Photo credit: sniderscion Torontoist spent its week uncovering who was behind mysterious ads for a drug called "Obay" that popped up across the country (Scientology? Frank Shepard Fairey?), first tracing them to an advocacy group called Colleges Ontario and then confirming their suspicions a few days later.Phillyist learned how to put on a puppet show – it's not as easy as you might think!Shanghaiist discovers that the average starting monthly pay for fresh graduates......

The old cliché is that if you eat Chinese food, you’ll be hungry again one hour later. We’re not sure of that, but in reviewing restaurants, we surely want to know what’s enduring one hour, one day, even one week later. Delicious when dining, perhaps, but ultimately fantastic… or forgettable? We’ve been bemoaning the lack of quality Chinese food in Seattle. Aside from a few Szechuan spots, very little is enduring. Dim sum is dull,......

It's been quite a debacle, but last year, Oregon gained on Washington in the diversity column by announcing, come the New Year, same sex couples could enjoy full domestic partnerships. Starting today, gay folks in Oregon get access to 500 rights, like making health care decisions, suing for wrongful death, being buried next to their partner, accessing their partner's death certificate, and obtaining "personal effects from their deceased partner's body." It's absurd that there......

An artist who "used his own blood as ink" is now cops' main suspect in the murder of Shannon Harps. The 29-year-old man was picked up three days after the murder on a parole violation--being drunk on New Year's Eve, the night Harps was murdered. Cops haven't charged him with anything. They interviewed him the night he was arrested because, according to the P-I, a tipster said he "had made statements about the case in......

Motley Fool's unwrapped their crystal balls -- and they don't see good things for some of Seattle's biggest companies. They're "unleashing our venom on some of the stocks that your fellow Fools think will tank in 2008." Three of their worst stocks for 2008: Washington Mutual, Amazon.com, and Starbucks. Jim Mueller's evisceration makes WaMu look like the worst of the trio: There are a lot of questions without any answers, let alone reasonable estimates. *......

Last summer (ah, summer!) we drove down to Portland for their annual Pickathon Roots Music Festival, where we found ourselves exposed to all manner of folkies from Portland and beyond. One of the bands that stole the weekend for us was from Indiana, of all godforsaken places. On Saturday night, Reverend Peyton's Big Damn Band played a show in the barn that seriously blew our mind. Joined by Seattleite Jason Webley, they just played......

Generally after the warm, fuzzy glow of our New Year's hangover wears off, Seattlest is left staring into the abyss of January without much to cling to, except our quickly fading memories of the resolutions we made and the knowledge that tax season is fast approaching. This year we're filing as a newly married, first-time independent contractor who bought a home last year and we're mighty worried. We liked the 1040-EZ we'd grab while dropping......

Brand new year, same familiar venue: Seattlest Trivia returns to the Old Pequliar tonight, with Seattlest James hosting. If you're reading this, you probably know the drill: 5 players per team at most, $5 per team to play, the OP doubles the pot and first place wins a bunch of cash. Signup starts at 7:45, but the real mystery is when tables run out -- claim your spot early! We think this month's quiz is......

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. Seahawks vs Pulled Hogette Sandwiches Preview On Friday night we were continually awoken by the......

Seattle-related only in the sense that we are but a minor gathering within the greater worldwide collection of souls who understand why Radiohead is the greatest band ever. Found this gem on the webs today. Thought it best to share, for those of us who've yet to come across it. It's a video made "for New Year's Eve, 2007" and features Radiohead performing every song from In Rainbows. Speaking of In Rainbows, color us curious.........

We roll out of bed, ready to face a new year of great coffee shops, stellar coffee and hearty roasts. Seattlest welcomes 2008! We head to the newest branch of Fuel Coffee, on Montlake Avenue. We've heard good things about Fuel and we love their graphics, most recently seen by us on a baby's onesie. We enter the Montlake shop and immediately relax. It’s a great space, perfectly laid out to facilitate a morning......

Seattlest hopped over to Fremont last night to experience Kublakai's much-anticipated The Basics release party, featuring not only new material from Kublakai but also sets from Illegitimate Children, Unexpected Arrival, and Phil In The Blank w/ The Oddfellows. (Joseph Average performed, as did Murder Dice, but we must have just missed them.) We lost $20, but left the richer for a solid show, a copy of The Basics, and a couple beers in our belly.......

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. On Wednesday we took our special touch friend to see The Kite Runner. She spent......

Here is a statement overheard when a local brewer was talking to Ralph Olson, owner of Hopunion (A Yakima located supplier of hops to world-wide brewers), as he was getting off a phone call: That's just another person trying to get me to shit hops. Beautiful. Something really has to be up in the world of hops when the man who should have them falling out of every nook and cranny in his house......

It turns out, it wasn't our booze-addled brains: The Seattle Center fireworks display on Monday night was messed up due to a computer program glitch (Y2K strikes 8 years late!). According to the Times: About a minute before midnight, technicians with California-based Pyro Spectaculars realized that the computer program that controlled the display was not going to work, said Mary Bacarella, a spokeswoman for the Space Needle. They rebooted twice, then decided to do......

Just in time for New Year's resolutions, Starbucks added a new word to their ordering lexicon: Skinny Latte. That's official SBUX lingo for "nonfat Latte made with sugar-free syrup." But not everyone's all Cinnamon Dolce with the idea. One New York barista cc'd Starbucks Gossip on her 5-point memo to corporate explaining why she won't be flogging the "skinny platform." Basically: 1) It'll confuse the staff. 2) It'll confuse the customers 3) "Skinny" is......

Seattlest David: What's up, computer? Computer: Good evening, Dave. Everything's running smoothly. And you? Seattlest David: Well, not so great. Can you explain why the bus tunnel's computers weren't working during the busy holiday shopping season? Computer: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that. Seattlest David: Uh, ok, well, actually, looks like everything's fixed now. How about the problem with the New Year's Eve fireworks? Computer: I'm sorry, Dave, I don't have enough......

Of the dozens of New Year's photos in our Flickr pool, we decided to feature this lovely and tranquil shot by Jeff Blucher. Thanks for sharing!......

Happy 2008, Seattle. Hope your morning view of the new year looks something like this. (And not like this.) Many thanks to Culinary Fool for dropping this shot in our Flickr pool.......

Maybe the first thing we should tell you about Striking 12 at CHAC -- besides the SAD tie-in, the rave reviews, or the fact that only 600 people in Seattle will have the chance to see it -- is that you can win half-off tickets to it. A limited number of $15 tickets are being held for those who correctly answer the following trivia question:Name at least one of the bands featured the first year......

A sign inside Fremont's High Dive states that the little bar's maximum occupancy is 98. Saturday night, with Bellingham's The Trucks in the house, it felt more like 398. Good for the band's young ladies, not so good for the claustrophobic. When Seattlest arrived, the Dive was already crowded for opener Black Eyes and Neckties, an appropriately costumed hard-punk outfit. The hyperactive, Seth Rogen-y singer's unintelligible shouting quickly became tiresome and the set--admittedly well-played,......

All of Seattlest will be struggling to remember that Sunday is the day we turn our clocks back one hour. We hope you remember too. Kim is so much of a puppy-lover, that she’s donating her Saturday to the folks at Pasado Safe Haven. She’ll spend Saturday night helping her mandolin player and his girlfriend celebrate their new wood floors. Sunday is dedicated solely to NaNoWriMo. The Cinerama is showing the super-extra-ultra-final cut of Blade......

Is the office slightly quieter today? Were there fewer parents dropping the little ones off at school this morning? Were there a lot more parked cars in certain spots around Wedgwood, Seward Park or Mercer Island? If so, then you noticed Seattle's very low-key signs that Rosh Hashanah or the Jewish New Year is here. Growing up Jewish in New York City, we're always a little surprised when the New Year rolls around in Seattle......

If you have not had the pleasure of trying this wonderful concoction from Big Time Brewing, you should get down to their brewpub on the Ave. as soon as possible. The Old Sol is a wheatwine, similar to a barleywine, but brewed with about 50% wheat malt. This year's batch weighs in at about 11% alcohol, which makes this beer a very nice sipper. The malt is rich and sweet to start out, but......

The first time we saw Kultur Shock, they were opening for Gogol Bordello at Neumo's, and we have to admit, we'd never heard of them. It was an all-ages show, so we were drinking our fill in the Bad Juju lounge next door, until the insane sounds of the band dragged us away from our beers. Quickly we came to regret missing the first half of their set. Kultur Shock is self-described "Balkan punk rock......

The Ides of March is nearly upon us and we just realized that we've made no progress on one of our new year resolutions. We had promised ourselves and the universe that we would compensate for our disappointed idealism and deep-rooted complaintive nature by volunteering some time each month for a good cause. Sitting for an hour at an Obama for President rally doesn't quite fulfill the requirement. The local affiliate of the Hands On......

After some letter-writing and phone calls to the mayor and city council members, vanishing Wallingford crossing flags have been resurrected. During their first appearance, our toddler found them magical. She had recently learned the power of the word “No,” so we anxiously latched onto and encouraged her enthusiam. We said hello and goodbye to the flags as we drove by. At bath time, we sang a song about the flags to the tune of “We......

Recently, a concerned friend directed us to a recipe in the P-I’s “Cook It” section for an easy "stew.” This “stew”, which consists of a lot of things from cans, promises to be not only delicious, but ready in 15 minutes! This is when we got annoyed. You know what's fast and delicious? Grilled cheese. Or an omelette. Stew, however, is by DEFINITION a slow process. We got so indignant that we consulted our OED......

STORIES: Matt "Defective Yeti" Baldwin, one of the 12 funniest people on the Internet, appears with Sean O'Connor at a special A Guide to Visitors event. It's being filmed for the Seattle Channel, it's free, and the organizers point out that the Skylark serves "Tater Tots and mozzarella sticks." 7pm // Skylark Cafe at 3803 Delridge Way SW in West Seattle // free QUEUE: SIFF wants a dry run of crowd-control measures at their new......

Sunday. Usually, a quiet, contemplative day in the Blogosphere. But not here in the Ist-a-Verse. Nonono! Just look below and see all of the wild and crazy stuff our staffs are up to. In Austin, bands are beginning to confirm for SXSW and the rumor mill is up and running. Good thing, too, because we all know how much Austinites love live performances. Austin also found itself in the national spotlight, with Longhorn Legend......