The Aurora Bridge Is About To Acquire A Suicide Prevention Fence. Thank you WSDOT!

The Aurora Bridge is about to acquire a suicide barrier.  Hallelujah!  This makes me so happy.

The Aurora Bridge is the second most "popular" suicide site in the United States...right behind the Golden Gate Bridge.  230 people have killed themselves at the bridge since it was built.    Those "choose life" stickers on the light pole haven't really helped.  Thank you Seattle and Washington State for finally doing this.  From mynw.com:

Work to begin on Aurora's suicide prevention fence



Construction on a fence aimed at preventing people from jumping off Seattle's Aurora Bridge begins next week. Construction will begin Monday night and last four to six weeks until crews begin working during the day June-December. The noise is expected to be so loud that nearby residents have been offered industrial-strength earplugs.

According to a flier sent to neighbors, "You may hear tools such as wood saws, compressed air drills, generators, power wrenches and other construction equipment." However, the Washington State Department of Transportation said it's trying to reduce the nose by using portable noise shields on generators and use ambient back up alarms on equipment. Call the WSDOT if you need earplugs 206-267-6019



The 8-foot, 9-inch steel fence is designed to keep people from committing suicide by jumping from the 167-foot high span. The WSDOT said the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline finds the "use of bridge barriers is the most effective means of bridge prevention suicide" and the method has been successful on the Bloor Street Viaduct in Toronto, the Memorial Bridge in Augusta, the Colorado Street Brdige in Pasadena, the Duke Ellington Bridge in Washington D.C., and the Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol, England.

Crews will being installing the actual fence structure in late summer or early fall. They expect to finish the project in late 2010 or early next year.

The WSDOT said the original budget for the fence project was $8.1 million, but it was revised to $4.6 million. The project was funded through the gas tax.
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Updated links to poetry on all this is that

The complete links to Jack Brummet's (nearly200) poems on all this is that.  Once a year we update the list, and put a link in the sidebar.  Jack has published nearly 200 poems here over the last five and a half years. 

The Odds
When Evil Fails
The White Pony
God's Angry Rain
Mathematics 
 Instructions to the sperm and egg
The Cover-up
The Mission
The Reverse King Midas Touch
The Fog
The Jitters
[A lone climber bivouaced]
The Moon's In Tune
Torches & Pitchforks
Three A.M.
Platoon
Hazards
A pod of sea lions
What color is water?
Why are bubbles round?
Resurrection
The Quest
Summer leaves in autumn hit the winter of their life
The islands from eight miles high
from the Poetry Generator: The Cloud Endures
Survival
Poem In Gorene
The listing freighter in the harbor at Kato Zakris
Rocks, flowers, and walls
Prayers In Istanbul
Sailng To Athens
That Cold Island Across The Sea
Moslems vs. Nazarenes vs. Pagans
Just Beneath The Topsoil
Sailing To Naxos, or, The Vortex
Flying, depending on the context, is better than not flying
Endurance & Limits
Scarred For Life
One of those days
Delusion
The Variations (newly revised)
How He Lived
The Broken Chord
Stackabones (for Claire)
In California, I write down the names of every great tree name I can remember
When the devil comes knocking
Into the wind
The Outlet
The riptide beneath my feet
The sounds on Puget Sound
Stages
But you can't
[with your back to the wall]
[The surging sea]
Are they on the way or is it "just my 'magination (once again)?"
The telepath
Catch 23
Narcissism
Midnight Madness
Grey USA
On seeing the photo of a long lost friend
Imaginary Friends
Alkyvision
[The streetlight's blue shadows...]
There's A Civil War In His Head
[Jesus Walks On Water]
On The Plain: just a song of Gomorrah
Why I won't run for President
The story of a long long journey
Dawdling
Landing, or, Aviophobia, Part 26
The eyes have it
You Rehearse Dying
How the first baby in the world
The Big Boat
Babylon and the unfinished tower
Late Spring
Higher Ground Poem: The Icarus Factor).
Truism 1
The Grey Convoy Flies Over the UFO Crash Site
Dual Mortality
Ephemeral Communications
toast
3 A.M.
I'm agnostic about atheism
Snow Day In Kirkland, Washington
Squirrel poem
Going Mad Might Be Like A Bad Eight Track Tape Deck
Fall Haiku
Jericho & How Joshua Caused The Walls To Come Tumbling Down
The Orgy In The Pantry (starring Duncan Hines, Betty Crocker, Pilsbury Dough Boy, Aunt Jemima, Chef Boy-Ar-Dee and more
With Or Without The Words
Hello. . .My poem is. . .
You Gather Your Friends
The Way We Were
The White Flag
The Cover-up
The Good German
Dream Of The Grey
Torches & Pitchforks
The Red Flag
Don't look back
The Tenth Planet (Or An Incredible Facsimile?)
Anger management is a slippery slope
the vault
The Moon's In Tune
Another politician resigns in disrace
Rub-a-dub
Tendrils
The Candidate
Reds
Making Room
The revolt in heaven
Found Poem: The Richmond Hill Oracle
The Robot Wars
Ten ways of looking at lies
The Broken Chord
With our heads in the sand during the transit and eclipse
the sun plays its red song
Litany
Poem: The Developers
A raindrop's life
The mystery of the first amendment to the Ten Commandments
The Bay Of Delusion
Mad Song
Reasons To Keep On
Conspiracy Theory
The Moon Race
Mr. Flue's Grave In Hillcrest Cemetary, Kent, Wash.
The World Seems Especially Calming And Verisimilitudinous Today
Kent, Washington
Rollover
[It's the Lee Harvey Oswald smile]
Zombie Breakdown
Heaven
Sonnet For Hari
Defensive Daydreaming
The Dream
Dogpaddling
The Prostethic Head & The Absence Of Blood
Tetuan - "No Paranoia, My Friend"
The Grey Ambassador
The Bad Movie
The Bucket
The Man In The Mirror
Liftoff Optimism
Perspective
A Flight Of Swallows
Audioblog - The Prevaricator
Weather Report
Your Wooden Leg
The Revelations
The Revelations Sermon At The First Church Of The Mojo Apocalypse
Dosvidaniya, Ivan Ivanovitch
The Late Excavation
Jack Kerouac, Meet John Barleycorn
The Gideon Bible In My Nightstand
At The Acropolis
When Aliens Land, Or, The Return Of The King
The sous-chef is a sociopath
James Wright
Falling
[Life Is Not A Hardy Novel]
Seven
Coyote Comes Home Like A Salmon
Shorts For Jerry Melin ca. about 1988
Bird
Monism
The Golden Rule
The Countdown
SAM THE GRASSEATER
Notes On Flying
Daybreak
Explosions
Not Past Tense Yet
the glass is not half-full
It's Getting Crowded Here
Li Po In Disgrace
The Clock
A Love Song
Bad Timing
The Killer
The Absence of Footprints
Growing Up
Gone Fishing
The M.D.s
Acrylic
The Marriage
Driving Home To Seattle, We Watch Deer Drinking from the Skookumchuck River
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Circular Poem

Quoting scriptures?

Whether it happened or not, at least they had the Bible verses right. . .

A new pastor was visiting the homes of his parishioners. At one house it seemed obvious that someone was at home, but no answer came to his repeated knocks at the door.

So he took out a business card and wrote "Revelation 3:20" on the back of it and stuck it in the door.

When the offering was processed the following Sunday, he found that his card had been returned. Added to it was this cryptic message, "Genesis 3:10.

Reaching for his Bible to check out the citation, he broke up in laughter. Revelation 3:20 begins "Behold, I stand at the door and knock." Genesis 3:10 reads, "I heard your voice  in the garden and I was afraid for I was naked."
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Poem: The Odds by Jack Brummet

1.
The odds are your luck
Will run out one day.

We know this from cemeteries
And the dearth of hundred year olds

Stomping around
This sweet blue sphere.

2.
Simple probability
And distributed statistics

Tell us ineluctably

That the more times

You stick your head

In the lion's mouth,

The more likely it is

that one day, he will close it.

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Legendary Seattle landmark The Lusty Lady to close

It's the economic slump, and according to the manager, high quality porn on the internet; whatever the cause, The Lusty Lady is closing.  Their revenues have declined every year since 1998 (or, roughly since the internet became widely available). In Seattle, The Lusty Lady, a downtown nude peep show (right across the street from the Seattle Art Museum) is best known for the double entendres on its marquee.

The Lusty Lady will close in June. Some recent marquees: "Happy Spanksgiving" "Happy Nude Year," "Seasons Squeezings," and "Always Open, Never Clothed."

A post from All This Is That a few years ago, lists some of their more notable marquee titles:  Some Classic Porn Movie Titles from the Lusty Lady

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Greatest hits of Representative Michele Bachmann

By Pablo Fanque
All This Is That National Affairs Editor

Now that she has partnered up with Ex-Governor Palin, Rep. Bachmann's stock seems to be rising.  Palin-Bachmann bumper stickers have appeared.  People are speculating about this dream team: double trouble! 

One of the most interesting facts I've recently learned about Michele is that she and her husband own a mental health practice employing 42 people in Sillwater, Minnesota.  Judging from some of her public pronouncements, it's probably a safe bet that she's not eating into the profits by over-using their services. . .

It seems like a good time to roll out some of our favorite Bachmann quotes from the last few years...

“one L, two Ns” - MB on how to spell her name correctly

"Little children will be forced to learn that homosexuality is normal and natural and perhaps they should try it."  - Interview with Jan Markell, Olive Tree Ministries.

“And what a bizarre time we’re in, Jan, when a judge will say to little children that you can’t say the pledge of allegiance, but you must learn that homosexuality is normal and you should try it.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, appearing as guest on radio program “Prophetic Views Behind The News”, hosted by Jan Markell, KKMS 980-AM, March 6, 2004.


"Literally, if we took away the minimum wage—if conceivably it was gone—we could potentially virtually wipe out unemployment completely because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level." —Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, Jobs, Energy and Community Development Committee, testifying against SF 3, a bill to raise the MN minimum wage and advocating the elimination of the minimum wage


“It’s part of Satan I think to say that this is “gay.” It’s anything but gay.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.



“If you’re involved in the gay and lesbian lifestyle, it’s bondage. It is personal bondage, personal despair and personal enslavement.” — Senator Michele Bachmann, speaking at EdWatch National Education Conference, November 6, 2004.





"The marriage initiative is 'not a Republican-Democrat issue'."
--Senator Michele Bachmann, Star Tribune, November 10, 2005



"Democrats need to fear losing their seat."
--Senator Michele Bachmann, Pioneer Press, November 11, 2005



"I had high heels on and I just couldn't stand anymore. I was not in the bushes."
--Sen Michele Bachmann, Strib, April 13, 2005



"He kissed me in Minnesota, too" - Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, Strib January 24, 2007



"Help!!!! HEEEELLLLLLPPPPPP!!!!! I was being held against my will!"
-- Sen Michele Bachmann, Women's Restroom in Scandia, Minnesota, April 9, 2005



"This is a ticking time bomb and there is a very real threat that an Activist Judge Strike down DOMA this year"  -- Sen Michele Bachmann, Interview with Jan Markell, Olive Tree Ministries.



"I never wanted to amend the constitution."
-- Sen Michele Bachmann, Calling in to Tom Barnard, May 12, 2005.



"Is there no longer freedom of speech in this chamber, Mr. President?....Mr. President...MR. PRESIDENT?....You can turn my microphone off now." - Michele Bachmann, May 16, 2004, Last day of 2004 Session.



"Many teenagers that come in should be paying the employer because of broken dishes or whatever occurs during that period of time. But you know what? After six months, that teenager is going to be a fabulous employee and is going to go on a trajectory where he's going to be making so much money, we'll be borrowing money from him." —Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, explaining why teenagers should pay employers for the privilege of working instead of receiving minimum wage.



"If we allow businesses to be prosperous and accrue capital, they’ll be giving their employees more than they can even begin to imagine. But when we continue to tie cement blocks on businesses (like the minimum wage) and constrain them, they can actually do less than their employees."
—Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, testifying against SF 3, a bill to raise the MN minimum wage and explaining why it actually keeps wages and benefits lower.



"I was wondering, if most employers are already doing this anyway, isn’t minimum wage really just superfluous? Why do we even have one?" —Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, Jobs, Energy and Community Development Committee, testifying against SF 3, a bill to raise the MN minimum wage, and advocating the elimination of the minimum wage altogether.



"If raising the minimum wage to $7.00 an hour is a good idea, that why dont we just raise it to $20.00 an hour, that must be even better." —Michele Bachmann, 1/26/05, Jobs, Energy and Community Development Committee, testifying against SF 3, a bill to raise the MN minimum wage.



"I look at the Scripture and I read it and I take it for what it is. I give more credence in the Scripture as being kind of a timeless word of God to mankind, and I take it for what it is. And I don't think I give as much credence to my own mind, because I see myself as being very limited and very flawed, and lacking in knowledge, and wisdom and understanding. So, I just take the Bible for what it is, I guess, and recognize that I am not a scientist, not trained to be a scientist. I'm not a deep thinker on all of this. I wish I was. I wish I was more knowledgeable, but I'm not a scientist." - Michele Bachmann interviewing with Todd Fiel at KKMS as quoted in the Stillwater Gazette, September 29, 2003.



"Something that I think sometimes people don’t like to hear is that secular people can be sometimes even more dogmatic in beliefs than people who are not secular. ... In some ways, to believe in evolution is almost like a following; a cult following — if you don’t believe in evolution, you’re considered completely backward. That seems to me very indicative of bias as well." - Michele Bachmann quoted in the Stillwater Gazette, September 29, 2003.



"No one that I know disagrees with natural selection — that you can take various breeds of dogs ... breed them, you get different kinds of dogs," she said. "It's just a fact of life. ... Where there's controversy is (at the question) 'Where do we say that a cell became a blade of grass, which became a starfish, which became a cat, which became a donkey, which became a human being?' There’s a real lack of evidence from change from actual species to a different type of species. That's where it's difficult to prove." - Michele Bachmann quoted in the Stillwater Gazette, September 29, 2003.
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analog-->digital art: Into The Fire

click to enlarge

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I'm Skookum

When I was growing up in the Green River Valley, south of Seattle, I often heard the word "skookum."  I remember hearing my Uncle Gould and a few other adults use the term in conversation.  It always felt like a word from the Pacific Northwest, like it may have sprung from our neck of the woods--because there were a couple of places named Skookumchuck).  I grew up hearing the word all the time, but it has fallen into disuse.  What a great word!  Misuse would be better than disuse.  The word was often used as a synonym for copacetic--a word you might hear Cab Calloway or some other hepcat use, and a word I associate with the 1920's to 1950's era.  World Wide Words seems to confirm that: 

COPACETIC/kəʊpəˈsɛtɪk/  - Fine, excellent, going just right.

The Wikipedia says "Skookum is a Chinook jargon word that has come into general use in British Columbia and Yukon Territory in Canada, and in the U.S. Pacific Northwest."  And that it has three meanings: 

1.  a word in regional English that has a variety of positive connotations;

2.  a monster; similar to the Sasquatch, or Bigfoot, often seen in these parts (the NW);

3.  a souvenir doll once common in the United States in tourist areas.

It has a wide range of positive meanings, and that is how I always remember it being used.  I never heard it used to refer to a Sasquatch or kachina dolls.  

 

A Frequently Asked Questions list from Skookum Tools Ltd. says the word has "meanings from 'good,' to 'strong,' 'best,' 'powerful,' 'ultimate,' 'brave' and 'first rate.' Something can be skookum meaning 'really good' or 'right on! 'excellent!', or it can be skookum meaning 'tough' or 'durable'. A skookum burger is either a big or a really tasty hamburger, or both, but when your Mom's food is skookum, it's delicious but also hearty. When you are skookum, you've got a purpose and you're on solid ground, in good health/spirits etc. When used in reference to another person, e.g. "he's skookum", it's used in respect with connotations of trustworthiness, reliability and honesty as well as (possibly but not necessarily) strength and size."

The same FAQ also claims that skookum house means jail or prison, or, "the big house."

I have been to at least three places--two in Washington (the river, and Skookum inlet on Puget Sound)and one in British Columbia--named Skookumchuck, most notably including the river you drive over on a road trip to California.  Skookum can mean "turbulent water or rapids"  and Chuck is Chinook for river or lake.

 

A quick internet search turns up a brewery, a social service agency, a "bay trading" company, a clothing manufacturer, and a few other businesses that have appropriated the name, including most appropriately one business that makes gear for steelhead fishing (that should be another post probably--the story of the singularly northwest fish known as steelhead).  There seems also to be a breed of cat known as skookum, and at least one rock band.  And how could I forget--Skookum Inlet on Puget Sound produces some of the best oysters I have ever eaten...

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Claire Brummet & Colin Whitchelo in a Bollywood film

Claire wrote me about her adventures traveling back to Mumbai and on to Goa, after we parted company last week in Pune.  She and Colin ended up appearing in a Bollywood movie!  From her email:

"After leaving Pune and arriving in Mumbai we walked with our backpacks in the heat of the day from VT to Colaba. It was sweaty. We found the Salvation Army [jack note: no relation to OUR Salvation Army] hostel right behind the Taj. They didn't have any double rooms available so we had to get separate dorm bunks. Usually, we opt to pay a bit more for the double room when we stay at hostels. So, this was actually my first time staying in a dorm bed separate from Colin. The beds each cost Rs. 200 [jack note: about $5]. That included breakfast and lunch. Very cheap. The price fit the place. It was nasty. Bugs, smells, cold water, noise, and plenty of young dirty peers."


"Our first day [back in Mumbai] we were approached and asked to be in a Bollywood movie. A day of work with three meals included and you get paid Rs. 500 [jack note: about $12 USD] . It was a Tuesday when we got there and our train didn't leave until Saturday morn so we said yes. We had lots of time to kill. We did the Bollywood movie on Thursday."

"They picked us up at 5am and drove us three hours to a hill station outside Mumbai. The location was amazing and although the day was long and hot seeing the area was worth it. Once we got there, they dressed all of the girls up in short skirts and tank tops. They did our hair and makeup. I'm pretty sure they get foreigners because we have no problem dressing like skanks. The shoot was a trip. The movie was supposed to be a comedy like Austin Powers they said. There was an elaborate set (which reminded me a lot of AmC) and hundreds of people in hilarious outfits. The plot of the movie was vaguely explained to us and it made no sense. I wrote down the name of the movie and it comes out on December 24th. Hopefully we will be able to download it. Once I can show you the pictures it will make a lot more sense."
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Jack Brummet digital art: Faces Gone

 Faces Gone by Jack Brummet

click to enlarge

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The Palin-Bachmann Juggernaut Picks Up Steam

click images to enlarge

By Pablo Fanque
All This Is That National Affairs Editor

People rarely agree (except Mona Goldwater) when I say that Ex-Governor Palin is a force to be reckoned with in 2012, either as a candidate, or as king-maker. Note: it's not like I WANT this to happen. Their logic is usually something like "The American people are no way that dumb," or "It can't happen here." But what happens when you put the two tea-party poster gals together into one rolling, perhaps unstoppable juggernaut? We have proved at least twice in the last decade that intelligence is not one of the job requirements for the Presidency. But then, again, perhaps there are limits to that theory and the voting public does have some sort of floor on the qualifications of POTUS?




Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann--the two Tea party favorites--rallied together
recently in Minnesota. "I knew that we'd be buddies when I met her when she
said, 'Drill here, drill now,'" Palin said. "And then I replied, 'Drill baby drill,'
and then we both said, 'You betcha!'"




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