Place is Rock Salt on Westlake, a steak and seafood restaurant with a neon sign proclaiming “Seating Available.”

Brendan Kiley reports:

The Runte party is subdued but with a sense of quiet anticipation. Around thirty people, 10 of them enthusiastic high school Dems and the rest over 30. Catering report: There are meatballs, raw veggies, stuffed mushrooms. Runte was drinking a martini (sorry, we know you’d love one, but we got no photo.) The few other drinkers were having beer. None of the older folks seem to like Runte as much as they hate Nickels, but for one gray-bearded man, who keeps saying, “Al is one of my only friends.” Peter Steinbrueck stopped by: “Just making the rounds. Al is a good man, a principled man,” he continued. “A lot of people wish he’d gotten into the race earlier. I wish he’d gotten into it earlier.” I introduced myself to Al, saying I was from The Stranger, and was perhaps a persona non grata. “Not at all,” he laughed, and shook my hand. “As long as you spell my name right.” A few of the high school Dems cornered me: “What were you guys thinking when you endorsed Linda Averill? Why did you endorse the mayor? Can I tell you something? You don’t look like a Stranger writer.” I asked what a Stranger writer looked like, but we were interrupted by the gray-bearded man, who came to tell us that Al is one of his only friends.