Forbes Magazine must have gotten tired of making the same "Richest People in the World" list, because the magazine has moved on to ranking the "Nation's Most Sinful Cities." In order to do so, Forbes came up with measurable methods to rank the proclivity for each of the seven deadly sins in America's urban populations. (For example to measure the sin of "wrath" the magazine used murder rates for cities.) Of course, you're curious, just......

We’ve been on a mountain bike clinic road trip smörgåsbord, starting in Bellingham a few weeks ago and then cruising through Hood River and ending up this past weekend near our hometown of Salt Lake City, Utah. This past weekend we coached a camp up in Park City, where it was a breezy 92 degrees for our afternoon rides—a temperature that is ridiculous in its own right yet still a respite from the record-setting spree......

Seattlest's AP US History teacher, George Henry, was something of a rabble-rouser at our Salt Lake City high school. At the time, we only barely appreciated that we were getting a hands-on miniature lesson in civil disobedience from the only African-American teacher at the school. What we knew at the time was that when the school board started debating talking about condoms and sex ed, George Henry started one of his lectures by replacing every......

We could hardly contain our blase excitement when we heard that Sound Transit was going to be having a meeting in our neighborhood about not just connections from Rainier Valley for the new light rail link, but also about the Eastside corridor project. Across I-90, turning north: a light rail humming along next to the clotted artery that is currently 405, our commute would be a floating dream, what now takes almost an hour sometimes,......

Cities in other states. Why, during 24 tonight, did Fox 13 news use their "Coming up" commercial break to tell us they have Breaking News about a bunch of people who got shot in a mall in Salt Lake City? (Granted, we're from there, so we care but we don't understand why this is making the Seattle news.) And why are they reporting on their site about a murder-suicide in Philadelphia? Next thing you know,......

We returned to the homeland over the holidays. Lugged skis and snowboards to the land of 3.2 beer, special garments, and the "Greatest Snow on Earth" only to find they had half the snow base compared to what we have here. Everything seemed backwards. We picked up the local weekly, which feels smarmily like Seattle's version as so many do (albeit, sadly, the SLC web version makes the Weakly look divine). And what do people......

Initiative 91 is one answer. We just voted against spending public moneys on sports stadiums. Major League Soccer wants all its teams to play in small, soccer-specific stadiums, but we don't currently have one of those laying around and one would be tough to build in the current environment. Too bad, because those are really cool stadiums that have great atmosphere and look sexy on TV and professional soccer at the highest (American) level would......

Urban travel blog Gridskipper is in the final round of their search for the -iest cities in the world. And in this case, all the -iests are sex-related: By Friday of this week, the world shall unequivocally know which city is the fetishest, which city is the lesbianest, which city is the gayest, which city layeth with the minions, which city is the least-sexiest; which city ye shall call Man and which ye shall call......

The professional team with the world's most talented roster--Beckham, Raul, Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos among them--will play at Qwest August 9th. Real Madrid of Spain will play D.C. United of the MLS (the team of phenom Freddy Adu) in the soccer event of decade in Seattle. Doubtful that all of these players will be in the game. A few might. Real Madrid will also play an exhibition in Salt Lake City as part of a......

Last week we were watching the progress of local adventure racing team, DART-NUUN, at the 2006 Primal Quest in southern Utah. We checked back in on Saturday and oh dear, team member Ryan VanGorder apparently collapsed from heat stroke and had to be airlifted to a hospital in Salt Lake City. Not good, as heat stroke in those conditions has a high fatality rate. Happily, Ryan pulled through--his wife was racing with a different team,......

Seattlest doesn't listen to Christopher Lydon's new radio show, Open Source, as often as we'd like. We rarely have the radio on at 9:00 p.m., but we do download their podcast. But we like to keep an eye on their production blog and suggest-a-show threads. We noticed this morning that they'll be in town next week to attend a new media conference. And they're looking for Seattle-based story ideas: So: what are the burning issues......

Our first film-going experience at Sundance got off to an inauspicious start. There we were, fresh off our flight, catching a film in Salt Lake before heading to the festival proper in Park City. We stood around in the wait list line for the requisite two-plus hours to guarantee we got a seat (once the actual ticket holders got theirs, of course). At long last, we entered the theater and took our seats. The lights......

In our absence from doing anything remotely fun outdoors thanks to this city's attempts to break some 1953 record, we've retreated into full-blown science geekery. After Jared Diamond's Science Series lecture last night left us wanting in the science geek department, we're now on the edge of our seats as NASA's Stardust mission--a collector of dust and ice from the tails of comets--is scheduled to touch down Sunday at a military post outside Salt Lake......

When Seattlest was a wee one of about 5 years, our house was tucked up in the eastern foothills of Salt Lake City, and there wasn't a flat street to be found nearby. One morning when two much older boys went flying down the hill by our house at full tilt on skateboards, we turned to mom and pined for one of our own. Our young body rushed with endorphins merely at the sight of......

It is a dark, ugly secret, but not all of Seattlest hails from our glowing Emerald City. Aye children, tis true. Please don't shun us. This weekend, the Seattlest contingent originally from Utah, all one of us, returns to the motherland. We do this typically once per annum around the holidays, as our beloved parents and various aunts/uncles/cousins still call Salt Lake City home and it is no surprise that the skiing there is pretty......

The Tacoma Rainiers' season is in full swing. Currently they sport a moderately respectable record of 17-20 and are in third place, five games out of first, out of their division’s five teams. Salt Lake leads the pack with a 21-14 record. As Seattlest reported on April 13th, the Rainiers’ hometown arena, Cheney Stadium, still has the feeling of authentic, pre-steroid baseball. However, Seattlest just learned that one of its classic features is, as we......

Seattle, get your green on. Wednesday night at Town Hall the Society for Ecological Restoration Northwest (SERNW) hosts a conversation with Terry Tempest Williams and friends to discuss how nature, cities, and culture can flourish in the 21st century. The Utne Reader named the long admired Utah naturalist and author, Williams, as one of their “Utne 100 Visionaries.” We especially welcome Tempest with open arms as a sign of belated solidarity, remembering October of......