Miss Adventures

Hey…while I’m working on the blog, I thought I’d register my happiness at the news that it looks like DC will get baseball after all. Hoorah!

So, I won’t be there for the initial excitement. But, that’s okay. The Expos’ first year in DC will probably be hard. Plus, the team is currently in LAST place in the NL East…dead last and DC just go together. It’s perfect.

I’m still not too keen on the name the Washington Expos, as I’ve mentioned before. And, I hear that those who bought the Senators way back in 1971 own those naming rights and will not sell them. So, maybe we should go with the Washington Grays, the name of DC’s former negro league team.

All of my advocating for a team will be for naught if they change the team colors to teal and puce or try to rename the Expos something like the “Sting” or the “Raptors.” Yes…those are WNBA/NBA names. I actually don’t hate some of the new-fangled baseball names like the Devil Rays or the Diamondbacks. Couldn’t care less about the teams. But the names aren’t that bad.

What I really hope is that the team keeps its official website in English and in French, just to piss off all those anti-”Old Europe” types. That would be icing on the cake.

Are you serious? You can’t be serious?

Marion Barry is in DC government again?

The immortal words of Chris Rock:
“Don’t smoke crack. If you do you won’t grow up to be anything”
“I can be mayor!”

Well, now you can also be a councilman!

Coming to the DC area for the 4th and want to know what to do? Here are a few events that I profiled for AOL Digital Cities:

• Independence Eve Bash
• National Archives July 4 Celebration
• University of Maryland July 4 Concert & Fireworks

And more from AOL…

Last night, I had the pleasure of watching the New York Yankees trounce the Baltimore Orioles 10-4. So the Yankees bought their talent – isn’t that what professional baseball teams are supposed to do? Alex Rodriguez’s salary is indeed bloated, but after seeing him belt two homers – and drive in half of the Yankees’ runs – I certainly feel like he was worth every penny. He made me a believer.

I’m sure he made a number of Orioles fans believers, too, even if they didn’t like the score. Last night was the highest attendance EVER at Camden Yards. 49,696 people came to the game. And though it was a great night for a ballgame, I’m pretty sure that many people showed up on a Tuesday evening just to watch A-Rod play.

Baseball is back, and early attendance records can back me up. For this reason, but not for this reason alone, I’d like to advocate the relocation of the Montreal Expos to Washington, DC.
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No matter what you think of “Reagan: The Man,” “Reagan: The Funeral” should be a fascinating nugget of history in the making. Major traffic arteries in Washington will be closed beginning at about 3pm today to make way for a funeral procession steeped in tradition.

Yes, Washingtonians will complain over the next few days because they won’t be able to go anywhere without encountering security checkpoints and road blocks. Then again, many federal and city workers within the vicinity of downtown have been granted “liberal leave” this afternoon, meaning that they can use the Reagan funeral as an excuse to ditch out of work early without using their vacation time. On Friday, government workers, financial workers, and companies that follow the government schedule (most all in Washington) will have the day off.

We’ve really got it good in this city of ceremony.
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The saturation Reagan coverage is cathartic to some, annoying to others. All I know is that we’re about to get bombarded with Reaganites over the next few days.

My day job has followed the Federal Government and declared offices closed on Friday (thanks, Ronnie!). Starting tomorrow, traffic around here is going to be hellish. Barriers and fencing are already up near the National Cathedral. I haven’t had a chance to look downtown yet, but I’m sure it’s a mess, too.

I have mixed feelings about Reagan, mostly because I was too young during his presidency to really get angry about his policies. A little older, a little wiser, I’m a bit disappointed that some of the negatives of the Reagan years are not being mentioned in the media. CNN’s site has some good ones, though. I’m touched by some of the people from the former Soviet Bloc (just wrote Soviet Blog - that’d be a cool one!) who feel that they owe RR for their freedom. Then again, this is the man who ordered an invasion on tiny Grenada and refused to speak out about the AIDS crisis. This guy says it pretty well:
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Back when the whole hullabaloo over gay marriage was in effect, I wrote this lil service article on spec, just for the hell of it. I shopped it out a few places, but I think that the mainstream papers are a little apprehensive about gay-oriented travel.

I’m not gay but I occasionally work in a gay-friendly restaurant (oh, I’ve got some fun stories!), and I can’t imagine why catering to the gay market or occasionally running a gay travel feature could hurt any kind of publication. Advertisers and editors have no idea what kind of disposable income they’re sniffing at.

Anyhow, with Capital Pride upon us, I thought I’d share this piece with y’all. It’s too late to sell it now and the info will be stale next time around.

Oh yeah…and this is also a bit in response to the people on the Boots forum who listed DC as their least favorite city of all time. There’s so much more beyond the monuments…you have no idea…
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It is now safe to say that the 17-year Brood X cicadas are long gone. They emerged from their nests, copulated, buzzed about, and died. I’m sad to see them go. Rather, I’m sad to hear them disappear. At the height of their existence in the trees around DC, the cicadas sounded like one of those rain sticks that you buy on a trip to Central America. It really was a lovely hum.

Now what do we have to look forward to this summer? Pandamania.
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This Sunday, when the NBA Finals kick off in L.A., the Detroit Pistons will be overwhelmingly the underdogs. Forget that the team is young and that most of its players have never been this far in the playoffs. Forget that the Lakers have home court advantage. Forget, too, that Pistons Coach Larry Brown has an incredible track record of winning conference finals but losing when it counts.

The real reason why the Pistons will lose ultimately comes down to this fact: four of the team’s starters once played for the Washington Wizards.
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