Lucy's away message alerted me to an article in The Washington Post from Sunday that discusses
"What Every First-Year College Student Needs to Know About Washington".Here are some of my favorites:
1. Stand to the right. This is really the first and last rule of Washington, a city obsessed with rules. If you don't want to join the hurried commuters walking up or down the Metro escalator, then move to the right and stand there. Do not block the path of the important people. They will huff and puff and make snide comments about your touristy ignorance. Soon enough, you'll be able to do this, too.
4. Maintain residency in your home state (if your new home is in the District). Especially if you're from a swing state. Your vote (absentee or not) will count more in Ohio or Florida than it will in the District, which is bluer than blueberries. Plus, D.C. residents have only a non-voting delegate in the U.S. House. Some call this "taxation without representation" (you'll see the phrase on our license plates), and it's why Americans shook off the shackles of Great Britain in the first place. You now live in the capital of irony.
7. That police car is probably not pulling you over. Yes, its lights are flashing, but if it is moving at normal speed and you don't hear the siren, you can feel relatively sure that you're not about to get a ticket that you'll have to explain to Mom and Dad. D.C. police keep their car emergency lights on as a way to make themselves more visible to the law-abiding public -- and, of course, to criminals. Trust us, when the D.C. police want to pull you over, they will let you know in no uncertain terms.
8. Yield to cars in traffic circles. The city is overpopulated with circles (a.k.a. Washington planner Pierre L'Enfant's grandest practical joke), so you're likely to encounter them if you're a driver. Yield to the cars in the loop. More important, don't stop if nothing is coming. ("Yield" means "yield," not "stop.") College freshmen are responsible for 85 percent of the accidents in D.C. traffic circles. We're making that up, but it's probably 25 percent true.
11. There is no J Street. No matter how far you walk, you'll never cross J Street. If someone tells you to meet her anywhere on J Street, you are being punk'd. The lore is that Washington designer Pierre L'Enfant (yes, him again) had a beef with John Jay, the first chief justice of the United States, and so didn't include a J Street. The real reason is that the lettering for J and I streets were too similar, so J got axed. Seems kind of harsh in retrospect.
KT introduced me to a blog called Design*Sponge. It's kind of everything I wish this blog were. I love the 'Before and After' section. I like Olga's before and after table, it looks like something that anyone could do with the right supplies and couple hours on a Saturday. Those are my kind of projects.
I went with Lacy Lace, Meg and KT to the Crafty Bastards show yesterday in Adam's Morgan. And this wasn't your grandma's craft show. All of the booths were fantastic. I could have spent $300 in about 5 min. I thankfully had the strength to resist, but I did buy myself a little gift in the form of a paper airplane necklace. It was one of the first things I saw, and after we had walked through the whole show, I was still thinking about it. The best part... I bought it from a booth called "Finch Metal". How apropos!
I thought it was really silly and fun. I'm in love. You can visit the site at www.finchmetal.com.
One of my favorite websites, Apartment Therapy has just launched a D.C. site! I've been hoping they would do this for some time. Take a browse around and enjoy! If I can get the bedroom complete before October 14th, I might enter it in the Fall Colors Contest. Not because I think I could get anywhere, but just to see what would happen. It's like March Madness but with decorating! What could be better?
P.S... I finally got the bed-side tables from Ikea. They look great. I'll post the pictures asap.
Why oh why do I love such horrible television?
Diet Coke...
It's been a wonderful week of season premiers. Gossip Girl and 90210 with a little The Hills mixed in got me through Monday and Tuesday, but I have to tell you I was just as excited about the season 2 premier of Top Design on Bravo (I know what you're thinking... shocker!).
