The Roxy was rocking Friday for a Seahawk rally that was actually pretty fun. Too bad Hugh McKinnis isn’t still on the team, because he can match trash with Joey Porter any day. Then again, he was speaking to a pretty friendly crowd.

Will it be a romp or will it be close? Will the Steelers get crushed? Will the Seahawks look like the weak Super Bowl team the likes of Skip Bayless believes they are?

Will Itula Mili get to suit up?

Really, I was surprised, nay, shocked when the city legislative staff from Seattle actually acted as if they wanted to learn something from Bremerton. I thought Mayor Bozeman’s invitation to address the lunch crowd might be feigning interest in the local. Get the people eating, let somebody talk while they’re doing it and it is a nice gesture.
Even when Jean Godden said she thought they might learn something from the mayor, I wasn’t convinced it was sincere.
Then Tom Rasmussen seemed genuinely impressed with the housing authority’s renewal efforts and I became a believer that they really were here to learn.
To be fair, not everyone stuck around and I’m sure many of those who did were doing it out of obligation. Nonetheless, there was a real show that among the 70 or so attending the event there were a fair number taking a real interest in what Bozeman was saying.
For one, he’s an energetic presenter. One attendee said it was quite “the sales pitch.” But there was real interest in how the projects were funded and a genuine sense that the Seattle folks were going to take something back and create some changes there.
Now who would have thought that?

The Bremer Trust, which picked two locals to oversee its real estate and securities holdings, owns nine buildings and the former JC Penney building that is now a parking garage.
The garage gets a lot of attention, because as much money as it is making for Olympic College, until you get close to it what you see appears to be an abandoned department store.
Frankly I wouldn’t expect that it will always look like that, but as Betti Sheldon said in the story, changes are probably not going to come quickly.

The Martin Luther King branch of the Kitsap Regional Library system will open in March.

I can say with some glee that the library will have what it calls the Northwest Collection, which has documents going back into the 1800s. I’m gleefult because I have a hankering to do some stories that could use historical context. Now I’ll just have to walk across the street. For those who appreciated going to the Sylvan branch for that collection, my condolences and apologies.