this afternoon I made POP PUNK BANANA BREAD. the secret ingredient is listening to pop punk while you make banana bread otherwise it’s the NYT Cooking recipe. I also added a ton of chocolate chips

ended a loooong day with a bike ride to and from my neighborhood association meeting and just blasted up and down all these big hills. once again a reminder to myself that the solution almost always is simply to Touch Grass

opening the six flags naming survey like “I bet there are gonna be so many ‘the BLANK at BLANK’ names in there” and I was right 🫠 formersixflagsurvey.typeform.com/to/bT2vy2r9

I constantly have to remind myself that when I’m stuck in my head I need to touch grass so today I walked 3 miles around silver spring with my friend from out of town and remembered why I like living here

drizzy’s birthday was yesterday and one of my favorite memories is when we got out of the car in asbury park the first time and his whole energy changed when he smelled the ocean air. happy birthday big guy ❤️🐾

“We need to incentivize housing production, or we will continue to hand over our residents — and our voting power — to red states.” I talk to @thebaltimorebanner.com about how homebuilding in Maryland has dropped to Great Recession levels and why that's bad: www.thebanner.com/community/ho...

went out to get my weekly crisp and juicy and it is grim out there. as @beyonddc.bsky.social reminds us, bad air days used to be really common here growing up and I’m grateful they aren’t anymore ggwash.org/view/89899/t...

big believer that you should date yourself so tonight I’m going to see maddie’s secret at the afi and before that dinner at locavino. they could use your support while they wait to get their liquor license back, but I enjoyed my cream soda www.sourceofthespring.com/silver-sprin...

there *is* a Silver Spring in PA but it’s outside of Harrisburg, so you’re safe

one may ask “but doesn’t your dog hate fireworks??” no. they’re going off outside my window and drizzy is fast asleep next to me and I’m grateful

coming home tonight I could see the diy fireworks over langley park and they make me so happy. people choose to come here—my family chose to come here—and no matter what this country tries to do people still find joy in being here. nobody can take that away from us

thought he was being sneaky

can’t make this stuff up: people in Friendship Heights, which has the highest population density of any city in the US, are afraid that someone could build a high-rise apartment building www.thebanner.com/economy/grow...

20 years ago yesterday (June 26) I started a neighborhood blog called Just Up The Pike and it changed my life. it brought me friends, a career, and a community. I was just 18 and writing about things that bugged me (ngl reading it now, I cringe) but people listened—

with the election over i have repurposed the campaign sign frames to confuse deer and as you can see it’s already working

off Route 355 in Gaithersburg, you can buy a brand-new 3 bedroom, 1600sf stacked townhome starting at $575k. we know how to build modestly-priced, family-sized homes in Montgomery County–we just need to make them easier to build in more places. www.beazer.com/maryland--dc...

a new study finds that making it easier to build duplexes and townhomes in Rockville mean a lot more people could afford to buy a home there–people might otherwise get priced out of the area gcaar.azurewebsites.net/docs/default...

my other favorite thing that happened at Pride this year: leading our own BUS BUS BUS chant with the @ggwash.org contingent! (my friend though we were saying “butts” 🫠) next year I’ll take a video. maybe somebody else did???

my favorite thing that happened in the Capital Pride parade this year: people chanting BUS BUS BUS at @dashbusva.bsky.social

spending my weekend in 2005, aka at the warped tour at rfk. my mom called me and asked where i was going and i said “remember when i was 17 and you drove me and my friends to nissan pavilion and we sat on 66 for 2 hours? it’s that”

4/ in 2024 MoCo considered another path: allow 2 or 3 homes on a lot. this is common in DC now: an old house converted to 3 condos, each selling for about $600k. that’s accessible to a middle-class family, or cheap enough to subsidize for a low-income family—

teardowns are common in East Silver Spring and other areas of Montgomery County where incomes are rising, found @montgomeryplans.bsky.social. ppl may want to be here, but when all you can legally build are big houses, only the wealthy can afford to. montgomeryplanning.org/wp-content/u...

this is a house Drizzy and I pass most mornings. we knew the owner and her dog, who was always so excited to see us. she got on in years and just sold to a flipper for $480k. two doors down is a sign of things to come: a once-identical 1930s bungalow, rebuilt in 2017, listed now for $1.35m—

the sky was so good this evening. it makes me think of watching TGIF as a kid, like this is the light in the backyard of the boy meets world house and mr. feeny is laying down some life advice

biked home from downtown Silver Spring tonight and it looks so good at sunset. this would have been unimaginable growing up here in the 90s. the only thing missing are the people: they’re out ofc but it’s hard to tell bc Georgia Avenue is such a barrier. what dreams may come

I don’t like arguing with people, but it’s important for folks to understand that land costs are real. “we’d be fine if you just built fewer houses here” is saying you will only accept expensive homes for wealthy people in your community. even if you don’t believe that, it is the reality

I got bullied for living in a townhouse in 6th grade and adults living there today insist that they don’t hate townhouses, they just don’t like the proposed new townhouses on Notley Road. your kids didn’t learn this behavior from nowhere! this is what he’s talking about: ggwash.org/view/101279/...

in my prior job I worked on Montgomery County’s Complete Streets Design Guide, which @mcdotnow.bsky.social uses. we have a great toolbox to fix streets like Sligo Avenue, and I wish this county would just use it already

this goob said it’s pride month 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈

I designed the original @actfortransit.bsky.social scorecard 10 years ago and I’m pleased to see it still in use informing Montgomery County voters! you can see the whole thing at www.actfortransit.org/scorecards2026