DISQUS

Pechorin · 11 months ago

MOVE!

linda_lasalle · 11 months ago

Off-topic, here, but I am a regular reader of your terrific blog. One complaint, howerer, is the add which covers the first entry amd is impossible to get rid of. Very frustrating.
Otherwise, keep up the good work. Even Gramdmas like me love you.

Sigh · 11 months ago

If you are a Firefox user, the (free at http://noscript.net) NoScript add-in is a lifesaver. I didn't even realize John had the amazingly annoying ad in question until I accidentally opened the site in another browser I use for testing purposes! Yuck.

John: When you redesign the site, you may want to give some additional thought to the amount and placement of ads.

max · 11 months ago

Yeah, I live close by in Dupont, and have both heard more sirens than I used to, and gotten more scary DC alert emails about shootings and robberies in the area.

Bush Bites · 11 months ago

Crime goes up during recessions, they say.

vkobaya · 11 months ago

Crime goes up when we have criminals in office. I am hoping things will change as of January 20, 2009. People will have more hope and less reason to despair. Obama is also promising more help and that government will nolonger steal from the people.

Blackacre · 11 months ago

I lived at Woodley Place one summer while serving an internship on the Hill and I went to Adams Morgan often that summer because it was in walking distance. That's unfortunate. Sorry to hear about that.

Bush Bites · 11 months ago

You may think about buying that condo in a near suburb rather than the city.

It's one thing to rent in a shaky neighborhood, but it's really depressing when it affects your property value.

Wh0Cares · 11 months ago

Washington DC has always been a shit hole and now epitomizes the deplorable state of this 3d world country.

vkobaya · 11 months ago

Especially bad when you have a third World Tin Despot running your 3rd World country. I am hoping Obama will make a difference, but beginning to fear he intends to be the third George Bush term. That is when we rejected one Bush clone, McCain, we simply got the other Bush clone.

Vincennes · 11 months ago

I'm sure the person who got shot feels worse than you. I suggest you move to a more exclusive neighborhood or do something to help the community. Blogging about how shitty Washington DC is isn't very progressive.

Balt_O_Matt · 11 months ago

You want safe? Feel free to join us in Baltimore, hon!

Seriously, though, shootings in Baltimore are usually pretty predictable and involve drug users, drug sellers, or gang members. It's still sad and unacceptable, but it doesn't typically happen in the "better" neighborhoods.

From 1999-2000 I lived in The Chalfonte there at Lanier Place. This was before that area turned all high falutin'. Never had a problem.

Rus · 11 months ago

With the economy crashing around us, you should expect crime across the country to be on the increase.

jixter · 11 months ago

Joe and John: GoogleMaps' "Street View" is a heaven-sent invention; I can virtually visit thousands of places that I've never been to and, in all probability, never will go to. Washington DC is one of those places. I just took a drive down your 18th St NW in Adams Morgan and enjoyed my excursion, unmolested. Please, tell us: if Adams Morgan is a "good" 'hood, what are the names of the 'hoods to stay away from? This isn't a trick question.

EDIT: Yes, and as Rus, below, says - crime always increases in tough economic times. Spousal, child and animal abuse all increase as well.

Cannon · 11 months ago

Where should a noobie stay away from? Southwest, Southeast, most of Northeast and the part of Northwest that borders Southwest. That pretty much covers it. There's much less crime in the area around Georgetown/Wooley Park/Tinleytown area...incidentally, this is the "rich" area of DC.

I'd say that Adams Morgan is definitely not the "good" part of DC and could actually be called one of the "bad" parts during the weekend. Bars + College students + small area = not a good look.

RonTunning · 11 months ago

John, you might have added "and don't forget to bring your gun."

JA · 11 months ago

Sorry, but I have to say (as a long-time DC resident and longtime reader) that the Adams Morgan strip has always been somewhat dangerous, at least for the past few decades. It has an undeserved reputation as a "good neighborhood" that belies its nature as a somewhat seedy place. Bad Clubs + idiots from the DC/MD/VA region flocking in = recipe for muggings (usually) and occasional shootings. Be glad it's not Trinidad DC, but, still, it's definitely not one of the safer places in the District.

Left of the Hill · 11 months ago

I was just there that area hanging out with some fellow bloggers over the weekend (we were all hanging out after a the first day of a bloggers summit, which actually included Joe leading a panel discussion). I live in the Northern Virginia suburbs of DC and I usually feel safe going into the area at night, which is why I'm somewhat surprised that there's been multiple shootings in the area in a relatively short period of time.

JA · 11 months ago

DC is a pit. A "good neighborhood" compared to other places is a joke. I live in North Arlington...all the benefits of the Capital, none of the garbage, crime, and panhandlers.

caphillprof · 11 months ago

We're also heading toward Christmas and in good times and in bad times street crime always increases a bit leading into Christmas, the pressures of gift giving, of entertaining, of supplying pharmaceuticals for the revelers, just making people feel better, street crime goes up before Christmas.

NovaNardis · 11 months ago

Saying Adams Morgan is the "good" section of DC is a bit of an understatement. It's also a hangout for the college crowd, no?

aquarius2 · 11 months ago

I visited DC once and would never go back. It is not like every other large city, it is more dangerous. Homeless everywhere and god forbid should you take a wrong turn while driving. I think Miami is even safer than our capital city.

SkippyFlipjack · 11 months ago

Some people think that it's not great form to talk about GOOD and BAD neighborhoods. It's too bad that crime is coming to your GOOD neighborhood, but there are plenty of good people in the "BAD" neighborhoods who probably don't like it there neither.

Just sayin'.

bboyle · 11 months ago

DC is a city...with all the attendant problems and glories. It ain't Mayberry and if that's what you want you don't belong here. Adios.

Tim · 11 months ago

Good things guns aren't banned...somebody may have gotten punched instead.

Naked Bunny with a Whip · 11 months ago

We had a double homicide just down the road from where I live, a stabbing. In Ames, Iowa, a quiet, small university town. Unfortunately, it happens everywhere.

Grainman · 11 months ago

Out here in the "Wild West", (Yakima Valley) we get three or four shoot outs or drive bies a day. We can't be in our front yard without fear of being killed or robbed. Gang wars and drugs. We don't need TV shows, this is the real thing. We also have the best brain surgeons in the West, right here in Yakima. Most of the gun-slingers are under eighteen and never get prosecuted.

Ferdiad · 11 months ago

It's not just D.C. - its everywhere. Violent crime is at record highs in many major American cities.

cereal · 11 months ago

As previously commented - 18th St (and the Florida Ave./U St. intersection and Columbia Rd. areas generally) in Adams Morgan is NOT safe, or good, or nice in any way. It's a skeevy, dingy, alcohol-skanky club-moron testosterone-polluted shitstain of a place as ever existed. I'd rather pass out drunk in front of the LA crack-dealing Popeyes - I think that's at on Hollywood Boulevard at Ivor St, which is similarly skeevy - but much less chance of getting knifed or shot over there.

For the 6-odd years I lived in DC (capitol hill) I avoided that neighborhood and strip like the plague. I grew up in NYC in the late 70's and 80's and I know what a dangerous, volatile, desperate asshat-infested couple of blocks feels like from a mile away. If you live within a half mile of that crappy, disaster-prone strip get the f*&k out now and never go back.