Why DC Ain't So Bad, Y'All

Now that I have been back in DC for more than a week, let me do a brief fifth grade summary of why I like staying here instead of whining about how much I miss India… especially since I have been extolled the virtues of London and NY on more than one occasion this week…those comparisons are totally unfair! Those are cities. Let's not compare apples to oranges.
So anyway: I like DC because I see history everywhere I walk, because I see dead Christmas trees waiting to be collected in January after the fuss of being lit and surrounded by presents, because I do bump into the same people at the same 5 places and I don’t really mind, because I see at least four different skin colors on the metro who are reading books like “Freakonomics” or “Confessions of a Video Vixen,” because there are a lot of smart people who take their work and fun in equal seriousness, because you can get a very good crepe for $7, because nothing beats Bush bashing when you’re in a bar a mile away from where he lives, because I don’t have to live in a house behind a picket fence in the suburbs and spend my weekends at Home Depot, because even though people recycle relationships, there are still enough crazy singletons and crazier married friends who keep it interesting, because there are at least SIX Scottish terriers who live on my street, because I can still walk home at 12 a.m. and feel relatively safe, because even though nobody cares what you’re wearing, they will say you look nice if you do or not say anything at all if they’re indifferent, because nobody here is totally indifferent to the world around them and for the most part they do know what’s happening in sub-Saharan Africa, because for every cabbie who has conned you there are two cabbies who are pretty decent, and because this year, I might, I just might be convinced to run a marathon in this cause celebre-fitness obsessed capital.