Cendant CEO and Starbucks employee to wed(!).
Poverty, Pension Fears Drive Japan’s Elderly Citizens to Crime.
Obese have right to two airline seats, in Canada.
Shoes for graphic designers, in certified PANTONE color. (pantone/seavees0963)
It’s a boy! Party like it’s 1873
Please welcome Dylan James Ortlieb, born 10:35am, 8lb 1oz 20″ long.
The Seattle P-I blog says current market woes are closer to the Panic of 1873 rather than the Great Depression.
A double-dose of The Stranger
I normally just skim our alt-weekly The Stranger, but this week provided two must-read articles: one person’s perspective on the economic slowdown, called United States of Anxiety, and a book review of Steven Seagal’s filmography and discography, relived in order of release.
Humanity is not dead in “Wall-E,” but it is in peril. The world’s population cruises the heavens ceaselessly on a mammoth luxury spaceship that it boarded in the early 22nd century after the planet became uninhabitable. For government, there is a global corporation called Buy N Large, which keeps the public wired to umpteenth-generation iPods and addicted to a diet of supersized liquefied fast food and instantly obsolete products. The people are too bloated to walk — they float around on motorized Barcaloungers — but they are happy shoppers. A billboard on the moon heralds a Buy N Large outlet mall “coming soon,” not far from that spot where back in the day of “Hello, Dolly!” idealistic Americans once placed a flag.
from the Frank Rich column, “Wall-E for President“
Denny’s: to go; Borat’s mankini: “Success!”
Developers: infinity, Preservation of sentimentality: 0.
And in the interest of balance (Warning: disturbing photos of callout below can be found here):
FROM the beaches of Kazakhstan to the catwalks of Milan, the mankini has finally found its way into high fashion.
In an outfit that can only owe its inspiration to the male one-piece swimsuit worn by the Sacha Baron Cohen character Borat, British designer Alexander McQueen sent this brave male model to front the crowds for Milan Fashion Week.
Guaranteed never to let the wearer down, the original mankini made its debut in the movie Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation Of Kazakhstan.
The mankini was a low point of the male collections, which included Donatella Versace dedicating her collection to US presidential hopeful Barack Obama, Giorgio Armani presenting jackets and suits, and Dolce & Gabbana unveiling pin-stripe suits as loose and easy as silk pajamas.
Deadnny’s
Gone in a flash, the Denny’s/Mannings at 15th and Market. Next target of mass destruction: The Sunset. Maybe they’ll run a memorial skybridge between the two properties to remind us of when Ballard was quirky and valued historical significance? Uff don’t.
Battle in Seattle: opening night at SIFF
Tracy and I went to opening night at SIFF to catch the Stuart Townsend movie, “Battle in Seattle”. It was… okay, but like many in the audience, I was there when the WTO protests happened, and it was a bit strange to see a semi-fictionalized version of the events on screen. Andre Benjamin (from Outkast) was the runaway hit, though — while Woody Harrelson, Charlize Theron (with a completely unnecessary-to-the-plot pregnancy-with-horrible-end subplot) and the script playing distant second. Ray Liotta was completely miscast as the Mayor of Seattle, as was the actor who played the Governor. There was also an unnerving disconnect between real-world footage and the film’s footage, which made me wonder that a straight documentary would have the better solution.
It wasn’t all bad, though — apart from Benjamin’s performance, the fight scenes were very spot on, and Townsend worked with people involved on both sides of the WTO protests to help build a story.
BUT, the best account I’ve seen from any of these films is Showdown in Seattle: Five Days That Shook the WTO. On VHS, though.
$10 a gallon gas? Geo is the new Prius.
An MSN article asks, “What if gas cost $10 a gallon?”
Snacks should be readily available for crews cleaning up an overturned tractor trailer 50 miles south of Chicago on Interstate 80. The rig in question was hauling fourteen tons of Oreo cookies, and when it tipped, the trailer’s roof ripped open, spilling cases of the cookies onto the median.
Disclosure about the following link: I had a 1993 Geo Tracker, and it got 28mpg for a 4×4, but I’d have kept it if I would have known you could get $7,300 for it today, for people wanting a more cost-effective car than a Prius.
Sunset Bowl closed
Mannings, not Denny’s
Denny’s isn’t worth saving, but Mannings Cafeteria should be preserved — lovely shot from the Ballard News Tribune.
And an architect in the P-I shows how the developers can merge both old and new.
Denny’s compromise
Artist’s sketch to save Denny’s, the Sunset Bowl, and add some condos! from hugeasscity.
