Tonight’s toodling brings me to the Arlington County Republican Committee’s annual awards program and gathering, as we in Sun Gazette-land do try our best to give equal play to the annual accolades handed out by Democrats and Republicans each year.
(Plus … there’s a buffet dinner involved!)
I’m sensing it unlikely that the confab will bring any candidate announcements for the 13 positions that will be on the ballot next November, but hope springs eternal that Republicans will be able to at least field contenders in a majority of those campaigns, if only to make things interesting.
If, however, there are candidate announcements, my chubby fingers will scratch out notes that will be used for coverage. It will be good practice for next week, when I’d expect a number of announcements at the Arlington County Democratic Committee meeting.
To show how discombobulated holiday weeks make me, last Tuesday I drove from home to the restaurant in Crystal City where the GOP meetings take place, roughly 50 minutes in rush hour, only to remember at the last minute that the event was THIS week. What can you do but turn the car around and quietly curse yourself?
SPEAKING OF POLITICAL GATHERINGS: Arlington Democrats traditionally have spent the noontime hour after Election Day at Nam Viet restaurant in Clarendon, sometimes to exult over the results and other times to lick their wounds and start planning for the next campaign. (In Arlington, there’s always a “next campaign” just around the corner.)
But since the Wuhan Sniffles of Death appeared in 2020, there has been no in-person post-election luncheon. Apparently there was a thought of resurrecting it on Nov. 9, but the decision was made not to. The party rank-and-file met online, instead.
But hope springs eternal. Given that there could be a number of intra-Democratic battles in A-town next year, how about holding a return engagement of the luncheon the day after the June primary? Having had dinner at Nam Viet a couple of months ago — nummy, nummy, nummy! — I’d certainly be game to cover it.
— Scott McCaffrey