Lima

After some sleuthing through my old gmail archives, I determined that June 21 is the anniversary of my arrival in the great "state" of District of Columbia*, and so to celebrate my making it four years here without succumbing to this city's migratory bug (or ever having to meet a lobbyist—-that I'm aware of), I decided to check out Lima. I seriously walk by this place constantly, seeing as it's about a block from my house, so it was high time to actually see what it was about.

It was approximately 1,000 degrees out, but we still braved the outdoor couches on the patio (I know, classy right? What place has outdoor couches?). Lima has happy hour specials on certain beers, wines and cocktails, but the main event was mojitos, which we ordered in big $29 pitchers...and promptly drank roughly a pitcher each**. They had mango!

The clear highlight of the night though was when this guy walked past the patio a couple times, and Ebo pointed out that he really looked like a character on Lost, to which Christina responded that she was 100 percent positive he was. Even cableless and TV-phobic as I am, I was pretty excited that this dude who kept passing us looking confused and "lost"*** may have actually been on television at some point. Just when we thought we'd missed our window of opportunity though, he walked toward us again and we nominated Ebo our ambassador to fame. He made the introduction and we got to talk to the guy for a while.

He was apparently there to go to a benefit for a refugee charity, cause, as he put it, now that he's been on TV and people know him he should, you know, probably actually do something. Later we also saw another dude from Lost that I totally didn't recognize (it may have been this guy? ...I could be totally wrong about that). So woohoo for me, only four years in this city and I finally see someone who's recognizable...just not to me.

Afterward we went to the Post Pub and got pitchers of Sam Summer, diner food and free shots from the waitress cause she enjoyed all of our best drunk stories. And at one point someone put my favorite INXS song on the jukebox.

Best anniversary ever.

*I technically started out in Maryland, but.....shhhh
**But who's counting?
***I'm so hilarious

Kushi

For my K, I decided to check out the new sushi bar and "izakaya" in Mount Vernon Square, Kushi. You could still wear your shoes and there wasn't any raw horse on the menu, but it still felt pretty authentically Japanese to me (cute bartender and all).

Kushi is part of the new revival just east of my place, which is awesome for me. The CityVista condo building has a host of cool eateries, including another Busboys and Poets location and a (squee!!!) Taylor Gourmet sandwich shop. Even the New York Times recognized that good things are happening in this area.

The place has a hip and classy vibe, and the drinks were priced as you might expect in that setting, but they had pretty decent happy hour specials until 8. We had *strong* Japanese-style margaritas (and the cutie bartender gave us an extra that he had "accidentally" left over), so we made out pretty well for under $10. I also appreciated the wide selection of Japanese liquors, like shochu, that aren't always that easy to find here.

We didn't try the sushi this time, but the selection here also seemed pretty broad. They even offer otoro, though they do specify that it's limited. I didn't think the sushi prices seemed all that unreasonable either, especially considering that everything we saw looked pretty amazing.

My verdict is that I will definitely go back, and I will try to have a shot at that sushi if I can stop myself from ordering Taylor's when I'm right next door....