Results tagged “parade>”

This weekend sure is a busy one. What with the National Cherry Blossom Festival Parade is on Saturday morning, the Credit Union Cherry Blossom 10-Mile Run and 5K Run-Walk on Sunday morning, plus Wizards, DC United and Nationals games all happening on Saturday night, off-peak hours this weekend on Metro are likely to resemble rush hour. In order to keep up, Metro has no weekend track work scheduled, and they've instituted a number of service changes.

We told you last week that the annual Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus Pachyderm Parade was set to begin this morning at around 10 a.m. at Garfield Park. Reader Elisabeth Grant confirms the parade got off to an on-time start this morning, and sent us the capture below, taken at about 10:30 a.m. from her office window on 4th Street SE in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. Check our map of the elephant parade route to see if the animals are heading toward you.

              

Plenty of our Flickr contributors went down to enjoy the annual Chinese Lunar New Year Parade on Sunday afternoon. Unfortunately, a lot of folks ended up disappointed by the sudden cancellation of the traditional five-story firecracker display. The lighting of the giant firecracker was finally called off after being delayed for a full two hours due to a suspected gas leak. We've heard from a lot of parade spectators who stood by through the entire delay and were none too pleased to have been let down after waiting so long. D.C. fire spokesperson Alan Etter told the Associated Press that a strong odor of gas appeared to be coming from a manhole near 6th and H Streets NW, and apparently fire officials exercised extreme caution by eventually deciding to the cancel the pyrotechnics.

At about 4:15 p.m., a group of about 20 drummers and musicians were parading down the middle of 13th Street NW in Columbia Heights, playing their instruments and headed south to the African American Civil War Memorial at 10th and U Streets NW. The group brought along a wheeled cart with drums and other instruments on it.

   

Reader Matt Ashburn sent in these captures of workers installing special street lamp globes adorned with golden eagles along Pennsylvania Ave. The eagles are being placed in time for the inaugural parade on Jan. 20.

Last week, WTOP was guesstimating that as many as 2,000 to 3,000 port-a-potties were being ordered to place around the city for Inauguration Day, but today the Post gets the scoop on the actual number: 5,000! Yes, 5,000 portable toilets will be installed along the parade route and around the National Mall, more than double the 2,200 provided in 2005. We'll say one good thing about the likelihood that it's going to be a cold day in Washington on January 20 -- at least the smell of all that human waste has a good chance of being tamped down by freezing temperatures.

According to the Washington Business Journal, there are still hotel rooms to be had in the D.C. metro area during the presidential inauguration next month. The paper is pointing to Destination DC's assertion that it currently has a line on over 1,400 available hotel rooms within 30 miles of the city. Anyone still looking for a room is being encouraged to call Destination DC's toll-free number, 1-800-422-8644, to inquire about available lodging. Of course, the key line is that the rooms that are left are going for per night prices ranging "from $100 to more than $1,000 per night." Good luck finding anything on the lower end of that scale.

If you won't be in D.C. for Barack Obama's inauguration on Jan. 20, you have a chance to at least get a sense of what you'll be missing earlier that month. The Post reported today that the official inaugural rehearsal date has been set for Jan. 11. The inauguration dress rehearsal, which features stand-ins for most of the VIPs, is done every year early in the morning on a Sunday before the inauguration. This year's rehearsal runs from 5:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. that morning, and will allow the Armed Forces Inaugural Committee to run through the program twice in a row. The rehearsal will be open to the public, so if you feel like getting up early that morning, head down to Pennsylvania Ave. to catch a preview of some of the bands that will be playing in the inaugural parade.

The Inaugural Parade has seen more than its fair share of controversy over the last few years. In 2001, a few protesters scuffled with police, resulting in six arrests. In 2005, D.C. police were accused by the ACLU of making false arrests and indiscriminately using pepper spray during the inauguration festivities. This past March, a federal court ruled that the park service had violated the First Amendment by preventing war protesters from getting near the parade. So news over the weekend that the National Park Service has proposed new rules about where the public can be during the parade come as no surprise.

       

Even though it literally rained on our Capital Pride parade this year, the spirit of celebration certainly wasn't dampened. Here's just a few of our favorite shots from the DCist Flickr pool.

In case you haven't noticed, it's Capital Pride week here in D.C. The 33rd annual celebration of all things LGBT in the nation's capital culminates in a parade tomorrow and the street festival on Sunday.

The Cherry Blossom parade will modify many downtown Metrobus routes this weekend. The parade starts this Saturday at 10 a.m. and marches on Constitution Avenue between 7th and 17th streets, and will force the 5A, 13, 32, 34, 35, 36, 52, 54, 66, 70, 80, P6, S2, S4 and V8 to alter their routes until about 1 p.m. If you plan on taking any of these buses tomorrow, you should expect delays.

The United States Park Police, DDOT and MPD have released the following road closure advisories for Saturday's Veterans Day Parade. All closures should be re-opened by 5 p.m. Saturday.

There's something inherently likable about about Spencer Krug. Just ask Wolf Parade bandmate Dan Boeckner who snidely referred to him as the guy that everybody likes. Although that was a clear barb, Boeckner has a point. Dante DeCaro, another fellow Wolf Parade member likes him enough to continue touring with Krug (under the moniker of opener Johnny & The Moon). Fellow Canadians Carey Mercer (Frog Eyes) and Dan Bejar (Destroyer) like him enough to work...

Saddle Creek Records was kind enough to let us offer DCist readers a couple of free MP3s in honor of the first Georgie James music video, which just hit the Internets for the first time yesterday. Sure sure, you're busy listening to the new Radiohead album you just downloaded this morning, but go ahead and download these while you're at for later listening. They're free, after all. Both tracks are from the band's recently...

The high point of this week in classical music is surely the Lieder recital by the superlative German baritone Christian Gerhaher and his regular pianist collaborator, Gerold Huber, sponsored by the Vocal Arts Society at the Embassy of Austria (October 11, 7:30 p.m.). Gerhaher's most recent Lieder recording is a knockout, and his program for Thursday night is devoted entirely to songs by Robert Schumann. THE SYMPHONY: >> Riccardo Chailly brings his La Scala Philharmonic...

>> There's a new webcam available showing the progress of Monument Realty's Half Street project, which includes the expansion of the Navy Yard Metro station. [Near Southeast DC Redevelopment] >> Georgetown student pleads not guilty in hate crime investigation. [WJLA/AP] >> Members of the Metro board representing D.C. are pushing for higher parking fees at suburban stations in order to avoid increasing bus fares. [Examiner] >> A bunch of streets will be closed this...

FRIDAY: >> Howard University alum Eric Roberson performs tonight at the Black Cat along with Emily King. Doors open at 9 p.m. $17. >> It's pretty much the end of times: Vanilla Ice will be at Foggy Bottom bar McFadden's tonight, "drinking, partying, and hosting the night" starting at 10 p.m. $5 Jager bombs and $2 Bud and Bud Light bottles are little enticement to make this event anything more than laughable, but maybe if...

We first heard about DieYuppieKickball.com over the weekend -- like some seed that had been delicately germinating for a few weeks, it burst forth into the sunlight of popular consciousness seemingly all at once, displaying its angry, vengeful sprout for all to see. In other words, seems like everyone's been talking about this lately. It surely doesn't take too much explanation to understand what this web site is all about, but here's an excerpt from...

The Examiner reports on a $36,000 bill received by the organizers of the 2007 Capital Pride Festival from the D.C. police and the Emergency Management Agency, who say they need the money to pay for overtime and other costs for security incurred during the June festival. But the festival's organizers and some members of the D.C. Council are questioning the charges, since the agencies waived these same fees last year and other annual parades, like...

YouTube user artschoolscrewup only recently uploaded this video from D.C.'s July 4th parade, which shows the guy playing Uncle Sam on stilts falling on his butt. A quick search reveals that Uncle Sam on Stilts Taking Abuse is on its way to becoming its own YouTube genre, but questions abound: is it funny for any Uncle Sam to look silly, or only ones on stilts? And why the prevalence of putting Sam on stilts...

>> Continuing their trend of showing only the weirdest awesome movies for free in this city, the Library of Congress' Mary Pickford Theater will actually screen an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 tonight as part of their Screening Shakespeare series. Really. It's the episode of MST3K where the crew is forced to watch a laughably bad German made-for-TV adaptation of Hamlet -- as the press release rightly notes, "is that Ricardo Montalban as...

MONDAY >> The City Veins are a strong local outfit that's been making their debut around town over the course of the past few months. They just formed in March and are already more mature and ready to bring the rock than a lot of bands with a lot more stage time. And hey, they have a blog! See what you're missing tonight at Solly's Tavern on U Street. 10 p.m. >> Do you...

Last month we got a letter from reader Christine, who related the follwing story and asked us to look into it. I recently moved to Fairfax, VA to live with my parents until my marriage next month to a marine who is stationed at 8th and I Marine Barracks in SE. After their Friday evening parade, many of the guys like to grab a beer or two. This Friday, myself, my fiancee, and five others...

MONDAY >> If you'd like to see how infinity is treating them, Souls of Mischief, of the album '93 to Infinity fame (released in 1993 of course), will bring mid-90s hip-hop to the Black Cat tonight. We assume they've updated their sound a bit since then, but quite frankly, we'll take some throwback hip-hop any day. With DJ Lex, Icon the Mic King, Kaze and Zeph & Azeem. 9 p.m., $10. TUESDAY >> For our...

Are you a resident of Washington, D.C. and looking for a new job? D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton is hosting her 10th annual Norton Job Fair, at the Washington Convention Center's Hall C on Tuesday, July 10, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. You need to show proof of D.C. residency to attend (either a valid D.C. driver's license, or picture ID plus a utility bill with your address), the idea being to give D.C....

Happy Friday, Washington! Oh, wait. It's Tuesday. But we're not going in to work tomorrow! Oh, wait again. We have to come in on Thursday. And Friday. This is confusing. We'll have some more info for you later today on how to avoid the crowds and have a stellar 4th of July celebration -- just as soon as we can wrap our heads around the idea of stumbling to our desks on the 5th, totally...

What with Paris Hilton's release earlier this week and the upcoming celebration of American Independence (sorry, Londonist!), we've been thinking a lot about freedom. Freedom to vote, freedom to choose, and most importantly, freedom to blog. Here are a few things we're happy we've been free to blog about this week. Being the nation's capital, DCist felt especially proud to let freedom ring this week by exposing the really important issues, like how sad they...

From the tallest skyscraper in the City of Brotherly Love to Canadian tourism copywriting brilliance, here's what you should know from our -ist cities: This week, Phillyist took a gleeful listen to the White Stripes' exciting new release, watched in awe as their new tallest skyscraper was finally completed, found a cheaper way to get to Gothamist, invented a tasty new dessert, and brought back their Craigslist Round-Up feature with a bang. Bostonist watches...

FRIDAY: >> Let it be known - any country with a holiday that translates as "party of music" (or "music party") is OK in our book. In celebration of the French holiday Fete de la Musique, as well as the summer solstice, French and American musicians will be performing at La Maison Francaise tonight. Local guitar and cello duo Janel and Anthony*** will play from 8 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. on the auditorium stage, but...