Feature Story: Old Dominion Diversity It's akin to Wisteria Lane meeting reality. Welcome to the City of Falls Church, with manicured yards and sun-dappled flowers in planters that hug the street lamps. On a temperate Saturday, strolling through the City of Falls Church Farmers Market, adjacent the quaint, brick City Hall, this town is picture perfect. You almost expect to bump into Bree Van De Kamp inspecting the heirloom tomatoes or the artisan cheeses. Then the reality sets in. Instead of Bree, there are the numerous Obama supporters -- and, granted, two young women with McCain-Palin bumper stickers across their backs -- and the kids collecting money for the local soccer league. Lawrence and Clifton in Falls Church There's also the obviously gay, African-American couple, who stand out somewhat in this largely European-American milieu, but that's just the sort of contrast that gives Falls Church a distinctively progressive vibe. The taller of the couple, after all, was elected earlier this year to the Falls Church City Council, making Lawrence Webb the first openly gay African American elected to office in Virginia. ...more

Gauge: Robert Hannah The Washington Metropolitan Police Department today released information for a suspect wanted in the death of Tony Randolph Hunter, who died Sept. 17 of injuries sustained Sept. 7 during an attack and robbery on the 1300 block of Eighth Street NW. Police say there is an outstanding felony warrant for Robert Hannah, aka Rob, for voluntary manslaughter. According to the MPD, Hannah, 18, is a black male; 5 feet, 7 inches tall; weighing 148 pounds. His was last known to reside in the 1100 block of McCullough Court NW, and is believed to frequent the area around the intersection of Seventh and O Streets NW. ...more

Gauge: Just to be clear, don't simply describe Gaylaxicon 2008 -- this planet's premier GLBT sci-fi event, held semi-annually since 1988 and last in the D.C. area in 2000 -- as a ''science-fiction convention.'' First, one must define the terms. ''It's really anything that might fall under the umbrella of 'speculative fiction,''' says Rob Gates, 41. ''That includes science fiction, fantasy and horror -- particularly things like supernatural horror.'' Gates, one of the organizers of this year's event, serves as the head of the programming committee for the local Lambda Sci-Fi group. He describes Gaylaxicon as the only science-fiction convention specially geared toward GLBT people. ...more

Gauge: ''This is not a big deal because I know I'm innocent,'' Saad Elarch (aka Saad Elorch) insisted to D.C. Superior Court Judge Frederick H. Weisberg at an Oct. 8 preliminary hearing regarding an assault on a gay man in Georgetown Oct. 3. During that attack, around 3 a.m. along the C&O Canal footpath, two gay men were confronted, one of whom was struck in the face with a bottle. The attack is being investigated by the Metropolitan Police Department as a hate crime. At the preliminary hearing, Weisberg ordered that Elrach, a native of Morocco, and Ruddad Abdulgader, originally from Sudan, be held without bond at least through Nov. 12, when they are scheduled to appear at a status hearing. ...more

Gauge: On any given day, chances are you will probably catch Shannon Minter in one of two places: Washington, D.C., where he shares a home with his wife, Robin, and their daughter; or San Francisco, where he's continuing to defend the nationally prominent case for same-sex marriage. Minter was the lead counsel for same-sex couples in the marriage case that the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of recently, citing that same-sex couples have the right to marry and live free of discriminatory laws. Shannon Minter Minter is also a transgender man. ...more

Dance: Economic turmoil. War. Chaos and totalitarianism. You think things are bad now? Let the In Series and the Washington Ballet transport you back to a Germany book-ended by World Wars. In the second collaboration between these two local, artistic pillars, Fall(en) Angels will engage audiences with a full evening of dance and music from classical Wagner and Brahms, along with Depression-era cabaret. Webre ''There is a message about uplifting ourselves,'' explains Septime Webre, the Washington Ballet's artistic director, who directs and choreographs the show along with David Palmer and Jared Nelson. ''It's a wonderfully complex journey, ultimately uplifting, passing through difficult times.'' ...more

Film: Teenage waist-land:(L to R)Cera, Yoo, Dennings, Jonathan Wright, and Gavron The infamous mix-tape. Admit it, you've made one and given it to a crush. Though outdated in name, the arrangement of songs in a meaningful order designed to get a date is a teenage ritual as inevitable as acne or masturbation. In the age of iPods, it's now a playlist, but the name of the game is still the same: gettin' some. Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is a mix-tape in its own right -- a testimony of love to New York City and coming of age. Like a teenage boy expressing a crush, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is at once charming and awkward. Director Peter Sollett (Raising Victor Vargas) has taken Lorene Scafaria's screenplay to create a film that's honest and frank in its assessment of the teen world, featuring characters who are carefree and seemingly invincible. It's a time when finding love is just as important as seeing your favorite band play. Nick (Michael Cera) is still suffering the broken heart he got as a birthday present from his girlfriend Tris (Alexis Dziena). His pining takes the form of 12 CD mixes, discarded by mean girl Tris, but rescued from the trash by Norah (The House Bunny's Kat Dennings). Without ever having laid eyes on him, Norah is a Nick groupie based on his musical tastes alone. When the two happen to meet following a concert of Nick's band, The Jerk Offs, it triggers a wonderful night of mayhem. Think Adventures in Babysitting but with drinking, drugs and rock and roll. And a Yugo. Yes, Nick drives a yellow Yugo that New Yorkers seem to think is cab. ...more

Music: Jennifer Hudson says she had no particular concept in mind when developing her debut album. ''I wanted it to show flexibility and versatility,'' she says in the album's press release. ''My voice has different characters and I looked at each song as having different stories, since I'm an actress too.'' Jennifer Hudson That lack of clear direction helps explain why her woefully uneven debut album veers from one sappy pop ballad to another sassy hip-hop jam, and from one Broadway showstopper to another gospel belter -- with lots of unobjectionable R&B filler in between. It's as if the album were a soundtrack to a made-for-TV movie about a singer who finds success as an actor, but struggles valiantly -- and in vain -- to gain a foothold in music. Treating every song like a mini-movie doesn't a compelling, consistent album make, and trying to please everyone ends up pleasing, well, less than everyone. Jennifer Hudson is the result of a budding, insecure artist who's as confused and unsure of herself as any American Idol finalist. It's certainly not the mark of a Dreamgirls knockout performer, confident beyond all reason. Unlike Effie White, Hudson lost before she won in the music business, and her successes so far have been confined to niche genres with limited mainstream appeal: gospel and show-tunes. It wasn't clear to anyone the best way for her to proceed. Her album's lead producer, Clive Davis, the legendary mogul, obviously thought she should mostly ignore her past and aim high, directly at the mainstream. And really, who is Hudson, only 26, to say no to the man who pioneered success for Whitney Houston and Alicia Keys, to name just two? ...more

Stage: There are two kinds of people in this world. The kind who click on that Gossip Girl blog posting with wild abandon despite the spoiler alert and the kind who carefully maneuver around so they can fully enjoy the guilty pleasure of a quiet evening at home with Tivo, Blake Lively and Chace Crawford. It's folks in the latter category who skip the helpful, highly detailed synopsis often included in the program books of plays of a certain type -- the type that involve wigs and elaborate gowns and individuals who deliver rhyming asides to the audience that are the 18th century equivalent of ''take my wife, please.'' (Sometimes literally.) Fop till you drop: King It's fitting really, because Gossip Girl and even the new (admittedly addictive but tragically inferior to the original) Beverly Hills 90210 owe a great deal to these scandal-dredged stage plays. Take William Congreve's The Way of the World, now at The Shakespeare Theatre Company's Lansburgh Theatre. A funny and almost impossibly complex scramble of double-dealing, shady alliances and adulterous affairs, Congreve's play is an elaborately dressed, primetime soap opera. You simply get an entire season in the course of a couple of hours. ...more

Clublife: ''I've been grooming some Mini-Mes,'' jokes Natalie Illum, longtime president of the feminist open-mike extravaganza known as Mothertongue. Illum will step down as the all-volunteer event's leader this Wednesday, Oct. 15, when Mothertongue will throw a special party to celebrate 10 years of providing a stage at the Black Cat to any and all who want to perform. ''Mothertongue is a really supportive space,'' Illum explains. ''It supports everyone, whether you're a seasoned veteran of creative writing or whether you just scribbled something on a napkin.'' In the past year the event has shifted from being a monthly to a bi-monthly party, and it has also started featuring musical performances and film screenings. Up-and-coming local folk singer Nancy Eddy and local punk rock duo Trophy Wife will perform on Wednesday, and a portion of Mothertongue volunteer Angie Young's new documentary The Coat-Hanger Project will be screened. ''We're gonna have a little bit of film, a little bit of folk music, a lot of poetry, some punk rock -- it'll be a lot of fun,'' according to Illum, who will serve as the evening's host. After years away, Mothertongue's two co-founders will also return to the stage to perform. Ruth Dickey now lives in Pittsburgh; Karen Taggart remains local, but says Illum, ''We have a hell of a time getting her to come out of her adult life and come back to the Black Cat.'' ...more

Body: Visit Gardasil's official Web site, and unless you are female, you probably won't find much appeal in the opening page featuring a group of women of various ages. That's because Gardasil, the vaccine that works to prevent cervical cancer, genital lesions and genital warts caused by human papillomavirus (HPV) types 6, 11, 16 and 18, has so far been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for women, ages 9 to 26, only. Why then are gay men getting the vaccine? Guardasil ''I think it's a great preventative,'' says John Curtin, a physician's assistant at the Dupont Circle Physicians Group at 1737 20th St. NW. ...more

Commentary: All the talk of mavericks during the Oct. 2 vice presidential debate started me humming the theme from The Magnificent Seven. There they are, a ragtag bunch of rugged loners in a wild country. Will they learn to work together in time to save the beleaguered townsfolk from the marauding villains? Hey, wait a minute - they are the marauding villains. Maybe I just have movies on my mind, since Washington's gay film fest starts next week, but the McCain campaign increasingly feels like a movie in which the director is desperately trying to make us suspend our disbelief and buy the Republican nominee as the guy to fix the wreckage wrought by the Republican incumbent over the past several years. Barney Frank is having none of it. The congressman from Massachusetts pounds a simple point he has made for years regarding the gay dimension in politics: that the far better record of Democrats on gay rights points to a partisan conclusion. ...more

Horoscope: Heavenly Round-Up: When the going gets tough -- and it's been tough -- the tough get tougher. Admire your new calluses, whether they be on your hands or your heart, and get on with the business of getting 'er done. You're closer than you can perceive from this vantage point. It's the tricky atmosphere -- or perhaps the treacherous terrain. In any case, you have the chops and the smarts and the willpower to see you through. Don't allow coldness to stand in for staunchness. You know better than that. Aries: You love to walk the walk. It beats the heck out of standing around with your parts in your hand. Only make sure you've tied your shoelaces properly and put your socks on first. Now you're really ready to get out there and show 'em how you do it with confidence. Strut. Taurus: Hang onto your hat, you're in for a bumpy ride. If you're stomach is not too full of all the crow you've recently had to eat, you shouldn't even feel nauseated by the experience. The seas calm and the weather clears by Tuesday. Plan for the future with extra optimism. ...more