Tacoma

Pacific Avenue in ruins

Pacific Avenue Trees removed
Photo of old Pacific Avenue trees lining the street Dec. 2012

It’s hard to pass through the northern end of Pacific Avenue right now without feeling like excrement. After driving through earlier, I am unable to fully comprehend what is happening down there. It has been puzzling for awhile now and I’ve been doing my best to keep quiet, not judge, wait and see..

But I can’t be completely silent! It looks awful and there are a lot of missing trees and ginormous trenches in the sidewalks! Tomorrow I plan to take some pictures of the whole mess and try to figure out what I’m seeing. Immediately afterwards I plan to cheer myself up with a visit to RR at Tinkertopia. Maybe he can help me understand?

Only way to “save the Luzon”

The Luzon issue is really starting to get old. How many different groups do we want to look at this before we move in one of many new directions? Personally, I would’ve given up on it long ago. Unlike most of you reading this, I’ve been here my whole life and the massive void in the middle of downtown created by the DaVita parking lot and the Luzon building has long worn out its welcome with me.

On the news of Igor Kunista moving in to try and save the day, I will wait a small while longer before calling for the outright demolition of this dangerous, useless structure. If we DO want to continue pondering ways to salvage the Luzon building, then I will offer my final idea on this matter.

Are you familiar with The Brooklyn Seafood, Steak & Oyster House in downtown Seattle? It is a rather upscale restaurant in a rather small, very old building adjacent to the relatively new and magnificent Washington Mutual Tower on 2nd and University (The WaMu Tower may now be called the Chase Tower, but you won’t ever hear me call it that). The old building that houses this fine restaurant reminds me a lot of the Luzon building.

When the WaMu Tower was built, they kept the little old building on the corner and even incorporated it into the new building, providing it with STRUCTURE and PARKING and a PURPOSE!! Anyone who wants to save the Luzon should take a close look at the Brooklyn.

In the picture below, you can see the Brooklyn’s old building incorporated into the base of the new super structure. From the street level, it works seemlessly, and the precious architecture from yesteryear is preserved.

Brooklyn in downtown Seattle

Dave Hates Chico at the Spar

My old friend Jeremy Johnson is coming to The Spar this Saturday, 8/1, with his bandmate, Kevyn Smith. They are Dave Hates Chico and they promise to pull out all the stops for their worldwide, exclusive North Tacoma debut. Check out the link to hear their new song.

Jeremy and I used to devour pairs of sandwiches together from the famed, and now defunct Raindancer sandwich shop in the University District of Seattle in the mid 90’s. This was our ritual: he would ride his bicycle from Queen Anne to my house in Wallingford with his guitar strapped to his back (I always thought that was super cool) and then we’d go snatch up a bag of sandwiches pre-jam. I’ve played guitar with many people and I’ve eaten Raindancer sandwiches with many people, but NO MAN could do both with as much fervor as Jeremy. Further, no other man explored the entire sandwich menu so completely. He even renamed most of the sandwiches for our purposes to aid in identifying their effects on the human body.

Dave Hates Chico has recently toured the country and their new EP “Floatin” is available now. Aside from playing great music, these guys are on a crusade to sort out the mess created by the music licensing business. Venues in Seattle are forced to pay licensing fees for cover songs played under their roof, and it is killing the live music scene in the process. I support Jeremy and Kevyn in all of their endeavors.

If you’re at The Spar and you don’t like this band, I will buy you one (1) pint of Hale’s Cream Ale, or another beer of equal or lesser value for your troubles. Once you’ve finished your free beer, I will show you the door.

Downtown Tacoma via Puyallup River

If you’re like me, you’ve often wondered what it would be like to take a kayak down the Puyallup River. Your ship has come in. This article and subsequent video should provide everything you need to know when taking this safe, fun journey through the wilds of Pierce County. You can park cars behind the Puyallup Fred Meyer on River Road and drop boats in the water under the bridge to Hwy 167. There is a nice sandy beach under the bridge, perfect for this sort of thing.

We left the other car at The Dock building on Dock Street in downtown Tacoma and it took us about 4 hours to connect the dots. 2 1/2 hours of the trip is like riding an escalator – very relaxing and calm. The last hour and a half did involve a pretty good paddle, but only because of the way we timed the tide. Surprisingly, when the tide is coming in, Commencement Bay actually backs up into what appears to be the last mile of the Puyallup River. So we were effectively paddling upcurrent and downstream at the same time for awhile, even though that really doesn’t make sense until you’re there.

You loop around the Simpson Lumber Mill (the one with the smokestacks and giant sawdust piles in the middle of the port – this is a site to behold if you’ve never been close to it) and cut across Commencement Bay to Dock Street.

I highly recommend this for anyone with a kayak in the Tacoma area. It’s just too easy and convenient to pass up. The river level is high right now because of all the warm temps and mountain runoff; I assume this is key to the whole operation. Obviously, if the water level is low, the conditions will change drastically, and you may end up carrying boats over sandbars in spots.

CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO of what we encountered. Good luck, and please drop us a line if you try it.

Much ado about nothing

Many people are saddened by the news that the Little Holland in Fircrest is closing. Personally, I’d be more disappointed if another one of my pets’ toys disappeared under a couch. The Little Holland’s building is in the way of a new commercial complex, and I assume they are being bought solely to clear space for this new business center. I find it amusingly ironic – the place that never had enough room for its patrons to park will now be bulldozed to make room for parking spaces.

In fairness, I should mention that the Mikie Burger was a very servicable “Smitty” type burger featuring a slice of Canadian bacon. This burger was delicious. Unfortunately, 75% of the time I visited them they were closed. They ran the goofiest schedule I’ve seen in the fast food world. If you happened to find them open, you would likely park a block away, walk down Center Street, place your order with some grumpy, old attendant and then wait 10 minutes for your order. They only had enough seating for a few people, so you were then forced to walk a block back to your car to eat. Fun. I haven’t been in over a year.

Because the business was sold for a good chunk o’ change and not simply forced to go under, I feel comfortable saying, “good riddance.” Take your money from the sale, and don’t open anything else.