What's That You Say?
Heisann, commenters. Hopefully, your weekend was spent enjoying a nice cool beverage and a dip in the pool. Or maybe you spent some time taking in the experience of the Capital Pride festivities. Or perhaps you were just busy trying to get back the hours and hours that Metro commuting took from your free time this past week.
In any case, it's Monday. And while that means a return to the chains of your desks or other workplaces - it also means that it's time for your weekly comment roundup. Buckle up.
I'll be the first one to admit it - our commenters are, for the most part, pretty smart. I mean, where else are you going to get the kinds of debates that we have around here? That said, we often aren't serenaded with poetry. So, this week's Comment of the Week comes from cminus, who wrote a villanelle dedicated to the terrible driving of Marylanders.
"Seriously, do you care more if your fellow citizen remembers what a villanelle is, or when to hit their blinker?"
Never trust those at the wheel
Driving in from out of town
Is this not how we all feel?
One must ask “what is the deal?”
Of each and every suburban clown
Never trust those at the wheel
In the rugby scrum of Detroit steel
That we all call our downtown
Is this not how we all feel?
Their driving styles are unreal
From Manassas to Germantown
Never trust those at the wheel
“Fie upon the automobile!”
Is the DCist cry of renown
Is this not how we all feel?
Unlike panda porn, they don’t appeal
Like the Man, they keep us down
Never trust those at the wheel
Is this not how we all feel?
Yeah, the meter is sprung worse than I am when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist and a round thing in my face. But cut me some slack, villanelles are not the kind of poetic form you can knock out over a coffee break.
Seriously, a freakin' villanelle. cminus, you fully deserve kudos.
After the jump, more Maryland driving opinions, plus your thoughts on fire hydrant opening.
Photo by sally henny penny
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The outpouring of sadness over the loss of Tim Russert was one of the biggest threads of the week. We always thought it fun to piece together What's That You Say? while Russert would probe the issues and people of the week on Meet the Press. He will be missed.
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WASA begs us to stop pulling the covers off of fire hydrants, and hence, we argued about it. (I'll take the pool any day, but hey, that's just me.)
DC1974 said that this was pretty common practice in every other city, and it has somewhat of a well-meaning purpose behind it:
In Chicago, where I grew up. The fire department would come around and open the fire hydrants to cool of kids. Keep people cool is pretty good way, or so the theory went, to lower crime. And since there aren't pools on every block (don't I wish!) it is much easier to keep track of your children at the corner playing in the fire hydrant spray than trekking to the pool.
Considering that WASA can't seem to even get all the hydrants in this city in working order, perhaps they should be happy that there are kids out there willing to test hydrants for them. And stop being such killjoys.
But Hillman, speaking from experience, disagreed:
Speaking as a former fireman, I can tell you that people opening hydrants is a serious matter. It really can mean that houses burn down, people die, etc. In many areas water pressure is piss poor to begin with, and all it takes is an open hydrant somewhere to take the water pressure down to the point where you have better luck just pissing in the general direction of the fire.
Anybody that thinks it's cute and harmless to open hydrants is a fucking moron.
And Cranky, not to be undone, displayed the DCist commentariat's awesome critical thinking ability:
WASA should replace the water in the hydrants with lava. Problem solved.
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DCist commenters shared their stories of pet adoption.
Speaking of animals, rabid foxes are on the rise again. But Stanton Park thinks we should not be so quick to judge them:
Let's not stoop to making fun of the hard-working foxes in the metro area.
I used to live in Montgomery County and take the MARC train to work in the morning. About 10 minutes before the train most days, a fox would trot down the tracks, heading towards Union Station.
It never occurred to me the fox could be rabid. I always just thought he was on his way to work downtown somewhere, just like I was. Ironically, I was carrying my lunch, but he wasn't.
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What a week for Metro stories, eh? First, an Orange Line train derailed between Rosslyn and Court House. Then, there was a massive power outage due to a fire in the Metro. Dupont Circle station was closed. Then, Metro Center, the busiest station in the system by far, was closed due to a second fire.
It's a long summer. Prepare yourself accordingly.
But of course, there's only one singular voice that could accurately describe the mess of the last week with the appropriate aplomb. That's right, it's time for another episode of The Magical World of Monkeyrotica.
Yup. Mrs. Monkey was offloaded from TWO Orange Line trains, both suffering from "mechanical difficulties". 45 minutes late. Delays, busted ACs, derailing trains...these "mechanical difficulties" are starting to form a pattern. Picture this:
Orange Line, U.S.A., early summer. A tree-lined little world of commuters with iPods, rustling newspapers, the chime of cellphones, and the gogo beat of the paintbucket drummer. At the sound of the roar and the flash of light it will be precisely 6:43 P.M. on the Orange Line, in the last calm and reflective moments...before the monsters came!
"Understand the procedure now? Just stop a few of their subways and radios and telephones and lawn mowers...throw them into darkness for a few hours and then you just sit back and watch the pattern."
"And this pattern is always the same?"
"With few variations. They pick the most dangerous enemy they can find...and it's themselves. And all we need do is sit back...and watch."
"Then I take it this place...this Orange Line...is not unique."
"By no means. Their world is full of Orange Lines. And we'll go from one to the other and let them destroy themselves. One to the other...one to the other...one to the other..."
Of course, now that we all know that Monkey is married, well, nothing really changes. Except that we know what you think of 40 year old bachelors who live on H Street.
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cminus wasn't the only one who had something to say about the Satanic stature of Maryland drivers.
TimmyTucker thinks it's time to unite - in order to vanquish the foreign driving threat:
I saw a car a couple months ago with a license plate from Guam. He was just meandering along with his Island mentality, not knowing where to turn, probably still trying to figure out how he even GOT his car to DC. I say we unite beyond our petty differences and take out vengeance on these Guamaniac menaces!!!
In other words: rabble rabble rabble.
Not only are Maryland drivers "the devil," but their taste in grocery stores is also terrible. So says eckingtonres:
I remember living in Adams Morgan, I would try to shop at the Safeway. I could never find a parking spot nearby because there were cars from MD taking them all.
Fortunately, that Safeway has a parking garage. However, when I got in there all the spaces were taken by people with MD plates!
I had no idea people commuted all the way from MD to shop at one of the worst grocery stores in the city.
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indiecognition presents the unofficial DCist Health Report:
Secrets to un-Fat your fast food:
Get your In-N-Out "protein style" (wrapped in lettuce instead of a bun), and think twice about the cheese, mayo, or "Animal Style" sauce. A good compromise: the 4X2 protein style with ketchup & mustard. But anytime you get to use the In-N-Out secret codewords, it's a good time.
And fill your Chipotle bols with chicken...ask for lettuce instead of rice, and avoid cheese and sour cream. Load up on the salsa(s) and fajitas (what they call their veggies), and go black if you get beans. That'll take the calories down to the 300-500 range, depending on how generous they are with the meat. And even a little guac on top is still pretty good from time to time, thanks to all the omegas.
That and getting Quiznos or even Subway with double meat, no cheese or mayo-based sauces, and whole grain bread can help most people stick to a decent diet without having to brownbag it for lunch. They helped me lose 120 lbs in a year and a half. Although maybe it was just living in Cali that provided exercise for the soul.
Also, people seem to like this "In-N-Out" thing. Phst. Go back to the west coast, hippies.
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boondoggle knows us way too well:
Hi I'm actor Troy McClure. You might remember me from such DCist news features as 'Wmata Matters: Orange you glad you don't live in Arlington' and 'Man Arrests Cop: Another Night of Wacky Police Hijinx'.
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Yup, MrTinDC, it'll be just like Judge Dredd. Or something.
I'm just glad they actually caught the four teens who beat their victim to death for no reason. Hopefully, they will be locked away forever, as on the face of it, these are individuals with no hope of ever being rehabilitated, and who would pose a serious threat if they were ever released, or escaped. Death penalty aside, theirs is a good case for some sort of futuristic prison on an asteroid somewhere between Mars and Jupiter, with no hope of escape.
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Alex Ovechkin now has the key to the city, but erahk0 asks a very important question:
(It's not inconceivable that someone in the Office of Tax and Revenue stole it. Just sayin'.)
Can someone tell me where's the door to the city?
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It's time for us to hand out the silverware; luckily, Ovechkin isn't nominated for any of them, or else it'd be a pretty boring ceremony this week, and we'd have to give him a key too.
This week's Avatar Award for Achievement in the Field of Avatars, though, is hockey related. LanierHts is rockin' the Whale, as in the logo of the now-defunct NHL franchise Hartford Whalers. We've always thought that it was totally cool that there's an H formed by the whale's tail. It's complete kitsch. Nice work, LanierHts.
And this week's Username of the Week goes to Stan Buzzman, whose definitely got that whole Max Power thing going on. Ooh, great name - he's the man you'd love to touch, but you mustn't touch.
As always, send your suggestions for our glorious awards to wtys [dot] dcist [at] gmail [dot] com.