The DC Examiner:

Emergency regulations issued by the commission allow gun stores to open along most commercial corridors not zoned for neighborhood retail, throughout much of downtown and in a handful of industrial zones. But because each store must be at least 300 feet away from the nearest school, library, home, playground and church, the number of specific possible locations is very limited.

In Ward 8, thanks to the 300-foot buffer, the only viable locations for gun stores are near Blue Plains deep in Southwest, at Suitland Parkway and Interstate 295, and in historic Anacostia off Shannon Place, according to a report from the D.C. planning office. A large chunk of Southwest between Independence Avenue and Interstate 395 is fair game, as is the New York Avenue corridor from Florida Avenue almost to the Maryland line.

There’s also a tiny plot along Connecticut Avenue NW in Van Ness, a cluster of parcels off Wisconsin Avenue just north of McLean Gardens, another plot off Wisconsin near Observatory Circle, and a small piece of M Street in Georgetown, again near Wisconsin Avenue. Downtown, between Pennsylvania Avenue and M Street as far west as 20th Street also is available for potential gun store business — though either side of 16th Street is off-limits.

The image of gun stores on major commercial corridors is “deeply distressing to me,” said Ward 3 Councilwoman Mary Cheh.

“I’m just greatly saddened to think of the specter of gun stores popping up along Wisconsin Avenue and Connecticut Avenue,” Cheh said. “But I assume they’ll have to comply with all laws and regulations to maintain the guns in a safe manner.”

Y’know what I hate about gun stores? The tendency to look like a pawn shop with all sorts of advertisements plastered up on the window. I think the majority of the complaints like Mary Cheh’s have as much to do with the stores’ aesthetic appeal as they do with any legitimate-concern regarding the potential misuse of the stores’ products: tint the windows, and come up with a name that doesn’t include any form of “gun” or “shooter” (Continental Arms, in Baltimore County, is an example of a classy gun-store name, while Christian Soldier*, also in Baltimore County, is a good example of a creepy gun-store name).

Also: I’m just wondering if the District still is going to make you bring your purchase to police HQ for registration, and since this is a city where many residents are dependent on mass-transit, will there be opportunities to transport said firearm on city buses and the Metro? Or would one have to shell out for a taxi? Is there an authoritative resource anywhere regarding gun laws in DC? (I haven’t found one!)

*Admittedly, I did buy a shotgun from them, and a transfer through them, but that’s way more to do with the owner being the neighbor of my boss at the time.

If Al Gore’s defeat in Florida in 2000 didn’t convince you of that, Al Franken’s projected win over Norm Coleman should. It’s a narrow gap, and I don’t think Coleman has much of a chance (but kudos to him for not giving up, although his refusal to is starting to reek of the desperate).

I’ve got mixed feelings on Franken, on one hand I think he’s a bit of a show-off jerk, on the other hand, I tend to agree with some of his politics. As for Coleman, I think he’s a jerk, too, but I do agree with some of his politics (I’m sure).

This hasn’t been a good year to be a Republican, and if Coleman’s ultimate defeat can be attributed to President Bush’s declining popularity and the lousy reputation the Republicans have accrued over the last couple of years, he can still console himself by knowing that he lost by a lot less than a lot of his former colleagues, and also that now that the Democrats are in power, they will soon dominate the scandals.

Saved By The Bell, that iconic TV show from my high school days, is a horrible TV show. I say this with great residual affection. Here’s my first confession of this post: I used to love this show. As in, I would tape episodes on Saturday morning. I think at one point I had three or four tapes full of nothing but Saved By The Bell episodes, but I think they made for awkward marathons because I hadn’t figured out how to use the pause feature on the VCR remote to edit out the commercials.

My refamiliarization with Saved By The Bell came during a slow hour at the Bookstore, when I picked up a book of essays on pop culture and read about the show. A few minutes on Amazon and I found out the DVD sets were, seriously, dirt cheap, so I ordered a couple. They arrived New Year’s Eve, and I spent the night watching the show and drinking myself into a rather incredible stupor (er, which is my second confession of this post: namely, that I’m a loser who spent New Year’s alone!)

When I say Saved By The Bell is a horrible show … I do in fact mean that with great affection. It’s campy, and silly, and the plots are ridiculous. I’m pretty much the most style-blind guy in the world, but I look at what the cast is wearing, and I think to myself, “Seriously, what the heck?” Zack breaks the 4th wall with impunity, and it seems the characters only hang out at school, at The Max (and where’d that guy go, anyway?), and in their respective bedrooms.

What Saved By The Bell is great for is getting drunk. With each episode break, you pop the cap on another cheap beer, hoping that this will be the drink that gets your alcohol content high enough to the point that you remember what it was you loved about this show seventeen years ago. Eventually, all that this accomplishes is that you fall asleep before midnight and wake up the next morning wondering where all your aspirin went and why you didn’t turn off your TV to avoid an all-night DVD-replay Saved By The Bell marathon.

Now, how did I spend my New Year’s Day? In addition to cleaning the hell out of my apartment, I indulged a secret favorite: Cutthroat Island, the atrociously awful pirate movie that boasts lines like “Bad Dog!” and “I’ve got your balls!” and torpedoed Gina Davis’ career to boot.