November 2011

Drunk enters wrong apartment
An intoxicated man was trying to make it into his apartment in the 800 block of S.W. 149th Street after a night of drinking. He mistakenly walked into his neighbor’s unlocked apartment instead. The frightened neighbor confronted the man with knives and detained him until officers arrived. Officers took the drunk man into custody without incident. It appeared the man was too drunk to remember which apartment was his. No injuries were reported.

Burglars raid medical marijuana dispensary owners’ home
West Seattle homeowners who run a medical marijuana dispensary say someone they know burglarized their home. They also think the burglars were watching their home and knew they weren't there around 10 a.m. even though both of there cars were in the driveway. Police say burglars took cash that was hidden in a drawer, while overlooking other valuables that were out in the open at their home in the 11400 block of Marine View Drive. It's unclear how much money was taken.

Car break-ins, vandalism, prowlers and thefts

Poetrybirige's motto is "poetry everywhere by everyone" and this Wednesday night from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. two members of the group, Lydia Swartz, and West Seattle reporter/photographer Steve Shay, will host the first hour with poems, tales and musings.

While there may (or may not) be a poem read entitled "Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving", Poetrybridge welcomes the public to this free event on this special eve. And don't forget, between 8:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. 'twill be open mic for others who want to read and share. Sign-up is at 6:45 p.m.

Biographies of Lydia Swartz & Steve Shay here.

On a glorious fall day, I played hooky for a couple of hours to walk around Green Lake with a friend. After the stimulating walk and conversation, I remember noticing the vibrant colors of the leaves and reflecting on how great my life was. In that moment, I think I even remember saying out loud “This has been a perfect day.”
On the way to my car, I had the urge to call my mother, which is not a daily, or even monthly urge for me. Everything changed in a mere two seconds when she said, “Oh, I thought you were the doctors. They found something strange on my CAT Scan.” Sure this could be taken in stride if you’re mother is prone for dramatics, but my mother is the opposite of that. She has had major surgeries without ever mentioning them to my sister or me. She doesn’t ever complain about ailments, she just goes to bed. So the fact that she was feeling sick enough to get a CAT Scan—and later I learned several blood tests, an MRI, lung screen, and numerous physical exams by numerous specialists—told me something was very, very wrong.

Deadline for receiving items for Community Calendar is 5 p.m. Wednesday for the following week’s Times/News. Events are published based on timeliness and space availability. Email submissions to: hteditor@robinsonnews.com Items can be accepted from nonprofit groups and government agencies only. Others may call Dona Ozier at 206-708-1378 for inclusion in our “Out & About” advertising section.

Call for Artists
Burien Community Center-- Artists working in 2 dimensional media are invited to apply for the 2012 schedule of gallery exhibitions at the Burien Community Center, 14700 6th Ave. S.W. Application materials due by Nov. 30th to ginak@burienwa.gov. For more information: ginak@burienwa.gov, 206-988-3700 or go to www.burienwa.gov.

Classes
The Hi-Liners--Registration is now open for The Hi-Liners DownStage Center Fall Theatre Classes held at the Burien Annex. Check out the exciting new ways to have fun this year! Open to youth ages 5 and older. For complete descriptions, schedules, and registration please visit www.hi-liners.org.

Events

Ballard High School runner Alex Bowns competed in the Nike Border Clash event on Sunday, Nov 20, in Beaverton, Ore and finished in the Top 20.

The Border Clash event pitted the top 40 runners from Washington against the top 40 runners from Oregon.

Seventeen runners from 4A participated, with Bowns as the lone Ballard representative.

Bowns ran the 4387 meter course at the Nike headquarters with a time of 14:285:18, earning him the 19th place.

Bowns was interviewed ahead of his race in which he gave a shout out to his "homies' in Ballard. See a video of Bowns' runner's profile from Border Clash, here.

Do you remember when everyone was migrating to Silicon Valley, the drawing card for technology nerds? The braggarts from the valley were abruptly told to move over for Bill Gates who became the power to be reckoned with. So Bellevue, once a suburb of Seattle, claims the richest man in the world. As a feminist I wonder if that means there might be a woman who is richer still. Reminds me of NASA that claimed to have an unmanned space vehicle. I wrote to NASA asking, “If it is unmanned does that mean that a woman is at the helm?” They were not amused.

According to the Family Promise press release:

Homeless Shelter Runs Out of Funds, Has To turn Away Homeless Families

Seattle, November 21, 2011. Family Promise of Seattle, an emergency shelter for homeless children and their families, will be closing its doors today. Family Promise of Seattle has been in operation since 2008 and is located in West Seattle.

The Board of Directors announced, that due to the lack of sustainable funding, Family Promise of Seattle is no longer able to provide emergency food and shelter for children and their families who are homeless.

The mission of Family Promise of Seattle is to mobilize community resources and provide, with compassionate care temporary housing, meals and case management for newly homeless families as they seek stable housing.

Over the course of a year, Family Promise was able to provide:
• 365 days of shelter, 18,250 "shelter nights";
• 1095 meals for each family, more than 50,000 meals;

Seattle’s Neighborhood Service Centers will close for the Thanksgiving holidays beginning Thursday, November 24. They will reopen on Monday, November 28. The six Centers are located in Ballard, Delridge, Southeast, University, Central, and Lake City.

Neighborhood Service Centers provide city and neighborhood information and assist community members pay City utility bills, obtain pet licenses, pay traffic tickets, and apply for U.S. Passports, along with other services. Its Customer Service Representatives assist more than 225,000 community members each year.

For more information, visit http://www.seattle.gov/neighborhoods/nsc or call Seattle Department of Neighborhoods at (206)684-0464.

I was wracking my brain this week trying to find a lighter topic to write about. Maybe something that wasn’t so statistics or technical jargon heavy. I’ll leave that for next week. Yet despite my adamant denial of being a die-hard cynic, I was having a lot of trouble. Blame it on the bleary skies denying me my rightful vitamin D or my inadvertent house arrest (see broken foot), either way I was coming up dry. Then I was inspired by some of my old college photos – point your fingers at Facebook for constantly plaguing me with updates.

After ragging on the college system last week, I want to make sure to highlight some of the good. Specifically, I want to talk about study abroad. Now I said no statistics so I’ll suppress my urge to drop one here. I’ll shoot from the hip, as it were.

Swanson’s Nursery is once again home to reindeer Blitzer and Dasher, who will be staying at the nursery until Christmas Eve.

This is the nursery’s ninth annual Reindeer Festival and each year they attract hundreds of kids.

There are daily feeding times at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. but people can come see the reindeer up close every day from 9 a.m. until 7 p.m.

Fun fact: Male reindeer lose their antlers in early fall meaning that Blitzen and Dasher, who still have their beautiful large antlers, are both female.

Santa will visit the nursery from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 26 and 27, allowing for a unique photo opportunity with a sleigh and a live reindeer.

While Blitzen and Dasher are people-friendly, a third reindeer, named Jingle, has been specially trained to stand still for hours at a time for photos.

Also back this year are Curly, the curious camel, and his companion, Moe, the miniature donkey.

The animals will be staying at the nursery until Dec. 23rd and people are encouraged to stop by at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. for daily feeding.