Local deep freeze continues; WA COVID cases skyrocket, as King County buys 300,000 home tests; would-be customer lacerates bartender who asked for vax proof; Beacon Hill Garden House saved.

County Councilmember race-baits a (white) election rival; SPD prepares for firings of unvaxxed cops, while Inslee might impose a private-sector vax mandate; Melinda French Gates joins ‘Forbes 400’ on her own.

Mudhoney bassist (and Harborview ER nurse) Guy Maddison tells COVID tales in a podcast; area health leaders blame public gatherings for COVID resurgence; Amazon now outsells Walmart (sort-of); Afghan refugees are headed our way.

The new ‘Skid Road’ book’s parallels to the older one; more institutions impose vaccine requirements; controversial PCC president quits; city attorney Pete Holmes is out of the general-election race.

Another big historic U District church is razed; ‘critical race theory’ isn’t what the far right says it is; south King County’s vax rate still lags; online petitions ask Jeff Bezos to go into space and stay there.

Longtime TV-radio combo divorcing; 40 years since AIDS pandemic’s start; Neptune Theatre’s reopening date; Seattle nears 70 percent fully vaxxed.

Hugo House executive director resigns, amid calls for more inclusiveness at the writing center; a 777 drops parts during a flight; City Light’s own Skagit dams harm fish runs (and thus orcas); should schools take ‘summer vacation’ in the spring?

A major SAM exhibit you’ll only see on video; new upscale apartment building donated for affordable housing; Point Roberts no longer blockaded; ‘rock concert rules’ for ‘winning’ vaccine access.

Sub Pop retail shop opens beneath a mostly-empty Amazon tower; WA records its lowest new-COVID-case count of the year; a Native-homeless advocate runs for mayor; no, Bill Gates doesn’t want to kill you on behalf of any lizard men from outer space.

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.

Two Bells demolished three years after it closed; SPOG head Mike Solan refuses to quit; activists claim the FBI had a role in suppressing local summer protests; a post-COVID national recession could make homelessness a whole lot worse.

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.

On the day after the Seven Gables Theater burned, we look back on some recent local arts and culture stories, trends, and tales of survival.

New kids’ book ‘Panda Demick’ looks on (and for) the bright side; state starts COVID tracking phone app; Tacoma ICE jail uses solitary confinement heavily; make your own ‘restoration of federal sanity advent calendar.’

A joint march marks 150 days of local protests; experts’ advice on COVID winter survival; T-Mobile joins the TV ‘streaming wars;’ violent shootings are up locally and nationally.