Well, it's a sad day for Tully's loyalists in Queen Anne: the Boston & Queen Anne Ave location is closed! According to our (much appreciated) tipper Landon, the windows are covered up and a sign reads, "Thank you for your years of service." There are three coffee shops within spitting range of the bygone Tully's, so it's not like QAers are sunk for expensive caffeine. One of those coffee shops is a Peet's, which we......

If parking lots designed parks they would all look like the new Counterbalance pit at the base of Queen Anne. Generally the park functions as an outdoor place for recreational activities or offers an aesthetically pleasing open space to relax or stroll. Counterbalance Park does neither. That isn’t to say it breaks the conventional mold of how we define the modern park because it doesn’t do anything at all. Deemed an “Urban Oasis” by......

Despite early afternoon plans to consume diabetes-defying amounts of truffles and other treats at the Seattle Luxury Chocolate Salon (resulting in a complete chocolate coma), Seattlest remained committed to the weekly "Dishin'" review and reported to Boat Street Café for brunch yesterday. We hadn’t been to Boat Street since back in the days when it was located on, well, Boat Street. Now in a unique location on lower Queen Anne, the café remains a......

Some guy at a bar last night told Seattlest that some friends of his got city approval for a public art prank in Queen Anne yesterday. He said that they set up some bogus construction site with a big painting of the city skyline obstructed by a new tram to take Queen Anne residents in to downtown. The painting supposedly listed the cell phone number of one of the pranksters. Guess we can expect an......

"Awaiting the Fireworks" by ADHD Independence Day in Seattle was a cloudy affair. Several people commented to us that they weren't even going to bother with the fireworks, because it was too overcast for the display to be worthwhile. Just before sundown, though, the sky moved off. We turned the corner along the Burke on our way to Gasworks Park, and there was the city, across the water, in all its reflective glory. Buildings casting......

Upper Queen Anne finally has a good bagel shop pho joint chocolate shop. With all the chocolate options around the city, Seattle’s becoming a bit of a chocolopolis. And now you can visit a real Chocolopolis. Chocolopolis isn’t exactly new. The online site sells over 200 artisan bars. But in speaking with founder Lauren Adler, it was clear that she was excited to go brick-and-mortar—anxious to interact with customers in person and to share......

TODAY IS WORLD REFUGEE DAY! The International Rescue Committee is hosting a benefit night of poetry, music, dance and crafts from our local refugee community at the Seattle Center, and John Hilde's Made In China (a documentary about his father's childhood in pre-WWII China) is screening at the NWFF with proceeds going to Mercy Corps' work in the devastated Sichuan province of China. Be a good neighbor and enjoy these artsy celebrations of diversity and......

The weather, it just gets worse. Hoping for summer? Keep hope alive! Remember spring? Surely, we must have had one. (Missed it last year; we were in the bathroom.) Wait, a dim memory: a vague recollection of a spring-like afternoon last week. It comes back to us now. We were on upper Queen Anne. A whole street of yellow blossoms catches our eye. Goldenchain, they call those trees, don't they? Laburnum, in the garden store.......

We love a good drink special, so imagine our delight when we came across a full-page ad in the Weekly for a big ol' happy hour next Wednesday. Join us for a special Seattle Weekly Happy Hour on June 4, when three dozen bars extend their specials to celebrate the release of our new Seattle Weekly Happy Hour Guide! Come celebrate and pick up a copy of your own! Sure, it's a Weekly-sponsored event......

With Memorial Day weekend approaching, the weather warming (sort of), and boats a-sailing, it’s time to think about eating outdoors. We’ve got lots of gorgeous places to gorge, but few are finer than Ponti Seafood Grill. Ponti offers two outdoor patios where you can watch the boats go by as they make their way below the Fremont and Aurora bridges. We recommend a reservation now if you’d like to enjoy the view while at......

A Seattle-area man whose identity had been stumping the FBI has been identified with the help of his parents. The 52-year-old man had been arrested two weeks ago by federal authorities on charges of identity theft and fraud. The government had not been able to identify the man, who had been known to use over 30 aliases, because he had burned the tips of his fingers to alter his prints. The man who had......

The second-longest serving member of the Washington House of Representatives, Helen Sommers, is retiring at the end of the current session, according to Crosscut. The second-longest-serving member of the Washington Legislature has confirmed she will not run for re-election. “This is my last session. I’m not going to run again.” Asked why, she laughed and said: “Because I’m 75 years old and I’ll be 76 in a couple weeks. That’s why.” She's been in the......

Since his car was stolen, Eric Schoenlerber had been taking the bus to get around. This morning while riding the bus to work, he spotted a very familiar car in a 7-11 parking lot--his car. Schoenlerber got off the bus and called police, who responded to the location on lower Queen Anne. Despite three police cars boxing in the stolen vehicle, the suspects broke through the barricade and headed against traffic down Fourth Avenue.......

During tomorrow night's three hour nation-wide Starbucks closure, local coffee shop Caffe Vita will be giving away free coffee and espresso drinks. Yes coffee fiends of Seattle--so that's basically all of you--that's good free coffee, just because the big chain that you feel slightly embarrassed about going to is closed. Lovely! Caffe Vita makes fabulous coffee at locations on Queen Anne, Capitol Hill, Fremont, Seward Park, and south of us in the state capitol,......

The local deliciousness that is Top Pot Doughnuts has opened a new neighborhood location. Queen Anne has been blessed (truly) with the fourth installation of the local doughnut and coffee shop. The new location had its grand opening this week, with hopes to create a whole new neighborhood of Feather Boa addicts. The new Top Pot is located at 325 Galer Street and is open 7 days a week to satisfy your Homer Simpson-like......

The saying goes, lightning never strikes twice. But what about house fires? A home on Queen Anne caught fire twice this holiday weekend, once on Sunday night and once today. Firefighters were called to the single-family home on Sunday, after some chemicals improperly stored under the back porch, accidentally caught fire. Today firefighters must have felt a sense of deja vu when responding to the same home for a fire in the attic. Today's......

We googled this guy to see if there's any more information about him available, but all we can find are reprints of this same missing persons poster, which has been emailed to Seattlest several times today. It sounds like he's a father of two, a member of Mars Hill Church, and he works on Queen Anne. He apparently called his wife to let her know he was on his way home, but then he......

So this gent orders the lasagna at the Capitol Hill Via Tribunali last week and LOVES it. Oh, says the waitress, we buy that from Sorrentino. Dude promptly finds out where Sorrentino is located (top of Queen Anne) and gets over there yesterday afternoon, is amazed to discover it's run by Mamma Enza, whom he met years ago when she was cooking at La Vita è Bella in Belltown. Big hugs all around. That amazing......

In case it doesn't snow too much tonight, or in case you're not too much of a pussy to venture outdoors, head to Queen Anne to network with the organizers of South by Southwest and other like-minded music geek individuals. Join us from 7-9pm on Monday evening, January 28th at Solo Bar in Seattle (200 Roy Street). This is the chance for Pacific Northwest digital creatives to meet with SXSW organizers, as well as......

Photo by FrayLo Sunday, the Times' Danny Westneat had the story of 91-year-old Rose Walter, who was ejected from Von's Cafe on Pike in December because she didn't have her ID. Rose manages an apartment building on Lower Queen Anne--the very apartment building, in fact, that our sister lived in until last summer. She (Rose) is just about the sweetest lady you can imagine, and we provide this anecdote as evidence: Our sister owns a......

On the topic of kaiten sushi, we go, well, round and round. Instant gratification in grabbing dishes upon seating, but hard to know how long they’ve sat on the conveyor belt. A festive feeling, but no natural interaction with the sushi chef. Unlimited gari (pickled ginger), but no self-serve green tea like in Japan. Cheap, but sometimes questionable quality. Since our last experience at Sushi Land in Queen Anne, we’ve wondered why the constant crowds.......

Pecos Pit BBQ is so fucking good it still smells great after sitting in the office garbage can for three hours. Pecos Pit is like the best cocaine in town, you’re willing to drive way out of your way to get it and you won’t balk for a second at the fact there are no accommodations or cute amenities to make the experience feel more complete. There are maybe five things on the menu.......

When the Crocodile Cafe abruptly closed down a month ago, we turned to a friend of ours looking for the inside scoop. Kultur Shock guitarist Val Kiossovski was bar manager down for quite a while (he's now running his own place in Lower Queen Anne, Solo, one of our favorite hangouts), so we figured if anyone knew, he would. Unfortunately, he was busy with problems of his own: rescheduling his band's show. Kultur Shock......

Photo by Tim Willis Thanks, snow. You've got one guy pledging never to take the bus again, and another venting obscenities. Both on LiveJournal. First, the new car convert:In Dec I got a job in the South Lake Union area, close to REI. I live in Greenlake and was busing it into the city everyday ... Today I drove to work because of the weather and fear of bus delays... My trip by car: $5.25......

When we're not blogging about food, wine and opera, Seattlest works as the sommelier at Sorrentino atop Queen Anne. (Keeps us out of the bars, don't you know.) So last night, who comes in but a devoted Seattle Opera volunteer shepherding soprano Nuccia Focile and tenor Antonello Palombi (with wife & adorable kids). Since they weren't drinking anything alcoholic other than a glass of Prosecco, we didn't spend much time at their table. Took a......

Coming home from work on the bus last night, we got to thinking about how even getting to vote on a light-rail package this year is going to be an uphill fight. The dire prospects for light rail anytime soon pushed us to extrapolate the costs to our psyche of waiting during the ride home. First we had to run a few blocks in the rain to catch the 8. While admittedly, we should have......

We spotted an older Volvo sporting a "Nuke Gay Whales for Jesus" bumper sticker turning left onto Mercer Street in front of the newly remodeled Pagliacci on Lower Queen Anne this morning. We would have taken a picture but we were too busy shitting ourselves at the sight of the sticker to pull it together. Apologies all around.......

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. Grits with Ham and Homemade Applesauce preview Rarely do we think, “I really......

1997: in January, Bill Clinton was sworn in for a second term; in August, Princess Diana was killed in a car crash; and a film about a shipwreck, Titanic, was the top-grossing movie. In the vineyards of the Old World, springtime came early, summer was hot, and the harvest was wet. The wine gurus and the voodoo sages swirled and tasted, ruminated and spat. Bah, they said, don't bother. Bah, said Parker. Bah, said Tanzer.......

They buzz, they flit, they fly. They dart, they dash, they zip. Ethan Stowell putt-putts from Union (downtown) to Tavolata (Belltown) to Wolf (Queen Anne). Corino Bonjrada bounces from La Vita e Bella (Belltown) to Mondello (Magnolia). Jim Drohman shuttles between Le Pichet (Belltown/Market) to Café Presse (First Hill/Madison). Scott Staples hops from Zoë (Belltown) to Quinn's (Capitol Hill). Josef Jimenez doesn't ride himself but sends his cooks on a scooter--a Honda, not a......