May Is The Time to Plant Marijuana And Mums
From backyard gardens to rooftop terraces, May is the time to plant marijuana and mums for the best results.
The post May Is The Time to Plant Marijuana And Mums appeared first on The Fresh Toast.
The Fresh Toast
Seattle Chief of Police Adrian Diaz is toast, at least as the city’s top hog, according to a source.
by Ashley Nerbovig
Seattle Chief of Police Adrian Diaz is toast, at least as the city’s top hog, according to a source. After a series of lawsuits accusing him of allowing a culture of sexism and racism at the Seattle Police Department, combined with rumors about an inappropriate relationship with a top aide, his stint as chief has come to a close after less than four years.
On Tuesday, the day of Diaz’s departure, the City’s Office of Inspector General sent out an email explaining that it planned to investigate a complaint against Diaz over his hiring of a top aide, who he allegedly had an intimate relationship with.
The City has scheduled a press conference at 1 pm today.
Diaz became interim chief of the department in 2020 after the departure of Carmen Best. Mayor Bruce Harrell officially appointed Diaz to the position in September 2022. Before he began overseeing the department, he led SPD’s Collaborative Policing Bureau, which focused on community policing efforts such as youth violence intervention and educating the public about policing.
This is a developing story.
The Stranger
Can we PLEASE just get rid of the self-checkout and go back to checkout lanes, with express lanes for 8 items or less?
by Anonymous
Can we please bring checkout lanes back? The number of people who take an entire, overflowing cart of groceries through a self-checkout lane thinking they can scan groceries faster than a cashier is astounding, especially when they eventually run out of space on the ever-so-sensitive bagging scale and start standing around to wait for employee assistance anyway.
I’ve seen people with a broken arm and a full cart of groceries go through the self-checkout. I’ve seen parents letting their children painstakingly scan each and every item in the cart, only to have them not put something in the bagging area and—surprise!—require the help of an employee!! The grocery store checkout is not some play place! I’m sure you could even buy a toy checkout set at Fred Meyer!!
And remarkably, some people still have NO IDEA how to use the self-checkout. They treat it as if it were some sort of elder alien technology they are first encountering after being unwillingly thrust a thousand years into the future. (Maybe they were? If so, fuggin’ talk to me! Let me live out my X-Files/Futurama fantasy!)
Can we PLEASE just get rid of the self-checkout and go back to checkout lanes, with express lanes for 8 items or less? Or at the very least make self-checkout express only!?
Just let me leave this place and show my receipt to the security guards on my way out.
Do you need to get something off your chest? Submit an I, Anonymous and we’ll illustrate it! Send your unsigned rant, love letter, confession, or accusation to ianonymous@thestranger.com. Please remember to change the names of the innocent and the guilty.
The Stranger
You’d think having more millionaires in Seattle would make the city richer. It doesn’t.
by Charles Mudede
One would expect that the 3,700 millionaires Seattle added in 2023 alone would mean the city as a whole (meaning, the public spirit of the area) would be that much richer. But such is not the case. Indeed, it appears to be the opposite. The Seattle City Council now claims to be broke, the same goes for Seattle Public Library and Seattle Public Schools. And so, the addition of, as Puget Sound Business Journal worded it, “3,700 newly minted millionaires, nine centimillionaires and one billionaire in 2023” is not at all a blessing. Indeed, it’s not a stretch to connect this explosion of the richest of the rich with the new and deeply regressive composition of the City Council. Is this a law that needs our attention? One that has, like so much in economics that’s related to reality or facts, been ignored? Concomitant with a rise in W is a decline in P? (W being the number of wealthy people and P representing public wealth.) What kind of city or urbanism can we expect with this law?
Before we examine the urbanism that’s adequate for those who have fewer infinities than most (more about this infinities business in a moment), let’s be clear about what makes a millionaire a millionaire. The less confusion on this matter the better.
Puget Sound Business Journal writes:
The number of millionaires in Seattle grew 72% between 2013 to 2023 to a current estimate of 54,200. The city is now also home to 130 centimillionaires and 11 billionaires. The report [by the global wealth management firm Henley & Partners] defines “millionaires,” “centimillionaires” and “billionaires” as individuals with over $1 million, $100 million and $1 billion in liquid investable wealth, respectively.
Liquid means cash-in-hand or assets that can easily be converted into cash. A millionaire, in this sense, has a million that can generate income from the dividends, interest rates, or manipulation (buybacks) of financial assets. A middle-class homeowner does not fit this description. For one, a member of this group usually doesn’t outright own the key middle-class asset, a house. It’s owned, instead, by a bank. The”homeowner” can, of course, use the asset as collateral for a loan or claim its equity when it’s sold. Both forms of capital extraction depend on the state of the housing market specifically and the economy as a whole.
What about the poor? What makes a person poor? It is a high number of infinities. A rich person, by contrast, has few or close to no infinities, this is why billionaires turn to space, to the stars, to rockets, to visions of “Occupying Mars.” There are just too few infinities for them. But a poor person is confronted with an infinity when, say, the “average rent for [a 1-bedroom] apartment in Seattle is $2,227.” Why infinity? Because the average rent is so high that it’s as obtainable as any price above it, be it a million/billion/trillion bucks. A key component of American ideology is to disguise these real and hard infinities by celebrating the self-made rich, emphasizing individualism, and pushing self-help solutions.
One more definition is in order. It concerns the economic category of late capitalism. It is used a little too loosely. For example, a class offered by the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research describes the current stage of capitalism as late:
[L]ate capitalism without citing baneful examples of its spatial manifestations—the soullessness of Hudson Yards; the Grenfell Tower disaster; the (lethal to build) Qatari World Cup stadiums; aestheticized server farms and data centers.
But the world-systems theory correctly defines this category as the final stage reached by a nation that holds the dominant position in a globalized capitalist order. The Dutch moment, for example, experienced the late stage in the early 1700s. Great Britain entered it at the end of the 19th century. The US, in the 1980s. What characterizes late in all of these moments is the transition from a productive (real) economy to a financialized one. China is still in the productive stage of capitalism, but it will eventually sunset with the expansion and final dominance of its financial sector.
With all of this in mind, let’s turn to what I call billionaire urbanism, which is specific to late-stage American capitalism. To grasp the substance of this specificity one has to apply the Uno School’s description of a totality, which is the completion of an economy’s “inner logic” (read Uno Kozo’s Principles of Political Economy: Theory of a Purely Capitalist Society). In this respect, American capitalism was structured by a housing market that rapidly expanded after the Second World War. A feature of this expansion was gentrification, which the German-British urban sociologist Ruth Glass first identified and named in 1964. As I explained in another post, gentrification is an innovation of what’s called the Golden Age of Capitalism (1947 to 1970). It entered hyperdrive after the deregulation of finance in the 1980s.
In Seattle, as with other cities, gentrification was totalized around the time of the housing crash of 2007. Indeed, the crash might be seen as a manifestation of this totality. The process simply ran out of gas, out of poor people to displace, out of NINJA loans to securitize. What was next? Billionaire urbanism. This kind of spatial configuration expresses the command those at the top have over all revenue. Investing in the classes below millionaires, centimillionaires and billionaires is no longer profitable for those with “liquid investable wealth.” The returns on capital-directed commoners (the infinity people) are way too small or too slow. This is why Seattle’s Council seriously considered making no investment whatsoever in the lower classes. This wasn’t an accident. It’s consistent with the new structuring (and spatial) logic of billionaire urbanism. All post-gentrification investments must (can only) go to the very top because that’s where all of the money is.
The solution to the decline of Seattle’s downtown will not be social (long-term) investment but the phantasmagoria of its own Hudson Yards.
The Stranger
One really great thing to do every day of the week.
by Audrey Vann
Amy Tan: The Backyard Bird Chronicles
(BOOKS/BIRDS) In 2020, a lot of us started birding—mass layoffs and an unfamiliar amount of hours to fill tend to encourage people to look to the skies, I guess. National treasure Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club) will conjure plenty of conversations about spark birds with her latest book, The Backyard Bird Chronicles, a “gorgeous, witty account of birding, nature, and the beauty around us that hides in plain sight.” Even if you’ve never identified a single species beyond a parking lot crow, chances are good that you’ll find the book inspiring. My suggestion? Go pick up some ‘nocs. (Seattle Public Library – Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave, 7 pm, free, all ages) LINDSAY COSTELLO
La Luz: News of the Universe Record Release Show
(MUSIC) Newly promoted from Hardly Art to Sub Pop for their new full-length, News of the Universe, La Luz have attained a peak—a rare turn of events for a rock group a dozen years into their existence. Inspired and consoled by Octavia E. Butler’s metaphysical poetry collection of the same title, Cleveland wrote these songs in the fraught aftermath of a breast cancer diagnosis, which occurred two years after the birth of her son. On top of these turbulent life events, La Luz lost veteran bassist Lena Simon and keyboardist Alice Sandahl (although both played on Universe), and had to adapt to new drummer Audrey Johnson. Life dealt Cleveland lemons, and she squeezed them into the delicious lemonade of Universe. (The Crocodile, 2505 First Ave, 8 pm, $22, 21+) DAVE SEGAL
Meet-and-Greet with Maria Bamford and Scott Marvel Cassidy
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(BOOKS) You’ve probably already caught Maria Bamford’s comedy, a surreal medley of voice impressions, deadpan jokes, vulnerable storytelling, and high-energy, rapidly changing characters on Comedy Central or Netflix. (She’s also played roles in BoJack Horseman, Adventure Time, and Kung Fu Panda.) But did you know that she is also one-half of a very cute couple, and you can hear the whole story through the eyes of their pugs, Blueberry and Bert?! Hogbook and Lazer Eyes, co-authored by Bamford and her artist hubby Scott Marvel Cassidy, tells the story of their OkCupid meet-cute and eventual marriage with naturalistic graphic storytelling and Bamford’s pitch-perfect comedic timing. You won’t meet the pugs at this book signing, but Bamford and Cassidy will be there, maybe even holding hands!! I’m not crying, you’re crying. (Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Ave, 7 pm, free, all ages) LINDSAY COSTELLO
(PRIDE) Kick off the 50th anniversary celebrations of Seattle Pride with a day of music, dancing, performances, and more. Emceed by drag favorites Versace Doll and Betty Wetter, one stage will feature live performances from the likes of headliner LIVt and groovy sextet Day Soul Exquisite while the other will showcase local DJs spinning dance tracks. It wouldn’t be pride without Drag Queen Storytime, and the family and teen space from Camp Ten Trees will also return. New this year, GenPride hosts an area specifically designed for seniors with accessibility features like ADA restrooms, ASL interpreters, and priority seating. As always, there will be an alcohol garden, a sober area, food trucks, community booths, queer vendor marketplace, and the most welcoming vibes. (Volunteer Park, 1247 15th Ave E, noon–7 pm, free, all ages) SHANNON LUBETICH
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(FOOD & DRINK) This festival revolves around the combination of savory, gut-busting breakfast foods and heady booze. Day drinking is encouraged with craft beers from over 30 local breweries, ciders, and seltzers, plus mimosas, boozy root beer floats, Irish coffee, and a 30-foot Bloody Mary bar—that’s FOUR Victor Wembanyamas! It’s stocked with dozens upon dozens of toppings, including tater tots, mozzarella sticks, jalapeño poppers, veggies, herbs, pickles, puffed Cheetos, bacon, and pork rinds. You’re probably going to want to clear your schedule for that requisite post-brunch nap. Entertainment includes DJ Supreme La Rock, dueling pianos, giant lawn games, bacon bingo, photo ops with a gigantic inflatable skillet, and more. A portion of proceeds benefits the nonprofit SCM Medical Missions, which aims to bring relief to people affected by conflict and natural disaster in the Middle East and North Africa. (Lumen Field, 800 Occidental Ave S, 11 am-3 pm, $45, 21+) JULIANNE BELL
(MUSIC) You can easily identify the famed post-punk quartet Echo & the Bunnymen from their full-bodied vocals, ethereal instrumentation, and wind-tossed hairstyles (set in place with lots of hairspray, of course). Let them add some doom and gloom to the spring season (we need more, right?) with songs like “The Killing Moon” and “Lips Like Sugar” as they bring their Songs to Learn and Sing tour to Seattle. (Showbox SoDo, 1700 First Ave S, 8 pm, $49.50-$55, 21+) AUDREY VANN
Ballard FC vs Chivas de Guadalajara U23
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(SPORTS) USL League Two champions Ballard FC return this season to defend their title. It doesn’t get much more local than being sponsored by Reuben’s Brews and having your main chant be “Up the bridges!” At the home opener this year, the game ball was delivered by parachuters and Dick’s burgers were thrown into the crowd after every goal. Honestly, it was more exciting than expected and I would recommend a game to anyone as cheap, entertaining, family-friendly fun. Plenty of local food vendors are on-site if you’re looking to do dinner at the game; the line seemingly never dies down for Nepalese food stand Kathmandu MoMoCha. (Memorial Stadium, 401 Fifth Ave N, 7 pm, $15-$40, all ages) SHANNON LUBETICH
The Stranger
Hey abby is celebrating its second anniversary with a special discount. Leafly readers can save up to 40% on their very own 420 Edition of the Hey, abby grow box by clicking the link below.
The post Celebrate two years of Hey abby with 40% off appeared first on Leafly.
Leafly
Was There Marijuana In The Old West
Watching Yellowstone and wondering about the American Frontier? Like, was there marijuana in the old west?
The post Was There Marijuana In The Old West appeared first on The Fresh Toast.
The Fresh Toast
But did they?
The post New study: People got high without any munchies on THC-V appeared first on Leafly.
Leafly
Seattle Chief of Police Adrian Diaz is toast, at least as the city’s top hog, according to a source.
by Ashley Nerbovig
Seattle Chief of Police Adrian Diaz is toast, at least as the city’s top hog, according to a source. After a series of lawsuits accusing him of allowing a culture of sexism and racism at the Seattle Police Department, combined with rumors about an inappropriate relationship with a top aide, his stint as chief has come to a close after less than four years.
On Tuesday, the day of Diaz’s departure, the City’s Office of Inspector General sent out an email explaining that it planned to investigate a complaint against Diaz over his hiring of a top aide, who he allegedly had an intimate relationship with.
The City has scheduled a press conference at 1 pm today, according to reports.
Diaz became interim chief of the department in 2020 after the departure of Carmen Best. Mayor Bruce Harrell officially appointed Diaz to the position in September 2022. Before he began overseeing the department, he led SPD’s Collaborative Policing Bureau, which focused on community policing efforts such as youth violence intervention and educating the public about policing.
This is a developing story.
The Stranger
The Stranger’s morning news roundup.
by Vivian McCall
Diaz is out: Ashley reports that Seattle Police Department Chief Adrian Diaz will no longer lead the department, according to a source. Sources told Fox 13 station that he cleaned out his desk last night, and that Mayor Bruce Harrell re-assigned him to special projects. The City will reportedly hold a press conference around 1 pm today. Ashley will have more on this developing story later.
Library cyber attack: Someone hit the Seattle Public Library system with a ransomware attack over the holiday weekend. It shut down several online services Tuesday. The attack affected staff and public computers, library loaning, access to the online catalog, e-books, e-audiobooks and the main website, which is now back online. Buildings remained open, allowing people to check out regular-ass books with old-school paper forms, which, if anything, should bolster your stalwart faith in our greatest public amenity.
Shame on you: City Council Member Maritza Rivera introduced a last-minute amendment to pull funding for a City initiative that empowers BIPOC-led community groups to build capital projects, and BIPOC-led organizations shamed her for about three embarrassing hours. They called Rivera, her amendment to pull funding, and her supportive colleagues racist, and a lot of other adjectives Hannah reported here. The council voted 6-3 to delay a vote on the amendment until next week.
Council delays Rivera’s attempt to gut equitable development initiative so she can combat “disinformation.” It is unclear how she will convert the three hours worth of public commenters who accused her of balancing the budget on backs’ of Black people. https://t.co/E8nl81LanC
— Hannah Krieg (@hannahkrieg) May 29, 2024
Why are there so many migrants in Tukwila? Spoiler, it’s not because Tukwila is (or isn’t!) awesome. According to the Seattle Times, it all started with a 911 call about six Venezuelan migrants on Jackson Street in the summer of 2022, who were the first of more than a dozen referrals to Riverton Park United Methodist Church, an institution that actually has provided a response to clear community needs. Seattle, meanwhile, has taken no ownership of a crisis it helped start.
Brouwer’s Café is closing after 19 years: The Fremont bar’s general manager told the Seattle Times that the rising costs of food, beer, labor, and shortages of servers and low foot traffic led to its demise. It opened in 2005 as a marvel, with West Coast beer dorks coming from as far as California to ogle its 64-tap, 400-bottle selection. The lights go out for good on June 29.
Air Force awarded Boeing $7.5 billion guided bomb contract: Under the contract, Boeing will build kits that convert “dumb” bombs into “smart” guided bombs known as Joint Direct Attack Munitions. The company will also provide spares, repairs, and technical assistance to the US government until February 2030. The US sends JDAM-equipped bombs to Taiwan, Ukraine, and Israel.
BUI: As Ashley wrote yesterday, a woman fell off a boat into Lake Washington Monday night. Seattle Police have since impounded the boat and arrested the 46-year-old man who owns it, who they suspect of boating under the influence. The woman is feared dead. The US Coast Guard stopped searching yesterday, but the Seattle Police Department’s Harbor Patrol Unit is still looking.
Israel intensifies attacks on Rafah in Gaza: Israeli tanks are advancing further into Rafah in a ground invasion that is drawing widespread international condemnation. Israel shelled a tent camp in the “safe zone” west of the city, killing at least 21 Palestinian civilians. Over the weekend, another Israeli bombing on the outskirts of Rafah killed 45 and injured 200 in an ensuing fire, most of them women and children. Al Jazeera reports Israeli air raids and artillery have killed 15 people today. The UN says only 170 trucks have made it to Palestinians in the last three weeks, when 500 are needed daily. There’s no indication that the Rafah crossing will open to allow more aid any time soon. President Joe Biden says Israel has still not crossed a “red line,” which he defines as a mass troop invasion.
Jury deliberations begin in Trump trial: In the seventh week of Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial, prosecutors spoke to the jury a final time, urging them to convict the former president for allegedly falsifying 34 business records to cover up his former lawyer Michael Cohen’s hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels. The defense called Cohen a liar and said the payment was just business, not a crime. As the jury deliberates, the wait for a verdict now begins.
RFK Jr. doesn’t stop lyinggg: First he claims a worm ate part of his brain, and now he’s out with a pretty fake story about indigenous Peruvians ambushing him with bows drawn while on a whitewater rafting trip in the 1970s. Kennedy told the story in a 1984 book, claiming that he and his cousin Christian Kennedy Lawford fought back with a stick of dynamite. His cousin told a more realistic version in his 2005 memoir: drunk villagers once shot an arrow from the shore in their general direction. Kennedy’s campaign did not respond to Huff Post’s request for comment.
Not a slay, Francis: Earlier this month, Pope Francis and a few bishops were yakking it up about whether or not to admit gay men into Catholic seminaries in preparation for the priesthood. Francis wasn’t into it and said that there was already enough “frociaggine” going on there, the Italian equivalent to faggotness or faggotry. He apologized.
I can’t get a bead on his Holiness and gay stuff, and neither can queer Catholics. This year, he said that “sex change” surgery and “gender theory” were grave threats to human dignity, but he’s also said that trans people can be baptized and serve as Godparents. Last year, he told priests they should bless people in gay relationships but not the relationship.
Pope Francis is queerbaiting again
— Lolo (@LolOverruled) May 29, 2024
World’s longest-serving flight attendant dies: Bette Nash died at 88 after serving as a flight attendant for 67 years. Nash started her job at the now-defunct Eastern Airlines in 1957, when airlines treated women terribly. Some companies still put age caps on the “stewardesses” they advertised as would-be brides for horny executives. She must have had an iron will; I can only hope she did it for love of the game and not an inability to retire.
Say cheese or die: People are filming—or pretending to film—Chipotle workers because they think the restaurant is directing employees to skimp out on portions. Chipotle denies this. Delish asks, “genius” or “greedy;” I ask, “What the fuck is wrong with you psychopaths?” Making workers’ lives even worse for one extra spoonful of wet slop meat is certifiable. You’re not sticking up to a corporation. You’re ruining a teenager’s afternoon.
The Stranger