Saw Jimmy Scott and the Jazz Expressions at the Kennedy Center Jazz Cafe Thursday night. Dr. Billy Taylor has put together an amazing season of jazz musicians in a small venue – and the “new” Kennedy Center lets you take and purchase drinks in the Jazz Cafe during the performance, but with no minimum. It’s definitely worth checking out – I know Megan Mullaly is coming in March. But Jimmy… he may be 80 and not all he used to be, but it’s no mystery why he was Billie Holliday’s favorite singer. When he sings “You Don’t Love Me Like I Love You” you just want to know who this cruel woman is. See him whenever you get the chance.

Del. Adrienne A. Mandel (D-Montgomery) and Del. William A. Bronrott (D-Montgomery) recently submitted three teen driving bills – one would prohibit teens with a provisional license from using cell phones while they drive, one would increase the amount of supervised driving a teen would have to undergo before getting a license, and one would restrict the number of passengers a teen driver could carry during the first six months of holding an 18-month provisional license. Apparently, proposals to ban cell phone use by teen drivers have failed in the past because authorities didn’t want to raise the possibility of a wider cell phone ban. Since last fall, at least 17 teens in the region have died in accidents where teens were driving. Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr. is also attempting to get legislation passed that would increase penalties for teen drunk drivers and extend the learner’s permit period from four months to six.

I’m all for these developments. I was a teen not that long ago, and I know what teenagers are capable of and how they think. They don’t often think that they’re dangerous when they’re driving. Anything that might protect others, as well as teen drivers themselves, is a plus in my book. What does everyone else think?

This morning, I was sitting in C Terminal at Washington National, waiting for my flight to sunny Orlando, when who should I see but Senator Fred Thompson (aka District Attorney from Law and Order, aka Carrier Group Captain from Hunt from Red October) with his wife (?) and a small child in a stroller. The Senator was carrying the diaper bag, God bless him.

If anyone was on westbound Braddock Rd. in Fairfax today and saw a big, tall guy with a little, puny fire extinguisher battling a white Toyota Camry going up in a giant ball of flames…that was me.

Something in my engine went POP, CRANK and then KABOOM! Next thing I know it’s like a bad day in Baghdad; shrapnel, flames, and acid flying everywhere.

Just wanted to put out an apology for the traffic delay.

Street closings due to tonight’s State of the Union Address, as issued by MPD:

On Wednesday, February 2, 2005, the State of the Union Address will take place in the United States Capitol. The Capitol Square will be restricted to authorized pedestrians at 6:00 p.m. Additionally, the United States Capitol Police will be putting the following street closures in effect at 7:30 p.m.

Second Street, between D Street, NE and D Street, SE;
D Street between Second Street, SE and Washington Avenue, SW;
Washington Avenue, SW between D Street, SW, and Independence Avenue, SW;

Independence Avenue, SW between Washington Avenue and Third Street, NW
Third Street, between Independence, SW and Constitution Avenue, NW;

Constitution Avenue, NW between Third Street, NW and Louisiana Avenue, NW;

Louisiana Avenue, between Constitution Avenue, NW and D Street, NW; and

D Street, between Louisiana Avenue, NW and Second Street, NE

The DC Examiner is out on newsstands for the very first time today. Formerly the Journal newspapers, there’s a new daily on the streets as of this morning. I have yet to see a dispenser by my downtown office, but, for the PDF-inclined, they do offer downloads of their daily paper to view on your local computer. I definitely welcome competition in the news marketplace, which is something we certainly don’t have now (sorry Washington Times, you just don’t count.) but may have in the coming months. Will the Examiner catch on? Perhaps it will, perhaps it won’t, we shall see.

A word on the Examiner name, an aside from a previous life. The summer I worked in San Francisco, I would commute in by car to the Richmond BART station (think Glenmont or Franconia-Springfield) and pick up a Chronicle at the station and read it on the way in. On the train home, however, I got to delight in the ever-so snarky and yet, still quite excellent, San Francisco Examiner. Sadly, the paper I once knew as an afternoon daily seems to have morphed into something a bit different. The pair were an excellent way to bookend the day on the commute. Perhaps this may yet be true for Washington.