West Seattle, Washington
24 Thursday
Since the WSB Forums launched more than a year and a half ago, originally mostly because people wanted to request and receive recommendations for local businesses and services, they’ve facilitated a lot of other connections too, with more than 61,000 posts and 5,000 members. The latest – a vanpool that’s got room for somebody new. If you commute between West Seattle and the north end of Lake Washington, check out the post here – and check out what else is new in the Forums here.
West Seattleite Joni, who works for the company behind story-sharing site Whrrl, e-mailed to share the latest story posted there – a traveling writer’s photographic look at a day in the life of the homeless camp that calls itself “Nickelsville,” now in its second week at 2nd SW/Highland Park Way on the eastern edge of West Seattle, just feet from its original location. See the story here (or click on the image above); Joni also notes that the writer, Mark Horvath (who tells the story behind the story here), is having a Tweetup (Twitter-driven “meetup” – he’s at @hardlynormal) downtown tonight to talk about his project invisiblepeople.tv, and there’s still a few spots left. P.S. Just discovered some additional “Nickelsville” updates at Blogging Georgetown, including work to start an organic garden.
It’s been about an hour since Facebook started offering members the chance to customize the Web address for their FB presence. We signed up fast for facebook.com/westseattleblog – so that’s where you can find us, as opposed to the previous long string of numbers that we never did manage to memorize. (If you haven’t signed up to customize your FB address yet, it’s a quick free process that starts here. –
(2008 photo by Jerry from JetCityOrange)
No, not a news release – just one line on Twitter: the big green trucks of Amazon Fresh are now delivering to zip code 98146. It’s been a year and a half since AF’s first West Seattle service, at which time (WSB report here) they told us they weren’t sure how soon 98146 would be added. (They added 98106 in March of last year.)
As Kristina put it while e-mailing WSB to share this New York Times link (which a few others have pointed out to us as well), “West Seattle-ites don’t hit the NYT all that often!” Seattle-based NYT writer Timothy Egan has written a long, opinionated look at the case of Amanda Knox, the Arbor Heights student who is about to testify at her murder trial in Italy. See it here.
Today we welcome Darling Skincare & Sugaring as a new WSB sponsor. Here’s what they want to share about their business: Vanessa is excited to bring sugaring to West Seattle! 
Sugaring is an all-natural way to remove unwanted hair. It differs from traditional waxing methods in that it is applied lukewarm so it never burns the skin. This gentle application removes hair at all stages of growth (no little prickles the following week!) and caters to sensitive skin while tackling the coarsest follicles with ease. It is simply the best way to say goodbye to hair that you don’t want around! Darling Skincare & Sugaring offers a full range of organic skincare as well. They offer visible results for a variety of skin conditions including acne treatment and anti-aging care, and also features professional relaxation services. Vanessa would like to thank West Seattle for welcoming her to the area, adding that she discovered where the hip professionals have gone! As a Seattle native from Phinney Ridge, Vanessa appreciates the sense of community she found in her new neighborhood. Darling Skincare & Sugaring also provides bridal and permanent make-up services, and offers gift certificates for any occasion. Darling Skincare & Sugaring is located at 3620 California Avenue SW (map), 206-930-0823, and online at darlingskincare.com.
We welcome Darling Skincare & Sugaring to the WSB sponsor team; the latest lineup is here, along with information on how to grow your business by becoming part of it!
When a sponsor joins WSB, we traditionally offer them the chance to let you know something about their business: Today we welcome 
My Family Doctor, Dr. Terrill Harrington, whose office is at 3623 SW Alaska [map] in the Triangle area. Dr. Harrington’s practice is truly for the whole family – children to adults. He’s ready to talk to you about your medical questions, and to provide care that’s open to everyone, regardless of age. Dr. Harrington is proud that some of the babies he’s delivered are still coming to him years later for their regular care. He says that can be attributed to how people feel about the care they receive from him. While there are many options out there, Dr. Harrington believes people want to come to a place that treats them with the respect and dignity they deserve. Dr. Harrington says he has worked for some of the largest medical providers in the area and while he practiced with people who were well-trained and intelligent, he says there’s no substitute for a neighborhood doctor who can provide personal attention, which even includes the occasional house call. Dr. Harrington has had a practice in West Seattle for the past several years; he has served as team doctor for the Seattle Lutheran High School football team, and has provided hearing tests and other medical screening for elementary and middle schools in West Seattle. My Family Doctor is ready to be your family doctor; you can call 206-362-8674, and find out more online at myfamilydoctorws.com. We welcome Dr. Terrill Harrington to the WSB sponsor team; the latest lineup is here along with information on how to join them!
WEST SEATTLE WINS KEXP HOOD-TO-HOOD: Thanks to a note from Beth, we were able to share the news here last week about the KEXP radio pledge-drive Hood-to-Hood Challenge, offering a special event to whichever neighborhood had the most pledgers by the end of the drive last Friday night. Today we get word (thanks to David for the first word, confirmed on the KEXP home page) that West Seattle won! Working now to find out (a) by how much (not sure if this is the final tally), (b) who came in second, and (c) when/where that event will happen. 4:21 PM UPDATE: (a and b) answer, $70,000+ with Ballard in second at $65K+, (c) answer, sometime in the first quarter of next year, though many details remain to be worked out.
EASY STREET RECORDS ON TWITTER: The latest West Seattle business to hop onto Twitter is the legendary music store that started in the heart of The Junction. You’ll find them at twitter.com/easystrecords. (If you “follow” us at twitter.com/westseattleblog, you know we also send word when we spot any other West Seattle business/institution turning up – over the weekend, for example, Westwood Village restaurant Eats Market Cafe got on board – twitter.com/eatsmarketcafe – other West Seattle eateries on Twitter include WSB sponsors @skylarkcafe and @caferevo.) In addition to our human-powered, interactive account at @westseattleblog, if you just want links to WSB stories, follow us at twitter.com/westseattlenews. You can also see our “tweets” and others mentioning West Seattle on the WSB Twitter page.
Well, that’s all we could think of for a headline, given that Beach Drive Blog already took “Tern, Tern, Tern” (here’s the soundtrack). Great pix on BDB: Terns over West Seattle waters.
We try not to take up much time and space here on the main page talking about panels we’re on and outside-media mentions we’ve gotten for being among the first nationwide to truly succeed as a respectable, commercial, online-only neighborhood-news operation. It would be boring to prattle on about ourselves, since WSB is about you. But this is a rare bit of national exposure, so we’re breaking our rule, and linking to it here: Two weeks ago we spent a few minutes at the KUOW Radio studios in the U-District taping an interview for the weekly NPR show “On the Media,” which was putting together a look at the Seattle news world, post-paper-P-I. The finished product is on this week’s program – which airs on KUOW at 7 pm Sunday, but is online now, and you can listen (via the embedded player above, or go to the OTM site here) if you’re interested. Your editor here is featured for about four minutes, starting five and a half minutes into the piece (after Eli Sanders from The Stranger). Now, back to the news … and thanks again for your support, your sharing of news tips and stories and photos, and for just being there.
Congratulations to Jacob Miller and Ross Monroe, from the West Seattle High School Class of ’09 and Damp Flame Design: Their redesign of the WSHS website has just gone live tonight — follow the link here to see it. Damp Flame has been in business since 2005, with other projects including redesigning the Husky Deli website. If you want to compare the new WSHS site with the old one, there’s a screengrab on the “About This Site” page on the new site, where you can read more about the project. Side note, Jacob is the son of veteran Seattle journalist Kathy Mulady, who has been reporting recently for WSB as well as for the Seattle PostGlobe.
We were just about to post this when the police search broke, but now that it seems over, did still want to let you know about this … Thanks to the folks who e-mailed over the past few days to make sure we knew that the “next page” link at the bottom of the WSB home page wasn’t working. It broke when we tweaked some code to lay the groundwork for the new “Announced” page the other day – but it took a few nights of work to figure out why it broke, and how to fix it. All appears well now, but again, we very much appreciate the heads-up (editor@wsb.blackfin.biz) when you notice something’s wrong – you may find trouble before we do.
Two weeks since West Seattle Community Garage Sale Day ’09, and the rest of garage-/yard-sale season is revving up big time. If you’re having a sale, we invite you to post it – free! – in the Freebies-Deals-Sales section of the WSB Forums – and so far tonight, four households with sales this weekend have done just that. They all ended up posting in the same thread, but you are welcome to start your own. See this weekend’s four sale listings here. (P.S. Almost forgot – we’ve also published an item about Shorewood Christian‘s 50-FAMILY yard sale this weekend!)
If you have a little more time to browse WSB this weekend and don’t routinely go off the main page, a couple things of note … In the WSB Forums, Wilson writes to let everyone know about the Good Samaritans seen in action, and Rockergirl kicked off a discussion that has nothing to do with West Seattle but has drawn lots of replies, looking for a “great place to stay in Las Vegas.” Other areas of our site off the main page with frequent updates include the More page (WS-relevant news links from citywide/regional sources PLUS the newest WS links from almost all Craigslist categories), the Blogs page (pointing to the newest updates from 100 WS-based writers) and the Twitter page (recent “tweets” from people mentioning West Seattle, plus a direct link to our “tweets”). All three of those pages automatically fetch updates from their sources continuously, so there’s always something new.
We’ve been tracking this for a few weeks – now it’s down to the final faceoff, and as WSB’er GenHillOne was first to announce in the WSB Forums, Chief Sealth High School is 1 of 2 schools remaining in KIRO’s High School Spirit poll. Voting’s under way now – go here.
It’s been down most of the week – and we know us news types aren’t the only ones who noticed, because more than half a dozen people asked us if we knew what the problem was – but now it’s back: Real-Time 911. Note, as always, this only reflects fire/medic calls, NOT police calls, but we know many find it invaluable for checking “why am I hearing sirens?” etc. (When we called Seattle Fire Department‘s media unit earlier in the week to ask what was wrong, they indicated it was down as part of a larger maintenance/repair issue that affected systems even more critical to their operations than the online log.)
We’ve updated you a few times on the KIRO TV online “High School Spirit” poll – the first round matched up West Seattle and Chief Sealth High Schools; CSHS got the most votes, then beat Renton in the next round, and now has beaten its next “opponent,” Liberty – which means it’s in the Final Four, and voting is already under way. It’s Chief Sealth vs. Inglemoor in one matchup, Auburn vs. Interlake in the other; you can vote for CSHS right now by going here.
RESERVOIR TOUR: We’ve been talking with Seattle Public Utilities for a while about setting up a tour of the reservoir-covering work at West Seattle (Westcrest) Reservoir, and today we finally got to take that tour. You’ll see the full story here within the next couple days, probably Sunday night if there’s no breaking news; the photo above is from inside the section that’s being covered, where concrete columns go up before the “lid.” It’s an amazing project, not quite as big as this one we covered at Beacon Hill last year; watch for our story.
COUNTDOWN’S ON: As of this afternoon, NASA has started the clock (see it here) running down to Monday’s scheduled launch of the shuttle Atlantis, piloted by West Seattle High School Class of ’72 alum Gregory Johnson (more backstory here). The launch is scheduled for Monday afternoon.
TOP 100 SEATTLE WOMEN IN TECH, THE WEST SEATTLE REPS: TechFlash published this list today and, as WSB Forum members pointed out before we’d even heard about it, WSB editor/co-publisher TR is on the list. Not alone in West Seattle residence, either – among the names we recognize, Patty Stonesifer, Vanessa Fox, Michelle Nicolosi, Shauna Causey. (Anybody else on the list who you know to be a West Seattleite? Let us know!) *Added Sunday night – thanks to the commenter who notes Joleen Winther Hughes is another West Seattleite on the list.
SPOTLIGHT FOR TONY’S: Hadn’t seen this till Seattle Weekly editorial exec Mike Seely, also a West Seattleite, mentioned it – his feature about Tony’s Produce, the beloved vegetable/fruit stand at 35th/Barton. Read it here.
SPEAKING OF SHOPPING: Wanted to showcase this post from the WSB Forums if you haven’t seen it already: WSB’er Kevin writes a detailed look at what’s available at Cash ‘n’ Carry, a potential Costco alternative.
Thanks to Lee for e-mailing to let us know that Chief Sealth High School has now made it to round 3 in KIRO TV’s online “High School Spirit” poll – winning the round 1 matchup against West Seattle High School and round 2 against Renton. Now, CSHS is pitted against Liberty. Voting’s open now – go here.
The mayor’s office just announced the draft Pedestrian Master Plan is officially available online — see it here. It includes various West Seattle projects such as the Alki Point sidewalk extension that’s being built right now, plus facts and figures (numbers on this page include: 2,256 miles of sidewalks in Seattle) and maps you can use to see how West Seattle stacks up (here’s the “potential pedestrian demand” map). You can give the city your comments (here’s how) through June 15, and a public hearing is planned June 21, before council action later in the year.
KIRO‘s online regional High School Spirit contest, which pitted West Seattle High School vs. Chief Sealth High School in the first round, is now into round 2, and Sue just e-mailed to suggest we remind you that Sealth is among the contenders, now facing Renton. Vote here.
Steph just sent that photo of her kids with their brand-new Tony Hawk-autographed skateboard, procured – sort of – via Twitter. It’s part of a nationwide “Easter egg hunt” promotion in which boards have been hidden in various locations, then announced at the @tonyhawk Twitter account. We happened to be checking West Seattle “tweets” right after this got announced about an hour ago; didn’t get there in time to capture the “find” but got Steph’s photo and note shortly afterward:
Luckly we had Tony Hawk on our twitter an my husband was looking at it during the time his tweet went out. We were picking up my daughter from school and got the call from him to go to the location. The skateboard is sweet! The kids are so excited!
The board was hidden at Shadow Land, by the way. (On Twitter, you can find us at @westseattleblog for 24/7 human-powered updates, including immediate word of breaking news, and @westseattlenews for a feed of WSB links as they’re published. Hope you’ll “be our friend” on Facebook too, where we are WS Blog.)
Just in from the city – word of a new website spotlighting Seattle composers, “presenting music you might otherwise never have the opportunity to hear.” Read on for the full announcement (and how to become part of it):Read More
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