Wanna know what happened in Seattle's various neighborhoods? Here is our weekly collection of items as they were discussed by the blogs from those neighborhoods. more ›

What's cooking around the State today? A university behaving badly, a goalie goes shopping, and a fire is rumbling down south. What a week! more ›

We've been mesmerized by the pure insanity of what's happening in London over the last few days. It was brought to our attention by a single Tweet from The Givers and since that time, the story seems to fall deeper and deeper into the ludicrous. more ›

Apparently, two weeks of dry-ish weather is all it takes to put King County into the realm of critical fire danger. more ›

Some day, you may find yourself on a beautiful farm, in a wide open field with 500 others and 20 chefs, and more cooked meat than you can possibly eat. And you may ask yourself, “How did I get here?”, the answer is Tamara Murphy. more ›

Our City Council knows what it wants and asks for it: late-night drinking. Meanwhile King County Council can't even get all its members in the same room at the same time. And not even three alarms can stop a wedding, all in today's Headlines. more ›

If you overdid it a little on the Fourth of July, you're not alone. Between the personal harm and the property damage, this weekend racked it up for quite a few area residences and businesses. more ›

News on land and sea, including the retirement of Sam Reed, a suspicious blaze, a new addition to the ferry family, and physical restraints for Isaiah Kalebu, who can't seem to restrain himself. more ›

Friday's news: a big blaze, some warm weather (and a hot story about a weather man), plus some new leads to a couple of cold cases. more ›

"STEAM LIKE FIRE" by ELLIOT NORWOOD from the Seattlest flickr pool. more ›

Phinneywood says that those three Greenwood fires in the last two days were set by an arsonist. And so was an earlier fire on June 19, which brings the total to four. Yesterday's fire was the first that involved an injury--a 50-year-old man was burned. Read all about the arson investigation on the SFD's Fire Line. If you see an arsonist, remember to call the Arson Alarm Hotline number at 1-800-55-ARSON. more ›

This morning around 2 a.m. a deadly fire broke out in a University Place home, killing 61-year-old Rachel Kalebu and J.J. Jones, formally John Eddie Jones, a New York Jets quarterback during the 1970s. Fire crews reported finding the bodies in different levels of the home--Jones had rented the basement--after the intense flames were extinguished. Suspiciously, the fire occurred a day after a restraining order was filed against Kalebu's 23-year-old nephew. Police have since taken the nephew into custody, and he is now being questioned in connection with the fatal fire. more ›

June 6, 1889: Seattle aped "world-class cities" such as Chicago, London, Boston, and Peshtigo, WI, by losing our entire downtown to a fire. more ›

We're just trying to imagine how police will go about investigating this morning's fire at the 10500 block of Midvale Avenue N (just off Aurora, near N Northgate Way). The SPD Blotter reports that the fire, which began at 4 a.m., was the result of an accelerant being "sprayed on and underneath" the victim's front door. No one was injured. more ›

In the bus tunnel, at least, where there's smoke there's not always fire. In fact, there may not even be smoke, as KIRO reports: "Tunnel traffic was rerouted to surface streets and the entrances were closed, but no fire was found, said Linda Thielke of Metro Transit." Doesn't sound like commuters were told why their routes were disrupted, so if you're curious, now you know. A tipster tells us: "Our 550 was just exiting the tunnel around 7:30 a.m. when the dispatcher announced over the driver's headset that the tunnel was closing and all tunnel bus drivers need to take the surface streets. (Our bus was full of sleepy commuters and was pretty quiet so I totally eavesdropped). At this point, our driver made some comment along the lines of 'good thing we just missed it'." more ›

"Engulfed" by Aditya Grandhi
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At 10:37 this morning, multiple fire units responded to a fire at 12712 Lake City Way Northeast, according to Real-Time 911. What's notable about that, according to our gumshoe Twitter tipster, is that that's the address of the business consulting firm run by Joel Hodgell, a local anti-spam activist. Back in 2002, Hodgell made news for taking a Florida spammer to court, where he not only didn't see justice done, but was hit with almost $7,000 in legal fees. If he's kept fighting the good fight, we wonder if any spammers have upped the ante beyond legal fees. UPDATE: "The minor fire was caused by food on the stove, department spokeswoman Helen Fitzpatrick said," reports the 911 Blog, undercutting our groundless speculation about spammer arsonists seeking payback. more ›

According to the Times, a guy set himself on fire over in Red Square at the University of Washington this afternoon! He is still alive, 61 years of age, and not on fire anymore. Authorities haven't figured out why he did it, though they found a lab coat and a pair of goggles on the ground by him and it has been determined that he soaked himself in gasoline beforehand. Update: He died later this afternoon. Thanks to Wesa for the new info. more ›

The Medical Examiner's office now says that the lone hold-out who died in the Marion Apartments fire, Ed Jackson, shot himself in the head. We'd been wondering about that ever since CHS mentioned yesterday that a gun had been found at the scene. It's beginning to seem likely that Jackson, a former apartment manager there, set the fire himself on the morning he was due to be evicted, then committed suicide. The Marion Apartments were going to be demolished and the lot developed. more ›

So reports the Seattle 911 blog: "Late Monday, investigators said the blaze was deliberately set when 'combustible materials' were lit in a first-floor apartment." The resulting fire killed the building's last tenant, Ed Jackson, 89, on the day he was scheduled to move or be evicted. Commenter Jesse said yesterday the timing of this fire sounded fishy. Looks like he was right. The P-I has more details on the Capitol Hill fire here. more ›

The news about this morning's fire just got grimmer: the P-I reports an elderly man, the last tenant of the apartment building scheduled for destruction, has died before he could even make it to the hospital. The man, in his 80s, was supposed to move out today or face eviction. KING 5 has video of the fire, and a quote from Dennis Saxman, development gadfly, about the victim: "He was having a hard time letting go." more ›

• My Ballard lets all you Ballard-drivers know that a traffic camera has been installed at the busy corner of 15th and Market.
• The Rainier Valley Post reports that Ana Ortega, the principal at Ali Kurose Middle School has resigned in the midst of an SPD investigation into sexual abuse by a teacher's aide at the school.
• Phinneywood is mourning the loss of another Woodland Park Zoo animal. Last week it was a monkey from congestive heart failure; today, a gazelle that died after being attacked by another animal in the African Savannah exhibit. (The lions are pleading the 5th.)

Seattle City Hall was evacuated this morning because of a minor fire. A fluorescent light on the second floor caught on fire, causing embers to shower on nearby desks. City Hall employees tried to quell the fire with an extinguisher to no avail, so firefighters were called. This is the first fire in the new City Hall building, there was no damage reported. Employees returned to business as usual after a 20 minute evacuation, hopefully getting right back to the really important things, like naked swimmers using public pools and approving more condos. more ›

Popular Science released its list of the 50 Greenest cities in the U.S. recently. Of course, liberal, green Seattle was on it. We came in eighth. It surprised no one at Seattlest HQ, however, that our neighbor to the South, namely Portland, came in first since some of us believe that Portland is better and we all love PDX regardless. more ›

Poets in particular seem to struggle with a bipolar mind, as discussed in Touched with Fire. But perhaps that visibility is just because they're poets, and inclined to make terrific material out of any experience. The new poetry anthology from Eastern Washington University, Living in Storms, shows no let-up to the harsh weather:

Schramm has collected more than a hundred poems by some four-score contemporary poets whose lives have been affected in various ways by bipolar disorder.... more ›

This fall we are combining our love of the football and our dream of learning to cook. On Sunday morning, following a trip to a local farmer's market/major supermarket chain, we will be preparing a meal from the city of the Seahawks opponent. Then at halftime we will throw our badly burned hands in the air and make hot dogs. more ›

We bring you the news as it happens or a little bit later. This was about 3:50pm today: more ›

We're working in a building next to Westlake Center, and just heard about a bajillion emergency vehicles go by. Looking out the window, they're all Fire Dept cars and trucks, and smoke seems to be coming from a construction site next to Pacific Place. Not that horrific billowing clouds of black kind of smoke, but disturbing nonetheless. There must be at least 12 emergency vehicles blocking the street. Anyone in the area know what is going on? (Word to the wise: don't take Lenora Olive home if you work downtown...) more ›

magazine claims, "You can't swing a dead cat this time of year without hitting a Top 10 List." Never one to waste a perfectly good dead cat, we decided to take a swing and create a Top Random-Number Shows Seattlest Saw This Year. And now, without any further ado, here's how your favorite bloggers broke down the year: more ›

Clubs aren't taverns; they don't grow finer with age. It's better to have a steady, sustainable turnaround of clubs and venues. It helps keep the music scene itself from stagnating and compartmentalizing.There's nothing more depressing than a club reaching mythic "legendary" status with 45-year-old, original patrons -- trying to relive old memories -- throwing lecherous glances at the 16-year-old noobs who go there because it's the cool place to be.The best thing that can happen for a club is to close before it gets tired and becomes a caricature of itself. Clubs best live on in the slightly hazy, alcoholic fog of memories of past patrons. more ›