BrockLi Soup

I don’t know anything about Webb or his politics, but I think an elected gay black man means we’re making progress - in Virginia, no less (well, Northern Virginia, but still). Link

I wish I had wandered through Chinatown that night:

Commenters at DCist have been reporting on the taxi strike that’s happening today, and it’s not pretty. For those of you living elsewhere, DC’s taxis operate on a zone system, so you pay based on how many zones your trip takes you through. Mayor Fenty has been pushing to get them on a meter, like every other city in the nation, but the drivers want none of it - at least partially because they can easily take unsuspecting tourists on winding, four-zone trips that could really be done by crossing only two zones.

Still, I’m all for worker’s rights and making a decent wage, so I supported the cabbies that wanted to stick to the zone system. But this is just ridiculous - making traffic even worse during rush hour is no way to win the sympathy of your customers. I can only imagine how much support they lost thanks to this stunt.

Update: Apparently I was misinformed. The zone fare is based on what zone you start in and end in, not how many you pass through. I don’t know who explained it that way to me, or (in retrospect) why I bought it, but that really wouldn’t make much sense, would it?

This year’s DC PHP Conference & Expo is going to come earlier than last year’s: June 2-4, rather than in November. I’m hoping to go again, because it was pretty interesting and informative last time, and I’m sure this one will be even better. If you’re a web developer in (or near) DC, consider registering - or, better yet, submit a paper!

From Examiner.com:

To combat the street gangs warring in Shaw, 3rd District police are going back to basics: Foot patrols are visiting with 10 residents a day, officers are taking names of suspicious people, and roll calls are being held outdoors as a show of force. On Friday afternoon, a dozen D.C. police officers formed a blue line on the corner of O Street and 7th Street Northwest, between two large, boxy public-housing apartments. Stern faces peered down from the windows.

7th & O is about four blocks from my apartment. Thankfully, we’re on the southern edge of Shaw, at the fringe of gentrification that’s brought nicer condos and lower crime rates, and most of the places we go are in the other direction. Unfortunately, my old roommate was mugged a few blocks away last month - not far from the police roll call, actually. We still try to avoid going north later in the evening, but the grocery store is up that way. The comments on that article make it sound like previous efforts like this one haven’t gone well, but I’m hopeful that our neighborhood will continue becoming safer.

Erin and I got blindsided by some Jesus tonight. We went to the Kennedy Center for the MLK Day Let Freedom Ring Celebration because she wanted to see this opera singer that was part of the show, but it was all about the Jesus’in. So here’s to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and a quick reminder: review the program guide before going to a show.

It’s been a banner week here at the BrockLi headquarters. Got in a couple movies screenings, two concerts, and went out with friends almost every night.

On Monday, Schmitty, Fotios, Mace and I saw the screening of Hot Rod. I can’t even describe how hilarious and random it was - I loved it, but you definitely need to go in expecting Super Trooper-style humor.

Tuesday night was a screening of Superbad. Mace and I loved it, Kidder and his friend hated it. Again, you need to appreciate that kind of humor - it’s definitely a Judd Apatow flick. Michael Cera is hilarious and I’ve always loved Seth Rogen

Wednesday night was the Gogol Bordello show at 9:30, which was just as awesome as you would expect it to be. They did all the best songs from the new album and a bunch of my favorites from Gypsy Punks Underdog World Strike. As always, their performance was entirely over the top. I left during a drawn-out marathon version of Baro Faro - I was too beat and dehydrated to handle any more - but apparently they did Mala Vida after that. NPR broadcast the show live, and you can listen to it on their site.

Thursday night, I finally got to use my iSight to chat with Ryan and Sarah for a bit. Fonny and Molly were in Columbia for a wedding this weekend, so we did dinner and drinks Friday night with a bunch of other folks. And last night, my roommate’s friend’s band was playing at the RnR Bar & Lounge. I hate to say it, but they weren’t very good. But, I had a good time hanging out with new people. Today, the Film Club went to see Manufactured Landscapes, which was incredibly disappointing. It was an interesting topic, but terribly presented and pretty boring.

This week should be a little quieter. Thursday night is the Swell Season show, also at 9:30, and that’s about it. Fine by me - I could use a week off.

I wasn’t going to do anything at all yesterday, because I really just needed a day off to recover. And I did get to spend most of the day just relaxing, but last night was pretty awesome.

I spent most of my afternoon doing that boring crap I’ve been putting off - opening a huge pile of mail, copying a bunch of media off the hundreds of CD-Rs I’ve had lying around for years - then I went to see Transformers, because I like doing matinees by myself now and then. It was actually pretty good, but I went into it with incredibly low expectations, so it would have been hard to disappoint me.

After that, I stopped by Olsson’s. Both Gogol Bordello and Against Me! have new albums coming out Tuesday and I wanted to special order them if Olsson’s wasn’t going to stock them (I like to buy the actual CD for bands I really like, and I’d rather get it from a local chain than Amazon). They actually had a box full of the Against Me album in back already, but wouldn’t give me one till Tuesday (obviously), so I’ve got one of each on hold.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the more time I spend hanging out in DC, the more I like it…especially if it’s with Schmitty. I seem to meet at least two or three people every time I hang out with the guy. Fotios moved back to DC yesterday, so we went to Science Club for drinks. I’ve been there a couple times before and always liked it. The place is really laid back and they have a big chalkboard by the bar where people write out equations and stuff when they’re arguing. The last time I was there was a Wednesday, so it was pretty quiet. No one checked my ID at the front gate, on the way into their patio, so I assumed that the guy standing at the door with a book and a cigarette was the bouncer. Turns out, he had just stepped out for a smoke; he spent the evening sitting at the bar, reading about philosophy. It’s that kind of place.

So we had a good time hanging out, and later learned that more people we knew were upstairs for Compton’s birthday. We got to talking with a guy and girl that work there and found out both of them had seen Against Me! and the chick had seen Gogol Bordello (this was after I’d convinced the guy to get tickets for their show next week). In the past two weeks, I’ve met a half dozen people that know one or the other - until recently, no one seemed to know who they were. Maybe I’ve just been meeting the wrong people.

I got home around 4:30 and slept till 2. In a few hours, I’m heading down to Chinatown to see Live Free or Die Hard with the Film Club. A pretty nice weekend, I’d say.

It occurred to me, as I Frogger-ed my way through families at the Metro, that most schools probably finished up this past week and I’ll be elbow-deep in tourists until Labor Day.

After work yesterday, I went up to the place I’ll be moving into to sign the lease and all the other paperwork that comes with it. It was quick and dirty, and now I just need to get the key from the guy who’s moving out.

Once I took care of that stuff, I wandered around the area for a little while, looking for some coffee shops. I had no idea at the time, but I was totally spoiled by Java Wally’s while I was at RIT. As it turns out, most coffee shops (by which I mean Starbucks and Caribou) DON’T have a bunch of couches and big tables that encourage sharing when the place is crowded. I didn’t go there often, but every time I did, I’d wind up chatting with some stranger and running into a handful of people I knew. I’ve never really found another place like that, but I hope to find a place like that near the new place.

I had no luck with the coffee shops, but that’s not the point. The point is that the city is a cool place to wander in the evening. Crystal City - the neighborhood I live in now - is nice enough, with lots of restaurants and things, but it is absolutely dead by about 6 on weekdays. A lot of people pass through the area on their way to and from DoD offices, but once they go home, it’s like a ghost town.

So for that reason, I’m psyched to be moving into the city. I’ll need to take the Metro to work, but the apartment and my office are both on the yellow line, so I’ll only spend about 15 minutes on the train and maybe 10 minutes walking to and from (I’ll get some reading done, if nothing else). I’ll be five blocks from Chinatown, and about eight from Dupont Circle, so I’ll be within walking distance of a lot of cool bars and such. I’m planning to get a cheap bicycle once I move, so I’ll can get around the city without waiting for a train or bus. And, with a cheap bike, I won’t have to worry much about thieves, because I can replace a $10 bike with no problems.

This move should be good for me. The lease there is up at the end of August, and it’s month-to-month from there, so I’ll have some flexibility. What more could a guy ask for? Maybe a harem on the first floor, but let’s be realistic: that would be out of my price range anyway.

Autumn has always been my favorite season, but spring is a close second, especially when spring feels like this. I couldn’t ask for a nicer evening, unless I was really really greedy. It’s a perfect 78 degrees with 19% humidity here in lovely Arlington, VA, and I’m taking advantage of it while I can, because we all know that in a few short weeks, it’s going to be 88 degrees with 90% humidity.

But let’s not dwell on that. Right now, I’m sitting outside, enjoying a Flying Dog, and inexplicably, a bunch of maple tree whirlygigs just went spinning past my ninth-floor balcony. I can’t complain.

UPDATE: Wait, do maple trees have whirlygigs? We had a ton of them in my front yard when I was growing up, but now that I think about it, they may have come from the other tree.

It was pretty rainy all day yesterday, so I used the tunnels to walk to work. Along the way, I came up behind a woman who was wearing open-back, slip-on shoes that looked like the bottom part of galoshes. Each of them was like one-sixth of a galosh, and I couldn’t help but think they’d be pretty useless on a rainy day like that. The lady was meandering along pretty slowly, and since we were close to the Metro, this flood of more-hurried people behind her kept trying to get past without running into the people coming from the other direction.

She was wearing a FEMA Evacuation Team windbreaker, and I couldn’t imagine anything more appropriate.

It’s snowing like a mother out there, big fluffy flakes that are fun to play in, and, thanks to Virignia’s fear of weather, foreshadow another day off for local kids.

Ed had been telling me for months that I should meet him at Madam’s Organ on Wednesdays for their bluegrass show, but this is the first week I actually took him up on it. It helped that Ricky was in town (despite the fact that he got sick and couldn’t come) and that Andy, Will, and Schmitty were also going - I’m a sucker for peer pressure.

That place is pretty great. Bob Perilla & the Big Hillbilly Bluegrass Band was playing - not half bad - and the crowd was just my type. I spent most of the evening chatting with Alicia, a Native American, and Storm, a half-American, half-Jamaican guy from London, with whom I argued about David Beckham, the ridiculous taxes on tea, and whether or not he was more Irish than I because he spent a few months living in Dublin. There was also a cute little redhead who kept scampering about - Schmitty and I agreed that ’scamper’ was a good word for her - but I forget her name. She stopped to chat at one point, and I told her that she was like a very small tornado. She took it as a compliment.

On the walk back to the Metro, I was telling Schmitty how friendly people around here could be, and in the course of the conversation, asked four different groups of smokers if I could bum a cigarette. How many smokes do you think I got? If you guessed four, you’re off by about four. In Rochester, I would have had a dozen cigs in no time, but down here, where people tend to have a bit more money, they’re stingy with their cancer sticks. Maybe folks aren’t so friendly after all.

(Blessing in disguise, of course. I’ve had less than ten since I quit two months ago, so why spoil it?)

Waking up in my apartment this morning was very much like living in the RIT dorms in late spring or early fall: it’s 80 degrees in my room, the air conditioning is useless, and all I can do is throw open the windows (and here, my balcony door) and sit really still, waiting for a cool breeze. When I look outside, there are people in shorts and t-shirts playing soccer out in the quad (er, the building’s courtyard).

I know they say that Global Warming only causes small temperature changes over several years, and that this unusual heat is all thanks to El Niño, but if this is an indication of what’s to come, I’m moving to Canada. I’m also wondering if our summer will also be abnormally warm, in which case I won’t be leaving my apartment between April and October.

But we’ll worry about that then. For now, I need to find some shorts so BP, Klem and I can go do whatever it is we’re going to do today.