Doomed Alaska Way Viaduct

Doomed Alaska Way Viaduct:
My esteemed governess, Christine, has made it clear that she’s going to knock down the viaduct by 2012 whether there’s a plan to replace it or not. I thought you might like to see some of the reasons we think it’s too shaky.

The thing that looks like ivy growing up the support is actually the Nisqually Earthquake. I didn’t know it but apparently earthquakes can grow like vines. If we cut that off the support it might fall.

The old Fremont Troll (sometimes called the Montlake Troll) has moved to the viaduct in hopes of scaring away the next earthquake. Hope it works.

The main viaduct is dark gray in front of the buildings. Notice on the lower left is a parking lot sign that says you have to pay to park under the structure. No liability if it falls on your car.

The South Lake Union Streetcar (SLUT) blue car is shown here even though it doesn’t go to Alaska Way. It’s just a fun thing.

Al

Washington State Primary

Presidential Primary - NOT:
We here in Washington, the state, will receive primary ballots in the mail in the next couple weeks. We’ll be asked to choose a party (of the five) and cast a vote for our favorite candidate from that party only. Fred will be on it but he’s already dropped out. It’s not due until February 19 so we can wait until after Super Tuesday and see who else has left. Might make it easy.

Included in the mailing will be paper we have to sign promising that we won’t participate in a caucus of the other party. If we vote on a Republican ballot we have to promise we won’t go to a Democrat caucus. Umm, wait. If we have a primary why are we talking about a caucus? Because nobody’s in charge! Christine is driving her big bulldozer up the shoulder of I-5 toward the Alaska Way Viaduct so she’s busy.

But it gets worse: on the Democrat side the primary won’t mean anything because all of their delegates will be chosen from caucus results. On the Republican side only half are caucus and other half are Primary results. So there’s a potential that half of the Washington State delegation at the Republican Convention will proudly cast a vote for Fred Thompson. Standing O to follow.

We’re tossing a whole election for virtually no reason. And since the caucuses will be over before Feb. 19 our votes will just be so much noise. Sort a referendum on the election process itself. Anybody know what a caucus is or where to find one? Now I’m curious.

So I say we need write-ins. For example what if all the Democrats wrote in Britney Spears? Wouldn’t mean a thing. What about if nobody at all votes? They’d still file charges of voter fraud.

Oh, by the way; if you see Clay Bennett tell him it’s OK to go ahead and move the Sonics to Oklahoma City now. As long as he takes the 12 game losing streak and tattoos it across his forehead.

Al

Sasquatch Sighting

Devil's Slide

Visiting the Snow:
This was a weekend when I went to visit the snow. We rarely get snow here in the Greater Newcastle megalopolis because the Pacific Ocean keeps us wet and mild. Our mountains get most of the snow. It can even snow in the mountains when it’s sunny in Newcastle. Ha ha, just kidding, the sun never shines in Newcastle.

A lot of your Western Washington residents like to go play in the snow because afterward they can return home and marvel at how rhododendrons can bloom in January. In February the blossoms turn brown and fall to the ground.

One method of visiting the snow is via snowmobile. That’s a kind of motorcycle that has a rubber track and runners instead of wheels. Amazing devices. But you aren’t supposed to ride them any place except on snow. And since the snow covers the mountains we need to go there to ride. You load them on a trailer and drag the whole outfit to where the rig gets stuck in the snow and there you are.

Well, on this particular trip we managed to visit a place called Devil’s Slide on the snowmobiles. It’s aptly named because it would be a devil to climb up and you’d probably slide back down. We didn’t make it to the top of Devil’s Slide because the snow and loose rocks were just too slick. But, in the tradition of Americans in the woods we made a fine mess. Snowmobile parts strewn along the trail for miles. What fun.

People who’re really into it ware helmets and brightly colored spacesuits while riding machines with names like “Sno-eater” or “Avalanche Masher” and stuff. They go upwards of 100 mph and don’t seem to have any barriers. If the Forest Service needs a road cleared of drifts they just put up a sign that says “Snowmobiles KEEP OUT!” and in a couple of hours the drifts are gone.

We saw 26 bears, 13 moose, about 300 elk, and 2 sasquatch. At least I think they were sasquatch. They might have been imaginative snowmobile jumpsuits. Their machines were pretty fast.

In any case it was a very nice weekend and I had a lot of fun. On the way home we ate at the Red Horse Drive-In just outside Ellensburg. We had great food all weekend and great company. Hard to beat a good weekend. Even if we did see sasquatch.

Al

Things I Don't Get

It’s Always Something:

I need to understand why there are so many things I don’t get. For example I don’t get why Newcastle wants its own ZIP code? Of all the important things going on in the world why is that an issue? Maybe it’s just me.

Another thing I don’t get is all the hundreds of annoying little tasks a person should do every day. If you actually followed directions on stuff you’d spend all your time oiling, adjusting, resetting, dusting, watering, or otherwise messing with something. My strategy is to wait for it to go bad and then find a new model with sealed barings that don’t need oil.

Another example of stuff I don’t get is maintaining this magnificent machine of a body. If I did all the stuff they want me to I’d never have time to get sick. Maybe that’s the point. If my whole day consists of eating fiber, walking, and drinking water I’d spend whatever’s left sleeping or in the bathroom – maybe both. I couldn’t possibly get sick because I’d never have time to see another human to catch something from.

And the danged vehicle: don’t get me started. Stupid thing seems to need gas after only 300 miles or so. Just once couldn’t it wait 600 miles? That little gas pump light on the dash seems like it’s always lit. And oil, tires, plugs, wiper blades, washer fluid, gear shift knob, headlights and front bumper darn near once a month. It just goes on and on. Brake shoes seem to last forever, though.

Another thing I don’t get is how seemingly magic technology goes bad. Take batteries. I could get a boat load at Costco or I could use rechargeable ones. The problem is rechargeable batteries always need charging. And if you try to “top them off” just before you need them they go permanently bad. Not a flicker. So off to Costco I go. People fear robots will take over the world some day. If they run on batteries it won’t happen.

OK this is about my Dell keyboard missing letters. I type a paragraph and then review it and several words are missing a letter. It’s getting worse so that points to hardware. Software goes bad all at once whilst hardware seems to just deteriorate. It gets tired of producing all the letters and decides to it would be easier to do most of them. Do keyboards have batteries?

Hard to imagine an issue with a Dell but it happens. I have this pristine Gateway keyboard that came with my Gateway laptop. It never got used because the laptop has its keyboard built in. Why did they send me a spare? Another thing I don’t get. If I understood stuff like that I probably wouldn’t need to eat fiber. Anybody know of fiber that tastes good?

So here’s my challenge. I need to use this Gateway keyboard for a few days while I try to clean the Dell keyboard. As if I have time to clean keyboards.

And why is it a challenge? Because if it’s not a hardware problem it might be my fault. Heaven forbid I’d blame myself for my problems. There are lots of other people who can do that – (blame me for their problems) so I don’t need to get in THAT line.

Anyway, so far the good news is the Gateway keyboard (which I’m using right now) seems to be working fine and not dropping characters and not going “BONG” every two or three minutes.

“BONG! I SEE YOU HAVE TOO MANY ICONS ON YOUR DESKTOP! WOULD YOU LIKE ME TO MOVE THEM TO OKLAHOMA CITY? WITH THE SONICS? WELL, WHAT ABOUT IT?”

So now I get to try it on the Internet. It’s a good thing I have spell checker or my email would be even harder to read than it is.

Al

PS: How’s the blog working for you? So far I’m in dual mode to support the people who have very slow internets. But the blog has pictures and links now. What fun!

Some Local History

History of Newcastle:

Newcastle in its current incarnation was incorporated in 1994. Seems like last century. The name comes from two earlier towns in the area. We still have a few artifacts from those early Newcastles including one of the original houses.

The first Newcastle was a mining camp that got moved to become the second Newcastle. Neither one incorporated but the name came from the big industrial coal city in England. People had big plans for coal back then.

Several of our local place names came from coal mining, such as Coalfield, Coal Creek, and Black Diamond. Coal mining was going to be profitable for a long time. That was the view in the 1860s anyway.

The last of the mines closed in the 1960s because the economy of mining and transporting coal evaporated. None of the mine entrances remain open because people would probably go into them and get lost – forever. Whenever an old mine entrance is found the people in charge of protecting us from ourselves plug it up with concrete. But we still find a new one to plug up every few years. Sometimes a yard suddenly sinks and hundreds of politicians gather around pledging to do something about it.

After the mines closed the Rabanco people started a landfill for construction material. They eventually created a mountain of debris and now there’s a golf course on top of it. So when a mine shaft collapses the hole fills with trash and golfers.

Glen, the Lake Boren Carp, was just another fish in the pond before coal was discovered in the Newcastle area. He was around to see most of the activity and has some interesting stories. In those early mining days the creeks had more water and Glen was smaller so he was able to get around easier. These days he has to travel at night to avoid upsetting folks who fear giant fish.

When the large coal vein was discovered in Newcastle in 1863 there were no rail lines to carry coal to Lake Washington. During those first years it was hauled in freight wagons drawn by mules. Glen tells me the wagons were very heavy and it took a lot of mules to pull them out of the hills. They would load a wagon with coal and then start hitching up mules. By the time the last mules were hitched the first pair had already reached the lake. Dock workers turned them around and sent them back toward the mine. That was convenient because the mule skinner (that’s the wagon driver) could check on his animals as they went by going the other way. It’s easy to see where that old wagon road was because things grow very well due to the natural fertilizer.

At the dock on Lake Washington coal was loaded on barges that carried it to the south end of Lake Union. We’ve heard of that lake before. Dock workers unloaded the coal and it took another wagon ride through Seattle to the Pike Street Pier. At that point it was loaded on ships headed for places like San Francisco. Seattle’s first train hauled coal from the South Lake Union docks to the Pike Street Pier beginning in 1872. Railroads replaced freight wagons in most coal mining areas by the late 1870s.

Descendents of those mules still roam the hills of Newcastle. Ha ha, that’s a joke. Mules can’t have offspring. Bet you didn’t know that.

Glen has seen continuous change during the past 160 years. When you drive through Newcastle today it looks a lot like an ordinary suburb (roads under construction) with houses and grocery stores. It’s hard to imagine people have been living and working in the area since 1853. Well, it’s hard to imagine people working there anyway.

One of the key reasons the coal barges stopped at Lake Union was rapids near the current location of the Ballard Locks. Barges and large boats could not negotiate the rapids. Therefore lake boats stayed in the lake and ocean going ships stayed in Puget Sound. In those days it was reasonable to haul coal by wagon, train, barge, and ship to sell in larger markets. After the Ballard Locks opened in 1913 ships could move between Lake Washington and Puget Sound.
In the South Lake Union area in 1890 the Seattle Electric Railway and Power Company successfully laid streetcar tracks to downtown Seattle in just five days. They used the same route as the old Seattle Coal and Transportation Company rail line which was no longer in use. This streetcar line was eventually extended to Fremont and Ballard. It finally closed in the late 1940s. In July 2006 the South Lake Union Streetcar (SLUT) track laying was started and took a year and a half to lay 1.3 miles. Times change.

In 1903 John Olmsted proposed a park on the shore at South Lake Union. They finally broke ground in 2006. That means soon the South Lake Union Streetcar will soon have someplace to go. In 1913 Henry Ford opened a Model T assembly plant there. The building is now a Public Storage facility. In 1998 the old Ford Building was designated a Seattle City Landmark. Be sure to check it out next time you ride the Trolley.

Given the slow progress in rail construction these days I think the rapid transit line connecting Newcastle to the rest of the Seattle metropolitan area will take some time. And that’s good because Glen has plenty of stories.

Al