Le tits now. Here comes snow! Maybe. It’s looking unlikely, but there’s a slim chance we may get a couple of inches of snow on Tuesday, though it probably won’t stick once temperatures get up in the 40s. As a reminder, landlords are responsible for clearing snow and ice from sidewalks in front of their buildings. If your landlord can’t be bothered to meet their obligations, please send pics to me so we can name and shame them as we did last year. (There is no option for reporting unshoveled sidewalks on the city’s Find It, Fix It app, which appears to have been created exclusively for us to complain about all the things it can’t do.)

Hawaii is blowing up a little bit. Mauna Loa is erupting this morning for the first time since 1984. A heavy amount of ash is falling on the island, but there’s no threat of lava floes for now.

Would you kids keep it down? If any of your local podcaster friends look particularly frazzled this morning, it’s because a bunch of troublemaking joyriders made a real racket around town this weekend. I tried waving my cane at them and giving them the glare of a lifetime but to no avail.

Protests aren’t stopping in China. Protesters in multiple cities have filled the streets, angry over authoritarian rules about containing COVID. President Xi Jinping, who’s moved increasingly towards seizing lifetime dictatorial power, has instituted policies that have seen people locked in their homes for months at a time. So far, police have contained the protests with mass arrests.

There’s no rainbows in soccer. Soccer fans are still being harassed by security guards for wearing rainbow items at the World Cup in Qatar. FIFA has said that rainbows are allowed, but apparently word hasn’t trickled down to the goons at the gates.

By the way, if you’re feeling chilly… Remember that space heaters should only be plugged directly into the wall outlet, not into power strips, and they should be the only thing plugged into that outlet. When in use, they should be kept on the flattest, driest, lowest surface possible, with a three-foot buffer around them. Space heaters cause around 1,700 house fires per year, and kill around 80 people.

America: The country that knows how, but won’t. Nearly every developed country in the world has seen a decrease in traffic deaths over the last few years... except for this one. Traffic deaths in 2020 were up 5% over the 2017-2019 average. It’s not a mystery why this is happening: More advanced countries have implemented a wide range of safety measures that are proven to reduce carnage, but here in the US we don’t dare inconvenience the auto industry. The only American citizen more important than a car is a gun. Here in Seattle, the failed “pedestrian friendly” promenade on Melrose has been taken over by cars, which block the crosswalk despite getting a specially-designated drop-off area just a few feet away.

Slow down. King County Council Chair Claudia Balducci (gosh that’s a lot of Cs) wants staff to look into improving the safety of their 1,400 vehicles by installing tech that can better manage driving speed. (There are exemptions for emergency vehicles.) This is in line with recent federal recommendations. Similar tech is already required in Europe, and it’s akin to measures being considered by other US jurisdictions. This is unequivocally a Good Thing to Do, and other Seattle-area leaders should get behind it, too. It’s because of good ideas like this that SECB has been urging you to vote for Balducci for years, so don’t say we never did anything for you.

The Jack in the Box lawyer is going after Daily Harvest. You might’ve heard about the disastrous health problems faced by many customers of Daily Harvest, one of those meal-delivery companies. Earlier this year, some customers reported major health issues requiring hospitalization and surgery, and the prevailing belief is that there was something wrong with a lentil-leek protein mix. (The company denies wrongdoing.) Now, local lawyer Bill Marler is going after the company. You might remember him from the Jack in the Box lawsuit back in the '90s, and for his efforts in the decades that followed to improve food safety for everyone.

Why are cops? There have been a series of particularly destructive thefts around town recently, with burglars ramming vans into storefronts to break in after hours. According to one business owner, police told him, “This is normal... It’s everywhere that this is happening.” Okay, cool! Do they know anyone who can do something about that?

Well, that’s one way to defund the police. Have you been getting robocalls claiming to be “fundraisers” for a police organization? These calls start with a recording of a man’s voice asking, “Hello?” And then when you say something (anything) a recording plays off a pitch: they’re raising money to support harsher sentences for violent crimes, can you spare $50? The rest of the call is a series of pre-recorded lines on a soundboard, triggered by an operator who does not speak but activates soundbites in response to whatever you say. (You can tell it’s a recording because if you say “Sorry, can you repeat that?” they play the exact same clip.) If you express interest, they play a recording of someone asking for your credit card info. The last time I got one of these, I kept the call going for as long as I could, feeding them inactive credit card numbers used for testing financial systems until finally they got frustrated and asked for my address so they could send me a donation form. I gave them a PO box that I monitor, so we’ll see what shows up. In the meantime, if you’ve had similar calls, let me know.

Leaf us alone. Have you been enjoying the nice mushy carpet of leaves that’s been making the city’s bike lanes wonderfully slippery for the last few weeks? It’s like a slip-and-slide but for wheels. Anyway, SDOT is aware that the lanes need to be swept, but resources are “stretched” and they’re doing their best to catch up.

Somebody please adopt Rose and then invite me over to your house to play with her. I will not speak to you or even acknowledge your existence. I am only there for Rose.