What’s the District’s chief exec really up to today?

MONDAY, AUGUST 21, 2006

Event: Remarks, American University Freshman Service Experience

Time: 4 p.m.

Location: American University, Woods Brown Amphitheatre, 4400 Massachusetts Ave. NW

The Lowdown: Ah, everyone’s back from their summer vacations…

The Dish: catfish sub

The Location: Oohhs & Aahhs, 1005 U St. NW, (202) 667-7142.

The Price: $8.95, with one side

The Skinny: Between the heat outside and the bubbling deep-fat fryer inside, the temperature behind the counter at Oohhs & Aahhs, the soul-food hole on U Street NW, must be close to 110 degrees Fahrenheit. But owner Oji Abbott refuses to doff his whites—or, in his case, his black chef’s jacket and toque. He’s either a fool or foolishly committed to his art. One bite of his catfish sub, and you realize it’s the latter. Because he prepares his sandwiches individually, dredging each thin fillet in a seasoned flour mixture and carefully monitoring its progress in the fryer, Abbott will make you wait for your food. But it’s time well spent. The perfectly fried fish—crispy and salty on the outside, tender but not muddy on the inside—comes tucked in a lightly grilled sub roll and topped with your preferred condiments. (Note: The mayo-heavy tartar sauce is a must.) When paired with O&A’s legendary mac and cheese, a truly toothsome side of pasta and at least five cheeses, the sandwich rises to the level of a soul-food classic. But if you do order the combo when the mercury’s hitting triple digits, for God’s sake, wait upstairs. It’s air-conditioned up there.

Hollywood’s most anticipated movie opens today, Snakes on a Plane—perhaps you’ve heard of it? Here is my prediction: It will fail. It will fail because it is already a runaway success. Or, the title is. And, really, the title is the film.

The genius of the title is that it capitalizes on two basic fears. Many people are afraid of flying. And who isn’t creeped out by snakes? Like peanut butter and jelly, Lennon and McCartney, Sacco and Vanzetti, it’s a killer combination. But critics and ultimately moviegoers will condemn the film for failing to deliver on the promise of the title, and on this score they will be correct. Because no matter the film’s merits, it can never match a title so powerfully evocative that everyone who hears it instantly creates the perfect horror movie in their head.

Screenwriter Josh Friedman writes a Hollywood-insider blog about his adventures in the screen trade, “I Find Your Lack of Faith Disturbing.” He recounts getting a call from his agent early in the Snakes development process; he took the meeting entirely because of the title. “It’s perfect. Perfect. It’s the Everlasting Gobstopper of movie titles,” he wrote. “What else do you need to know? How the snakes get on the plane, what the snakes do once they’re on the plane, who puts the snakes on the plane, who is trying to get the snakes off the plane…This is not for you to ponder. There are snakes on the plane. End of fucking story.”

Exactly. And end of movie. However star Samuel L. Jackson saves the day is, at this point, beside the point. Once film geeks became aware of the title, the international cabal of Internet-connected, overly media-savvy and -saturated fanboys sprang into action, making up their own Snakes on a Plane. From blogs such as Snakes on a Blog and Snakes on a Whatever, to YouTube trailer mashups, the movie quickly became a paradigm, a tabula rasa onto which everyone could project their own snake onto their particular plane. So the movie disappeared into the construct: Whatever on a Whatever.

The Snakes on a Plane that exists online best captures the essence of the title. Against all the possibilities that the online community has already presented, and continues to generate, even the great Mace Windu is powerless.

The closest comparison with the Snakes phenomenon is The Blair Witch Project in 1999. Though that film’s Internet buzz was in part studio generated, what the films share in common is that they are more concept than motion picture. Everyone I know who saw Blair Witch after it was featured on the cover of both Time and Newsweek hated it. And rightly so. Lured by the hype over a seemingly nonfiction horror flick, what moviegoers saw on the screen was a whole lot of blackness and shaky camerawork worse than your grandfather’s home movies.

It had to be fake, yet I and many others were more than willing to suspend our disbelief. However, I saw The Blair Witch Project once and never felt the need to watch again. Even on cable. Snakes on a Plane will be the same. Hear the title and you’ve already seen it. And you’ll never see it again.

Illustration by Doug Boehm

What’s the District’s chief exec really up to today?

FRIDAY, AUGUST 18, 2006

No public events scheduled.

The Lowdown: Hmm—five days of “No public events scheduled.” Is someone taking a stealth vacation?

Every Thursday, we round up Pay-Whats and other cheap seats at local theaters. Just so’s your weekend is a little easier.

Before we start, remember the general rules: (A) Reservations for these? Not so much. (B) They’re offered on a space-available basis, so have a backup plan. (C) Click each theater name for details and contact info. Oh, and you might tell ‘em City Paper sent you.

Well, this feature has officially run aground: It’s the deadest time of the theatrical year, with the possible exception of the week between Christmas and New Year’s. Almost nothing is opening this week. And because Pay-Whats tend to be offered during previews, just before openings, well…almost nothing is being Pay-Whatted.

There is this Hatchery Festival thing, which wraps up this weekend—and as with the last two weeks, there are a couple of Pay-What performances associated with that. See below for details.

And it bears repeating that all the Hatchery performances are pretty cheap. Technically these are workshops, which are all about giving promising young playwrights a chance to see their possibly rough work on its feet—so you pays your money and you takes your chances.

Still, the festival is right here in Adams Morgan through this Sunday, Aug. 20—and if you’re a DCAC member, admission is the same $10 you’d spend on a movie. (It’s only $15 for non-members.)

So think of it this way: Even if what you see isn’t so hot, it’s probably better than…wait, what shall we pick on this week?…Oh, I’ve got it: Talladega Nights. So go check out a show, then come back here and post your review as a comment.

Here’s the rundown on the final Hatchery show:

• The Woodpecker, The Hatchery. Set in Arkadelphia, Ark., hometown of 25-year-old playwright Samuel Brett Williams. A “pitch-black comedy about endangered species and Guantanamo.” Gee, by “endangered species” do we mean democracies, civil liberties, and enlightened discourse? Nope, apparently we mean actual woodpeckers. Though I’m guessing there’s a metaphor in there somewhere. Rorschach regular Grady Weatherford directs. Pay-What workshop performances Saturday and Sunday at 3 p.m. At DCAC, 2438 18th St. NW.

Every Tuesday and Thursday, we run down what’s going on in local Internet discussion groups.

columbia_heights
Most. Depressing. Post. Ever. Abridged from C.J.’s original poem:

OPTIONS
(For My Parents – Alice F. and Joseph L.)

…During the first realization that you were with Kid
You should’ve done to me what with your first-born you did -
Taken an Olympic-type dive off of the end of your bed,
In an infallible attempt to crush my newly formed head.

If you were warned about drinking while carrying me
You could’ve swung by a Liquor Store and set yourself free;
Ingesting anything you desired that would totally serve
To disconnect “me” from your every nerve.…

Rather than taking me through those eight years of hell
You could’ve entered the tallest building, dropped me over the rail;
You could’ve created a receptacle, and burned me as ash,
Or simply wrapped and deposited me in your “Landlady’s” trash.

MPD-4D
A crime report from Aug. 13 suggests more questionable parenting. The incident occurred on the 100 block of Longfellow Street NW; one can only hope the kid wasn’t strapped in at the time. “[The complainant] reports that she and [the suspect] were involved in a verbal arguement. [The suspect] then picked up an infant car seat and threw it at [the complainant] causing a small laceration above [the complainant's] eye. [The suspect] then ran to her car and returned with a hatchet and swung it at [the complainant] several times but didn’t strike her. [The suspect] then chased [a different complainant] out of the house with the hatchet. [The suspect] was apprehended and placed under arrest.”

Artists-Models
Tim needs volunteers this weekend to work on the set of “NUDIST CAMP ZOMBIE MASSACRE” in Stafford, Va. “Sunday is the big climax of the film where Beth, played by Zui finally meets and teams up with the alien Remco,” he writes, before posting a call for make-up artists, PAs, grips, and “Actors to play Nudists.” Oh yeah: “[I]f anyone has a whip please bring it for the Devo zombie.”

What’s the District’s chief exec really up to today?

THURSDAY, AUGUST 17, 2006

No public events scheduled.

The Lowdown: See, Tony, that’s what happens when you take all your vacations when everyone else is working. Now everyone else is gone, and you’re lonely.

In tomorrow’s City Paper, you’ll find:

• A cover profile of pickpocket hunter Cedric Mitchell by Huan Hsu. This Metro detective is the city’s top cop when it comes to catching artful dodgers—and he has some pretty strange relationships with some of them.
• In Loose Lips: James Jones details how Linda Cropp screwed up her smear of fellow mayoral candidate Adrian Fenty. Plus: Marion Barry throws his weight around a school-board race, and an item on Natwar Gadhi’s political donation habits.
• Jason Cherkis on the long-overdue overhaul of the city’s most notorious dump.
• In Young & Hungry: Anne Marson on the final days of San Marco, a too-often-overlooked example of a dying breed: the neighborhood Italian joint
• Plus Mark Jenkins on Scritti Politti’s new album and more film, music, and theater

Dennis O’Connor, 2006 graduate of UDC’s David A. Clarke School of Law, has just achieved his first legal victory: a claim against his alma mater in the District’s Commission on Human Rights. A July 26 decision held that O’Connor, who uses a wheelchair, had been discriminated against by the university because there were stairs in his way at graduation (”Suit Yourself, Part 2,” City Desk, 6/9) at the
university amphitheatre*, because the wheelchair-friendly doors to the law library closed too early, and because UDC didn’t have a proper wheelchair-evacuation plan in the event of an emergency.

“This is great,” says O’Connor, who came to UDC because Robert Burgdorf, the original drafter of the Americans with Disabilities Act, is on the faculty.

“Mr. O’Connor has got his right to express his feelings, to take whatever course of action he feels was necessary,” says less-enthused UDC spokesperson Michael Andrews, who also points out that some of the problems O’Connor complained about have since been fixed. “The bottom line is that Mr. O’Connor was a student here, and he was able to earn his degree. It seems to me he was able to deal with these problems satisfactorily.”

O’Connor has a pretty good idea of what he wants out of this: “Money,” he says. “Lots of money.”

CORRECTION, 8/17: Due to an editing error, the orginal post mistakenly claimed that the decision addressed O’Connor’s graduation ceremony. It didn’t address the graduation ceremony specifically but rather general accessibility problems O’Connor had at the amphitheatre.

On Aug. 3, Department of Public Works (DPW) investigators discovered an abandoned boat washed up in a less-than-ideal dock—the shoulder of the northbound access road along Kenilworth Avenue NE near the Maryland line.

The vessel, a MacGregor speedboat, white with steel-blue trim, was tied atop a trailer. Its new environment had not been kind: The trailer was missing its tires. One rudder had been torn off. And its steering wheel had been swiped. Inside the boat, people had dumped three tires and several crumpled empties.

Since the private hauler DPW contracted needed to find an adequately equipped flatbed truck to take it away, the boat would get a six-day stay on Kenilworth—and a Tuesday-night visit from Omar Johnson.

Johnson had an explanation for the boat’s new environs. He claimed the boat was his, that he had sold it but when the buyer couldn’t make his payments, he had to repo the boat to this strip. He offered to sell it for $2,800. By way of salesmanship, Johnson said he’d christened the vessel Sandy the White Freak.

Sandy, he says, provided some happy memories. “I took it on the marina a couple times, ate some crabs,” he boasted. “And banged a few bitches.…As you can see, it’s very tight. You do the math.” Johnson’s offer on Sandy was good for a few more hours. He claimed he would be coming back to the MacGregor in the morning to move it to friendlier shores.

Instead, on Wednesday, Aug. 9, DPW hauled the boat away to its Blue Plains impoundment lot.

What’s the District’s chief exec really up to today?

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 16, 2006

No public events scheduled.

The Lowdown: No presser? Plotkin misses you, Tony.

Every Tuesday and Thursday, we run down what’s going on in local Internet discussion groups.

MPD-1D
On July 27, ebranic stimulates the collective gag reflex by describing a neighbor who hoards “loosely-wrapped” bags of dog crap in her front yard. “Over the course of several days a collection of bags grows on her front step, and on any given day the pile stinks to high heaven,” writes the peeved resident. “I cannot leave my window open without the ‘fragrance’ of baked dog poop entering my home.” Eleven days and 43 posts later, there’s a new poop problem in the neighborhood: e-list diarrhea. “Clearly dog poop is a major issue in the 1st District!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” writes D Grant, who later apologizes for his immodest use of exclamation points. “I [couldn't] take another reply to the pooper post.”

MPD-1D
Those thievin’ horticulprits have struck a new low. “I was affected firsthand by this last night when apx. 15 hostas that were recently planted at my daughter’s day care center – having been paid for with money from a grant we received from a community gardening group – were dug up and stolen,” writes Angela. “I…realize that in the big picture, this is not an A-list crime, but it really galls me that someone not only stole plants but that they stole them from small children at an obviously marked day care.” Eric suggests that it is, in fact, an A-list crime worthy of an A-list response. “Having had this exact problem happen in our garden two years ago,” he writes, “my wife and I encased the root balls of our plants in chicken wire and then bolted them to the stone wall planter.”

MPD-6D
Trish asks the police for help in catching red-light runners at a busy intersection of Pennsylvania Avenue SE. She also wants to know if somebody can fix the bad grammar on a nearby sign, which she says reads, “Red means stop, yellow means break, don’t run red yours life’s at stake.” Sixth District Commander Robin Hoey implies that he can at least assist in the crime-fighting department. “If the sign say it, we should be enforcing it.”

Heads up: At long last, Trey Graham has posted his final entry (for this year, anyway) over at Fringe & Purge, our Fringe Fest blog. He’s got a lengthy wrapup, with lots of input from producers and performers and all the rest. He’d love to have your input, too.

Thanks to all the readers who gave Trey tips, comments, criticism, and everything else. Same time next year?

What’s the District’s chief exec really up to today?

No public events scheduled.

The Lowdown: Spending some time with Madame Chairman down at the Superior Court file room, perhaps?

Posted by Zak Stambor
How does Metro calculate train arrival times? It’s definitely not accurate—I’ve timed it!

Metro knows their passenger information display system monitors (PIDS) don’t match the actual train arrival times. Rather, the signs show Metro’s train schedule.

As long as Metro trains remain on automatic control (i.e., the driver doesn’t actually take over the controls) and there’s no delays due to passengers cramming into trains, a train malfunction, or other factors, the PIDS is accurate, says Metro spokesman Cathy Asato.

But even though PIDS don’t show the trains’ actual locations, Metro does monitor every train at Metro’s operations control center at its downtown headquarters, at Sixth and F streets NW.

So why don’t they display trains’ actual arrival times?

The PIDS system, which has been in place since October 2000, cannot handle real-time changes, according to Asato. She does note that Metro has enhanced the signage, for instance to feature a train’s number of cars, alongside the line color, destination, and number of minutes the train is expected to arrive.

Every Monday, the ‘Huh?’ Bub takes your questions. Got one?