From the 30 Bus, 1992

LL says "had been," because the mayor has canceled.

When asked in recent weeks, Fenty has said repeatedly that executive-legislative relations have been "great"—with all available evidence to the contrary.

So maybe things aren't as hunky-dory as he says. Or maybe there's a reasonable explanation; LL awaits an answer.

UPDATE, 3:30 P.M.: Mayoral spokesperson Mafara Hobson has a damn good excuse: Hizzoner's appearing at a D.C. Housing Authority press conference with Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan.

Richard Layman, over at Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space, is capping on our recent cover story about bike helmets. After laying out his own biography vis-a-vis helmets, Layman goes prescriptive on what Washington City Paper could have done to produce a better cover story. Here goes:

The City Paper article would have been better had it been motivated to go beyond snarky, and discussed the difference between riding in the U.S. and Europe, and had they interviewed bicycling experts beyond head injury types, such as Rutgers University professor John Pucher (see "John Pucher – the Bicycle Scholar" from Momentum Magazine and the full paper, "Making Cycling Irresistible: Lessons from the Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany") or Anne Lusk, a researcher at Harvard's School of Public Health (see this column by Neal Peirce, "A New Two-Wheeled Course?" about cycle tracks and Anne's work).

Shit! Man, I knew we were missing something! I should have sent an advance copy over to Layman, and this disaster would have been averted. I mean, how do you write a comprehensive story about cycling in D.C. without drawing comparisons with Europe? That section would have worked perfectly right between the story about D.C. bike messenger Rico and the local guy who died from a bike accident in Colorado. My apologies.

As for failing to consult with Pucher and Lusk—again, a huge belly flop.

We'll let Layman have the last word on this: "Sadly, the City Paper is most happy being snarky in its articles, rather than taking a step beyond conventional wisdom."

Surely, Amazon's preorders are already through the roof. If you haven't heard the details yet, the package will be "packed with bonus features that are sure to please even the most hardcore Twilighter.

"They include extended and deleted scenes, three music videos, a commentary with director Catherine Hardwicke, Robert Pattinson, and Kristen Stewart, a featurette on the "Comic-Con Phenomenon" and an in-depth, seven-part documentary, The Adventure Begins: The Journey from Page to Screen, that takes the fan through each step of the film-making process."

A seven-part doc! That should appease even the most ardent Twihards. (Yeah, I said it.)

Yet if you poke around the Post newsroom a bit, you can find an initiative or two that has some beef and some direction. Take the Book World project. A component of the Sunday Post package, Book World, like book sections everywhere, isn't exactly lighting up the revenue sheets, thanks to the longrunning bad fortunes of the book industry.

So the Post is trying to sell its book fare to newspapers across the country that've either bagged or drastically reduced their own coverage.

Here's Book World Editor Marie Arana on the matter:

"We're looking at the possibility of launching a Book World Digest, which will be a single
broadsheet page, which we'll place in papers around the country. The papers
seem to be very eager to get it, given the paucity of book editorial staff
to fill the readers' interest. It will probably be done on a special
syndication basis."

More to come.

This afternoon, I strolled over to ubiquitous retailer CVS's Adams Morgan outlet, at 1700 Columbia Road NW. There I purchased a 99-cent bottle of aspirin and two packages of AAA batteries—2-for-1 deal today!

For my $7.32, I not only received the aforementioned goods, but 22¼ inches worth of receipt. Just what am I getting with all that paper?

• About 5½ inches is your usual receipt stuff—store address, date and time, items purchased, subtotal, tax, cash, change.
• One-half inch is for a bar code. Yeah, apparently receipts need bar codes now.
• Three-eighths of an inch is for a "TRIP SUMMARY" informing me I've saved $5.99 today.
• Three-eighths of an inch is for a Flexible Spending Account summary, which might be helpful if I had one.
• About 1½ inches is for a 40-word statement explaining exactly why the Flexible Spending Account summary might be helpful.

• One inch is for a "REMINDER TO PICKUP A LITTLE SOMETHING FOR THE SITTER, HAIR DRESSER, TEACHER, PAPERBOY, GROOMER OR CO-WORKER. WE'VE GOT SOMETHING IN THE RIGHT SIZE FOR ANYONE!"
• Another half-inch is used to remind me that I can "SHOP 24 HOURS A DAY AT CVS.COM" and to thank me for spending my drugstore dollar at CVS.
• Three-quarters of an inch is used to inform me that I've spent $30.38 at CVS in Fall 2008.
• Now, the next five-and-three-quarter inches is for a coupon for a free $25 gift card with a new or transferred prescription. That includes:
• One and three-eighths inches for another CVS logo and an "extracare/coupon" logo
• One inch to tell me what the coupon is for, and an expiration date
• Another half-inch for a bar code
• Three-eighths an inch for some unexplained nine-digit number
• A quarter-inch for my ExtraCare Card number (actually only the last four digits—the rest is all asterisks)
• Two full inches for a 59-word disclaimer explaining that this doesn't count if your script is paid for by any government program or if it's for a controlled substance in Louisiana, among other restrictions
• A quarter-inch for another inscrutable number, this one 11 digits.
• After that is a second 5½-inch coupon, for $1 off any Cottonelle or Scott Bath Tissue 4 or 12 pack. This includes all of the elements on the other coupon, though the disclaimer on this one is only 1¼-inch. ( It does note that the offer "EXCLUDES PRESCRIPTIONS, ALCOHOL, GIFT CARDS, LOTTERY, MONEY ORDERS, POSTAGE STAMPS, PRE-PAID CARDS & TOBACCO PRODUCTS"—not sure how that applies to a toilet-paper discount offer.)
• And, for good measure, a half-inch of plain white space.

I appreciate all of this added value, CVS—don't get me wrong—but what I'd appreciate more is if you could keep the receipt to, say, five inches, cut your paper costs, maybe take a nickel off that pack of batteries, and give me a receipt I can actually fit in my wallet.

Thanks!

I blame men’s workplace fashion. If offices would stop forcing men to wear jackets and ties maybe they wouldn’t need the air conditioning up so high. Call me second wave, but I’ve got to assume that men are still setting the standards for indoor climate control.

Note that the U.S. Capitol is the worst A/C freak in D.C. They can kill the global warming legislation if they want; they should just turn up the indoor temperature a little bit for some green brownie points. A Capitol maintenance guy told one Capitol Hill reporter (who keeps a space heater in her office even in July) that the lawmakers would complain that it was too warm and so he sets it as low as it will go – 58 degrees.