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Law-breaking, wasting public funds and an elected official who's increasingly unpopular -- the story had everything you would want in an exposé. So when WTOP's Mark Segraves reported Monday that D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty used a police escort and clogged up area roads on his daily bike ride, everyone jumped on it. Including us.

Many of you have likely already seen this YouTube video shot by Ephraim and Christy Smethers (and fair warning, it's graphic in the same way that many nature shows are) of a deer being attacked by a lion at the National Zoo yesterday. The deer, which had presumably wandered in to the Zoo from neighboring Rock Creek Park, managed to run inside the lion habitat, and the lions, being lions, went after the young animal like it was a tasty snack.

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty's obsession with physical fitness may be about to get him into trouble with his constituents. It seems that when he's out training with his cycling team, D.C. Velo, the mayor has been using a large motorcycle police escort that allow him to both flaunt traffic regulations and tie up traffic, WTOP's Mark Segraves is reporting. WTOP spotted Fenty and his team as they "rode on parkways where bikes aren't permitted, ran red lights and stop signs and created traffic backups wherever they went." These rides reportedly occur during weekday business hours, and there's evidence that they are responsible for a large amount of police overtime hours spent doing nothing but waiting for the mayor to show up for his ride. Plus, there's video!

Good morning, Washington. As expected, Bob McDonnell thoroughly defeated Creigh Deeds in yesterday's race for the Virginia governor's office. Conservatives' efforts did well nationwide in general, in fact, with the exception of the tumultuous NY-23 race. Experts will be quick to tell you that election results during an off-year shouldn't be used to draw any broad conclusions... before wondering aloud whether there are any broad conclusions that they can draw from the results. Metro Computer Systems Down: A power failure at a WMATA computer center has left a variety of Metro systems inoperative this morning, according to the Post. Bus fareboxes, MetroAccess booking, call centers, alert systems, and debit card purchases at farecard machines are all inoperative. On the bright side, the PA system in stations is also broken, so riders will at least be spared the constant inane messages demanding that they ask each other about their bags. D.C. Sniper Asks Supreme Court To Delay Execution: John Allen Muhammad, the convicted D.C. sniper, is scheduled to die in just under a week. Now the Examiner reports that his lawyers have asked the Supreme Court to delay the execution while they consider whether Muhammad was adequately represented at his trial. Muhammad also has a request for clemency filed with Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, based upon the claim that he suffers from a variety of serious psychological and neurological problems. Montgomery County Mulls Helicopters' Cost Versus Awesomeness: The Examiner reports on a dilemma facing Montgomery County: should anti-drug funds be used to fight dealers and treat addicts, or to start a helicopter program that could probably fight drugs but mostly involve having totally sweet helicopters. To be fair, the county already has the helicopters lined up, a donation from the military. On the other hand, the county is facing cuts to its police department, which critics point to as an argument against starting an expensive new program. Briefly Noted: EHN pushing for D.C. attorney general district attorney... Monday's gym shooting may have been drug-related... Teens dead from apparent suicide pact... Former NSO director has heart attack while conducting orchestra... Montgomery County firefighters will start using foam to extinguish blazes... This Day In DCist: One year ago Shaw got a dog park and Google Street View debuted in D.C..

As a competitive cyclist who mourned the postponement of this year's only professional race in the District, I was ecstatic, though slightly skeptical, to stumble acros the news this morning that organizers of the Giro d'Italia, one of the three grand tours of international cycling, were thinking of bringing the opening stages of the race to D.C..

On a sad day after the killing of 13 people at Ft. Hood in Texas, the Post is delving into the local ties of suspected shooter Maj. Nidal M. Hasan. He was born in Arlington, graduated from Virginia Tech, prayed at a mosque in Silver Spring and spent the better part of his professional career caring for trauma victims at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. He apparently went on the shooting rampage in response to his upcoming deployment to Iraq; he had expressed opposition to both the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When in late September the Post all but announced the death of the fixed-gear bicycle fad with a 1,700-word primer on single-speeds, we wondered what would come next. Now we've got our answer -- the Tweed Ride.

It was a year ago today that District residents awoke -- likely groggy from the celebrations the night before -- to a new president-elect. Barack Obama not only became the nation's first African-American president, he also offered residents of the District of Columbia the promise of a new relationship between the federal executive and the city, one that had largely fallen by the wayside during President George W. Bush's eight years in office.

Another sad death to report at the Smithsonian's National Zoo. Merlin, the Zoo's oldest male sloth bear, died this morning after a 48-hour illness, according to a news release. He was 28 years old.

On Monday morning, Nov. 2, he underwent a routine physical examination. Although the examination went well, his anesthetic recovery was prolonged, and he had not returned to normal by the afternoon. While under observation, veterinarians noticed that he had vomited some blood-tinged fluid.

Continue reading "National Zoo's Elderly Sloth Bear Dies"

By Sommer Mathis on November 4, 2009 2:50 PM 29 Vote 1 Vote

DDOT workers were out putting the finishing touches on the contraflow bike lane on 15th Street NW today, installing the permanent plastic pylons that separate the line of parked cars from the new sidewalk-adjacent bike lane.

Good morning, Washington. DCist is actually compiling the Roundup from Philadelphia this morning, where the streets are overflowing in grief after last night's World Series loss. We didn't spy any rowdy crowds or inappropriate displays of frustration after the game, but we don't even want to think about what might have happened had something like the Cox cable outage in Virginia gone down up here. Congratulations to all the Yankees fans in the DCist commentariat. We're looking ahead to the Nationals' world championship that's sure to be coming in 2037.

D.C. Council member Mary Cheh (D-Ward 3) has introduced a bill that would ban more than a dozen hazardous chemicals from being sold in the District, the Examiner reports. Among the materials listed in the proposed ban: Mattresses and furniture containing polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, which act as flame retardents; food or beverage containers intended for children younger than 6 that contain Bisphenol-A, or BPA, which has been linked to neurological health problems; and body scrub beauty products that contain synthetic microbeads, which are often blamed for contributing to oceanic pollution.

WARNING: This post contains Top Chef spoilers, albeit from last week's episode. Read no further if you are behind on this season.

Like, literally. Our sister site Londonist brings news of London Mayor Boris Johnson, who on Tuesday night jumped off of his bike to save a woman from an aggressive gang of teen girls. The victim of the attack, who actually voted for opponent Ken Livingstone in last year's mayoral election, called Johnson "my knight on a shining bicycle" in comments to The Guardian.

What does BGR stand for? Though it could easily be booger, in this case it's burger, which is what you'll get for free if you go to a local BGR The Burger Joint today with the letters "inked" on any body part. And yes, they can just be written on your hand with a ballpoint pen.

• Metrobus fareboxes are functioning, although some bus operators had difficulty logging onto them earlier this morning. If that was the case, customers were allowed to ride without paying.
• The Bus Operations Control Center had early difficulty communicating with buses on the streets, however bus radios came back into service at about 10 a.m.
• All reservation and dispatch systems for MetroAccess returned to use at about 10 a.m.

Susie Cambria, via her excellent Budget & Policy Corner blog, reminds us that there are 900 D.C. foster children who are hoping to get Christmas presents this holiday season, and the Child and Family Services Agency needs D.C. residents to help. If you're able to purchase a few gifts for some needy local foster kids this year, you can find more details on this flier. Just tell CFSA how many children you can buy gifts for, and they'll give you the age, gender and sizes for each child. Delivery dates for gifts for specific kids are Dec. 7 & 8, while general toy donations can be dropped off on Dec. 14 or 15. Also on the flier are details on how to put together a Thanksgiving dinner basket for a CFSA family.

The authors (and dare we say, the readers) of this web site often get pretty exercised over pedestrian and cyclist safety issues, especially when so many of these kinds of accidents seem to involve city bus drivers. But a new study of relative pedestrian safety finds that D.C. is actually one of the safer cities in the country to be traveling through without an automobile. According to Transportation for America, a transportation advocacy group, walking in Washington is less dangerous than in 31 other metro areas in the U.S.

Typically I try not to describe a band's sound by listing every obvious influence and antecedent. But when it comes to Wolfmother, the exercise is almost impossible to avoid. Their sound is a skein of 70's rock tropes. Songs contain blatant borrowings from Steppenwolf, Led Zepplin, The Rolling Stones, Black Sabbath, etc. Everything from little riffs, to entire melodies, to more esoteric thematic robberies. It's not bad to borrow but there is certainly a big difference between what someone like Jack White has managed to do with his influences and what Wolfmother is doing with theirs.

New York businessman Joel Azumah wrote to DCist today to let us know that his discount bus line, modestly dubbed TransportAzumah, will be launching several new routes servicing D.C. this month. Refreshingly, these routes will not be servicing New York. Instead, Azumah plans to offer non-stop bus service from D.C. to Wilmington, Philadelphia and Boston.

By DCist Contributor Adam Mazmanian

The Dremo never dies, so long as people long to play flip-cup and watch weird movies in an eclectic taphouse -- assuming there's money for it. Home of the Night of 101 Elvises and the much-missed Psychotronic film series, Dr. Dremo's is looking at a new home. According to an email from manager Andrew Stewart, the backers behind the former Arlington landmark seek to raise $200,000 to build out a location in Clarendon. It's unclear whether the good doctor has found a venue in Clarendon or simply means to keep with the original ambition to find a new home there. Any angel investors out there with a love for Dremo's Redneck Ale? The bar needs $10K minimum, to be paid back over 2 years for 10% annual percentage rate. For my part, I can pledge to spend that much in the form of a tab over 2 years.

Good morning, Washington. Looks like the stunning, unseasonably warm weather we've been enjoying for the last few days will soon be coming to an end. The remnants of Ida are moving in our direction, and while the Capital Weather Gang says we'll miss out on most of the heavy rains, we will be getting clouds, scattered showers, and cooler temperatures into tomorrow. Guess we can't complain -- it is November, after all.

Despite another fatal shooting in Northeast last night, it's worth noting that with less than two months left to go in 2009, the District has recorded 123 homicides all year long, according to D.C. police crime data. That figure continues to reflect a 25 percent decrease in the number of homicides compared to this time last year, when there were already 164 homicides on the books. By all accounts, the Metropolitan Police Department has also seen an improvement in homicide arrests this year.

We reported yesterday on rumors that the Giro d'Italia, one of professional cycling's biggest events, may come to the District for an opening stage in 2011.

Cycle the Ghost Round's photo of what appears to be a 1949 Chevy Fleetline is a fall classic. A quiet Georgetown street, leaves blanketing the car, and a crisp autumn day with blue skies and fluffy clouds; just idyllic.

Sometimes it's the most simple photograph that catches your eye and steals your attention. This photo from every.seven is exactly that: simply beautiful.

Congress Heights on the Rise had the scoop Sunday morning: former D.C. mayor and current Ward 8 Council member Marion Barry is currently filming a pilot for a reality television series. No joke.

No word yet on when the show would make its way to TV or on what network, but folks are telling The Advoc8te they have seen the film crews trailing Barry about town and that members of his staff have confirmed that they are in fact filming a pilot for Barry's reality show. No idea yet on what the focus of the reality show will be, but if in fact true, The Advoc8te isn't really all that surprised. Wasn't it just the next illogical progression for the ultimate showman - his own reality series?

Barry Chief of Staff Bernadette Tolson confirmed for DCist that the pilot is in fact happening, though she claimed not to know the names of the producers behind it (seems pretty hard to believe that Barry's top aide wouldn't have the details, but given this is the Mayor for Life we're talking about, we suppose anything's possible).

The same-sex marriage bill currently before the D.C. Council passed its first formal hurdle today, as the Committee on Public Safety and the Judiciary voted to move the bill on to the full council for debate (see more at D.C. Wire). The committee approved the bill by a 4 to 1 vote; Council member Yvette Alexander (D-Ward 7) was the lone dissenter. Before voting, the committee altered the bill's language to remove a provision that would have eliminated domestic partnerships, as well as broaden the religious exemption. With 10 co-sponsors, the bill is expected to pass the full council with no trouble at all. A full council vote is expected on Dec. 1.

• If you're commuting by car to Montgomery County this evening, you might want to come up with some other plan, or wait until much later. The county's traffic lights still aren't timed right after a malfunction this morning.
• Area corporate executive denied first class seating on United Airlines because he was wearing a track suit. WTTG/FOX5 investigates!
• Jean Cryor, commissioner of the Montgomery County Planning Board, has died at the age of 70, AP reports.