West Seattle, Washington
29 Monday
Just out for a Christmas night drive … saw a few places with people inside; on Alki, Celtic Swell and Pepperdock — in The Junction, we’d already heard about Poggie’s plans from Slog — and besides the convenience stores you’d expect to see open (including indies like Juneau St. Market), both Rite Aid branches are open.
-First, the non-merry note: After just 6 months, looks like Al’s Cafe & Espresso on Cali Ave north of Morgan Junction is out. We thought it seemed odd this morning to see it closed this morning when we stopped by during prime coffee time to check on its Christmas hours; drove past this evening, suddenly the sign’s gone from its window, and a light inside shows the place pretty much stripped bare. Tough location, with so much so close right at the Fauntleroy/Cali crossroads.
-Now, the holiday cheer: One more light display to recommend — 56th & Alki, Santa in the front yard on a brightly lit replica of construction equipment (with a sign for a construction company cleverly placed beneath it). And at 42nd & Raymond, we passed a parked pickup truck with HONK IF YOU LOVE SANTA written big and bold in the rear window.
-Just ’cause the power’s back doesn’t mean City Light crews’ work is done … saw a truck in action after 8 pm tonight, back at the scene of The Tree That Blocked Fauntleroy.
We apologize for, while tracking the events of West Seattle Unplugged ’06, slacking on one of our favorite things to do, keeping an eye on storefronts and permit databases to see who’s coming/going/changing around here. Two recent discoveries: The 2-story building at Westwood Village, north of Barnes/Noble, is apparently getting a “day spa”; and looks like we’ll soon have another location for coffee — 4800 Delridge, where the city permit info says they’re putting up a sign saying BUBBLES (any relation to Bubbles on Alki, whose site offers “business opportunities”?).
We were going to say that driving around WS tonight was “normal” — no major lights out, etc. — for the first time in more than a week, but the pre-Christmas craziness is making up for it. Crowds galore. Good for our local businesses, at least.
In post-storm notes … got e-mail from the office of local County Councilmember Dow Constantine (while Seattle City Councilmembers aren’t elected by district, King County Councilmembers are), saying he’s pushing for a “formal council review of the local response to (the) windstorm.” As for the city, haven’t seen anything yet about the outcome of today’s “briefing.” The video is now posted on the Seattle Channel site (with an ironic disclaimer about “diminished” audio quality because of an “unforeseen technical problem”).
Today’s storm-aftermath photo: proof some of the fallen trees in Lincoln Park are being cleared away; we spotted this pile in the central LP parking lot.
Commenting on a post below, a reader asks a question that also occurred to us while checking out the “Webster pocket” earlier — what happened to the cow bull atop John’s Deli at 35th/Webster? Storm casualty, put away for safekeeping, or … ? If nobody out there knows, we’ll check. In the meantime, heading out for our early-evening pocket survey (even after so many years up north, it’s still weird to call 4:40 pm “early evening”).
… Well, no, actually, flashlights are better than candles. We prefer ’em since a candle-sparked house fire in childhood. So we set out tonight to see if there are D batteries to be found anywhere in West Seattle. Our non-scientific sample revealed: NO. Not even at the Harbor Avenue 7-11, for heaven’s sake. Other notes from Power Patrol: Morgan Junction and environs remain dark (including Fauntleroy almost all the way to L-Park), and now the Fauntleroy/Cali traffic cop’s gone (just a commute thing?); and no juice yet to 57th Ave SW, from just south of Alki Ave all the way back to the bluff — apparently the northernmost powerless pocket in WS. This situation is painful for everyone affected, but tonight we’re feeling especially blue for the M-Junction businesses smacked by today’s re-outage, particularly the indies like Pet Elements, Teriyaki & Wok, Abbondanza, etc. Hope they’re back up by tomorrow. We’re planning to rise early to check on things, if tonight’s weather (starting to rustle the bushes even as we type) doesn’t keep us up.
-Last power update for the night: The pocket just west of Westwood Village is back on. The pocket near Home Depot (Delridge & Orchard) is not (at least, as of our drive thru the area a few hours ago). Meantime, the sinkhole saga on the hill over Lincoln Park seems to be even worse, at least for one homeowner featured again in tomorrow’s P-I.
-While checking out the Delridge/Orchard outage, we took an unintended turn and wound up on Puget Ridge. More than a decade in WS, and we’ve never been in the South Seattle Community College area before, believe it or not … hard to tell at night, but seems like some people up there must have a heck of a view.
-Non-outage related business notes: First, Bakery Nouveau. Ducked in on its second day of ops today to have a look (unfortunately we’d just had lunch so no room for a taste). Several of the items in the case at the time looked incredibly scrumptious, such as a chevre/garlic/pine nuts galette-type thing (sorry, our culinary vocabulary fails us), slices of dark chocolate cake, and brown sugar pecan brioche (gotta stop by tomorrow morning and see if they’ve got any more of those for breakfast). Also in business notes, the former Jan-Michael salon (and long-ago “frozen custard stand”) just north of Thriftway in Morgan Junction has finally revealed its new identity … a mortgage company moving from its prior spot a few blocks south on Cali.
-Just back from our first official drive in search of WS’s best Christmas lights. Will post our findings sometime tomorrow. To generalize wildly — so far, the north side of WS appears to have many more lavish displays than the south side.
-Sorry if this is old news to Morgan Junctionites; just noticed the big CLOSED FOR REMODELING, REOPENING FALL 2007 signs in the windows of Washington Federal Savings at Cali & Fauntleroy. Somehow you gotta wonder, will they really reopen as a bank? That corner is so incredibly prime … you’d think those “mixed-use” developers would be clamoring for it.
-Earlier this fall, when we posted a few times about best-selling author Terry Brooks (who lives in WS at least part of the time), someone wrote to say that other best-selling authors live in WS, including a couple, Skye Moody & G.M. Ford. If that’s so, apparently they won’t be here much longer, according to her MySpace page, which mentions they’re moving to the Oregon Coast next month.
Website for Mud Bay says its pet-food-etc. store in the Admiral District opens next week.
Another excuse to mention our holiday page: In the Junction, the wreaths have been hung from the light poles with care, in hopes more holiday shoppers soon will be there … Tonight there seemed to be a fete at Menashe & Sons, perhaps in honor of the retiree? With valet parking outside! (We just got a flyer in the mail about the big sale starting Thursday.) Meantime, also on a holiday note, Santa arrives at Westwood Village a week from Saturday. (The reindeer near his hideaway next to Bed-Bath-n-Beyond have already landed.)
Big sign in the Menashe & Sons Jewelers window in The Junction — Jack Menashe’s retiring after 30-plus years. Since it’s “… and Sons,” we’re assuming the business will go on. But what about the Christmas lights at the Menashe house on Beach Drive? Please tell us they’re not going into retirement yet! We’re still reeling from the loss of the Gai display long ago. (Not to mention the little old guy in Burien, may he rest in peace.)
As holiday-shopping season looms, we’re throwing in a few words of support for shopping at local businesses as much as you can. A lot has changed in The Junction, for example, since last holiday-shopping season. And many businesses are doing what they can to court you — such as, we learned at last weekend’s Gathering of Neighbors that Square One Books has a pre-holiday sale next weekend — 19% off! Check them out before wandering resignedly over to the big chain bookstore at W-Village. And if computer stuff’s on your list, sounds like changes are afoot at Quidnunc — its new newsletter reveals it’s now part of a company called HomeTown Computer Centers, and promises “changes to improve prices and customer service.” Certainly we all pay attention to prices … but it’s worth considering that paying a few cents more is the worthwhile price of not living in one of those hideous megaburbs without a true small-town downtown.
West Seattle-based “faith meets fashion” fame-gaining Vox Sacra got a network TV spotlight this week, according to this blogpost (with pics).
A new liquor-license application just landed on the state’s site for “Spring Hill,” seeking a restaurant/lounge permit for the ex-In Bloom spot on the north side of The Junction. (Side note, according to the semi-official Junction history page, the business district “is built on a swamp originally known as Spring Hill Pond.”)
Fingerprint payment usage must be lagging at the West Seattle (Morgan Junction) Thriftway. With signs, banners, and even a winnable car on display, it’s pushing people to sign up for Pay By Touch. Four and a half years after the store made national news as the first grocery store anywhere to sign up for the system, we have yet to personally witness a single person using it. However, the store owner is quoted in a variety of articles as saying they’ve processed tons of, shall we say, digit-al transactions. (Not us; we still are not ready to have our fingers, retinas, or any other body parts scanned and linked to our $.) Checking the Pay By Touch website, it appears the WS Thriftway folks remain “early adopters”; according to its “store locator” engine, this store remains the only store in Seattle deploying PBT (possibly even in the region; we tried Everett & Tacoma zip codes, and nothing came up).
Speaking of boutiques (see below) … the proprietor(s) of Divina just let us know about the first edition of a new series of West Seattle Art Walks, coming up next week! It’s set for 6-8 pm one week from tonight (Thursday 11/9) starting at Divina, where walking maps will be available (along with vino and snax). Organizers plan to do this each month thereafter, on the 2nd Thursday. (Perhaps it could evolve into something like this.)
I’m glad West Seattle has charming little boutiques but I will never be able to set foot into one for a whole host of reasons. So I don’t know if this tale is really true. $212 for jeans?
Three months ago on one of our episodes of “As the Blog Turns,” we found out from Rob that Westwood Village had updated its website to trumpet the impending arrival of Taco del Mar and a mystery pizza joint. Ever since, the WS Blog Posse has strolled frequently around Westwood V, staring into the vacant spaces, trying to guess which ones would become TDM and “Gionnoni’s Pizza.” Turns out … it will be new construction … and it’s been delayed. A week or so after e-mailing WV management in search of answers, we just got this from the operations director:
They will eventually go into new space that is an extension of the current Payless Shoes/Sally Beauty building (where the gravel is next to Sally’s) along Barton Street. Unfortunately we have run into some permit and design issues and construction probably will not start until early next year – hopefully January. Given that schedule, they will open late spring/early summer 2007.
Not enough time at the moment to post ALL the stuff that’s happening this pre-Halloween weekend — we’ll get to that first thing in the morning. But we’ve gotten some notes asking about, and telling us about, the business district trick-or-treat events, so here’s the full scoop lowdown on those: Junction trick-or-treating is Saturday afternoon, 1-3 pm (the nice folks down there say “don’t let the road work keep you away,” and honestly, there’s not much of it left anyway); Admiral trick-or-treating is 3-6 pm on Halloween (Tuesday, if you’ve lost track); Alki trick-or-treating is also on Halloween, 1-6 pm (the WS Chamber site has all three of those on one convenient page); and what a coincidence (oddly NOT listed by the WS C&C, or are they and WV on the outs?), Westwood Village has trick-or-treating 5-7 pm on Halloween night.
The relatively new shop Divina north of the Junction has a website now (discovered via the Herald). This led us to wonder whatever happened to the plan for a “Divina Cantina” just east of the shop’s location. Owner Julie tells us she’s trying to work out some code issues with the city — if all goes well, the Divina Cantina would be a tapas bar — if not, she’s got “a backup plan to make the space a gallery of sorts.”
Thanks to a WSB reader for writing to inquire why the number for O2, the Cali Ave restaurant launched by Ovio, was disconnected. Reminded us that we had seen a liquor-license ap several weeks ago for the same address under the name “Beato Food and Wine”; went by O2 back then, saw no signs of change, forgot about it till now. But today, there it is in the window — a sign saying O2 is closed but Beato will open soon. (The sign also touts a website that as is usually the case with these things, isn’t up yet. Argh.)
At least once a week, someone writes to ask if we’ve heard anything new about the longstanding rumor that Trader Joe’s will sweep triumphantly into West Seattle, at last relieving so many of us of the need to frequent Burien. Got another such note today and we’re thinking it’s time to publicly say, we unfortunately have not heard a word of anything new. The rumors for a while circulated around the future development near Metropolitan Market … which doesn’t even seem remotely close to groundbreaking anyway. But we know the WSB visitorship includes a few insiders from the business and development communities; if anyone cares to share any inside scoop, we promise your anonymity’s safe with us …
Chalk another one up for West Seattle Blog Spouse, who bet me that the ex-Remo Borracchini spot in The Junction would become a “fancy bakery with something French in its name.”
Sometime in the past 24 hours, a sign went up, as follows: “Coming soon (to delightfully spoil West Seattle with bread, pastry, cakes, chocolates and coffee)/Bakery Nouveau/home of world baking champion 2005/USA top 10 chocolatier 2004/William Leaman.”
According to a variety of online references, Leaman’s been at Essential Baking Company in North Seattle for a while and does indeed have quite an impressive resume, dating back into his teens. West Seattle’s got a fair amount of good bakeries — so could this mean we’re in for something great?
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