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Moments later, Santa was pulled into the cage and nearly killed.

Ed. note: This story was originally posted last year on Seattlest and I'm bringing it back this year in the hopes it will become a treasured holiday tradition. Rest in peace, smelly cat.

When I looked down and saw the small pool of copper brown gel on the soft white cuff of my Santa uniform, the scent that had been offending me for nearly half an hour was suddenly made very clear. Just to be sure, I brought the sleeve to within an inch of my nose for a little sniff. Yes, there it was--a decidedly potent Preparation H-like substance that must have come from the small, terrified dog I'd met earlier who would have nothing to do with me. As the dog had struggled and pushed away, kicking violently at my ribs with its pointed little feet, it had slimed Santa with its anal gel.

After washing the cuff with soap and warm water, I could still smell the offensive odor. A further examination presented yet another smear of the brown slick mingling among the coarse white hairs of my beard, mere inches from my mouth. Luckily for me, a back-up beard waited in the employee lounge. Does this happen often? I wondered. Clean and newly bearded, I walked back to my post at the front of the store, thinking to myself that however sorry I felt for the little dog and its apparent discomfort, I thoroughly hated the human who'd set its exposed, hemorrhoid gel-covered anus in my arms.

During lulls in the photo-taking, I would occasionally walk outside for fresh air and wave at people at random. I would also wander the aisles of the store, often catching people off guard. I found it amusing to imagine someone suddenly seeing Santa in the corner of their eye, flipping through a book regarding the proper care of ferrets. It was during these expeditions that I made an interesting observation. Often, adult men would give me an accusing look as if to say, "Just who the hell do you think you are?" Women, however, would almost always smile and say, "Hi Santa," thereby proving my theory that all women want to sleep with Santa, which, comforted by this knowledge, is how I made it through two long days dressed as him....

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Amnon Shoenfeld

Yesterday morning on my way to the office, I bicycled past a man who was shouting to someone from the sidewalk. "MA MEENY MA MOSEY!" he yelled, repeatedly, spittle flying. His eyes were fixed somewhere in the middle distance, his face was red with rage, and the object of his anger was invisible to me.

Depending on who you are, and the time of day, this is the kind of sight--after Shannon Harps--that usually reminds you that there's a good reason to walk a block out of your way. Stretch the legs.

I have felt that I've been seeing more and more homeless, mentally ill people in the grip of visible psychosis since the recession started, and I called Amnon Shoenfeld, director of the King County Mental Health, Chemical Abuse and Dependency Services Division, to see if this was purely anecdotal or not.

Shoenfeld has been director for the past seven years, and with the County in various capacities for 30. He earned his MSW from the University of Washington, and went to work for King County as a crisis outreach and involuntary commitment specialist in 1979.

There are about 27,000 people who rely (voluntarily or not) on King County's mental health services, and another 12,000 who are involved in substance abuse services. This number hasn't varied much recently, Shoenfeld said, but recent budget cuts at the state level have reduced funding by $7 million for mental health, and $3 million for substance abuse.

Funding cuts are about to worsen: Governor Gregoire has just released a doomsday balanced budget that would eliminate the Basic Health Plan and GAU (assistance for people unemployable because of mental or physical disabilities), slash financial aid for college students, and suspend "all-day" kindergarten and support for poorer school districts.

The Seattle Times notes that, "Most of the state budget is off-limits to cuts because it's either protected by the state constitution (such as funding for basic education) or by other requirements (such as the state's share of Medicaid, a federal-state insurance program for the poor.)"

"If I could say anything right now, I'd just say: Please don't cut us any more," Shoenfeld said near the end of our conversation.

I had asked him, looking for a bright spot, if extra funding was somehow found, where he would like it to go. But Shoenfeld, beleaguered, thinking of his case managers with up to 70 clients, couldn't go there at first.

Despite the fact that much of the mental health and substance abuse "bill" is associated with Medicaid, with the federal government footing as much as 60 percent, the state is perversely focused on what it is permitted to cut, rather than the overall cost-effectiveness  of combined federal and state dollars.

"We had to cut back on outreach to kids--mainly street kids--who are abusing substances." As in so many cases, prevention is the cheapest option, Shoenfeld explained, but it seems less critical to the budget-cutting eye.

"We've had to cut back on the number of people who can get into outpatient treatment, both adults and kids. In King County, we have to use all our 'non-Medicaid dollars' to cover crisis services and involuntary commitment services, our evaluation-and-treatment programs, our residential programs," said Shoenfeld.

Now he's expecting proposed cuts of over $1 million in those core crisis services, which for the general public, is related to the sense of insecurity you feel at noticing more people ranting and raving, and behaving unpredictably....

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November is a strange time to visit our large cousin to the north. It's cold, but there's very little snow. Every new day loses another five minutes of daylight from the previous. The whales have gone south. The bears have had their fill of salmon and are working on making their dens nice and cozy for the winter slumber. You can count the number of actual vacationers on one hand. Most of the out-of-towners appear to be there on business, as was the case with my wife. I tagged along because I can't pass up an opportunity to go to Alaska no matter what time of year it is.

We spent our first few days in downtown Anchorage without a vehicle. We stayed at a bed and breakfast called the Copper Whale at the West end and spent most of our time walking the streets, ducking into shops, boutiques, cafes, and brewpubs. There was a lot of bundling up, covering the ears, neck, and hands, only to shed it all again minutes later.

The high temperature during our stay was 35 degrees, though at times it was much colder than that. Still, I felt kind of silly, wrapped up as I was inside my snowboarding parka while hardened locals strolled by in little more than a flannel shirt. I told my wife I was glad it was so cold. "It makes the trip seem more exotic," I said. Luckily for us, the sky was clear, even sunny, so we were able to keep an eye on the surrounding mountains to be sure they were not misbehaving.

If you visit Anchorage, I recommend you not leave until you've consumed the following: the Crabby Omelet from Snow City Cafe, the Big Orso Burger from Orso, beers from Glacier Brewhouse and Snow Goose Restaurant and Brewery, and trivia night at Humpy's Great Alaskan Alehouse.

After a few days in Anchorage it was time to drive south to the Kenai Peninsula in a rented mid-size SUV. This is a breathtaking drive. First one must drive around the Turnagain Arm, a large inlet ringed by snow-capped peaks which seem to launch straight up from the icy water. The highway then ducks into the mountains and snakes its way through the gorgeous Chugach National Forest. The road then nuzzles the turquoise glacial waters of Kenai Lake and the Kenai River before eventually straightening out into a more even landscape dotted by marshes and small lakes.

Moose love Kenai. I don't think a day passed without seeing one of these huge, goofy-looking things in someone's lawn, on the side of the road, or, as was the case once, crossing the road right in front of me. I'm happy to report that the brakes worked wonderfully in my rented Toyota.

Located at the south end of the peninsula is the beautiful town of Homer. If you believe the bumper stickers popular in the area, Homer is "a quaint little drinking village with a fishing problem." If you ever get the chance to visit the area, you must visit Homer. It is stunning. And it has a spit.

As my wife was busy working for two days, that left me with a vehicle, some magnificent country, and ample time for exploration.

I drove around the first day, somewhat aimlessly, without an agenda or a destination in mind. I took photos, watched the sun rise over the Kasilof River, visited an old Orthodox Russion Church in the town of Kenai, and then drove around some more. Feeling like I must be missing something, I decided that my second day of solo exploration needed to be a little more organized....

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I love it when the Seattle Municipal Archives turn our Flickr pool into a time machine. What else I love: When new people and new photos join the group.

Béchamel, the classic white sauce used to make all manner of wonderful things--Macaroni and Cheese, the Croques (Monsieur and Madame) and Savory Soufflés to name a few--should unquestionably be part of your cooking repertoire. It’s not at all difficult and yet, it’s the culinary obstacle you never knew was there. Learn how to make it and doors will open for you.

Béchamel sauce (or more snooty-like: Sauce Béchamel) is a sauce that comes from the French culinary tradition and thus any discussion that ignores Mrs. Julia Child would be both callous and unwise, especially because ever since that Julie and Julia movie came out, everyone and their mothers (including both my mother and stepmother) went out and bought a copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

If you have your copy in front of you, you’ll see that on page 57 Julia leads off the sauce chapter with this all-important sauce. Along with many many Americans, I learned how to make béchamel from this...

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The rusting husk of Gasworks Park, a fitting metaphor for our elected government. Photo by our Flickr pool contributor feekner.

Late last month, I wrote about Oregon's special vote for Measures 66 and 67, two bills passed by the legislature and signed by the governor that were sent to the voters as a referendum, which raised taxes to help close a budget shortfall. One raised the minimum corporate tax for the first time since 1931, while the other was a modest increase in the income tax for high-earners (Oregon has an income tax but no sales tax). Both measures passed with substantial margins, with roughly 54 percent in favor to 46 percent opposed.

The vote was closely watched nationally because Oregon, like Washington, is a state known for its anti-tax fervor. Oregon had its own Tim Eyman, has caps on property tax increases, and has repeatedly rejected new tax increases. But faced with dramatic cuts to crucial services, Oregon voters banded together with their elected representatives and passed two very simple measures that kept the state working.

Our fearless leaders in Olympia, on the other hand, have done virtually nothing. While Gregoire has stated she wants to "buy back" some of the slash-and-burn budget cuts she originally proposed (as a matter of state law, which requires her to present a balanced budget--from the beginning, she made clear she did not support that budget), her alternate budget still relies extensively on cuts, with a large portion of new revenue expected from federal stimulus money. The House has introduced a bill (HB 3176) that would generate $210 million in new tax revenues by mostly closing loopholes, but that's a pittance compared to the overall $2.6 billion shortfall over the biennium....

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Kaori Nakamura of Whim W'Him. Photo by Marc von Borstel.

It feels completely redundant to heap more praise on Olivier Wevers at this point, since nearly everyone else has been in a full-blown love-fest since his new company Whim W'Him's sold-out debut this last weekend at On the Boards. But as much as I'd love to be the odd man out in this orgy of praise, I just can't: Wevers & co. delivered a pretty stunning evening of dance that was at once accessible and charming as well as subtle and thoughtful.

The evening was split between two shorter works that have been presented before—X stasis, part of PNB's 2006 Choreographer's Showcase, and FRAGMENTS, created for Spectrum's Studio Series in 2007—and the premiere of 3Seasons, a new work set to Vivaldi's Four Seasons, with a bit of pure chance thrown in: each night, one of the seasons was swapped for an original composition, based on Vivaldi's structures, by local composer Byron Au Yong.

The word most frequently used to describe Wevers' choreography is "whimsical" (hence the company name, I assume), and that's definitely true. His vocabulary is primarily balletic, but looser and informed by contemporary dance, and lets the personality of the dancers shine through. Half the charm comes from the expressions on the dancers' faces, which isn't something you normally associate with ballet, not least because PNB's house is too large for the audience to see them. Comparatively, OtB's mainstage was downright intimate.

For instance, FRAGMENTS opens with a duet between Kelly Ann Barton and Vincent Lopez, both in tutus, lip-syncing to opera. Largely they perform the same movements, but Lopez, exaggerating a coquettish expression, comes off as aping the (sometimes) more serious Barton. But FRAGMENTS also shows off Wevers' ability to create powerful drama. The fourth suite, a solo by Lopez set to Mozart's Requiem, ends with the dancer contorted on the ground, back arched, caught somewhere between agony and ecstasy. The finely sculptured tableau is a powerful and beautiful image, achieved with neither the humor nor the light, athletic movements that are generally associated with Wevers' work....

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Trees at risk: each year, 200,000 trees just like the ones in this grove, go to the blade for junk mail.

When the U.S. Congress passed the National-Do-Not-Call-Registry into law in 2003, and improved it in 2007, it became one of the most popular government programs in our nation's history. Almost overnight, the Registry stopped millions of obnoxious calls from interrupting the average American's dinner or Saturday morning sleep-ins. It wiped out the most intrusive, unwanted, and annoying communications development since Alexander Graham Bell implored Watson to "Come here, I want to see you."

I say nearly, because the DNCR left a few loopholes that continue to annoy us all. Exemptions for non-profit organizations and political calls continue to be allowed. This is a problem, but make no mistake: The Registry has been a stunning success that's allowed many of us the chance to eat our meals in peace.

Now the Seattle City Council has the chance to right a litany of wrongs when they vote on a resolution to petition the state legislature to ban junk mail. The council will vote for the resolution to create a Do-Not-Mail-Registry on January 11.

I could reel off a massive list of environmental reasons it's a good idea. The appropriately, and somewhat humorously-named group ForestEthics sent around a blast email to local media chock full of the "environmental impacts" of the local junk mail trade. For the ultimate guilt trip, consider these factoids:

• Almost 200,000 trees are cut for Seattle's junk mail every year
• Junk mail sent to Seatteites causes global warming gases equal to almost 6,000 cars, due to logging and industrial emissions
• It costs more than $400,000 a year to dispose of Seattle's junk mail.

That cleanup total, by the way, is paid by us through taxes. So every day my wife pulls the junk mail out of the mailbox and throws it into the recycle bin in one deft move, it's costing us money....

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Mike McGinn was much lauded for frequently using Twitter to communicate with supporters along the campaign trail. Now that he and his staff have moved into their new digs, he should probably start playing Foursquare. Aside from racking up points and letting constituents know where he's spending time, he could also claim virtual mayorship of his new office. Until then, we'll just have to imagine this showing up in the @MichaelMcGinn timeline.

Things happen for a reason, and not talking to Zia McCabe prior to The Dandy Warhols' December 11 gig at Neumo's was one of them.

Instead of eking out a few scant minutes of conversation amidst the tumult and noise of an impending show, we spoke one week later at leisure, over the phone for a good forty minutes. McCabe oscillated between committed artist, doting mom, restless kid, and music geek—a combination that makes for many engaging tangents.

In a lot of ways, the keyboardist has undergone more intense personal transformations than any of her bandmates. McCabe was still a teenager when she joined The Dandy Warhols. Now, to a great extent, she's a full-fledged grown-up—the first of her comrades to juggle parenthood as a rock musician (band leader Courtney Taylor-Taylor, now an expectant father himself, follows her example in just a few weeks). As she explains, though, she's still not the mini-van-and-picket-fence type.

How did the tour go?

It was only three shows [two in Portland, one in Seattle]. They went really well; I don't know if you stuck around for the Seattle show, but I think that was the best show we've ever played up there.

I was there. I've seen the band live three times, and I'd definitely agree that it was the best I've seen you.

Courtney pointed out that we hadn't played in Neumo's in forever, and aside from them being absolute Nazis about their backstage rules, it just shreds in there, sound-wise. There's such a fun, super-rock sound in 'Mo's that I think it made it really easy for people to move around and feel the music. That kind of reflects back to us.... It was an easy gig to play.

The audience was definitely into it. It's the most packed I've ever seen Neumo's....

...And Seattle crowds aren't usually super-responsive to us. It felt more like a Portland show than a Seattle show....

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We're in the Christmas homestretch, with New Year's on the way, which means that there's extra time to watch movies, either in the warm/suffocating bosom of your family or as far as possible in the opposite direction.

Luckily Hollywood, like a deranged mother, has given us everything we could possible want in a holiday theme, whether it's impossibly heart-warming or wonderfully black-hearted. Here are our top picks. If we've missed yours, please let us know in the comments. And keep in mind that our sponsor Scarecrow Video would be a great place to get any of the following:

Seth: The Apartment: They just don't make movies like this anymore. Billy Wilder's masterpiece about a schlubby office worker (Jack Lemmon) who meets the girl of his dreams (Shirley MacLaine) defies categorization. Where does Blockbuster put a comedy that contains a suicide attempt? Set during Christmas--if not exactly a "Christmas movie"--this is one of the best things you'll ever see, film-wise.

Tony: Gotta throw in the Strangeoid Quotient and give my nod(s) to Black Christmas, a sly and creepy 1974 chiller in which a shadowy killer picks off a group of sorority girls in their creepy old house: Margot Kidder makes a great nasty Queen Bitch Kitty, its ending twist predates the slasher spate of the late '70s/early '80s, and it's directed by (Six Degrees alert!) Bob Clark, director of A Christmas Story. Of course my all-time favorite is Santa Claus, a 1959 Mexican flick in which Santa operates from a City in the Clouds, scores wacky dust from Merlin the Magician, and runs afoul of Satan. It's a kid's movie!

Jeremy: It's cliche, but A Christmas Story. Come on! [SPOILER!] He actually shoots his eye out!

Josh: Arnaud Desplechin's Un conte de Noël is probably not the first DVD to grab for heartwarming times around the family DVD player, but it's depiction of a sprawling dysfunctional French family might just make your own relatives seem reassuringly quaint in comparison. Catherine Deneuve is the caustic matriarch with a recent cancer diagnosis, Mathieu Amalric is son who was only conceived to save a dying brother, Anne Consigny is the eldest sister who banished her brother in a questionable family business-saving legal maneuver. The film would be worthwhile for the guardedly tender insults that comprise almost all of Deneuve's conversations with Amalric, but there's also another brother, a friendly neighbor, plenty of long-suppressed romantic intrigue, a teen who hallucinates wolves, and adorable kids who put on an incomprehensible play. After spending five cinematic days with this bunch, you'll feel like a part of their extended clan. Whether you want to return to them or stay at the vacation house for the rest of the holiday may vary.

Don: Die Hard. Nothing brings home the concept of holidays being about family like defending them from terrorists using your wits and a clever, profane catch phrase. Also: things blow up and America wins.

Jack: Elf. [Which not coincidentally is playing right now at Central Cinema, through December 23!] No one could have played that role like Will Ferrell. Also, Zooey Deschanel is my girlfriend. My favorite scene is the one where Miles Finch (Peter Dinklage) attacks Buddy for calling him an elf over and over again: "He's an angry elf!"

Donte: Love Actually. Hugh Grant at his stammeringly charming best, surrounded by an ensemble cast (Bill Nighy, Liam Neeson, Emma Thompson, Colin Firth) portraying the many facets of love in holiday season London. "Chick flick" or no, this movie can calm anyone's inner Scrooge--the attractive cast doesn't hurt either. (Josh: For the record, there are those whose inner Scrooges are inflamed by Love Actually. Clint: Donte's right: Love Actually is wonderful.)

James: One of the funniest screwball comedies ever made ends with a Christmas miracle, which makes it as much a Christmas movie as its contemporary (and reigning Christmas movie king) It's a Wonderful Life (showing at the Grand Illusion through December 31st). What's the Miracle of Morgan's Creek? That would be telling, but small-town girl Trudy Kockenlocker needs one. Trudy winds up married to and pregnant by a soldier--possibly named "Ratzkiwatzki"--who ships out before she sobers up. Norval Jones, who's been infatuated with her for years, sacrifices every last shred of dignity to help her out, but the two of them end up buried under a madcap mudslide of bad decisions. Preston Sturges is a master of slapstick satire, and in Miracle he's working at top form (almost--The Lady Eve ain't a Christmas flick, but it's equally unmissable). George Bailey makes you weepy; the Kockenlockers clan make you weep with laughter.

Clint: Planes, Trains and Automobiles. (Thanksgiving counts, right?) Steve Martin + John Candy + R rating = Unforgettably awesome. The mismatched, accidentally-aligned duo attempts to get home for Thanksgiving and, yes, hilarity ensues. A great (refreshingly non-teen angst) movie to remember Candy ("I like me. My wife likes me.") and Hughes by. And there's Martin dropping 18 F-bombs in less than a minute. "I want a fucking car. Right. Fucking. Now." They don't make mature/silly comedies like this anymore.

RvO: The Ref is a bitter, caustic, profane and frequently hilarious holiday treat. Denis Leary is a thief on the run who kidnaps the hyper-bickering Kevin Spacey and Judy Davis and hides out in their lush suburban home on Christmas Eve. If you thought your family gatherings were dysfunctional, think again. Leary, who punches out Santa at one point, has never been better and Spacey is brilliant in a similar, but much better, role than his Oscar-winning turn in American Beauty. Or turn back the clock for Stalag 17, set in German POW camp during WWII. On Christmas Eve, officers in one of the barracks find out that they have a Nazi spy among their ranks who is tipping the guards to escape attempts. William Holden gives a brilliant performance as the cynical, hard-bitten Sgt. Sefton who is accused of being the spy. Magnificently directed by Billy Wilder, this tense, thrilling and award-winning film about deliverance at Christmas is a stunning tour-de-force.

MvB: Double feature! Scrooged with Holiday Inn. Bill Murray is an updated Scrooge, a gloriously cynical TV exec, and is joined by an outstanding cast including Bobcat Goldthwait, Carol Kane, Robert Mitchum, and Jamie Farr. He's so bitterly funny, you're sad to see Murray cheer up near the end. Holiday Inn is the ur-Christmas movie, starring Bing "White Christmas" Crosby and Fred Astaire. You should probably be wearing a sweater, vest, or sweater vest, and be sipping egg nog or a butterscotch schnapps/hot chocolate combo....

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Paul Mullin. Photo by Karen Odyniec.

Paul Mullin, the 2008 Stranger Genius Award winner for theatre, is known as much as a pugilist as a playwright. Mullin's got strong opinions on everything that's wrong with the theatre, and is more than willing to share them.

His most recent project, It's Not in the P-I: A Living Newspaper About a Dying Newspaper, failed to find a home in any professional or fringe theatre in town, so Mullin produced it with the drama department at North Seattle Community College. When the play drew extensive local and even national attention, Mullin lobbed a broadside back at the artistic directors of Seattle's large theatres by way of a media alert that read in part:

If this coverage by NPR proves one thing it’s this: the rest of the nation actually does give a damn about what we do in this city.  They actually do care what happens to our newspapers, and they actually do want to know about what kind of original theatre we’re doing here, what stories we’re telling, uniquely, as Seattleites.

What they don’t care about, what they will never care about, is how carefully and exquisitely we craft a restaging of some chestnut from the canon, or the play that knocked ‘em dead off-Broadway last year.  And this isn’t because those stories aren’t good, it’s because those stories aren’t uniquely ours.  Seattle theaters that dedicate themselves exclusively to craft and the canon and providing a local outlet to New York’s latest exports are museums.  And Seattle will never have as good museums as New York, Chicago or LA.

Mullin's bullish support of his own work is just the latest in his ongoing battle to turn Seattle into a "world class theatre city," a challenge he placed on his own plate when he accepted The Stranger Genius Award (he even claimed it could be done in just five short years). And now, to that end, he's launching a new website with a planned series of essays laying out--and strategizing how to overcome--the obstacles. In the introductory essay, "Towards a World Class Theatre," Mullin explains the purpose and limitations of the project:

Potshots of prose alone cannot go any significant distance toward making theater better here in Seattle or anywhere. Only making great theatre will make theatre great here. This series will be about sharpening my arguments and placing them in a public place, where they may serve to convince or be dismissed, or maybe even dismantled and built into something more useful. I am done bitching in bars. I am pushing my stakes on the table and I encourage my colleagues, especially those who disagree with me, to do the same.

As someone who knows the high- and low-points of Seattle theatre all too well, I sincerely help Mullin manages to force others to step up to the plate.

The opening half of last night's Deck the Hall Ball was a Whitman's sampler of poppy rock acts that might have seemed more at home at a fundraiser for KEXP than a holiday party for The End. The doors opened at the after school special hour of 4:30 p.m. to admit the around-the-block lines of mostly underagers waiting to get a prime spot for Muse.

By the time Visqueen finished their sound check, introduced Rachel's niece to the stage, and changed into their rocking clothes, the concrete arena had filled to respectable capacity for the hometown opening set. Each band fit about six songs into their thrifty twenty minute set: Vampire Weekend mostly played the hits from their self-titled debut and threw in "Cousins" [youtube] as a taste of next month's Contra. ...

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Two Christmases ago, I published two delicious candy recipes in a magazine printed on real paper. It’s true. You can ask my mom to show you one of her nine copies. These recipes, for soft caramels and peppermint marshmallows, are still among my holiday favorites, but since my friends did not leap at the chance to make the candies themselves, I had to wonder.

Either my friends considered it supportive enough to simply eat candy that I had already made (weak) or, perhaps the required candy thermometers proved too much for them. Time and continued interaction with non-food professionals has led me to see that most people don’t like candy thermometers--they believe thermometers to be indicative of exacting recipes, recipes that require accuracy and hold the potential for messy, sugary failure.

Luckily, there also exist easy, thermometer-free candy recipes and for Christmas, I’m going to give you one.  

It’s for almond toffee.

This toffee (you could also call it brittle, but I like to affect British-ness, so toffee it is) is basically a classic butter toffee with toasted almonds mixed it. It can be dipped in a chocolate glaze, or left plain--it’s delicious either way. It’s also quite fancy-looking and can be happily packed into bags and boxes to be given away as presents.

Now, I would be lying if I didn’t warn you that candy-making is different from other kinds of cooking for the obvious reason that it involves molten hot sugar. Try to think of this as exciting, rather than terrifying. To assuage your fears, below is a somewhat long-winded, but extremely useful overview of candy-making that a magazine would have happily cut out (many thanks, kind SunBreak editors). Below that, is the recipe itself. Enjoy.

When you make any caramelized sugar and butter/cream type candy, this is what’s going to happen. First you’re going to cook some sugar with a little bit of corn syrup and water until it comes to a boil. You’re not even going to think about stirring it. Stirring the mixture at this point can cause it to seize, meaning to turn from a liquid into a solid clump of crystallized sugar. Bad.

Next, you’re going to add a lot of butter (or in the case of soft caramels, cream); the mixture will bubble and souffle up in a way that is not un-terrifying to some, but that won’t bother you at all because you will either be using a long-handled whisk or wearing one of these babies.

Then you’re going to whisk and whisk and continue to cook over high heat until the mixture turns the a nice light amber color. You’re going to add a couple last minute things and then, carefully and without burning anyone, you are going to pour the candy out onto a sheet pan that you have already prepared. Done. Now relax.

Also: I’ve just been informed that the caramel and marshmallow recipes are no longer available on the ReadyMade site. If you want ‘em, just say so in the comments....

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I go in for all manner of dorky DIY projects: jam, scarves, window cleanser, but I’ve always drawn the line at homemade granola, because frankly, enough is enough. It seemed to me that people who made their own granola were tidy and polite and always wiped down the stove. They probably kept both toilet paper and tissues in their bathrooms and even made their own yarn prior to using it to knit their own scarves.

In other words, people who made granola represented an entirely new level of domesticity and one that I felt compelled to resist lest I find myself on the slippery slope towards hand-crocheted doilies and clothing for animals.

Besides, I thought, store-bought granola is pretty good, right?

However, my homemade granola ban began to erode just before Christmas last year. I was faced with shopping for my dad, a man who buys everything he wants even right before major gift-giving holidays. With days to spare, I recalled one of his favorite treats: Maple Granola, baked and sold by the Cold Hollow Cider Mill of Waterbury, Vermont.

My dad goes to Vermont often, but not quite often enough to satisfy his taste for granola, and since the Cider Mill charges an “astronomical amount” (his words) for shipping, he refuses on principle to order it. I decided on a temporary lift of the ban, just long enough to replicate the granola and provide him with a homemade batch and a recipe. Perfect.

The basic premise behind granola is to take rolled oats, nuts and some spices, and use something sticky and slightly sweet to bind it all together. After that, the whole mess gets toasted in the oven until dark and crunchy. It’s really quite simple, but the Cider Mill’s granola has a rich fall flavor and a Vermont-y quality that I had to get if my dad was going to be satisfied with this substitution.

I flavored my granola with maple syrup and reduced apple cider, added a bit of cinnamon and ginger and the results were sublime: flavorful and crunchy, full of toasted almonds and every bit as good as the original. If not better.

I gave my dad the granola, he liked it--but unfortunately, this is not where the story ends. Sadly, my ban has never been put back in place. I haven’t bought granola in a year and probably never will again. I’ve been making it every couple of months, slowly improving it. Worse still, I’ve been wiping down the stove and making my bed. It’s kind of nice; and since I’ve yet to produce any dog sweaters, you should feel safe enough to go ahead and make a batch yourself....

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I have no idea what's going on here, and I think I prefer it that way. Thanks to mangpages for sharing this in the SunBreak Flickr pool.

It's hard to upstage, in writing, how much we need music. The description isn't even an echo. If you were there, on the floor, shoulder-to-shoulder with the strangers and singing along, it might spark a memory. Or it might not. And anyway, that's not what I'm interested in here.

I was at two shows this week, the Mountain Goats at the Showbox Market, which is downtown's gritty rock palace, a sprawling, sunken main floor overlooked by terraced bars; and Faun Fables at Neumo's, along with Chop Suey the ideal of the indie Capitol Hill music club: a shoebox of a room with a concession stand of a bar at the side.

The Showbox was already full during Owen Palett's Final Fantasy set; he closed with what he said was a song by Theodor Adorno: "Independence is no solution for modern babies." Babies (read "hipsters"), we learned, just want to dance. Adorno, I have just read, was critical of the replacement of art's merit by its social value. Music becomes a fetish when you enjoy it because other people like it.

The Mountain Goats

That is not John Darnielle's problem. His album The Life of the World to Come is twelve songs all titled after Biblical verses, selections from Hebrews 11:40 to Matthew 25:21. Here's an mp3 of "Genesis 3:23," which contains the chorus, "I used to live here." It's about a return to a childhood home, and there is also a superposition of a naive Eden of faith, "creeds and prayers that he can't wholly buy into" these days. (Maybe this is also why he's at the keyboard more often on this album, which impersonates a heretic organist's hymnal.)

Darnielle is a strange apparition in concert--skipping about the stage, face contorted in a middle-schooler's rockgod transport, he can remind you of David Byrne's spasmodic too-much-coffee guy except without the cool, self-appraising distance. Between songs, he drops little drawled hints as to their inspiration in a pleasantly low-key manner that contrasts with his higher, forced-nasal singing register.

He's funny, disarming, and a master of unsettling emotional harmonics. "Thank You Mario But Our Princess Is In Another Castle" was prefaced by an explanation of his delight at unexpectedly freeing a "little dude" instead of the princess. That bright "8-bit choir" catharsis has its malevolent bass counterpart in "Hast Thou Considered The Tetrapod," as the protagonist is battered by an abusive drunk.

The new album is more reflective than entrail-spilling, and as likely to question its Biblical sources ("Romans 10:9" contrasts the redemption of confession against taking your medication before you have anything to confess) as to quote them. The religious lessons that Darnielle has learned, or found, are in his music, despite the nods to the Bible....

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Mayor Mike McGinn

When the Seattle mayoral election was finally decided last night, after King County Elections dutifully counted up the votes, Joe Mallahan graciously conceded, and Governor Gregoire announced she was looking forward to working with the new mayor.

It sounded like business as usual, but Mike McGinn’s election was the biggest upset victory in Seattle politics in more than three decades. This was the 1980 U.S. hockey team over the Soviets, Truman over Dewey, David versus Goliath. It was an epic long shot and it shakes Seattle politics to its very core.

Seattle is no Chicago, but we have our own version of the political machine. Business, plus labor, plus the Democratic Party equals victory.

Mallahan won endorsements from state Democrats, the Governor, the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and its political arm the Alki Foundation, big business and labor. McGinn won the election.

Mallahan outspent McGinn by a 3.5-to-1 margin. Mallahan loaned his own campaign about as much as McGinn received in total. McGinn won the election.

Now, Seattle’s traditional powers-that-be are scrambling to figure out just how it all happened. All the money, all the powerbrokers, and all the political muscle didn’t deliver the knockout punch. There are all sorts of theories.

McGinn was helped by Mallahan’s complete ineffectiveness in debates. Mallahan struggled to get two thoughts together in a coherent fashion. In nearly every debate, he bobbled the easiest questions and completely missed on the major issues. The fact that McGinn’s lead increased as the counting went on suggests that the late voters broke for him, not Mallahan. Seems the longer Joe talked, the less people liked what they heard.

McGinn won the election just the way he said he did, by talking to people and by listening to people. He won by energizing his supporters with a message of common sense and a determination to fight for change....

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Few authors are as successful in shape-shifting and genre-hopping as Michael Chabon. From the epic, Pulitzer Prize-winning The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, to the mind-boggling Jewish-Alaskan homage to crime noir, The Yiddish Policemen's Union, to the sword-swinging adventure tale, Gentlemen of the Road, Chabon has always shown an incredible knack for adopting and reinventing whatever writing style he takes on.

Chabon's newest book, Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son, shows off Chabon the essayist, thoughtfully dissecting and reflecting upon what it means to be a man in modern America.

"A father is a man who fails every day," Chabon writes in the book's first essay, "The Loser's Club." It is a line that serves as both a wonderful introduction to the stories ahead and as an invitation to the rest of us to go ahead and join the club. Nothing to be ashamed of in here.

While Manhood for Amateurs is certainly told from a male perspective, the book is by no means a boys-only tree house of stories. In fact, many of the essays are either about, or are at least inspired by, the women in Chabon's life. From his mother's support and eventual consolation following a failed comic book club, to the dazzling pride and adoration he feels for his own daughter during her bat mitzvah, Manhood for Amateurs is as much about being a man as it is an ode to the women we love, who have the patience enough to love us back.

In "A Woman of Valor," Chabon reminisces about one of his first flames, the little-known DC Comics superheroine, Big Barda. For nine edifying pages, Chabon takes us on a journey through the history of Barda and her contemporaries (Wonder Woman, Super Girl, Sheena) and proclaims, after much rumination and analysis, Barda to be the most perfect of the super heroines.

Lacking the usual chauvinist cliches--the "tininess" of Shrinking Violet, or the "insubstantiality" of Phantom Girl, or the nonsensical narratives (or lack thereof) of Wonder Woman and Super Girl--Barda was, according to Chabon, the first true female role model in the world of comics. Not only was she strong and vigilant and fully capable of kicking some ass, she was also intelligent, thoughtful, empathetic, and vulnerable only to those who had earned her trust and her love. Most importantly, Barda was submissive to no one....

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On last night's episode of the Colbert Report, Stephen devoted "The Word" segment to R-71, the referendum on the state's "everything but marriage" same-sex domestic partnership law that will be on the ballot in Washington next week. (Don't forget to vote!)

In particular, Stephen focuses on the efforts by those in favor of R-71 to get the names released of those who signed petitions that called for the law to be overturned. The US Supreme Court heard the case last week, but blocked the release of the names.  Of course, Stephen, in his trademark roundabout counter-intuitive way, comes out in support of R-71 (since that will allow the petition-signers to stay in the closet). He also introduces the concept of sexual orientation orientation--that is to say, the way one feels towards another person's orientation, which is an inborn trait and not a choice.