CHEAP SEATS

EDITOR: Just wanted to drop y'all a quick note to thank Lindy West for fucking up one of my favorite pastimes: spending all day surfing shitty movies at Pacific Place 11 ["Pacific Place Death March," April 12].

Every so often the Movie Buffet (as my friends and I refer to it) stacks up a bunch of first-release Hollywood shit that nobody in his right mind would pay full price for. So I plan my day, I pack a lunch and maybe a book, and I get it all out of the way at once. Bruce Willis, the latest Harry Potter movie, George Lucas's embarrassing descent into animatronic hell—I could see them all for under 10 bucks.

But evidently Lindy needed a puff piece and The Stranger needed something to fill some space—so now there's an article in the city's biggest weekly about the free movie ride available at Pacific Place. I don't mean to suggest that this fact was unknown to anyone at Pacific Place. I'm just making what I would expect to be the obvious point that the kind of sad, overweight, compensating assholes who hover in the middle-management bracket at national cinema chains take shit like this as a personal challenge to their picayune authority. So I think we can pretty well fucking expect them to start putting up velvet ropes and shit to keep people from sneaking around after their chosen feature has concluded, à la the Metro 16.

So thanks for that. Hey, why don't you see if you can find out where homeless people score free pizza from sympathetic employees and report about that!

Jason Schmidt

FINELY CHOPPED

HI JOSH: Just wanted to say how much I appreciated your article on Frank Chopp ["Misled," Josh Feit, April 12]. Excellent! Great research, readable, understandable, and with accessible information that is usable to take action. It's made me upset, especially the list of progressive legislation that should have been, but was not, passed.

Thanks for doing what the best journalism should—providing specific, timely information about a serious public issue. You've moved me to action, and I've passed your article on to others.

Carla Kiiskila

HAPPY HOMEOWNER

MR. JONAH SPANGENTHAL-LEE: When you called me last week, you stated you were writing an article on the new 2200 building, of which I am a resident. I specifically asked what the focus of your story was.

You stated you just wanted to get a feel from the residents of their experience of living there and if Vulcan had met their expectations. I went on to say that it has been a great experience and that I very much enjoyed living there. You stated that many residents have had problems and that things were not getting completed or had shoddy workmanship. I stated this was not my case and that I was happy with the work and had not incurred these same problems you mentioned of others.

But in your article ["Trouble in Paradise," April 12] you lumped me together with an "anonymous" tenant and went on to mention many problems, inferring that I, too, was in a similar situation. I stated to you that my situation was quite the contrary and that my transition was a smooth one. In the second part of the same paragraph, you use the phrase "they say" when I did not say any of those things.

In one of the later paragraphs, you said I remarked, "The building is not full" when of course I stated, "The building is not full yet because people are still moving in."

I asked if my views would be fairly presented and even restated things so as not to be misquoted. I could tell by the leading questions where your article was going, but you assured me that both sides would be fairly represented.

I find this bush-league journalism and although I have been misquoted by the media in the past, I cannot remember such a blatant misrepresentation of my thoughts and words.

Jim Dierst (Happy 2200 Resident)

JONAH SPANGENTHAL-LEE RESPONDS: In discussing the focus of my story, I told you I was looking into residents' complaints about 2200. You obviously have a positive opinion about Vulcan's 2200 project. However, you did provide examples of problems in your own unit: furnace problems and water leaking from a unit above you. Your statement that "the building is not full, but people are still moving in" highlights a point from the article: The property remains unfilled seven months after opening.

DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS: In the Up & Coming preview of the April 14 Long Winters show at the Showbox, we implied that John Roderick is a frat boy when in fact he is not. Also, in last week's news article "Howdy Partner," Josh Feit reported, "The bill leaves a host of other rights off the table, like access to a partner's health insurance or pension benefits, the ability to file a wrongful-death suit if one's partner is killed..." In fact, the bill was amended to include the right to sue for wrongful death.