Photo by brianmka

Good morning, Washington, and happy Friday before a holiday weekend! At least, for some of you. Most of us seem to have to work on Monday anyway, solidifying Columbus Day’s place as the least useful and most offensive of federal holidays. On the bright side, it looks like we’ll have some decent weather for the most part. On the dark side, getting around the city via Metrorail is going to be totally effed. We’ll have more reminders on that for you later.

Protest Against Teacher Layoffs: The Washington Teachers Union managed to get more than 1,000 people to come out on Thursday afternoon for a protest against the most recent round of DCPS layoffs, the Examiner reports. We’ll have some photos of the protest, which seems to be evidence of mounting distrust of the Fenty administration having reached new heights, for you later this morning.

Taxi Bribery Tapes Played in Court: The Post and City Paper both have reports from U.S. District Court yesterday, when federal prosecutors played some of the surreptitious recordings from the ongoing taxicab industry bribery case. They played the tapes with the hope of keeping Yitbarek Syume, who has lately also been accused of threatening to murder FBI informant Abdulaziz Kamus, in jail until his trial. Judge Deborah A. Robinson is expected to make a ruling on that matter today.

Briefly Noted: Teenage girl caught in crossfire gets shot in the head in Northeast … Man shot in his Bethesda garage … Firefighters catch fire during sprinkler demo … Family of girl who died at Rumsey Aquatic Center upset with Fenty administration response … Oh yeah, and Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize.

This Day in DCist: In 2008, we interviewed Sarah Vowell, and in 2007, we wondered if we should rename the Navy Yard Metro stop.