A regular summary of irregular news and notes from neighborhood blogs and email lists around the District.
Would You Like a Sweeping Generalization With Your Taco?: 14th & You observers the opening of El Centro D.F., 14th Street NW’s newest restaurant, which coincided with Cinco de Mayo. (In case you hadn’t heard: El Centro D.F. serves tacos.) Also noted by the blog was Dining Bisnow’s reaction to the establishment, which described it as “El Centro D.F. is bringing Mexico to DC (without the drug lords and fire ants).” Well, then! Commenters didn’t find the grand opening that impressive, though. Writes one, “Got in but left when we found out they were charging a $20 “cover” which we thought was tacky for a restaurant opening.” Though another explains, “Well the $20 cover was for free appetizers and drink specials. I’ve heard the apps were all really good, but have not been yet myself sadly…” a third commenter says, “Then not exactly “free” if they’re charging you $20. When restaurants open, the custom is to provide free food, or let customers explore what they might want to eat first, before you “tell” them what they should eat. We were also turned off by the cover and left.”
Chain-umbia Heights: New Columbia Heights posts a reader writing in to report that a long-empty space at 14th and Fairmont Streets NW will be filled by a Domino’s Pizza. This has not elicited much excitement from the blog’s commenters. One writes, “If I want a pizza, I’ll still get it from Radius. I guess this is preferable to an empty storefront, but not by a whole lot,” while another says, “I was afraid the Pizza Hut would be selling wings (like their 20th & M location does) and that we’d be seeing a lot more chicken bones on the sidewalk. So I’m glad to hear it’s Domino’s instead. I’ll still get my pizza from Pete’s, though.” And, of course, one commenter can’t resist the urge to bring up parking: “Hopefully they have the delivery drivers park in the Uptown’s lot and not take up the little bit of on street parking on Fairmont (or leave their cars double parked there while they load up pizzas).”
Snakes on a Bus: A few weeks ago, one member of the Tenleytown email list wrote, seemingly out of context, “I was reading the paper and enjoying my coffee and a nasty-ass snake slithered across the floor of our fifth-floor apartment.” The same email list is steeped in debate over whether or not the N8 bus route, which will likely be considered to be cut by WMATA, deserves to go. But the snake thread—entitled “Are You Missing Your SNAKE??”—has returned! One member plays along, asking, “No really, let’s get back to the snake. What bus does it take, exactly?” Another retorts, “I think we can rule out the N8.”
More Found Than Lost: A member of the Georgetown email list put out a notice for their lost cat, writing “Our young male sealpoint Siamese Snowshoe cat escaped from the yard Thursday evening. We last saw him in a neighbor’s yard on the north side of Que Street near 31st. We think he continued traveling along the Que Street back yards. He has a red collar with an id tag that reads ‘Winston Snider’…He is friendly but, of course, may be frightened and wary.” Fortunately, only four hours later, the same list member submitted an update: “Winston, the Wanderer, has returned and is currently sleeping off his big night out. Now, if we can just find his escape route, we hope to prevent this happening again. Next time the outcome might not be good.”