Seattle-raised filmmaker at old ‘spaghetti western’ filming locales; student ‘sickout’ planned at several schools; non-emergency surgeries put on hold due to COVID surge; WA’s Cascade mountain passes all finally reopened.

Author Neal Stephenson defends utopian fiction; COVID-related staff shortages affect schools, bus service, and more; three more state senators test positive; two Cascade passes still closed.

Two UW profs praise ‘Don’t Look Up’ as climate-change metaphor; all major WA mountain passes closed; medical leaders say we’re near a hospital crisis point; ‘big rent hikes’ coming once they’re allowed.

Guild 45th theater sign comes down, but will the building also go?; Snohomish Co. exec has COVID (along with many others); SPD spread misinfo during CHOP; one year since you-know-what.

What will become hotter and lukewarmer during the coming 365.

The ‘revered and reviled saxophonist’ gets an HBO doc; Space Needle fireworks will be back (sort-of); full hospitals can’t send folks to full nursing homes; Bruce Harrell’s niece will be his chief aide.

‘Internet Ends’—or will it?; Comic Con returns (even with at least some stuff about comics!); Sawant recall backers spending big; COVID protocols cancel UW basketball game.

People rising from the streets are shown above the streets; town of Sumas is flooded again; an ‘invasive European green crab’ teems in local waters; Seahawks almost pull off a last-minute upset.

Neptune Theatre turns 100; 2022 Seattle budget battle’s already underway; community groups want investigations into abuses by Vancouver and Clark County law enforcement; Inslee removes a Legislative foe by picking him for Secretary of State.

Temporary ‘COVID Remembrance Project’ now underway; UW football coach Jimmy Lake’s suspended for one game; 9 percent of Boeing’s US workers want a vax exemption; how has Amazon changed fiction?

Local eco-origins of ‘Dune;’ state antitrust suit against big chicken producers; ‘a new Black arts center’ to anchor a CD mixed-use project.

New doc covers an anti-racist protest (and pro-racist counterprotest); many Pike Place Market and South Lake Union businesses still struggle; Portland cops won’t stop vandals unless they can bust heads; it’s Vax Deadline Monday #1!

A literary mag has a ‘scary’ Hanford essay; a classic-cartoon producer dies in Gig Harbor; leaked emails support claims of sexism at Microsoft; the city settles a major police-killing lawsuit for half a million.

The local origins of Netflix’s hit series ‘Maid;’ the welcome rise of Indigenous People’s Day; County Councilmember Kathy Lambert apologizes for racially-charged campaign flyer; the real reasons for WA’s ferry-crew shortages.

New nonlinear film explores Billy Tipton’s life and secrets; hospitals overflow with COVID patients again, as local sports teams demand attendees be vaxed; Rep. Jayapal wants to declare Amazon an ‘illegal monopoly.’