October 22, 2010 · 10:00 am

Ginkgo Season Not So Bad This Year

While it’s not peak ginkgo berry season yet, GM is confident predicting it won’t be that bad this year. He was a little nervous going into the fall since there was talk last spring that the weather turned warm too quickly for DDOT to spray the trees. After the spring passed without signs going up warning about the spraying, GM became particularly nervous about this fall.

Turns out the worry was misplaced. While signs never went up (at least not in GM’s neighborhood) the spraying took place. GM heard that on his block the spraying took place at about 3 in the morning.

Either way, as this season has progressed, the berry production seems way down even compared with last year’s relatively modest crop. Continue reading →

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October 22, 2010 · 8:00 am

The Morning Metropolitan

Photo by M.V. Jantzen.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

  • New theater just over the bridge in the West End is opening next week.
  • The great Brass Knob Back Doors Warehouse is closing in November, so if you’ve got some historic renovations planned, you ought to stop by soon.

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October 21, 2010 · 2:00 pm

The Georgetown Metropolis

3200 block of M St.

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October 21, 2010 · 10:00 am

Three New Stores Open Up

As GM was biking up Wisconsin checking out the new CaBi stations, he noticed a trio of new stores that have rather suddenly swept in to Georgetown.

Muncheez Mania

The first is the somewhat unfortunately named Muncheez Mania at 1071 Wisconsin Ave. It advertises itself as a “hip and funky restaurant…offer[ing] fresh, homemade fare at a reasonable price in a lively, fast-casual dining environment.” DCist had this to say:

The main attraction is the hand-stretched bread called saj — a thin flatbread not unlike a pita, but stretched thinner and cooked on a saj (which looks like an upside down wok). The texture ends up being close to naan, but with the thinness of the pancakes you receive with Peking duck. The same dough is stretched less and baked in the oven for sandwiches and wraps.

Sounds tasty. And by staying open until 4:00 AM, this will likely be a popular post nightlife spot.

Interesting tidbit:

This is the work of Capital Restaurant Concepts, the people behind Paul Bakery, which should be opening up across the street later this year. It’s funny to think how this “hip and funky” and kinda tacky restaurant will be facing the (likely) staid and conservative Paul Bakery, yet have the same corporate parent.

And for what it’s worth, GM’s fairly certain that that sideways facing blade sign wasn’t approved by the OGB (or at least it shouldn’t have been). Continue reading →

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October 21, 2010 · 8:00 am

The Morning Metropolitan

J. Pauls by Vpickering.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

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October 20, 2010 · 2:00 pm

The Georgetown Metropolis

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October 20, 2010 · 10:00 am

Two More Capital Bikeshare Stations Open in Georgetown

Georgetown’s next two Capital Bikeshare have opened. The first one is shown above and is located on the east sidewalk of Wisconsin just south of the canal.

GM thought the other one was going to go right in front of Hardy, but he was wrong. It’s a bit higher and on the other side of the street, essentially in front of the British School: Continue reading →

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October 20, 2010 · 8:00 am

The Morning Metropolitan

Photo by Elderc.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

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October 19, 2010 · 2:00 pm

The Georgetown Metropolis

1000 block of 29th St.

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October 19, 2010 · 10:00 am

Summer Crime in Georgetown Was Bad Even For Summer Crime

Last week, GM explored the third quarter crime numbers and concluded that crime was up this summer. Reader KPE helpfully pointed out that GM was comparing the crime numbers from the third quarter only to the second quarter. Doesn’t crime always tick up during the summer and would this not explain the increase for this year?

Fair enough, so GM went back and recrunched the numbers comparing this past quarter to the third quarters from the prior four years, and the conclusion hasn’t changed: this was a bad summer for crime in Georgetown.

(And before you ask, yes GM is looking at the third quarter, not the “summer.” To the extent that some theories over increases in summer crime depend on the school schedule, looking strictly at quarters might not be the best approach, since it misses late June, when students get out, and captures September when they’re back in session. However, looking at quarters the best way to look at apples to apples, so that’s what GM will stick with for now).

As you can see in the chart above, crime was up in Georgetown this summer compared with the previous four summers. If you’re not a visual learner, here are the numbers:

  • 2006 – 215
  • 2007 – 245
  • 2008 – 230
  • 2009 – 235
  • 2010 – 262

And in most of the categories, Georgetown recorded the highest or nearly highest numbers this summer.

These include robbery:

Continue reading →

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