May 2007

Four years ago, a small group of Lafayette Elementary School parents decided it was time for a major upgrade to Lafayette's aging two-acre asphalt playground.

"Grass grows so well in the cracked asphalt that the custodian has to mow it," said Jennifer Broadstone who has been leading the committee of parents.

After four years of planning and fundraising, Phase One of the restoration will begin in June when school is out for the summer.

Hi it's me, Charlie Brown. I don't type so hot.

Big paws, I guess. I used to belong to the Robinson family. At least they thought I did. Truth is I just didn't like hanging around home all that much. Booorrring.

They thought they could keep me in the yard and even put up a wire fence that cost them 400 bones. Ha, I had a tunnel out of there in 15 minutes. They shudda known we are famous for rooting out rabbits.

She bought me for him from the Bassett family in Woodinville. Isn't that a howl.

The topic I am about to discuss is a very sensitive one to me. It involves cruel, rude, or even merely imperceptive people who feel that it is their responsibility to share their opinions with the rest of the world. These people just cannot keep their thoughts to themselves. So incensed or vindictive are they that they believe it is their right and/or duty to ruin or attack another's reputation without any evidence to stand upon besides their word.

These self-appointed prosecutors are less interested in truth than they are in the infliction of damage and angry breast beating.

"I wish dad could've ... God, I love baseball."

- Roy Hobbs, The Natural

I remember before I had kids, one of my dearest fantasies was dreaming of my kids someday playing baseball.

For me, baseball is inextricably woven with the memories of my childhood. My closest memories of my father involve him coaching my team. My warmest memories of summer are all about my sister and I passing the day away in the playground across the street, playing ball with the neighbor kids. The best memories of my successes often involve softball.

With the city putting more emphasis into bike lanes, while making parking harder and harder, we think the time has come for bicycle riders to have city or state "bicycling" licenses coupled with proper training on how to ride on streets shared or dominated by automobiles.

The city says 6,000 people commute by bike each day, three times the national average, and it thinks that number will triple in 10 years.

The question of how to pay for a Green Line Light Rail needs more thought than just adding taxes. Your recent essay (editorial, May 2) on the subject suggested buses are fine but light rail would be faster.

That is far too simplistic.

Buses are necessary now but have four serious problems: (1) They are very labor intensive which makes them very costly. For each dollar of fare a Seattle rider pays the taxpayers must pay $4. That is grossly inefficient, light rail should, if done well, cut that cost in half.

I am compelled to make public an experience that I had at the West Seattle Neighborhood Office of the City of Seattle. Attending to a parking ticket that I received a few weeks prior, I arrived early for my 1:15 appointment and then went out to patronize a merchant in the junction in the time available. I arrived back for my appointment on time and proceeded to sign in and wait to be seen.

I was a regular at Coy's theater. My girl friend, Frances Cardin, was an usherette. She wore a cute outfit with bellbottom pants and a snug jacket. She was a tiny person and one of the two tiny people who held that job. I wanted to be an usherette. I loved the idea of having people follow me down the carpeted aisle as I carried a small flashlight carefully pointed downward at a spot near the heel of my shoe. Then stopping at a row with vacant seats, I would ask people to stand to allow the late arrivals to take the seats.

I just received the Herald and immediately looked for Charlie Chong's obituary. I feel compelled to comment on the headline "Charlie Chong dies."

There's something about that headline that makes me wince. The Herald surely could have done a better job on it. It reads more like a classified ad headline than the important event in West Seattle history that it is. Secondary article at that to "Sealth is now a 'world school.'" Sealth will still be a world school next week, but Charlie Chong's passing is huge news. All other front page news is minor compared to this event.

On behalf of the Friends of the Animals Foundation I would like to thank all of our generous business and personal donors to our fifth annual silent auction. In addition, a thank you to the many West Seattle residents who showed up at the Rocksport to generously bid. Friends of the Animals is a West Seattle non-profit foundation that provides cat rescue, spay and neuter, and adoption services. We feel very lucky to be in such a generous and caring community.