Thanks for checking out the Weekend Warmup - We have a LOT going on this weekend. First of all, Sunday is Mother's Day. Second of all, the Mariners are starting a home stand against the Blue Jays on Friday. Let's go! LINKS: Seattle Mariners Schedule USAF Band of the Golden West - Bellingham USAF Band of the Golden West - Mercer Island Seattle Beer Week 43rd Annual Beat the Bridge World Migratory Bird Day | Seward Park Audubon Center Penn Cove Water Festival Pierogi Fest 2025 Seattle Art Book Fai...
May 08, 2025•8 min
More than three decades ago, tiny blobs of gelatinous goo of unknown origin rained down on the small Grays Harbor community and captured national headlines. The cause of the strange phenomenon, and even what the blobs were made of -- remains an enigma. It was even the subject of an episode of the TV show Unsolved Mysteries. (Watch the episode here .) No one knows what they were. But last month they returned. Guests : Alli McCrite Tom Paulson, former reporter for the Seattle P-I Related Links: Oa...
May 08, 2025•16 min
Yesterday, Seattle-based author Tessa Hulls won a Pulitzer Prize for her graphic novel "Feeding Ghosts." Hulls' first published book starts with her Chinese grandmother, Sun Yi, a journalist and author who fled Shanghai after the Communist Revolution. Then, the narrative shifts -- to her mother Rose, the daughter of a Swiss diplomat, essentially raised in a Hong Kong boarding school after her mother was institutionalized. And finally to Hulls herself, who is trying to bring peace to her family g...
May 07, 2025•20 min
King County has its first new Executive in 15 years. Dow Constantine, who held the position since 2009, was chosen as the CEO of Sound Transit earlier this year. He stepped away from the Executive job at the end of March. In his place, Shannon Braddock is leading the county until a new executive is elected this November. Before this she worked mostly behind the scenes in various roles for the county over the last 15 years, including Deputy County Executive. County business waits for no one and B...
May 07, 2025•24 min
In the face of staff cuts, funding freezes, and threats to zero out its budget – Head Start has survived… for now. This program serves almost 800,000 kids throughout the country –15,000 in Washington State alone. Many of these children are low-income, disabled or in foster care. A Trump Administration budget proposal leaked in April put all Head Start funding on the chopping block. Providers in multiple states, including Washington, filed a lawsuit last week, aiming to halt the elimination of th...
May 06, 2025•18 min
In the new Netflix documentary “Bad Influence”, 11 teenagers recount their experiences working with Piper Rockelle, who was herself a child influencer. All of the teens were former “squad members” of the Youtuber. They described performing scripted scenes in front of the camera - like fake “dating” scenarios, or pranks. They also described feeling violated by some of the videos, and behind the scenes interactions with Rockelle’s mother, Tiffany Smith - who’s also her manager. And they described ...
May 06, 2025•15 min
In the 2010s, the video game industry saw an ENORMOUS boom, with annual revenues jumping from 80 billion dollars to TWO HUNDRED billion over that decade, according to a report by investment research group Epyllion. But in recent years, that exponential growth hit a plateau. “Games were so successful both prior to & during 2020 & 2021, that they set kind of impossible standards for 2023 & 2024… And when the uptick flattened, it was seen as a tremendous failure.” That’s video game writ...
May 06, 2025•19 min
Seattle city leaders were met with some less than ideal news this month: the city is facing a $241 million dollar budget shortfall over the next two years. And maybe you’re thinking, hey didn’t city council use the Jump Start tax to fill the $250 million budget gap this year? Surprise: that was a whole other budget deficit. But Seattle is far from the only municipality facing a shortfall. King County is facing a $150 million gap. Tacoma? It had to fill a $24 million hole late last year. Spokane ...
May 05, 2025•20 min
Since May 8, 1792, European colonists have called the large volcano just off the coast of Puget Sound "Mount Rainier." It was given that name by a British explorer, Captain George Vancouver – a gift to his friend, Rear Admiral Peter Rainier. But prior to Vancouver’s arrival in what eventually became Washington state, the Indigenous peoples in and around the Salish Sea called it by many names. A recent linguistic paper from the Puyallup Tribe of Indians traced those many names for the mountain – ...
May 05, 2025•14 min
After a week of gloom & drizzle, we’ve finally got a 70 degree day or three in the forecast! We won’t talk about what’s happening with Saturday’s weather, it knows what it did… THAT SAID - if you need a few more excuses to go out & do things, we’ve got you covered! Soundside Producer Jason Megatron Burrows is here with a VERY SPECIAL Weekend Warmup. LINKS: May Day in Seattle 2025 Seattle Erotic Art Festival Port Townsend Victorian Festival FCBD 2025 Comic Books Store Locator - Free Comic...
May 01, 2025•6 min
For people addicted to fentanyl, the desire to quit is often overshadowed by the fear of withdrawal. Incredible nerve pain, diarrhea, chills, vomiting. It’s been likened to the worst flu you’ve ever experienced. Buprenorphine, the medication often used to aid in easing addiction, can trigger withdrawal symptoms, making it tough for patients to continue treatment. Here in Seattle, Downtown Emergency Service Center, or DESC, has been trying a new method of administering buprenorphine to ease treat...
Apr 30, 2025•23 min
A new law waiting to be signed by the governor would give you more options when your technology breaks. House Bill 1483 establishes a “right to repair” for consumer electronics, including tech like phones, laptops, and home appliances. Its partner bill in the Senate ( SB 5680 ) also establishes the right to repair electric wheelchairs. This is part of a larger, nationwide movement to create more accessible technology. If the governor signs these bills into law, Washington will be the seventh sta...
Apr 30, 2025•13 min
When tech companies began announcing advanced artificial intelligence systems like ChatGPT, there was widespread enthusiasm. AI was going to make mundane jobs more efficient; it was going to reshape entire industries and creative processes; and it was going to free up time for humans to do things that were, well, more human – things like creating art. But in the last few years, it’s been artists themselves raising the alarm around automation. Some see AI as a cool new tool, or another color on t...
Apr 30, 2025•15 min
Today marks the 100th day of Donald Trump’s presidency. How about some more numbers: Since taking office, the President has signed more than 140 executive orders, pushing major policy shifts on issues from immigration, to climate policy, and DEI in schools and workplaces . As of Monday, court rulings have blocked or paused Trump policies 128 times, according to the New York Times . The administration enacted high tariffs on around 60 countries before walking that back and going with a much lower...
Apr 29, 2025•16 min
Sheriff Patti Cole-Tindall has headed up the King County Sheriff’s Department since 2022. The King County Sheriff’s Department serves unincorporated King County and 12 contract cities, in addition to policing King County Metro buses and Sound Transit trains. Since she took over the role, overall crime numbers have been trending in a positive direction – felony referrals were down by a quarter in 2024 compared to 2019. And new data from the King County Prosecutor’s office released this morning sa...
Apr 29, 2025•34 min
The debate over how to address homelessness in Spokane continues to simmer after a decision this month from Washington’s Supreme Court. The ruling struck down Proposition 1, a camping ban introduced by a citizen-led initiative that was overwhelmingly passed by Spokane voters in 2023. The court’s decision wasn’t based on the merits of the camping ban, but rather on whether the citizens of Spokane had the power to take such action in the first place. Now, the legal ripples of this decision are sti...
Apr 28, 2025•15 min
Companies have increasingly shifted the responsibility of saving for retirement onto workers. Pension plans have mostly disappeared from the private sector, in favor of 401k style plans. For example, the Boeing Machinist union tried unsuccessfully get their pension plan reinstated during last year’s strike. For most public employees, including Washington state workers, though, Pensions are still an option. But not all public pensions are created equal. Some allow workers to potentially increase ...
Apr 28, 2025•25 min
Do you ever wonder why you turn to Google so often to search for a recipe or a news article or how to properly use a semicolon? If you ask Alphabet, Google’s parent company, they’ll tell you it’s because they just have the best results. The Department of Justice has a different take: it filed an antitrust case against the company in 2020 accusing Google of using its power as the pre eminent online search engine to stifle competition. The government won last year, when a federal judge ruled again...
Apr 24, 2025•15 min
Have you been outside this week? It’s GORGEOUS. If you need a few more excuses to go out & do things, then you’re in luck. We’ve got Soundside Producer Jason Megatron Burrows here with one or two or three more reasons to leave your house LINKS: Seattle/King County Clinic - Seattle Center Crescendo: A Symphonic Celebration of Washington Landscapes Seattle Independent Bookstore Day Jet City Roller Derby vs RCRD's Grave Danger PBR Unleash the Beast | Tacoma Dome Run Like the Wind Running Festiv...
Apr 24, 2025•5 min
Vauhini Vara’s new essay collection opens with a heart to heart with ChatGPT. In her prompt, she asks the program to give her feedback on a few chapters of her upcoming book. “I’m nervous,” she tells it. “That’s completely understandable,” it responds with a cheery exclamation point. “Sharing your writing can feel really personal, but I’m here to provide a supportive and constructive perspective. Take your time, and whenever you’re ready, I’ll be here to discuss it with you.” So begins a high te...
Apr 23, 2025•33 min
On Monday, the Department of Education announced that it will resume collections on defaulted loans on May 5th. That’s after a five year pause started in the midst of the covid pandemic. More than 42 million people in the United States have student loans through the federal government. And, according to the Department of Education, five million have not made a payment in the last year. Experts warn that this push for repayment will put loan holders in difficult financial situations and could hav...
Apr 23, 2025•14 min
"Our world is changing. It's changing rapidly. Like, we can see climate changing our world as we speak, but also, we're losing nature at unprecedented rates, and there's an equity crisis as well." That was University of Washington professor Phil Levin two years ago. At the time, he’d just been tapped by the Biden Administration for a one of a kind mission: writing the most all encompassing review ever of nature throughout the entirety of the United States. “The National Nature Assessment,” as it...
Apr 23, 2025•17 min
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments over an executive order ending birthright citizenship. President Trump signed that order in his first days in office. A federal judge in Seattle temporarily blocked the Trump administration from enforcing the order nationwide. And two other legal challenges – in federal courts in Massachusetts and Maryland – also prompted injunctions. Now the Supreme Court will decide whether a 125 year old constitutional right to citizenship for people born in the ...
Apr 22, 2025•21 min
The Pentagon is roiling over yet another Signal group chat. No, not that one with the Trump Administration national security team that accidentally included an editor at the Atlantic. This is… another Signal group chat scandal. The New York Times reports that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth shared operational details for a March 15th U.S. strike on the Houthis in Yemen with a group of 13 people. They allegedly included his personal lawyer, brother, and wife. This comes while Hegseth’s team is ...
Apr 22, 2025•14 min
An old faded rice cooker. A blue two piece suit. A vial of water from the Ganges River. For the past four years, Poet Shin Yu Pai’s podcast, Ten Thousand Things, has explored how objects – from the extraordinary to the mundane, the literal to the figurative – communicate stories of Asian American meaning, identity, and culture. As of last month, the stories in the series have broken out of podcast players and become a new exhibit in Seattle’s Wing Luke Museum. The exhibit includes objects that w...
Apr 21, 2025•11 min
News has not been good lately for research universities in the United States. The Trump Administration has proposed slashing the National Institutes of Health Budget by about half – eliminating tens of billions of dollars for the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world. The White House had earlier announced a 15 percent cap on indirect costs for NIH grants. That money goes towards facility maintenance at research institutions and university presidents say the move will greatly ...
Apr 21, 2025•28 min
“With dignity, but like any Christian, because the bishop of Rome is a pastor and a disciple, not a powerful man of this world.” That’s part of the instructions from Pope Francis to “lighten” the formality of his funeral arrangements. Francis wrote about his wish for a simpler ceremony in his autobiography , published earlier this year. The attitude reflected his wish that the church move closer to regular people and its mission of serving the marginalized, including migrants and the poor. Pope ...
Apr 21, 2025•12 min
The Trump administration is pushing for more logging on public land, pledging to boost America’s domestic supply of wood products and increase wildfire resilience. In March, the President issued an executive order directing federal agencies to begin finding ways to expand timber production by 25% over the next few years. Last week, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins sent a memo establishing an “ emergency situation determination” covering more than 112 million national forest acres. That inclu...
Apr 17, 2025•25 min
It's CONVENTION WEEKEND... But also Easter Weekend... And the start of Bellingham Beer Week, and National Park Week. It's the Weekend Warmup! Enjoy! LINKS: Norwescon Sakura-Con Bellingham Beer Week National Park Week Climate Pledge Arena – Phish Spring Fair | Washington State Fair Events Center Skagit Valley Tulip Festival KUOW - Meet Me Here Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes Soundside is a product...
Apr 17, 2025•5 min
We are three weeks into the Major League Baseball season and one of the main story lines of the nascent season is the bats. On the second day of the season, the New York Yankees hit 9 home runs against the Milwaukee Brewers. Many of the Yankees players were using a new type of bat – shaped kind of like a bowling pin. This bat bulges at the center and narrows at the end. It’s called a torpedo bat. Of course, traditionalists don’t love the new bat (let’s be real, some people hate change). But Majo...
Apr 16, 2025•10 min
