C A P I C O S T I A

  In STEAK ISLAND, the red-skinned, pointy-headed alien strongman, Bullethedd, stocks shelves and unloads trucks for the metamythically gargantuan Bygmo warehouse store. Among the denizens of Steak Island, are Bygmo's general manager, the Iron Munkee, a grumpy, living statue, a fallen health goddess and others – all brought to life in weekly, one-panel vignettes, struggles desperately ..to be liked. Steak Island creator, Mel Dyer, is an American freelance website developer and weblog publisher, who grew up in a hard-working, middleclass, Catholic family in Washington, D.C. Between them, his parents privately operated two successful small businesses, a print shop and a detective agency, for nearly fifteen years, while holding down full-time jobs. At home, the political views of his mother, a right-leaning liberal, and his father, a pro-labor conservative, inspired strong populist patriotism at an early age that endures, today, ..and he is very proud of his Southern American her...

Councilwoman Alexander and Mayor Gray leading other D.C. officials in protest for municipal budget autonomy. (Staff photo from YvetteAlexander.org) Editorial [Second Edition] This will be my last editorial as a community blogger ..and as the publisher of what might have been (with better marketing) a great D.C. blog,  Capicostia Heat.   It has been my experience, as a writer and a man,  that, sometimes, the grandest things are best said simply and sincerely, ..with authenticity.  So, there you have it. There were times, just a month and a half ago, during the disastrous aftermath of the rogue storms that devastated the D.C. area, that it seemed my mother's Penn Branch community had been entirely abandoned by the District of Columbia.  Penn Branch was left sitting in the dark with no power, no visible police presence (police patrol cars, etc), in the middle of the worst heatwave of recent memory - temperatures of one hunde...