Be careful driving around the NE section of Seattle today folks. Traffic lights are out all around, notably 5th and Roosevelt, Northgate and Meridian. Remember, when the traffic lights are out, treat the intersection as a four-way stop, many eejits out driving today need to be reminded of that fact.

So far, I’ve not seen any police directing traffic, hopefully that’ll soon change.

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The Seattle Times is helping Beacon Hill promote a “new” neighborhood name: BeHi, short for Beacon Hill. Similar to SoDo and NOMA (where is NOMA?), this catchy-to-some new label has created some local buzz with residents.

Personally, I think Beacon Hill doesn’t need a new name. What do you think? Catchy? Dumb? Any suggestions for a new name or is the original just fine?

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If you were just thinking that it’s been far too long since you last went to a county fair, this is the perfect weekend for you as the King County Fair starts today in Enumclaw and runs all weekend long.

The fair’s 4H focus features the display and judging of all kinds of livestock, crafts, and produce. See kids show off the dogs, goats, chickens, pigs, cattle and bunnies they have raised themselves. Check out the Berry Pie Baking judging and awards. Cook’s Racing Pigs are almost ridiculously entertaining, topped only by the adorable Kid’s Pedal Tractor Pull. There are dog agility trials. A llama and alpaca steeple chase. Putt Putt golf. Quilting, sewing and doll making demonstrations and displays. Fair food! Arts and crafts of all types. Live music. Rodeo. Talks and tips on gardening and living green. Vendors selling everything from jewelry to cookware to eco-friendly mole extermination.

There’s a huge focus on living green at the Fair. Several King County departments will have booths on hand to talk to you about transportation alternatives, water safety, trail hiking, adopting animals, controlling noxious weeds, protecting the environment and much, much more.

One of the things that I think makes living in King County great is that while I live in a large city where all my food comes from the market, my county neighbors live in towns where their food comes from their backyards. The King County Fair presents a great opportunity for rural, urban and suburban residents to all come together and have fun at the fairgrounds. And, oh yeah–it’s free!

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Seattle, what is wrong with you lately? Punching old gardeners, robbing banks, and now burying spikes at the bottom of Greenlake? This is not cool. So far, divers have found 41 machine sharpened spikes in the south end of Greenlake, buried with the pointy ends up [Times]. They may have been there for a couple of months, and they could only have been put there to hurt people.

You’re not supposed to be walking around in the water down there, but one injury has been reported by a wader who stepped on one of the spikes, so clearly some people are not following directions. Anyone with information about who would want to stab people in the feet should call the Seattle police.

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Still from Last Year at Marienbad courtesy SIFF

• If your favorite movies are those that tell an easy-to-follow story in a direct, linear fashion, you might want to avoid SIFF starting this Friday as Last Year at Marienbad is odd even by the avante garde standards of the Nouvelle Vague movement. Both revered and reviled, the 1961 film was directed by Alain Resnais whose earlier work Hiroshima Mon Amour was one of the first films of the French New Wave. As in Hiroshima Mon Amour, Resnais cuts in and out of flashbacks within a scene to suggest the sudden instantaneous recall of memory; in Last Year at Marienbad it is never entirely clear which memories are real or even memories at all. The entire film, gorgeously shot in lush black and white and featuring stunning visuals of elegant men and women at an ornate baroque-style chateau, takes place in a sort of dream state where there is no true sense of time or direction. A man called only “X” speaks to a woman, “A” about their prior meeting and their plans to run away together, but it is never clear if any of this has actually happened. Another man, “M”, may or may not be the husband of “A”. The three interact in various ways with their conversations and actions repeated in different places and with different points of view. Scenes are shown without a definite order and voiceover narration adds to the story without clarifying it.

  Last Year at Marienbad presents its riddles without answers or even clues; the film seems to tell a story but just what that story is is ultimately only answerable by the viewer. You’ll want to take a friend to the fascinating Last Year at Marienbad so you can have many happy hours afterward arguing about just what it was that you saw.

• Northwest Film Forum offers up some uniquely creative cinema of its own with A Slice of Blood and Honey, a collection of short film, video art and documentaries from Macedonia whose emerging artists create works reflecting the environment in their homeland as it grows from its roots in the sluggish past into a fresh, cosmopolitan future.
• Also at NWFF: Glass: A Portrait of Philip in 12 Parts traces a year in the life of the iconic composer. Director Scott Hicks had unparalleled access to his subject during the filming documentary, allowing him to show an intimate portrait of Glass as both an artist and a man.
• On Sunday, July 20, head to Cal Anderson Park at 4pm for Sustainable Capitol Hill’s Imagine Capitol Hill festival focused on environmentally-friendly urban living and stick around til dusk for their “Bike In Movie”
• Grand Illusion continues their “Best of the Rest: 5 Years of Late Nights at the Grand Illusion” series with Deathstalker, the sort of cheesy swords-and-sorcery epic that’s best seen with an audience so you can all enjoy the unintentional humor together.
• You’ll also want to head to the Grand Illusion for their screening of a brand new print of the 1968 classic Planet of the Apes. The first time I ever saw Planet of the Apes was in a Saturday afternoon revival back in the early 70s and despite all the sequels and remakes of varying and often dubious quality, I still recall the thrill of watching the entire film from the edge of my seat, enthralled and anxious as I watched the story unfold before me in this stunning film. If you think Planet of the Apes is simply some corny flick, think again–this is a sci-fi classic for very good reason.
• The enduring appeal of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a bit of a mystery to me; I’ve just never seen what so many people see in it, really. The movie, on the other hand, is great–I ended up seeing it as a compromise film when a friend and I both wanted very much to see other movies that the other refused to see and ended up being very much impressed by its great humor and exciting action. I know, I know, Joss Whedon himself says the TV show is a more faithful rendering of his vision, but this light-hearted satire of the horror film genre is funny and likeable, Kristy Swanson sparkles at the title character, and, really, how can you go wrong with a film featuring Rutger Hauer? Central Cinema through the 20th.
• If you feel like you’ve been getting way too many good nights of sleep lately, stop in at the Egyptian this weekend for their midnight showings of Aliens. Maybe you’re so used to the creepy alien creatures that they don’t scare you any more (oh, how I envy you for that), but the pulse-pounding action as Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley takes on a whole heaping nest of those nasty critters will definitely get your adrenaline pumped.
• The Dark Knight opens at theaters all across the Puget Sound on Friday, July 18.

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“Horse-drawn garbage wagon, 1915” by Seattle Municipal Archives

I adore our Flickr pool, especially when we get gems like this dropped in. I wonder where the garbage went from there in 1915? Landfill? The ocean?

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For most of the last year, I turned off wifi auto-discovery on my iPhone just because it was too annoying to have it latch onto all of the Starbucks in-store networks that were “open” but required a “username”, “password”, and “money” to connect to the non-iTunes Internet. In many places in the universe, this would not be such an ordeal, but in Seattle it’s hard (but getting slightly easier [mb]) to walk a few blocks without accidentally falling into a Starbucks wifi cloud.

Now, however, those days of trivial annoyance might turn into ones serendipitous free higher speed wireless. After hemming and hawing, releasing and retracting, and any other stop–start analogies you’d like to use, AT&T has granted the ever-growing iPhone userbase free access to its 17,000 wifi hotspots, many of which are (sorry, t-mobile) beaming their waves of internet from somewhere in the vicinity of a mermaid logo. They “know what’s hot.” [at&t]

(via gizmodo [#] via the internet)

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Remember when people were up in arms about Ladro moving in on “neighborhood creating” Victrola way back around the turn of the century [stranger]? Well, I think we all know how that turned out: it’s 2008 and both appear to be thriving. Until today I would have continued that sentence with “… in seeming harmony with a Starbucks just a block away.”

Now, however, we learn that the 15th Avenue Starbucks, one of the city’s oldest, is among the seven Seattle stores on the chopping block [#]. Let the vigils begin. [capitolhillseatle]

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The Seattle Seahawks will be playing their annual scrimmage 11 a.m. on Aug. 2 at Qwest Field. Tickets go on sale today and are available here. The cost is $12 for adults and $5 for youth (ages 6 to 17.)

All proceeds for the event will benefit the King County “Play it Smart” programs.

Go ‘Hawks.

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photo by S X 2 [flickr] via our group pool [#].

• Ichiro pumps up his AL All Star teammates with annual, win-ensuring, motivational speech: “Bleep … bleep bleep bleep … National League … bleep … bleep … bleeeeeeeeep … National – bleep bleep bleepbleepbleep!” [yahoo!]
• Yes please. Umi is spinning off a Japanese street food restaurant called Kushibar. [belltowner]
• MyBallard spins off PhinneyWood
• Is this a real endorsement of Kurrent or performance journalism? [captothehill]
• Absinthe is brewing in Woodinville. [voracious via citizenrain because no matter how many times I try I can’t get the Seattle Weekly’s RSS to work]
• Several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of Dutch bells will be ringing on UW’s campus thanks to a sentimental donor. [times via uw.lj]
• A certain kind of hell: Robin Willims + Bobcat Goldthwait + a film crew in Wallingford. [bigblog]
• End of an era? Market Street’s premiere Scandinavian foods emporium is closing its doors forever. [ballardgossipgirl]
• Hiking gets more eco-friendly with a $20 hiker shuttle from North Bend to Snoqualmie Pass. [dailyscore]

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King5 News is reporting on the rescued construction worker who was buried up to his waist for two hours at 2944 SW Avalon Way (where the Cafe Revo renovations are happening, near Luna Park). The Avalon Way back-up, which extended over the lower bridge from West Seattle to Spokane Street is starting to clear, but many emergency rescue vehicles still remain on the scene.

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Jayne Simmons is one of the happiest vendors at the local farmers markets. Every time I see her, she’s got the biggest smile on her face. Not only does she sell products designed to help you feel better, but talking to her always leaves me happy. Her passion for her products and way of life is obvious from the first moment you visit her booth. I spent some time talking with her in person and over email a few weeks ago and she agreed to be interviewed for Seattle MetBlogs.

Continue after the jump to read the interview.
Read more

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I’m not particularly a good hostess. I like my space. I don’t like to be around people all the time. And I like to sleep or go at my own pace without someone saying, “Now what?”. That said, here’s what I did when a friend I’ve had for 15 years came to Seattle for the first time for a visit.

Wednesday:

-Plane Delayed till 2am. The “weather” was to blame.

Thursday:

-Took lots of pictures at Kerry Park and Parson’s Garden.

-Went back to my apartment because my Atlantan guest wasn’t used to our cool mornings.

-Went to Pike Place Market for more picture taking. She had a yummy crumpet with jam and nutella at the Crumpet Shop, while I “ate lunch” at my all-time favortie smoothie place, Shy Giant.

-Took the ferry to Bainbridge Island. Walked around. She got fudge. I petted the yarn at Churchmouse Yarns and Teas.

-Then it was time to introduce my guest to some of my friends. So we all went to Rancho Bravo, had some drinks and played Rock Band until the wee hours of the morn.

Friday:

-I slept at Alki Beach, while she took pictures of kids being buried in sand.

-Then it was time to show her my old place and the bums that come along with it. Thus, to Capitol Hill we went. We split a small CrazyCherry concoction, where I now always ask them to put the toppings on the bottom as it is way more eatable this way, and then we threw the frisbee around at Volunteer Park. Actually, I take that back. The boyfriend, a friend and I threw the frisbee around. I guess in Atlanta they don’t play frisbee. Luckily my friend - a boy - was more than happy to teach my guest how to be a true Seattleite. Cue in a romantic comedy montage and suddenly a vacation couple is born.

-She’s never had Ethopian food before, so the boyfriend and I prayed for fast service at Queen Sheba, and miraculously our wishes were granted. I opted not to get too drunk on Tej because I knew I still had the night to entertain.

-With that said, I needed caffeine. Fast! We took her to Vivace so she can see the pretty picture in the cup. She took a picture and I drank it fast. Then said good-bye because they closed their doors on Sunday and will become yet another store that sits under a condo (am I the only one who really fucking hates this new trend). Rumor has it, the new Vivace will reopen near the new Dilletante.

-We went to Hot House. Ahhhhhh, I can sleep. I can read. I can be in a whisper zone. We both needed some relaxing and this was the place. We spent a good 3 hours sweating our tits off in the jacuzzi, in the steam room and in the sauna.

-THEN, we had drinks at Bleu. I used to actually like this place, but the more I come here the more I realize it just sucks. The service that is. The guy was more like friends with everyone than an actual server. He berated the boyfriend for ordering something non-alcoholic (note to all servers, DO NOT DO THIS, you will get a shit tip from me if you do) and when we asked for the bill and saw that he was having a cigarette and then went inside and delivered some food and then went back outside for another cigarette and then bumped into a friend and talked to him for 5 minutes we just left without ever getting the bill. If I was in Spain, this would be considered normal. But we’re no where near Spain, and this douche got what he deserved.

Okay, where was I? Oh right, SATURDAY:

-We started the morning a little late and went directly to the ID for the Chinese Festival (brought to you by the one brand I always think of when I see anything Chinese, McDonalds).

-We meandered toward Occidental Park and bumped the Fire Festival which was actually pretty cool. It was a little kid’s wet dream, what with old fire trucks and police cars and fire drills.

-And off to Ballard we go. We had dinner at Lunchbox Laboratory, where I finally got to try the Dork. I was actually a little underwhelmed, but the chocolate cherry milkshake saved the experience so all is forgotten and I’ll happily go back to eating the meat I’m used to over here.

-It happened to be Art Walk in Ballard so we checked out some “art” and then bought some clothes at Twenty20.

-Then, it was drinks and skeeball at Kings.

Sunday:

-Made blueberry/chocolate/walnut waffles and an egg scramble for 5 to prepare for our day trip to Vancouver!

-Immediately got one speeding ticket. We made the officer laugh so he gave us a little bit of a break. Note to self. Make them laugh.  

-Stopped in Richmond for Dim Sum.

-Walked the shit out of Stanley Park. Learned a little about Totem Poles. Walked around some more.

-Slept in the car on the way back.

Monday:

-Yay! Hiking! We went to Denny Creek Trail and Franklin Falls. What a great short, easy hike. At the Denny Creek Trail, after an hour or so of a steady incline (500 ft?), at the end you are greeted by large flat rocks and kids sliding along them into the river. I passed out on the rocks while the friends and guest played. After I properly drooled everywhere, we did the even shorter hike to Franklin Falls, where once again the treat was at the end. A beautiful fall that splashes in your face and is just so refreshing, we were all happy to have gotten out of the city for the day.

-Then we took the guest to Gas Works so she could take pictures of kites, seaplanes and defunct gas plant site.

-And as a proper goodbye, we tried to go to Paseo but of course they are closed on Mondays. So we did the second best thing and had great beer and eats at Brouwer’s. My seitan BBQ sandwich wasn’t quite as meaty as other seitan I’ve had, but still good nonetheless. And I highly recommend the Apple Wit (I forget the name of the actual beer, but it’s the only Apple Wit on the menu). If you like Hoegardden (which I just learned is pronouced Who Garden and not Hoe garden, like I’ve been saying for years) then you’ll like this citrusy beer with an apple infused twist.

Tuesday:

-She left. And I went to a place I really wanted to take her, but just didn’t have the time: the Arboretum.

Anyone else have guests this summer? Where are you going? How are you coping? Do you feel totally run down when they leave, or am I just getting old at the ripe age of 29?

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Want to relive two of the oldish- and newish-rock highlights of SP20? Mudhoney and No Age are in (actual) Seattle next week for a show to support KEXP by way of Toyota and Urban Outfitters’s FreeYrRadio promotional car-winning machinery. The show takes place at KEXP’s parking lot next week (23 July) and admission costs nothing more than the paper required to print your own invitation [pdf] ahead of time.

Prepare to make intellectual small-talk between sets by reading Sascha Frere-Jones profiled of No Age, their previous album, and a beloved run-down LA club, in that journal of provocative cover-images. [newyorker] Since then, the blissful assault of Nouns is vying for a spot on well-informed listeners’ top whatever lists to that even early devotees are nearing overload on “blind youthful optimism”. [eb]

I can think of far worse overdoses for a warm mid-summer night.

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