Microsoft’s weird vision for future VR conferencing; an ex-Sonic’s running for mayor; protesters’ lawsuit against Seattle expands. anti-Asian racism may be why a schoolteacher was attacked on the streets with ‘a rock in a sock.’

Picket-sign art is installed at the AIDS Memorial Pathway; the first local (and US) COVID deaths are remembered one year after; Black workers describe Amazon’s ‘race problem;’ jazz-piano mainstay Deems Tsutakawa dies.

After the Big Snow, get ready for the Big Melt; the Lava Lounge building gets closer to demolition; Sen. Murray says she was ‘within inches’ of the Capitol mob; the state reports 1 million vaccine shots.

More calls by local pols for an early White House removal; should Seattle divorce King County?; new light-rail construction could cost lots more; Tim Eyman court case nears its end after several years.

Could John Roderick’s deleted Twitter thread affect Ken Jennings’ TV career?; Inslee announces new ‘reopening’ plan, restaurant trade org. hates it; Virginia Mason/CHI Franciscan merger moves ahead; pioneering local Black judge dies.

Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic leader quits, claims systemic racism at parent organization; a local singer becomes a social-media meme as ‘Bean Dad’; local Catholics want archbishop to speak up about abusive priests; some computer-animated New Year’s weirdness fictionally set at the Space Needle.

Our 35th (Yes!) annual list of trends that will soar and decline over the coming 365.

Seven Gables Theater movie memories; the local COVID curve’s still ‘flattening’ for now; Seahawks clinch division title; ‘excessive force’ lawsuit against the SPD could cost the city $600,000 or more.

Alaska Airlines’ suddenly popular ‘Safety Dance’ ad; Cal Anderson Park ‘reopens;’ an obscure part of the federal relief bill could threaten live-streaming; a holiday message for our time.

Where poetry, programming, and Amazon intersect; train cars with crude oil catch fire; homeless-services group refutes KOMO’s depiction of it; a few of the big COVID relief bill’s various pieces and their various effects.

‘Sonics Forever’ podcast gathers basketball memories; another record day for COVID cases in the state; Amazon enters the prescription-drug biz; sex robots for old folks?

Sacha Baron Cohen takes over Olympia militia rally; CHOP stays but shrinks; how the 6/1 Capitol Hill march ‘went from peaceful to violent in 60 seconds;’ could an NBA team be available to ‘poach’ (but should we do so)?

Local/global music legend Bill Rieflin passes; Seattle cruise-ship season put on hold; Microsoft imports 240,000 face masks from an unnamed country; Steve Ballmer won’t move basketball’s LA Clippers here.

A local benefit concert that benefits its own local musicians (who need it); more downtown-shooting reactions; Alex Pedersen scoffs at the City Council’s anti-injustice resolutions; the feds decide to close the Northwest’s only National Archives facility.