D.C. Gov extends the registration date for tour buses to today. Three thousand buses have registrated so far for the inauguration. That's less than the anticipated 10,000 buses. The New York Times debunks more of the hype.

D.C. Gov notes that the Circulator buses are changing it's schedule to make way for the inauguration. Monday's schedule:

The Convention Center to the Southwest Waterfront route will stop operating at 1:00 pm. Passengers are advised to utilize Metrobus route 70 as an alternate, but buses will not be allowed to cross Pennsylvania Avenue.
The Union Station to Georgetown route will operate regular service between 7 am and 3 pm. At 3:00 pm, DC Circulator will no longer be able to access Union Station and buses will use an alternate route.

All Union Station passengers are advised to use the nearest stop located at North Capitol Street and H Street, NW. Traveling toward Union Station on Massachusetts Avenue, NW buses will turn north on 5th Street, NW, travel eastbound on K Street and terminate on North Capitol Street at H Street.

Traveling toward Georgetown, buses will begin on H Street, NW at North Capitol Street, travel down H Street to Massachusetts Avenue and return to their regular route.

Tuesday's schedule:

All regular Circulator service will be suspended.
Metrobus will operate replacement east-west service downtown from H Street, NW at North Capitol Street (near Union Station) to Washington Circle (24th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, NW) via L and M Streets.
Special service Metrobuses on L Street will begin on the south side of Washington Circle, just east of 23rd Street, NW, and end at H and North Capitol Streets near Union Station. These special service Metrobuses will have placards indicating "North Capitol Street" as their destination.
Special service Metrobuses on M Street will begin at H and North Capitol Street, near Union Station and end on 23rd Street just north of Washington Circle. These special service Metrobuses will have placards indicating "Washington Circle" as their destination.
Georgetown service will be provided by Metrobuses on Wisconsin Avenue and M Street between Friendship Heights and Washington Circle. Georgetown buses will begin and end on Pennsylvania Avenue between 24th and 25th Streets, NW, just west of Washington Circle.

Penn Quarter Living has it's own great inauguration roundup. Prince of Petworth has compiled his own list of inaugural options.

New Columbia Heights offers a guide to the neighborhood (for those out-of-towners willing to brave the cold, the security checkpoints, and the possibly large crowds). It's classy:

"Wonderland is the focal point of the neighborhood, tons of people go there and they have DJs upstairs sometimes and pretty good bar food. The Heights and Red Rocks have booze too, but are more restaurants. CommonWealth is, as noted, a pub, and farther north at 14th and Spring is the Red Derby, a great bar with lots of beer, but only in cans – cheaper that way – you'll probably want to take a cab there and back."

Here's our own inauguration guide?

Capital Spice, the self-descibed blog of a couple of D.C. food geeks, did what the rest of us didn't, and it's paying off in links and hits. Mike Bober, who runs the blog with his wife, Elizabeth, read in the papers that 213 bars and restaurants were approved by ABRA (D.C.'s Alcohol Beverage Regulation Administration) to stay open until 4 a.m. for the inauguration. But there was no list of where to go and definitely no map. So Bober got on the horn with ABRA, got the list, and spent an hour or two typing the establishments into Google maps.

We've linked to his genius repeatedly, Marc Fisher at the Post is also a fan.

Bober, 30, who lives in the H Street NE neighborhood (note: I did not call it the Atlas District, Mr. Englert), says his hits have been "going through the roof....We just hope that people who come for the map come back and check us out."

The blog is less than a year old and covers restaurants, news and gossip, and food porn. Bober just blogged about the D.C.-centric "No Reservations" episode airing on the Travel Channel Monday night at 10 and starring our own Tim Carman. (Anthony Bourdain, who?)

Capital Spice is planning to update the map, too. Bars with voluntary agreements had to work those out as of 1 p.m. yesterday if they wanted to be included in early-morning boozing. There were 76 of those pending; yesterday I spoke with Kristen Barden of the Adams Morgan BID who said 33 on and off the 18th Street strip were pending and that 32 of them were likely to be approved. "That's almost half of them right there," says Bober.

As for his inaug plans, Bober says he and the wife scored tickets to the swearing-in from some Hill friends and they plan to make an appearance at Chef Spike's Burger Ball at Good Stuff Eatery. But 3 a.m. shots are not in the plans. "I think we're going to be in hunkering-down mode," he says.

In 2008, firms that were nowhere near as leveraged as Six Flags, which is anywhere from $2 billion to $3 billion-and-some-change in debt, tended to sign on for Chapter 11 protections or just go away.

But Six Flags, albeit with its stock still cratered (down from a Snyder-era high of $11.93 to just 16 cents a share a couple months ago) and its future bleaker than Levi Johnston's, made it through with no such filings.

And with the new year has come the first good news of Snyder's disastrous reign atop the corporation, which began with a stockholder coup he led in late 2005 amid promises he'd boost the stock price and make the parks more family friendly: A barrister in Texas on Friday ruled in favor of Six Flags after a nasty battle over the chain's request to be allowed to sell booze at two parks in the state.

From the Dallas Morning News:

The beer taps could be flowing soon at Six Flags Over Texas and its Hurricane Harbor water park after a yearlong licensing fight.

A state administrative law judge issued two nonbinding opinions Friday recommending that the parks be allowed to sell alcoholic beverages. Carolyn Beck, a Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission spokeswoman, said the agency's administrator rarely rules against an administrative law judge.

After the ruling, Sharon Parker, a Six Flags spokesperson, said she "hopes that beer will be on sale" when the two parks open on Feb. 28.

Apparently, in Snyderland, nothing says "family friendly" like tapped kegs. By this standard, the grounds of FedExField must be the familiest friendliest acreage in this time zone. God love the Mayor...

Alas, not all the recent headlines have pulled Snyder's chain the right way.

Also last week, an animal rights group reaffirmed Six Flags' Vallejo, Calif., outpost as one of the "Ten Worst Zoos for Elephants" for 2008.

That's a list the park makes every year. But a Six Flags official named Nancy Chan told the Vallejo Times-Herald that the designation was "a little insulting" to the animal caretakers there.

How you think the elephants feel, Nance?

And Snyder's first run as overseer of a full-blown Golden Globes Awards show (the writers strike in Hollywood last year crippled last year's production) was a disaster.

Despite the presence of his former suite-mate Tom Cruise, the telecast, which was produced by the now-Snyder/Six Flags-owned Dick Clark Productions, garnered what Nielsen Media Research called "the smallest audience since the awards moved to network TV in 1994."

No wonder Snyder wants more booze.

Keep the dial right here for all the breaking news in Snyder's Six Flags soap opera.

While the fur continues to fly with our federal friends and their thoughts on whether or not we can keep slammin' our Obama Slammers well into the a.m., City Paper's favorite bar owner has been quietly killing it on the Adams Morgan Listserv with his rapier sarcasm.

To wit, regarding (presumably) ANC Commissioner's Bryan Weaver's comments in the Post poo-pooing extended inaugural hours—"To have 3 1/2 days of 24-hour service without any input from the community, there's going to be hell to pay from a lot of neighborhood associations"—"Bill D" responds:

To hear these extremely low level, local politicians speaking out about how they should have been consulted before decisions were made about this grand international event is absurd. I'm surprized there has been no ANC demand that one of their exaltd leaders be designated to hold the bible for the swearing-in ceremony. Apparently these other elected officials who passed legislation without conferring with Bryan and Mindy beforehand just do not understand the importance of the Adams Morgan ANC...they will live to regret their impudence.

Enter the Duggan pile-on. How dare "Bill D" malign the innocent character of ANC Commissioner Mindy Moretti! She is not interchangeable with Bryan Weaver! She is her own person! She can respond for herself! (But, it should be noted, she does not.) "Bryan Weaver," however, is no shy violet when it comes to being poked by "Bill D". I mean, there's a reason we picked him as Best Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner. To wit:

And yes, I have asked that I swear in President elect Obama while holding Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States" and that the Presidential Inauguration be moved to midnight at the Basketball Court at Walter Pierce Park. Looks like it will happen, but we need to push for some emergency legislation for the park to be open all night in case some of the 4 million expected visitors want to play a game of  basketball after the inauguration, perhaps President Obama will even join us in a game or 2, hey now that is emergency legislation I could get behind.

With sarcasm less rapier (as in she's totally serious), another Adams Morganite, "Nani WePaste," brings the issue back to the national focus is so clearly deserves. To wit:

When you read on this community forum an outright personal attack on two of the hardest working Adams Morgan community organizers, you have to wonder what the agenda of the attacker is. Remember Sarah Palin's attack against community organizers in her speech at the Republican Convention this year?
The Struggle Continues.
Nani

This totally serious hyperbole is no match for "Wes Combs," however, who demands "Bill D" take back his mean, mean comments. To wit:

It would be nice to hear Bill Duggan just once say, “We are also concerned about the possible excitement that the visitors to our city will be expressing as they patronize our bars and restaurants.  We are committed to ensuring that they do so in a safe and responsible manner.” His continual refusal to be part of the solution does a disservice to the many responsible bar and restaurant owners.

To which (and here's the money pullquote you've been waiting for) "Bill D" offers up his sincerest of sincere apologies.

Wes is so right. I wasn't able to sleep last night after I realized what a dick I've been; how callous I was, not just to Bryan and Mindy, but, by extension, to all "community organizers" everywhere and, shit, really to everyone, everywhere. I realize now that I should never have opened that stupid bar. That the neighborhood and the city would be way better off without it. So, Wes, here I go. I'm going to say just what you need me to say "We are also concerned about the possible excitement that the visitors to our city will be expressing as they patronize our bars and restaurants. We are committed to ensuring that they do so in a safe and responsible manner." I'll do better in the future, Wes.  I swear I will.  Please don't give up on me.

CP photo by Charles Steck

The real drama was in a 8-6 8-5 vote as to whether nightclubs would be offered the extended hours or not. Here's who fought for your right to party: Harry Thomas Jr., Yvette Alexander, Marion Barry, Kwame R. Brown, David A. Catania, Mary M. Cheh, Jack Evans, and Vincent C. Gray.

LL ran down the drama.

Here's what LL knows: This is not a done deal, and it looks likely that the 5 a.m. hour will change.

This morning, Ward 1 Councilmember Jim Graham walked into the pre-legislative-session breakfast meeting and told his colleagues about his plan.

LL noticed that Graham seemed somewhat tentative over the prospects for the bill, and he did not in fact mention the 5 a.m. cutoff in his initial remarks on the matter. He said that "negotiations are ongoing."

"The debate is about the time," he said, "whether it's reasonable."

For the record, many of Graham's colleagues issued strong support for the 5 a.m. time, including Chair Vincent C. Gray, Ward 2's Jack Evans, and at-larger David Catania.

Ward 6's Tommy Wells raised an interesting point: "What's the point of 5 a.m.? So you can start drinking at 8 again?"

Graham expressed the likelihood that he would hold off on presenting the bill, negotiate whatever needs to be negotiated, and bring it back for the council's final legislative session on Dec. 16. Evans was more gung ho: "Just pick a number—we'll support it!"

Catania got the last word in: "After eight years of Bush, we all need a drink."

Here we are at 6:30 p.m., and the drinking-hours bill has not yet come up. The bill is emergency legislation, which traditionally comes last. ("Emergency" means that it's a bill that will go into effect immediately; it's distinguished from regular legislation, which doesn't go into effect until a congressional review period is up. The trade-off is that emergency legislation expires after 90 days and needs nine votes to pass.)

LL will update here when they get to it.

UPDATE, 6:45 P.M.: Graham spokesperson David Lipscomb says the bill will come up today. The only change that will be made, he says, is that nightclubs will be exempted from the extended hours, at the request of the mayor.

UPDATE, 7:15 P.M.: OK, they've started the debate. Here's Mendo the party pooper: "There are very few people I know of who are out partying at 5 o'clock in morning...who are not out getting drunk." Duh! He cites an already overstretched police force for voting agin' it.

UPDATE, 7:25 P.M.: In initial vote, on emergency declaration, vote is 12-1, with Mendo dissenting. Bah humbug.

Now they've moved to the bill itself. Catania is Mr. Party—introduces amendment to scrap the nightclub exception! Graham says to keep it, citing discussions today with "various stakeholders...not the least of which is the mayor."

UPDATE, 7:30 P.M.: Marion Barry, who knows from a good time, supports the Catania Amendment, as fine a piece a legislation as has moved through this august body today.

UPDATE, 7:40 P.M.: Here's the Catania Amendment tally. Party people: Thomas, Alexander, Barry, Brown, Catania, Cheh, Evans, Gray; party poopers: Mendelson, Schwartz, Wells, Bowser, Graham. Woooo! Nightclubs are in!

UPDATE, 7:41 P.M.: Mendo, Carol, and Bowser end up voting no. Graham votes no "in order to honor the commitment I made to the mayor." Tally is 9-4 in favor of LATE-NIGHT DRUNKENNESS!

LL approves.