Because the Washington Nationals have to start somewhere.

(Part one is here.)

The president's entrance.

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Because the Washington Nationals have to start somewhere.

The arrival by Metro.

The walk down Half Street.

The barbershop quartet.

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When you don't notice the air, those are good nights. The breeze feels as much as is fitting, and the temperature is just Three Bears right. We had such weather at the gloaming Friday, and friend Sheri and I found a table on the Four Courts sidewalk just in time. Between Passover for her and Good Friday for me, artichoke dip and salmon sufficed. After a long week, golden drinks mattered more. The night air mattered most.

I can't help it! These words are words you have to say in this weather. The winter's too cold for gloaming — just get inside — and with air and sufficing, the only thing that realistically suffices is to get out of the air.

Spring, as we know, is different. After catching up at the bar on lots of life — work idealism, travel, dating guesses and theories — we wound our way to Iota, where her friend's boyfriend's friend was playing with his band. Justin Trawick was one of the thousands DMB liberated with fiddle and sax sidemen, but hanging out on the higher-pitched, faster-sung end of folk-rock's spectrum, he and friends put on a good show.

Soundboard.

The bassman was newly engaged.

A Mr. Flex Mathews raps about crowd-submitted everyday objects.

A waltz for the bassman and his fiancee turns into most of the band taking to the floor and trying to teach everyone how to waltz. 1,2,3…

Or am I? (No.)

Google Analytics tells me the most popular search leading here in the past month has been pat cooper romantic times 2010. Building on the grand tradition of people with my name doing random things, it turns out the lady Pat Cooper is a prolific reviewer for Romantic Times, the leading (and only?) monthly review magazine for romance novels.

Sure, I can show you a bodice-ripping good time and toss off words like "bosoms" and "lissome," but these books take the love drama to another level. I now give you some of my favorite Pat Cooper recaps:

Devlin and the Deep Blue Sea
"Standing on a moonlit Mexican beach, cursing her ex for taking off with their money and a new girl, helicopter pilot Elizabeth Moore finds herself tossed into the middle of a murder and international intrigue — and face to face with sexy-as-hell Joe Devlin. Caught between Devlin and the Deep Blue Sea, Elizabeth tries to pay off her debts as she attracts the attention of the police and a drug smuggler looking for his property. Then she gets involved in Joe's mission for a covert organization in Merline Lovelace's fast-paced tale. Unfortunately, the characters may not connect to readers on an emotional level."

Her Christmas Wish
"Meeting paramedic Eric Sepulveda at the winter carnival, nurse Alina Allinova's heart starts to topple, until she realizes that in no way does he resemble the man her psychic grandmother said she'd fall in love with — and Baka Fania was never wrong. Adding to that, Eric's family is trying to match him up with Alina's best friend because they believe the two would be more compatible and they don't approve of Alina, who will be returning to her own country in a few months."

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Family's house, then up the street to Mass — good to sing the Ode to Joy-tuned Sing with All the Saints in Glory and all its blockbuster lyrics, good to see friend Beau and meet Mary — then home for catching up, the back porch, dinner and dessert (angel food, chocolate ice cream).

As I've said before on this blog, it's easy for a newspaper to write a holiday story. It's hard to write a holiday story no one else can write.

A quick run through the homepages of the top 25 papers shows as much this morning. More than anything else, you have your talk-with-local-ministers stories, your wires from the Vatican, your scared-of-the-Easter-Bunny galleries, your wires from the Holy Land, your egg-prep stories, your egg-hunt-finds-corpse stories, and your local event lists. The automated groupings in Google News results show the same.

But three unique Easter pieces stood out in today's mix.

1. The Chicago Tribune, which does holidays better than most, writes about Edgebrook Lutheran Church and a man named Jim Deichman. He struggled for years with mental illness, but the church welcomed him.

And Deichman — a square-jawed, white-haired 62-year-old who came to church every Sunday in a rumpled dark suit — did his best to reach back. He volunteered to work as an usher, helped with the rummage sale and read Scripture during services.

But on Jan. 31, a firefighter found Deichman standing in an alcove, as smoke filled the sanctuary. His hair and clothing were disheveled; his face was contorted in fury. Suffering from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and raging against enemies that only he could see, he had allegedly set a blaze that would leave the church in ruins.

2. A columnist at New Hampshire's Keene Sentinel, circulation of about 14,000, tells the story of a town policeman's early Easter morning in 1955. The officer catches a speeder, and that's all that happens. The resonance is indirect but, in an Easter fashion, oddly understandable.

3. West Virginia's Sunday Gazette-Mail modestly turns over today's lead editorial to quotes about Easter and spring. As you read, you see how the compilation can connect with not just Christians of all stripes but all readers. Among others, lines from Matthew 28, Song of Solomon, Virgil, Tennyson, Milton, Rilke, Browning, E.B. White, T.S. Eliot, Millay, Dorothy Parker, Emerson, and Twain make the list. Hard to choose a favorite.

Six years ago this spring, I learned of restaurants serving only cereal.

USAT ran a story about Cereality, and friends Matt, Brett and I nearly fled the office that morning to start our own franchise. Later in '04, the concept arrived in Philadelphia, and I urged my brother to go. In 2005, the concept hit Chicago, and I urged friends to go. In 2006, Evanston got a cereal restaurant, too late for me, and I urged whoever was left in the NU suburb to go. The world also began hearing of other cereal restaurants that year, including one called The Cereal Bowl. In 2007, Cereality cut back, and I grew disillusioned. Would D.C. ever get one?

But, amid my new skepticism, The Cereal Bowl continued its rise. In 2009, I turned my hopes to custom cereal and custom cereal boxes. Little did I know Cereal Bowl had D.C. squarely in its sights for 2010.

The new franchise opened a week ago in Cleveland Park, and friend Meghan and I went this morning. It was a cereal dream come true.

Beginning our tour and review… The spot is next door to the Uptown.

The Bowl's other neighbors, not so hot. They don't even have cereal.

Inside, digital screens tell the menu. And, yes, "Create a Box" is real.

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(Notes: Kids, Patrick Cooper requires a college diploma or equivalent life experience. Also, I kid about Al's suit with respect. I can only hope to peacock half as well in decades to come. And elsewhere in the pix, Al wears this tie-vest combo better than any 86-year-old ever has.)

My awful Blackberry camera did nothing to capture the attitude of this year's Free Spirit Scholars. Field-tripping to USAT mid-last month (their founder is our founder, Al Neuharth), the group lived up to its name.

After too many sessions talking to morose collegians with no intention of going into the field, the Free Spirit high school seniors were openly crazy about journalism. They asked terrific questions, filled our big hall with more energy than I've ever seen there, hopped on stage to take pix, and, by the looks of their Facebook gallery, did so all over town.

A scholarship selection committee had done its job. The students were smart free spirits. There was one area, though, where they grew more serious. In that class Facebook gallery, sent my way, the captions on the pix from their USAT trip couldn't have been more straight-forward.

Like, "Multimedia manager." Or "Re-write manager." Or "Editor of the Front Page." Or "Editor of the Sports section." Or "Editor-in-chief John Hillkirk." Even Al's White Stripes-est suit ever was soberly captioned.

But there was a lone exception: I was a piece of meat. Ur welcome.

After watching most of it a couple months ago, I finished watching disc one of Sesame Street's 40 Years of Sunny Days DVD set last weekend.

Disc one had the first 20 seasons (1969-1988ish), and I loved it. Great picks ran all the way through: first scenes, Rubber Duckie, I Love Trash, John-John counting, the grocery run, Sesame Street News Flash, Super Grover, the pinball animation, Monsterpiece Theater, Mr. James Taylor, Teeny Little Super Guy, the Smokey Robinson segment that scared me, Mr. Hooper's death, the celeb Put Down the Duckie, and so much more.

(Note: Decades later, even YouTube'd, the Hooper scene gets to you.)

Had zero desire to watch disc two — after my time with the show. But then I watched the bonus features for disc one and had to put two in. Both had old behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with the early principals. I watched these features for an hour and could've spent the rest of the day had more been available. I found myself taken aback.

The show had been a big part of my childhood and held a special place in my heart. But between the selected material from the show and the bonus exploration of the work behind it, I was stunned at how deeply the show had influenced my creative and narrative beliefs years later.

I can hardly begin to explain it. The randomness, the references, the counterplays, the need for enveloping experience, the play with the minimal and the overwhelming, the music in the daily, the physicality, the envions of possibility. The show had thoroughly affected my life.

Rather than try and explain more here (and fail), I want to share two snippets from the interviews. Both appear to come from the early '80s. The first plays out a ton for me and probably at least some for you. The second is wonderfully mind-blowing as it relates to digital storytelling.

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The sun finally came back yesterday, and it took all day to truly kick in.

Woke up at 2:30, fail. Then 4, fail. Finally, 6, fail, got up. Throwing open the blinds and windows to a good soundtrack at 8 gave major signs of hope. But then the morning was a wreck. Afternoon, same. BUT THEN.

The day got better. Went to a retirement party that was inspirational. Discussion of finding new possibilities, needing fun and friends in work. Then met my parents at Sette Bello to celebrate my dad's birthday. No wrong ever happens at that restaurant, and we had a great time. We made plans to go to the new Capital City Diner and looked forward to Rob getting home this weekend for Easter. Sun worked just as it set.

CWG this morning: "Forecast: Beautiful, warm sunshine into Monday."