Month: March 2006

All I want pictures of and someone in Truxton has a picture of a rare sight, I could not believe it when I was told…. there were police officers walking in the neighborhood. Walking! Not sitting in a car looking exceedingly bored, but walking around.
There are benefits of walking that one cannot get from driving or motorcycling. A slowness that comes with having to move under your own power. There are drawbacks but hear the benefits. You notice the little things. If the police walk around I believe they too will notice the little things, the behavior and patterns of those who are around. You also get to know the people. Walking around I bump into familiar faces and there is some sort of relationship ranging from the general ‘I acknowledge your presence as a human being’ to neighborly friendship. Walking cops might, just might, develop a deeper relationship with the community with this greater interaction. Maybe.
Update: LB put the picture up on the TruxtonCirlce.org site (thanks!).

|—————————————–|
| Blagden Alley Association |
| Monthly Meeting |
| THURSDAY, March 23, 2006 |
| 7:30-9:00 pm |
| Marthlu and Hal’s |
| 945 O Street, NW |
|—————————————–|
| Reminder |
| “Street Cleaning” Tickets |
| have RETURNED |
| Help Support Baseball |
| (Don’t move your car) |
|—————————————–|

The newsletter is at

http://www.pro-messenger.com/Blagden/Monthly%20Pages/2006%20Monthly%20Pages/BAN_
2006_03_P1.html

Topics of the meeting:

Convention Center Update: About the restaurants and brewpubs…

910 M Street progress…about those rumors…
“That school”? Maybe something new…
Naylor Court keeps the BZA busy…
On the crime front…seems awfully quiet…

Also, see the web page at http://blagdenalley.com or http://naylorcourt.com,
(depending on your persuasion).

Do hope to see you there.

I have a leak somewhere in my bathroom. I thought I had conquered it. But alas no. In my hallway there is a quarter-sized brown spot in the ceiling. After one shower I had gone downstairs and noticed a drip-drip sound. The drip was coming from the ceiling and I figured it related to the shower.
So I ran the cold and hot water to figure out if it was coming from one of the pipes. No. Then I changed the shower head setting, to relieve some of the pressure from the other setting. Nothing happened. I figured it was all good. Then this morning, drip-drip-drip.
The bathroom has a lot of crackhead design problems. And I was hoping to wait till I got a new job/position (it’s kind of up in the air until the end of the year) before doing a big gut job on the house. I want to just completely redo the bathroom and I don’t want to invest too heavily in it before gutting it. But I’m going to have to call a plumber, but I need to see where the leak is coming from. So I’ll run some tests tonight.

Okay there was some discussion on the Truxton Circle discussion board about the Catania Bakery at 1404 North Capitol. It has been in existence for 70-80 years but the exterior never really said “come, buy baked goods here”. So after someone pointed out what the secret was to buying baked goods was (early in the morning) I decided to venture over this morning.
I got 6 croissants . Six of the freshest tasting croissants I’ve ever had (no I did not eat them all, just 2). They were eighty something cents a piece. This makes up for the worst ever croissants I had at Dunkin Donuts on Rhode Island (it was just a hard roll shaped like a croissants ). Yummy, yummy.
I asked the French woman at the counter about the hours. They are open for retail on Saturdays from 6:30AM till around noon. They might be open for retail Tuesdays thru Fridays at that same time, but there isn’t a person available to do the counter, so maybe not. But Saturdays most definitely. They could try to accommodate an order if you call them. I found their number on the web at (202) 332-5135.

I have pea-envy.
B.& IT showed me their pea seedings growing on their window sill and they are lovely. Me? I don’t have as many seedlings going and my peas are small and tiny. Now I know that peas are not a plant you’re supposed to transplant. I know I’m supposed to directly sow them into the ground. But we transplanted pea seelings into the ground last year and they turned out fine. I put a few seedlings in pots yesterday, as well as some pea seeds.
I’ve got a number of seedlings and things going on. Outside in the backyard I planted some onion, shallot and spinach seeds. Also in the backyard I have a few plants that survived the winter quite nicely. The pansies in the hanging basket and one of the pots are flowering with purple and very edible flowers. The winter thyme is doing well but the French thyme, not so hot, I’m going to have to cut back the dead looking parts. The daylilies seem to be doing well, but I need to transplant them into a bigger pot, as will I need to do the same with the rosemary. Inside I have a large pot I’m going salad greens. I plan to put it outside once the temperatures get stable.
I’m waiting for the last frost (need to look that up) before I put a lot of stuff back outside. I have a small scraggly basil plant that would die in a frost. There are also the laurel bays that I’m keeping inside. And of course the many seedlings.
I haven’t done a thing with the front, except sow some peas. The blueberry bushes, or sticks, as they look less like bushes and more like sticks, are begining to bud. I want to tear up the front yard. Get rid of all the non-edibles and the weeds. Maybe replant with chard and squash and more veggies. Or just let the peppermint take over the whole yard.

The thing I like about living in the city is that I do walk everywhere. I walk to the Giant, the corner store, the metro, the library (back when it was open), the donut shop (only to find that they are out of anything glazed) and the bike shop. Walking, besides being some form of excercise, is a good way to run into neighbors, who are also walking, and take in small changes in the neighborhood along the way.
Last week I was in Florida for my sister’s wedding, an event my half-sister (the wedding planner) took over. All I know I was just following whatever orders I was given that week. Anyway, one of the orders was to show up at a particular church my dad’s side of the family attends. When I was a kid we walked to the church. When I was a kid I walked to the church, the elementary school, the middle school, the corner store, the fried chicken place, the beauty supply store, grandma’s, basically a lot of places. So I figured I would walk from mom’s (who now attends a different church that she needs to drive to) to the church. Walking to a place I’ve walked to hundreds of times in the past just seemed to amaze everyone. *eyes rolling* It was strange and a bit annoying to confront this mindset that walking…. ‘who walks?’ mentality of my car-dependent relatives.
But I did witness one good thing in Florida, that I wish we had more of in DC, more clearly marked bike lanes. I saw a lot of bike sized (too small for cars to take over) bike lanes on a majority of the roads. I also saw a number of people using those lanes. Yes, mind you most of the cyclists were helmet-less old codgers, but they where traveling along on long lonely stretches of road in the bike lane.

Apparently the pellet gun shots at the school bus didn’t gather the attention I thought it would. And Vincent Orange attended Marion Berry’s State Ward 8 speech last night in Ward 8, so I lose my $5 on that bet.

However, it appears that the media has already turned it’s focus to the story that a 7 year old girl accidentally took her mother’s (illegal) handgun to school on 1st St NE yesterday. Yesterday was not a good day for school kids around North Capitol Street. It’s shameful that the mother would be so careless with a handgun with such a young child around. Seriously shameful. As in, no excuses, terrible parenting, you should be severely punished.

So anyways, I guess my point is it’s not a good time to be a elementary school kid around North Cap. This made me realize it’s going to be a loooooonnngg time before I’d be excited about sending my child to a public school around here.

I think we now know. NBC4 / MSNBC are reporting that a school bus had shots fired on it by a pellet gun. No one appears to be hurt or injured which, thank god, is the good news in all this.

But… while not one to make light the severity of this, I’m going to. It’s a pellet gun. There are actual gunshots fired in the area along the North Capitol corridor every once in a while. Any coverage of those? Nada.

Anyone want to take a bet that Vincent Orange will be on the news tonight? $5 says he’ll be interviewed at the scene. Any takers?

I did mention this new con on the main site but it does need repeating:

Neighbors,
A couple of neighbors have reported to me that a person knocked on their door today, reporting to have broken off his key in his front door lock. Curiously, the individual (a virtual stranger to both neighbors) wanted to “borrow” $80+ dollars to engage the services of a locksmith to fix the problem. Perhaps needless to say, neither of our neighbors complied with the request of the stranger and he went on his merry way.
The Fifth District Police have been notified and, in general, the description of the person is as follows: An light complected, African American male, approximately 5 feet 10 inches tall, bald and clean shaven. He had an aqua (blue-green colored) jacket, dark pants and white sneakers trimmed in black.
Be aware of the possibility of this person knocking on your door to solicit money and, because we are trying to track his whereabouts, let me know if he shows up at your house.
–Jim Berry

Then Jim (our great ANC leader) followed with:

Dear Neighbors,
Yesterday, I wrote you to make you aware of the fact that there is a guy knocking on doors in the neighborhood, claiming to have broken off his key in the lock of his door, who is making requests of residents to “give” or “loan” him money to engage the services of a locksmith to fix his problem. Since I sent the email, a number of you have gotten back to me, indicating that a person of a similar description appeared at doors in the Unit block of Bates Street, in the 200 block of P Street, in the 1600 block of New Jersey Avenue, N.W., in the 1700 block of 4th Street, and elsewhere in the neighborhood with the same story. Fortunately, no one complied with his request for money and, according to each person who gave me feedback, the person left without incident.
As I also indicated to you yesterday, the Fifth District Police are on the lookout for this person. Similar complaints have been reported about a person in Brookland who was perpetrating a similar scam in that community, but from what we have gathered about the person who is roaming our neighborhood, it doesn’t sound like the same guy who was playing this con in Brookland. Much like the guy in Eckington who was doing the “contractor scam,” it is clear that we must be careful about how and to whom we respond when strangers appear at our doors and, perhaps needless to say, an effective way of neutralizing the adverse effects of such a scam is for neighbors to communicate quickly with neighbors, if and when situations like this occur.
At this point, the police have been provided with the name (possibly, a street name or a nick name) of a suspect who was identified by one of our neighbors and we think we have an address in the community with which he might be associated. I will keep you posted on new developments in this situation, as they occur.
–Jim Berry

And stolen off of the Truxton Circle Dispatch’s submission:

I attended the early sessions of the Ward 5 Constituent Services Summit. As advertised in many listservs, MPD Chief Charles Ramsey was present to open the Summit. His first item mentioned with regards to Ward 5 crime and public safety was about the “Broken Key Guy”. He used the exact phrase as community emails and discussions, [personal observation] so it appears that the police DO take notice on our complaints.
The Chief did indicate this is a relatively new type of scam and that we should always be vigilant for ANY type of scam AND that scam sshould be reported like any other crime. [personal observation #2 – perhaps because this is a new type of scam – that is the reason for the dispatchers at 311 being less-than-helpful with some calls.]
I was able to ask the Chief about the problem some neighbors have reported with the unresponsiveness of 311:
1) The Chief indicated they were very interested in catching this guy or any scam artist.
2) The Chief advised that 311 / 911 dispatch is not the MPD. They are their own department. [communication dept I believe]
3) He advised that he has briefed the head of the dispatch/ communications dept of this scam-and that it is to be taken seriously.
Chief Ramsey advised if the guy was at your door, to call 911 to report a “Crime in Progress”. [my best guess for additional details – tell the dispatcher its a *wanted* scam artist – may be helpful to mention Broken Key Guy, OR Contractor Guy if he’s still out there]
IF you’re comfortable and do not feel threatened – tell the guy your you’ll be right there/back – hopefully to keep him at the door – then call 911. If he’s already gone or you want to report more information – call 311, or call the Operations desk at 698-0150.
IF you talk to him or can see him clearly- try to get a good description -physical characteristics that will not change, in addition to what he is wearing.
Chief Ramsey stated that they would like someone that has given money to file a report,[If I understood correctly] then a warrant can be issued and so they can get a description.
If your neighborhood is collecting information, continue or resume calling 311 or 911.
The dispatch response should be better since the police have alerted them to this issue.
As for any crime: If its a crime “In Progress” OR you fell threatened -call 911.
If its after the fact or you have additional information to report – call 311. If your not sure – call 911.
Always try to have the correct address and as many details as you can. 311 and 911 track statistics on the amount of calls, so call them FIRST – then call your “local phone chain”.
–S. Kaufman