In late June, 4 young women died in a horrific beltway crash. Then, I prematurely blamed alcohol for the crash and the resulting fatalities. Many corrected me that there was no evidence of drinking, only alcohol in the car. Today, the toxicology report was released, with a .02 rating for the driver, as well as positive for marijuana. It does strike me that there was careless action, either by the person who sold her the alcohol and couldn’t recognize her fake ID, or by the driver herself who’d had at least one drink before getting behind the wheel.

The Post uses the phrase “a sad coda” to the story, and I think they’re spot on. I’d even titled this entry with that, before reaching that phrase halfway down. Right before that phrase is used, the families of the deceased passengers raged against youthful irresponsibility and the failure of the system to protect their children from underage drinking. Might as well rage against the wind for blowing or the rain for its wetness. Tragedy? Surely. Avoidable? Possibly. Enough to make one hug their friends? Definitely.

photo courtesy of Gullevek

Being an area that’s been flat-out nuts in the housing market the last five plus years, I’m betting we have a good number of folks here who have purchased houses and had work done on them. So I have a funky question – has anyone reading this ever had an external entrance added to a basement?

My darling girlfriend and I are looking around at housing – both rentals and purchases – and we came across a property that was very nice, except the basement had no outside access. Being as the basement will be where the woodshop will live, this is somewhat of a problem. Could I pass lumber in and out of a window? Yes. Do I hate myself enough to do so? Probably not.

So, have any of you or anyone you knew ever had an additional entrance put into a home? It can be done, of course, but I wonder how weird an occurrence it is. Would Joe Average contractor have done it before? I’ve done a lot of construction in my life but I’ve never retrofit a door into an outside wall, much less one that’s partially below ground level. In my home town we call the area below ground level “underwater.”

While most shots of our beloved Metro system are uninteresting and seem to all look the same, this shot by relative Flickr new comer krisetya really captures the essence of DC’s mass transit system. The perfect symmetry of the tracks fading off into the great unknown, along with the giant concrete canopy really give you a sense of scale and show you just how massive the Gallery Place station is. I love how all of the people are lined up like the robots that they are. And thanks to Metro for installing the new red platform lights to add a little extra zip to the photo’s color.

Be sure to check out his other photos. We have a great new photographer on the DC scene.

C&O Canal

Originally uploaded by alberto238
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Well, with all the traffic woes of this morning, I decided to hang back a bit and delay my entry. Now with the American Legion Bridge work entering it’s supposed final phase, that backed up traffic quite a bit even in the later morning hours… what is a motorcyclist to do, but hit the Cabin John Parkway and the Clara Barton.

Now, I haven’t been on it in a while, and think the tree lined canal area is quite nice and tranquil. Motorcycling in the morning is nice, and in general, you get fresh air, natural air conditioning, and the smells of the day. Normally, the latter is a good thing, except this morning. About C&O lock 8, my nose said to my brain:

“What in the holy mother of christ is that smell?”

Now, I would think, maybe, just maybe, there is the random effluent from DC making it’s way to the Potomac. But, at each successive C&O Canal Lock, as well as some of the closer bits of the canal to the road, my nose caught that scent. The scent of the worst spoilage imaginable… some worse than dead bodies and spoiled milk. (And yes, I’ve even been around a blooming corpse flower)

What’s the deal? I think it’s the last bits of last weeks heat finally releasing the brew of rotting algae, and other garbage that’s in the canal. I would suggest, to the National Park Service, if possible, to try to flush that canal at their earliest convenience, or I fear, if we get another week of heat, that brew in the C&O could turn deadly, knocking bicyclists off their seats, joggers out of their shoes, and us motorcyclists tearing up in our helmets. (Yes, I know it’s supposed to be “natural” in setting, but that’s an “unnatural” smell)

Derek Terrell of myLHBS brings us another fine beer to beat the last days of summer and take us into cooler times. If you got started now, the beer would be ready to drink by the time September comes to an end, just in time to usher in cooler autumn evenings and a sense of relief, having survived another sweltering summer.

What? You don’t homebrew? All the cool kids are doing it! Derek can hook you up with all the equipment you need, from fermenters to carboys to bottles.

Go see Derek or one of his courteous, helpful staff. He’s the guy to talk to if you want quality ingredients for good prices and great advice to boot!

Shipwreck IPA (2007)
Shipwreck IPA was written in the mid-90s and became a best-seller for Brew America & now myLHBS. This ’07 version uses hop varieties and specialty malts unavailable back then. For added fun, consider the even more robust “Ship-rocked”!

Ingredients
8 lb. Alexander’s Pale liquid malt extract
1 lb. Briess Golden Light dry malt extract
1 lb. Gambrinus Honey + 8 oz. Briess 20L crystal malt (crushed)
2 oz. Yakima Magnum + 1 oz. Summit pellet hops (bittering)
1 oz. Simcoe pellet hops (1st flavor)
1 oz. Amarillo pellet hops (2nd flavor)
1 oz. Summit* pellet hops (aroma)
1 oz. Summit* whole hops (dry-hop: optional but highly recommended)
1 package Safale US-05 dry yeast
3/4 cup priming sugar * Summit comes in 2 oz. packages

And don’t forget…
Irish Moss (recommended), grain bag(s), hop bag(s), bottle caps and sanitizer as needed.
(more…)

It took four days and two trips to my house by Comcast staff, as well as six phone calls to Comcast across two days, but I now have a TiVo HD working with the Comcast network.

Folks, this is absolutely positively ridiculous. It should not be this hard to get a cable-ready device working. The reason for the 1996 Telecommunications Act was to make this possible and doable, not to make it obfuscated, arcane and foreign. But, I guess that’s how Comcast is.

Prince of Petworth Photo

No matter your stance on the Iraq War, or the effectiveness of protests, I am sure we all can agree that too many signs about anything ain’t good.

And in my hood we’re all kinds of pissed off with Answer Coalition’s “End the War Now” sign posters as they’ve covered every lamppost in around Grant Circle with their garish yellow fliers.

A few people have suggested that Answer devote as much energy cleaning up their mess on September 16th as they are preparing for the 15th. But I think my neighbour Joe has the best idea:

One concept: We’ll have city-wide clean-ups after the September 15th march, tabulate the time it took to clean up their mess, and send the bill to A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition. Their return check to the District government could be equally divided among wards for neighborhood beautification projects.

I know I’d be happy to bill them for my time scraping off their signs August 15th.

It might’ve been warm today, but it’s been a pleasant warm, and should make for a delightful evening to take a picnic out to the Mall around 15th and Constitution and catch Screen on the Green: Casablanca tonight. Screening starts around 8 or so, and you can claim your space after 5 tonight.

So grab a sandwich and some chips from the deli downstairs, and a couple sodas with ice, and head for the Mall to see Bogart and Bergman spice up the screen, and to hear my favorite line: “I am shocked, SHOCKED, to hear there is gambling in this establishment.”

Wayan’s DC Photos

After escaping from Macy’s wedding registry runaround, I noticed the newest expansion at the Pentagon City Mall.

Victoria’s Secret is now going to occupy several storefronts, stretching a mighty long way for a lingerie store in uptight DC.

Could this be a sign of a secret sexiness in the usually straight-laced Capitol? A delayed Jessica Cutler effect? Or is there an increase in lingerie knowledge from NoVA libraries?

Either way, as visual man, I welcome this greater opportunity for women to celebrate the curves god gave them.

May the store be a uplifting success!

When’s the last time you saw a suicide knob in action? I think the last time I saw one was in my grandfather’s car when I was a kid. He had an excuse, though. He had extra hand controls custom installed due to missing a leg from a run-in with a forklift, so freeing up one hand by use of a spinner was somewhat legitimate.

I saw this at a rest stop here in VA a few weeks ago. I doubt they are street legal but I would love to hear from someone who knows for sure. Probably it’s more like legally selling a kit to turn a rifle into full-auto, but it being illegal to own an automatic rifle. What do you think?