What’s Your First Georgetown Memory?

GM recently took part in a focus group being run by the BID designed to find out what Georgetowners like or dislike about the neighborhood and what could be done to improve it. At the beginning of the session, the participants introduced themselves and stated, among other things, what their first memory of Georgetown was. It was an interesting way to kick off a discussion of what people think of the neighborhood.

While GM moved to Georgetown ten years ago, his first memory is much older than that. In the mid 80s, his family came down to DC from Connecticut for something or another (it was either part of a visiting fife and drum corps or the time GM’s brother won the Sea Breeze Award for “teenager of the year” and got to meet Nancy Reagan and Ms. America). Either way, GM remembers bunking up with his family in one room at the Hotel Harrington.

The Georgetown memory is of waiting forever to get a table at the legendary Geppetto’s Pizza, which once occupied the space currently housing Unum. Growing up the in northeast, GM had never experienced pizza that thick. Through the compound interest of memory, that pizza is still the best pizza GM ever ate. Continue reading

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The Morning Metropolitan

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Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

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Georgetown University

 

Georgetown University

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Why Doesn’t Georgetown Feel Like a College Town?

Photo by Aaron Webb.

Tonight, Georgetown University Hoyas will play their first round game in the Final Four tournament. But if you walk around Georgetown, you wouldn’t know it. (Well unless you walk by Prospect St. where a giant inflatable Jack looms overhead). Despite the presence of a major university right in its midst, Georgetown just doesn’t really feel like a college town.

GM went to college in a small upstate New York town. That was a college town. On fall weekends the whole town came down to watch our mediocre football team probably lose. On winter nights they’d huddle into our ice rink and watch our quite good hockey team probably win. It didn’t matter.

But that sort of relationship just doesn’t seem to exist here. Sure, there are parts of west Georgetown that are constantly buzzing with students, which might seem more college towny. But by the time you get over a few more blocks, you’d hardly think a school with thousands of students was right around the corner.

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3200 block of Reservoir Rd

 

3200 block of Reservoir Rd.

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Reddz Trading Moving into Monarc Rugs Space

GM has learned that the future tenant of the space currently occupied by the soon-to-be-closed Monarc Antique Rugs is Reddz Trading.

Reddz Trading is a consignment shop that currently has just one location, which is up in Bethesda. It appears to focus primarily, if not exclusively on women’s clothing. Actually, GM should clarify that the shop is not technically a consignment shop because they just pay you for your clothes when you drop them off, whether they end up selling them or not. The store’s website calls it a resale store.

Either way, this does seem to be yet another chipping away of Georgetown’s retail diversity.

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3000 block of Cambridge Pl.

 

3000 block of Cambridge Place

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Czech Yourself

GM was ready to deliver a big scoop about a new restaurant, then he did a little digging and saw that the Georgetowner beat him to it: We’re getting a Czech restaurant. It’ll be called Capitol Prague and it will take over the old Morso space at 3277 M St.

The Georgetowner writes that manager Petra Foist promises “Czech and Slovak cuisine—schnitzel, goulash, braised pork and dumplings—as well as various beers.” GM is particularly interested in that last part. Apparently the restaurant will be the first restaurant to offer Czechvar on tap. For those unfamiliar, Czechvar is the original Budweiser. In fact, in Europe it is sold as Budweiser (and our St. Louis swill is sold as “Bud”). As decided in one of the few cases GM can still remember from law school, Anheuser-Busch successfully kept the Czech brewery from selling its beer here also as Budweiser. Continue reading

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