Admit it. You sometimes miss elementary school: you, a carpet square, a room full of people, and someone reading a story. Luckily, you need not return to the trauma of childhood to recreate story hour. On a fairly regular basis, authors show up at bookstores to read to anyone who shows up, for free.

Tonight is no exception. Well, the exception is some events are more exciting than others: in particular, Kevin Guilfoile will be at Elliott Bay Company tonight at 7:30 pm reading from his new novel, Cast of Shadows [$]. Kevin is probably best known for his work with McSweeney’s and for being one of the very funny co-authors of My First Presidentiary [$]. Having mastered the art of the faux-autobiography, Guilfoile’s new book is a philosophical thriller about what happens when the teenage daughter of a fertility specialist is brutally murdered and her father uses his professional skills and a bit of DNA extracted from the death scene to create a copy of her killer. The novel has been very well reviewed, and the best part about readings is that you can pick up a copy of your very own to have autographed afterwards (authors are among the more approachable celebrities).

Get there a few minutes early to buy some milk and chocolate-covered graham crackers from the cafe. It’s an ideal fusion of the warm glow of childhood memories with the benefit of feeling literary and sophisticated on a Wednesday evening (don’t worry — Lost is a re-run).

We seem to live in a city determined to have as many different forms of public transportation as possible. Eventually, we may need to invent an entirely new type of transit just to keep the list growing at a steady pace.

While several exciting new options (monorail, light rail, trolley) are in the planning/theoretical stages, another could be in jeopardy. The ever-lovable Waterfront Street Car could be going the way of the Kalakala. Its maintenance barn is situated on the site of the soon-to-be Seattle Art Museum Olympic Sculpture Park [#]. Apparently the people with a giant animated yard ornament [jpg] on Second Avenue feel that a maintenance barn would be an eyesore in an outdoor art gallery.

Everyone seems to agree that the Streetcar should remain a part of city life. And by everyone, we mean:

• Historylink.org (“a streetcar named expire!”) [#]
• the editorial boards at the Seattle Times [# ] and the Post-Intelligencer [#]
• city council members have “vowed to save it” [p-i]

Even S.A.M. “supports” it [#], just as long as the garage isn’t located in the park. We don’t understand why someone couldn’t be commissioned to turn the shed into a piece of modern sculpture — even if it’s garish I’m sure we could learn to love it just like we did for the EMP.

In just one week, Seattle Metroblogging’s finest will step away from their computers to for a very special meetup/happy hour type event. Your presence is requested. Without you, it’s just isn’t the same.

So take out that dayplanner of yours:

Then click on that link and RSVP. Meetup RSVPs are like candy in our inboxes.

If the Macy’s parade and customer transition celebration didn’t help to ease the sting of the final stages of Bon Marché rebranding, maybe this will:

Much about Macy’s still will seem like the Bon. The Christmas star at Fourth Avenue and Pine Street will go up this holiday season, and the popular one-day sales will continue

Really, we meant to liveblog the US Barista Championship finals, but a cloudless Sunday afternoon got the better of us and we missed it. We’ll be there for the Worlds. We promise, maybe.

Say what you will about the olde mainstream media, but at least they showed up and put a clever headline on the event. (“Local barista brews her way to the top” [ seattletimes])

The good news is that a Washingtonian, Phuong Tran, captured the title with a her signature drink, which features espresso, sugar-cane juice, a pinch of white ground pepper and a topping of sage-infused steamed milk. She’s from Ridgefield, but since she consults for Zoka we’re willing to claim her as our hometown hero going into next month’s World Championships.

We dare you to order the Crimson Sage the next time you visit your usual espresso provider. Please report your findings.

What’s that? Feelings of school pride stirring? A bit of fairweather fandom in the spring air? That’s right. A fantastic weekend for the University of Washington Huskies, who won the Pac-10 tournament and picked up one of the top seeds in the NCAA tournament:

Washington (27-5) is the top team in the Albuquerque Regional, which keeps the Huskies in the West, potentially, through four rounds. They open NCAA play Thursday against 16th-seeded Montana (18-12) at Boise, Idaho. … it’s a 6-hour drive from Seattle to Boise, and the Huskies’ noisy students are sure to be there.[espn]

It’s probably great news for anyone who’s on the athletic department’s tutoring payroll. Finals week at the UW starts tomorrow and the players need to pass their classes to be eligible to play in the tourney. I expect that the best tutors are being called up for their very own big dance.

related:

• University of Washington | Men’s Basketball

• gear (embarrassing or otherwise) for the trek to Boise at GoHuskies

Starting into the third week of 25 for $25, I’m feeling pretty pleased with myself. I was trying to average out at one restaurant a week, and have so far been to the Barking Frog out in Woodinville for dinner, and Ray’s Boathouse (the Cafe part) for a $12.50 lunch.

There’s really no comparison between the two restaurants as they are both very different. The similarities between the two? Both were packed to the gills when we went (Barking Frog on a Thursday night, and Ray’s on Sunday). I was very glad to have made reservations at both places. We usually try and wing it because we don’t like to have to plan to have a meal at a specific place and an exact time — and usually we manage to find odd times to eat or eat at places that always seem to have a table available for us. Also, the wait staff at both restaurants were gracious and ready to please — obviously prepared for an influx of curious first-timers.

At the Barking Frog dinner, service was impeccable (I think we had at least three different sorts of waitstaff). Diners on either side of us were celebrating birthdays, and desserts were coming out with lit candles on the side (you try walking with a lit birthday candle some time, and see how hard it is.). However, the space was too noisy and seemed to have been specifically built in order to have sound bounce off the walls and onto our poor ears.

At the Ray’s Cafe lunch, service was a little bit more casual. Our server seemed overloaded, but still found the time to come over a couple of times and make sure everything was to our satisfaction. It was a little noisy there, but not so much more than typical for a completely full restaurant. And of course, the daytime lunch view was gorgeous, and we drank in the sight of sailboats scudding across the sunlit water.

Having been to only three restaurants so far, I have a long way to go before declaring an overall winner. One of the reasons I will say that the Yarrow Bay Grill is a long way in the lead is that it wins on three fronts: the surroundings are nice, the noise level is pleasant, and the food is the best of the three. At Ray’s I actually took a peek through the real menu because I really wasn’t impressed with the lunch menu. They change it from week to week, and I had made a decision to go based on week 1′s menu. By the time I got a look at week 2, I was already committed. The Frog’s menu was better in some ways and worse in others. The chef had decided to go boldly out there with such scary dessert combinations as a fallen chocolate souffle with roasted banana ice cream and smoked paprika caramel. I managed to get a bite of this off the husband’s plate, and the combination of flavours made my tongue scream “WHAT THE HELL?” in horror. The husband liked it though.

Apparently during half-time at a Sonics games (they played the Bulls on Friday night), we don’t see scantily clad women…we see the Sasquatch playing dodgeball. We didn’t win, but maybe better luck next time.

What a beautiful day in Seattle. Took out some time to enjoy the delightful marionettes at the Seattle Center. As you all know, this weekend is Vegfest 2005 at the Fisher Pavilion at the Seattle Center. Entry is only 5 dollars and let me tell you, I sampled so much stuff, I thought I was going to burst. (Seek out the mango sorbet table.) As we were leaving Vegfest and the demonstration of how to make a field roast from Seattle chef David Lee, we stopped in on the Irish Festival that is going on this weekend as well. The ‘River Dancing’ was too cute.

Camellias have been in full swing for over a month and are starting to look a little frumpy. It’s starting to snow cherry blossom petals all over town. And ka-blam — out come the magnolias. To me, magnolia blooms have always looked a little scary up close, but there’s no denying the beauty in an old, huge magnolia tree, kind of looking like it’s on fire with a million pale, tinted flames.