harikari.com

A Washington man was in a single car accident last Friday, ramming into a power pole.  The 50-year-old man suffered no major injuries in the accident and called family to come help him get his car out of the ditch.

While waiting for his family to arrive, he decided to go “see a man about a horse”.

One can only imagine what happened next, and since the Seattle Times did a poor job speculating, I will provide the following as my reenactment, beginning after the phone call to family:

“Well, son of a bitch. This sucks and I gotta take a piss.  Well, they’ll be here soon, I’ll just hold it….  Oh, god they’re never gonna get here…  That’s it I’m gonna just pee into the ditch.

(sidenote: He doesn’t see that he has knocked a powerline into the ditch and it’s live.)

zipppp….. pssssss……  “Ahhhhhh…..”

“YEOWWWW!!!!!”

The Seattle Times picks up the story at this point indicating that, while an autopsy is planned, the burn marks seem to indicate a direct path of travel of the electricity.

Ouch, this has got to be a terrible way to go.  Remember to look where you pee, you never know when the reaper is gonna come for you.

It’s HOT in Seattle.  Today’s high will be in the nineties again, and tomorrow’s high is projected to climb over one hundred degrees.  We Seattleites are not used to extended hot, dry spells.  Most people don’t have air conditioning in their homes, because it’s not something that would get much use.  I would have appreciated having it last night though, and I’ll wish I had an air conditioner tonight.

Because this isn’t really a weather blog, I must have some other point to make.  Oh yeah… I watched Do the Right Thing last week.  That is a movie that I highly recommend.  The movie takes place on a very hot day in Brooklyn, and as the day gets hotter and hotter, race relations heat up.  

Race relations has been one of the ongoing topics of fervent discussion since Henry Louis Gates was arrested for being agitated in his own home.  So maybe if you are so inclined, what you ought to do today is read Eugene Robinson’s column and then later this evening go find a cool spot in your house to watch Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing.

It’s a beautiful sunny day in Seattle and, if that’s not enough, it’s also the start of Copper River King Salmon season. 

SEATAC, Wash. – The fresh Alaska salmon season begins for seafood lovers in Seattle with the arrival of an Alaska Airlines flight with about 20,000 pounds of Copper River salmon.

The airline and seafood companies recruited Washington football coach Steve Sarkisian to make the ceremonial first catch Friday of a fish from the 737 freighter from Cordova, Alaska.

Yes it is expensive, but it’s flown in from Alaska and it’s very fresh.  More about that freshness here.

Go buy yourself some at The Pike Place Market and, while you are there, pick up a bottle of La Bastide Blanche Bandol Rosé to drink while your preparing your meal, and a bottle of J. K. Carriere Pinot Noir Provocateur to drink with you dinner.

And remember… the fish is as fresh as it gets, so before you slap it on the grill, be sure to trim off a little and eat it raw.  Mmmm…  Mmmmmm… good.

Is not pretty this year.

My calendar says the Spring Equinox was at 4:44 a.m. PDT, but you’d never know it by observing the weather.  It’s cold, grey and drizzly today.  Just like it was yesterday… and the day before that… and the day before that…

I need some sun. 

I know where I should be - Austin, Texas.  There’s something going on down there called SXSW that many of my drunk friends are attending.  They tell me it’s sunny and warm too.

Well Seattle, it looks like we are gonna dig a tunnel to replace the viaduct.  I am very excited about this.  Sure, it’ll be expensive, but we will finally have a waterfront that is connected to our downtown.  Additionally, there will be opportunities to create more parks and open spaces.

From the Seattle Times article on the Viaduct Replacement:

The state and local governments have agreed to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct with a tunnel under downtown Seattle, Mayor Greg Nickels and Metropolitan King County Councilmember Dow Constantine confirmed today.

The agreement between the state, King County, the city of Seattle, and the Port of Seattle is expected to be formally announced Tuesday.

This New Year’s Eve I am throwing a huge party at the Spitfire in Seattle.  It’s gonna be a blast.

From my New Year’s Eve Party Website:

Re-Session
A fabulously inexpensive evening

Change is coming, but not soon enough to help out with your New Year´s Eve party plans.  Don´t worry, Re−Session is here. The folks who brought you Electrobama 2008 at the Spitfire are teaming up with the Spitfire again to throw the most value packed New Year´s Eve Party in Seattle.

While some parties are charging admission in excess of $100, we are here to provide some well−deserved relief.

Our affordable $25 door won´t break the bank, the $5 well drinks will quench your thirst, and the complimentary party favors are, well, priceless. For those with a slightly larger budget, we have $50 VIP tickets available. You´ll get access to the Ciroc Sponsored VIP section with an exclusive bar, no wait entry and a deluxe party favor package.

Join us beginning at 6pm. Enjoy some great food until 10pm. We will be featuring a $30 Don Julio Tequila Flight with food pairing, Ciroc specialty cocktails and a selection of affordable champagne to ring in the new year.

Tickets:

• $25.00 Advance Door (General admission with basic party favor package)
• $50.00 Advance VIP (Ciroc VIP Lounge, Priority Entry, deluxe party favor package)
• VIP couch reservations available

Featuring:

• DJ johnny Fever, DJ Keith Chambers, and DJ John Lee − Playing house music in the front
• DJ Gene Lee and DJ Marty Mar − Rockin’ Top 40 and 80’s mash up’s in the back

That’s Seattle, Washington on a clear fall day.  It’s a blue city in a blue state, so some people would say it’s not real America.  I say it is.

This past Saturday a very close friend jumped off the West Seattle Bridge.  He killed himself. He was only 21 years old.

Jesse had suffered his whole life with rapid-cycling bi-polar disorder (aka manic depression).  Three years ago he became infected with HIV after a few months of careless (read: meth-related) unprotected anal sex.

His doctors had postponed starting HIV-treatment because his health seemed pretty “normal” until very recently.  Last month he started treatment.  His doctor prescribed Sustiva, an anti-HIV drug said to do a good job of controlling HIV and increasing T-cell counts when used in combination with other anti-HIV drugs.

However, Sustiva is known to have some very serious side-effects, among which are severe depression and suicide attempts.

I am disgusted that the healthcare system that was supposedly looking out for the best interest of this sweet, unstable, fragile young man prescribed a medicatioin with so many devastating side-effects.  Their careless use of such a dangerous (yes, in this case) drug lead directly to Jesse’s suicide.

Here is the description of side-effects, directly from the website of Sustiva itself:

What are Sustiva’s possible side effects?
Like all anti-HIV drugs, Sustiva has been shown to cause side effects. While some of the side effects, including rashes, are similar to those seen using other NNRTIs, Sustiva appears to cause a number of brain-related side effects not seen with other anti-HIV drugs.

In clinical trials, over half of the patients taking Sustiva reported one or more side effects related to activity of the brain or central nervous system (CNS). These symptoms included dizziness, insomnia, impaired concentration, drowsiness, abnormal/vivid dreams, anxiety, depression, nervousness, and even hallucinations (although very rarely).  Combining Sustiva with recreational drugs, particularly marijuana, can also increase the psychological side effects.

About 2% of people taking Sustiva have more severe psychiatric problems, including severe depression, strange thoughts, or angry behavior. Some patients have thoughts of suicide and a few have actually committed suicide. People with a history of mental illness should be especially careful if they start Sustiva.

As we move further from a world where your identity is checked by a person before you can withdraw your money, it is more important than ever to have a secure password for your accounts.

Please note that having the same password for all accounts does not count as a secure password. Your password should be different for all accounts.

If you need help creating a strong password, check out this Washington Post article for a few pointers. Basically, your password should include letters of different cases, numbers, and special characters.

And if you don’t think that strong passwords are important to protect your assets, check out this story, I was a Cybercrook for the FBI, on Wired.com. This story is about a Cybercrook living in Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood. I have lived in this neighborhood and love the neighborhood, it is one of Seattle’s best.

Here is a taste:

It was July 2004 and Brian Campbell had been on Isla Mujeres off the coast of Cancun for three days for a relative’s wedding when he discovered he’d been scammed.

An American MBA student studying in Australia at the time, Campbell (not his real name2) was accustomed to checking his investment portfolio daily over the internet. But the wedding distracted him a couple of days, and when he finally got online, he found he was locked out of his Schwab trading account.

He called Schwab and discovered that his user name and password had been changed. What’s more, $106,000 had recently been wired from his account to a Fortis bank account in Belgium. Campbell hadn’t requested the transfer.

Better get those passwords changed…

What are you thankful for?

Me?

I am most thankful that my dog Lucy made it back home from her wild adventure yesterday.

Yesterday, Seattle was surprised by a midafternoon thunderstorm. Lucy hates thunder and lightning even more than than taking a bath. I only heard a couple of thunder claps and was comfortable knowing that Lucy was safe at home, probably sleeping on my bed.

Upon arriving home I discovered that she was not in the house.  At first I thought that I had forgotten to lock up the dog door that goes into the backyard (the door was on the floor) and that she was in the yard.   When I went to reinsert the door, I found that it was binding on the runners.  At that point I knew that Lucy must have been quite scared, as she somehow ripped the locking dog door out of the runners.  (I have since tried to pull it out of the runners, myself, and can not.)

After getting out of the house, she found herself in the backyard and broke through the fence (a first) to the front of the house. She must have been totally terrified…

Lucy was running down the middle of the street when a very nice woman, Pam, saw her and stopped. Pam had never seen Lucy before, but knew that Lucy was scared and needed her help. Lucy did not have her collar and tags (remember, she was locked in my house on the bed when I left), so Pam stopped by the vet and had her scanned for a chip. Bingo… She now knew Lucy’s name and my name. But she was only able to get that far, as I am not listed and my personal information related to the chip was out of date (my bad).

After running errands with Pam for a couple of hours (Lucy loves hanging out in cars), Lucy found her way to the pet walking/sitting services of Furhead Riviera. A massive thanks goes out to Amy at Furhead Riviera for keeping Lucy safe for a few hours until I could get her back home.

These two women, who did not know Lucy or me before yesterday really made my year.

Thanks for making this a great year!

After a long day Lucy loves a nice Pinot.