Our bike route to work from Magnolia to Capitol Hill takes us down a short hill on 20th Ave W to the Pier 91 bike trail. That little street runs right along a ton of train tracks leading into the train yards. (It's on the back side of the Interbay Golf Center.) Generally it's filled with locomotives connected to empty cars or lines of containers waiting to be shipped one place or another. Noting terribly......

We've been locking our keyboard in a drawer to keep ourselves from putting up any "this is the weekend the green line would have begun service" posts, both because it's been done and because it's history. Yes, it would have been great to have, but we decided against it. If there's anything like a blog to mark the day in the distant future when we'd have it paid off we'll be impressed. But a reader......

Making up for weeks of hibernation and workaholism, Kim will hit the parties this weekend. Tonight, she’ll don her Groucho glasses for a lesbian function at Jabu’s celebrating the births of her two favorite Sagitarii. Saturday, it’s to the War Room for a company party with the missus and her workmates. Finally, she’ll ship off to the sub-tropics on Monday, where she’ll spend what remains of 2007. While his wife is taking a Wilderness......

As previously mentioned, Les Savy Fav play Neumo's tonight. If the idea of a pregnant dude spitting water on you doesn't quite float your boat, head to the Croc to check out Cave Singers and Fleet Foxes. Tonight is also a free-free-free hip hop show at the War Room with Bun B and Swizz Beatz, care of the redundantly good people at Goods and Zune. Show up early; the last event like this, with Clipse......

If you were here right now, you'd see us looking around suspiciously like we don't quite trust we're awake because we just read Knute Berger's latest deep thought over at Crosscut and we...agree with him.While promoting green consumption might be politically more palatable than getting people to change their habits and expectations, promoting consumption still offers an answer that doesn't solve the bigger problem. Global warming's hawks have to be honest with us: Fighting the......

We're not yet convinced that the current War on Plastic Shopping Bags/Global Warming will stand the test of time, but we sure are intrigued that everyone everywhere seems to be trying to make the eco-friendly message stick (do you really think NBC's "Green Week" is destined for the history books? Neither do we.). We're feeling equally ambivalent about "Geography," the latest piece from local choreographer/composer duo Scott/Powell Production, premiering this weekend at On the Boards.......

Trouble in Tahiti / Rita: Seattle Young Artists Program @ CHAC 8-10pm, Nov. 16-17 // CHAC // Tickets $20 in advance Friday and Saturday, Seattle Opera's Young Artists Program perform at CHAC with an unusual double-feature. We buttonholed our friend Jonathan Dean, the Education Department's Artistic Administrator, and peppered him with hard-hitting questions to get to the bottom of all this. MvB: You're doing two shows, one by Leonard Bernstein, one by Gaetano Donizetti. What's......

Prop. 1, the roads and transit measure. Supporters say it will help solve our gridlock problem. Anti-tax opponents say"no it won't" and environazi opponents say "roads are killing the planet, it's transit-only or nothing." Tomorrow's election day. Here's how Seattlesters are voting. Dan: I'm not exactly turning cartwheels as I cast my "yes" vote, but I look at it as "which is easier to get passed, roads or transit individually?" I couldn't pass up the......

For some reason no big deal is being made of the rails-to-trails thing going on right now on the Eastside. Preventing the addition of capacity to I-405 is a big deal to Seattle environmentalists, but the impending doom of a potential passenger rail corridor that runs north-south from Renton to Snohomish is of no interest. We don't get it... One guy who does get it is Chuck Mott who seems like an interesting guy.......

We got an Amtrak phone survey call over the weekend and they wanted to know if having a snack bar in business class would make us more/less likely to travel by rail. How much would that be worth? In-station hotspots? Now how much would we pay? Private lounge with butler? On the other hand, what if they put leather seats in coach and added more legroom? How did we feel about that? Bit of a......

There's nothing like the prospect of a smart hip-hop show to build up our anticipation on a Saturday night. One where we know that the act we're going to see can't fail to deliver, cranks that up a little higher than we can generally handle when we're forced to first stop by a friend's party before the show. To all those in Shoreline that we bored with excited chatter about Lyrics Born and Blackalicious......

Local filmmaker, occasional pub trivia host, and friend of Seattlest Dom Zook blogged on September 19 that he's moving to LA. I’ve been a stalwart Seattle fan for most of my adult life. I love this town, even though some of the people who govern it are slightly “challenged”. I love making movies in this town… but I think I’ve gone in depth about my issues here. Many have wondered why I’ve stayed so long......

We told you we didn’t know much about Earl Greyhound, and after Wednesday night’s Paramount show, we’re still ignorant. (Will call tickets trickle in after the opening band takes the stage? Really?) When we finally made it in, Greyhound was pounding through their last song. We noted that singer/guitarist Matt Whyte had worked himself up quite a sweat. We got this photo. They exited stage right. But late for the opener meant early for the......

We had a little haus-warming party Friday to celebrate our new East Ballard digs. We've been enjoying our new neighborhood, meeting new human and feline neighbors during our walks, discovering its little nooks, and enjoying all of the old pickup trucks that seem to be one of its characteristics. We hope to start boring you with our fabricated embellished observations soon. At some point during our proceedings on Friday, local historian and awesome guy, Walt......

Seattlest just got done attending the press conference for the re-opening of the Downtown Bus Tunnel. After two years of work, it's set to reopen next Monday. That's exactly two years (as King County Exec. Ron Sims was fond of repeating over and over today) after it closed. We have to say, we're pretty impressed with what they've done. Needless to say, it's a pretty big achievement in a region not exactly known for making......

Rick Steves. The man lives in a pleasant world. The voice, the haircut, the folksy European dinners with friends one after another after the other. Just once we want to flip to PBS in time to see Steves in Friedrichstraße going berserk on a ticketing agent, but it won't happen because the world is his oyster. A friend of Seattlest's is currently on a 5-week Rick Steves tour of Europe, which we love telling people......

This past Friday, Steinbrueck Park was the site of a free, four-hour concert that punctuated Pike Place Market’s Centennial Celebration. It was a great time to be a proud, passionate Seattleite. A wonderful time to be a frugal tourist. And, despite a tiny bit of Pearl Jam-overpromising by Party promoters, a perfect time to be Seattlest. As people started to pour into the area, claiming spots in what little grass was left by the freshly-erected......

Or you could get your ass FIRED! Just ask our old pal/arch nemesis/best livejournal trainwreck on the internet the Bicycle Hobo(TM), who just got let go from his job at the Times for visiting Fleshbot.com [evidently NSFW] while ostensibly "working." From the hobo's blog: I could have gotten drunk at work, groped a coworker and peed in the corner of the building, and I would have gotten a warning, but a little ass & tickle......

Londonist are starting to think their city is getting just a little bit too expensive, when even Christian Slater can't afford to go out there. And there's no escaping, as local singer Lily Allen discovered when she was barred entry to the US. The British mapping agency caused further bad karma, by blocking a 3-D representation of London in Google Earth. But the smiles returned to Londonist's faces as they interviewed Baroness von Reichardt,......

Portland's alt-country meets indie-electro sextet Blitzen Trapper has been hyped up the wazoo lately. They'll be playing a free show at the Croc tonight with Jennifer Gentle and Hypatia Lake. Tomorrow night the Croc's got a great all-ages line-up, with Throw Me the Statue, Bishop Allen and Page France. Indie popsters Page France sure do love them handclaps. Meanwhile, folks 21+ can head to Ballard for the flat-out rawk of Thee Emergency and Iceage Cobra......

Hey, whaddya know? There's another show worth your attention at the Sunset this week. Tonight it's Irish singer-songwriter Fionn Regan. Yeah yeah, we know what you're thinking: "Another singer-songwriter? Just look at him, all broody with messed-up hair strumming a guitar in an alley." Truth be told, we usually avoid the genre as a whole, since most singer-songwriters run the gamut from boring hippie to boring douchebag. But in this case, don't be so......

We attended an advance, VIP screening of The Simpsons movie at Cinerama on Friday night (or at least that's what the guy who sold us the ticket for the special price of $45 told us). It's hilarious, and if you don't like it you're probably a Nazi-loving pervert. One of our favorite parts of the experience came through a bit of audience participation. Early in the film the bag guy is telling the Simpson's characters......

--Sally Clark has pulled her nightlife plan citing the fact that everyone from the mayor to the other city council members to the lowliest 1st ave drunk hates it. --A woman may have successfully attempted suicide by train in Auburn this morning. --4th of July ain't nothin but Thanksgiving in the summer. --Starbucks starts to look at its carbon emissions. --So, you’ve decided to join a Startup and live the life of high risk,......

As a public service, let us alert you first that traveling by Amtrak in the summer is different than other times. The trains get full up days in advance, as do the bike racks in the baggage car. (You can take your bike on the train for just $5 each way.) Then, because Amtrak is understaffed, all sorts of things begin to break down -- if you're us, the wrong part of your ticket gets......

All across the Ist-A-Verse (or at least the American parts thereof), writers and editors are in the midst of enjoying their three-day weekend. But after the week we've all had, we feel like the break is not only needed, but deserved. Just look at everything we've been doing! Gothamist headed into the Memorial Day weekend with a number of tasks accomplished. They worried about Long Islanders giving New Yorkers a bad name. They tried......

It wasn't. At all. However. When we first heard about the Vegan parents who starved their kid to death by feeding him only apple juice and soy milk we weren't really convinced of the murder charge they'd been convicted of. We were also pretty quick to dismiss Vegan parenting as one of the lesser ideas we'd come across lately, and these particular parents as not the most complex proteins, but murderers? Then we actually read......

This happened between Tacoma and Olympia. Nobody got hurt, but if you were planning to take the train between Portland and Seattle, you'll be taking the bus instead, says Amtrak. There's also a road blocked and some people lost electricity. The AP has the details. Image from KOMO/4, via Seattle P-I......

The planets alligned Saturday for a confluence of free stuff: Free admission to the grand opening of the new revamped Seattle Art Museum and, just as importantly, the annual Free Comic Book Day at participating comic book stores. Pinch Seattlest's cumulative butt cheeks and tell us we're not dreamin'! All the action at SAM takes place on floors three and four with an overwhelming mix of integrated everything. We overheard somebody in the crowd......

FACT: On August 24, 1919, film star Harold Lloyd -- while posing for publicity shots in which he was lighting a cigarette from a lit bomb -- blew the thumb and forefinger off his right hand. "Somehow," accounts explain, "a real bomb had gotten mixed in with the props." In 1923, as if to underscore learning nothing from the experience, he released one of the most famous films of all time, Safety Last! (Which......

We had a little trouble interpreting the results of the Viaduct public vote a while back. Clearly it was a vote against the tunnel. Was it a vote for a new Viaduct? Was it a vote for surface and transit? Was it a vote for "further political uncertainty?" None of the above, it turns out. It was actually a vote for "we're suffering from severe Viaduct fatigue and we don't want to talk about it......