Eye on Logan Circle

When I wrote the "You too can have your own pretentious hyper local blog" post, I was not taking a swipe at any particular local blog. Several came to mind while constructing the list, and a few of those have been mentioned in the comments. However, there is one local neighborhood blog that fits the bill exactly, and serves as an example of the "hip wannabe urban transplant scum" we all get a laugh at here.

Pretension? Check. Hyper exaggeration of how "hip" their neighborhood is, and woeful declarations about a lack of a good (read: not filled with gay men or minorities) watering hole? Check. This isn't news. There are literally dozens of DC blogs whose sole purpose in life is to self-fellate to the masses via Blogger. Last week one of the many Logan Circle blogs, District Schmistrict, added a new item to my list of things necessary for local pretension: self-righteous to the point of screening the low number of comments received on said blog to keep out anything perceived as negative.

District Schmistrict itself is an uneventful altar of the goings on and happenings in Logan Circle which would normally be fun to read if 500 other blogs weren't doing it better. If DCist is considered the CNN (a stretch, I know) of local DC blogs than District Schmistrict is the equivalent of your friend's Facebook news feed: nothing original, nothing new, and nothing worth noting. Until now.

I was tipped off that District Schmistrict, despite its attempts to be a serious neighborhood blog, gets a little hot under the collar when presented with comments that are unfavorable to the progenitors Noah Wiese and Katie Knorovsky. In 2008, while Katie was supposedly working for the "National Geographic Traveler" magazine, her husband won an essay contest sponsored by the magazine. The prize was a sweet DVD box set, the Indiana Jones DVD collection. Now, I mean, I had never heard of National Geographic Traveler before, but I would assume that something affiliated with the National Geographic Society would at least have the good sense to not let spouses of employees win prizes in a public contest. Maybe that's giving National Geographic too much credit, I don't know. But I do know that a commenter put together that: 1.) District Schmistrict is run by Katie Knorovsky and 2.) called Katie out on this in a comment which went unposted by the purveyors of District Schmistrict, saying it was inappropriate for her to name her husband a winner in an essay contest, especially considering that the essay is written about Katie herself. This commenter with way too much skill at Google searching dug up proof that the winning announcement was given by Katie herself to her husband, with no disclaimer of their relationship. The reason given by the duo? "There were only a few entries." Huh. You would think a few entries by someone other than the guy who's legally bound to put up with your shit from now until eternity would outweigh entries by your old man. Who cares if they're good (and frankly, his wasn't). It's a conflict of interest and bad form. It technically doesn't break any laws, save for the laws of decency and journalistic integrity. It's a conflict of interest to have your spouse win a contest that you're administering. It'd be like if my girlfriend worked for Ruby Tuesday's (the National Geographic Traveler of restaurants) and I won a year's supply of UNLIMITED SALAD BAR because hey, a few other people wanted to win, but it was easier for me to take the prize rather than have her do any work in actually giving it away. Or you know, promoting the contest in the first place.

We all know that in DC it's not what you know, it's who you know. If you want the prize you have to know the powerful people in charge. In breaking news, WIHDC has learned that Marion Barry's successfully hasty kidney transplant was the result of an essay he wrote about Katie Knorovsky and the Iowa State Fair. You'll be up and rooting for the PG United in no time, Hizzoner.