By Katie
‘Are you gonna take me home tonight’
courtesy of ‘christaki’
OH MAN I JUST GOT RULL EXCITED because I just remembered that not only does October mean my birthday, it also means THE BEST EVENT OF THE YEAR, the High Heel Drag Queen Race! Squee!
Mark your calendars for Tuesday, October 27th, to watch all the ladies (and hot tranny messes) parade up and down 17th street. If you can’t wait ’til then, (and who can, honestly?) check out our past coverage including a photo gallery.
By Rebecca
‘Skewers on the Grill’
courtesy of ‘Kevin H.’
Starting yesterday and continuing through this weekend you can enjoy the culinary delights of the 61st Annual St. Mary Armenian Church Food Festival at St. Mary’s Armenian Apostolic Church (Metro Red Line to Friendship Heights Station).
The festival highlights delectable Armenian foods such as: lahmajoon, kufta, stuffed grape leaves, grilled shish kebobs, lamb skewers and other traditional fare. You can also partake in authentic Armenian beer and grape wine. Portions are ample and pricing is reasonable.
Lunch: October 7, 8, 9 and 10th from 11AM to 2 PM
Dinner: October 10th from 5 PM to 9 PM
By Jenn Larsen
Esther Williamson as Isabella, and Kimberly Gilbert as Angelo
Photo by Kristin Holodak
“Measure for Measure” could be described in simplest terms as a “he said, she said” kind of play. When fellow author Don shared his thoughts on Taffety Punk’s current production with me, it fascinated me that we had two disparate views. So why not mimic the play’s conceit and split the review?
Before we go into it, plot please? The leader of the free world gives it all up temporarily for some meditation practice, leaving a stuck-up prig in charge as a test. The prig goes to town cleaning up the junkies and whores, jailing a reprobate with a hot virgin as a sister. Virgin begs for her brother’s life, prig will give it if she sleeps with him. All hell breaks loose with the leader working the marionette strings behind the scenes.
At least, that was how my professor described it.
So here goes, our little gender joint review experiment… Continue reading
By Jenn Larsen
Image courtesy of VelocityDC
There are dance parties where you dance, and dance parties where you watch in awe. This Friday and Saturday for a paltry $15 you can do the latter at VelocityDC Dance Festival, where six companies will strut their stuff upon the stage of the Harman Center. It’s a wide variety – ballet, modern, flamenco, hip hop – with troupes such as The Washington Ballet, CityDance Ensemble, and Liz Lerman Dance Exchange presenting short pieces designed to introduce you to dance performance.
Both nights start with a special street performance at 5:30pm called “Bodies in Urban Space,” which will move from the Navy Memorial through Penn Quarter to the Harman. Stage performances begin at 7:30pm. Meet the dancers afterwards at the bars of the Harman to chat them up about their profession, one of the most grueling and athletic of the performing arts.
And if that weren’t enough, Saturday will also feature a 10pm cabaret with performers like Furia Flamenca and Capital Movement Project, followed by DJ Ian Knight spinning in the Harman lounges.
So, $15 for poetry in motion. Not bad.
By jasmine
‘(269/365)’
courtesy of ‘kimberlyfaye’
Last Saturday, book lovers of all ages braved the rain for the Library of Congress National Book Festival on the National Mall. The Book Fest is always a great way to see a bunch of the biggest authors around, but this year they encouraged people to tweet from the festival and tag their pictures on Flickr with “NBF.”
The best part of the festival was all the moments that make even adults squeal like little kids. There were authors whose books I grew up reading, like Judy Blume and Lois Lowry, and authors so big they’re practically celebrities (even though you might not recognize them), like John Grisham, Nicholas Sparks, and James Patterson. Other exciting names were Jodi Picoult (My Sister’s Keeper), John Irving (A Prayer for Owen Meany), and Ken Burns (of the Ken Burns effect, as seen on every slide show I’ve ever made). Continue reading
By Rebecca
‘The Good Stuff’
courtesy of ‘DaveFayram’
In last weekend’s Washington Post, the article “Tips on Throwing a Neighborhood Block Party,” detailed the ins and outs of how to–legally–plan, promote and execute a block party in DC.
So now, my friends, it’s time to get the block partying on!
Look no further than the Big Kids Block Party, Saturday, October 3 from 6pm to midnight at Marion and Q St NW in DC’s Shaw neighborhood. The party is being hosted and organized by the Q Street Nehighborhood Association, is properly sanctioned by local DC authorities and, as a BIG kids block party, is for the 21+ crowd (photo ID will be required for entrance.)
Did I also mention all the local restaurants/shops that are providing provisions for the event? I’m talking 200 half-smokes from Ben’s Chili Bowl, Mr. Yogato fro-yo (and they’ve got some sort of 100 yogurt cup competition up their shelves AND gift card giveaways,) lots of tasty goodies from Julia’s Empanadas, a cotton candy machine, rice crispy treats and more. Continue reading
By Cathy
‘rental’
courtesy of ‘staceyviera’
With the Lebowski Fest coming to DC on September 28-29, we’re sure you have bowling on your mind. These days you can bowl on your iPhone, your Wii, and a number of other technological devices, but some days you just want to get out there and have the whole experience. Perhaps you’ve already thought of hurling a ball towards ten pins as your preferred indoor activity during the upcoming winter season, or even – Dude! – joining a bowling league.
Well, lucky for you, the DC area has a plethora of options for getting your bowl on.
Keep it casual
Maybe you’re not looking to get into a serious relationship with bowling just yet. Maybe you want to date before you marry. Lucky Strike in Chinatown and Strike Bethesda are high-end options for an occasional bowl. The pricier-than-most food and drinks accompany the bowling prices, but when all’s said and done, it’s a classy – and still affordable – affair for a great night out. On the opposite end of the spectrum, GW’s Hippodrome offers cheap, cheap, cheap – no frills – bowling. And, while not always possible, moving your bowling extravaganza out of the city and out of the way of a metro guarantees a more “authentic” experience. — See below for more details on US Bowling (VA), Bowl America (VA) and Marlow Heights Lanes (MD). Continue reading
By Tom Bridge
‘Film: “St Elmo’s Fire”‘
courtesy of ‘dbking’
The 1985 movie St. Elmo’s Fire opens in Roosevelt Hospital, with a drunken Rob Lowe getting arrested by an MPD officer for drunk driving. Judd Nelson plays his friend, a Congressman’s staffer who drops the name of his employer to try to get his friend off. And, of course, they all head right back to the bar. And now? It’s going to be a TV show.
Of course, the movie features Judd Nelson, Ally Sheedy, Rob Lowe and Demi Moore, so it’s got that much going for it. Perhaps we’ll get lucky and the TV show will at least have interesting people in it?
By Rebecca
photo courtesy of pbs.org
This Sunday evening, September 27 at 8pm, the long awaited Ken Burns documentary The National Parks: America’s Best Idea premieres on PBS. The documentary stories the inspiring individuals who dedicated themselves to establishing our National Park System and to protecting America’s cultural, natural and historic heritage. The series will air a new episode every night next week with the concluding episode on Friday, October 2.
To spread the word about this awesome documentary and get park lovers to share their parks stories with friends and family, the DC-based non-profit, the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) is organizing nation-wide viewing parties for the Sunday premiere, and they’ve made it super easy to host your own get-together with customized evites, your own personalized party page, helpful party tips and innovative ways to share this documentary with people around the country. “Our goal is to inspire all Americans to dedicate themselves to protecting and preserving our national parks,” says Tom Kiernan, NPCA President, “so that the parks can be enjoyed, explored, and cherished by our children, our grandchildren, and by all future generations.”
Register to host a (private or public) party, and you’ll be entered in a raffle to win 1 of 5 signed copies of award-winning, conservation photographer Ian Shive‘s The National Parks: Our American Landscape. This new, visually stunning photo journey highlights the beauty and majesty of our national parks from Alaska’s Denali to Florida’s Everglades. RSVP’ed guests will also be entered in the drawing, and you, as the host, will get a bonus entry for every guest. Woot! Continue reading
By Katie
‘DSC_0303’
courtesy of ‘|
Slip on your brown flip flops, because this Saturday is the 12th Annual Clarendon Day, an event celebrating Arlington’s original downtown. The festival, to be held rain or shine on September 26 from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., will feature all kinds of Arlington loving.
There will be magic and puppet shows, a Doggy Splash Pool, skateboard demos, electric cars, art booths and of course, my favorite, food from more than 15 restaurants, including The Liberty Tavern, Willow, Whitlow’s on Wilson, Mexicali Blues, and Tallula/EatBar. You can even catch GoRemy, the Arlington Rapper, emceeing the event, which is probably pretty epic in person.
Just beware of people packing heat and boat shoes.
By Rebecca
‘Don’t Have Any Words at the Moment’
courtesy of ‘marciadc’
I’m guessing that even if you’re Irish, you probably didn’t realize that tomorrow is the halfway mark to 2010’s St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.
If you’d like to celebrate this VERY special occasion, have a pint or you’re just looking for a good time, check out the St. Patrick’s Day Festival at Kelly’s Irish Times and the Dubliner tomorrow. Festivities begin at 4pm and last until 12pm with drink specials, raffle prizes and live music.
Entry is $5 in advance, $7 if you’re sporting green and $10 if you just want in at the door, and can be bought through Lindy Promotions.
By Rebecca
‘Defiance’
courtesy of ‘artwork_rebel’
There’s a casting call for some serious adult male soccer players for a video shoot next week. The production company is having “auditions” – today, where all you have to do is show up in your hotness and show them your footie skillz. It’s all for some sort of Gatorade-ish take-off spot, so envision sweat drops in slow-mo. If you qualify, contact Karen @ Carbone Entertainment. Also, please forward your headshot to the ladies at WeLoveDC. ;)
By Rebecca
‘DSC05164.JPG’
courtesy of ‘The_WB’
Celebrate Niner-Niner-Niner Day with copious amounts of Magic Hat #9 at RocketBar at 714 7th St NW in Chinatown starting at 7pm today. Free Magic Hat t-shirts go to the first 99 people, there will be 3-for-$9 specials on all #9s and awesome giveaways like free rounds of beer to parties of 9, a custom cruiser bike and iPod shuffles. Pretty solid marketing promotion for a tasty beer if you ask me. Hooray beer!
By Rebecca
‘and their (clothes are) off!’
courtesy of ‘m hoek’
Sorry for the semi-disturbing picture. Avert your eyes! Avert your eyes! But I couldn’t help it. I mean the event’s title is the Full “Corn Moon” Bike Ride. So, you’re better blaming the Washington Area Bicyclists Association who will be leading this nighttime tour of the Capital Crescent/Georgetown Branch Trail. The ride starts at 8:15pm right next to Cycle Life under the Whitehurst Freeway at the Georgetown Waterfront by moonlight starting from the Georgetown Waterfront. You’ll bike the non-hilly, cement paved trail all the way up to City Bikes in Chevy Chase, where you can feast on some BBQ before heading back.
By Rebecca
‘roar!’
courtesy of ‘staceyviera’
Nope, Steven Speilberg and Jeff Goldblum are not in town. However, “Walking with Dinosaurs – The Arena Spectacular” is starting this Wednesday, Sept. 16 through Sunday, Sept. 20 at the Verizon Center.
The show takes the audience through the 200 million years that dinosaurs roamed the earth with key performances by Tyrannosaurus Rex, Plateosaurus, Stegosaurus, Allosaurus, Torosaurus and Utahraptor and a 36′ tall by 56′ long animatronic Brachiosaurus. The entire production took one whole year to build, with a team of 50 animatronics’ experts solely dedicated to making the dinosaurs come to life. Like John Hammond said, “We’ve made living biological attractions so astounding that they’ll capture the imagination of the entire planet.”
I believe Samuel L. also said, “Hold on to your butts!“
By Katie
‘Yummy Lunch!’
courtesy of ‘kimberlyfaye’
We Love DC editor man Tom just sent me this link, and now my life is complete. You see, I have lunch angst. I do! I can never figure out where to get my lunch, and I always forget about all my options. So this Wheel of Lunch is brilliant! I’m in love. Input your zip code, and take the wheel for a spin and let it decide what you’re going to eat today. If wheels aren’t your thing, check out the UrbanSpoon slot machine widget.
By Max
"Lake Anna Lifeguard Stand" by needlessspaces, on Flickr
Ah, one of the last summer weekends is upon us. The city is emptying out, you can have bar space to yourself, everyone’s baking in the heat and living slow. Enjoy.
Katie: It seems like DC’s disgustingly hot weather is going to keep up this weekend, so my plans will revolve around keeping cool. I’d happily take a day trip down to the beach at Lake Anna State Park outside of Fredericksburg, where you can soak up the sun on a sand beach, and float around in the huge lake. There’s even a snack shack with ice cream when you need a cool treat. To continue my plans to stay cool, I’ll probably be spending Saturday night on the roof deck at Eventide in Clarendon where they’ve built an entire food, wine and cocktail list revolving around cold. Sunday I’ll head over to my new Farmer’s Market crush, the small but loveable Columbia Pike market (props to WLDC author Donna for suggesting it to me!) and grab some watermelon for the fridge. The rest of Sunday will be spent indoors reveling in air conditioning catching up on summer flicks like (500) Days of Summer or Julie and Julia.
Jasmine: This weekend, I am venturing to a couple of places I’ve never been before. I pass the Postal Museum on my new commute, so I figure I better check that place out. Right now, they have an exhibition featuring alphabet stamps, which sounds like it will feed the word nerd in me. I also want to take a day trip to check out Great Country Farm’s outdoor laser tag setup in Bluemont, VA, which I read about a while ago. They have a lot of other activities, too (including a vineyard across the street) in case laser tag is a bust, but I am envisioning it something like the paintball scene in 10 Things I Hate About You.
Paulo: We’ll be at the Philips Collection to see Paint Made Flesh, an exhibit of modern post-World War II paintings of the human figure. Time permitting, we may also check out the Corcoran Gallery’s exhibition of William Eggleston’s Democratic Camera. Oh, and Alexandria residents may want to check out the current show of landscapes at The Art League Gallery, Torpedo Factory — especially since it includes a painting by (ahem) my wife.
By Katie
Meg (Music) Photo Courtesy of Laura Warman
I have a huge, festering blog crush on total internet sensation 2birds1blog. Written by two friends and ex-roommates, Chris and Meg, the blog has me snickering all day long. Snarky, irreverent, honest and totally hilarious, co-author Meg, lives here in DC. Her witty commentary about all things in our city regularly keeps me entertained, I can always relate to posts about the metro, her gym crush (me, thinking: zomg I totes have a gym crush too1!!), and other DC-centric things. Not only is DC mentioned in random posts, Meg has penned a few blog posts solely on the topic of DC, one of my favorites is 6 Reasons You Should Love DC. This post, plus her winning personality? All make her perfect for a She Loves DC nod here on We Love DC. So, as a gift to you, dear reader, I give you Meg, from 2birds1blog.
Katie: Why DC? What made you decide to take up residence in our fair city?
Meg: I’m originally from the area and then went to school at American University. After graduation I decided I needed a little break from DC and moved to New York. I came crawlin’ back a year later. What can I say? DC’s got her hooks in me.
What is your favorite place in DC?
On my roof, poolside, Miller High Life in hand, magazine in my lap. Given that, you wouldn’t think I’d be so offensively pale, and yet, here we are.
What would you change about DC if you could?
Sweet mother of God, the weather. All I have to say is T-minus 34 days until the Fall equinox.
If DC were to go on a date with another city, what city would DC be best with?
Here’s how I see it: DC is a lot like Rachel Leigh Cooke’s character in the movie She’s All That—seemingly shy, nerdy, smug and a little stand-offish. We need someone who’s going to take the time to get to know the real DC. Because on the inside, we’re actually not shy and nerdy at all; we’re interesting and creative and any city would be lucky to date us. We need to find the city equivalent of Freddie Prinz, Junior. So I guess what I’m trying to say is Boston. Continue reading
By Rebecca
‘devil or angel?’
courtesy of ‘NCinDC’
I was just cruising around Yahoo Events, when I came upon the uber-intense looking SMB-XII DC’s 13th Annual Summer Masquerade Ball. Seriously, I’m kinda freaked out/intrigued by the “Angels & Demons” theme, the creepy airbrushed images and the idea of spending part of my evening in one of the themed section called “Hell” that features freak show performers and fire spinners in a secret chamber. Better lay off the absinthe filled, smoking goblets.
Unfortunately, I’ll be out of town this Friday on a long ago scheduled vacation, and unable to attend, but I’d love to hear all about it. Have you been to the 12! other balls? If so, what were their themes? What kind of people attend?
By Tom Bridge
‘Marion Barry’
courtesy of ‘cliff1066’
Set your TiVos, everyone. The Nine Lives of Marion Barry premieres on HBO tonight at 9pm. The 80 minute documentary covers Barry’s career from his start as a civil rights activist in the 1960s through to current day, through the beginnings of Home Rule in DC, to his crushing conviction for crack possession and use, through his resurgence & re-election to the City Council. The documentary does not cover the latest chapter with his girlfriends who were given city money, but as with all good things in movies: there’s plenty of room for a sequel.
