Over at Modern Art Notes, blogger Tyler Green has the (hilariously named) MANscoop that the National Gallery of Art is in negotiations to expand across the street from its current location on Constitution Avenue into the Federal Trade Commission building. The deal isn't sealed yet, but Green's sources sound pretty confident that the museum will be moving over to the space in time for a 2012 opening. MAN has a decent history of the two......

The United States Park Police, DDOT and MPD have released the following road closure advisories for Saturday's Veterans Day Parade. All closures should be re-opened by 5 p.m. Saturday. Roads closed at 6 a.m.: * Jefferson Drive from 14th Street to 4th Street, SW * Madison Drive from 4th Street to 15th Street, NW * Seventh Street from Independence Avenue to Constitution Avenue, NW Roads closed at 10:30 a.m.: * Lincoln Memorial Circle to Henry......

>> Payday lending reform legislation passes in the D.C. Council, Ward 8 Council member Marion Barry's bizarre change of heart on the matter notwithstanding. [City Desk] >> It's likely that the Texas State Bar is probing the professional conduct of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. [Huffington Post] >> A water main break at Third Street and Constitution Avenue NW this morning caused U.S. District and D.C. Superior courts to be shut down all day, but......

Good morning, Washington. If you're the sort of person who likes to start thinking about their lunch break just as soon as they sit down at their desks, we have excellent news for you in the form of a planned DC Vote rally for voting rights between noon and 1:30 p.m. today. Anyone who'd like to show their support for voting rights is encouraged to meet on the north side of Constitution Avenue between First......

>> Another photographer reports being harassed, this time outside DARPA headquarters in Arlington. [Raw Fisher] >> An off-duty D.C. police officer was carjacked early late last night in far Northeast Washington. A group of gunmen forced the officer and her friend to the ground and then stole both of their cars. A Sixth District spokesperson said carjacking has been a major problem in the police district lately. [WaPo] >> Plan for lunchtime tomorrow: DC Vote......

In times when security fears, whether justified or not, begin to creep over our lives, it's important to remember that the tiny chipping away of legitimate rights can be a slippery slope to unwarranted governmental authority over our lives. We wrote in June about photographer Chip Py's experience in downtown Silver Spring, as well as Kate Mereand's similar confrontations all over D.C., and their subsequent formation of DC Photo Rights, a Flickr group dedicated to......

>> Yesterday we wrote about the Amish market in Burtonsville being relocated next summer when the shopping center where it's located will be demolished. The blogger at Just Up The Pike seems to have information that the owner of an acre-sized plot behind Route 198 has expressed interest in leasing to the market, thus keeping Burtonsville residents sated with an uninterrupted supply of delicious Amish fried chicken. >> Private tour buses are set to......

Tomorrow morning marks the annual running of the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. The race, which takes place on the National Mall, begins at 8 a.m., with several pre-race events as well. To accommodate the 50,000 people expected to participate, Metro will begin operating two hours early, at 5 a.m., with trains running every 12 minutes from the end of each line. Metro has not scheduled any track maintenance during the day on......

Say hello to your old friend labor, D.C.-- not that these hearty climbers didn't work hard to scale a rock and capture an oddly captivating shot. Whether you spent the holiday laboring to keep sand out of your bathing suit on the beach or perfectly timing bathroom breaks during a Law and Order marathon at home, we hope you had a nice break. To kick off the roundup with some happy news news, it......

April has been an exhausting month for classical music listeners. Still, when that means staying out late to hear Evgeny Kissin play eight encores, you will not hear me complaining. Put your shoes back on, because there is more music to be heard. We start with the best events this week. >> By all accounts, Chinese-American pianist Chu-Fang Huang, winner of the 2005 Cleveland Piano Competition, is an exceptional talent at age 23. She is......

Courtesy of our friends over at Fishbowl DC, today we discovered that Time had quietly launched a new blog on national politics. Called Swampland and featuring the online musings of Ana Marie Cox, Joe Klein, Karen Tumulty, and Jay Carney, there really isn't anything about this blog that sets it apart from the many other notable blogs on national politics, either independent or MSM-run. Except the name. Oh, the name. We thought the myth......

It's getting down to the wire. The city's Democratic primary will occur next Tuesday, at which point the identity of the city's next mayor will almost certainly be decided (there's always time for post-primary scandal, we suppose — or maybe just hope). Today's Post tackles the race with an all-out blitz. If you've somehow missed out on the flyers, handshakes and speeches that have blanketed the city these past few months, you may want to......

Good morning, Washington. And what a good morning it is. It's the first day of meteorological autumn, the brutal D.C. summer finally behind us. And is it just us, or was it cool enough last night to very nearly feel "chilly"? So breathe deep the cool, non-swampy air, and maybe skip out of work a little early on this long Labor Day weekend to enjoy the...um...torrential rains. CapitalWeather reports that Tropical Storm Ernesto, which made......

It may have been the shortest State of Emergency declaration the District has ever seen -- imposed on Tuesday night in response to two days of heavy rainfall, only to be quietly rescinded on Wednesday. But as the city dries off, residents are starting to wonder whether the declaration was needed at all. More importantly, concerns are being raised over what the response to heavy rain says about the city's ability to deal with a......

Good morning, Washington. And the rain, it continues, though today looks as if it will be better than yesterday. As Maryland State Highway Administration spokesman David Buck was quoted as saying in an AP article on cnn.com, "It's going to be a challenging week." Challenging indeed -- time to order some rain boots. WaPo tells us all about the rain, and though WJLA says crews are still pumping water out of Constitution Avenue, the traffic......

Anthony Bourdain defines "food porn" as "the glorification of food as a substitute for sex." As with food porn, wine porn -- to paraphrase Bourdain -- describes certain mind-blowingly hedonistic and expensive wines for an audience that has little intention of actually drinking them. If Wine Spectator and Robert Parker's Wine Advocate are the respective Penthouse and Hustler of wine publications, then the 7th Annual Heart's Delight Wine Tasting and Auction -- running from Thursday,......

A basement electrical fire at the IRS Headquarters on Constitution Avenue sent about 4,000 out of the building and home for the day. The building apparently filled with smoke around 9:30 this morning, but no injuries have been reported, and the fire is currently under investigation. Should arson emerge as a possibility, it is expected that everyone in the country will be named a suspect. And in possibly the most optimistic statement ever made, an......

No, Auslanders, the National Mall is not, as many surmise, a gigantic shopping mall. But for the occasional National Football League-slash-Pepsi promotion, we do prefer to keep the National Mall free of branding. However, once a year, the Mall at 15th and Constitution Avenue goes multiplex, presenting a series of film classics called Screen on the Green. And whether you’re a film buff, an enthusiast of DC’s green space, or simply a summer intern looking......

The circus is coming to town (the MCI Center to be exact), and that means it's time for the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey animals to parade across Capitol Hill. On Monday, March 21, at approximately 1:30 p.m., the elephants (and, for the first time, a donkey -- "in order to celebrate the non-partisan event of the circus and the spirit of the Nation's Capital") will make the trek from 32nd and D Streets,......

(Classical music agenda contributed by Charles T. Downey of Ionarts) Want to hear something classical to impress your family and friends? At DCist, we have some quick picks for you, and can you say free concerts? That's right, Washington has more excellent classical music to be heard for free than probably anywhere else, and we're here to tell you about it. For more information, see our Concert Schedule at Ionarts. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS: >> Free......

In case anyone was wondering whether yesterday's standoff between the man in the red van near the White House was a distressed constituent from out of town, sure enough, he was. In fact, the man, Lowell Timmers, is from Cedar Springs, Mich., a small exurban town north of Grand Rapids called Red Flannel Town USA. The town's biggest event, Red Flannel Day, says that Cedar Springs has "small-town charm and home-grown characteristics." Yesterday's episode may......

The organization ReDefeatBush is sponsoring a rally at the U.S. Capitol at noon today they're calling "Defend Democracy, Support the Challenge." A variety of liberal organizations have been calling on U.S. Senators to join the Representatives who are planning to launch an official challenge to the November election results, and U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer has agreed to object to the results to trigger debate. Official counting of the Electoral College votes begins at 1 p.m.......

Good morning, Washington. We're sure that with many of you off for Veterans Day yesterday, you may have taken today off as well. Enjoy your four-day weekend and a rainy Friday. Redskins Pedestrians Face New Hurdles: Just after they won a ruling by Prince George's County that will allow them to walk to FedEx Field to avoid parking fees at the stadium, Redskins fans who hope to park at Landover Mall for free have seen......

Watch out, D.C.! 15,000 runners are expected to hit the streets of Washington this Sunday. A local institution, the Marine Corps Marathon attracts competitive runners from all over the world as well as thousands of amatuers eager to punish their bodies by running through 26.2 miles of D.C.'s streets. This years race starts at Arlington National Cemetary, goes through Georgetown, much of Rock Creek Park, hits the National Mall, winds through Hains Point and......

Some residents on Capitol Hill are breathing a sign of relief now that the Route 96 and 97 metrobuses have been steered away from a temporary terror-related detour to a new fixed routing. The old 96 and 97 routings on First Street NE between the Russell and Dirksen Senate office buildings ended this summer when Washington's terror alert level was elevated to Orange. First Street was closed to traffic and metrobuses used Third and Fourth......

The National Mall is officially crowded. Now that the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian is set to open next week, all the usable space intended to be used for museums, monuments and other important national sites have been taken. The Post explores the politics of the National Mall in this morning's edition. Everybody wants a piece of it, but there's no room to spare. In fact, the chairman of the National Capital Planning......

DCist was excited to read in today's Post that the imaginative fantasy architectural sketchwork of Giovanni Battista Piranesi is on display at the National Academy of Sciences. The 18th century Italian engraver was born a Venetian and studied stage design and had a love for ancient Roman ruins. These all intersect in his fantasy sketchwork, that involve grand staircases, great vaults, ropes, chains and instruments of torture. Piranesi's work is coupled with the modern-day string......

With new security closure announcements coming everyday it seems like, DCist found it odd that among federal installations slated for perimeter upgrades is the National Arboretum. Not only would terrorists have trouble finding the Arboretum way out on Bladensburg Road in Northeast, they may run into trouble with some of the local residents. (But then again, maybe the Arboretum is a viable target on a symbolic level. It is, afterall, on the colonial road......

The Department of Homeland Security has named five buildings it believes could be targeted in a new wave terrorist attacks. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge says that credible information indicates that the headquarters for the World Bank and International Monetary Fund are targets. The buildings are adjacent to one another, just two blocks from the White House, on Pennsylvania Avenue at H Street, between 18th and 20th streets. The Post is reporting today that......

Inbound traffic from Virginia this morning has been slow-going because a key intersection, 14th Street and Constitution Avenue, has been shut down for the police investigation of a fatal 6 a.m. car-pedestrian accident. Eastbound Constitution Avenue from the Memorial and Roosevelt bridges toward Federal Triangle and the Capitol is seeing major trouble, as is inbound I-395 via the 14th Street Bridge. Traffic reports indicate that with 14th Street shutdown, backups push back many miles toward......