Montgomery County is "weird." (It's called civility.)

Montgomery County Fire truck on Cedar Street in DC
Originally uploaded by rllayman

(Image: Montgomery County Fire truck on Cedar Street in DC. Apparently it is easier for the Silver Spring fire station to service parts of Takoma Park, Maryland via Blair Road/DC than it is to go through Montgomery County.)

1. Saturday I was in Silver Spring, returning a Zipcar. I was at the intersection of Colesville Road and Georgia Avenue. The light for Colesville Road traffic turned green. But two blocks away on Georgia Avenue, fire trucks were rushing towards the intersection, sirens blaring.

The traffic stayed put. No cars jumped the intersection until the fire trucks passed.

That would never happen in DC.

2. Yesterday, I rode my bike up Colesville Road, about a mile past the Beltway, to a Ritz Camera store. (I had taken it to a Ritz store to be repaired, and that store is now controlled by a liquidator holding a going out of business sale, so the company sent the camera to this far out North Silver Spring location.)

Riding up and down Colesville Road, I was surprised to see how relatively little litter there was alongside the roads (definitely more trash was present at the intersection with University Boulvevard).

So many streets in DC are so trashy. It's embarrassing. But cleanliness starts with people properly disposing of their trash in the first place.