First Visit to DC

A one-industry town, OP. Politicking.

What's the old joke? Politics is show biz for ugly people.

Since Bill Clinton the 20 year-old girls have learned to wear trench coats even inside, OP.

Don't discount that lots of kids from good Southern schools get their first jobs in DC - UVA, UNC, Duke, William and Mary--and that's what kids who go to those schools look like.

Wtf. You visit in the middle of a pandemic and judge the city’s creative efforts? DC has changed a lot since the stale impressions of r1 and r3 were formulated.

There is a performing arts scene, at least, and some find museums.

What I wrote does not discount what you wrote R4

There can be both a large number of especially preppy girls AND a creative community.

They are not mutually exclusive.

This OP sounds very reminiscent of a post I've ready before, but whatever.

Anyway, it's DC. It's a city for federal government employees and government contractors. Why would it have some huge creative class? That type of industry isn't based out of DC.

It has lots of ambitious professionals. Can't swing a cat without hitting someone who is a lawyer or in law school.

My guess would the Trump evil is still lingering, along with the effects of the pandemic. Both soon to be a very bad memory, one hopes.

OP here. Yes I know I’m here in the middle of a pandemic but it seems like if you have pink or blue hair or dress edgy or creative that they would toss you in the river.

Ah, so your definition of edgy also dates to the mid Eighties. Got it.

In DC, r9? Where are you from? The Alabama part of Pennsyltucky?

Politics is the ugliest business there is. Information is currency. Clout is everything. It is disgusting. My one exposure to it sickened me to the point I often wonder whether to vote. Even the people you'd like to vote for are awful, just not as awful as the people you'd never vote for. Still, awful enough you wish you didn't have to vote for them either. There is nothing and no one decent in politics. I'm not even sure about Joe. It is a business that warps you if you're not fucked up already.

Gosh, I wonder why the nerve center of our arthritic empire, run by a gerrymandered, unrepresentative group of ancient slave owner types is full of boring unstylish people?

Also this:

Miz Lindz is in D.C. when she's not in Mar-a-Lago. She gives the town eloquence and flare.

I hear ya R12. I feel like I have to vote, but our choices are tough.

As someone who works in a creative field, I lived in DC for 5 years. Awful place filled with awful people. Many people come and go with administrations. The career government workers are all about doing as little as possible. Lots of fussy white bottoms. So many lawyers at every party I went to. I was ready to move after 1 year,

R17 Yes people seem very impressed with themselves. Sadly I don’t own any khaki pants so I would never fit in here.

Sorry, OP, you won't be seeing the creatives out right now during the pandemic. DC is a weird place because employment is greatly centered around government, but there's a lot of cool edginess if you know where to look. It's not cheap, so the more creative types live either in group houses and only hang out with each other, or they live across the bridges in NoVA or MD. The central area that used to be edgy and a lot gayer than it is now (Dupont/Logan Circles) caters more to the frat/sorority crowds that have moved in with gentrification. You need to head over to other neighborhoods to get a sense of personality. Also, DC is a "career town" -- most who move here do so after college and have already done the pink hair phase. It doesn't help that we lost shops like Commander Salamander.

There's a great music scene in the area. Most bands stop here on every tour. And we have some of the greatest live music venues (930 Club, Merriweather Post Pavilion, The Anthem) in the area. 930 makes the list of best music venues in the USA every year.

Curious -- where did you stay? Downtown has been dead the last year, and it's not a "downtown" that offers many residential options.

R17

You know, the cliche often repeated about lazy government workers is lame and untrue. I don't know where you worked but I worked for an agency in DC for over 15 years and we all worked our asses off. Very dedicated people that strived to do a good job. I worked 10 and 12 hour days, and many weekends, and I was not an oddity.

Are there some slackers that are hard to get rid of? Sure. But the majority of the people with whom I worked were serious about public service and doing the best job that they could.

That should be acknowledged along with whatever lazy employees people always use as an example of a government worker.

[quote] Even the people you'd like to vote for are awful, just not as awful as the people you'd never vote for.

I've said many times, in many cases choosing who to vote for is simply choosing who is the lesser of all evils. Voting for Biden, Warnock, and Ossoff was a refreshing change for me. Finally I had people to vote for I truly respected and who I felt would be respectful.

DC is a dreadful city. Flat, unimaginative, classist, zero natural beauty. It seems like an outdated remnant in today's woke culture. It's still run by old white boomers. I'm a creative from the PNW and lasted 18 months there on a three year contract. Nope. Life's too short to voluntarily live like that.

The novels of George Pelecanos present a non-political, and not necessarily white set of characters who exist in the DC that doesn't often get noticed.

basically it's hollywood east or is hollywood washington west? in mindset, ambition and unethical, immoral and shitty humans.....

R24 Can you imagine what they talk about a cocktail parties?

Relatives in politics lived in sort-of nearby Bluemont, Virginia, and commuted in, and said most people commute because the city is difficult to get around in and there isn't much of a community beyond the political work community.

I've been to Bluemont enough times to know it doesn't exactly have a buzzing arts community, either, so I don't quite know if I 100% believe my relatives.

[quote]there isn't much of a community

They mean straight and white.

I kind of wondered if my aunt and uncle meant white, R27, but surely not straight, two of their three kids are gay. But you never know. That whole side of the family is mean as dogs.

So true OP. It’s such an odd city. Lots of striving corporate types - including the gays. Better than a lot of places - and I do think it’s a pretty city with nice architecture. But stifling, pretentious and uptight. Much prefer Philly and NY. I find Boston to share some traits with DC.

"Isn't much of a community" LOL. Just a bunch of black people, and we all know they don't count.

This thread is sickening. I mean, DL is always obviously white-centric, but sometimes it's too much to take.

There is a certain transient nature to the city given the habitual in/outflow of Presidential Administrations and their appointed staff.

There are 700,000 permanent residents.

45% of which are black.

Used to be as high as 70%.

Remember when W had the "No Taxation without Representation" DC plates taken off the limo during his inauguration?

R4 and R8 are right! We visited DC when Obama was president in 2011. We were there during the 4th of July and stayed at the JW Marriott. We had a blast! Everyone - locals, employees, visitors were so positive and festive! I am sure the Trump lingering stink and pandemic are affecting the mood/atmosphere now.

Whenever I return to DC, the first thing that flattens me is the great sea of NAVY BLUE. People still wear navy blue in DC. Navy blue IS DC.

R38 Yes and regulation khaki. You’re given a pair as you enter the city.

[quote]Politics is show biz for ugly people.

Well, I never!

Navy blue is the pink of DC.

Many decades ago on a trip to Ottawa, it was apparent with in a short time how similar it was to D.C. and how much that can be attributed to politics being the primary business. They were very nice and pleasant looking, but Stein should have saved the “There’s no there there” comment for places like them.

New Yorkers joke that DC is only good for lunch.

Isn't Georgetown the hip, creative-class neighborhood?

Washingtonians are horrid people, worse than Massholes by far. Almost everyone in DC is a vile nerdy sociopath with the same creepy frozen reptilian stare. And yes, it is a very very conservative place. It's like a giant open air country club, with all the classism and bigotry that implies.

As someone who is from the MA/RI line, I heartily disagree. I've never encountered nastier people than when I go back home.

[quote] it is a very very conservative place

How so? I agree to some extent, but DC is like the bleeding heart capital of the US. Biden got 92% of the vote and EVERYONE goes to Pride. It's not a fashion mecca, but it ain't no Omaha either.

Never forget the Nationals Stadium crowd giving Trump a well-deserved heckling.

What other crowd would have the BALLS, the presence of mind, and the wherewithal to exercise freedom of speech on someone (Trump) who deserved every "Lock Him Up!" that was uttered that day?

Washington, DC, is a liberal town. You can't have every damn thing. I like Dupont Circle and Georgetown. I like the Metro, etc.

What cities and towns do have a vibrant arts scene? Not many.

R46 Conservative in the sense of attitude, personality and a sort of bourgeois vibe. There's this unspoken rule to dress and act a certain way, and just a very restrained coldness. Other cities simply have a more free and live and let live energy that DC doesn't have.

I find Tammy Baldwin competent and effective. I also found her attractive when she first got elected in 2013; she now looks like she starts, middle, end and snacks on bourbon, 24/7. Thankfully, her politics are still the same...but I sure wish politics didn't do that to her face.

in the before times I'd work with two musical groups in DC, travel in, stay in a hotel. the arts are devoted right now, so I hope OP isn't expecting anything

R49 Very well written and totally right on the mark.

The ‘arts’ in DC consists of some rich old white lady selling paintings of floral arrangements in some over priced store front. Yes we know about the Kennedy Center .. snooze: If anyone showed up not wearing their regulation DC uniform to any theater production at the Kennedy Center they would be tossed over the side. Studio Theatre it’s full of people trying to be cool in a city full of nerds. You’re never going to be cool you work at the department of interior in a windowless office you toad.

OP, where do you live?

I was in a relationship for a decade with a DCer. I refused to move from Manhattan to DC (who the hell does that?). He was all bravado and preening. Looks, manners, work meant everything to him--he couldn't stand to talk about anything difficult or substantiative but could drone on and on and on about last night's opera. If I got sick, he'd leave. If I tried to talk about our relationship or my unhappiness, he'd minimize and dismiss me. He didn't drink, thought weed was akin to crack, and was in AA. Religiously in AA after 25+ of not drinking. OCD and intense and would spend hours poring over a paragraph he wrote for work. He didn't talk to people, he interviewed them. He called Uber drivers "oh, driver" and the college kid pouring our wine "oh, miss". He'd hem and haw over his latest haircut--it was a conversational staple. He was OLD without being old.

When we finally broke up (he basically just left one day, no closure after ten years, and never came back), one friend said, "He's just so fucking DC."

God we were terrible for each other.

R34, is that a bad thing?

Perceptive of you, OP. The absence of a creative class is a key indicator of what's wrong with the city.

"Yes, yes, but Sam Gilliam, and Alma Thomas!" they'll say, "and the museums!". All of which are wonderful, as are a handful of other successful DC artists alive and dead. But the city never had the hustle of a place with artists trying to make it; instead they were spouses of partners in big law firms, surgeons who sculpted to relax, architects rich enough to become painters, artists in Hermes scarves and Gucci loafers and summer houses, not scary, sullen looking art school kids with purple hair and backpacks ready with spray paint in case they see the right surface, and "what's that metal thing in his nose?"

Washington is a lovely city with a great array of 19tg and early 20thC architecture and residential neighborhoods. It's clean and tidy and there are restaurants of every nation and ethnicity, and wonderful vistas in the sweltering days of summer down long avenues, the moisture in the air visible, touchable.

But it's also boring as fuck because the inhabitants are so preciously preoccupied with their good luck to live in DC and their eternal busy-ness. It is the only city I know where someone at a party will walk briskly toward you, extending an arm go shake, not with a "Hello. I'm John..." but with an introductory volley of "And what do you do?". Hesitate even fleetingly or answer incorrectly and the arm will be retracted and John, quick as a wink, will have his back to you, moving swiftly in the direction of some new prey who may can be of use to his career. Cunts.

Whining counts whining about how they are "so very busy, well, how we are all so very busy!", Whining that if they were not saving the world as deputy executive director of a carbon offset credit scheme for manufacturers of golf carts, that they could be making SO much more money in the private sector! Counts who continually say, "I hate to say how much profit we made on the last house!" and then proceed to say, to people whose names they don't even know. And when they are not whining with words, they are turning their noses up, whining with a bitchy sneer.

There is no more self-congratuoatory bunch, nor no bunch less deserving of congratulation of any sort.

Their houses are as big as they can afford and filled with shit only insipid college students would have. Even their taste in art in cheesy, retrograde, jokey allusions to Warhol (for the avant-garde) and 1776 patriotism and miasmic photos of the Jefferson Memorial for the older, more conservative, weapons-trading set.

It's a terrible city to live. I did for many years and managed to find a few wonderful friends and interesting people, but it never felt like home, never like a place I wanted to stay.

Def no there.. there Boring AF.

90 percent of DC has been working from home for the past year. How stupid are you to go be a tourist in a city that's basically shutdown?

So tired of the "I hate DC" trolls. Didn't like it? Don't come back. You won't be missed

It’s a city full of robots who conform. Anything that’s original interesting or different doesn’t exist.

DC has a surprising amount of theater and many shows go to Broadway.

The music scene is more limited and seems to have its ups and downs--jazz clubs were closing even before the pandemic.

Visual arts, crafts---not a great town at all. Places like the Torpedo Factory in Alexandria, which is meant to serve working artists is filled with humdrum looking stuff. The same with local art fairs. Before it became overpriced, the Logan Circle area aspired to be an arts district and still does an art walk in Spring and Fall (though not this past year). DC used to have more in the way of notable art galleries---still some good ones like Maurine Littleton for glass, but fewer than 20-30 years ago and the decline began pre-internet. Basically DC artists have to go elsewhere and make a splash to ever get recognition in DC.

[quote]So tired of the "I hate DC" trolls. Didn't like it? Don't come back. You won't be missed

Well, it is the perfect place for the pretentious; the mediocre talents who were the first in their families to escape to college and never go back to Elk Knuckle MT, Kanawha County WV, French Lick IN, Dirty Bottom AR, or Sioux Falls; the people just good enough to plan the annual convention of the National Association of Vitreous Porcelain Material Standards Estimators.

Didn’t the priced-out DC creative crowd decamp to Baltimore years ago? It’s like the people who are supposedly moving from NYC to Philly because it’s cheaper.

It doesn't sound like you went over to Anacostia or spent time finding out about the 11th Street Bridge Project. In other words you missed a lot.

R63 I’ve been laughing at your response for 15 min. This is DC Talk to a core.

R57 Spot on! Especially about the decor; I am going to have to get rid of a few things...

I loved DC during a visit. Not boring to me at all.

‘You’re never going to be cool you work at the department of interior in a windowless office you toad.“

Fuck you, i’m a free-lance musician living in Brooklyn, you tard. You have any idea how hard the arts have been hit this past year? Entire orchestras put on leave with no pay, famous opera soloists released from contracts with not even thank yous? Eat shit and die you cunt!

[quote]Didn’t the priced-out DC creative crowd decamp to Baltimore years ago?

I don't think so, R64. There was never an arts crowd as such, not since the salons of Natalie Barney for rich lesbians in international arts circles. The Corcoran art school, established in the 1870s was important in DC but never big enough to make much impact outside its walls; it separated from the Corcoran Gallery in the late 20thC . You never saw gangs of identifiable art students tearing through the town, the art in private galleries was very establishment or proven. Briefly in the 1980s there were a couple of high end more experimental galleries and a fancy photography gallery, all very pricey. There wasn't a big group of artists nor of art buyers. The diplomatic corps contributed as much as anything to some interest in avant garde and exotic pictures, but it was more a town if prints and engravings, and small pieces collected on travels or imported. Of course there were some rich people with good art collections, but it was a small group of people.

Performing arts always fared much better than visual arts. There were/are some good theatre companies, and lots of choices in musical performance . But there was never a big group of starving visual artists who flew off to Baltimore. It just was never a starving artist kind of city, few wild collectives, I can't imagine there were any punky artist-squatters or anything that radical, no gritty arts areas to get gentrified or nurtured.

The hippie areas like Dupont Circle in the 1960s don't appear to have made much long lasting artistic impact either.

For decades there were neighborhoods in DC on the verge of being gentrified but not quite, but we hen they finally tipped mad became uniformly plush and prosperous, it happened almost overnight. There were artists who had day jobs but had large unmodernized apartments above retail shops on 14th St NW and kept a room or two to do projects, to keep a hand in, but the great wave of prosperity that swept through saw all those shitty buildings (perfect for artists or those clinging to the idea) made into small, expensive apartments, surrounded by expensive restaurants and expensive furniture stores to fill the newly renovated.luxury loft+like apartments. That huge shift chased a lot of people to Baltimore and the exurbs, middle class people, and some artists too I'm sure, but DC was never a town of the kind of artists who lives and worked in real lofts, collective run galleries that changed. location every few months, street art, grittiness, rent parties to pay the heat bills.

R70 The artists were creating for themselves. People in DC have absolutely no taste whatsoever for anything that is avant garde or out of the ordinary. ‘Chauncey I simply must have everything in my house bland and boring - like my clothing and personality.’

Sounds like DC is full of assholes (politicians aside...who are always assholes).

R72, you are hearing a one-sided view of a very narrow slice of DC. It’s like framing your opinions of New York around the hedge fund and private equity industries. As with most such analyses, people reveal a lot about themselves with what they choose to see.

I agree

Or with who they choose NOT to see.

seen and unseen - the DC conundrum

R73

Thank you. You can be a resident of DC, recognize its limitations, and still be enamored of the city for many reasons. I think that's probably true of many cities, but maybe it s that DC is so publicly associated with politics that many can't see past that cesspool.

I'm not sure a list of DC's positive traits would convince anyone on this thread. Especially those that have lived there and hate it still.

I no longer live there but I miss it terribly and will always consider it home, even though I wasn't born or raised there. They were the best years of my life. And I can say that while recognizing that there were aspects of DC that I really, really disliked.

I love their nightlife

[QUOTE] If anyone showed up not wearing their regulation DC uniform to any theater production at the Kennedy Center they would be tossed over the side.

Ridiculous. I’ve been there many times, never dressed up or saw many who did.

that cunt has only witnesses the kennedy center presidential awards - fucking ignorant shits

Touche R73...

I had my first Ethiopian meal in DC, it can’t be that much of a cultural wasteland.

So did I, r82. It was about all you could eat in Adams-Morgan during the ‘80s. In case you can’t tell from my tone, not all of us thought of that as cultural advancement.

I‘ve loved N.Y., D.C. L.A. and Paris

What’s wrong with dressing up, wearing navy blue, or working for the federal government? I don’t see anything wrong with that or with being creative and not wearing pearls. A city will be a reflection of their residents and the industries that most people work in, doesn’t mean that very body is an asshole.

I don’t live in DC anymore, but I believe that every city has things to offer if you take your time and explore without prejudice.

So your art was shit and nobody in DC would buy it? So we are not infested with starving painters and self-deluded "artists"? Boo-hoo. We have a vibrant performing arts scene, world-class museums and (at least pre-covid) an expanding and diverse choice of restaurants. We have clean streets, good manners, stand on the right side of the escalator so others may pass, and would rather not walk around town looking like we just rolled out of bed. Most people are highly educated and well traveled, Even those who are less well off financially listen to NPR and use the public libraries. I can think of worse places to live. It is true though, that the transient nature of the population (administrations change, diplomats are reassigned, academics move on, etc) has a strange effect on social interactions. We tend to avoid engaging with those we perceive as "in transit" because it´s just too much work to develop friendships withe people that will have moved away in a year or two. Every year is filled with welcome and farewell parties. So we do tend to become cliquish and only really open up once we decide someone is here for good.

NPR sucks.

you suck

Hahahahaha

If DC were a retail store it’d be Banana Republic.

Luckily, is obviously OP’s last visit there, but there seems to be great likelihood that next city they don’t like there’ll be a thread about too.

I always feel there’s something sinister in the air. Too many spies and senior military. Like “No Way Out” in real life

It’s strange to have so many Republicans in a urban center.

R86 You write like you’re ‘top drawer’ Gloria. Boo hoo.. Starving artists have something to say and contribute to the world. Assholes in DC have nothing to contribute.

I agree

There are great writers in DC, media/journalists and theater. It isn't by any means a creative wasteland. And over 90% democratic. Now if we could just get rid of Eleanor Holmes Norton.

[quote]So we are not infested with starving painters and self-deluded "artists"? Boo-hoo.

[quote]We have...world-class museums...We have clean streets

Lucky though that other cities tolerated the 'infestation' of starving painters, so their works could fill all those 'world-class museums.' Doubtless all the artworks deemed adequate were thoroughly disinfected to maintain DC's cleanness.

what a shithead

Someone break your heart in DC? Couldn't make it there?

make my achy-breaky heart

R99 Somehow I doubt it. That is unless men that look like 35-year-old boy scouts drooling from the mouth wearing ill fitting khakis and multiple lanyards turn you on.

On Datalounge: HISSSSSS! Tattoos!! Beards!!! HISSSSS!!!

Also on Datalounge: no khakis! And if you wear khakis, they better fit correctly!! HISSS!!!!

Man, you people need to unclench and let others do whatever the fuck they want. Crossing into legit eldergay age must really suck.

I once had a friend in DC who wore earrings, and caftans

and then she died

I see a lot of tats in my neighborhood

PS- DC is not flat...it ascends uphill.

To say that DC has no natural beauty is wrong. Rock Creek Park is lovely, as is the jogging/cycling trail along the old Chesapeake and Ohio canal towpath adjacent to the Potomac, to say nothing of the superlative gardens at Dumbarton Oaks or the Hillwood Estate (former home of Marjorie Merriweather Post). The National Arboretum, though a bit out of the way, is worth the schlep.

Love the architecture of DC - hate the people.

"Rock Creek Park is lovely, as is the jogging/cycling trail along the old Chesapeake and Ohio canal towpath adjacent to the Potomac, to say nothing of the superlative gardens at Dumbarton Oaks or the Hillwood Estate . . ."

I mean, that's all fine. Nothing spectacularly gorgeous about it at all. Your basic city standards.

nice enough

The museums are world class and free. The National of Gallery of Art has the only Leonardo Da Vinci painting in the Western Hemisphere. Not even New York City has that.

Hillwood Estate, Museum & Garden is quite unique and unbelievable. There really isn’t another place in the world quite like it. I go as often as I can and would never move from Washington because of this place. I think it trumps the Frick and the Gardiner.

The downside about DC is the lack of great shopping downtown. There’s only a Macy’s.

I often go to Baltimore for the most fabulous food scene. Another beauty of DC is that it’s so close to other places. I can drive to Philly, NYC and my newest favorite Richmond which is quite fabulous. Paris is still my favorite city but D.C. is my second choice.

I delight in the Eagle

Just remember the National Gallery of Art was created to excuse Mellon of his tax evasion.

What about the Met and don’t even mention Frick being run out of Pittsburgh.

The Carnegie Museum of Art has a very respectable collection, but it would have been up there with the museums of Paris, New York and London had the Frick and Mellon collections gone there as hometown collections. But of course that wasn’t going to happen when the building had the name of one of their primary adversaries and competitors. Though Alisa Mellon Bruce’s collection did end up there.

Lane Worthington Lane here. Diddums .. Bitsy & I do love Washington in the spring.

I had a few gov workers in my circle when I lived there. All they cared about what all the holidays they got, prattling on endlessly about pensions, clocking in and clocking out and doing the absolute minimum. Someone upthread (R17) said this is a cliche. From my experience it is 100% true so put that in your pipe and smoke it and quit telling other people their experiences are wrong.

I've been here all my life. I'm a creative person. I went to grad school for creative writing and I paint. It's true: there's very little in the way of arts in DC aside from community murals.

I don't agree that DC is a one-industry town. There's more here than politics, but a lot of the other industries do relate to politics. I work at a higher education association that lobbies, but we also educate. There are tons of trade associations here that are similar, as well as significant medical-sector presence. But yes, it's a town that is pretty devoid of creativity. People here entertain themselves by drinking heavily. (That's not a joke. That's the District's primary entertainment.)

[quote] The museums are world class and free. The National of Gallery of Art has the only Leonardo Da Vinci painting in the Western Hemisphere. Not even New York City has that.

This is true. The thing is that art galleries in D.C. are actually museums, and most of the artists on display are dead. The arts culture is set in the past. There's no lively arts community.

Wasn’t there some recent thread on a pair of elder gays and their cluttered house tour who were from DC? They were quite creative and engaging.

Here you go, r119.

I know answer.

Is because Washington DC was specifically built to be political city.

I learn this in cless before I ship off to be “model” in US

[quote] if you have pink or blue hair or dress edgy or creative that they would toss you in the river.

If you hev pink or blue hair you are old lady like Shelley Fabares.

I fucking love DC.

[quote]It just was never a starving artist kind of city, few wild collectives, I can't imagine there were any punky artist-squatters or anything that radical

Huh? The late 70s/early 80s thrashcore punk scene there was one of the most influential music scenes in US history.

I was the someone that cited as a cliche the idea that government workers were all lazy.

I acknowledged that there were some slackers, as you illustrate with your circle of acquaintances; I maintained that we weren't ALL slackers.

[quote] It is the only city I know where someone at a party will walk briskly toward you, extending an arm go shake, not with a "Hello. I'm John..." but with an introductory volley of "And what do you do?". Hesitate even fleetingly or answer incorrectly and the arm will be retracted and John, quick as a wink, will have his back to you, moving swiftly in the direction of some new prey who may can be of use to his career. Cunts.

YES! I know a former govt atty who's now in private practice down there. They go from being all pious about the law to a white shoe law firm showing clients how to maneuver around the laws they previously vowed to uphold. Anyway, like a human energy drink, he's all excited to come talk to you at a conference or a party and within 10 secs, he's already looking around the room to talk to someone else as you're answering the question he just posed. He's actually a very nice, affable guy, but very stereotypical of that whole scene in that you wonder if there's any genuine substance. I mean he's a DC lawyer. How much substance could there be?

God awful hell. Wish they burn it down. Then again.. where would the nerds and dorks move? SF is over.

[quote]Even those who are less well off financially listen to NPR . . . .

Aspirationally?

Oh, my sides!

I love Banana Republic - great deals!

Why are some of you from DC so offended if people dislike the city? Who cares?

I never understood getting so pissed. I mean there are countless threads about people hating NYC and I don't give a shit. I only speak up if they say some bullshit about it being a "war zone" now, because that simply isn't true.

R130 It’s because DC is full of the biggest nerds dorks geeks and overall misfits of the world. They come to DC to be around their own. It’s the student council dweebs that were teased in high school. Mix that with people whose ambition in life is to sit in a windowless office pushing paper around.

[quote]What's the old joke? Politics is show biz for ugly people

Not necessarily the case any more. There are more attractive people these days.

and actors in hollywood are uglier

R132 Lol, but Ted Cruz is their poster child right?

Ted is gross, but I like Rep Jim Himes

Im visiting DC in 2 weeks, can anyone suggest a good gay bar or restaurant?