what can we help you find? -- apparently nothing

file this under too strange to be true:

my roommate is checking to make sure that he's registered to vote here in the district. like any computer-literate person these days, he decides that a good source for information might be an official website of some sort.

so, he checks out dc.gov, our city's award-winning portal.

right there in the menu bar across, the top, he clicks on 'RESIDENTS', figuring that might be a good place to start.

lo and behold, that brings you to a page with a search function at the top with the polite question "what can we help you find?" there in bright red letters. and, in a matter of perfect harmonic convergence, the polite question offers an example, that example being "Register to Vote".

"PERFECT!" my roommate thinks, "just what i'm looking for!"

ah, but this is DC, my friends, where nothing is ever perfect.

go ahead try it yourself. enter "register to vote" into that field and see what you get.

nothing.

a multitude of questions come to mind, but i think the first and foremost would be this: don't you think that those who created our city's award-winning website would have checked to make sure that, when creating a search function like this and offering up a concrete example, they would have checked to make sure it actually does what they promise it does?

(as a public service, if you want to figure out if your voter registration is up to date (especially if you live in anc2c, just sayin'), check out this tool on the website of the dc board of elections and ethics.)

this is a dangerous neighborhood! yuppies stay away!!!

ok, just kidding....figured the title might draw a little attention.

check out this sign (which is one of many that was taped up and down first street. there are always a lot of guys who congregate in groups of two or more out here in the street (usually not to sell and buy drugs, but sometimes i'm not so sure...), but i've never seen the police telling people to move along, etc.

anyway, the enforcement period ended last weekend, so i'm thinking the police should take the signs down. i would volunteer to take these down, but it says if i tamper with them, i'll get in trouble. so, might as well just stay away for now....because CHIEF CHARLES RAMSEY might come and get me...

a tale of two ANCs

look at the report for tonight's meeting for anc2f, and then look at the report and video of anc2c.

two groups that share a common border, a (supposedly) common mission, and absolutely nothing else. i can only imagine what developers and others coming in to present at these meetings must think.

it's quite obvious that the chair doesn't know parliamentary procedure (and thus, to her credit, she has brought in a parliamentarian there to tell her what to do at all times). i've seen student council meetings run more effectively in grade school. 'tis a shame...

purple place at night

they've put lights up on the façade of the empty purple space on first street. looks nice at night (would look better with a nicer camera, i'm sure). new planters out front too. still nothing in there though.

dumb pedestrians in bad weather

leaving work this time of year means it's going to be dark when you step outside. if you're walking, paying extra attention when crossing the road is even more imperative, because it might be hard for traffic to see you. when it's snowing out and visibility is impaired, your chance of getting hit by something goes up even more. but you know this, you're reading this blog, so you must be smart! ;)

if you're the guy in the long black coat i almost hit today, you're not that smart. in fact, you might just lack common sense and an understanding of common courtesy.

(here's the deal: check out this map. open it in another window to follow along.)

so i was biking home tonight. in the snow. i've got lights on my bike, and know how to deal with the bad conditions. i went to school in michigan, this is nothing to me. anyway, if you look at the map (you do have it open, right) you can see three points and a line. i was biking on that line up rhode island avenue. traffic was driving along in the lane to my left, cars were parked ahead to the right, and there was this guy in one of those long black coats that look somewhat formal standing there off the curb all the way out in the lane i was biking in.

i couldn't see this paragon of intelligence until i was almost on top of him. if he was paying attention, he had to know i was coming, because i had my headlight on. he had to know that i couldn't move out into the lane to my left to avoid him because i would get run over. so i called out (and not rudely) "i can barely see you!" he took a step back as i passed, and i figured that was that. i thought about saying "you should wear brighter/reflective clothing" but eh, who cares right?

then, as i'm biking away, i hear him call out (in response to my "i can barely see you") "open up your eyes then"...

"open up your eyes then"?

i wasn't about to turn around, i had places to be, but boy oh boy, what an ass. i was doing this guy a favor, letting him know, in case he didn't already, that he was invisible for all intents and purposes standing there in the middle of the road when opposing traffic had a green light and it's snowing outside. and he's a smart-ass about it.

i wish i had a quicker wit, because a witty rejoinder would have been wonderful here. or turning around to see him hit by a truck, that might have been a decent comeuppance.

let this be a lesson...if you're a walking (which i do a lot myself), stay on the curb until you get the walk signal. that extra two steps you can get by stepping off the curb ahead of time isn't worth the risk.

going to get the new recycling bin

i updated my post below about a recycling bin when mari over at inshaw.com found me a new recycling bin (ok, slightly used, but not a big deal...no one else was using it).

on the way to her place to pick up the new bin, i took a few pictures:

leaves, leaves everywhere. i was going to ask what we need to do to get the leaves off of the sidewalks, because it seemed like a lot of houses weren't doing their job and clearing the sidewalks in front of their houses (let's you know who probably won't be clearing snow off if we get any this year). the wind over the last two days has pretty much taken care of this for now. but i'm sure it's an issue in some places where the wind wasn't as strong.

i'm a little confused with the rosale condominiums at 1st and randolph. a couple days ago, this sign said, "Hurry, Just 4 Left", then "Just 2 Left", and now "Just 3 Left". can they make up their minds? how are there more available now than a couple days before? are people backing out of deals here? are more condos magically appearing out back?

finally, here's three d motors in the small triangle on the west side of the florida and R intersection. i hope they're paying the city rent for that part of the sidewalk they're taking over. actually, i would hope they would take their cars and high-tail it out of here. little crappy car lots like these around the city are an eyesore. the falling-down chain-link fences are ugly, and the vibe around places like this is just pure sketch. move on and build a house there instead!

the view just outside the neighborhood

i took the long way biking to the giant at the rhode island ave. metro station, and got these three photos:
here's the house at 26 P street NE. they are actually stacking two more floors on this house! it looks like they'll tip over on one of the houses next door. i'm hoping for two things here: 1) that the addition is made to look like it really should be part of the house architecturally, and 2) that the neighbors do the same thing, otherwise this is just going to look damn ridiculous.

here's the central building at the florida avenue market. just some exterior TLC (fix up that sign, good god! and repair the lightning rod-looking poles, replacing the missing ones and getting the existing ones that are listing like the leaning tower of pisa back upright) and this building could look 100 times better.

finally, we're at the point just south of new york avenue where brentwood and mount olivet split. this sign really made me laugh. apparently, you bear left to stay on brentwood, bear right to take mount olivet over to trinidad, and drive straight ahead through the grass to get on new york avenue. of course, that means you'll have to go through the grove of trees straight ahead...

FOUND CAT

there are flyers going up around the neighbohood, and i thought i'd reproduce one here to see if it helps! (it's getting smeared from the rain, so that explains the weird-lookingness behind the cat's ear.)

FOUND!!!!

is this your cat?

cuddly, calico, cute cat.
found 12-1-07
on randolph place, 100 block, 7 pm
very hungry, nails clipped...
is homesick... call 202 550 6950

old tena market no more

well, no longer will i refer to this building on the southwest corner of 2nd and rhode island NW as the old tena market. apparently, it will be the timor market now (read that in scott roberts' bloomingdale email this morning). so, it's gone from being named after a town on the amazonian frontier in ecuador, to the newest country in southeast asia. and that's your geography lesson for the day. :)

(i was hoping it would be a restaurant called timor, and we'd be getting southeast asian cuisine....darn.)

traffic control on unit block of seaton nw

looks like speed humps (sounds dumb, oh well) have finally come to the unit block of seaton place nw. there are a few of them spaced out over the length of the block. i watched a couple cars really slow down to go over them today, so it looks like the days of using seaton as a racetrack are over, unless someone chooses to ignore them and go flying off into the stratosphere (which i'll bet happens at some point).