Final Chapter of the Last Harry Potter Book Leaked!

BET you're wondering where I got THIS lil' gem? Seems plausible...

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Harry wakes up surpised, not to be at Hogwarts, but in a British mental institution. His wizard cape has been replaced with a straitjacket; his wand no longer in his hand, only the cold steel chain of a handcuff. After being pumped full of an ungodly amount of L-dopamine, young adult Harold Potter looks up at Dr. Dreyfus Umbledor, an older Ugandan-English psychologist at the facility who smiled as the young man's eyes widen. "Hello Harold, how are you?" he asked our hero.

"Where am I? Where's my wand? I thought you were dead!" screamed Potter.

"I am very much alive, Harold, though I had to take a leave of absence since my divorce. It seems once again you're alive as well. You've been in a catatonic state for years. It's good to see you, to meet you face to face."

"Why am I bound? What happened to Snape? Where are my friends Ron and Hermione? What has He Who Must Not Be Named done to Hogwart's?" asked Potter.

Dr. Umbledor tossled the thick black hair of his young charge. "Harold, I've watched over you for nearly a decade, wondering what was going on in your beautiful mind. Despite our wonderful advances in mental health since the 1990s, we are unable to truly read minds. We could tell through brain wave monitors that your alpha waves and receptors were constantly firing. Your eye movements have been unlike anything we've ever seen in similar REM moments. It's almost as though you were alive while being completely asleep."

"Why am I bound, Dumbledore? I need to be released! I must fight..." exclaimed Potter.

"You were restrained to keep you from hurting yourself." Dr. Umbledor explained. He reached over to pick up a small hand mirror, and showed Potter the scar. "You gave yourself quite the nasty gash one day many years ago in one of your states. We bound you to protect you from yourself."

"But my friends Ron and Hermione!? Where are they? I must see them!" cried the exasperated youngster.

Dr. Umbledor looked quizzically at him. "Who are Ron and Hermonie?" he asked.

"You don't know Ron and Hermione? My Lord, Voldemort has gotten to you, too! You don't remember your three finest students at Hogwart's?" answered Potter by way of questions. He was convinced more than ever in the evil of Valdemort.

Dr Umbledor chuckled softly in acknowledgement. "Oh, Harold...I apologize. I had no idea that while you were in your state that you could synthesize exterior stimuli and incorporate them into your dreams. Ah, the power of the mind is so amazing! Harold, I'm afraid your friend Ron is nothing more than Ron, one of the janitors here at Azakbhan's Mental Health Facility..."

"Wait," interupted Harry. "you mean Azkaban?"

"Oh my. It appears you picked up on my pitiful trait of mixing up consonants. English is such a hard language to learn. I tried to learn it through music, and for years, I thought Mott the Hoople was Hott the Muggle. I still get them confused" said Umbledor.

"What's a Muggle, Professor?"

"I don't know, but I used to say it all the time. And Harold, I gave up teaching years ago. Hardly a Professor; simply a doctor now. Anyway, as I was saying, Ronald is a custodian here at Mopple's, and he hangs out at the Hero Mine, a comic book store in town. We believed that you could someday hear us, so all of us on staff would tell you stories from our day-to-day lives. Perhaps Ron told you about the store."

"But Hermione was my true friend. She is so lovely, the way she's grown. Her hair so lively, her eyes so brown, perhaps my great love!" extolled Potter.

"Either you read some Greek Mythology before you came here or you're thinking of Ron's tale. It's very much a comic book store, Harold. Full of many boys and men about your age. None of them have ever seen, let alone actually touch, a girl, and certainly none as lovely as you describe."

A wave of realization crashed into the storm breakers on Potter's face. He was wondering if he was under some sort of spell, but he felt a pain in his left shoulder far too acutely to be under one of Voldemort's sinister plans.

"Doctor Umbledor, why does my shoulder hurt so?"

The doctor looked at the young man's shoulder. "While you were sleeping, you were bitten by an exotic spider. Before you were bound, you would constantly itching it. We kept telling you to stop itching it, but you obviously didn't listen. Ron, the Janitor, took special attention to your area, always making sure your room was spotless. He'd tell you in that rough cockney drawl of his 'qwit itchin! Qwit itch!"

The doctor loosened the shackles on Potter's arms. "Here you go, young friend. You don't need these now."

Potter snapped up in bed, and snapped the pencil out from Dr. Umbledor's coat. He started to cast the Spell of Reality he learned while at Hogwart's, but something caught his eye - a pimple-and-pock-covered pig had walked into the room.

"Snape!" snapped Potter. "It must be you!"

"Oh, dear Harold!" exclaimed Dr. Umbeldor. "That's our pet hog, Viktor. He's a bit old, but he provides company to the patients while they sleep."

Potter looked at the walking pork chop. "He's covered in marks..."

"Yes" said Dr. Umbledor. "Warts from when he was a piglet. We couldn't send him to butcher, so we kept him on as a pet."

"Hog - warts..." said Potter slowly. "Quit Itch....Quidditch...Viktor..."

"Yes, Harold?" inquired Dr. Umbledor.

"I'm still a great wizard, right?" asked Potter."

"Wizard? Oh my boy, the only Wizards I know of play basketball back in America, and you're far too young, short and pale to be effective in their game."

"But I'm a champion...Quidditch player..."

"In your dreams, Harold. In your dreams you were legend, I'm sure. This, however" as he gestured around the sterile hospital room, "is reality. It's 2007; we haven't seen a wizard in England since the 1500s, at least."

"My Lord, Doctor...could it all have been a dream?"

"Perhaps," said Dr. Umbledor "it all was what you wanted it to be."

The young man sat back down in his bed. He had just been given news that would shake any lesser man to his knees - that his whole basis of reality was a lie. A figment of his imagination.

"Doctor...thank you" offered Potter, softly.

"You have no need to thank me. You will prove to be a fascinating case. What did you think you were?"

"Well," began Potter, "I was a boy wizard, taught at Hogwart's School...a place for those talented in magic. I was friends with Ron and Hermione and we laughed and we fought evil and you were there as a Professor, but you were white, and you fought with Snape and we were warned of the evil Voldemort..."

Dr. Umbledor roared with laughter. "The evil Voldemort?! That's priceless, Harold!"

The young man looked quizzically at the older gent.

"Voldemort," explained Umbledor, "was the name of my ex-wife's divorce attorney! He tried to take everything I ever owned! You got that evil part spot-on!"

Potter excused himself from laughing, though he wasn't mad that Umbledor was still cackling like an old hen. He realized that his dream world was so much better than the real world.

"My young man," said Umbledor to Potter, with his hand placed on his shoulder "these dreams of yours would make a wonderful story. 'Harry Potter the Prisoner of Azkaban!' has a ring to it..."

FINIS

A new device and Decemberists in July

Picked up a new laptop to replace the long-dead but not-forgotten Device Mk. I, the Toshiba Satellite laptop that died back in `06. Best Buy had a pretty good sale on HP laptops, so I purchased one with 2 gigs of RAM, AMD Turion X2, integrated webcam, LightScribe SVS/CD burner and...Windows Vista.

So far...other than being slightly annoying, Vista has worked fairly well so far. The "cancel or allow" thing is pissy, but at the end of the day, it's still Windows. Take it or leave it.

Went to the Decemberists' show last night with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra at Merriweather Post Pavillion. They were all fine and dandy...and boy was I neither over or underwhelmed. I think I was simply whelmed.

They're not a bad band, but boy are they a lot to swallow more than a random mp3. Their lyrics range from preposterous to pompous. They remind me a bit of Crash Test Dummies - the words *SEEMED* important and meaningful until you gave the lyrics and actual read and/or listen. Then, it hit ya like a sledgehammer to the forehead "Hey, this is crap!"

Still, they put on a nice show, and seem like charming folk. The music just ain't my bag, baby. That's what I get for buying a ticket to a show of a band I barely know.

One of those nights...

1) Rumors in NW DC needs help. The A-Hole to Normal Evolved Human Ratio is SO out of whack there. The place has always been cheesy, but cheesy AND full of pricks...can't handle that.

2) Why do women insist on flirting with the friends of the guy they just broke up with? Honey, I heard the stories. I know why you're done as a couple, mostly because you're probably a dirty, dirty girl who cheated on my boy. So why do you think I'd give you the time of day?

3) MeetinDC - can the obsession with my ass PLEASE stop? I'm done with it. I'm about ready to drop the group completely. Knock it the hell off. Seriously. Next person who grabs my ass is going to get their ears boxed, or a kick in the shin. I'm sick of my ass being grabbed more than antacid at a Mexican food festival. If I wave it at you, then you may proceed. Otherwise....NO!! Bad MiDC person! Bad!

oh my DAMN!!! Transformers frickin' rocks!

Finally, a movie Michael Bay didn't screw up!

Shia LaBeouf rocks! Megan Fox lives up to her name! John Turturro is hilarious! Optimus mother-f*ckin' Prime!

Perfect summer movie! The Five Paragraph Bitter Film Critic is harder than a virgin at a gang bang!

I'm writing in exclamation points!

You will love this movie...unless you're a tool. You're not a tool, are you?

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Transformers gets 8 Whammies! for the eight different Transformer toys I had as a kid. It could have had nine if I hadn't have lost Starscream in the move to Glenarm Road.
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My only complaint...

Strange...Never a Huge Fan Before...

...but suddenly, I'm digging Alyssa Milano. This picture helps.



Plus, this quote from ESPN.com:

ALYSSA MILANO: [Laughs] There's absolutely no pink. Pink offends me. It's the man's misguided answer: "If you make it pink, women will buy it." I'm a traditionalist.

Just say no to Pink.

Dear Bad Driver...

Hi. You may not remember me from our little near-collision in Arlington this morning. Actually, I'm quite sure you don't know who I am because I know you didn't see my car. Well, I shouldn't say I know you didn't see me, but I do know you didn't see the big red STOP sign that you so blythely ran, sending you scant inches away from my bumper. I'm not sure if you heard my tires squeal and my horn blare, but the people around our potential auto rendezvous did. Your mid-2000s tan SUV almost made more of an impression on me than hearing my parents have sex in their bedroom one sleepless night when I was a kid, and trust me, pal, that scarred the shit outta me.

Sounded like my mom was getting stabbed with an ice pick, and my dad was moving around a sleeper sofa. Not cool, bro.

When I spotted you again on Columbia Pike, you were laughing, though nobody else was in your vehicle. Though your rear window is far-too-heavily tinted to see through, your side window showed quite plainly that you're an officer in the United States' Army, and your Pentagon parking hang tag (which, BTW, you're not supposed to drive around with dangling from your rear view mirror. Safety violation and whatnot...) indicates that we must work in the same building.

So, you're in the Army. With all the acronyms thrown at our soldiers, I'm sure you got confused, and thought STOP meant Speeding To Obliterate Pontiacs. It actually means "stop."

Being in the Army makes you some sort of instant hero nowadays. What, with 9/11 and fighting our godless enemies and making sure we have a secure oil stream to ensure you can drive your SUV. Within the Pentagon, rank has privilege, and military law backs that up. However, on the streets, the laws of the military do not circumvent the laws of physics and traffic court. If I wasn't such a careful driver with a trigger finger for a braking foot, you'd have taken out my front end, damaged your precious SUV, and been woefully late for work.

So, please, Mr. Soldier or Army of One or Warfighter or what ever term you prefer - hit the fucking brakes and come to a complete stop.

Do it for the troops.

Don't Even ^&$%@~! Think About Speeding in Ole' Virginny

From this weekend's WaPost...

Say you are driving 78 mph on the Capital Beltway and a state trooper tickets you for "reckless driving -- speeding 20 mph over." You will probably be fined $200 by the judge. But then you will receive a new, additional $1,050 fine from the Old Dominion, payable in three convenient installments. So convenient that you must pay the first one immediately, at the courthouse.

First-time drunk driver? A $300 fine from the judge and a $2,250 fee from the commonwealth.

Driving without a license? Maybe a $75 fine. Definitely a $900 fee from Virginia.

Yee-ouch!

I'm all for improving the quality of life on the highways, but, DAMN!

The article points out several drawbacks to this plan, such as the dramatic burden to the local court system as now EVERY traffic offense would be fought in court, just to avoid these fines. So, on paper, it looks like a potential windfall for the state, but it could end up costing more than it makes.

Also, if I was an attorney specializing in traffic law, I would move to Virginia and set up shop quicker than a jackrabbit on a date. Student loans? Bah! Paid off in a New York Minute! $500,000 condo? Hell, paid off by March `09...

What I see as an unintended consequence, though - how many folks will be unwilling to "move" to Virginia? Live in the Commonwealth but maintain their permanent addresses in other states. Decreased tax revenue from a potential citizen at the expense of a traffic violation. If you're going to have legislation that allows for non-residents to skirt by such fees, while sticking it to your own citizens, that hardly seems fair. Not to mention...a pretty good way to ensure your dumb ass will be voted out of office.

If Virginia is so intent on cleaning up the highways and increasing revenue, here are a few options from yer friendly Telecomedian:

1) Sliding scale of vehicle registration fees. Sort of a combo SUV tax and a way to promote better MPG. Right now, most cars cost 30 to 35 bucks to register in VA, and trucks are $40. I was pretty surprised to see such low fees, especially in a state that usually can't wait to tax the HELL out of its citizens. Offer free registration for purchasers of a gas-sipping vehicle (like a hybrid, turbodiesel, or car with a average MPG over 35 on the highway). Triple or even quadruple the fees for registering non-work trucks or SUVs, and gas-guzzling muscle cars. You figure a good suburban cul-de-sac would bring in a couple thousand dollars in registration fees, as they are people unlikely to be driving without a license or on suspended plates.

2) Motorcycles that weave in and out of traffic like they're reinacting the trench scene in Star Wars can be hit with scalding hot coffee. I hate these guys driving souped-up crotch rockets threading through traffic at ungodly speeds, coming inches away from getting into wrecks with every turn. This behavior caused a fatal accident on the Maryland side of 495 last week...while the motorcyclist got away scot-free.

If a biker is following the rules of the road, great. But this Speedy Gonzalesesque crap has got to stop. Don't want to be hit with scalding hot coffee? Don't drive like an idiot.

As an added bonus, think of the extra sales' tax gained from coffee shops as some people will want to have a piping hot cup of joe at the ready, just waiting for the next prick to zoom by at 100 miles an hour on 95 on a Ninja.

3) Just a thought - make everybody take a new driving test instead of automatically renewing their license. See how it goes. Try it out. You might like it.

4) Lower the Speed Limit During Rush Hours. I can hear y'all scratching your heads, but read this carefully: Traffic is caused my multiple factors: weather, accidents, volume, construction and capacity being among them. We can't change the weather. Accidents tend to happen to even the safest, most careful drivers. Construction delays are often part and parcel of living in a growing area. But volume and capacity CAN be controlled, or at least predicted.

Rush hour in the evening starts pretty much between 3 and 3:30. Part of the initial crush of cars is the high volume of people hitting low-capacity feeder roads to beat the rest of the rush hour that begins in earnest at 4. So, they want to hightail it out of work so they can get to the high capacity interstates and highways before they clog, the idea being that driving at 70 for a couple of miles makes up for driving at 30 for a dozen more.

How many times have you been cruising on 66 or 495 to see a sudden sea of brakelights around the next hill? Part of that problem is the differential in speed. Brakes are vital to avoid accidents and to make sudden turns, but they are often used to modulate speed. This indicates to me that the road is not being used efficiently. Large gaps between cars are neccessary at high speeds to allow safe following distance, and that gaps becomes decidedly smaller at slower speeds. What can set off a chain reaction of braking is somebody driving dangerously down the highway, or a lone police officer on the side of the road. But what really sets them off more often than that? Somebody in the left hand lane needing to get over to the right hand lane for an exit a 1/4 of a mile away. Somebody needing to merge to avoid a lane that ends. When somebody needs to make one of these such maneuvers, they usually make an unsafe lane change. The drivers closest to the incident hit the brakes to avoid an accident. This makes everybody around them panic break in a pack mentality.

Wouldn't it be a much better allocation of vital resources for the Commonwealth to force the major roads like 395, 66, 495 to go to a slower, more reasonable speed limit like 45, and thus giving drivers more room for merging, lane changes and closing lanes? The regulation of traffic speeds allows for smoother commuting and higher road capacity without building another highway.

It's simple physics...and if entire roads can be made for HOV lanes, the speed limits on other roads can be modified too.

For the Six of Us Who Still Care...

The Caps are unveiling their new jerseys tomorrow for the draft party.

HOWEVER - Caps Nut got them earlier this week, and, uh...

Well, look for your own damned selves.



and



Dear God.

This looks like the jersey that would come from one of those historic teams form a Canadian industrial town that relocates somewhere in America's Sun Belt. You know, a team that wants its new fan base to forget any ill will from the team's move.

What, pray tell, was wrong with this:



MEMO TO TED: There are approximately 9,000 fans dressed up as empty seats at every home game. Please don't make the remaining 6,000 look at these retreads from the WAC or Arena League.

UPDATE:
Anyway, upon giving the unis a third look, I figured out what the design theme was:



GREAT JOB!!! "Ladies and Gentlemen, come on down to the Verizon Center for our Dogfights and Fistfights Promotion. Every time a Cap gets into a scrap, we'll unleash two rabid pit bulls on the opponent! The first 5,000 fans bringing in a Rott, Chow, Shepard or wolf-mix get free admission. That's Dogfights and Fistfights, brought to you by Aquafina. When you need to stash your pot before an international flight, think Aquafina!"

The Caps is idiots.

The Five Paragraph Bitter Food Critic Vs. The World

I never thought I had much in common with Lindsay Lohan.

She's a young Hollywood starlet and pop star, better known for her hard-partying, relapses into rehab, ever-changing breast size, spectacular rise and fall, and for showing her birth canal to pretty much every actor, athlete and paprazzi in California. I'm more of a brokedown former disc jockey and comedian who couldn't wait to sell out to Corporate America for a stable paycheck. As far as I know, she's done more drugs than a Rick James' groupie, and the hardest thing I've smoked is turkey. But her song "Me vs. The World" from the Freaky Friday soundtrack speaks to me. Well, it doesn't technically speak because I've never heard it, and couldn't pick it out in a police lineup. I just found the lyrics online, and thought "I had no idea I could relate to young Lindsay's plight."

See, "The World" in my case is Reese's. The loveable brand from our friendly neighbors to the North, Hershey (if not the best corporate citizens), has finally released a limited edition Elvis tribute Reese's Cup - Peanut Butter and Banana Creme. One of his favorite treats was fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches. As I have resolved to eat healthier and exercise more, and been doing a fine job of it, these little chocolatey bastards could be my undoing. As a kid, my mom preferred that I ate peanut butter and banana sandwiches, getting at least some vitamins and potassium from the banana slices, benefits absent in most jellies. When mom found these new Elvis cups, she thought it would be nice reminder of my childhood. They're not bad, either, as I was afraid the banana would be too artificial, too overpowering. But the banana flavor is just enough to complement the traditional chocolate/peanut butter balance of a Reese's. One of the few "Limited Editions" that I like.

Plus, this has a picture of Elvis on the package. And it's not like that cop-out Young Elvis versus Old Elvis stamp debacle, either. You can find these with Young Athletic Elvis, Hawaiian Shirt Elvis, and, my favorite, Old Elvis. It's clearly Fat Elvis in all his early 1970s Vegas coked-out jumpsuit glory, maybe not quite as bloated and rambling, but it's clear he's baked... much like Mlle. Lohan.

This limited edition run is hitting stores throughout the region now. Dollar General Stores seem to be a reliable place to find them, though they seem to be allergic to putting a store within the Beltway. If you see them, please share in the comments. Let others find their inner Elvis. Hopefully, Mojo Nixon's vision of Elvis being everywhere can be realized.

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Elvis Reese's Cups get 18 Whammies!, one for each of The King's U.S. number one hits on the pop singles chart.

Thanks to The Junk Food Blog and Candyblog.
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What if Somebody Else Wrote About Dave?

This posting is the result of a night of much drink and revelry on Friday. My exercise is to write the lede of Dave Connolly's lambasting in the WaPo's Weekend section. So, we threw around a couple of ideas, figuring that if the Post is one of the few "standard-carrier" papers around, and this article flat-out sucks, how hard could it be if other papers took a crack at it?

And, as I do voices for fun and profit, surely I could write voices, if such a thing were possible. Right?

Here, again, is the real lede:

Dave Connolly needed friends.

Which is a tricky predicament. Tricky and kind of banal. And -- let's be honest -- a little sad.

By the time you're out there in the world, haven't there been enough opportunities -- in the sandbox and eighth-grade math class and the varsity tennis team and between dorm rooms and cubicle clusters -- to pick up a few good friends?

Obviously.

Unless, you know, there weren't. Or there were. There were all those opportunities, and buddies were met and made and then, somehow, lost. Binding ties came unbound.

Maybe there was a marriage. A baby. A transfer, a taxing project, an illness, a changing lifestyle, diverging hobbies, a new neighborhood, a gradual maturing, a big dramatic fight over a guy you were both interested in. Maybe your new medical sales job has you sleeping in Reston and creeping along Interstate 66, shaking hands with lots of doctors and nurses and not really getting to know anyone.

Maybe you're Dave Connolly, 29, athletic and outgoing and fun and successful, and everything was great and your social calendar was booming until one day it just wasn't.

Banal. A little sad. And common enough for this town to support a whole host of organizations designed to help people reach out and meet someone. Probably lots of someones. Probably in similar predicaments.

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Number 1, The Washington Times.

David Connolly, Democrat, has no friends.

He is typical of the young, unwashed liberals that flock to DC every year. Some of these man-children are naive enough to think that working for some non-profit organization has merit. That they can change the world.

Others come here because they want to attend one of the area's renowed liberal universities, like Georgetown or American or Catholic.

And still others, like Connolly, come here because they figured out a way to make money from their liberal viewpoints. Connolly, 29, is an environmental consultant who makes sure that the neighborhoods around Andrews Air Force Base in suburban Maryland don't suffer from such minor nuicances like noise, light and fuel runoff.

But Prince George's County, home to Andrews, is full of liberal Democrats and they demand such Welfare.

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Baltimore Sun
14 people were killed in various gun battles thoughout the city this weekend as drug violence once again reared its ugly head. The Orioles were swept at home by the Arizona Diamondbacks. Ravens' training camp starts in just a few weeks, and all we can gather is that Dave Connolly needed friends. Whether he made any new ones is debateable, but one thing is clear - this town makes THE BOMB crabcakes! Who needs friends when you can eat seafood on a sandwich, hon?

All Dave needs is some crabcakes, and to drink real beer. Like Natty Boh. Not that crappy Belgian crap, or those stupid microbrews. Once he learns to drop his expectations like the rest of us in Charm City, he'll be fine.
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USAToday

Dave Connolly has no friends. Then he made some. What did Paris Hilton do now?


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The Onion

"Local Man Has No Friends"

Transplanted New Englander Dave Connolly stated today that he "has no friends other than empty beer bottles" and feels no compulsion to make any relationships that don't end in a drunken stupor.

"I love beer," exclaimed Connolly to nobody in particular on Friday night. "It makes me a jolly good fellow."

"Though," he admitted, "sometimes I cry and it makes me pee yellow."

Connolly moved to the DC area a few years ago to pursue a career in giving oral sex to lonely Capitol Hill staffers, but decided the pressure to be the male Jessica Cutler was just too much to bear.

"Frankly, I don't have the lips for it" Connolly mentioned. "My mom...very thin-lipped woman, and I favor her."

"Now my dad," said Connolly with pride, "that's a big-lipped SOB. He's the Angelina Jolie of all the guys at the docks back in Portsmouth, New Hampshire."

"And, semen tastes NOTHING like Leffe Blonde," one of Connolly's favorite brews.

When asked why he eschews dating for drinking, Dave explained it simply "Women suck. Beer doesn't."

But how does that preclude you from having friendships with men, Dave?

"Easy," offered Connolly. "Dude's try to drink me beers. Fuck that."

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Wonkette.com

Local tree-hugger has no friends, less dating options. Good abs, though (OBPOPCULTREF)

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NY Post

A-ROD IS DAVE'S ONLY FRIEND!

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Variety

Dave Shaves Slaves to Fave Paves Maves, Flaves

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MeetinDC

So what if Dave got disrespected in the Post? We got 150 new members! Yay! See you at an event! You wanna host or should I?

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O Noes! Sammy Perlozzo Fired

The picture of Sam is from happier days, when he was announced as the new manager of the O's. His dream job.

And, like many dreams, you wake up to reality before the dream is over.


ESPN.com, The Baltimore Sun - they're all saying the O's just fired manager Sam Perlozzo. Andy MacPhail is coming in to oversee baseball operations, and will persue former Marlins' manager Joe Girardi to replace Perlozzo. The Two Headed GM of Jim Beattie and Mike Flanagan of previous years, and now Flanagan and Jim Duquette, probably won't be around much longer.

On one hand, this is a very good thing. Perlozzo's almost automaton-like devotion to bullpen roles cost them nearly a dozen games, as Danys Baez and Chris Ray have proven to be unable to reliably close out games. You don't earn a nickname like Per-LOSE-o by punching all the right buttons.

And Beat-agan was far too fascinated by slow 1B/OF types (Jeff Conine, BJ Surhoff, Kevin Millar, Jay Gibbons) instead of getting a true 1B with a real, working bat. So, Duquette-agan got Aubrey Huff. *sigh*

At least he has a third-baseman's glove, too.

However, I'm not sure if this is such a great move. I was in Baltimore Saturday night, hanging out in Federal Hill after the loss against the D-Backs. The town has gotten so bloody depressed over the team that they have a fatalistic sense of dread, kinda like a Cubs fan. Ravens' training camp can not start soon enough.

Personally, I think the whole team and city needs an enema.

To the average fan, there's nothing positive going on with the team, and these losses from the bullpen are just crushing the whole organizations' morale. They've had leads in 21 of the past 22 games - partly the starters give up the lead immediately but so much of it has been a crappy bullpen...and a fan base ready to commit hari kari over yet another blown save.

Perlozzo gets canned, but pitching coach Leo Mazzone has not done the job expected of him. Can anybody say "overrated?" He can't reach Cabrera, can't cure Ray, and kicked Baez' dog or something.

Terry Crowley has been awful, at best. This team seems unable to take a walk or work a pitch count. The O's seem to lead the league in first pitch outs.

And, Beat-agan counted on Corey Patterson to build on last seasons' success. Corey Patterson crushed the Cubs with his on-again, off-again talent. The guy can play...just, not reliably. Corey Patterson is this season's Gary Matthews, Jr., who's career is very up-and-down as well. Sometimes brilliant; often maddening. You guys might remember Patterson and Matthews when they played under the monikers of "Mike Devereaux," "Ken Gerhart," "Chito Martinez" and "Pete Stanicek." What must they think in the Warehouse? "Oh, they had one good season after a career of nothing spectacular? Chalk them up for a big year next season!"

Meanwhile, former O Jack Cust is tearing up the league, with 31 hits, 20 RBI, 9 home runs in 113 at bats. So...yeah. He's hitting better than any other OF the O's have. Great judge of talent there. Other than Nick Markakis, the O's outfield is yet-again a joke.

It's an organizational issue. I think Flanagan and Beattie were doing well as far as rebuilding the talent base in the minors, and the draft picks of the past couple of seasons seem solid so far. But the major league team has too many 1B/OF types and can't keep pitchers healthy. Bad, bad combo.

It's not Perlozzo's fault the O's chucked cash at Jaret Wright and his balky arm. It's not Perlozzo's fault the O's chucked cash at Danys Baez and his flaky psyche. It's not Perlozzo's fault the O's chucked cash at notoriously slow starting Aubrey Huff. It's not Perlozzo's fault that Chris Ray loves giving up game-losing grand slams.

However, Perlozzo lost Patterson. Lost Gibbons. And when you can't keep Kevin Millar happy, something's up.

Best of luck to ya, Perlozzo. Shame you had to manage Team Dysfunction.

Don't F*** with the Mamma Bear

My good friend Dave Connolly is the subject of an article in the Washington Post about online social networking sites, like MeetinDC. In fact, Dave and I met and became friends through Meetin. Dave is one of the more interesting cats I know - knows more about the outdoors than L.L.Bean if he worked at REI; brews his own beer; works out like a demon, and provides environmental controls with the military, trying to keep pollution from a base from getting into the surrounding neighborhoods.

He's from New England, lived in a tent in Colorado, and has been on top of more mountains than anything other than snow.

Put simply, he's one of those fellows who has done what he wanted to do, and enjoyed the path. A perfect subject for a newspaper article, right?

However, the article starts off:

Dave Connolly needed friends.

Which is a tricky predicament. Tricky and kind of banal. And -- let's be honest -- a little sad.

Wow. Banal? A little sad? Ouch...it continues:

By the time you're out there in the world, haven't there been enough opportunities -- in the sandbox and eighth-grade math class and the varsity tennis team and between dorm rooms and cubicle clusters -- to pick up a few good friends?

Obviously.

Whoa! Judge much?

Unless, you know, there weren't. Or there were. There were all those opportunities, and buddies were met and made and then, somehow, lost. Binding ties came unbound.

Maybe there was a marriage. A baby. A transfer, a taxing project, an illness, a changing lifestyle, diverging hobbies, a new neighborhood, a gradual maturing, a big dramatic fight over a guy you were both interested in. Maybe your new medical sales job has you sleeping in Reston and creeping along Interstate 66, shaking hands with lots of doctors and nurses and not really getting to know anyone.

Maybe you're Dave Connolly, 29, athletic and outgoing and fun and successful, and everything was great and your social calendar was booming until one day it just wasn't.

Banal. A little sad. And common enough for this town to support a whole host of organizations designed to help people reach out and meet someone. Probably lots of someones. Probably in similar predicaments.

Yeah, I got a 1300 on my SATs back when that still meant something, and I know what banal means. I had to look it up in case there was a little-known definition that few people would recognize, or some slang term that changes its meaning. Nope. According to Dictionary.com, banal is :

ba·nal /bəˈnæl, -ˈnɑl, ˈbeɪnl/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[buh-nal, -nahl, beyn-l] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–adjective devoid of freshness or originality; hackneyed; trite: a banal and sophomoric treatment of courage on the frontier.

Great. Hackneyed and trite. The writer just made Dave sound like Dane Cook.

The article goes on to describe how a group like Meetin can help people make new friends in an area, and does eventually give Dave a good quote:

Maybe even finding, like Connolly did, "the best sphere of friends I've ever had in my life."

Thanks for the plug, dude.

Still...small consequence after having the words "banal" and "a little sad" tied to every Google EgoSearch you do for the rest of your life.

The writer could have easily done the lede as the following:

Dave Connolly had moved to the DC area after years of living in Colorado, New
England, and other parts of the US. The outdoor enthusiast had friends
all over the country, but none in his new home.

Feel free to cut-n-paste, future journalists. Now, I know that *I* don't write for the Post, so, what do I know about writing, right? Well, I know this:

1) Mike's last name is H-E-A-R-D.
2) You don't write about private citizens with the same degree of detached cynicism that you hold towards athletes, politicians and celebrities.

Now, I know I only MAJORED in journalism at Virginia Wesleyan; TV and Radio Production at Towson; and only was a gawd-durned voice on the ray-dee-oh. The only news I wrote only ended up over-the-air, either on the radio or the evening news. I certainly could fact-check and research at CNN for Larry King Live while not actually being as vital to the show as Larry. And, I know my feature writing experience was pretty much regulated to bungee jumping in Ocean City and the morning show at 99.1 back in the mid-90s. I also wasn't one of the writers on the old weekend roundup on Digital City, DC. I didn't get a fancy piece of paper from Northwestern or Syracuse or that Sally Struther's piece of crap, so, maybe I'm just not qualified to accurately judge this work.

But I certainly remember walking down Locust Avenue in Des Moines about 9 years ago, meeting Rob Borsellino. You might be asking "who the hell is Rob Borsellino?" As well you should. See, when I first moved to Des Moines, I stuck out like a sore thumb. I was thin, didn't wear Dockers, and looked at the complete and utter lack of people in Downtown Des Moines with a sense of shock and awe. Here's this clean, safe, fairly bland city, presumably with enough culture and entertainment to prove its worth, and a population that beelined for the suburbs at 4:45pm, CST, every working day. My first couple of months in Des Moines were rough. I missed my friends. I missed my family. I missed minorities. I missed homeless people. I missed urine on the sidewalks. I missed crime. I missed the excitement of living in the DC/Baltimore region, where every day could be your last. I walked down Locust Street, looking for a lively lunch spot on a glorious spring afternoon, wondering why the Iowan chose to walk in the climate controlled Skywalk instead of the fresh air.

Rob Borsellino was a firebrand columnist for the Des Moines Register. He was a champion of the little guy; pointing out social injustices, and skilled at showing the fallacies, fallibilities and contradictions in us all. He took a magnifying glass to those he felt needed to be exposed, and a mirror to those who needed to see their true reflection.

He also was wearing a black leather jacket and jeans on a 80 degree day. I recognized him immediately from his thumbnail in the Register, his black and grey hair and eyebrows working like trademarks. He'd have fit in perfectly in Jersey, and his slightly-aging hipster demeanor made me look like an Iowan lifer.

He saw me looking around, and since tourists in Iowa are as rare as Republicans at a Pride Rally, he asked if he could help me find something. I said that I was new in town and was looking for something that would remind me of home. To this day, I'm not sure why, but I told him that I had no idea I would be so homesick.

He asked where I was from, and why I moved to Des Moines. Next thing you know, we talked for 30 minutes, and shared our lives' stories. He was a New Yorker (I was close on my initial guess) and said that he stayed in Des Moines because it was full of real people - you just have to find them. The Iowan - even those absorbed in their career, trying to get ahead in any of the big firms in DM, like Principal Finacial, the publishing houses, the law firms, even the Register itself - was a sincere American who cared; they just didn't always know who to care for or about. But they felt the need to care, to give a rat's ass outside of the rat race.

Something about the simple elegance of that philosophy let him stay in Iowa, despite countless and repeated opportunities for him to flee to the hipper, happening coasts, no doubt for better exposure and bigger paychecks.

I never missed a Borsellino column after that, and was saddened to learn of his passing in 2006, like a true Yankee fan, from Lou Gehrig's Disease.

One thing I learned from reading his columns - he could be painfully liberal, sometimes to the point of madness, but he cared. He gave a crap about who he wrote about, and why.

He was gentle towards those who needed coddling, and vicious to those who needed scolding. And he'd NEVER make somebody out to be banal or a little sad if they truly weren't.

He was, for a New Yorker, a great Iowan.

He'd never throw somebody under a bus for a poorly-written lede, allowing snark to get in the way of a proper description.

Funny...he taught me how to be a better writer, and his tuition cost me 25 cents a day.

May all feature writers learn this lesson.

For now, Dave and I will knock back a couple of dark, unpronouncable beers, and ponder subscriptions to the Times (in jest, of course). Maybe we'll start a club for those who have been embarassed in the Post. Dave, me, and Marion Berry.

Sweet. At least we'll get the good drugs.

This guy...wow

I seldom embed YouTube videos in my blogs, but this guy deserves it.



I don't love opera as much as I love Opera, but, damn.

DAMN!

This fellow studied to be an opera singer, but life, like it does so often, got in the way. He sells mobile phones - and then makes Simon Cowell stunned.

The opera purists may complain that he has some resonance issues, and some sibilance most likely due to his lack of high-quality British dental work, but damn. That's nitpicky as hell. That'd be like a dude who loves gay disco only listening to Erasure because Andy Bell's voice is better than Neil Tennant's from the Pet Shop Boys. This guy is real, and he loves what he does. There is a joy to that singing that is so evident, so passionate, so accessible.

I don't like opera as a rule, but I will gladly purchase his CDs. Congratulations are in order to this man, and I hope he does well in this competition.

Who'd a thought, that with the NBA Finals, the series ending of The Sopranos, and the never-ending media storm around Paris Hilton, that a chubby, unassuming Welsh opera singer would be the best thing on TV?

My Life in Cotton/Lyrca Blend

As though the Nick Hornby book/John Cusack movie "High Fidelity" didn't sum up my ever-so-slightly elitist appeal to obscure indie rock bands quite enough, this t-shirt by cartoonist Richard Stevens nails it.

How was your weekend, dear readers? Mine was booze-filled, with sangria on Friday, margaritas on Saturday, and a Sopranos' Sunday filled with chai liqueur, wine and far too much sugar. Even though I drank a lot, I didn't fall asleep until 5:30am.

Was I wired from the sweets? From the knowledge that Tony Soprano survives?

Perhaps I was just suffering from the shakes.

In any event, this week shall be known "System Clean." Water. Basic foods. Nothing fancy. I feel toxic. Not priddy. And I need my priddyness.

Might paint a picture this week. Not sure what yet. But I found the oils and canvas, and they need to be used.

Wheelchair Macros

He went bye-byes in his wheelchair.

Part of me thinks this kid did this on purpose. It could have been a Jackass-style stunt, or a suicide attempt gone (hilariously) wrong.

I'm also not above thinking this is a publicity stunt for the Transformers' movie. Optimus Prime, how could you?

My Datelab is up

Read it here

Fairly accurate, but, wow...she thought I had a bit of a pudge? Good thing she didn't see me in February, when I weighed 220. I was 200 on the day of the date. Only because she's damned near anorexic. Seriously...Ms. Duffy was really trim. Athletic, so she was still healthy, but she was quite small.

Anyway, I like how she says I didn't listen. Honey, I listened - you went off on a half-dozen Republican National Committee talking points throughout the date. You flat-out said you were a Republican twice, if not three times. I can't get over what a little fibber she is! She held up the bag, and when I said "Oh, you're a Republican?" she did a 3/4 wink at me indicating that I got it. She proceeded to ask a few questions about the war in Iraq, and my stance on it. She clearly supports a continuation of the war, whereas I'm of the opinion that we needed to get out of there shortly after we entered.

Was I not listening, or did I just tune out? She was incredibly interesting when she wasn't doing her best Tony Snow impersonation.

The rub is that she's an incredibly interesting person otherwise. If she'd left the politics at home for one night, it might have gone better. How emotionally and developmentally-stunted is this area that so many people not even in the political arena feel the need to cram it down a first date's throat?

By way of admission: yours truly was a registered Republican in the state of Maryland and Iowa. However, I never voted a straight GOP ticket, and actually voted Libertarian in the last election. However, I supported former Maryland governor Bob Ehrlich completely. Why? Because as Maryland has been ruled by a near 40 year reign of Democrats, a sense of entitlement has grown in the Democratic Party in the Old Line State. Abuses of power, from zoning violations to tax laws to environmental controls to school districting, has done nothing but create a Tammany Hall in Annapolis, and a Republican vote in Maryland is actually a vote for responsibility. The same was true in Iowa, but with the Party's reversed. Tom Vilsack, the Democrat who beat long-time Republican leader Terry Branstad ended a nearly 40-year cycle of Republican tax increases and failing infrastructure. Iowa is in better shape now, and I was sad to see Republicans become so entrenched and abusive in Des Moines. That experience led me to look long and hard at the Whig Party. Pro-industrialism, anti-Andrew Jackson. I take a stand.

I did not tell Anne that I was actually a Republican as her conversation was too political as it was.

She DEFINITELY said the urban legend story was about her aunt and uncle. Way to lie in an INTERNATIONAL NEWSPAPER!! Now, I'll kindly note that I also let Ms. Duffy off the hook, letting her screed about how black people play the victim card at the Brickskellar go unmentioned to the Post. We'd had a couple of beers at that point, but my state of "pudgy" allows me to drink a lot more than she can. A simple mention of O.J. Simpson on the bar's television caused her to go off on "the victim card" and "playing race again." I attributed it to diarrhea of the mouth, but I wonder if there's not something nastier lurking inside her cranium?

Otherwise, great date... at the time. The aftermath clearly indicates the beer and marscapone influenced the date far more than I ever expected.

Please read what I wrote to Post writer Gene Weingarten about the date. This is what happens when you look for the good in people, and ignore the 800 pound gorilla.

---30---

I can't believe what I just saw

So, it's pretty obvious from my Myspace page that I am a fan of Lost. I was a little concerned as the first few episodes from this season were fairly mediocre. However...after tonight's season finale, the writers could devote an episode to reading telephone books in Esperanto. This was, simply, television at its finest.

More twists and turns than L'alpe D' Huez (Tour De France thing, Google it you lazy bastards. I don't have time to explain all of my witty references.)

I won't give anything away as a courtesy to those who haven't seen it, or are waiting for the Season 3 DVDs to come out, to get caught up. I will say this - The Sopranos *was* the best-written show on TV.

"Lost" used this episode to say "uh, not so fast, HBO."

In other news...The Milltown Brothers and Power of Dreams have Myspace pages. Two of my favorite Britpop bands from college...wounded, but not forgotten. PoD has disbanded, but Milltown's still kickin', and I downloaded their newest album from iTunes. I'll give it a listen, but I have to use this to point out the absurdity of the label system. Both of these bands had college rock/alt rock hits here in America. Both bands got caught up in label issues, and were regulated to smaller status in the U.K. 15 years later, I can listen to them online, see where and when they're performing and buy their newest music without one hint of label interference.

Not to get all Agent Smith on your ass, but that ticking you hear in the background, RIAA and your kin spread throughout the planet, is the sound of your impending doom. Record sales in `07 are off 20% from last year's dismal sales figures.

Evolve into promotion, not distribution companies, if you want to live.

(Heh, that was kinda Terminator 2-ish there...had to spell out that witty pop culture reference.)

Thanks Gene!

Gene Weingarten knew what I meant, what I was trying to say. He gets me. He's my dream woman (just fuzzier, too old, and frankly, a dude). The Datelab isn't a matchmaking service; it's a lab.

From today's WaPost.com chat with Gene...


More on Date Lab: I remembered the comment in last week's updates when I read Date Lab this past weekend. Not only did this couple seem to hit it off, they were practically having sex on the dessert plates by the time the date was over. And then...nothing. What is up with these people? Is it pressure to have a cute story to report the next day, or relief that the other person isn't a freak, or what?

Gene Weingarten: The poster from last week kind of nailed this. You're trying to adapt to an experiment; it's a lab. You're trying too hard to make it seem to work, but by week two you're focused on all the things that WEREN'T quite right.

_______________________

from DCFUD - Review of Bloom

Come in, shop happy! After spending the past few weeks trying to get their too-catchy-to-be-ignored, too-kitchy-to-be-respected reworking of the Partridge Family's "Come On, Get Happy" removed from my conscious, I finally broke down and went into a Bloom grocery store. Since it was Mother's Day, it only seemed fitting for the Five Paragraph Bitter Food Mother to tag along as well. After a relaxing day of pancakes in Rockville and coffee in Frederick, we spotted a couple of Blooms, and the two of us went in to see if the most annoying commercial song since "Empire Today" was worth the pain. We didn't see any choreographed dancers, and no background music, but we did find a lot to like about the store.

From the folks who brought you Food Lion, Bloom's goal is to concentrate on freshness, offering an easy-to-shop, upscale layout. To call Bloom upscale, though, is a bit of a misnomer - this is not even close to the gourmet mass of Wegman's, or the organic sensibilities of Whole Foods - though it is better looking and better stocked than parent Food Lion. The store offers a good-sized prepared foods section for the busy shopper on the go. The basics - chicken, ribs, cold cut sandwiches, mac & cheese - are next to the more sophisticated - paninis, salads, sushi - are all displayed next to a nice, if not spectacular, deli. The bakery is loaded with surprises, featuring dozens of muffins, breads, cookies, no-bakes and fudges. The 5PBFM was shocked to see potato candy, a beloved fixture of her youth, made fresh in the store.

The produce section shines with a dazzling array of vegetables and fruits, many from local suppliers, arranged in well-labeled bins. Nearly a dozen different types of apples sit near such oddities like brocoflour, and a mix-and-match area of chili peppers. The whole produce area is washed in a Rainforest Cafe'- inspired environment. The walls shimmer with lighting effects, and small speakers pipe in the sounds of nature. It's supposed to give the effect of getting the produce straight from the farm, but the constant sound and impression of water just triggered my bladder response. Wisely, there's a clean restroom right around the corner. Apparently, I'm not the only one susceptible to such stimuli.

The meat section was pretty typical, with prices about 80% of Harris-Teeter, 90% of what Giant and Safeway offers, and roughly the same as Shopper's and Magruders. The seafood section was nicely stocked, again at 90% of Giant and Safeway prices, but with a higher quality and better selection than the typical Shopper's. The wine and beer sections were quite large, with special end-caps for local vineyards and breweries - apparently Bloom is trying to be a good corporate neighbor. The international sections were solid, and the baking supplies section showed their Southern roots with all sorts of fillings, chips, glazes and sweeteners. The spice section was as loaded as any store I've seen, and barbecue fans will love the range of sauces, rubs and supplies.

Basically, Bloom is a cleaner, newer Food Lion. It has some great touches - portable price scanners, online shopping lists, hand sanitizers for the grocery carts, recipe stations - that other stores will no doubt incorporate. Those who view Club Discount Cards like John Goodman views salad will like Bloom's lack of of them. Buy One, Get One Free discounts and savings are open to all shoppers. The store has some drawbacks, though. The low aisle height makes the bellowing of screaming children reverberate in the store like The Three Tenors in a shower stall. In an odd design twist, the store aisles are mostly run north-south, and then several turn 90 degrees, creating plenty of hot cart-on-cart collisions. Plus, Bloom seems to view The Beltway as its 38th Parallel, refusing to enter the urban landscape as the closest stores are in Rockville, Accoceek, Laurel, Fairfax and Chantilly. However, given the amount of advertising they're spending on the market, I can't imagine it won't be much longer before those of us inside 495 will be wandering the aisles, trying to get that damned song out of our collective head. Come in, shop happy... *grumble*

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Bloom earns 7 out of 10 possible Whammies!; a solidly above-average score for being a solidly above-average grocery store. It's clean, reasonably priced, great produce section, and it's got some nice consumer touches. It's also not nearly as upscale as its marketing would lead you to believe, and it doesn't have the large amount of loss leaders that smart shoppers know to target. It's not worth the drive like a Wegman's or a sweaty Metro haul like Whole Foods, but it's definitely a nice touch for our ex-urban neighbors, and should provide a real challenge to established chains like Safeway and Giant in the region.
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The Rock and Roll Hotel Rawks Hard

I dragged Jan Louis and Dana to the Rock and Roll Hotel the other night to go see three bands, DC's Cedars, Chicago's The Changes and Glasgow's The Cinematics.

Ironic that I had never heard Cedars' music, even though they're the local chaps. The Changes hit my radar a couple of years ago from Pop Candy, and The Cinematics were the iTunes single of the week last month.

I didn't know the bands were performing in town until I read it in DCist that night. And to think I consider myself culturally literate about DC. Amazing how priorities change...a few years ago, I knew every single band, comic and show coming to Des Moines, but can't even keep track of three or four sweet venues in DC. Bad, bad Ray...I'm getting too fud-centric, perchance? I've got a fever, and less food, more rawk is the cure.

Cedars are quite good. Jan thought their lyrics were lousy, but the CD is quite good. I'm blaming the sound of the R&RH for that one - there were few people in the place at that time, and the band was playing too loud to hear the singing. By the time The Changes started playing, there was enough people in the place to make the sound appear a bit sharper. Part of it's also due to experience - Cedars sound good, but do that retro-alternative sound like The Killers or The Bravery. The Changes are more basic alternative, and don't need to rock out every song.

The Cinematics, though - they Britpopped the joint out. Think The Alarm mating with Franz Ferdinand. Not quite as jaunty as Franz; not quite as anthemic as The Alarm, but simply damned good. Their polished show belies their relative youth.

Plus - the guys from all three bands were quite nice. Good to hang out with; quite chatty and friendly. Much like dogs to Jules in "Pulp Fiction" - personality goes a long way. Guys who chat with the fans, make a point of having fun, not pretending to be the second coming of Jesus on stage - they get bonus points from me.

Saturday night, my favorite Pittsburgh band, The Clarks, are playing at the Birchmere. Always a good show - these guys worship The Replacements with a bot of Texas-twang (lead singer's from Texas) and Pittsburgh-volume, and I have no problem with that combination.

Sent to Gene

As Gene Weingarten mentioned Datelab...

Hello Gene-

For most of Datelab's young life, I had been in a relationship with a young lady, and we read the feature together, laughing at those poor souls going through the dates and the tell-all interviews afterwards. We always found it hilarious that nearly all of the men would inevitably rate the evening a "4 out of 5" and never call the woman again. Another routine outcome is the man saying "it was one of the best dates of my life" but..."there's no chemistry." I could never fathom this outcome - how can a date be so amazing, yet, so fruitless at the same time?

Or, there would be sudden, amazing meeting of two souls, as the column has produced at least two engagements. No couple matched by the Post ever seemed to just "date." It's all or nothing for Datelab.

This year, my relationship ended and I found myself reading Datelab in a new light. I decided to enter, and was surprised to be picked for a date. The Style editor Jennifer Hudson Neal arranged the time and place, but wouldn't give me any hints about the victim...I mean, date. I was curious, seeing as how some Datelabs have been nearly science experiments in incompatibility - "She's a 35 year old thrice-divorced mother of three from Kinhump, Kentucky; he's a 24 year old Hill staffer from Highbrow, Connecticut" - I wondered what my date's fatal flaw would be?

So, when we met at the appointed time and place, I was surprised to find the date witty, bold, intelligent. Pretty in a very natural, easy way. I liked her. My initial wave of relief that she wasn't my Worst Nightmare Incarnate was quite powerful. She confided that she'd had similar fears about me before our meeting, and was relieved as well that I was socially presentable. We weren't 100% matches, but I'm not one who's interested in dating a female carbon copy of myself. I like some differences; makes life interesting. Our conversation flowed easily, and once the wonderful dinner was over, we continued the date at a nearby bar. At the end of the evening, we agreed to go out again soon.

The next day, I did my post-date interview with the Post writer, and exclaimed about what a good time I'd had. I rated it a fantastic date. The writer confided that my date had expressed similar thoughts. Datelab had scored a victory.

Over the next few days, I spoke to the writer a few times. Basic follow-up questions mostly, but there were a few things about me that had bothered my date. As the writer and I spoke about these issues, I suddenly was struck by some of the things my date had said that night that would have usually waved a big fat WARNING! GET OUT! RUN! HIDE! flag in my face. Sparing details for the article, I'll say that they are issues that are part of a much-larger national debate that should never be mentioned on a first date, but somehow became part of the conversation. I wondered why I had ignored my usually-flawless warning system.

After a couple of days, I finally figured it out - Datelab really is an experiment, not a custom match-making system as some would believe. The goal of the column isn't to make every single Washingtonian happy on a soma-induced date, but to take a more accurate look the dating scene; to gain insight on the elusive beast of compatibility. Why do some folks seem to hit it off instantly? Why do others who look like perfect matches fail to spark?

Therefore, I ignored the huge, 800-pound gorilla flaws in our worldview and activities simply because I *wanted* to. I wanted us to be compatible, though our differing views on The Big Issues of the Day would be hard, if not impossible, to mesh. Still, that initial wave of relief, that thought of "hey, this person's not NEARLY as bad as you feared!" is a powerful narcotic. It affects us all on those semi-successful blind dates, either set up by friends, coworkers, the Internet, or even major international newspapers.

Maybe I just wanted the Post to have a happy story to report. Maybe I just wanted somebody to go out with again. Maybe I was just so grateful she wasn't Medusa.

In any event, I can now understand how a date can be wonderful...and lead nowhere.

I'm told my Datelab will run on May 27.

That didn't take long

Datelab partner emailed me, said she didn't think we'd be compatible. No second date here, either.

I was suspecting that too, but figured we got along well enough for a second date.

Oh well...good meal.

The historic Capitol Hill market and gathering place Eastern Market was severely damaged by fire early this morning. Nobody was injured, but all of the vendor space - the butcher, seafood, bread, snack shops - are all destroyed. At this point, the fire department and police are investigating the blaze as possible arson.

Here are links to coverage from the Post and Mark Fisher commentary. Here's a quick story and pictures from DCist.

While Mayor Adrian Fenty is vowing to repair the damage quickly, and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton is requesting Federal dollars to help, the immediate question for the community is what will happen to the vendors and surrounding businesses who make a large portion of income from the foot traffic generated by the market? Where will they be placed? How quickly can they (or are they even willing) to rebuild? Mayor Fenty says he'll get them new spaces, which is admirable...and also eerily similar to what the City of Annapolis told the vendors of the historic Market House when that building was flooded by Hurricane Isabel in 2003. Much like Eastern Market, the City-owned Market House was mostly full of locally-owned tenants - a couple of sandwich shops, seafood, bakery, produce, pizza, cheeses - a favorite of locals and tourists alike, and the building practically dripped with history. It was the worst-kept secret that the Annapolis City Council and Mayor Ellen Moyer had offered up the Market House to high-end grocery store Dean and Deluca before the hurricane, and the subsequent flood damage merely heightened the rumors and animosity between the tenants and the Council. The existing tenants were still wringing out their flooded inventories when they were booted out by the City, many closing family businesses that had existed for decades.

After a long, drawn-out leasing battle with the Annapolis City Council and Mayor, Dean and Deluca pulled out. While no official explanation came from Dean and Deluca, it became a black eye for the City to have such historic, highly valuable real estate essentially vacant during the prime tourist season and annual boat shows.

It doesn't take an advanced degree in Urban Planning or Macroeconomic Theory to know that Eastern Market is sitting in a similar prime real estate area. Metro access, established neighborhood, nearby parking, mere steps to the Capitol - every chain in America itching to enter the D.C. market would want that. It will be Fenty and the City Council's job to heed the lessons learned from the bitter romance and divorce in Annapolis, that the well-heeled suitor is not always the best choice for marriage.

The Five Paragraph Bitter Food Critic vs. Fogo De Chao

Few phrases can evoke the body into unconscious acts, rendering us less human and more automaton, operating on pure emotion. Of these phrases, most invoke love and major life announcements. "Will you marry me?" "I'm pregnant." "All-you-can-eat Brazilian steakhouse."

I have done my best to avoid hearing two of those phrases and the accompanying emotional response, but "All-you-can-eat Brazilian steakhouse" spoke to my soul like a classic Spenserian sonnet or a well-edited blooper compilation on YouTube. I took the Five Paragraph Bitter Food Family to Fogo de Chao recently, reveling in the poetry that only fire-grilled meat can write.

After perusing a wine list specializing in South American malbecs, diners are given a disc, one side red and the other green. If you don't want any meat, keep the disk showing red. Flipping that disk to the green side gives the serving gauchos carte blanche to bring out scores of skewers of perfectly-charred meats to your table, and you're free to take as much or as little as you'd like, and at your desired level of doneness. Prime rib, various types of sirloins, bacon-wrapped filets, chicken, pork ribs, lamb chops, each bite perfectly seasoned and prepared. It's like Dr. Atkins' dream restaurant - all meat, all the time, with none of those pesky starches to get in the way.

That disk, with the red and green, reminded me of the Omni from the early `80s TV show Voyagers - the green side was good, red was bad. All that was missing was Jon-Erik Hexum as Phineas Bogg saying "Great job, kid!" The green side meant the meat kept coming, and like a lonely man in the presence of a beautiful woman, I couldn't say no. I started to revert to primal instincts. I couldn't pronounce polysyllabic words. The gauchos brought out pincanha, a salt-seasoned sirloin. I ate that with glee. Bacon-wrapped chicken medallions. I pointed and grunted in approval. Alcatra, another form or sirloin? I am told by my mother than I actually drooled. Linguica, a type of sausage - by that point in the evening, things were becoming cloudy, fuzzy. I must have blacked out. I vaguely remember somebody at the table offering me a bite of cheesecake, and somebody shoving a piece delicious key lime pie in my mouth while I looked at the skewer of beef ribs like Mark Foley at a Congressional Page.

The veritable orgy of meats does not diminish the surprisingly good salad bar, featuring not only the usual lettuce and carrot mixes, but a mix of local and South American vegetables, peppers , chilies and dressings. The salad bar also has more meat, thinly sliced prosciutto and smoked salmon served cold, as though you didn't get enough dead animal already. Once I awoke from my food coma, I found the desserts were efficient and tasty, and the coffee - usually a weak spot in many restaurants - was incredibly delicious. I can't imagine eating there too often; it's easily 70 dollars or more per person for dinner between drinks, the meal, dessert and DC tax, while lunch is about half that. But, somewhere in that Big Diet Book in the Sky, Dr. Atkins is looking down, smiling at Fogo de Chao.

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Fogo De Chao earned 19 out of 20 possible Whammies! One Whammy! for each type of meat served (14 that day), one Whammy! for the coffee, two Whammies! for the salad bar that didn't suck, one Whammy! for the extensive wine list, one Whammy! for the Key Lime Pie, one Whammy! for the incredibly gracious service. One Whammy was not earned for them not allowing me to live there. I promised I'd be clean. Stupid health department.
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The Five Paragraph Bitter Food Critic Falls Off The Wagon

The Five Paragraph Bitter Food Critic has been hitting the gym almost as hard as Presidential candidates are hitting the campaign trail. The past few weeks have been spent eating healthier foods, avoiding sweets, riding my bike to work, and getting to the weight room more often than I went to the buffet. The result? As of April 23rd, I weighed less than 200 pounds for the first time since moving back to Washington in mid-2005. Heart rate's lower, blood pressure's good, and only 10 more pounds to go before I'm back to "normal." I celebrated this wonderful occasion not with more sit-ups and cardio, but by eating an ungodly amount of sumptuous, decadent tortellini at La Perla, a gem nestled between Pennsylvania Avenue and the Rock Creek Parkway near Georgetown.

This was for a good reason - the fine folks of the Washington Post's Datelab series set me up on blind date at La Perla. While I won't spoil the surprise of the details of the date (check www.washingtonpost.com or buy the Sunday papers), I will gladly dish about the restaurant. Pictures of famous guests to the restaurant line the entrance, surrounding a formal document from Pope John Paul II. The dessert case then casts an enticing glare, chock full of pastry, tortes and cheesecakes. This sugar-laden minx rests in front of a wall of wine bottles, surrounded by flowers, Italian artifacts and plaster carvings, while a replication of Botticelli's Birth of Venus stands guard over the dining room.

I had been warned that the portions at La Perla were generous, and that leaving hungry would not be an option. Chef and owner Vittorio Testa did not disappoint - my plate of tortellini alla panna was full of delicious meat-stuffed shells covered in a glorious marscapone cream sauce, and my fellow Datelabber's Piatto Di Mastro Geppetto was a massive cornucopia of shellfish served over linguine. Every mussel, clam, scallop and shrimp at the Waterfront fish markets had been kidnapped and held for ransom on her plate. This dish will taste even better later this year as more fresh sea scallops are shipped down from the New England waters. Still, that tortellini was star of the show; each bite a reminder of why I love Italian cuisine. If I ever become the male Oprah, this dish gets prime billing on my "Favorite Things" list, somewhere between TiVo and world peace.

They brought out a slice of tiramisu with some lemonchello liqueur for us to share. Now, the restaurant knew who we were and who we were representing, so it is possible that's why we received special treatment. But while good service can be faked, a genuine spirit of hospitality can't. The server, the maitre'd, bus staff, even Chef Testa himself made sure we were welcome guests, and none of that felt like it was an act to get good press (and I doubt they knew I was a humble food blogger, either).

So, La Perla has earned a future visit from me. This meal was every bit as good as my usual standard for Italian in D.C., Al Tiramisu, and though Al Tiramisu's cozy interior could be considered more romantic, it's a fine line between "intimate" and "cramped." There's something to be said for elbow room. Palena is still my favorite Italian dining experience in the city, but these are not comparable restaurants. Chef Ruta's adventurous dishes at Palena win you over using non-traditional ingredients and inventive presentation whereas Chef Testa's La Perla is more of a classical spot that honors traditional fare and hospitality.

La Perla
2600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20037
202-333-1767.
Valet service available

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La Perla earned 6 Whammies! out of a potential 7 Whammies!, the only deduction coming from the just-ever-so-slightly too salty sea scallops, which will quickly not be an issue later in the seafood season, and that they wouldn't let me swim in that marscapone cream sauce. Something about health code standards and sanitation. Hmph.
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Felt French, Ate Italy

The fine folks at Datelab set us up at La Perla, a wonderful little Italian place nestled between the west end of DC and Georgetown, moments away from the Kennedy Center. I got to the place a few moments before my date Anne, and was also fortunate to find a parking space right of Pennsylvania Avenue.

I'm not allowed to give away the details of the date, but I'll simply say we had a nice time.

The meal, however, was bloody awesome. She had a seafood medley of scallops, mussels, shrimp, mussels served over a bed of linguine with more mussels. Anne likes mussels, so that worked out for her. I had a meat and cheese tortellini in a cream sauce with marscapone cheese.

Yeah, the same stuff used in tiramisu. The yummy stuff.

I just about died and went to heaven. As my former boss at Broadstreet Communications, Chris Preston, said - "you always seem to know how to order the best thing on the menu."

This stuff was as close to pasta perfection as I've ever had. Marscapone, you've been upgraded from dessert to entree'!

DCFud will get a much-needed update from me, both on my eating habits, my diet and my Datelab.

All in all, this was a good day. Something to cherish.

feeling California, looking Colorado

I had my pre-date interview today for the Datelab piece. The reporter, Christina Antoniades, and I had a quick pre-date conversation. It's amazing - as a former media dude, journalism major and sometime-writer, I was immediately second-guessing what I told her for fear of a misinterpretation of the quote. My attempt to compliment the Post for the interesting use of a wheelchair-bound man in the last edition was pretty clumsy, at best, and could EASILY be turned around to make me sound like I wouldn't want to date a disabled woman.

Amazing how quickly the concrete I was walking on turned to eggshells.

Still, I'm looking forward to tonight. I'll post about the date when I get home...

whatta week

As a rule, I hate "weekly wrap-up" posts. It's lazy, like "here's what I couldn't be bothered to write about this week."

However, given the events at VA Tech this week, I've been lax to weigh in. Not because of any reluctance to share an opinion, just merely trying to find a unique voice to mine. Nothing can possibly forgive the actions of Cho Seung Hui - murder is murder is murder - but it's obvious this kid had issues from childhood on through his violent end. Neighbors, classmates - hell, even RELATIVES - have called this kid a loner, sullen. I will admit that I was not a terribly social youth. I was small for my age, picked on in school and not especially popular. The bike became my outlet; I rode to exercise, to get away from my family, to get away from my town...sometimes to get away from my own thoughts. The physical pain of riding up a mountain made me forget about any emotional pain. I can't imagine making it through middle and high school without the bike.

Catharsis, clearly. Something it doesn't appear this young man could get anywhere. While I feel horribly for the parents, friends and families for those who have lost loved ones, I feel as bad for the Cho family - if not worse. The parents raised two other children who have had some success in life; what must go through their minds every day for the rest of their lives would be every single moment they saw their youngest in trouble, and couldn't save him. Knowing that maybe if they had punished him more, or got him into counseling, or took away his video game, or hell - even gave him a HUG - that it might have saved those other peoples' lives.

That, my readers, is the definition of living through Hell.

Which makes the rest of the week seem to miniscule. The AG is fighting for his job, and appears to be half the public speaker President Bush is. If you thought the Ellen DeGeneres fish in "Finding Nemo" had a bad memory, just look at his testimony. He recalls less than a broken hard drive.

And I heard from the Post today. My Datelab date is next week at Ristorante Del Perla. Hopefully the food and company is as good as the artwork!

DateLab Date of Date

Looks like it will probably be sometime before the end of May. I'm not going to divuldge the exact date because:

1) if it's going to be a blind date, some mystery would be cool. Too easy to Googlestalk nowadays.

2) if I know what restaurant we're going to, I'd check it out in advance and write a food review.

3) if I know where we're going, then my friends would know where we're going, and they'd try to embarass me.

I trust them...to try to screw it up.

In other Datelab news, looks like the guy wasn't into her, she wasn't into him, and there was zero chemistry from the beginning.

Yet, as always, he rated it "4 out of 5."

DUDES!! Stand UP for yourselves! If you didn't have a good time, or didn't feel a spark, don't demean yourself by ranking it so high. She's NOT going to suddenly want to sleep with you because you THOUGHT you had a good time. Take a stand. Tell her "I wasn't feeling any spark/chemistry/it/whatever" or what have you. Just don't be condescending to her. Especially if she seems like a pill from the get-go.

Guys have no balls.

Excuse Me Sir, There's a Sebring in My Fajita...

My former place of employment during the economic crapstorm of the early `00s, Chili's of Annapolis, just got hit by a Sebring.

According to NBC 4, the car hit the restaurant at the height of lunch rush, 12:30pm. 3 people are in the hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

Having lived and worked there for so long, I can safely say that the intersection of Forest Drive and Riva Road is awful. It's at an acute angle - they had a chance to make it a perpendicular intersection for years, and have sat on it. It's a long light, and people generally gun their engines to make those last precious seconds of green and yellow lights. Plus, since it's 2 turn lanes in a roughly 80 degree turn, most people take a lousy approach and have to adjust in the middle of their steer. I've had numerous close calls of cars nearly hitting me on that transition to Forest Drive.

Still...that driver had to be cruising to miss that turn so badly. Follow the tire tracks on the NBC Chopper pictures - that's not even an attempt to steer.

I have to wonder if the manager on duty comped their meals...ole' Jeff White probably would have, but Joyce might have comped their appetizers.

Quick Hits

Hope everybody had a nice Easter. I had one FANTASTIC meal Sunday night with my Mom, friends Bart and Diana at Fogo De Chao downtown. It was pricy, but...wow. Worth it. Check the upcoming review on DCFUD.com - should be up today or tomorrow.

I'll also have a review of Saint-Ex where I dined last week.

I received an email from the folks at the Post's Datelab. My date could be as early as tomorrow night. Guessing it's too late for a last minute face lift, huh?

Nice for the Orioles to win their home opener. That'll give the doomsday crowd a couple of hours of happiness.