In a city where the weather is conversation topic numero uno, and where geeks rule, it's no surprise that a shake-up in the meteorology scene could cause such the cultural tsunami. News of Cliff Mass's departure from KUOW's Weekday rocked the city, sparking debate about free speech, big media and, of course, the weather. His presence on public radio has been sorely missed, but all you weather fanatics get pumped: Cliff is coming back! more ›

Frequently, we're the bearers of bad news. Today is not that day. 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 ›

DON'T FORGET THE GROCERIES: Do you have enough marinara sauce for tonight's pasta? Did you remember to make a lunch? How's your milk looking? If you need any type of grocery item today then we strongly recommend that you head to your nearest Whole Foods. And it's not because we think that you need to be shopping exclusively organic (that gets expensive). It's because today 5 percent of sales from all five Puget Sound Whole Foods (Bellevue, Interbay, Redmond, Roosevelt Square, Westlake) will be donated to Lifelong AIDS Alliance to help them feed hungry people with their Chicken Soup Brigade. Lifelong AIDS Alliance's food program feeds hundreds each week with bags of groceries and individualized meals. The meals are an important part of maintaining the health of people living with HIV/AIDS and other life-challenging illnesses. Feed yourself, help feed others. Win-win. more ›

Publicola's ECB reports that, wrapping up a 20-minute KUOW interview, King County Executive candidate Susan Hutchison offered what sounded like a challenge to her rival Dow Constantine: three debates, come and get it. (Constantine was making hay with Hutchison's infrequent public appearances during the primary.) But Dow told Publicola that debate arrangements are already in progress, and talks are ongoing with two TV stations about the logistics. ECB quotes Dow's comeback as: "Is she going to challenge me to a primary election next?" more ›

There will be no special legislative session to take care of lawmaker odds and ends. What kind of fun are our legislators missing out on? more ›

UW atmospheric scientist Cliff Mass became a local internet celebrity seemingly overnight during last year's Snowmageddon, when he was forecasting weather in circles around all the other so-called weathermen. In addition to his blog, he's got a book, The Weather of the Pacific Northwest, that came out last fall. His next lecture, "The Secrets of Northwest Weather Prediction," is tomorrow night at Town Hall (7:30 p.m.). Tickets are $5. more ›

Lowell's APP program might be splitting up along North/South lines. Sable Verity dives into the controversy surrounding KUOW's coverage of one APP student's description of how she was treated in the program. Over at HugeAssCity, it's mourning time once again for the loss of the Ballard Dennys, now that the monstrous development plans for that space have been revealed. Lake City Live did a bad news (frowny face) round-up, and CHS has an interesting piece on what the light rail ride from Capitol Hill to the airport will really look like (eleven stops...!). Reverb has an update on Renton's Jimi Hendrix Foundation involving a comic book character named Captain Strata. Hmm. more ›

At the turn of the year, trivia-and-wordplay show Says You taped four shows at our own Town Hall. Two of those have already aired on KUOW; if our calculations are correct, tonight's show should be the third show taped, a special Seattle-focused edition. Many of the questions have a Seattle theme (including one that'll make EIC-emeritus Seth Kolloen pretty jazzed), and many of the people who submitted the questions were in the audience. This includes us—we contributed one of the words used in their regular bluffing game. We've long had a love-annoyance relationship with the show, which is often clever, sometimes in a typically NPR-ish kind of way, and sometimes indulges in word origin urban legends and zombie rules of grammar. It reminds us a little of hanging out at our parents' cocktail parties, during parlor games, if our parents had been Robert Benchley and Dorothy Parker. If you don't already know what "fumetti" means, tune in tonight at 6:00 on KUOW and see if you can guess. more ›

For those of you interested in why the hell everyone thinks a tunnel is such a hot idea, Gov. Christine Gregoire will be on on KUOW 94.9 FM this afternoon at 1 p.m. She'll (hopefully) have to explain her controversial decision to spend billions on a tunnel that doesn't increase traffic capacity (and decreases for the entire period it's under construction, between 4 and 10 years) while cutting budgets across the state government even as the public need for government services increases. more ›

We're not sure when KUOW started running Marketplace Morning Report at 8:50 every morning instead of the last 10 minutes of Morning Edition. But we heartily approve, since American Public Media's economic coverage knocks the stuffing out of NPR's in-house efforts. We're used to hearing Scott Jagow or Tess Vigeland host the morning version, but the last couple of days we've heard the velvet voice former Seattleite Bill Radke, who last we checked had dropped off the face of the earth since leaving Weekend America. We're not sure if he's a temporary fill-in or a new permanent host--the Marketplace website doesn't list him among the cast and crew. But we're happy to hear him back on the air, even if it's temporary. more ›

Take a little break this afternoon at 2:40 p.m. and turn on KUOW to hear Seattlest Rachael Coyle. She'll be on their Sound Focus program, chatting with Susan Lerner about tips for making a good pie crust. If you're in the pie-making school that buys the pre-made, frozen crusts, you may be able to appreciate what a delicate quest making one from scratch would be. Tune in this afternoon, though, and get a new lease on life...then go make us a pie! more ›

If you haven't listened to Chicago Public Radio's Sound Opinions before, it's a show hosted by two well-respected music critics/dorks (Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot). Each week they have intelligent, candid discussions on popular music. Often, they have guests and these guests perform songs and get chatty with Jim and Greg. more ›

What a glorious morning! The Sonics have won three of five, Edgar Martinez wasn't in the Mitchell Report, we've got a kickin' holiday party to attend tonight. more ›

Yesterday morning, as we were getting ready to leave for work, we heard Deborah Brandt mention to Harmon Shay that "this is the last Monday we'll be doing this together." Yup -- with a week to go, Brandt announced her upcoming departure on air. more ›

Our actual drive time won't change, but it's about to feel shorter. Morning host Deborah Brandt is leaving KUOW in mid-February:

At KUOW, Deborah Brandt, who has been the local host for "Morning Edition" for nine years, is departing in mid-February. Derek Wang, who had been weekend host, will succeed Brandt. Wang, in turn, will be replaced by Jamala Henderson.

When John Moe let us know he was leaving KUOW, our first question was, "What about The Works?" more ›