Can't Get There From Here

Like most Washingtonians, especially those living around the city's core, I get asked for directions a lot. The Mall, Georgetown, 395...I have a repertoire of the more common destinations all ready to go.

While walking the dogs this morning, I was summoned by a woman looking for Krispy Kreme. After I explained Washington Circle versus Dupont Circle, New Hampshire Ave, and so on, and she was unconfidently on her way, I realized the truly most efficient directions for her would have been

"Park your car and walk or Metro."

I hope she wasn't expecting drive-thru service.

Hail, Hail the Lucky Ones

In all the hubbub on Saturday, I didn't get to mention that when the mail finally did come, our Eddie Vedder tickets were in the mix. WOO HOO!

Getting these tickets was quite the ordeal. We're Ten Club members, so normally when Pearl Jam comes through town, we have a few days in which to get our tickets order in, and when we do that has no bearing on seating, since it's assigned based on length of club membership. We've now seen the band nine times, seven based on this nice stressfree method.

Evidently Ten Club only had a tiny number of seats for the two shows at Warner Theatre so we got squeezed out of the primo seats. We were totally not expecting that to happen. Complacency...

So when the rest of the tickets went up a couple days later via the hated Ticketmaster, we were ready. It still took a while to get through, but numerous gut-wrenching browser refreshes later, we had them. And now we really have them, in hand.

I've waited 15 years for a show like this. And I'm thrilled to be over the moon for a Pearl Jam-ish concert again.

WaPo followup

The Washington Post has a full story on yesterday's incident at GWU Hospital. Apparently a patient climbed onto a ledge 5 stories up and paced for about 4 hours, then when trying to climb down, fell, and only partially hit the inflatable cushion laid out for his potential landing. He's now back in the hospital, in critical condition.

How awful. I hope the man makes a full recovery, both of body and mind.

In looking up that story, I also saw that someone died at the Rockville Twilighter 8K last night. I've run this race three times, and it's always hot and always uncomfortable, and the organizers always warn people to take it easy. It was even hotter than usual last night. What a tragedy. My thoughts to the man's loved ones, and also to the folks at Montgomery County Road Runners, the race organizers.

Police Activity at Washington Circle

As we were leaving for afternoon errands, we noticed a bunch of police tape being strung up in front of our house. The cops weren't letting anyone stand around outside, much less ask any questions.

We returned 90 minutes later and the yellow and red tape was still there. WTOP had reported the activity during its traffic report, but didn't have any information about what the activity actually was. I took a few pictures at the tape (which crosses our gate) but was then told to go back inside. Local news isn't on it yet. But there are cops and ambulances blocking the intersections on 24th, New Hampshire, K, and I Streets. Fire trucks and other various emergency vehicles around the circle.

We haven't gotten our mail yet, and the regular din of ambulances for GWU's emergency room has stopped. Very strange.

UPDATE (3:35 pm): screengrab from a WaPo.com traffic camera, which appears to be located on the southwest side of the circle, where K Street enters:



UPDATE (4:35pm): It's over; the police are taking the tape down now and traffic is moving (slowly) through the area again. If the DC alert is correct regarding it being a jumper, I suspect the person was threatening to jump into the construction site across 23rd St from the hospital. Dozens of fire and rescue vehicles around that "corner" of the circle between 23rd and Penn, and along 23rd.




Whew. We normally only experience this sort of police attention when Cheney has chest pain.

Beautiful Acadia

Jordan Pond, and the Bubbles