…believes in local media, I don’t regularly weigh myself down with the Sunday NY Times. But yesterday’s edition contained two major pieces of local interest–a profile of Seattle industrial and waste art-photographer (really!) Chris Jordan, whose work I’ve long admired and even occasionally imitated, and a supportive text piece lauding Costco for being kinder to its employees than Wall Street analysts want it to be.

I should’ve come to Harry Potter Midnite Madness last night with a mom and kid, so I could take digipix of the scene whilst pretending to take digipix only of my own party.

The Potter events, at both Borders and B&N, were just what I’d expected and more. Both stores did their best to keep the way-past-their-bedtime girls n’ boys awake and entertained.

B&N had a children’s choral group, storytellers, and costumed employees cavorting with wands. They even gave away plastic Potter eyeglass frames. They also had an elaborate purchasing system, reminiscent of Southwest Airlines’ boarding routine. You reserved your place in “line” by pre-registering and getting a wristband. At midnight, as the colorfully-printed cardboard cases of books were wheeled out to behind the counter on hand trucks, a clerk called all-points bulletins on the PA for numbers 1-50, etc.

The Borders fete was simpler. No wristbands or numbers; simply a line. The line included at least two teens who sat on the floor and stared into laptop computers. There was a crafts table where kids could make and decorate their own conic construction-paper wizard hats. There was a Potter trivia quiz, and Harry and Hermione lookalike contests, all with Potter-merchandise prizes. And, thankfully for the way-past-their-own-bedtime parents, there were vats of coffee (which, alas, ran out around 11:35).

A clerk on the PA system counted down each of the last five minutes until midnight. As the hand trucks wheeled in the cases of books from a back storeroom, the clerk counted down the seconds, while other employees unpacked the books and stacked them to be plopped into customers’ anxious hands. Finally, at the stroke of midnight, the customers at the front of the line were prompted to stand up and single-file their way toward the sales counter, where all transactions were handled promptly and efficiently.

Along the walk back to B&N, the streets were still boistrous and joyous. When I’d first spied on B&N at 10:30, ACT and the Paramount had let out their audiences, who’d spilled onto Pine. This, my friends, is what big-city life is all about–happy upeat total strangers in crowds, milling about and sharing each other’s auras. After midnight, the scene was still busy, with diners/drinkers from Von’s and the Cheesecake Factory, lingering Cineplex Oedipus theatergoers, and Potter purchasers ranging from post-collegiate fantasy geeks to tots barely big enough to hold the weighty tome (which, at 650-some pages, is actually shorter than the previous sequel volume).

Overheard quotes: Outside B&N, a fantasy-dude in a beard and Utilikilt said he was “just happy to see all these kids waiting in line for A BOOK.” I tried to convince him that reading had not become an unpopular activity in general, as evinced by the size and prominence of big-box chains such as B&N. I don’t think I succeeded. Oh well–some people like to fantasize about themselves as the only magicians in a world of “muggles;” other people like to fantasize about themselves as the only literates in a world of hicks. As the Potter books prove, myth is a powerful thing.

On the escalator down from B&N’s small street-level storefront in Pacific Place, toward the basement-level bulk of the store, I was in front of two high-school dudes as anxious as anybody else to grab the novel. But once they caught their first glimpse of the wristbanded preteen hordes already down there, anticipation turned to frustration: “I just wanted the fucking book! I don’t give a fuck about fuckin’ little kids in costumes!” I didn’t stick around to see if the teens stuck around, but I’m sure they have their copies now.

It’s a quiet Saturday morning as I write this. Throughout the English-speaking world, happy parents are waking to stillness and serenity. No shrieking, no sibling-fighting, no running indoors, no video-game explosions. In millions of households, peace reigns today.

For some grownups, that alone qualifies as magic.

…presents, in boldface type, “The Reasons to Get Rid of the Major Record Labels.”

…has listed all the ’80s and early ’90s films for which George W. Bush was a co-investor. They turn out to include Return to Oz, The Color of Money, Ruthless People, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, Good Morning Vietnam, Ernest Goes to Camp, Outrageous Fortune, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Tin Men, Three Men and a Baby, Blaze, The Little Mermaid, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Pretty Woman, Beauty and the Beast, and Spaced Invaders.

…buy almost anything that’s legal from Amazon these days.

…has reached its biggest slump in 20 years. The studios, as can only be expected, are blaming this catastrophe on everything except the suckiness of their product.

But I don’t intend today to talk about that, at least not directly. Rather, I’m ranting against the “news” media’s whoredom to the sucky-movie biz.

Even “local” news media are enthralled by the films we all hate, but which the studios desperately want us to love. I can’t even watch the KCPQ or KONG morning shows, or NorthWest Cable News, on a Thursday or Friday, ‘cuz every non-weather-and-traffic-together minute on those outlets on those days seems to be devoted to introducing the studios’ video press releases for this weekend’s new sucky movies. Then the following Monday, these same programs can’t stop repeating the “box office countdown” stories revealing how few people saw these same sucky movies.

O, for the old days of John Proccacino and Greg Palmer, when local TV stations had arts-and-entertainment reporters who got to cover actual local arts-and-entainment stories.

…claims there’s a new conversation-based paradigm for commuincations these days, and that mass marketers still don’t get it.

(via Arthur Marriott):

“Seems there’s an issue with Southwest Airlines moving to Boeing Field that hasn’t yet entered the public discussion thereof. (Of course, there wasn’t any public discussion of this until Tuesday, was there?)

The final approach to Boeing Field goes right over the top of Magnolia. I grew up there, and was in the sixth grade when Sea-Tac was undergoing one of its previous makeovers, and the major carriers had to use Boeing Field temporarily. Granted, this was in the age of noisier “first-generation” jets, but the noise was to say the least obnoxious.

I rather doubt that it would be easy to ameliorate the problem by coming in at higher altitudes either, because the Boeing approach actually passes UNDERNEATH the Sea-Tac approach lanes over Elliott Bay and the southern part of downtown.”

That just might scuttle the whole thang, ya know. If Seattle politics is anything, it’s politics by demographic marketing. We can ask Georgetown and Beacon Hill to put up with anything, but to inconvenience the stately homes of Magnolia and their upper-income denizens? Never!

Trader Vic’s, that legendary tiki-lounge restaurant chain, is coming back to the metro area this fall, after 14 years away; specifically in the new Westin Hotel being built near Bellevue Square.

…about media conglomerates getting ever-bigger? It’s working out to be a poor business strategy, at least as viewed by executives who only pay attention to The Almighty Stock Price.

Thus, Viacom’s thinking of spinning off CBS into a separate company. This comes just five years after Viacom (originally formed when CBS spun off its local cable systems and its pre-1972 rerun library) picked up CBS, which had been previously bought and spun off from Loew’s and Westinghouse.

The new CBS would include not just the eye-branded network and network-owned TV stations, but also the Infinity radio stations, the UPN mini-network, and the UPN-branded Viacom-owned TV stations (including KSTW here). Viacom would keep its cable channels (MTV, Spike, BET, et al.) and Simon & Schuster publishing.

Paramount Pictures would be severed, Solomon-baby-like. Viacom would keep the feature-film and DVD businesses; while CBS would get Paramount’s TV production and syndication arms (including all those old CBS shows). Among other results, this would mean TV Land (to remain part of Viacom) would have to pay CBS for most of the shows it airs.

American society and American discourse could still use more voices, more choices. There’s no guarantee that the split-up pieces of corporate media giants would behave any less corporately.

I finally got myself the HDTV-compatible TV I’d been thinkin’ about getting for some weeks now.

I would up getting it at one of the last TV stores still within the Seattle city limits. They had it as a floor-model clearance item. It was reduced from $2,000 or so when first introduced two years ago, to $1,350 or so at current online pricing, to a mere $699 plus tax.

The deep discount was partly prompted by a few minor flaws in the item–they no longer had the box or a printed manual, the plastic “door” over the back input ports is missing, and the remote control’s different from the one shown in the online manual.

But it’s a beautiful set. And it’s so lightweight, I could take it home on Metro, thus avoiding delivery costs, cab fares, or long waits to find someone with a vehicle to lend.

I don’t have HDTV reception yet, but even on standard broadcast and cable channels it looks splendid. DVDs look superb, especially of widescreen movies. The picture looks fab in bright daylight, from odd angles, and from 15 feet away (where I usually have my portable computer desk). The audio’s also lusciously crystal clear, even without external stereo speakers.

I can instantly switch from a widescreen to a normal viewing ratio, so Drew Barrymore doesn’t end up looking like Drew Carey. The regular 4×3 image is slightly smaller than that on my old 19-inch Magnavox from 1991; but it’s so bright and crisp it seems larger. (I can actually read the box-score type on ESPNews!)

Tiny flaw #1: I can definitely see the image flaws in my old off-air VHS tapes, in poorly-compressed digital imagery (such as the title screens on the Music Choice channels), and in my cable company’s reception of broadcast channels. (The company does offer seven broadcast HD channels; but for some reason it doesn’t offer KCTS in HD, nor any of the dozen or so made-for-cable HD channels.)

Tiny flaw #2: The set’s got four different types of input ports, but I haven’t yet figured how to use any of them to make the thang into a computer monitor.

Not a flaw but a wistful note: With my TV and my computer both equipped with LCDs, I’ve now moved completely beyond the CRT technology that’s powered video reception since the days of Philo T. Farnsworth. CRT television was first demonstrated in 1927; regularly scheduled telecasts began in 1936 in London, in 1939 in New York, and in 1948 in Seattle. (Similarly, when CDs replaced vinyl, they replaced an analog technology that dated back some 110 years to Thomas Edison himself.)

I feel like I’ve abandoned something of high importance to our cultural history. I’ll feel that way again if and when the FCC ever gets around to telling TV stations to go all-digital and shut off their analog signals.

(You can see this set in action if you come to my housewarming/birthday/website-tenth-anniversary party this Wednesday evening. Email me for address and other particulars.)

…talks about “millionaires’ post-Microsoft pursuits;” including those of early-middle-aged tycoons who’ve vowed to give back to their communities.

I can think of a few other ways to use local private money to help the region–capitalistic, potentially profitable, ways even.

I’m talking about taking back key parts of the Northwest commercial identity that have been run into the ground by out-of-region consolidators.

Specifically, I call for the de-Cincinnatification of Northwest retail.

Kroger is ruining QFC and Fred Meyer. Kroger’s crosstown colleagues at Federated Department Stores have trashed The Store Formerly Known As The Bon Marche, and are preparing to do the same to Portland’s Meier & Frank.

Let’s get some locals with spare cash together to buy these chains back, to bring them home, to make them again responsive to local consumers and local communities instead of stock-market speculators.

If these tasks take more money than we can round up, we can always start smaller, by buying the Rainier and Olympia beer brands back from the Pabst/Miller joint venture that controls them now, contracting their production to underutilized local microbreweries, and making them ours again.

Minimalist retro-modern bars are called copies of an LA/NY look. (“…These places scream: This. Is. Not. Seattle.”) Not so. They’re really nostalgia for a past fantasy of the present–specifically, the 21st century as predicted at the Seattle World’s Fair. (And what’s with the article writer, and the quoted drinkers, repeatedly denouncing “grunge” as if it still existed?)

HEADLINE OF THE DAY #2: “Rules limiting beach bonfires to grow tougher.” Rule one: You can’t call them “bonfires” anymore. You have to call them “macyfires.”

The labor organizers who couldn’t get into Wal-Mart just might have a new goal. New York magazine, in a story largely ignored here even by the “alternative” media, reports about one guy’s attempt to bring union representation to a Manhattan Starbucks outlet. Among the grievances he and his coworkers cite: mandatory perkiness. The union organization they’re trying to bring in: None other than that ol’ nemesis of the Northwest timber barons, the Industrial Workers of the World.

The most famous brand in romance novels, “Harlequin Romance,” is apparently to be retired next year. The company’s still churnin’ out the paperbacks; but the firm’s specialty lines have taken the sales, and the shelf space, away from what had been its flagship series.

Masculine-oriented readers might scoff at ’em, but romances are the last commercially successful branch of old-fashioned pulp fiction. They’re “adventure” stories written to precise pubilsher-decreed formulae–just as the Hardy Boys, Sherlock Holmes, the Shadow, Tarzan, and Doc Savage had been.

Horror, sci-fi, mystery, and action novels are still being published in paperback, of course; but those industry segments are, for the most part, not as centrally editorially-controlled as they used to be (with some exceptions, such as Star Trek novels).

No, it’s the romances that are still this heavily pre-planned by the home office. Each “series” brand has its own characteristics–length, setting, characters, explicitness level (some of the racier romance lines are now the only sexual material allowed for sale at Wal-Mart).

This obsession with order and contrivance can be seen in some of the “chick lit” novels marketed to women who consider themselves too hip to read romances. “Chick lit” stories might not always have happy endings, but they seem to all have perky young heroines who all live in glamorous cities and all have glamorous AND high-paying careers, just like the heroines in certain romance series. (Trust me on this: In the real world, nobody who writes for an alternative weekly newspaper can afford Sarah Jessica Parker’s wardrobe.)

We’ll leave this item with a totally unrelated aphorism from the source of this news flash, “Superromance” novelist Susan Gable: “Beware of men with expensive, flashy cars and expensive, flashy teeth.”