I’m declaring today Australia Day for you guys here on the west coast. Since Australia is about 19 hours ahead they’ve already been celebrating it for hours (mostly by sleeping in).

So kick back with a meat pie and a slice of lamington — the Pie Company is open all week — and to all our aussie readers out there, I wish you a happy Australia Day.

Arlo Guthrie is coming to our very own Kirkland Performance Center in April. How come KPC always gets the good stuff? I’ve had fond memories of Alice’s Restaurant, since one of the (Denver) radio stations played it on a loop for the whole day (they were switching formats). Since the song’s a whole 20 minutes long, that means I only got to hear it about 20 times. Man, that was a great song.

After this week’s live show, we’re gonna be gathering down the street at Blu Water (Leschi) at 10pm – so it’s more like a Geek Midnight Snack. There’s a bar and a restaurant that’s open ’til 1AM, but no Wi-Fi. Bring your camera, cards, and make reservations ASAP so that they’re not overwhelmed and understaffed. Spread the word to other Seattle-area geeks. I’m looking forward to meeting even more of you! Geeks are obviously welcome, and more than welcome to bring their non-geek counterparts.

I didn’t happen to get Sabrina’s memo on Sunday being Official Be Nice Day and I’m afraid I was a little bit of a pain in the butt. But put yourself in my position — you live in a town where it’s a miracle to have everyone driving on the same side of the road. Now, if you were stopped on BelRed Road, waiting to turn right into the Evergreen Village Shopping Complex, would you not be terrified that someone was going to come up behind you and ram into your car? Me too.

Here’s my problem, and to be honest I’ve kept it to myself since last summer. That new safeway gas station on the corner is an accident waiting to happen. The prices were cheaper there than anywhere else in town. Then they started doing that stupid 6 cents off per gallon thing. During lunch hour and after work, people all swarm over to THAT PLACE. They don’t understand that you can’t just park on the driveway while you’re waiting for a pump to free up. So they just sit there and the cars just back out onto the road.

I finally blew up yesterday. I can’t believe that it has come to me actually considering changing MY HABITS in order to avoid this crapfest. I went to talk to the safeway store manager. Store Manager Kent was very polite, but there was obviously nothing he could do. It’s a small space. Apparently “they didn’t realize they were not going to do that much business”. Huh? How you could NOT realize that when you are the cheapest place in town is beyond me. Not only did “they” not realize it, but Kent also blames the city for giving them permission to put something in that corner. (Oh, good, cus I need more people to hate right now)

We talked over options and he shot down everything I had. He can’t have extra people out there directing traffic because he isn’t allowed to have extra people for that department. We can’t just direct traffic around with signs because it isn’t intuitive — and we can’t have signs out on the road telling the gas-buyers not to go in that driveway. He’s trying to tell the fuel trucks to come in and park a certain way, but then you get a new driver and all of the sudden, traffic is backed up again. We can’t build extra driveway lanes because we will piss off Applebees (and can I tell you that I have never been so surprised in all my life that a chain restaurant would be so popular but they really do need all those spaces, and I have seen that with my own eyes).

Kent, I am telling you again — your only option is to price your gas higher. Once you match the prices of the other two gas stations within a block of yours, people will STOP COMING OVER HERE. And then I won’t have to go postal and honk everyone to deaf.

This slow-mo caf

Just for curiousity’s sake: Is there anyone in Seattle who doesn’t have a LiveJournal?

Okay, so I know this is a big big boat town (most boats per capita or somesuch) but I really had no idea of the teeming boat-based economy until I went to the Boat Show on Saturday. A friend who himself works in the boat bid-ness had gotten tickets at work, so we thought it would be cool to check things out and see what the deal was about. For those of you who have only ever just seen the ads on during the evening news and always wondered, well, here you go…
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Gosh, parking attendants in my town are sure in a good mood today. I was heading out of the hospital carpark this morning after a quick doctor’s visit, and the guy at the paybooth solemnly told me, “I can’t take any money from you today… guess our paychecks are going to be short this week!” In the far corners of my mind I heard a drumset go *ba-dum-tish!*

(For those of you who are lucky enough to never have visited our lovely hospital, the first hour’s free)

OK, so while the first hour is free at the hospital, it’s not free at a few of the buildings in downtown Bellevue, and technically the first half hour of parking is $3. I do a little bit of drop-off/pick-up on an infrequent basis around town, and I’m always grateful when they see I’ve only been in the building for 10 minutes, and wave me through (which is what happened today while I was running a couple of errands). Of course, I’m kind of a moral person, so I always expect people to charge me $3 even if I’ve been in there 10 seconds, because “0-30 minutes” is “0-30 minutes”.

So, thanks guys, for making my Friday just a little brighter.

PS: Personal to the woman in the black honda SUV with “baby on board” sticker: if you are driving up to a RED light, and someone in the lane next to you puts their signal on and then changes lanes 2 seconds later, it’s inappropriate to speed up behind them and honk. Asshat.

Okay, I’m in. As in, in – living here. That, and in – into Metblogs. Blogging. Within days of settling down, I set up a discussion list for any Seattlite to join. You’re all welcome to hit it. Just found a great recommendation for auto body work – as Ponzi, my fiancee, had issues with our old garage wall. Oy! And hey, if you were at last night’s Seattle Bloggers Meetup, be sure to sign in and identify your icon. I talked about doing monthly geek dinners after my live show – down the street there’s a great bar / restaurant that’s open ’til 1AM. Stay tuned.