Is the Emerald City turning into Kansas? Drought in Seattle has produced some strange phenomena, including this cornstalk growing out of a gutter in Montlake. more ›

Neighborlogs news intern Lucas just posted this story about a couple raising chickens in the Central District--"City code permits up to three domestic fowl in addition to up to three other small animals on single-family lots"--which reminded us that we've also seen a chicken coop in Montlake, of all places! Quel agriculteur! UPDATE: Commenters confirm that chicken coops have been spotted in Wallingford and Ravenna, too. Look, they're cute! more ›

It was too nice a day to spend entirely indoors. (Not that we aren't going to the Ms game tonight, but--okay we were bored.) So we grabbed our camera and slogged across Marsh Island and beyond, past the youth groups, past the college kids sneaking Coors Light in the great outdoors. Montlake was humid and alive with summering wildlife. more ›

• Add this to the traffic sucks--again--column. Eastlakers were fortunate enough to find out this morning that construction crews began work on the Boylston Avenue E street and sidewalk improvements. Work will continue daily (except weekends) till Friday, June 26.
• The Montlake home of Daphne Tomchak has been left in shambles--$18,000 worth of damages--after funding ran out mid-shoot for the Hollywood movie types who used and abused her home for the film.

SDOT has issued a traffic advisory that lasts from noon to 6 p.m. and also announced that Montlake Boulevard will be closed from 1:30 to 5:30 p.m., so getting from say eight-tenths of the city to the University Village to buy flip flops and $8,000 patio ensembles will basically end for the day. That’s okay. Those attending the graduation will take up all the Village parking spaces anyway. more ›

It turns out that it's not such a good thing to be a PC if you want to be prepared for disaster. At the Montlake Community Club disaster and crime preparedness fair last night, representatives from the Seattle Police Department, Animal Control, and the Red Cross were there for presentations and to answer questions. The Red Cross presentation, given by a young AmeriCorps volunteer, was set to be a riveting, 60-minute, all-you-need-to-know showcase about disaster response. Trouble was she couldn’t get the PowerPoint presentation to load. "Are you a Mac or a PC?" yelled some wag in attendance. "I’m a Mac at home, but I had to use the agency’s PC, and it’s got some kind of virus," replied the volunteer. She thought about that a moment and added, "I guess I wasn’t prepared for this disaster." more ›

Some Montlake residents had fetch their mail from the Union Street post office early this week because of a dog with mail issues. Turns out, the USPS stopped delivering the mail to the entire block due one family's dog on the loose. The carrier, who has warned the family about their dog's behavior several times over the past two years--and fined them--finally went postal nuclear by alerting the postmaster, who promptly put the whole block on “Dog Hold.” It's a draconian response to the timeless battle between dogs and mailmen--is the assumption that the mail-less neighbors will grab the pitchforks and torches and rush over to ensure compliance? We're not sure, but since no one on the block knew why their mail had stopped coming, we think we see a flaw in this strategy. more ›

Construction alert! We've got it all right here. more ›