Liberty Tax Service

This isn't a picture from Seattle, but it IS a picture of the Liberty Tax Service mascot, representing the replacement of some of our fine Queen Anne retail shops up the block from Peso's. The consignment children's clothing store is gone, Monkey Love Rubber Stamps has moved from a smaller shop to a larger one, wiping out the overpriced paperstore off the block and the sweet boutique filled with purses, kama sutra products and cute clothes for skinny women is gone as well. I will miss the smiling face of that store manager, she was always very sweet.

Now, Liberty Tax Service has swooped in. I wonder if we'll see a cheesy mascot of theirs roaming the street in a few weeks. Take a look at flicker (search keywords: liberty, tax) and be afraid. I wouldn't want to see Lady Liberty drunk stumbling out of Chopstix.

Mirabeau Room CLOSED

That's right. The doors have shut and the Mirabeau Room is closed. I hope a buyer will pick it up soon... I love the remodel they did on that place.

You will be missed.

What I Like About You OR Try Not to be Negative

With work and moving (due to condo conversion? Yes, you guessed right!), I have not been able to take advantage of the good (and bad) bars that Uptown has to offer.
Queen Anne is not as much the destination nightclub area as, say it's neighbors, Belltown, Fremont or Ballard. But, there are many places to get your drink on. I have lived in this area over 4 years now, so I tend to see only the negative in the bar life, but herein lies my challenge.
The bars of uptown I've been to, and at least one good thing about each:

Jabu's Pub: one night of the week, they have $0.25 PBR night, until the keg is empty. Pool, cute (Stephanie?) behind the bar. Kick ass happy hour

Floyd's Place: see previous entries. Ignore the negative comments.

Ozzie's: (reach for it...)...actually this is a good place to get your drink on outdoors (the roof!), but now that it grows colder...a good place to go if you need some attention

Melting Pot: great happy hour...chocolate fondue? that sounds like foreplay to me!

The Sitting Room: warm, cosy ambiance and good wine.

T.S.McHughs: a wall of liquor to stare at while you drink some

Racha: late night happy hour and good thai food, mmm!!

Mojito's: dancing, live music,

Moxie's: great, if you're my parents

Ten Mercer: great if you're a bit boring or need a little more light than the sitting room to feel comfortable

Streamliner: darts and beer, can't beat it with a stick

Mr. Lucky's: that it's closed (it is still closed, isn't it?)

Chopstix: friendly wait staff, sing along without getting TOO much attention

Peso's: a great way to remind yourself that in comparison your life DOES have substance...but that's just some of the nightlife crowd. In general: some of the best brunch around

Caffe Lladros: great for foam and non-alcoholic drinks

Mirabeau room: love the nights, the drinks, the atmosphere, the music. AND they dropped their silly mid-week covers!

Mecca: an uptown landmark

Condo conversion

I'm afraid that many uptown folk have recently been uprooted and replaced to other seattle areas because of the recent movement of condo conversions. Tenents in apartments across the city are having to relocate due to their apartment owners selling the property to become high-end living establishments. S & I recently moved from the 5th N. & Mercer area to the lower Queen Anne area along 4th Avenue West. We got lucky - as many apartments continue kicking tennents out by the dozens while creating a lack of housing all at the same time.

Drain, Bite of Seattle,

Drain, Seattle Center, Bite of Seattle, Seattle, WA
Originally uploaded by djwudi.

"Drain"-ed is exactly what many of us felt this weekend with the insane heat that the rest of the nation has had to suffer these last weeks. I'm guessing the attendance to the Bite of Seattle was lower than previous years, as moving and being in the sun seemed like too much effort to many of us.

Monkey Love Rubber Stamps

Monkey Love Rubber Stamps
Originally uploaded by justinbaeder.

A small boutique next to Peso's on Queen Anne Avenue has closed and much to my surprise, Monkey Love Rubber Stamps (a small hole in the wall store selling rubber stamps) is EXPANDING into that space as well. IS there really this large of a demand for a variety of stamps in this world? I do love this store - the woman who owns or manages it was quite helpful a few xmases ago with advice on how to make my cards extra special.
It just surprised me to see such a great piece of property be used for arts and crafts products.

I must admit I was not sad to see Paperspace disappear, taking their overpriced paper cards and merchandise with them.

4th of July at Myrtle Edwards

Nearing Sunset
Originally uploaded by Sean Glenn.

We walked to Myrtle Edwards after a great bbq party with a view of Alki and the sound. The weather was a bit finicky so we waited until a light drizzle of rain passed and then walked down around 6:30pm. We were thinking we would be too late to get a good spot, but the park was relativley sparse. The "4th of Jul-Ivar's" seems to have lost a lot of it's funding, as there were no Elephant Ears (or any food for that matter) or entertainment. There was actually no one around us with music playing - so the fireworks display went unaccompanied. It was a great show, however, the design of the pyrotechnics was very nice - not too over the top and full of the gold/silver sparkling ones that are my favorite. Very low key in comparison to years that have passed.

I heard WAMU's 4th at Gasworks was shoulder to shoulder packed, so it was nice to have space to spread out and enjoy the night.

Beautiful sky and sunset delighted us as we waited for dusk...what a fantastic picture Sean took, seen here.

The park is currently undergoing some construction, which made the walk out a bit stop and go and time consuming. The entrance being right near the train track intersection made it take a while as well, which I guess couldn't have been helped. I imagine it took a lot longer getting out of Gasworks!

Here's to celebrating the freedom we have and another day gone by without a missle being successfully fired at us.

Pride Continued

Dance Floor
Originally uploaded by Charolem.

I hear Queer Fest on the hill was a "protest" to having it moved from Capitol Hill to the center. What?! Why protest the move of a festival that is GROWING in popularity because of more "out" members of its community and more tolerance? Isn't the point of PRIDE to wear your colors proudly? What better way than to get off the safe hill and bring the festival to a place where all major Seattle festivals occur! In any case, Pride saw more attendants than ever before.

Being a booth worker last year and this with The 5th Avenue Theatre, I can tell you the center allows for more visibility. And the fountain was practically like this shot I found on Flickr, except there was a pack of 8 or so people wearing pink wigs to the right of the dome of the International Fountain. My co-worker came back to our booth saying "Go check out the fountain - it's a like a rave or something!"

The parade that S & I caught part of on our voyage to retrieve the car we had forgottenly left in Belltown the night prior was rather tame. It was great to see corporate sponsors like Starbucks come out. But really, any corporation that bypasses marketing to such a large demographic is honestly missing out.

I really enjoyed walking down the streets of Uptown when I did - two married husbands looked at me with a curious "Is SHE a lesbian?" gleam in their eye.

YAY PRIDE. And, hey, when it comes down to it, I'm glad there were heaps of celebrations, marches and after hours parties on the Hill as well as the center, Pioneer Square and surrounding...spread the love.

Seattle Pride

Seattle Pride
Originally uploaded by Homo olympus.

That's right - PRIDE moved to Seattle Center from years up on Capitol Hill. This year the dikes on bikes led both parades - the Pride "out and proud" parade and LGBT "QueerFest" that happened on the hill.

bill & melinda gates building

The Bill & Melinda Gates building will be taking over the block south of Mercer on 5th Avenue N. There's a skate park and basketball court that were originally designed and have been used by the community - these are planned on being demolished to make room for the building. Also, word is that Fun Forest has been bought out of its contract. What will the city replace it with? Undoubtedly something that clashes with the EMP almost as much as the EMP clashes with itself.
Some bet it will be parking, but I'm guessing it will be another tourist attraction.

Pay parking machines

Queen Anne Ave between Roy and Mercer will soon have working pay machines for parking- no more searching around for quarters for the parking meters. It will be interesting to see how much parking costs when you pull over to grab a latte at Café Ladro’s or Peso’s.

Sam's Sushi

No-Frills Standby: When I ate dinner at Sam's Sushi with one of my closest friends we were both stressed out. She seemed unable to talk, I lacked the energy to buoy her spirits. But with certain friends you don't have to try and that is what makes time together restorative. Consider Sam's an old friend—my plate of fish was nondescript, but its freshness was undeniable and elegant, delivered seemingly without effort. The spicy tuna roll ($4.75) is particularly tasty and clear, and Sam's gets extra points for serving the heads of the raw shrimp on the side, deep fried ($4). (521 Queen Anne Ave N, 282-4612, Mon–Fri 11 am–10 pm, Sat noon–10 pm, Sun noon–9 pm.)
- from the Stranger article: Sushi Thrifti

K2, commandments and concrete

Hey there Seattle kids of Queen Anne & beyond...I'm Keridwyn (aka "K2", as not to be confused with the illustrious K of J and/or K fame) - J and K are letting me give this blog a whirl. Consider this my first audition as a member of Uptown Seattle. I got scared off a couple days back, when J and/or K send the following comandments. See my responses below. I encourage all readers, as well as J/K to reply to this - as my opinion is just one of many and this blog should be for the people who live here:

13 neighborhood blog commandments

As we prepare to hand off updates to our old 'hood blog, here are some rules to blog by. We follow most of them though a few are constant temptations.

1. Thou shalt not get off theme. If your theme is your neighborhood, stick to it
Deal.
2. Thou shalt not write cute headlines. Clear first, then clever
While "cute" is an adj. I don't shy away from, but if the clever outweighs the clear, you gotta keep working.
3. Thou shalt make lots of lists and include numbers in your headlines because people like lists and numbers in headlines
clear first, clever next, then numbers, ok?
4. Thou shalt not write about free stuff you score without telling people you scored it for free
Of course - why would I shy from sharing the wealth? I'm not a republican!
5. Thou shalt not write about blogging, your blog, other blogs or any other bloggity-blog related blog topics more than 2x per week
Ok, but i think i should be able to link to relevant blogs as will to help enhance Seattle-blogging-communication, as long as I'm not being redundant. If people want to know about my other blogs, they can just click on my profile. Relevant posts from Drunk in Seattle may be linked here, alright?
6. Thou shalt not write about your personal life more than 2x per year. Though thou shalt find witty ways to slide in personal touches in non-personal posts.
This needs rephrasing. There is no way to keep personal out of experiences I'm reporting on. I'm not going to use this blog to talk about how great and fabulous my friends are, though. Just maybe the great,fabulous or horrific things that affect them in Uptown
7. Thou shalt post at least 6x per week
I'll be getting my own laptop in the next few months (used ibook) - but until then, no promises, as much as i'd like to.
8. If thou goest on vacation for a long timeth, let your readers knoweth
ok
9. Thou shalt count to 10 before posting negative meany-pants stuff (this one is hard!) ok.
10. Thou shalt tag your posts consistently to services like del.icio.us
once i know what this means, I'll reply...
11. Thou shalt either try to keep lists shorter than 10 items or stretch them with silly items like this to go beyond 10 because top 10 lists are over nice.
12. Thou shalt be a stealthy blogger so you may observe your neighborhood in its natural state yes sir/ma'am!
13. Thou shalt check the Slog, Metroblogging and Seattlest before posting to make sure thou are not redundant ok.I'm not doing that now, but I think we're safe.


What do you say?

On a seperate note, AMEN to Queen Anne Ave between Roy and Mercer being such a different world now than a few weeks back. No longer will we have to drive and walk over ripped up pavement with metal spikes protruding as we round the corner from Lladro's. Peso's must be very happy to have their world back in order.
-K2

Uptown's last post

New places, new posts. Turns out, the best, easiest solution for what to do with our neighborhood blog is to leave it behind and wish it the best of luck. We won't be updating Uptown after this post -- we've moved up to Capitol Hill. You can follow along here if you're interested.

Meanwhile, the brilliant posts from this blog will just drift along and gum up Google for a few hundred years. To the future, we apologize.

Thanks for reading.

What to do with a neighborhood blog when you move

We started this blog about our neighborhood for a few reasons:

1. To share the good stuff we found on our home turf
2. To inspire more good stuff
   
3. To call out the bad stuff in the area
   
4. To inspire changing or eliminating the bad stuff
5. To weigh in on life and issues from the neighborhood's perspective

For the most part, we've been happy with the results. While we don't presume to have been the final word on anything we've written about over the past year, we do like to think we've turned a lot of people onto the best things about Uptown while protecting a few of you from the worst.

A few hundred people drop through the blog each week so there must be some little bit of value -- though the competition from reading work e-mail isn't very significant, of course. But now we're moving to Capitol Hill. What do we with our neighborhood blog?

Pack it up and take it with us?
Moving the blog to our new neighborhood is one option. On the plus side, all the 'timeless' posts on interesting stuff (yeah, 'all' of them!) would come with us and have an attachment to our new neighboorhod. On the technical side, I don't know how easy it would be to completely move a new Blogger URL but it would likely be easy enough to simply re-name the blog. Still, moving the thing with us seems disruptive -- a future full of oddly labeled Google links and cross-links from other blogs that need to be updated with new info.

Shut it down
Another option is to stop posting and just leave the blog out there drifting in space for the occasional visitor from a Google search. This seems to be the way of the old Web, especially -- full of ghost pages that just suddenly stopped being updated.

Pass it on
Finally, we could hand off the pages and posts to a new editor so the neighborhood voice continues. If there were a more sizeable inheritance, we would be pushing more for this option but, in reality, there's not much there there. Still, if somebody's interested, you know where to find us. Until the end of this week, at least.

-- j