Ting has placed this thing in Carole’s front yard

Hello neighbors! Have you been enjoying the seamless process that Ting employed to lay down fiber optic throughout the ‘hood?

Mark the street. Put down tape. Dig a trench. Come back next week with actual cable. Slop some messy concrete in the trench. Come back two or three more times for fine detail work on the asphalt. This has taken longer than the entire season of The Last of Us (so freaking good — watch it!).

Suffice to say, every time I see those paper No Parking signs lining the streets, I want to mow them down with my scooter. Anyhoo…

Just when we thought our long BevHills nightmare was over, the “Ting has placed this thing in Carole’s front yard” email complaint hit the listserv. Subsequent comments from the peanut gallery have included:

Carol looks ecstatic!

Helpful to know the “box” is called a “passive cabinet” and is allowing hundreds of people to receive symmetrical gigabit speed internet in the surrounding neighborhoods. (ergo, why the city permitted it).

Apologies to Carol, but the box is actually not in her yard but in something called “the public right of way,” and the City gave TING permission to put it there.

It’s beautiful isn’t it?! Wondering how long before a big truck takes one out 

I walked passed it the other day…and my thoughts were…eeee gads…that’s ugly.

Looks like Carol won the Ting eyesore lottery. They should give you free internet for mounting that beast in your yard without asking. 

Of course, it didn’t take long for the optimists among us to recommend that these ugly boxes be painted to become beautiful works of art. I am all for the beautification of BevHills (AS LONG AS YOU DO NOT TRIM MY BUSHES!), so I’d like to present some bespoke creations that I believe really capture the spunk and spirit of our beloved neighborhood.

Take that Dogs of Del Ray! We have the BevHills Bitch Sesh:

West Glebe Road Bridge Completion Countdown Clock

Homage to the Halal Chicken Slaughterhouse Market

Trompe l’oeil scooter parking

A welcoming location to leave those steaming poop bags we all love

Glass recycling art when you can’t make it to the purple dumpsters

Can’t wait to see the creative minds of BevHills add to my initial artistry!

Bev’s Bill of Rights: Sign the Pledge or I’ll Whine About It

Hello friends! It’s election time (June 8th!) and this has been a doozy of a race for Democratic mayor and City Council.

Recently, a group of city residents (let’s call them “Karens”) are asking City Council members and candidates to pledge themselves to a document they are calling the Alexandria Constituents’ Bill of Rights. This shady group declined to name their members or answer questions from our local publications, including who drafted the document and what a rejection of the document means.

But that has not stopped listserv from becoming a non-stop volley of who has/hasn’t signed the pledge, despite an explicit stated ban on posting political content and the fact that this pledge reeks of elementary school class elections (“vote for me and the snack machine will be FREEEEEEE!”).

So, in the spirit of “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”, I’ve created my own bill of rights that I will now pester all candidates into signing.

Take the Bev Pledge! Do you solemnly swear to:

• Personally chain yourself to a bulldozer at Chinquapin?
  
• Turn Seminary into a 12 lane freeway?
  
• Start an exclusive Grumpy Gus/“I’d like to speak to the manager” Facebook group of likeminded complainers to fuel your campaign?
  
• Gather every last scooter in the city into a pile and light them in an epic bonfire?
  
• Run on a platform of bitching about the popular incumbent without offering up your own policy?
  
• Picket butcher shops?
  
• Answer a constituent question faster than Justin Wilson? [trick question — this is not possible]
  

If you refuse to sign this, preferably in blood, you are a horrible person and probably have no friends.

Yours in civic pride, Bev
PS: VOTE!

Foul Play

Have you been waiting with bated breath to hear from Bev and make sure she survived the pandemic? Well guess what baby?

I’m back. I’m vaxxed. I’m ready to talk smack!

Today, let’s dish on some neighbors went on an unsubstantiated witch hunt against a restaurant they accused of imprisoning a duck family.

Apparently the Karens of the Hills who love reading NextDoor (the QAnon of listservs), jumped on some unsubtantiated claim that the Royal Restaurant in Old Town was running some duck hostage ring:

The Royal Restaurant is REFUSING to allow assistance to ANYONE to help save a Momma Duck and her ducklings from being rescued from their roof, where they are trapped.

Listserv to the rescue!

I scorched ROYAL restaurant on YELP. Many others are doing likewise.

And just to be extra, the Karen brigade also tried to enlist the help of The Zebra (the NewsMax of ALX).

Of course the real story is that the Royal Restaurant called the new halal butcher to come get them, and their Peking duck is legit. I kid. The actual story is that Royal contacted animal control and his HVAC company to save the birds. The ducks are safe. Everyone cool out.

Speaking of saving the birds, can you freaking believe that this election season, <checks notes> omg are we still complaining about the halal chicken butcher?! There are literally people running on a platform of continued anger about chicken. If you haven’t read that completely BS Alexandria “Bill of Rights” put out by some of these dingdongs, rest easy that your right to eat chicken and/or trap wild ducks remains unimpeded.

xoxo
Bev

Look out! The poors are coming!

Have you been following the 3 day+ rager on the listserv about supposed plans for George Mason Elementary school?

For those of you that just read this blog for comedic value and can’t be bothered with your idiotic neighbors’ rants, there was a PowerPoint deck that went out from ACPS to parents at the school outlining how they plan to rebuild the aging building. Only, an earlier draft had a mention of the space’s potential for housing, and someone read it and freaked the hell out thinking there was a land grab. The final draft that’s online has no mention of the school being used for housing, but hahahaha who can be bothered to read, and why do facts matter?

In no particular order, the BH listserv worked themselves into a froth about:

• Racism
• Class warfare
• Why people of more modest means would want to live among seven-figure dwellings (Jesus f’ing Christ, people!)
• Greenspace
• The difference between affordable housing and low-income housing
• Parking
• The Mayor’s developer mafia
• Traffic
• Number and types of cars in BH
• The annual salaries of firefighters
• What constitutes an ACPS employee versus a contractor
• Will my home value go down if everyone near me isn’t rich
• The number of square feet a single mom and 2 kids need
• Zoning rules (and wouldn’t these people be better in Del Ray?!)

Honest to god though, I had to pick my jaw off the floor, when I read THIS gem from the lovely Jennifer M.:

What’s perplexing to me is how anyone can think that folks living in affordable housing want to live in a neighborhood with $1M+ homes.  You think that’s going to make them feel better about themselves?  Taking the bus while a neighbor is driving a Mercedes is going to perk them up?  Think they are going to feel like they belong to the local community??  Come on – who would want that?

Seriously, JFC. I hope everyone throws their dog poop bags in your city trash can, Jennifer.

Anyway, I’ve been sitting back writing and rewriting a possible blog post for the past several days, and then I see that my fans have spoken (Thanks, Tom E.! I’ll bring by a halal chicken to reward you for the plug!).

Wait, so this was all one big misunderstanding?  Oh boy…can’t wait to see what Tales from the BH Listserv is going to say about this!!!!

It’s time for Bev to chime in.

May I present to you a one-act play I’ve written, entitled “The George Mason Commons”:

———

The sun is rising and people across Beverley Hills are getting ready to go to work.

A brown-skinned person walks out of the old George Mason Elementary school, recently renamed “The George Mason Commons” because affordable housing brought a wave of commoners into the neighborhood.

She waves at the recycling truck crew as they drive by. After all, they all live in the building. “Damn,” she thinks, “this Beverley Hills neighborhood might not be everything I dreamed it would be. They don’t even have curbside glass recycling here. What have I gotten myself into?!”

She tries to put it out of her mind, only to look up and see one of those fancy-pants single-family-home dwellers drive by in a Mercedes. Sigh. Clearly, she is unable to see a nice car and not hate on herself.

“I’ll show those snobs,” she thinks, walking past the bus stop of lowlife scum waiting for transport to the Pentagon, DC law firms, and other low-class jobs.

Finding a pile of abandoned scooters in a heap across the sidewalk, she heads off, helmetless, toward her job at the newly opened halal butcher shop.

Of course, the fastest option is to zip her scooter down Seminary Road. Ever since the road diet (high five, Mayor Wilson!), she can get to work before the angry picketing crowds show up and ruin her mood. Speaking of mood, she’s having such a fun, fast ride that she waves to all the cars waiting. A few of the drivers see her and honk. “Wait, are those middle fingers?” she wonders. “No, they couldn’t be. Not here. I’m pretty sure those drivers are just telling me I’m #1 based on my eco-friendly commute!”

The scooter breaks down about a block away from work when she jumps it over one of the ridiculously high speedbumps recently installed. “Hmm,” she thinks, “maybe some of Mayor Wilson’s developer cronies put these here.” Angered,  she flings the scooter in the road, because scooter riders do what they want.

Her workday at the butcher is pretty quiet and uneventful, except for all the dogs outside howling because the blood makes them crazy. She ignores the sound, and when she eventually gets bored, her mind wanders. “Man, I’m so lucky to have scored that affordable housing in the middle of Beverley Hills. To think it was all because a sneaky ACPS ‘contractor’ stuck that slide in a PowerPoint deck a few years ago and set it all in motion. Surely, this is the only way a person of color like me could ever gain entrance to such a utopia. I don’t even have a European car.”

With her shift done and unable to find a scooter, she hops on the bus (ew, gross!) and makes her way back to the four-story George Mason Commons building she now calls home.

Walking up to the building, she narrowly avoids stepping in a fresh pile of dog poo that someone neglected to pick up. “What a jerk!” she says. “Dog poo belongs in people’s city-provided trash cans!” At last, the brown-skinned woman climbs the stairs to her apartment. First floor, firefighters. Second floor, trash truck folks. Third floor, sketchy potential child molesters. And finally, fourth floor, the poors.

Home sweet home. As she walks in the door, she can’t help but sing the words to the Weezer song, “Beverly Hills”:
Where I come from isn’t all that great
My automobile is a piece of crap
My fashion sense is a little whack
And my friends are just as screwy as me

Beverly Hills!
That’s where I want to be!
Gimme gimme gimme gimme!
Living in Beverly Hills!

[Aaaaand scene]

PS. How has our opinionated “Donna” not chimed in on this thread after 3 days?? Has anyone checked in on her? Does she have cats? They get so hungry…

BevHills classic from the archives: Baby Chick/Duck for Easter?

So, uh, greetings my many new blog followers! I am glad that I am not alone in laughing my a$$ off at some of the more egregious listerv antics. So you know, my mission is to share the more hilarious posts (which can, by the way, be publicly accessed by anyone who is subscribed to the group), and NOT to be mean-spirited or rude toward anyone posting.

With that out of the way…

While we wait for the listserv to lose their mind about something else, it was suggested that we highlight some of the classics that inspired the creation of this blog.

I sat down and made a list, off the top of my head, of at least seven crazy pants things that have happened over the last 12 months or so. The first thing that jumped to mind was the now-infamous “baby chick” post, right before Easter this year:

Does anyone know where I might get baby a baby chick or duck for Easter?? Ideally I am looking for an outfit/farm where I can purchase the egg and then return the baby a week or two after it’s hatched (granted it survives my child) where it will live a long good life. Because I have no room for a chicken or duck in the yard…. But I would love to share the learning experience with child.

Any leads would be great!

Thanks!

“Mia”

Parkway Terrace

I practically did a cartwheel when I saw this hit my inbox. This was a slam dunk to get the community sputtering mad. We do love our animals (and their poop) here in Beverley Hills, and so the neighborhood immediately lost their collective minds fast and furious on poor, misguided “Mia”.

Some of my favorite rants and snarks are copied here for your amusement (gotta love the search feature on the Yahoo listserv page!).

Kind of confused here.  Are you hoping someone will let you swipe an egg from its nest and the nesting mother and take it home in the hope that it will hatch? And then hope the little chick or duckling will survive without its mother?  Or are you trying to take a newborn chick or duckling away from its mother and hope it survives in your house without its mother for a week or so?

The pile-on continues unabated:

The little chick will probably not survive, so you will also be giving the child a lesson in cruelty and death.

I was very distressed to read “Mia’s” request for chicks. Causing animals injury and death in the name of celebrating a time intended to remind us of peace and compassion is very very sad.

And then, the thread takes a left turn when a resident gets all Dr. Science on everyone:

There is no reason that a fertilized egg needs a “mother” chicken at all.  The egg just needs to be incubated for 21 days and then the chicks need food and water after hatch.  As long as they are in a group of at least 2 to 3 chicks, they do just fine.  Many farms use this method so that their laying hens are not out of production for 3 week stints.

And then, finally, a voice of reason…

I have a bunny if you want to borrow it 😉

What are your favorite epic listserv blowout, knock down, drag outs?! Share in the comments and we’ll keep them in mind for the next Tales from the Beverley Hills Archives post!