From snowpocalypse to quakepocalypse

The earthquake in DC.

Via: MR

Russians mock the Snowpocalypse

As reported in the NYT, which gets in some snarky comments of its own toward the end.

Hat tip: Anya Chung

What's Jessica Cutler been up to?

I'm sure you've all been wondering, like I have, what famous sex blogger and courtesan Jessica Cutler, a.k.a. the "Washingtonienne", has been up to.

It turns out that after those wild years, she has succumbed to domesticity, married a bankruptcy lawyer - presumably hers - and had a kid.

Hmmmm ....

Social capital inside the beltway

The Atlantic provides a brief meditation on the fact that lots of folks in Georgetown (one of the older and more expensive parts of DC) do not bother to shovel the snow on their sidewalks, despite a law requiring them to do so and despite the costs this imposes on pedestrians, most of whom are presumably their neighbors.

The author of the Atlantic piece reaches a different implicit conclusion about the cause of this behavior than I do, as she emphasizes car ownership and high incomes.

In contrast, my sense is that the behavior she complains of is merely a special case of the general observation that DC does not have a lot of what sociologists call social capital. If you drive in DC, you will observe that the locals pass up pretty much every opportunity to improve the lives of other drivers, or of pedestrians, even when the cost to them would be quite low.

Why might this be, in the city famously said to combine northern charm and southern efficiency? One good candidate is high population turnover. Relative to other cities, a lot of people live in the DC area only for a short time. High house prices and bad schools also encourage a lifecycle pattern of coming to DC single, horny and full of idealism in one's 20s and then leaving for somewhere with lower house prices and better schools in one's 30s with a spouse, some kids, and a lot less idealism. Others come for a few years to serve in government.

I think an explanation based on low social capital resulting from high population turnover fits the data better, where data here means casual observations by me and by the author of the magazine article, but someone should collect some real data and do a serious study.

Winter Warriors versus Snowmageddon

The wussies at the WaPo are now calling DC's mid-sized snowstorm "snowmageddon". Please. Places like Syracuse and Rochester get snowfalls this size all the time without whining or expecting national news coverage.

Meanwhile, in Ann Arbor, "winter warriors" dined and drank outside in a special promotion to boost the downtown business area.

Snow comes to Beltwayland

Mocking the wussies inside the Beltway, who think that a few inches of snow is just a millimeter or two away from the apocalypse.

Hat tip: the consumerist (!)

Life in DC

People like Neighborhood Advisory Commissioner Mark Winstead are in fact much more common in DC than the wording of this article would suggest. They perform the not very useful function of making the lying politicians (is there some other sort?) and their courtiers look good. Certainly one would rather have a beer with a politician than with someone like Neighborhood Advisory Commissioner Mark Winstead.

And what is a Neighborhood Advisory Commission anyway? It sounds like an institutionalized forum for busybodys and bluenoses like Mark Winstead to go about making life worse for those who have the misfortune to live in their vicinity, thereby replicating in a small, local way the service that DC performs for the country as a whole.

I am so glad to be back outside the beltway.

Hat tip: reason.com