Space Needle New Year’s fireworks are canceled (again), to ‘go virtual’ this year; COVID outbreak at a WA Frito-Lay plant; police pepper-spray and topple an old man with PTSD at a Capitol Hill protest; can the unfinished Convention Center expansion plan be redirected?

We’ve got a hockey team name (just not a team yet); federal agents land in Seattle, but Durkan says don’t worry; more lawsuits and investigations over Portland anti-protester violence; WA restaurant/bar reopening rules will be re-tightened.

Amazon pays to give new hockey arena a ‘climate’-theme name; Black drivers and mechanics allege racism at Metro; COVID cases soar in parts of the state; ‘Real Change’ vendors now have their own brand of hand sanitizer.

Amazon Go grocery’s biggest store yet opens on E. Pike; Kennedy High principal put on paid leave; two state House Dems will get primary challengers; 1 in 5 WA community college students are or have been homeless.

Family ties and the new Seattle Asian Art Museum; free health clinic returns this weekend; a diluted winter-eviction ban passes the City Council; a longtime Madison Park bar is suddenly closed.

The Pacific Science Center’s laser shows are run by real live artists (imagine!); the state ramps up its coronavirus response; a leaked memo sheds info on Blaine border detainments; Amazon’s now worth $1 trillion (in stock value) and has almost 800,000 global workers.

University Book Store turns 120; Gov. Inslee’s carbon-cap law partly survives state Supreme Court; Microsoft vows to become ‘carbon negative’; Julia Sweeney defends her ‘Pat’ character as more ‘annoying’ than androgynous.

The year starts sans fireworks; an Olympia legal victory for Seattle’s MHA plan; Amazon delivery contractors’ high-pressure existence; how to make lower Third Avenue safer for all.

The Seattle City Council wasn’t “flipped” (not completely at least); the TV station you all thought was Fox-owned now is Fox-owned; Tom Douglas workers get a cash settlement (plus gift cards).

AEG wants out of running Bumbershoot; outdoor-wear maven Gert Boyle dies; the Snoqualmie Tribe buys Salish Lodge and nearby lands; our long local political trudge is almost over.

Some just-plain-gorgeous WA scenic photos; investigators clear Constantine (with a caveat); the mother of Seattle City Council districts dies; Bellevue prepares for Amazon’s office dogs.

Did a local black-dance pioneer inspire the Space Needle’s shape?; does SDOT have to buy bigger streetcars?; what killed thousands of bees in Spokane?; are Americans addicted to violence and hate?

Bill Nye invokes ‘behavior change’ for Google; AG Bob Ferguson sues to keep federal clean-power rules; Southwest Airlines might buy its first non-Boeing planes; mistrial in UW shooting case.

Nordstrom leaves an emptying-out Northgate; a bus driver’s lovely ‘Ode to Aurora;’ feds try to discredit a climate-related UW study; there’s too much of the wrong kind of salmon.

A new mark of desperation: shoplifting Goodwill; the new arena will take longer and cost more; former co-mayor (sorta) Bob Royer dies; the meaning of Saturday’s unofficial holiday.