Have you heard the news ? The National Zoo’s panda, Mei Xiang, might be pregnant.

Oh lord, here we go again.

All panda stories strike a particularly nostalgic chord with me. This is not because I lived across from the National Zoo when I was a toddler (I did. It was awesome). Nor is it because I just adore pandas in all their slow moving, bamboo-gnawing cuteness. Nor is it that I care about their plight as an endangered species.

No, any mention of a panda brings me back to my first days as a reporting intern a few summers ago. I was tasked with writing a brief piece about the last baby panda at the National Zoo. I can’t exactly remember that day’s breaking panda news. Maybe, the panda opened its eyes for the first time. Or it had a good check-up. Or it gained three pounds.

Whatever it was, it was clearly something MAJOR. So, I called the damn zoo, wrote the damn story, and didn’t think much of it.

Apparently other people did though. Read the rest of this entry »

Dear American Apparel,

Please accept my congratulations on your decision to stock the Hitachi Magic Wand Vibrator ($50) alongside your sarcastic bling ($48) and (earnest?) sustainable doggie tees ($17). I would also like to extend a long-overdue thanks for the continued excellence of your free fetish porn.

One query, however. Prithee, A.A., how might one best stimulate the clitoris ironically?

Awaiting your reply,

Amanda Hess

P.S.: I see you are calling the device a “massager.” Is this with the same wink-and-nudge that you refer to this as a skirt?

Sioban Farey, she of the incensed, wordy postings regarding the planned closing of the National Cathedral’s greenhouse, is deep in the weeds on this issue now. Since City Desk broke the news the greenhouse would close June 29, Farey and between 65 and 300 other incensed plant-lovers (her estimates) have been busy organizing to stop the insanity.

They’ve launched a rudimentary Web site, savethegreenhouse.org (upgrades are coming), and Farey has been on the horn with the Washington Post (a weekend story is promised) and NBC 4 (news tonight at 6 or 11, she thinks). It was on the front page of the Northwest Current (can’t link to it, sorry) and, well, they are doing this thing; they are going to keep that greenhouse open.

The Cathedral, which has already handed out virtual pink slips to the greenhouse employees, does not appear to be budging. The associate dean, Margaret Bergan Davis, has said (I’m paraphrasing) that cuts need to be made, new visions have to be realized, the greenhouse is not part of said new visions, so good luck, Sioban Farey. Davis left a message on Farey’s machine about all the other green programs going on that still are a part of the Cathedral’s vision. Farey was not impressed.

Farey has said, well, Farey has said a lot. In a 45-minute conversation late this morning, she brought up Darfur, 9/11, the snipers, the Walter Reed scandal, global warming (natch), and the stress our nation’s decision makers are under. (Plants reduce stress. There are studies. She could find them.) For all of these reasons and many more—including people like to buy plants and herbs at the greenhouse—Farey thinks this is a cause worth fighting for.

“I read the strategic report yesterday. They [the Cathedral officials] want more diverse, younger participants. We’re moving into a more enlightened green period. Even if it’s John McCain, it’s going to be more progressive environmentally. America is rejoining the international community….I’ve been working on planet change the last couple of years out of my own personal interest…This is the nation’s church in the nation’s capital and what they’re doing is cutting the tiny greenhouse loved by lots and lots of people….”

Farey of Chevy Chase, D.C. side, says she has also been enlisting “establishment” people, one of whom calls what’s happening “absolutely disgusting” and another of whom promised to pull $1,000 out of her pocket right then and there “and she said she has a friend who’d be willing to contribute considerably more.”

Yet this is not just a greenhouse for the matrons of Cleveland and Glover Parks, she attests. Latinos shop there for the specialized herbs and people “make pilgrimages” there on a regular basis.

In other words, watch out Margaret Bergan Davis. You’re going to have to deal with this one for awhile yet.

(photo by Just Chaos)

A based-on-real-events overheard conversation in D.C.:

Girl 1: Did you like the movie? I thought it was fun, but I didn’t like the ending?
Girl 2: Yeah, the ending was, like, too depressing for me. But the characters were really likable so…
Girl 1: It’s still early? Let’s get a drink? There’s this great bar a block away?
Girl 2: OK. I wonder if they have mojitos. I love mojitos so…
Girl 1: Yeah, I, like, totally love mojitos?
Girl 2: I wonder why I can’t just end a sentence. Why do I always trail off with so? So…
Girl 1: I don’t know? Why can’t I speak without turning everything into a question? It’s weird?
Girl 2: And annoying so…

What the hell, people! This is, like, totally going to ruin your day, but start listening for people who end their sentences with the word “so.” Or with an unnecessary inflection. It will drive you crazy.

This guy I know (OK, I’m married to him) has a simple theory about the District: There are two types of people, those who make it a great place to live and those who make you want to scream. Last night I encountered a card-carrying member of the latter group at the MLK Library.

This was at the famed Washingtoniana room on the third floor, the go-to spot to research D.C. neighborhoods. Or maybe it’s not so famous, because when I called the main number of the library to ask if this room would be open during regular library hours, I talked to someone who seemingly had never heard of it. She gave me another number to call, an automated message with general hours and the location. Screw it, I said, and hopped on the 42 bus to take my chances.

The room was, indeed, open and the librarian in there was, at first, nice enough. She pointed me to the stacks, gave me a bibliography binder that has seen better days, and told me to start with the books. When I was done with those, she said, I could come back and she would pull some hanging files for me. I could not pull them myself, she let me know, and I could not check them out. Fair enough. I dug into the books, only when I was ready for the hanging files, she was about two minutes into her 45-minute high-decibel telephone diatribe about some loan she couldn’t pay off, about how she was going to have to use credit-card checks, about how no one understood her predicament.

By the time she had finished, I didn’t have time to go through all the hanging files. That guy I mentioned (my husband) was leaving to come pick me up and called my cell to tell me so. I talked quietly until I heard the librarian say to me in her now-familiar take-no-prisoners tone: “Miss! Miss! If you’re going to talk on the phone, you’ll have to go outside or go into the hall!”

I get it, I really do. I hate cell phones, loathe them. They are a menace to civility and should have no place in a library. But c’mon, lady. I just listened to you berate someone for almost an hour.

And, while I’m at it, I might as well bring it: As a member of both the D.C. Library system and the Arlington Library system, I’ve concluded that the difference between them is the equivalent of spending six hours at the Half Street inspection station listening to DMV workers bitch about their supervisor and getting a foot rub while a valet parks your car and has it detailed.

Oh, and the drinking fountains at Arlington libraries? Water comes out of them. Amazing.

Like most sports fans who grew up inside the beltway in the 1970s, I rooted for the University of Maryland. Rooted hard. The Terps basketball teams under Lefty Driesell were as lovable and entertaining as any local squad in any sport in my lifetime — where have you gone, Ernie Graham?  — and I screamed for ‘em through what I remember as last-second loss after last-second loss after last-second loss to Dean Smith. (Coach K is more despicable than Smith, for sure, but I’m too old and burned out by those years to work up the same bile for him that I had for Smith.)

 But, after getting sorta immersed in the Terps’ athletic and racial history over the last few months while preparing a story about a guy named Wilmeth Sidat-Singh for this week’s issue, it’s hard to feel anything but hate for the school and the state.

Historically, Maryland might have the worst combination of a liberal veneer and a racist foundation of any state in the union. You don’t have to know much more than what happened to Sidat-Singh back in 1937 to figure that out.

Rather than retell the whole story here, let’s just say a whole lotta people should be burning in hell for the way the state’s flagship university denied Sidat-Singh a chance to play ball because he was the wrong kind of black. 

Sidat-Singh was 19 years old at the time.

Sure, it was a long time ago. But, far as I can tell, the school has not only never apologized for the organized and contractual hate it directed at the teenager — it’s never even acknowledged any wrongdoing.

Somebody in the administration in College Park or the statehouse in Annapolis should step up.

The best local blog I’ve stumbled upon so far: Things Rachael and I Argue About, the diary of a District man’s relationship with his roommate and her creeping insanity. The site details the fascinating spiral of increasingly unbelievable interactions that brew between the blogger and Rachael, a woman who shares his room, and consumes his life. According to the blog’s FAQ:

Q: Did this really happen?
A: YES. ALL OF THIS REALLY REALLY HAPPENED.

Meet Rachael:

Rachael: Why did you lock the bathroom door?
Me: for privacy?
Rachael: are you afraid I’m going to come in there?
Me: no, just a privacy thing
Rachael: yeah right, you don’t trust me
Me: How did you know the door was locked?

In about forty posts (written over an unknown period of time), the blogger detailed all of Rachael’s threats, insults, condescending asides, temper tantrums, and accusations. Then, Rachael found the website. He writes:

Rachael found this webpage. It’s not that I think she’s going to kill me or anything, but she’s just nuts enough to make me genuinely scared for my life. So I’m printing out several copies of this and signing it as testimony, should something bad happen. Knowing her was perhaps the worst thing that happened in my life, and it left me emotionally tortured, financially devistated, and all around feeling a hopelessness for humanity.

The blog hasn’t been updated since I found it last week.

This topic may be a bit unseemly, and I’m usually too apathetic (except, maybe, about foie gras) to start a movement, but someone has to say it. Ladies, you gotta stop this hovering over the toilet bullshit. Get your quad workout somewhere else. You hoverers are the ones causing the problem. You’re the ones splattering all over the seat. Leave aiming to the men. Sit down. The backs of your legs can’t pick up diseases. If everyone sits down, then the seat stays clean. Let’s work together. Let’s sit.

Umbrellas: Useless. A good one might, at best, keep your hair dry. Assuming there’s no wind. Just saying.

I’m not a regular reader of Esquire, but I was checking out the home page and was excited to see a tab for The Best Bars in America. This is slightly misleading because of the democracy the mag allows in its choices; there are bars listed for every state (even Puerto Rico!). So what are the best bars in D.C.? The winners are…The Tune Inn and Hawk ‘n’ Dove. Cue sinking heart. Really, Esquire? Really? You can’t see past Capitol Hill and khaki pants? You refuse us the D.C. culture that exists beyond politics? Go north! Go east! We have literary-themed bars (St.-Ex and Bar Pilar) and freak-inspired bars (Palace of Wonders) and classy bars (ESL and Dragonfly ) and classic bars (Tabard Inn and Old Ebbitt) and on and on. I don’t think you get us at all, Esquire.

Earth Day is coming up. I totally support Earth Day. But not when it comes to my theater program. Some friends and I went to see The History Boys at Studio Theatre over the weekend. (Definitely worth seeing, by the way. They’ve extended the run through May 18, so go buy tickets.) Shortly before the play began we realized we had no programs. Nobody had programs. Upon questioning, one staff member said the lack of programs was Studio’s way of observing Earth Day. I appreciate where they’re coming from, but I want my freakin’ program. I paid for that program. I’m happy to give it back at the end of the play, but I want to know about the play. I want to know who the actors are. I want something to fiddle with if I get bored. So thank you, Studio, for thinking of the environment, but give me back my program.

Washington Gas is making bad service into a form of art. Since November, they’ve sent me two bills every month–one for me, and one with my name on it for the nice lady who lives in the apartment upstairs. She and I verified that it’s her gas bill by checking the meter numbers on the two bills and comparing them to the numbers on our meters. Right after I moved in, she says, Washington Gas sent her a refund check and discontinued her direct payment program. She was baffled.

I’ve explained the problem to Washington Gas call-takers five times. On Mar. 12, after several calls from me, my upstairs neighbor, and even the management company, Washington Gas sent a guy to check the meter numbers. He confirmed the mix-up. I figured that had to be the end of it, but yesterday, I received my neighbor’s bill once again. Like the last two, it says DISCONTINUANCE NOTICE on it. It’s for over $1,000 and there’s no way for her to pay it.

Washington Gas is just hell bent on sending me my poor neighbor’s bill. It’s Theatre of the Absurd over here. It’s like something from a play by Samuel Becket or Harold Pinter. It’s crazy! I explained the problem to a Washington Gas call-taker again yesterday–now I’m escalating the situation with public whining.

I beseech you, teeming millions of City Desk readers, for suggestions on how to solve this problem.

UPDATE 4/9/08: An alert reader forwards me a Mar. 16 Baltimore Sun story on similarly-bad service a Prince George’s County deli owner received from Washington Gas this year.

UPDATE 4/10/08: A woman from corporate communications at Washington Gas called my neighbor and me last night to apologize and say the problem would be fixed. We’ll see…

In Sunday’s Post Magazine, Tom Sietsema wrote a cover story on the increasing noise problem in restaurants. The result is that he is going to include noise ratings along with his reviews. Personally, I don’t get it. Here’s why:

1. Yes, there are loud, busy restaurants, and there are quiet, intimate restaurants. The ambience is already touched on in the review, so why do we need to know exact decibels?

2. How do you give a restaurant an average rating? Price range is easy to give, noise range is not. The noise level changes drastically depending on the night of the week, the hour of the night, the distance from the bar or a large group, etc. I don’t see how one can say a restaurant comes in as 70 decibels.

3. What in the world are restaurants supposed to do? They already are padding/cushioning/draping things all over the place, and it still doesn’t seem to be enough for people. Really, the “problem” is that D.C. is becoming a great place to dine. And restaurants are slammed. And people make noise. This reminds of my itty-bitty hometown in Pennsylvania. The older folks in town complained that kids had nothing to do and were getting into trouble. After a stroke of brilliance, they built a movie theater. Then they started to complain that kids were loitering on the square outside the movie theater. They shut the theater down.

I say welcome the crowds, welcome the noise, and if you want a quiet evening, cook dinner or order takeout from a nice restaurant.

An ongoing chronicle of douchebaggery on the road

Hey, idiot. Yeah, you—the one behind the wheel of 5,000 pounds of steel on 18th Street NW. Come here. There’s something I want to say to you.

No, come closer. It’s a secret. It’s an important secret meant only for you. Are you ready?

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOOOU!

OK, I lied. It’s not a secret that just about every person who drives a car in Our Nation’s Capital is a fucking dumbass. And my ALL-CAPS “Fuck You” isn’t meant only for you, either. It’s for every stupid prick who bought a Hummer to compensate for a tiny dick, every soccer mom who traded in her mini-van for an Escalade, and every compact SUV owner who thinks buying a hybrid makes them less of a piece of shit. Fuck you, every last one of you.

Oh, what’s the matter? Do my words hurt you? Are you upset? Are you furiously typing away a defensive comment right now telling me what a great driver you are, how you need that Ford Escape because every once in a while you buy a big piece of furniture at IKEA, or that you picked up that 4×4 option not out of vanity but because you never know when you’ll feel like getting a little off-road action in through Rock Creek Park while chugging some Coors Light?

Well, dumbfuck car-owner, go for it. And, while you’re at it, P.S.: Go fuck yourself.

And do you know why? It’s because you suck. Try walking through the city for a change instead of spending a million spacebucks on gas each month for the privilege of sitting in traffic while the rest of us get to and from work in less time than you do. Do you know what you’ll see at EVERY FUCKING INTERSECTION? An asshole running a stop sign. Another idiot making a right turn on a red light without stopping. Some dipshit accelerating into a crosswalk trying to beat a pedestrian. “Oh, look at me! I’m an important person driving a tank and I can’t be bothered with civilians trying to cross the street!”

You don’t believe me, because you’re too busy being an asshole in your car, honking at people like the prick that you are. But if you were to get your fat, lazy ass out of your automobile and take a nice stroll or bike ride through town, you’d see drivers such as yourself endangering the lives of pedestrians at every goddamned intersection in the city. It’s true.

So it is for you, the stupid car-owning resident of Washington, D.C., that I write this blog entry—as well as those that will inevitably follow it as I continue to be almost killed by stupid shits such as yourself during my daily 10-minute walk to work. No, no—don’t thank me. Thank the batshit crazy driver of the silver Nissan Pathfinder who refused to stop at the crosswalk on Columbia Ave. Road NW in Adams Morgan even though I was in the middle of it. Thankfully, he wasn’t going fast enough to prevent the big fat fucking loogie I hocked up from landing right in the middle of his rear passenger side window.

Yeah, that’s right. I spit on your fucking car. Deal with it.

Lately, it’s seemed as if Entertainment Weekly has decided that since it couldn’t break celeb news faster than blogs, it would become a place where pop culture was chewed over, which would at least explain all those wretched how-I-grew-up-loving-James Bond-movies/The Big Lebowski/horror-films essays that have been polluting its pages of late.

But if there was one thing you could always count on in Time Inc. publications, it was superior copy-editing. Which is why I’m at a loss upon reading this, in Benjamin Svetkey’s Speed Racer article:

Judging from the advance footage, Speed Racer is a family film alright, but a family film that missed a couple of doses of Ritalin.

Forget the tortured simile. What made me vomit in my mouth a little bit was the spelling “alright.” Goddammit, that’s two words! ALL RIGHT! It’s in the bloody dictionary. Real dictionaries, not the fun little pretendy online ones where you can look up slang terms!

From Webster’s New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition:

al•right (ôl rit) adj., adv., interj. disputed sp. of ALL RIGHT

That’s right, disputed! As in, the theory of evolution is disputed. BY DUMBASSES!

From Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition:

usage The one-word spelling alright appeared some 75 years after all right itself had reappeared from a 400-year-long absence. Since the early 20th century some critics have insisted alright is wrong, but it has its defenders and its users. It is less frequent than all right but remains in common use especially in journalistic and business publications. It is quite common in fictional dialogue, and is used occasionally in other writing <the first two years of medical school were alright— Gertrude Stein>.

“[I]t has its defenders”: They’re called ILLITERATES! Or British journalists, which is practically the same thing. The battle over this dumb usage has been lost in Blighty; I’ll be damned if I’m gonna cede the colonies without a fight. To quote Free: All right now!