The economy claims Bailey/Coy

I'm not terribly surprised, but it's still very sad. Bailey/Coy is one of this town's loveliest bookstores -- I always preferred it to the much larger Elliott Bay -- and it deserved a longer life.

Listen up, vegans

Michael has put forth the following tip on some excellent animal-free bargain chow:

At the Hopvine Pub, on 15th E. and Republican, they have a special on--baked polenta with wild mushrooms and tomato sauce, spiced with cardamom and anise. It's delicious, it's vegan, and it's $5. They're adding it to the menu soon, hopefully for that price, but it's a really good small meal. I repeat: $5.

Next time I'm on the Hill, I'm totally there.

Top 10 things I'll miss about Capitol Hill

INPO:

1. Victrola
2. Jamjuree
3. Volunteer and Cal Anderson parks
4. The Harvard Exit, the Egyptian, and Northwest Film Forum
5. Madison Market
6. The unbelievable quiet and privacy of my mother-in-law cottage
7. Seeing people I know as I walk up and down 15th Avenue East
8. On 15th Video
9. Watching singer-songwriters warm up outside the Hopvine on open-mic nights
10. Living in what remains -- sorry, Ravenna and West Seattle -- my favorite Seattle neighborhood

Another bike incident on the Hill

While Emily's accident didn't get any press, the car vs. bike incident on Aloha involving Critical Mass sure did. Whether the driver was the victim or the bad guy all depends on what you read.

Gazpacho and tortilla, coming soon to the Hill

The spot across from the Harvard Exit has been a Greek restaurant, a molecular-gastronomy mecca, and even a dessert cafe. Now, according to the Capitol Hill Blog, it'll be serving up tapas, including gazpacho and a real, honest-to-goodness Spanish tortilla. Since I haven't been able to get to Spain since I spent a semester there in 2000, this is a nice reminder of my undying love for two of Spanish cuisine's few vegetarian specialties.

Dueling inscriptions

Bought a copy of The Movie That Changed My Life: Great Writers on Their Favorite Films at Horizon Books on 15th Avenue East, partly for the content -- Joyce Carol Oates on Dracula! -- and partly for the fantastic inscription and counter-inscription. On a page that's a bit shorter than the others, and thus seems to have been inserted, is the following, handwritten in red pen:

D.

One might be a good bus book. The other, an interesting curiosity by one of our favorite authors.

V.

P.S. Don't leave the rat poison lying about in the garage.

This alone might have merited buying the book for a paltry $7, but wait -- there's more. "D." wrote back with a vengeance -- in fact, he or she (I have some strange intuition that it's a she) typed a response below the handwritten note from "V." And here it is:

I couldn't get into this one either. Sorry. I guess I'm just not interested in the opinions of people I don't know on movies I haven't seen. I've only seen 2 or 3 of these. I started "Bambi" but couldn't get into it, and I browsed a couple of pages in others, but didn't get anywhere. Thanks anyway.

In more than a year and a half of living on 15th, I'd never wandered into Horizon, always waiting for some excuse. Today, the friend I'd had brunch with at 22 Doors wanted to venture in, so we did. And I think it's safe to say the back-and-forth inscriptions made my day, and possibly even my week. I also picked up a 1984 Roger Ebert book, A Kiss Is Still a Kiss, that I'd previously borrowed from Michael but really wanted to own. Among the gems it contains: an interview with Woody Allen in which he, Woody, explains why women are "closer to what life's supposed to be about" than men, and a piece wherein Ebert accompanies Muhammad Ali to a screening of Rocky 2, which the legendary boxer picks apart both thoughtfully and hilariously, as is his way. Though I still love Ebert's writing, it's nice to look back at his golden years and recall how on fire he was back then.

Saw Margaret Cho at the Paramount last night and enjoyed her performance -- amazing that she can talk about sex for what feels like more than half the show and always find new angles and new absurdities. Her bits about recent political scandals, including Eliot Spitzer and Larry Craig, were also great, as was a joke about Iran. I'd try to recreate some of the best moments here, but Cho is so much about inflection, body language, and facial expressions that it'd be pointless, and probably offensive. Her delivery is what lets her get away with as much as she does; in that way she's like Sarah Silverman, though Cho's humor is more consistent, albeit with fewer big laughs. (She gets a lot of smaller ones and misses less often than Silverman, who can be positively flat or absolutely incandescent within the same minute.)

Breezed by the "Roman Art from the Louvre" exhibit at SAM last night, which I realize is heresy, but it was after 12:30 a.m. and I was tired, and the statues just looked liked... statues. I also checked out Molly Moon's Homemade Ice Cream yesterday afternoon, and realized a few things:

1. Molly Moon's is as hip as Wallingford is ever going to get, outside Babalu
2. Cardamom ice cream is excellent
3. A little salted caramel ice cream goes a long way
4. Lemon is not to be passed over; despite its ordinariness, it's probably one of the best flavors
5. Owner Molly Moon Neitzel's dog, Parker Posey (who appears in the shop's logo, which I've posted above), is very cute
6. Kids with chocolate ice cream smeared all over their faces are always entertaining
7. Wallingford -- the neighborhood I lived in when I first moved to Seattle, way back in January of 2002 -- can be pretty wonderful

Yep, still watching "Quarterlife"

Nothin' to see here, folks. I'm on webisode 28 and still enjoying it a lot. I had a very nice time tonight at the Hopvine with Sheela, Celia, Robbie, and several other friendly people. After dinner, we stopped by Victrola for tea/coffee/cupcakes, listened to The Con by Tegan and Sara (which was playing over the sound system and sounds much better there than in my headphones or my cabin) for a bit, and parted ways. It was my first normal-feeling night since the breakup, and I'm grateful for it. I'm also grateful to be enjoying The Abstinence Teacher as much as I am. I'm experiencing the proverbial desire for it not to end -- same feeling about Quarterlife, naturally -- and the fear that it may take a while before I find another book that's this enjoyable without being total junk food. But I'm sure I will. I need to find a book club!

And now, back to Quarterlife. Hopefully less boring posts await you in the near future.