UPDATE: Some months back I named the Wallingford Food Giant Seattle’s best full-size supermarket. Since then, the north end’s been abuzz w/rumors that the place was being sold to Alfalfa’s, the out-of-state yuppie health-food chain. Not so, insists FG management.

THE MAILBAG: I can say the most outrageous things and get no response (perhaps because, as I’ve learned, some folks just assume I’m kidding); while the slightest throwaway gag can cause the most irate responses. Like my little joke about Vancouver’s new Ford Theatre. I’ll readily accept the letter writers’ assertions that Canadians probably know more about American history than Americans know about Canadian history–or than Americans know about American history. I know enough about Canada to endorse DOA singer Joey Shithead’s campaign for the BC legislature (can’t ya see it, “The Honourable M.L.A. Shithead”?). On a related note…

CANADIAN CATHODE CORNER: Canada, especially Vancouver, is gaining awareness as the prime filming site for exploitation TV dramas. I wouldn’t be surprised if next fall Fox aired more Canadian-made prime-time hours than Canadian network CTV. I also wouldn’t be surprised if sci-fi conventions started circulating “fan fiction” stories in which the universes of all the Vancouver-filmed shows (X-Files, Strange Luck, Sliders, Profit, et al.) collided at a dimensional gateway somewhere near the Cambie St. Bridge.

REFLEX, RIP: The regional visual-art tabloid was great while it lasted, and (particularly under first editor Randy Gragg) provided frequent glimpses into the peculiar jargon of art-crit (‘tho sometimes I wished they’d run a glossary of terms). It illuminated issues surrounding the corporate/ institutional art world and the role of creative individuals therein. And it gave many artists precious review clippings. But it was never all it could be, or all its community needed. Its bimonthly schedule meant it could never recommend a show while it was still up. Its nonprofit-bureaucratic structure meant it was eternally begging for gifts from the same funding sources as the artists the paper advocated.

AD VERBS: Still recovering from its old pretentious “Lack of Pretense” ads, Subaru is turning toward marketing at specific market segments. As part of this, it’ll soon run specially-designed ads in lesbian magazines, touting its autos as the perfect acoutrement to a practical, sensible Womanlove lifestyle. Meanwhile, Elvira (aka Cassandra Peterson) has quit as a Coors spokeswitch–not due to Coors’ support of right-wing causes but ’cause indie brewery Beverage International offered to market her own line of Elvira Brews. Look for the first bottles in test markets by July.

LET ‘EM GO: EastsideWeek’s new “Independent Republic of the Eastside” promotion sounds a bit like certain secessionist movements in Montana and Idaho, or at least like these pro-sprawl “new county” movements across the Cascade foothills. On the good side, the promotion (devised largely by editor Skip Berger) calls into question the “community spirit” of folks who’ve moved to the burbs precisely to avoid civic commitment, to drive from office park to mall to cul-de-sac without feeling any expressed need for “public space.” And it gives Berger a chance to question some assumptions about suburban growth by offering alternatives: “Will we become Paris, Rome, Venice, or Orange County?” (Place your own joke answer here.)

DOME SWEET DOME: What to do with the Kingdome, with no baseball in three years and possibly no football? (The NFL’s hinted at demanding a new arena in return for keeping or replacing the Seahawks.) The obvious is to keep it for auto shows and tractor pulls, and as an exhibit annex for the Convention Center. The county’s been planning this anyway.

I say, let’s go build two new stadia, with as much private money as possible. Make the football field convertible for NHL hockey; make both convertible for trade shows.

Then take the existing Kingdome, gut its current interior, and rebuild it into the living and recreation space of the future. A World’s Fair domed-city fantasy made real, or a pansexual “intentional community” utopia. Level upon level of PoMo condos around the concourses, looking onto an indoor plaza and celebration zone. The mind reels with the possibilities! (Got any fantasy Dome uses of your own? Send ’em here.)