Mr. Speaker

If I were on a postage stamp (and I intend to be, when I get married) I would want a more flattering picture than this.

CSIS's favorite Iranian Australian is, sadly, leaving tomorrow at an ungodly hour and returning to sunny Australia. To mark his last week with us, a group of us went out to dinner last night: I found a place, Zagat-rated, with decent prices, ranked in the Washingtonian's 100 Best Restaurants List. We agreed to meet at the nearby metro at 7:30. The restaurant was right there on Pennsylvania Avenue, which is easy to find unless you're us and you don't read the street signs correctly and you walk an extra six blocks in the freezing cold. (I'm never ever leaving the house without gloves again. Ever.) Then, much to our dismay, the restaurant was closed, locked, and out of business. So we stopped in at Rami's place nearby, to thaw out, and then decided on a Chinese place around the corner. It wasn't cute, quaint, and Italian, but the tea and the asparagus crab soup thawed us. But here's the best part: just as we started our tea, the Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert came in, body guards and all, later to be joined by Dennis Kucinich. So Rami, the guts of the group, asked the bodyguard if we could get a picture with him, saying something like, "My friend over there is from Australia...can we get a picture with you?" And we did, and he was very friendly about it. Then after our five chinese dishes (I think the fifth one was ordered for us by our waitress. None of us actually said, "One General Tso's Chicken, please") Rami asked Kucinich, who looks better in real life than on TV, for a picture, and although he agreed, he was much less amiable than Mr. Speaker. Maybe he didn't care for his Szechuan beef?

We went out into the cold again, renewed our vows to never leave the house without gloves, and went home with plenty of leftovers. At least Poulad has some interesting memories from his last night out in Washington. We'll miss you, Poulad!

In other Aussie news, Russel Crowe claims that Al-Qaida wanted to kidnap him because he's an American symbol. But he's Australian. Maybe they just needed some star power to raise their television ratings?