10 things Washington will miss about the shutdown The former Disney star has been an unavoidable cyclone of tongue-out, twerking controversy in recent weeks. But when she appeared on Saturday Night Live as Michele Bachmann (licking a toy Abraham Lincoln) it was genuinely funny. And the sketch show racked up its highest ratings since March. 3) The chance to grab lunch with Obama and Biden On October 4 the cable networks went wild with the news that the president and vice president were on the move to an "undisclosed location." We thought it might be a West Wing Style march on Capitol Hill. But it turned out they were just walking around the corner for a sandwich and some speechifying. 4) The drunk dial Congress app For a while people were being encouraged to have a lot of drinks and then call Congress to vent their frustration. It is the purest, if a little slurred, form of democracy. Suggested talking points include: "I cant watch the panda," a reference to the popular Panda-Cam at the shut down National Zoo in Washington, and "why don't you make yourself useful and at least mow the lawn?" 5) Fewer tourists A huge chunk of Washington's economy depends on tourists but, man, if they don't get in the way. Worst of all are the segway tours that wind on and off the pavements as visitors convince themselves they are half-human, half-machine. Picture by Sarah Young 6) Talking about about Monica Lewinsky The Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky affair blew up in 1998. But not everyone remembers that it actually began in November 1995, the last time the Republicans shut down the government. Lewinsky was an intern at the White House and worked throughout the crisis because she wasn't getting paid, meaning she was around Clinton at a time when few other staff were in the West Wing. Don't worry: the interns were furloughed during this shutdown. 7) Fewer people hunched over BlackBerrys During the shutdown it was potentially illegal for people to check their government BlackBerrys if they had been furloughed. This meant more eye contact on public transport, fewer people walking into things and better posture all over Washington. 8) People stopped talking about Hillary 2016 (actually not really) The shutdown briefly distracted us from the 2016 election, which is somehow both imminent and 36 months away. Though it didn't stop reports of Hillary allegedly talking up her role in the raid on Osama bin Laden. 9) Not being reminded about the jobs situation On the first Friday of every month the Bureau of Labour Statistics reminds us in its monthly jobs report that the economy is still weak and people are still struggling to find jobs. But not this month! The shutdown meant no jobs report. We'll make up for it soon with a report that will capture at least some of the economic damage wrought by the crisis. 10) Countdown clocks No one can resist a countdown to doom and cable news gave us a sense of 24-style drama as they ticked the seconds down until default and the collapse of the American economy. It didn't really matter that no one seemed quite sure exactly what the Treasury deadline meant and what would happen if we passed it. With the government now funded through January 15, we've got nearly three months before it's time to count down to shutdown all over again. See you then.