West Seattle, Washington
31 Saturday
The Alaska Marine Lines loading dock along West Marginal Way Southwest is usually bustling with trucks – but this morning, minivans and SUVs ruled the day, as West Seattle Girl Scouts and troop leaders picked up this year’s supply of cookies. Inside, stacks of boxes awaited each group that dropped by from predawn till noontime:
Service Unit cookie manager Cheryl Brown says this year’s West Seattle order totaled 35,016 boxes – 5,220 more than last year. No new flavor this year – same ones as last year. If you pre-ordered, deliveries are starting tomorrow; if you didn’t, look for Girl Scouts selling cookies outside local stores and businesses starting next Friday (February 25th) and continuing through March 13th. Wondering where to find them? The online Cookie Locator is up and running again this year too – just go here. (Use it to search by zip code, or within a certain distance of a zip code; this appears to be the complete list of WS sales.) And if you’d like to buy cookies to donate to U.S. military personnel, Operation Cookie Drop is back in business as well (read about that here).
After Thursday night’s kickoff for this June’s cancer-fighting Relay for Life of West Seattle, Rebecca Polivy sent in a report – and an invitation if you haven’t signed up yet:
The West Seattle Relay Kickoff event held (Thursday) night, February 17th, at Coffee to a Tea with Sugar in the junction was a huge success! New and old participants gathered for a night of food, entertainment and information. Event Chair Jilyan Perry spoke to new and old relay participants and got everyone very excited for the event which will be June 10-11 at the West Seattle Stadium. Dwaine Casmey, captain of Team Avanade, entertained the crowd with his brillant tunes while everyone munched on delicious cupcakes from our hosts.
If you haven’t had a chance to participate in Relay for Life it’s not too late! Please visit our website and contact us with any questions. Team registration fees will be half price through this weekend – so sign up today!!! All are welcome.
West Seattle’s eagles have made headlines recently (both here and on TV) – but don’t forget the rest of our amazing avians – like the owl Trileigh photographed at Lincoln Park this morning:
It’s not only eagles who are increasingly active this season! Many of our forest species are feeling the energy of spring. If you keep your eyes, and especially your ears, open, you can see all kinds of life in our West Seattle parks. Here’s a photo from this morning of one of our Lincoln Park Barred Owls, named “Oswold” by one of my students in honor of young Wollet of a previous year. If you’d like to find owls, pay close attention to when other birds large and small are making a loud fuss…you may get lucky and find that the source of their concern is a nearby owl!
(We appreciate the tip – we’ve had about as much luck owl-watching as we have had whale-watching.) If you missed WSB reports on the owlet Trileigh mentioned, Wollet, check out this 2009 story.
(Photos by Ellen Cedergreen for WSB)
Sunny Saturday at Alki wasn’t just about kite-flying and wave-watching (more photos of that later, by the way). It was also about mural-painting and awareness-raising. West Seattle-founded environmental/family-focused activism group CoolMom organized “Paint Past Coal” outside the Alki Bathhouse, with the Sierra Club and others, as part of a campaign to stop coal-burning as a means of energy generation, because of pollution concerns. At right, below, is CoolMom director Terri Glaberson with, from left, Sierra Club’s Charley Danner and Robin Everett, who noted, “In the end, this is really about having a healthy planet for our kids to grow up on.”
There were speakers (including City Council President Richard Conlin talking about alternative fuel sources including wind – appropriately enough today! – and solar) and musicians:
Our state has one coal-burning plant, in Centralia, owned by Canada-headquartered TransAlta, whose website notes this pro-plant rally in Olympia last week – the State House is considering HB 1825, seeking to decommission the plant. CoolMom and Sierra Club say they are hoping that coal can be completely phased out by 2015. CoolMom says the mural will be presented to 34th District State Sen. Sharon Nelson, who has been working on the issue (also of local note, West Seattle’s 34th District State Rep. Joe Fitzgibbon is a co-sponsor of HB 1825).
Every time we stop by the West Seattle Farmers’ Market on Sunday and see live music, we’ve wished it had been announced ahead of time so we could have mentioned it here. Tonight – there’s advance notice! Great news for an expected-to-be-sunny Sunday market – market manager Catherine Burke sends word that tomorrow they’ll have “folksy MOZO music, a Tool Library demo and a new farmer, Silver Springs Creamery (fresh cow and goat milk!)” A tweet from the West Seattle Tool Library itself elaborates on the demonstration: Sewing machines making produce bags. As always, year-round, the WS Farmers’ Market is at 44th/Alaska.
First, the latest stolen-car report we’ve received – from Andy:
Last night between 10 pm and 1 am some hoodlums stole my black 1997 Nissan Maxima from the street in front of our house, which is located on the 5200 block of 45th Avenue SW. Most importantly, my golf clubs are in the trunk. Police report was filed… just sharin’ the love. License number 192 ZGB, if anyone spots the vehicle please report to police. Black Maxima, my kids like to write letters in the dirt on the doors, so that’s another identifying characteristic, golf clubs are Nike Procombos :(
Here’s the SPD tweet on that. Second, an update from Tina, whose family car was stolen for the second time in a year in the Genesee area, just as she and her cancer-patient husband were about to head out of state with it – she says it was found in South Park: “For the second time, they stole the car, stripped the brake light modulator, then dumped the car. We’re still waiting to hear about the trailer and our belongings. The crooks also stole a family heirloom that was very important to my recently deceased mother.”
1:06 PM: From Bellevue College: Chief Sealth International High School‘s boys-basketball team lost to O’Dea, 67-51. Next game: Auburn on Friday (part of the state tournament). More details on today’s game later.
ADDED: As promised, details, and two video clips, after the jump:Read More
(Saturday night note – another roundup in the works with today’s great photos – editor@westseattleblog.com if you have one to share)
Before we move on to the rest of today’s news, more photos of this morning’s confluence of high tide, north wind, and full moon (thanks to everyone for sharing!) … Above, Cormac captured the seaspray at Alki. Someone else who lives near Alki Point e-mailed to say it was so fierce early this morning, they were getting soaked on the second floor of their building. From a bit more of a distance, David Hutchinson sends this rosy view of the Olympics and a choppy-sea-navigating tugboat:
David reported it was about 34 degrees (before the wind chill!) when he sent that. (added) Later in the morning, Danny McMillin photographed the wave action, with Mount Constance towering overhead:
And how about one more shot of the moonset?
That’s courtesy of Leaf, taken along Beach Drive. If you want to see something close to any of the above again – tomorrow morning just might bring a repeat – except for the part about the gusty wind. The tide will be a bit higher than it was this morning when it peaks just after 6 tomorrow morning; the Sunday forecast looks just as clear as today.
Beautiful moonset this morning – thanks to Lynne for sharing the view, with the Olympics (which are out in all their frosted splendor right now). And late last night, Booker shared a closeup of the full moon that graced the West Seattle sky through the night, including a spectacular moonrise for those facing the Cascades:
As for what’s up today – the full list is on the WSB West Seattle Events calendar as always, but here are a few highlights:
FAMILY FUN – MAGIC SHOW! Family-friendly magic show with Jeff Evans at High Point Community Center (6920 34th SW), 10:30 am, $5 per person.
‘PAINT PAST COAL’ AT ALKI: CoolMom, Sierra Club and others invite you to join in painting a mural during today’s event south of the Alki Bathhouse, 11 am-2 pm, to “highlight the need for a coal-free future for Washington” – event details here.
CAMP LONG ROPES COURSE WORK PARTY: 10 am-1 pm. Organizers say they’ll be “working primarily on removing logs and an old fire circle near cabin 2.” (Here’s the latest on the project.)
NATIVE PLANT SALE: 10 am-3 pm, 3225 47th SW.
HIGH-SCHOOL BASKETBALL: Chief Sealth vs. O’Dea at Bellevue College (map), 11:30 am.
SEATTLE OPERA PREVIEW: 3 singers – all the main characters! – 6:30 pm at The Kenney. (Entertainment 2011 books for sale at $25 also, raising money to pay for the preview events.)
‘SOUL JAMBALAYA’ DENNY FUNDRAISER @ SEALTH: Benefit concert with Total Experience Gospel Choir, Septimus, other groups, in addition to student musicians, organized by Denny International Middle School as a benefit for student musicians’ travel, happening at Chief Sealth International High School Auditorium, 6:45 pm (full details here)
FINAL WEEKEND FOR ‘EMILIE’: Last scheduled evening performance at Arts West at ArtsWest in The Junction (tickets available online
‘THE NEW NEW NEWS’: The play about the changing world of journalism is performed again at 7:30 pm at South Seattle Community College‘s Olympic Hall (details here)
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