will make you green with envy. 

With everything from iced Kermit Cookies for $2.25 each to a Frogger Pie made with an Oreo crust and crème de menthe cream for $2.95 per slice, these are just too cute to pass up.  Even better, if you pick up half a dozen iced Kermit Cookies or more, you can enter to win a brand new DVD of “The Princess and the Frog!”   You’ll definitely score points with the kiddies with that one, so make sure you stop in soon!

For more information, call 703-600-2899 (703-600-BUZZ).

I don’t mean your own at the B&J ice cream happy hours, I mean Paul of local music duo Paul & Storm eating an entire Fudgy the Whale tonight. What started out as a stunt to get more twitter followers has turned into An Event as well as a drive to raise money for the Arlington Food Assistance Center.

And just because community service can have a personal payoff as well, local business ThinkGeek is raffling two $100 gift certificates off to everyone who contributes via the link on this page. Each $1 gets you 1 chance to win. Like a lotto scratch-off card, but with less rubbing.

Wait, that sounded dirty.

Watch the debacle live at 8pm tonight if you dare.

‘Taking a water break’
courtesy of ‘philliefan99’

DANG it is gorgeous out. I could get USED to this kind of weather.

Come play outside with us on April 21. You can use your $10 food voucher for some cool beverages at the scoreboard bar. Teddy encourages this kind of behavior – see above.

Tickets are now on sale for the baseball game event taking place Wednesday, April 21 starting at 5:30 with a behind-the-scenes stadium tour at Nationals Park, followed by “Let Teddy Win” related events, and the Nats vs. the Rockies at 7:05.

‘monkey in the jungle’
courtesy of ‘nicasaurusrex’

City Council has been hammering out the rules related to medical marijuana, and it doesn’t look like DC residents are going to get the right to cultivate at home, at least not for a while. (There goes my plan for my new backyard!)

The bill under consideration by the Council allows DC residents with a specific list of medical conditions to possess up to 2 ounces per month, which the Examiner reports is enough for “about a joint a day.” The bill does provide for a committee to study the home cultivation question and make a recommendation to the Council by 2012.

Brown Kiwi
Originally uploaded by Smithsonian’s National Zoo

If there is one thing that we love at We Love DC, aside from DC itself, it’s cute baby animals. This little baby kiwi bird was hatched at the zoo on Tuesday. Isn’t it totally adorable? I know that I’m having a really difficult day here thanks to some jerks at Comcast, and this baby bird made me go awwwww just a little bit. Better yet? there’s video of it pecking out through its shell.

The Asia Heritage Festival is coming up next month, and the organizers are teaming up with Dhoonya Dance to hold their first ever Bollywood Flash Mob during the Fiesta Asia Street Fair on May 22. Anyone can participate; the choreography is available on YouTube, and while it looks complicated, it has been specifically designed for novice dancers to learn easily.

But maybe you’d prefer to have a professional teach you the steps? No problem! Dhoonya will be hosting workshops to teach the choreography at Metro-accessible locations in Arlington and Takoma Park:

• Wednesday, March 31st, 7pm – The Dance Exchange, 7117 Maple Ave, Takoma Park, MD
• Saturday, April 17th, 1pm – Saffron Dance, 3260 Wilson Blvd, Arlington
• Monday, April 19th – Saffron Dance, 3260 Wilson Blvd. Arlington

‘blue shadow’
courtesy of ‘philliefan99’

WMATA has a press release out about a minor but odd incident that happened this morning. According to the statement a train of eight cars that was ready to be put into service accidentally coupled with another six-car line of cars that had been stored behind it in the rail yard. While the release does not say, presumably a physical junction can happen without someone taking some sort of deliberate action. Perhaps just bumping the cars together, as the release certainly doesn’t imply that someone must have taken steps to couple them.

After the train pulled into the station and allowed passengers to board it was apparently brought to someone’s attention that, hey, there seem to be a whole lot of other cars hanging around back there – is that on purpose? Passengers were unloaded and shortly afterward able to board another train.

If you’re thinking “how exactly does a train operator not notice that she or he is dragging 75% more cars than expected?” well, apparently WMATA is as well. The release concludes with “The train operator was taken for standard drug and alcohol testing and is out of service pending an investigation.”