Inaugural poem set to a local funk-rock track; waiting lists for vaccine-clinic helpers are getting as long as those for the vaccines themselves; Tacoma police SUV runs over street-race spectators; Microsoft’s developing chatbots based on dead people.

‘Mario’ games you’ve probably never seen; state tries to speed up vaccination pace; ‘Twin Peaks’ Roadhouse might close for good; Nikkita Oliver to teach Seattle U law students about ‘abolition.’

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.

An old idea about why Seattle attracted Scandinavians; a ‘Nation’ article disses the UW’s ‘modeling team’ org. and the Gates Foundation; King County to partly bail out Convention Center expansion project; ‘rapid response teams’ going to understaffed nursing homes.

‘Cascadia’ group wants four big, all-new cities; City Council passes budget with some SPD cuts; a massive (but multi-day) state COVID case count; an appropriate Christmas carol for this ‘bleak” year.

‘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?

The 50th anniversary of the ‘exploding whale’ film; Inslee wishes you’d spend T-Day at home; where I want new arts spaces to go when we can have them again; UW football season starts (finally) (maybe).

Allegedly true Seattle ghost stories; Alaska tsunami threat likely won’t reach us; ex-Gov. Dan Evans turns 95 as the WA GOP steadily collapses; ballot drop boxes filling up quickly.

An ‘Indigiqueer’ drag performer wants real Native inclusion in the arts (not just slogans); more evidence of tech-biz sexism; Gates says COVID vaccine could be close; another failed try to track a ‘murder hornet’.

Bartell Drugs to be sold off; Elephant Car Wash on Denny to be razed; public school enrollment (especially kindergarten) is down statewide; city Human Rights Commission wants Mayor Durkan to resign or be removed.

Bill Gates the Elder passes; Inslee bashes climate denial from the White House; Durkan-friendly ‘activist leader’ gets high-paying city job; Ms game called on account of smoke.

The coughs just keep a-comin’ as some big fires slow down; schools might consider reopening as COVID declines in WA (except Pullman); a debt crisis looms for renters; a Black Lives Matter group voices ‘concerns’ about some City Council members.

Amazon’s big plans for Bellevue don’t mean it’s abandoning Seattle; remote school starts with some glitches; what SPD’s cutting to add to patrols; many area arts groups could go broke before year’s end.

A woman with one of the pandemic’s most sensitive jobs; City Council advances more SPD cuts/changes, plus ending homeless-sweeps Navigation Team; Gov. candidate Loren Culp’s (mostly maskless) rally; report of ‘the death of the city’ are greatly exaggerated.