For those of you interested in snacks, snacking, snack innovations, talking about snacks, and/or sharing snacks with pals, I have something to tell you. My friend brought these crackers over to eat during Dr. Phil:

THIS IS A CRACKER THAT TASTES LIKE A PIZZA. Finally the food scientists have done something worthwhile.

And speaking of crackers (which I do as often as possible), I have to mention the weirdly icky new Triscuit slogan, “Triscuit fills you, but not with regret!” It just seems a little, you know, intimate.

Megan brought up “Lazy Sunday,” the SNL rap video parody that’s a big hit on the web. She doesn’t mention the most compelling thing about this video: Andy Samberg.

He’s, like, totally fucking hot—huge mouth, big teeth, shaggy hair, tall, skinny—he’s the best looking guy that has ever been on SNL.

The pretty hilarious SNL skit, “Lazy Sunday” (i.e. “The Chronic(what)cles of Narnia”), has been all over the internet for weeks. Now, a couple not-so-famous dudes on the West Coast have posted a response to the spoof-rap called “Lazy Monday.” You can check it out here.

I dunno, A for effort, guys, but you really can’t beat the line “Mr. Pibb and Red Vines equals CRAZY DELICIOUS.”

The GOP Political Action Committee responsible for the recent $75,000 attack-ad mail piece that mimicks sex offender notices is called the Speakers Roundtable.

Weyerhaeuser gave $5,000 to the Speakers Roundtable last year.

The mailings, misleading at best, are classic scare politics, and unfairly imply that Democrats haven’t been hard on sex offenders.

The question is: Do local companies Wehyerhaeuser support this kind of mud slinging?

One way to find out: Ask them.

Call Weyerhaeuser at 253-924-2345

J.T. Leroy and James Frey both wrote pieces for The Stranger—does anyone know if this “Nasdijj” guy did too? Did we hit the lit hoax trifecta?

Does everybody already know about bookcrossing.com? I was in the sleepy, conservative lumber town of Shelton Washington (Christmas Town, USA!) last month and found a copy of Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City on a bus stop bench. I thought it was a small-town liberal’s attempt to “open some minds.” Too bad it was discovered by this big-city faggot! I am now catching up on my gay history. Check out the book exchange program, and release some of your own deviance into the world.

Well, my burning question has been answered: Rev. Hutcherson did show up in the state senate this afternoon to testify against the gay civil rights bill. Did he say anything new? Not really. Although he did close his remarks with a warning that if the legislature approves the bill this year, Washington’s new protections for gays and lesbians may soon be rendered moot by an initiative that’s already been filed by… wait for it… Tim Eyman.

“Maybe the best thing in the world is for this bill to pass,” Hutcherson said. “Because if it does pass… it’s going to come before the people.”

We’ll see. But more interesting than Rev. Hutcherson’s prophecy of a popular backlash against the bill is a new Associated Press report, which hit the wires just as Rev. Hutcherson was sitting down to testify.

Slog readers may recall all the time I spent last week looking into Rev. Hutcherson’s false prophecy of a nation-wide boycott against Microsoft and other companies that are supporting the gay civil rights bill. It was a prophecy he delivered via the Associated Press, which unfortunately took him seriously and sent news of the boycott out to millions of readers. Now that the boycott Rev. Hutcherson threatened via the AP has failed to materialize, the AP is revisiting the issue, and taking a more skeptical look at both the reverend, and his newly-revised boycott plan:

OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — A pastor who had threatened a national boycott against Microsoft and other major companies for supporting a gay civil rights bill is now pushing for an unlikely protest, urging people to buy up the companies’ stock and then dump it to drive prices down.

Rev. Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, home to the software company’s headquarters, says he wants to use the stock market to make a political point. But one market expert laughed at the idea.

“The chances of him being successful with that are slim to none, and slim just left town,” said Hans Olsen, chief investment officer at Bingham Legg Advisers.

Hutcherson told The Associated Press last week he was calling for a boycott of the companies, but said Tuesday that the stock-dumping plan, which calls on people to sell the companies’ shares on May 1, had been his strategy all along.

I have a story coming out in this week’s Stranger about what the boycott flap means for Rev. Hutcherson’s standing as a leader of the religious right. Here’s a link.

UPDATE:

The civil rights bill passed out of its first senate committee, 7-3, and now moves toward a vote by the full senate.

Seriously, sweatily fucked. This is what a realtor who works for a company called GITA did to my partner Patrick and I this weekend.

GITA stands for, and I’m not kidding, God Is The Answer.

Patrick and I have been looking for a house for about a month without any luck, slogging our way through swamp zones, dilapidation and painful ’70s remodels. It’s not that long to be looking, but meanwhile, we’re commuting from Tacoma, and we’re ready to move. And on Friday, lightning struck. I fell in love with this great little sorta-fixer in Madrona. (Patrick’s love was less sudden but it came along.) We saw it in the early afternoon, just after it went on the market, and that night, we went over to our realtor’s office to make an offer at full price. We couldn’t go higher than that, really, but we thought at least we had time on our side.

Our realtor, a fabulous individual who does not work for GITA and is in fact a heathen like us, began writing the offer. He was checking the listing to get some information when he noticed that the selling agent — from GITA — had changed her remarks since earlier that afternoon, which is against realty rules, I guess. She was saying now that she wouldn’t be accepting offers for another week, meaning that we’d probably lose our time advantage, and maybe end up being outbid. But we were determined to still try. So, we thought we would wait to make our offer until later in the week, when we would know more about the other possible offers — if there are pre-inspections, then we pretty much know for sure there will be multiple offers, and we might want to try to see whether we could scrape up some money or some courage and go a little higher. We really wanted this house.

Two days later, on Sunday, I noticed online that the house was already sold pending inspection. Our realtor called the GITA lady. She said sorry, she’d screwed up, but basically, she just decided to violate her own stipulation because she’d felt like it. She had no explanation. If we had kept going with that original offer on Friday night, we’d probably have the house by now. Jesus Freak Bitch!

Our only comfort is that this woman’s jackassed moves might earn her a fine from the listing service of $20,000 or some such. But that does not put the Triscuit cracker in my stomach.

This morning, Chad and Brian from the Showbox reportedly spotted Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin wandering around Pike Place Market. “We got a call alerting us that they were at the magazine stand (at the market), and we all ran,” says Chad. “That was totally retarded, but necessary.” Coldplay is in town to play a show at the KeyArena, and apparently the two were very nice and even offered them tickets to the show. Chad also says that Gwenyth looked very pretty and also very pregnant.

I was drooling over the travel section in the NYTimes, when I came across a blurb about “refinedâ€� camping with The Four Seasons (wha???).

Each of the 15 tents at the campsite is as luxurious as a five-star hotel room; each is 581 square feet and has a hand-hammered copper tub, high-speed Internet, twice-daily housekeeping and even a safe.

Okay, but are campers still forced to shit in a bucket? Important questions go unanswered!

Another popular “campsiteâ€� in Missoula (ironically named Tent City) features feather beds and a butler to do pesky camping chores for you like gathering firewood and interacting with your family.

Has anyone heard of this before? I yearn to know more!

It’s getting its first hearing in the Senate right now. Watch it live here.

My burning question: Will Rev. Ken Hutcherson show up?

I won’t bore everyone by giving a complete rundown of council committee assignments, which just came out this afternoon, except to say that Richard Conlin is head of the utilities committee, which everyone thought the new council member would get saddled with, and which has been retooled to encompass environment and emergency management. The still-TBA new council member will get the new neighborhoods and economic development committee. Meanwhile, the rest of the committees have been retooled in subtle and sometimes bizarre ways (parks, education, libraries and labor?) and the government affairs committee no longer exists.

OK. That’s all for today. I promise.

“The unit that controls the odor of sewage at the Lake City regulator station failed, causing stinky air to seep through the city’s manholes and into the air.” The Seattle Times has the stinky story.

Figures, since today is supposedly the worst day of the year.

(Another Times story confirmed that men who wear fragrance usually wear way too much.)

I smelled it, too—first in my hallway, and immediately wondered if a neighbor had died and was rotting—then, stronger, on Pike Street. Results of a quickie Google investigation are on the way.

Tom Delay’s approval rating has plummeted; if the election were held today, according to a recent poll, DeLay would get just 22 percent of the vote. His Democratic opponent, Nick Lampson, is polling at 30 percent.

This just came in…

hey stranger, i’ve been checking all day on the slog to see if you’ll provide some explanation for the wretched stench that opressed the entire city this morning. did a sewage treatment plant erupt or something? what gives?

I hadn’t noticed the city smelling any worse this morning than it usually does. But did anyone else notice a stank this morning? Anyone got any thoughts?

Our arts interns are flirting (intellectually) outside my office. Could someone please give one of them something to mail or transcribe?

The best thing about the Seahawk’s game was watching all of that red money being flushed into the system of a deep blue city. Finally liberals have a reason to support the building of bigger and better sports stadiums and sustaining expensive professional teams—it is the one thing the reds cant do and yet they need, are addicted to, the spectacle of pro-sports.

Yeah, big whoop, a Democrat likes Governor Christine Gregoire. I voted for her, and welcomed a recount investigator into my house to make sure I properly signed my absentee ballot.

But my general affection for Gregoire blossomed into particular love during a televised address Gregoire gave yesterday, commemorating the progress of Washington’s long-stagnant anti-discrimination bill, which would extend equal rights in employment and housing to the state’s gays and lesbians. Most impressive: Gregoire’s informed, level-headed explanation of the distinction between the anti-discrimination bill and the nebulous specter of “gay marriage.” The gist, presented in a gentle but firm manner: The anti-discrimination bill has absolutely nothing to do with gay marriage.

Of course, bills such as our pending anti-discrimination legislation help plenty in confirming gay folks’ status as members of society deserving of equality, which is a crucial step in forwarding the cause of gay marriage. But I appreciate Governor Gregoire for picking her battles and cannily staying on point.

UPDATE: I removed improperly placed Rs from Gregoire’s name. Forgive me.

If you have the ability to get outside and soak up the odd bit of sunshine being offered at the moment, by all means, take it—it looks like it’s not going to last.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Sex.com, long coveted as potentially one of the most lucrative sites on the Web because of its catchy name, has been sold for about $12 million in cash and stock, a source familiar with the deal said on Monday.

A group of anonymous buyers, Boston-based Escom LLC, said in a statement it had acquired the Web address Sex.com from Gary Kremen, chief executive of Grant Media LLC and the founder of Match.com. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Sex.com is seen as one of the most recognizable and therefore financially most promising Web domain names but does not currently have much content.

If only I’d purchased that domain instead of couplesengagedinconsensualsexualcongress.com back in 1993.

I knew it was coming, but it still made me sad to read it.

Speaking of the sure-to-be-missed brilliance of Radar magazine, I heard a completely unsubstantiated rumor that the magazine’s financial failure was due in large part to the amazing article on Scientology the mag ran in its next-to-last issue. It’s no secret that Scientology is the most litigious religion in the history of the world, rumored to be able to set smaller organizations on the road to bankruptcy with just the threat of litigation. Still, Radar had plenty of financial trouble even before they decided to aggressively bust the Scientologists—which, it must be said, is a fate-taunting maneuver on par with wearing a SUGE KNIGHT SUCKED MY DICK T-shirt to the Source awards—and I wouldn’t put it past the Scientologists to have birthed this we-killed-Radar rumor themselves, preying on an already hobbled beast to send a message to everyone else: Don’t fuck with us.

I expect a threatening letter from the Scientologists regarding the Slog entry. I’ll keep you posted.

So Nick Licata, defying expectations, is council president. What remains unresolved is who will take charge of which council committee. Usually, the council president heads a low-profile committee like government affairs; but Licata says he wants to keep control of public safety, a high-profile assignment. Meanwhile, Drago wants to take over transportation (Richard Conlin’s old committee), leaving Conlin (who thought he had the presidency locked up last December) with nowhere to go but government affairs (Drago’s old committee) or utilities (Jim Compton’s), which no one wants. Will Conlin, who already lost the presidency, get doubly screwed? Licata says he and Conlin are “discussing various options,” but wouldn’t detail what those options might be.

Best Muhammed Ali quote ever: “I’m so bad, I make medicine sick.”

A conservative magazine says Bush is getting ready for the worst. (Or, depending on your perspective, the best.)

Firstly, the WB and UPN are forming a merged network, “The CW”. Whether the new network can discover that appropriate mix of UPN’s African-American “sassiness” and the WB’s teen-demo “spunkiness” remains to be seen, but I do hope that they refer to themselves as The Spassky Network as often as possible.
Also, Kanye West now thinks he’s Jesus. (And he’s also, inside tomorrow’s issue of Rolling Stone, posing as Muhammed Ali, which, really, seems like the greater sacrilege.) Which leads me to wonder: are celebrity photographers really really charismatic, that they get these hot-topic celebrities to pose in controversial photo spreads just before they burn out? Or are celebrities just really, really stupid, suggesting these controversial photo shoots, not even considering the fact that, despite the momentary universal press coverage, people will get sick of them a lot sooner?

I have been quoted here as saying, “I can get behind a winner.” To clarify: There are many, many winners I cannot at all get behind, and even my propensity toward fair-weather sportsfanness is limited. I like spectator sports because and only because of my association of the spectating with snacks. I watched basketball with my dad for years, never registering a thing but deeply enjoying the popcorn; likewise, I read and ate peanuts at Mariners games. I missed Sunday’s game, but I saw the terrifyingly enthused Seagulls fans on the 11 o’clock local news. They were distorted and drunken (the latter I’m generally for, but I prefer it unaccompanied by the former). The newscaster said of the stadium, “This must be what ancient Rome was like” (hmmm). Paul Allen, now our philosopher king, said something along the lines of “The fans have been incredible. It’s such a moving experience… such warmth,” upon which the newscaster commented, “Have you ever heard such eloquence?” Jesus FUCKING Christ—not to mention now this man (who wants to go into space! Hello, people!) will literally (okay, only nearly literally) OWN this town (“Allentown”—barf) as every mouth-breathing sports fan (sorry, Brad) wants to hand him even more of whatever he likes on an even shinier silver platter.
One of the ‘Gulls, though, cutely said post-game, “WE’RE GOING BOWLING!”
Please pass the popcorn.

Adam Sekuler replaces outgoing program director Jaime Keeling. Here he is:

Adam Sekuler comes to us from Minnesota Film Arts in Minneanapolis, where he has been programming the non-fiction film series for a year or so. (Before that, he programmed for the University Film Society and the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival, which is administered through with MFA.) Currently on the schedule at his theater: Ganges River to Heaven, New York Doll, The Untold Story of Emmett Till, and The Goebbels Experiment. Minnesota Film Arts hasn’t been having a great time of it lately: They may be closing down their other theater, which programs narrative classics like Casablanca and Citizen Kane. The programmer of that space quit at the beginning of January. Good job getting out while the getting out is good, Mr. Sekuler!

But here’s the kicker. If Minnesota Film Arts sounds familiar, it’s because that’s where we shipped Northwest Film Forum cofounder (and former Stranger film editor) Jamie Hook, who was subsequently ousted from his MFA executive director perch after failing to apply for a crucial $50,000 grant. According to a hostile witness, board director Larry Lamb, “[Hook] missed numerous grant deadlines. His folly was on a grand scale.” So it appears that Hook’s presence led, in a roundabout way, to Sekuler’s exodus. Ironic, n’est-ce pas?

The Washington Court of Appeals overruled the King County Superior yesterday. The Superior Court had wrongly held that “vicious” pets were considered guilty until proven innocent. The Court of Appeals correctly said the County has the burden of proof when claiming that a pet is “vicious” and demanding that it must be removed from the County

Despite my reputation as a dog hater, the ruling makes sense to me. Three Cheers to the Court of Appeals.

However, it’s this kind of language from the ruling that drives me crazy.

In recognizing “that the bond between pet and owner often runs deep and that many people consider pets part of the family,â€� the court held that, “an agency seeking to enforce a removal order must prove both the violation and the remedy it has imposed by a preponderance of the evidence.â€�

If dogs are “part of the family,” maybe dog owners should be paying extra taxes for the sidewalks and parks and … legal rights they enjoy.

Dog licenses cost $20 a year. That money helps pay for the City’s Seattle Animal Shelter, which provides a range of pet services. However, it does not help pay for things like dog parks (which cost about $88,000 a year), or dog clean up …200 pounds of poop a day at those parks…, or sidewalks, or to medical attention for dog bites. It also doesn’t come close to covering the $2 million budget of the Seattle Animal Shelter.

Moreover, the City reports that only about 30,000 (out of the 125,000) dog owners have licenses, ie, even bother to pay the $20.

I’ll admit, The Stranger isn’t exactly known for its penetrating analysis of business trends — and neither am I. But check this out: More than two weeks ago I said on the Slog that “convergence” was making a comeback, and cited recent moves by Google as proof.

And just two days ago The New York Times reported that “convergence is back,” cited recent moves by Google as proof, and even declared a “Convergence 2.0” to be in the offing.

I now take my virtual bow.

More advice for sudden Seahawks fans from my brother Bill Savage, English prof and football fanatic.—Dan Savage

A bandwagon-jumper’s guide to football nomenclature, in the spirit of Ambrose Bierce’s Devil’s Dictionary. Part I.

Cheerleader: sideline reminder that not all men care to watch large hypermasculine men hit each other. Vital connection to traditional patriarchal heteronormative notions of feminine virtue and family values.

Offense: When a team has the ball.

Defense: When a team doesn’t have the ball. These are actually metaphysical concepts, as when a ball is turned over via fumble or interception, the teams instantly switch from offense to defense and vice versa, and the rules which apply to players’ conduct on each team also change. As when Republicans impeach a Democratic President, but then do not impeach a Republican President for far worse infractions, because the rules have changed.

Special Teams: Where the developmentally disabled play football.

Referee: Solon in stripes, adjudicator of game action—considered a wise and just applier of penalties to your opponent, blind and bought-off applier of penalties to your team. Also known as Zebras, for their equine qualities, as they tend to herd together and talk pointlessly without accomplishing anything, whenever under stress. See Democratic Congressional Caucus.

The Spread: not the sort my brother writes about. This is the calculation, by professional gamblers, of the two teams’ relative strength, expressed in points. The Steelers are currently favored by three and a half; that means if you bet on Pittsburgh to win, they have to win by four points or more (covering the spread). If you bet on Seattle to win and they lose by 3 or fewer, you win as the Seahawks have beat the spread. Anyone in Seattle betting on Pittsburgh due to the spread will go to Hell.

The Spot: Not the spot my brother writes about. It’s where the official places the ball at the end of play. If the spot favors your team, it’s good; if it favors your opponent, the ref is in the bag. See Referee.

Reuters reports that yesterday Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against New York Times reporter Timothy O’Brien and Warner Books for allegedly falsely pegging Trump as a millionaire, instead of a billionaire, in his recent book TrumpNation: The Art of Being the Donald.

“I believe it is important to expose irresponsible, malicious and false reporting,” Trump said in a statement.

And so he is suing O’Brien and Warner for defamatory statements, to the tune of Five Billion Dollars ($5,000,000,000).

After he is compensated for his inevitable court victory, Trump plans on buying the moon, and then chiseling his real net worth on its surface, along with this image (beware, image contains an artistic rendering of Donald Trump’s wang. Don’t view at work, if you value respectability). That’ll show those motherfuckers who’s rich.

My guy is a coffee connoisseur and won’t go anywhere that doesn’t have excellent java. I, on the other hand, prioritize the availability of good morning noshes in my choice of place.

It has been a problem for us to find a place that pleases both of us, as many coffee houses have mediocre snacks—as was documented by Sara Dickerman here, here, and here.

I think these articles maligning bad pastries are starting to have a positive effect. I just returned from Caffe Vita, where the food choices used to be merely so-so, where I drank some delicious coffee and snacked on some very tasty banana bread. Cheers to that!

Expectations are a funny thing. When I first read the synopsis for the documentary small town gay bar, it sounded more dangerous than any of the Iraq documentaries being made today. I mean, heading into the Deep South to associate yourself with gay culture seems like bringing a lamb to the slaughter. Word up.

The movie starts out similar to what I expected when the filmmakers move two blocks away from the gay bar Rumors to interview drunk rednecks outside a roadhouse. They say everything you’d expect, but it sets the stage for an interesting dichotomy. But then the movie moves inside the gay bars, into the safety of the southern gay communities, and fails to give a general context about what average people think of out homosexuals who gather and drink. Instead the villains of the piece become the homophobic preacher, the guy from the American Family Association, and the unseen threat and history of violence.

What we eventually learn is that the inside of gay bars are the same whether you’re in the city or in the country. The bulk of the movie is an optimistic call for tolerance and family and unity, and it should play well in gay and lesbian film festivals across the country.

-Andy Spletzer
reporting from Sundance
Park City, Utah