The day’s off to a drizzly start, just like Saturday (sun later?), but there’s plenty to do. INDOORS:There’s a 3 pm matinee performance of “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” (right) by Twelfth Night Productions (WSB sponsor) at West Seattle High School Theater. Tickets are available online at Brown Paper Tickets, in person at Square One Books (WSB sponsor) or at the door … Tonight Alki Arts, the new gallery next to Cactus (2820 Alki SW), celebrates its “one-month anniversary” with a 6-9 pm wine/dessert reception … Sundays are always all-ages night at Skylark Café and Club (WSB sponsor), with three live bands scheduled tonight (listed on the Skylark calendar), starting at 7 … OUTDOORS: Volunteer beach naturalists from the Seattle Aquarium (WSB sponsor) program will be out 9 am-noon at Lincoln and Constellation Parks for one last low-enough-to-see-something tide (-2.0 just after 10 am) … West Seattle Farmers’ Market is 10 am-2 pm, 44th/Alaska; here’s the fresh sheet (from Gravensteins to garlic!) … Highland Park Sunday Market is happening at the HP Improvement Club parking lot again today too, 12th/Holden, 11 am-3 pm (see what’s in store) … And it’s the second day for the Festival of India on Alki, noon-7 pm (presented by Vedic Cultural Center – info here).
Darren in High Point caught a Blue Angels jet on video over his home in the 34th/Findlay area on Saturday, and tipped us via Twitter. For a while in the murky midday, many of us Blue Angels-watchers wondered if they would be able to go up at all, even for the so-called “low show,” but at 1:31 pm, off they went for 40 minutes of flight. This time, we watched from the lot just north of the Boeing Field tower, after two days in the lot to its south; this quick clip shows part of the crowd and also the folks who had the real front-row seat, on the balcony outside (and atop!) the tower itself:
That lot and the one south of the tower are both reachable from turnoffs along East Marginal Way; if you don’t want to watch through chain link and barbed wire, bring a ladder or prepare to sit atop your vehicle! But neither compares to watching from the Museum of Flight itself, where you can snag a spot along the southern fence to watch the pageantry from the maintenance crews prepping the F/A-18s to the pilots’ “walkdown” (check the WSB video by Cliff DesPeaux from Friday for a taste of what it’s like.) As for the performance over Lake Washington – David DeSiga shared this Saturday photo:
If you watch from the lake shore in the official Seafair zone – where you also can see the hydro races and other airshow acts – you’ll need tickets (info online). And one last traffic reminder, the I-90 bridge will again be closed approximately 12:45 pm-2:40 pm, and that invariably slows things up on feeder freeways, particularly northbound I-5 (and in turn, the West Seattle Bridge’s east end getting to I-5). On the downtown waterfront, this is the final day for fleet tours, which are free – the Seafair website has details on those. P.S. One last note – a source who wanted to be anonymous said, “Watch for a BIG airshow surprise between 2-3 pm Sunday.” That would be AFTER the Blue Angels. We’ll see! (8:33 AM:Looks like it’s the 787 … or maybe not a surprise? Seafair’s FB page lists airshow order as “Today’s Boeing Air Show Schedule: 10:00 Opening Ceremony – Sean Tucker, 10:10 USCG H65 SAR, 10:20 Sean Tucker – Challenger, 11:20 HFF – F7 and F8, 11:35 USAF C-17, 11:50 Boeing 787, 12:40 John Klatt, 1:00 USN – F/A 18F, 1:15 Clay Lacy – Lear 24, 1:25 Fat Albert – C130, 1:35 U.S. Navy Blue Angels, 4:15 E/A 18 Fly-Over, …4:20 Sean Tucker – Challenger, 4:35 Tim Weber — Extra 300, 4:50 John Klatt – Staudacher!“)
(Photos courtesy West Seattle Amateur Radio Club)
If you were out on Alki on Saturday and passed the Oldsmobile seen on the left in the photo above, you might have noticed it was no ordinary car: It served as an antenna for the West Seattle Amateur Radio Club, whose members set up a tent at Alki Beach Park, conducting a special operation in honor of the nearby Alki Lighthouse:
(By the tent, that’s Chris [KE7JBF], who we’re told brought the pink box o’ treats from Cupcake Royale [WSB sponsor].) The event’s goal: To “activate” the lighthouse via radio transmissions with the code USA005, in honor of International Lighthouse and Lightship Week (which concluded on Saturday). Club member Steve (K6US) sent the code before the Saturday rain really got going:
They weren’t able to operate from the lighthouse itself, according to club vice president Curt Black (WR5J), because, as an official U.S. Coast Guard installation, “it’s pretty busy during Seafair.” So they’re hoping to set up on its grounds in two weeks, on August 21st. (You can find out more about the club at westseattlearc.com.)
If you’re on Puget Ridge and wondering what all the police action is about, officers are responding to a report of a flipped car in the 5600 block of 21st SW (map), empty after two females were reportedly seen running from the scene.
Here’s our original story from January; then in March, they held a fundraiser at Talarico’s to help them get to their $5,000 goal, the amount required to participate in the climb. Tonight, we can report that not only did they reach their financial goal, but David summitted Mount Rainier on July 24th during Climb for the Cure.
“It was a great feeling … a big relief,” says David.
“C” shared this story, saying it happened about 5:30 pm Friday:
I witnessed a hit and run accident at the corner of California and Myrtle. A red sedan rear-ended a SUV. He then proceeded to back away from the SUV and take off down California! (For the record, there did not appear to be any serious injuries). I pulled over, as did a few other awesome West Seattle-ites, and called 911. As I was describing the event to the 911 operator I realized that the license plate of the sedan had pulled off the car when the criminal pulled away from the SUV! The perpetrator’s plate was lying in the middle of the road! My neighbors and I gave our story to the SPD officers that arrived and hopefully they will be able to catch the guy!
We’ll do our best to find out if they actually did.
By Christian Reyes
University of Washington News Lab
Reporting for West Seattle Blog
Amid summer plans and college applications, Chief Sealth International High School student Molly Freed took a break from her regular life to attend a special conference with her social-studies teacher more than a thousand miles away.
Freed and her teacher, Noah Zeichner, were named Bezos Scholars in mid-April, an honor that only 12 students and 12 educators received across the country. All scholars attended the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado in July.
“I was incredibly excited,” Freed said when describing her reaction when she first heard the news. “I had connected my happiness in general to whether or not I got into the program, so I was relieved that my summer was (going to be) as life-changing as I thought.”
Here’s the official word: West Seattle Outdoor Movies‘ plan to show “Star Trek” tonight is canceled because of rain – there’s no indoor backup. Even if it stopped raining by dusk, it would still be soggy after the all-day rain. “Star Trek” will be rescheduled for Saturday night, August 28th, stretching out the WSOM season beyond the previously scheduled 8/21 end date.
Volunteers, mostly Rotary Club of West Seattle members, converged on Rotary Viewpoint Park (35th/Alaska) in the rain this morning to spruce things up before Tuesday night’s rededication event. Most notable, check out the pole’s new “surroundings” – the flowers that were growing around its base have been removed, replaced by rocks so the pole can be fully seen. Other planting beds in the small park received more-conventional touchups:
Tuesday night’s event is at 5 pm, followed by a no-host celebration in the Golf Course clubhouse down the hill. The pole was reinstalled a week and a half ago.
Update: If the weather doesn’t lift, tonight’s showing of “Star Trek” for West Seattle Outdoor Movies in The Junction is at risk – Lora Lewis from Hotwire Online Coffeehouse (WSB sponsor), your emcee and host for the movies, tells us the “on or off” call will be made at 4:30 pm. If it IS rained out, Lora says it’ll be rescheduled for August 28th (currently, August 21st is the last scheduled movie). We’ll have the latest here at 4:30, as well as on Facebook and Twitter.
We’re just back from Mayor McGinn‘s walking tour of North Delridge, and the photo above is from one of the stops – a work party along Longfellow Creek, with volunteers including Rat City Rollergirls. Other stops included the North Delridge P-Patch – where the mayor talked about budget realities – as well as the Delridge Fresh Food Spot produce stand by Super 24, and the alley behind the starting point (Delridge Library), site of a now-weekly cleanup by nearby residents who got to tell the mayor all about it. He actually spent about 2 hours in the area, with the tour preceded by a half-hour meeting with a small group of local leaders at Pearls coffee shop – as for the tour attendance, it peaked around 20 people (including neighborhood leaders, Department of Neighborhoods director Stella Chao and Neighborhood District Coordinator Ron Angeles, Delridge Neighborhoods Development Association executive director Derek Birnie and several DNDA board members, Camp Long’s Sheila Brown, local uber-advocate/activist/leader Pete Spalding, and Delridge District Council chair Mat McBride, but not counting your co-publishers, the only newspeople on hand). Many more photos and the full story later.
From the WSB West Seattle Events calendar: We previewed both last night, but another quick reminder – you can tour Delridge with Mayor McGinn, starting 10 am from the Neighborhood Services Center at Delridge/Brandon; “Star Trek” is the scheduledWest Seattle Outdoor Movies presentation tonight at dusk in the Hotwire Coffee (WSB sponsor) courtyard, but subject to rainout, so check here/Facebook/Twitter for the show’s status if the weather doesn’t improve. Also, two events happening now: A cleanup at West Seattle Rotary Viewpoint Park to get ready for next Tuesday’s rededication (volunteers welcome, just head over), and a fundraising sale for West Seattle High School‘s football team, till 3 pm in the school parking lot. Other fundraisers today/tonight include a benefit spaghetti dinner for the West Seattle Eagles Auxiliary – all welcome, nonmembers too – 5:30-7 pm – and the breakfast fundraiser happening right now, till 11, at 9800 8th SW for an area family recovering from a fire. What else is up? Calendar’s here.
On assignment for WSB, Cliff DesPeaux‘s video tells the story of our favorite Blue Angels viewing choice – “on the fence” at the Museum of Flight (9404 East Marginal Way S.; map). As you can probably tell from the weather, he was there yesterday. If you decide to go today or Sunday, don’t be last-minute about it – though they didn’t fly Friday till 1:30 pm, which suggests the timetable may be similar this weekend, spots along the fences (both south side by the jets’ “parking” area and east side by the runway) will fill up much sooner. If the main MoF parking lot is full, the Boeing lot across East Marginal should be open for overflow this weekend (unlike weekdays, when workers need it). We watched takeoff, landing and flybys from a lot south of the control tower the past two days; other runway watchers got these great photos:
Above, that’s David DeSiga‘s view of two Blues peeling off shortly after liftoff (different angle from the one we caught in our Friday afternoon report). Next, Susan DuTemple‘s view of Angels support plane “Fat Albert”:
Once again today, the I-90 bridge will close approximately 12:45-2:40 pm for the air show. And if you are going to go watch it on Lake Union, along with the hydroplane races – and/or tour the Seafair fleet docked along Elliott Bay – all the extra info can be found at seafair.com.
Every week, courtesy of Gretchen Montgomery @ Square One Books (WSB sponsor), we get the lists of her independent West Seattle bookstore’s 5 best-sellers in each of 4 key categories:
Hardcover:
1. Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson
2. The Cookbook Collector by Allegra Goodman
3. Queen of the Night by J.A. Jance
4. The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean
5. Glass Rainbow by James Lee Burke
Paperback:
1. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
2. Border Songs by Jim Lynch
3. Starvation Lake by Bryan Gruley
4. Tinker by Paul Harding
5. The Lost City of Z by David Grann
Children/Young Adult:
1. Warriors/Skyclan’s Destiny by Erin Hunter
2. Artemis Fowl #7/The Atlantis Complex by Eoin Colfer
3. Aliens Love Underpants by by Claire Freedman & Ben Cort
4. The Wimpy Kid Movie Diary by Jeff Kinney
5. Big Nate: In a Class by Himself by Lincoln Pierce
Teen:
1. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
2. Pretty Little Liars by Sara Shepard
3. Melting Stones by Tamora Pierce
4. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
5. Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
Square 1 Books is in The Junction – in Jefferson Square.
(WSB photos by Patrick Sand)
After a mostly cloudy day, the golden evening sunshine was a perfect complement to the first of four Outdoor Concerts at The Mount last night. The concertgoers’ soundtrack for The Macarena, above, was courtesy of featured musicians Mariachi Fiesta Mexicana, below:
Next Friday night, it’s Maia Santell & House Blend on stage (free), with jambalaya, burgers, and hot dogs available for dinner (purchase). And for kids – a bouncy house, face painter, and caricature artist. Gates open 5 pm, music at 6. Full 4-week lineup here. (Before Friday arrives, of course, it’ll be the third edition of Summer Concerts at Hiawatha next Thursday night, with Pearl Django and guest vocalist Greta Matassa, 6:30 pm, more info here.)
2 quick food-truck updates to share: Kamala from the fabled Marination Mobile e-mailed to say they will be closing early tomorrow (Saturday) during their regular weekly Saturday stop at 35th/Graham – 1:30 instead of 2 pm. Also, Amy of the new burger truck Buns on Wheels asked us to share the news that they’re now spending most of the weekend at Alki – Friday nights, Saturday all day, Sunday lunch. (We’re checking on exact hours.) They’ve been parking by Alki Auto Repair. Food trucks tend to send last-minute updates via Twitter, so if you want to keep close track of these two, MM is at @curb_cuisine and BoW is at @bunsonwheels.
That’s one of the official trailers for last year’s “Star Trek” movie, which is tomorrow night’s big feature at West Seattle Outdoor Movies (co-sponsored by WSB) in the courtyard next to Hotwire Online Coffeehouse (WSB sponsor). There’s music before the movie, Dream Date with Paul Fischer, “performing his original pop songs with the help of Steve Moore,” according to Hotwire’s Lora Lewis. Featured sponsors for the night: Martha L. Davis, Highline Therapy Services, and West Seattle Music Studio. The movie’s free, but bring a few dollars so you can buy tickets for the raffle benefiting forest-restoring Nature Consortium, with prizes donated by Feedback Lounge (WSB sponsor), Shadowland, Elliott Bay Breweryand Hotwire, and also for concessions, which also are nonprofit fundraisers. The movie’s at dusk – which keeps getting earlier, but you don’t want to show up at the last minute, anyway – the crowd’s usually pretty big; come stake out a spot sooner rather than later. One note: IF it rains or threatens to – there is NO indoor backup this year, so a rainout is possible; if the weather looks dicey, we will have the latest info here on WSB (as well as updates on our Twitter and Facebook pages).
Another longtime West Seattle businessperson has died: Helen Armfield (Williamson, Zaar) Damron, 94, who had lived in West Seattle for almost 80 years and was an active member of the business community for several decades. Her memorial service is set for tomorrow, starting at 1 pm atGrace Church, 10323 28th Avenue SW. In 1966, she and husband Clarence Zaar opened Clarence Zaar Real Estate in The Junction (it now operates under the name Keller Williams Realty). She had worked in the real estate business in West Seattle since 1935, starting out as an errand runner for E.H. Savage Realty. Helen was a 1932 graduate of West Seattle High School; her family moved to Seattle from LaCrosse, Washington, in 1931, so that her father could seek work. Read on for more about her:Read More
Five West Seattle Crime Watch reports this afternoon – starting with a theft that netted loot whose owners are hoping they’ll somehow get it back. They signed themselves “Disappointed in Alki“:
We live in Alki on Halleck Ave. SW just off 53 Avenue [map]. Sometime in the past 24 hours we had a few things stolen from the steps of our front porch. Now, it may sound insignificant but along with a few pots with herbs in them a small Indian statue was stole which has HUGE sentimental value to us. I’m guessing it was just kids being stupid but the fact that someone walked up our steps, were literally at our front door and stole something that that is very special to us and cannot be replaced feels awful and breaks our hearts. If this is posted and by chance the person who took is reading this post, can you do the right thing? Can you please bring back our little Indian sculpture… no questions asked, we promise, you would not believe how important it is to us. We have always felt so safe and comfortable in our little home on a dead end road, this is a sad wake-up call.
(In case you see something – we verified, that’s “Indian” as in South Asia, not as in Native American.) Four more reports ahead:Read More
ORIGINAL 1:59 PM REPORT: Clouds don’t keep the Blue Angels down, assuming the ceiling isn’t too low – so the Navy’s aerial-demonstration team is up right now over Lake Washington (and points beyond) for its “practice show,” before the “real” ones tomorrow and Sunday. As is usually the case, we’re at Boeing Field to watch the takeoff/landing, and whatever’s visible inbetween (more than you might suspect). Our current location south of the Boeing Field tower on the west side of BFI is close to where the jets lift off after taxiing away from the Museum of Flight further south, and while 1-4 took off in formation northbound, 5 and 6 peeled away almost immediately, and that’s how our iPhone – lens poked through opening in the chain-link, barb-wire-topped fence – caught the shot you see above. Reminder that the I-90 bridge is closed until they’re done, 2:45 or so. More later! 2:17 PM UPDATE: The Blue Angels have landed. For our fellow timeline fans, they were up approximately 1:33 pm-2:12 pm. (Other air-show acts are resuming their practices – like the gray fighter jet that just took off.)
ADDED 5:28 PM: One of the not-so-celebrated-but-memorable aspects of Blue Angels-watching involves their support plane, the C-130 known as “Fat Albert.” It goes up to scope things out before the six jets practice/perform; then it usually thrills the Boeing Field/Museum of Flight crowd with flybys and an extra-steep landing. Then, if you watch by the runway, you see “Fat Albert” taxi back with a crew member poking her/his head out of a top hatch, waving a flag. Today, look who was seen from the hatch:
Thanks to David DeSiga for the photo. ADDED EARLY SATURDAY: A different angle, from Jim Clark:
In case you don’t regularly check the WSB Forums – which are close to the 100,000-post mark after 2 1/2 years in existence – we like to mention what’s going on in there from time to time – they’ve been particularly busy lately, and you’re welcome to join the discussion OR start one of your own. Today, for example, the Target political-donation controversy has sparked talk of a boycott, and longtime WSB Forums member JoB declared she would deliver her boycott notice to Westwood Village Target today. Also, you are also welcome to publish yard/garage-sale notices for free in the Freebies/Deals/Sales section, and a quick check reveals more than a few in the works for this weekend. Lots more going on – like the rest of WSB, the Forums are in business 24/7/365 – start here.
For the second consecutive Saturday, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn will visit West Seattle tomorrow – not for an event this time (he was here last Saturday to help celebrate the Camp Long Lodge reopening), but to find out more about our area, specifically the Delridge neighborhood. His tour guide: Ron Angeles, Delridge Neighborhood District Coordinator for the Department of Neighborhoods and longtime West Seattleite; the tour starts at Ron’s HQ, the Neighborhood Services Center in the same building as the Delridge Library (5405 Delridge Way), 10 am tomorrow, and will end about an hour and a quarter later at the Delridge P-Patch – all welcome – one of the first stops will be the Clean Greens produce-sales stand alongside Super 24, which is open 10 am-6 pm every Friday and Saturday this summer.
… and they’re asking for feedback. We spotted this about a week after its recent “soft launch”; now DNDA executive director Derek Birnie has published an item on the Delridge Grassroots Leadership site (one of 100+ featured on the WSB “Blogs” page) asking for feedback on the new dnda.org format, which offers more aggregation of Delridge-area news/info from multiple sources, as well as a bolder look at what DNDA itself is up to. Check out the revamped website here.
There’s a 3 pm matinee performance of “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” (right) by 
Since January, we’ve been following the story of Lisa Town, diagnosed with breast cancer at age 43, and her husband David Town, who committed to participating in this year’s 
Amid summer plans and college applications, 
Another longtime West Seattle businessperson has died: Helen Armfield (Williamson, Zaar) Damron, 94, who had lived in West Seattle for almost 80 years and was an active member of the business community for several decades. Her memorial service is set for tomorrow, starting at 1 pm at 
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