Susan Coll's Blog

Alternate Sides has found a new place to park. Please come read us at Bethesda Magazine.

In what will be a semi-regular feature on Alternate Sides, we will simply report the news. Here, a random week in public transport in Washington, DC:

1. A 28-year-old William and Mary law student was struck and killed by an Orange Line train.

2. For the second time in as many weeks, a Blue Line train was incorrectly re-routed to the Orange Line. "My life flashed in front of me," one passenger said, according to ABC 7 news.

3. The thermometer inside an Orange Line metro car, at 6:08 p.m., in...

Ah, we are back to our blogging roots after an invigorating drive up the New Jersey Turnpike, which, in its ability to inspire, is second only to Rockville Pike. (That strip of asphalt that hugs Newark Airport, with those Continental jets streaming in one after another, gets my heart racing every time.)

And then, after stewing in the sauna of the congested Lincoln Tunnel, onward into Manhattan, where after a few seemingly hopeless trips around the block, we are offered a reward...

Alternate Sides has been binging on memoirs lately, and, for the first time, we've inched a step closer to discovering something about the intersection of parking and the meaning of life, or maybe just of love---although let's face it, this is still a blog in desperate need of both an editor and a more coherent vision.

When I researched my second novel, Rockville Pike, which tangentially involved the intersection of discount furniture and F. Scott Fitzgerald, I confess to rereading The Great ...

Imagine you are driving from College Park, Maryland, to Washington DC. You approach the beltway on-ramp with about ten seconds to make the call. South: Virginia, Andrews Airforce Base. Or North: Baltimore and Silver Spring.

Say what? College Park is north of Virginia. So you might think south. But no…you are not going to fall for that one! You've been fooled by this before, your passenger reminds you.

"Remember, mom, that you got on the Beltway returning from Baltimore and Went The Wrong Way a...

What is this hilarious, Onion-like broadsheet being distributed, anonymously, around leafy Bethesda, Maryland? Headlines include such gems as "Neighbors Alert Authorities About Boy With Free, Unscheduled Afternoon," and "Family Fails to Renovate, Neighbors Hold Intervention."

My personal favorite story is headlined, "Landmark Theater Hosts One-Millionth Smug Elitist," with the explanation that the winner of a free ticket to this independent movie theater has had his prize revoked because he i...

Weirdly parking has been in the news quite a bit this week, what with the slow proliferation of pay-by-cell meters in DC, and now, a supposed innovation in NYC, where a new iPhone app allows a person about to vacate a parking spot to "sell" the space to someone who is circling the block in hot pursuit. You can read the details in The New York Times. While Alternate Sides is not a political blog, we will nonetheless go out on an ideological limb here and say that this seems wrong! How can you ...

Weirdly parking has been in the news quite a bit this week, what with the slow proliferation of pay by cell meters in DC, and now, a supposed innovation in NYC, where a new iPhone app allows a person about to vacate a parking spot to "sell" the space to someone who is circling the block in hot pursuit. You can read the details in The New York Times. While Alternate Sides is not a political blog, we will nonetheless go out on an ideological ledge here and say that this seems wrong. How can you...

Just last night, when I went to feed my meter along Wisconsin Ave. in Northwest DC, I observed three disconcerting things: the hours of operation had been extended from 6:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. Saturdays were now included. And suddenly a quarter only bought eight minutes, whereas once upon a time about a week ago, it bought a luxurious twenty. Scraping together barely enough change to scarf down a quick dinner, my husband remarked that DC must be taking its lead from Bethesda. And indeed, accordi...