Secretary of State Sam Reed announced last Friday that ballots for the Nov. 6 General Election are in the mail. Approximately 2.7 million ballots are on their way to voters' homes across Washington. According to state law, all mail ballots must be postmarked on or before Nov. 6 to be counted.
..all shot from the southern bluff of Magnolia during the past week or so
Planned Selig project would block them, they sayOwners of pricy condominiums on West Mercer Place are still hoping that developer and Magnolia resident Martin Selig changes his plans about a project that would replace the Westfarm Foods and Darigold at 635 Elliott Ave. W. with a two-building, 65-foot-high complex. Their hopes were buoyed, too, when Selig met with several of them, something several owners complained in an earlier News story that he should have done in the first place. Selig said meeting with people affected by his projects is not unusual. "It's something I always do."
Paying for project still a big issueIt's been five years since plans were first discussed for replacing the earthquake- and slide-damaged Magnolia Bridge, and what started out as a choice among 25 alternatives was narrowed to just one last year. Making the final cut was an alternative that would see most of the bridge replaced just to the south of the existing one, said Kirk Jones, the Seattle Department of Transportation manager for the project. "Since then, we have looked at different types of bridges," he added at an Oct. 16 public meeting.
...all shot from the southern bluff of Magnolia during the past week or so
Halloween the fifth-highest day of the year for candle-related fires, coming in behind Christmas, Christmas Eve, New Year's Day and New Year's Eve. Here are some Halloween Safety Tips from the National Fire Protection Agency:❚ Purchase only costumes, wigs and props labeled flame-resistant or flame-retardant. When creating a costume, choose material that won't easily ignite if it comes in contact with heat or flame. Avoid billowing or long trailing features.
Piles of bright orange pumpkins outside of all the local grocery stores should give you a hint that Halloween is just about here.While I've seen recipes for pumpkin soup and I know that pumpkin pie is a traditional Thanksgiving dessert, I don't think all of these orange globes are intended for eating.No, they will be carved into jack-o'-lanterns and lighted from within by a candle in the hopes that they will scare off the ghosts and goblins that come begging goodies on that mysterious night.
On July 22, Frances Mushkin moved in with her neighbors across the street, Linda and Stuart Sommerville. The Sommervilles raised eight children, but, says Linda, "We're also accustomed to living with people who happen to be old." They took in Stuart's ailing mother, then Linda's ailing father. "The transfer bars were already here," Linda continues. "We just had to make it personal for Fran." Although Fran considers her health to be "generally good," she suffers from renal failure, congestive heart disease and a vascular disease that necessitated the amputation of her right leg in 2000. "First they cut below the knee, but that didn't heal right," says Fran. "They tried to use leeches to draw the blood supply to the wound, to aid healing, but it didn't work, so they cut above the knee." With the same tenacity she showed when she was more able-bodied, Fran continued to live alone, and even to drive her truck with hand controls. But finally Linda convinced Fran to move in with her.
THE 2007 TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL may have been the most satisfying of the 15 I've gone to in the years since 1989, not least because it included a paradigm of what's thrilling about film festivals. "To Each His Own Cinema," produced to honor the Cannes Film Festival's 60th anniversary this past spring, is a two-hour film comprising 33 three-minute films created by world-class directors from five continents. (If you're doing the math, yes, there must have been a few seconds here, a few seconds there of overrun.) The filmmakers range alphabetically from Theo Angelopoulos to Zhang Yimou, and stylistically and temperamentally from ... well, how to nominate polar opposites from a roster that includes Jane Campion and Roman Polanski, Olivier Assayas and Manoel de Oliveira, Ken Loach and David Lynch, Gus Van Sant and Hou Hsiao-hsien, Aki Kaurismäki and Abbas Kiarostami?
Sheila Daniels' production of William Shakespeare's "PERICLES" opens Friday, Oct. 26, with a preview Thursday, Oct. 25, and an end-run date of Nov. 18. Reginald André Jackson (pictured) takes the title role of "a wandering prince on an epic journey of sheer theatricality. A murder plot, a narrow escape, a perilous sea journey, a shipwreck, exotic lands, a tournament for the hand of a princess, a marriage - and that's just the first half!" Center House Theatre, Seattle Center. 733-8222.
The wonderful thing about live theater is you can sometimes be surprised and delighted. Such is the case with "Murderers," a wacky piece of theater noir overflowing with homicidal humor. In this killer comedy, playwright Jeffrey Hatcher unleashes three lethal raconteurs on the stage, armed with offbeat tales and delicious one-liners. It's not a murder mystery; you don't have to solve any crimes. These killers confess with a perverse pride - motive, intent and deed. In this case, murder isn't an "In Cold Blood," bone-chilling experience -it's wickedly funny.
THIS IS THE TIME OF YEAR to celebrate the scary, to bring out the ghosts, the Headless Horseman and all the great chilling stories of the past. Stone Soup Theatre honors that tradition with a program of three one-act suspense dramas adapted from literature and radio. It's a good production with a fine cast. There is, however, within it, one segment - "The Tell-Tale Heart" -- that ranks among the most powerful theater pieces I've seen in years. Good as are the other two offerings, "Sorry, Wrong Number" and "Trifles," it's "The Tell-Tale Heart" that steals the show.
"The Women" has come to town. ACT Theatre began preparation for this production three years ago, and I am happy to say that it was worth all of the energy, time and money that went into it. It's a delight. It's also an extravagant offering with 16 actresses playing 44 roles, dressed in more than 100 costumes in a total of 12 different scenes. This is ACT's definitive statement that the financial difficulties that almost did it in a few years ago have been overcome, and that this is a theater whose place in Seattle is far too important to ever let that happen again.
Every so often someone proclaims the end of painting. Rodchenko created a triptych entitled the "end of painting" in the 1920s, for instance, and Ad Reinhardt said the same thing in the 1960s. Digital cameras, computers and other forms of new technology were all supposed to make painting obsolete. The problem with this theory is that no one can tell artists to stop painting. And this is a good thing. Last Saturday, Brad Biancardi opened an exhibit at Crawl Space, that spunky little alternative space that has become the darling of the Seattle art press, proving the (local) art of painting is alive and well
Volunteer Park Conservatory will celebrate five decades of friendship honoring the 50th anniversary of Seattle's Sister City relationship with Kobe, Japan, by dedicating the Fall Chrysanthemum Exhibit in Kobe's honor.