Revolting science
After six days without power, two Rockville roommates made an interesting discovery upon returning to their apartment: a Tupperware bowl of leftovers that had been forgotten and sitting on the apartment balcony.
The covered bowl, now days ripe after sitting in the hot sun, had contained ground beef. The two men could now swear it looked like the beef was now boiling.
Nope. A lift of the lid confirmed this was no balcony-turned-easy-bake oven. Maggots had found their way into the leftovers.
Of course, being men, the bowl was still on the balcony a day later.
“We were thinking about leaving it there for a little while to see what happens to it,” one roommate said. “Kind of like our own little science project.”
Up close and personal
A recent Friday night kicked off in a Dupont Circle apartment for a set of Washingtonians, where the subject naturally turned to their very pretty smartphones.
One guest from Alexandria started praising his iPhone application for a locally-based magazine.
“Really? You like the app?” asked his host.
“Yeah, I guess. It looks good, it’s easy to use.”
His host shrugged. “Thanks for those clicks,” he said, admitting he worked for the magazine. “You’re my paycheck.”
Let the stars be your guide
Her mother was simply trying to send her a letter, explained a bespectacled young woman on a Pentagon City-bound bus one morning.
“She put South 28th Street instead of 28th Street South,” she lamented to a fellow rider, who nodded.
“By my old apartment, there was a 13th Street, a 13th Avenue and a 13th Road.”
After confessing that they needed to employ Google Maps simply to navigate their own neighborhoods, the Northern Virginia women laughed at the prospect of living in the District.
“Northeast, Southeast, Southwest, Northwest? How can you keep it all straight!” the woman with the eyeglasses said.
Well, there’s always the North Star.
Before it was called Tebowing
“I’m the original Tebow,” said a man in a full suit on another scorching day.
Or so he proclaimed after going to one knee in prayer outside a Northeast Safeway grocery store, drawing comparisons to the NFL quarterback from a crowd of nearby teenagers. “I do this at least half a dozen times a day,” said the man. “It keeps me grounded.”
When asked whether the Tebow phenomenon trivialized his sacred routine, the District man said, “Of course not. I’d like to think that when all those kids are down on one knee, they learn something — call it osmosis.”
Goodbye, monster
Next to the never-ending fare hikes on the Dulles Toll Road, the most eye-popping sight of the past few years has been the massive horizontal cranes building an elevated Metro track from Interstate 66 through Tysons Corner and to the airport access road. After dropping 2,700 concrete segments, the last crane, a 366-ton yellow and blue monster that snakes its way from pier to pier, is at the end of the line.
Many drivers fascinated with the crane, which puts the last truss in place this month, are sad to see it go. “It’s a modern marvel that I loved to see at work,” said one commuter from Loudoun County. “It kept my attention off the traffic and the fares,” said another.
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