Results tagged “scientology”

    

The Church of Scientology Religious Trust's building at 16th and P Streets NW is the site of a barricaded celebration of some sort today -- one which is blocking a sizable section of one of the District's major arteries. (Obviously, I wasn't invited behind the curtain. I mean, you should have seen my last audit: whew!) Police are out in full force around the humongous 50,000-square foot building, and security is tight -- a ten-foot tall white temporary barricade is blocking off 16th Street; there are huge draping banners reading "SCIENTOLOGY" and "DIANETICS", though, in case those walking by on their Saturday jaunts to the 14th and P retail corridor were wondering what the hell was going on with this big white thing in the middle of the street.

Supporters of Anonymous, the loosely organized group of internet activists who have attacked the Church of Scientology recently with videos and server hacks, appeared outside D.C.'s Founding Church of Scientology center on Sunday. The protest was part of a planned "global day of action" with the stated purpose of setting off a government investigation into how Scientology got tax-exempt status.

>> Yesterday we profiled Five Four, the hardest working all girl band in the city, with the cutest shoes, in a Three Stars piece. Tonight you can see those shoes up close and personal at DC9, $8. If that's not the dose of local music you were hoping for tonight, how about Meredith Bragg at the Black Cat, or Gist at Iota?

Good news in time for Christmas this year; the Warehouse Theater will continue to operate through next summer, according to the institution. The venue is currently hosting Scena Theater's The Maids and will have new shows in February and March. That also means it remains a venue for next year's Fringe Festival. The Warehouse is still looking for a new home. Despite the usual winter doldrums that December brings, there are still a number of...

SFist witnessed a new apartment building tszuj the skyline with spectacular, gaudy turquoise aplomb, the (informal) renaming of the Mission/SOMA neighborhood border, the return of the Maltese Falcon, the Mayor Gavin Newsom mea culpa-ing over his Hawaiian getaway during the oil spill, and double-decker buses hitting the streets of San Francisco. Oh, and some baseball player named Barry Bonds is a liar whose pants, it seems, are totally on fire. LAist continues to cover the...

Download the original attachment Chicagoist is gearing up for this weekend's annual Air & Water Show along the lakefront. In what's becoming an annual tradition around there, staff member Todd McClamroch even got to fly with one of the participants. Chicagoist's decidedly opinionated readership was also appalled that one of their staffers found a popular local brewpub to be a great place to bring a kid. They also think that an unlikely activist for immigration...

Good Morning, Washington. It looks like another fine spring day from our vantage point at DCist headquarters -- weather fit for a queen, as it were. Thanks to Flickr user Jon-Miles for sharing some of his shots with us from yesterday's press event with President Bush and Queen Elizabeth II. Today is the final day of the Queen's tour of the region. Before a private dinner with the Bushes, she'll spend it by visiting the...

Update, Part 3: Here's the audio of Rep. Gohmert's wisdom on the District's lack of representation. Or, should we say, over-representation? And we've redesigned the banner for his website to better reflect his new responsibilities... Louie Gohmert — The District's Voting Representative powered by ODEO--> Update, Part 2: Here's a pic of Louie. He seems like a nice guy. And this is what he said, according to the Congressional Record: "I would submit to...

>> We don't know about you, but our mom used to tell us if we can't take care of our own toys, we didn't deserve them anyway. Which leads us to wonder how the FBI feels about having a cache of weapons and equipment stolen from two cars parked on Capitol Hill Sunday. Now the Feds are working with local authorities to find the pilfered guns. This begs the question: Is it sound policy to...

The lovely ladies over at The Reliable Source have the scoop that Tom Cruise, along with fiancee Katie Holmes and kids Isabella, Connor and indeed, baby Suri, are currently in Washington at the invitation of Redskins owner and new financial partner Dan Snyder. The entire Cruise fam is reportedly staying at The Danny's Potomac manse, out of which they ventured last night for a private, after-hours visit to Six Flags America, where we suppose they...

This week featured a little bit of everything. We debated whether a man should be safe in his home, defended Washington sports fans, checked in on the National Zoo's elephants, and checked out Tilly and the Wall at Black Cat. We wondered where the Smithsonian's electric car went, visited and reviewed SILVERDOCS, took a look at the new development plans for Near Southeast, and looked on as D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams took control of Metro. We reported on a cab scam in the making, finally saw the Georgetown Waterfront Park take a step forward, de-mystified corkage policies, wrote on Vegetate's continuing battle to serve alcohol, previewed Scientology's new digs, and opined on GPS monitoring of cab zones.

As we reported last month, this city seems to be buying Tommy’s Scientific schtick whether or not he is still feeling indigestion pains after placenta consumption. In the hometown of Scientology (is it really allowed to share a suffix with Microbiology and Physiology?), L. Ron’s people are revving up to open their new location on 16th St. in NW, and as of today, go-time is set for the fall. With so much more space, they...

This week saw the official introduction of our newest service to make all of our social lives that much easier -- Last Call. For those of you that missed the news, our tech guru Tom Lee has set up a system through which you can check Metro arrival times, movies, weather and open tables at area restaurants by simply sending us a text message with your query. We're working to iron out any hiccups, so...

Londonist prepares a Happy Birthday bath for Buddah this week and then things get all cliched. A madman goes on a rampage while axe-weidling and London's mayor warns an American diplomat to avoid the kitchen if the heat bothers him so much. LAist has finally come around to purchasing tickets for Clipper Train. Hyper local dating sites are spamming L.A. neighborhoods and the fascinating Dame Darcy talks with LAist about art, the city and earthquakes....

Washington has become all the rage in the Hollywood set; whether they're trying to establish their public policy bona fides or soak their late husbands for millions of bucks, the beautiful people (and Michael Douglas) have been showering the District with unprecedented favoritism. So I suppose it should come as no surprise that the strangest and most untentionally hilarious of movie star trappings, the Church of Scientology, should be doing a booming Washington business.

With the double benefit of a long weekend and sunny skies, area residents return to work with spirits and energy restored. But that feeling may be fleeting -- transportation experts warn that the first Tuesday after Labor Day is often referred to as "Terrible Traffic Tuesday," or T3 for short. Sandwiched somewhere between Manic Monday and T.G.I.F., T3 is the day that workers hit the roads, students at local universities return to campus, and school...

Thanks to DCeiver, who points out some Scientologist wackiness that doesn't involve Tom Cruise. It seems those crazy Dianetics believers are at it again, this time causing a ruckus at a local print shop. The issue? Apparently, they thought the staff was holding on to fliers for a special event. Copies of the flier had apparently been leaked to the public, and the angry Scientologists -- clearly unable to control MEST -- sent a lawyer and some investigators to search the entire store. Their actions then got weirder -- but we'll let the witness do the talking:

Then they said they wanted to buy some reams of colored paper. We said fine. They said they wanted to pick which reams they got. Odd but fine. They must have bought 100 reams of paper. They opened them up and looked at the pages. It seems they thought we were hiding documents in there. They left all of the paper in a big pile. We recycled it.

Good evening, D.C. This weekend was certainly hot. Capital Weather's forecast indicates more of the same, with a chance of storms for much of the week. And there's good news for the Nationals -- their winning streak now stands at 10 wins. This photo, taken by Remain Fabulous and posted in DCist Photos, is of Saturday evening's Annual Pride Parade, which was part of the 30th anniversary of Capital Pride In some quick news items...

The city was in bloom this weekend. Near this DCist's apartment, we spied a number of tourists blocking the Connecticut Avenue sidewalk near Woodley Road to snap photos of the giant bed of tulips on the embankment of the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel. From cherry blossoms the previous weekend to now tulips ... what's next weekend's flower of choice? Over on Euclid Street, were this photo from DCist Photos was snapped, even the weeds and...

The Fraser Mansion at the corner of Connecticut Avenue at 20th and R streets stands out, as you can see in this DCist photo. In a sea of older and newer commercial buildings a few blocks north of Dupont Circle stands the distinguished red stone mansion, its giant porte-cochere meeting the sidewalk with a majestic portal leading inside. It’s also Washington’s Scientology House, and while Clearwater, Fla., might be a more important Scientology center, Washington is where L. Ron Hubbard started Scientology when he was studying at George Washington University. We aren’t sure to call it a religion, cult or a pyramid scheme (feel free to post your thoughts in comments), but that’s not the point of this post. When DCist was in New York before Thanksgiving, we got a chance to interview a former Washington resident, who, on a whim, decided to go on a tour of the Fraser Mansion with friends when they were recovering from a tough hangover.

What's a young, literary-minded D.C. denizen to do, when she's bored with this "boring/overly political/unartistic/gentrified/dangerous" city? If you're anything like "Zoe," the answer is of course: start a blog.