I am doing my homework about my upcoming move to Miller Park and am curious — where is the local post office?  Is it the Broadway location?  23rd and Union?  I saw that the Postal Plus on Republican is the nearest place from which to send mail, but I admit I’m very skeptical.  These reviews make it sound like sending mail can be a pleasant experience!

Even though Seattle didn’t achieve true heat wave status* over the weekend, I’m positive that some Capitol Hill micro-climates did.  For example, I was at Bauhaus yesterday afternoon, and inside the ladies room it must have been at least 126 degrees.  I heard the men’s room was even hotter, although no one was brave enough to make a direct comparison.  Any other nominations for hottest micro-heat wave on the hill?

* While there is no official definition of heat wave, I prefer the criteria provided by A. T. Burrows in 1900.  He “rigidly defined a ‘hot wave’ as a spell of three or more days on each of which the maximum shade temperature reaches or exceeds 90 °F (32 °C).”  (Primary source: Glossary of Meteorology; Secondary source: Wikipedia.)

A comment buried in an older post about previous unfortunate run-ins with Brix construction workers caught my eye. Dita reports:

I was walking northbound on eleventh ave. btwn. Mercer and Aloha when two of the hispanic construction workers were walking behind me about a hundred yards or so. I crossed the street (on the Lowell Elementary payground side) and one of them quickly walked across the street towards me and began following me a couple feet behind me. I turned around and saw thwe most creepy look on his face and just then a woman appeared and I started to walk with her.

Andersen Construction is now running the construction show at Brix. I have no idea if these workers are rollovers from WG Clark — which lost its job — who supposedly received a “talking to” about why harassing women is not OK. On the one hand, I understand that a company can’t control what their staff do when not technically on-the-job. But on the other hand, they represent the company and it is obviously terrible PR to let it continue unchecked.

Unfortunately, Andersen wasn’t overly responsive to Dita at first pass. Furthermore, the police weren’t going to get involved unless there was physical contact. I’m talking with her about possible next steps but wanted to see if anyone else has had similar problems with the Brix construction workers.

Seattle is once again under a Smog Watch today. The hot air from the south is trapping in the pollution and causing our air to be soupy and gross. As someone who’s relatively new to the West Coast, smog still freaks me out a little. Then I found this handy graph on the Puget Sound Clear Air Agency’s website.  Sure, Boren and Olive is not *quite* on Capitol Hill, but it’s close enough for me.  Clearly the air quality trend isn’t moving in a healthy direction, but it’s not nearly as bad as I was expecting.  Whoo!

Last night my companion and I noticed that the door to Broadway Video was propped open. This was notable (to us) since Broadway Video is notorious (to us) for always being warm inside (to us) and never opening their door. My first reaction was to “blog about this!” but quickly realized that this observation would likely have resonance with absolutely no one else. Then again, neighborhood blogs seem to exist because there is a shared appreciation of quirky observations within a particular place. But there must be a limit, right?

So I’m curious — what have you noticed in the neighborhood that was just too micro for micro-blogging?

The combination of the scale of this building, its location, and (especially) the Jimi Hendrix monument out front makes it seem as if a record store was always meant to be here.

The stretch of Broadway between Republican and Harrison generally has near 100% occupancy.  Yesterday I noticed that the storefronts on either side of Gruv — STA Traval and a Chinese restaurant whose name I can’t remember — very recently closed and it looks like Gruv is expanding into STA. 

p.s.  While we’re on the subject, in my best Seinfeld voice, what was the deal with STA Travel?!

One of things I was most looking forward to as a soon-to-be Miller Park resident was the QFC on 15th. See, as my co-kuer City Limits pointed out to me last year, the 15th Ave QFC carried the extra-scrumptious maple pecan Sweet Home Farm granola, while the Broadway Market QFC only carried the Honey Nut and Low Fat Raisin granola. It’s so good that City invited me on special “uphill outings” just to stock up.

Lo, as a practice run over the weekend revealed, the maple pecan on 15th has gone missing! Is this a lease-breaker?

The first hour of today’s Weekday on KUOW was about Seattle’s architectural design review process. This reminded me of my recent trip to the east coast — specifically, Lancaster PA — and how I fell in love with the thousands of rowhouses that line nearly every street. Are any of the newer developments on Capitol Hill following this type of model?

Several of you agreed with me that Capitol Hill, particularly the Fancy Pants, could use a yarn store.  I have definitely tried to make Stitches on Pike work for me.  But they are clearly more of a sewing shop than a knit/crochet shop, and their selection just doesn’t cut it for some projects (e.g., afghans) since most of their yarns are pretty pricey and in really small skeins.  So, I find that I end up schlepping over to Ballard’s Joann Fabrics most of the time.  What about the rest of you happy hookers and nifty knitters?  Where do you do your yarn shopping?  Is there a place nearby that I’m missing?