Archive for March, 2007

Kite Festival: Perils, Pirates, Pink Elephants

Went down to see the cherry blossoms and kites today. No doubt we will have more than enough photos of the flowers in the days to come, so I’d like to draw your attention to the Kite Festival instead. After the jump.
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Happiness is Baltika Beer @ Domku

It is my first time at Domku and I am ecstatic. My new local has Baltika beer, my drunken joy from Russia.

The interior matches the beer selection. Odd tables and mis-matched chairs give a funky, fun vibe. The crowd is a little too Tryst for me but a Baltika 9 can change the view quickly.

I can see many stumblings home from this Petworth gem in my future.

Breast Feeding Ain’t WashPost Worthy News

Today the Washington Post unveiled a new home page and a new online section, Smart Living, which they say will:

aggregate the best stories, blogs and columns from The Washington Post and washingtonpost.com in the areas of parenting, health, food and dining, home and garden, pets, relationships, personal finance and more.

Prior to this launch, consumer content could be found in many different areas of the site; the goal of Smart Living is to provide a one-stop destination. Because we thought that sounded, you know, smart.

breast feeding

But guys, male readers of the Post, if you think this section might have anything for you, the very first image to pop up today should dissuade you.

While I am all about breast feeding, especially from clock stopping hotties covered in honey or melted chocolate, this section promises to be emasculating for those Y chromosomed.

Yo, word to the Post. “Consumer content” does not revolve just around lamb chops vert pre or governmental regulation of spanking. Consumers, and Post subscribers, come in way more stripes, flavors, and demographics than just soccer moms.

The section I await: a Blogger Directory. But I’m not holding my breath. Hell, who knows what qualifies as WashPost news?

Hat tip to Doug

The best $5 you’ll spend this year

I realized last night I’d completely dropped the ball on this – The Studio Theater is doing a companion reading to their play The Pillowman, called Nightmares and Pillow Tales. I’ll endeavor to write up my experience at the Pillowman this weekend, but you’ve got several more weeks to catch it, wheras these readings are a four-time-only deal, the last two performances of which are today and tomorrow at 5pm. Stop reading and GO – this article will still be here when you get back.

In a nutshell, this is a little over an hour of dramatic reading of stories in the scary childhood tale genre. If you’re skeptical about what a troupe of talented actors can bring to some material when limited to standing in front of some music stands and without costumes beyond a black and gray outfits with a splash of red…. then you haven’t been to this reading.
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Gmaps Pedometer


stroll
It was a lovely spring afternoon. I decided to go for a stroll, only my “stroll” ended up lasting over an hour. I like to explore on foot because you notice things you’ll never see from a car, or even a bike (because you’re
always worrying about cars). Plus, the exercise of course.

Anyway, I was curious what distance I covered once I got home. I knew there had to be a mashup out there for this sort of thing, so I started googling and, sure enough, it didn’t take long to find just the tool.

Gmaps Pedometer is a Google Maps application (not really a mashup since the programmer is only enhancing it) with a nice interactive interface.

You start by narrowing the location using the same methods you’re already used to (an address is easiest). Zoom and pan are always available. To begin marking your route, press the “Start recording” button and double click each point along the way (a nice side effect of this is as you trace your route, the map is always centered at your last point). After each point is recorded (which you can undo) the total distance is updated. There are options for english and metric units. You can also enable mile markers and there’s even a calorie counter. Another nice feature is elevation so you can see along the route which hills you climbed and descended. For posterity, you can save, print and even export the route as GPX.

Total Distance: 3.5 miles
Change in Elevation: 140 feet
Elapsed Time: 80 minutes
Calories Burned: 400

It’s a nice tool for bikers and joggers as well.

Calling All Pirates and Ninjas.

I realize that this is practically no notice, but there is a public call out for pirates and ninjas to show up at Whitlow’s on Wilson tonight between 5:30pm and 9pm. Consider this your warning that Clarendon could be the flashpoint for the greatest conflict of all time.

The Call Reads:

I have a friend who’s filming a public access gig for cable in Va. about Pirates Vs. Ninja. They need one or two pirates to sit at a table and negotiate with some slanty eye pan-asian ninja devils. This goes down tomorrow around 5 PM to 9:30PM at the TV studio in the Clarendon area (near Whitlow’s on Wilson).

If you are interested, then e-mail me and I’ll give you the contact information. But first you will have to explain to me why you are a Pirate reading the website of a Ninja.

And I’d like to see your Pirate headshot.

Sadly, my pirate suit’s at the cleaners.

No Tunnel for Tysons

Sorry tunnel-lovers, it’s gonna be above ground. Virginia has signed up Bechtel for between $2.4 and $2.7 Billion to do the Metro work out to Dulles, and all the plans currently are for above ground rail, which would allow them to keep the $900M in federal funding promised to the group for the extension. It’s a big blow to everyone who wanted an underground Metro in Tysons as part of a more “pedestrian friendly” Tysons.

Time to embrace Tysons for what it is: strip malls and office buildings and roads galore, and get real with all of it.

Dangerous choice

The risk of going about your day in your PJs is that some obnoxious blogger will make fun of you for it. However this is not one of those situations – personally I’d be happy to go about in a torn t-shirt and my gym shorts all the time, much to the horror of my darling girlfriend. Rock on with your sloth self, girl. Soon enough you’ll be in polo & khaki hell like the rest of us wage slaves, and that’s only if you’re lucky enough to work in a “business casual” office.

No I’m writing because I saw this girl in Panera the other day and thought “I’m willing to bet that she wasn’t even born yet when I went to my last Pink Floyd concert.” Good to see the flame kept going, though you really oughta pick up “Wish you were here,” kiddo – it’s a better album and a dude on fire is a way cooler image than a prism.

Though I do like Richard Cheese’s take on it.

I Wanna See a Wookie!

Does this Matches ad make you jealous? Don’t you wish it was you who “let the Wookie win”? Especially if you were a young’in being hunted by an older woman in black. Grrrr!

wookie_ad.jpg

Fare Hike Gone. Kinda.

Don’t worry transit-riding folks, your fares aren’t going up. Well, at least not until Summer, anyway, when they may go up by an amount tied to cost of living factors like the CPI. Instead of infrequent large hikes, we’re going to get used to bi-annual or quarterly hikes in the fares. Instead of the immediate fare hike, Metro’s getting smaller, cutting “inefficiencies” out of the system.

Get ready for a leaner, meaner Metro?

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