Morning Roundup: Goodbye, Abe Edition
Vegetate to Close at the End of the Month
D.C. Police Seek Suspect in Series of Bank Robberies
Suspect in 9-Year-Old's Murder Found Dead in D.C. Jail
Wizards Owner Abe Pollin Dies at 85
Do you live in Cleveland Park or its surroundings? If you do, chances are good that much like this editor, you are a walking zombie today courtesy of a terrifyingly loud alarm that went off early this morning at the University of the District of Columbia.
The alarm -- an ungodly combination of high-frequency buzzing and a brain-piercing pitch -- began to sound between 5 and 5:30 a.m. this morning, lasting for about two hours before finally subsiding. Upon awaking to such clamor (and allaying my fears that Washington was under some sort of nuclear attack), I dialed 311. After 20 minutes on hold, the operator, whose brevity obviously implied that she had answered this same question from every other person in the area, said that the alarm was the result of a mechanical disruption at UDC, and that police and technicians were on the scene working on it.
There are several alternate explanations being reported, including NBCwashington.com's version, which cites information from the "Department of Emergency Management" (we assume they mean HSEMA) as saying that the noise was coming from someone's "tricked-out" house alarm on the 3500 block of Macomb Street NW. Pardon our skepticism, but unless that house was sided with megaphones, there's just no way a single family residence was making that much noise.
In any case, if you see someone from Cleveland Park today, be gentle. They're probably a couple hours behind on sack time.
UPDATE: Through Councilwoman Mary Cheh's office, UDC has issued an apology for the disturbance. The alarm was not a part of the University's security system; rather, the sound was, according to MPD Commander Matt Klein of the Second District, "a civilian alert system that had been installed...several decades ago" and which "UDC officials [thought] had been disconnected years ago." The university required the assistance of Pepco technicians to disengage the alarm -- which certainly explains the lengthy delay in shutting it off. The noise blared again this morning around 11:30 for about ten minutes. Engineers are still conducting tests to see how the alarm was actually tripped. The full text of UDC's apology, after the jump.
Dear UDC Community:At approximately 5:30 a.m. on Wednesday, April 29 an alarm on the roof of Building 39 (on the corner of Van Ness and Connecticut Ave.) went off for about 90 minutes. The alarm was not promptly silenced because it is not part of the University's systems. It appears that the alarm may be part of a Municipal Civil Defense system. The University has contacted the appropriate District and Federal agencies to resolve this concern. The University will be reaching out to its neighbors with additional information and a special contact number should they have and questions or concerns. Again, the University apologizes for any disruption to our neighbors.
Respectfully,
Jacquelyn Boynton
Assistant Vice President for Marketing, Communications, and Alumni Relations
202.997.7161
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"Department of Emergency Management" = milk jug in car's backseat
The tricked out alarm story is pretty sweet, whether true or not. If true, the owner should be locked in a room with the alarm on for 24 hours as penance.
A house alarm? You have got to be kidding me. The level of effort would have to be incredible in order to get the entire f*ing zip code to hear it. This, in and of itself, justifies gun ownership: the house next door should be able to blow the speakers away after 30 seconds.
Where did you find that clip art? Or is that supposed to represent the current world view of Cleveland Park residents?
It looks like an owl from the set of Braveheart.
Freedom!!!!!!!
If only the Drudge Report came with audio effects like the alarm . . .
I saw a flying pig and sent out that alarm. All Bacon Men
Assemble! With our fresh baked bread we headed out as the alarm sounded but alas it was false. It was only the sky signal for PIGMAN: Protector of DC!
He was warning of the pending Manbearpig fluppocalypse
Wonder Pig powers...ACTIVATE!
Shape of...A PICKLED PORK RIND!
Form of...BACON EXPLOSION!
Since we are talking about bacon and guns, I have to offer this for your consideration. Is their a more awesome site?
http://www.sogoodblog.com/2009/04/15/bacon-gun/
I've long thought that laws should be changed so that it's legal to reward errant car alarms with a cinderblock through the windshield... it's hard to imagine a punishment severe enough to suit a "tricked out house alarm" that wakes a whole neighborhood.
I'm a cranky bitch this morning. oh boy. I can forward this to my co-workers to show it's not my usual tardiness that had me rolling in to work just now. I live about 3 blocks from 3500 Macomb and that was some crazy alarm. It sounded like the city had tinnitis.. a high-pitched "eeeeeeee" for a looong time.
So your excuse for being late was that you woke up early?
What are you folks still doing in bed at 5:00AM.
The day is wasting, get up and get moving!
hear hear!
You lazy maggots have had it too easy. When I was in the Corps, we used to get up at 3:30 everyday just to tell God that he may have made the universe but when he showed up to work, there was already Marine on guard duty. Hoo-ah!
Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.
My sentiments exactly. If you wake up before the sun. Things get done. If you wake after the sunrise. Pigs will fly.
Yeah, I heard it in Mount Pleasant, but I probably wouldn't have noticed it had I not been lying awake in bed when it went off. I thought there might have been a 1940s-style air raid going on.
Oh, those are my fave! I get all "Battle of Britain" for those ones!
Damn I live on Porter and Conn and slept through that like a baby...sweet, sweet Ambien....anyhoo:
Neighbors,
Councilmember Cheh's office received the following note from UDC this morning
regarding the siren:
Dear UDC Community:
At approximately 5:30 a.m. on Wednesday, April 29 an alarm on the roof of
Building 39 (on the corner of Van Ness and Connecticut Ave.) went off for about
90 minutes. The alarm was not promptly silenced because it is not part of the
University's systems. It appears that the alarm may be part of a Municipal
Civil Defense system. The University has contacted the appropriate District and
Federal agencies to resolve this concern. The University will be reaching out
to its neighbors with additional information and a special contact number should
they have and questions or concerns. Again, the University apologizes for any
disruption to our neighbors.
Respectfully,
Jacquelyn Boynton
Assistant Vice President for Marketing, Communications, and Alumni Relations
202.997.7161
Best regards,
Asher Corson
Director of Communications
Office of Councilmember Mary M. Cheh
Council of the District of Columbia
(202) 741-0932
http://www.marycheh.com
It appears that the alarm may be part of a Municipal Civil Defense system.
So is it or isn't it?
The University has contacted the appropriate District and Federal agencies to resolve this concern.
How do you contact the "appropriate" officials if you don't even know who the alarm belongs to?
Now, I'm no fancy city lawyer monkey (GASP!) but it seems to me that an alarm is supposed to indicated to people that they need to do something. When the fire alarm goes off, you leave the building. When the cop siren goes off behind you, you pull over. When your tailgunner starts bubbling, it's time to go ca-ca. WTF is up with a nondescript siren going off for an hour and nobody knows who set off the alarm, who the alarm belongs to, and what the alarm is supposed to indicate?
And WTF is up with "Civil Defense" anyway? Didn't we get rid of all that Mccarthy-era cr@p when Reagan became a contra and rescued all those christian aid workers being held in Burma? I thought Homeland Security was supposed to handle that nonsense, or are they just in charge of the flamethrowers we're supposed to use to burn all the corpses? Because their website is totally lacking any details on alarm responses, corpse burning procedures, or even rudimentary zombie attack survival scenarios.
Look to the left of you. Now, look to the right of you.
By the end of this thread. Some of you will be victims and some of you will become victims of victims who didn't listen the first time. That was no test. Pirates were spotted East of the Potomac River. All landlubbers
beware. Pirates. Yes, Pirates!
BEST POST OF THE FREAKING DAY! Harvey Monkeyman, at your service.
Clearly the alarm was put there to warn Ward 3 residents whenever a black man enters the neighborhood.
The good folks of Cleveland Park might want to petition for a ghetto-bird landing pad in their neighborhood. The frequent rhythmic sound of low-flying choppers should drown out any sirens.
At least it seems to work that way in other parts of the city.
Fools! All of ya's. The next time you hear an alarm at that decibal. You should high tail it out of where ever you are. Run as far and as fast as possible. You'll know if it was a drill or the real thing when you get to safe grounds. Lying in bed and wondering isn't going to save you. You all are victims. You are already dead. If it had been an actual emergency...you all would have been
toast or delicious BAR-B-Q.
Exactly!
Real-Time Blogging of disasters will kill off the citizen-reporters as they type.
Famous "almost" posts:
Mt Saint Helens About to Errup.....
Giant Meteor About to Hit Ear...
Do Not! Piss H…
It woke us up in Adams Morgan, too, so I can't begin to imagine how loud it must have been closer to UDC! Even for or us, it was a "brain-piercing pitch".
Maybe it was filming for a remake of the film "1941" with Marion Barry as Capt. Wild Bill Kelso, David Catania as Ward Douglas, Sommer as Donna Stratton, C. Everett Koop as Capt. Wolfgang von Kleinschmidt, and our very own Monkeyrotica as Sgt. Frank Tree.
That was no siren. It was the mating call of PIGMAN.
You see during the high pollen season, the Morlocks and C.H.U.D.'s hormones go into hyperdrive. When they mate, their sweat releases a baconey scent that drives the PIGMAN wild. He dashes from roof to roof. Wishing and hoping to catch sight of the copulating couple. What you heard was the whooping and holloring of a sad mad lonely horny soul which is the equivalent to most men watching porn.
I have all his DVDs
Pigman: Squeal of Fortune
Pigman: The Pork is Right
Pigman: The Ace of Bacon
Pigman: Gabbagulag 19
Betcha don't have the un-aired pilot: Barn Lovin'
Banned in over 392 countries. That blurred version on You
Tube is the pits. The scene where Pigman is having the egg bukkake party has been deleted. You can tell after the chicken lip sandwich song.
No. Sadly, I don't have that one.
I do have Pigman vs MechaGodzilla. It's a rom com.
I think mine is on BETA. Pigman vs MechaGodzilla is awesome. Crashing into the Washington Monument. Falling into the Reflecting Pool. I love the scene where the aliens who are controlling MechaGodzilla raise the roof off the White House so that you can see Ronald Reagan getting a sponge bath. Who was the actor that played Reagan?
It was Gerald Ford in the spongebath and he was played by Ronald Reagan. His last great role...well, bfore, you know...he was elected.
Don't forget this classic on Laserdisk
Pigman: Black Forest Showdown
I had that on Super-8. My dad caught me in the basement watching it and confiscated the reel. What he didn't know
was that I also had Whoopie Woman of the Amazon. Remember that. Much better than the National Geographic covers of Virginian women in the buff. Thank Gawd for Johnson and Johnson cocoa butter.
I once saw a theatre production of Pigman in London. American cast, of course. It was "Pigman: Pearls before Swine." Not to get all drama-snooty and play the part of pig-critic, but it was basically an Ibsen play with a lot of pig-sex. I felt emotionally robbed.
I saw the Off-Broadway production with Chris Farley as Pigman. The critics of course were fierce. One said,
"If bacon could talk." Poor man went on a bender that made even Satan toss his cookies. The fools who tried cashing in on the Pigman phenomenon went hog wild when they created
PIGMAN: The Animated Series for CBS on Saturday mornings.
The parents weren't too happy with their kids being exposed to shaking quivering man boobies.
that is a really good point because when that series came on it was widely believed to be an aniamted version of The Power Rangers and subsequently the origins and significance of Pigman became a very contentious subject.
I am forever grateful that Granta, in an effort to clear the air, dedicated an entire issue of sniffy English prose to the wider cosmology of pigman. Each piece expressed the profundity of Pig through primitive, atavisitc Truths. What some might call a Jungian porcketype. Pigman as Geist, was my favorite.
As it were.
bark bark.
When it all blew over like smoke at a pig fry, there was so much merchandise left over. Remember the scratch and sniff PIGMAN buttons. You never knew what you were going to get. Some smelled like sweat and others smelled like bacon. The rare ones smelled of fine Corinthian Leather.
I kept eating mine. My favorite PIGMAN product was the PIGMAN anti-perspiration roll-on. It stung like the Dickens. Had to be re-called.
Originally, Nirvana was going to title their album "Smells like Pig Spirit" for that very reason...but I guess the lawyers and suits got involved and you know how it is in the Biz...you fight the man and you fight the man...and eventually you have to just make a ton of money.
The album that clinched it for me was "Beat the Meatles!"
The Beatles answered that with "The Pink Album". Classic songs like: No. 9 Pork Rinds
Pork Butt in the USSR
Dear Pigman
Glass Pig
Ob-bla-di Ob-bla black pig
Wild Pork Pie Hat
The Continuing Story of Capitol Hill Swill
While my Pig Gently Weeps Grease
Happiness is a Warm Pig
Piglet my Dear
Tired Pig
Pigbird
Bigger Piggies
Rocky Pig News
Don't Pass the Pig
Why Don't We Sell Bar-B-Q in the Road
I Pig
Julia Child's Pig
Pig Birthday
Piggie Blues
Baby Pigs on Ice
Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and Monkeyrotica
I feel much safer now, knowing that this city has a Municipal Civil Defense system that nobody knows about, or knows how to use.
I feel much safer now, knowing that this city has a Municipal Civil Defense system that nobody knows about, or knows how to use.
I feel much safer now, knowing that this city has a Municipal Civil Defense system that nobody knows about, or knows how to use.
All I hear when you say "Municipal Defense System" three times is "Doomsday Device". It's better "they" don't know how to use it.
AND NO, I DIDN'T HIT THE SUBMIT BUTTON THREE TIMES!
IF YOU DID NOT HIT THE SUBMIT BUTTON THREE TIMES THEN WHO DID? WHO DID? I WANT ANSWERS! I WANT BACON!
YOU DID!
You mean I'm Kevin Bacon. Oh dear. That means that you all are 6 degrees away from me and the PIGMAN.
I live at the corner of Connecticut & Macomb & didn't hear a peep. Either I'm deaf or everyone else is extra whiny/sensitive to sound?
Are you saying that it didn't happen? Does a bear knit in the woods? If Mr. T falls in the wood, did he make a sound?
These are things that I can not answer, but I did spend the night in a Holiday Inn.
Any updates as to this Civil Defense thing?
Because it's on my corner. And it sure would be nice to know where the off button is.
Just make sure you have a line to Strategic Air Command in case the Luftwaffe decide to go on a bombing run.