Getty Images is like LOL, no such thing as Seattle bagels.
Getty Images is like "LOL, no such thing as Seattle bagels." Screenshot

A bold claim: "[Seattle's] best bagels are just as good as any in New York.”

That explosive quote comes from fresh Seattleite J. Kenji López-Alt: He told the Seattle Times' Tan Vinh that among his favorite local bagel places are Loxsmith Bagels and Zylberschtein’s Delicatessen & Bakery.

It's the two-year anniversary of the first reported case of COVID-19 in the United States: Congrats, Snohomish County, you'll always have the honor of being at the center of that anniversary.

It's also David Lynch's birthday: Those two dates are unrelated. I think. Lynch is 76.

What were you doing two years ago today? Since that day, there have been 69 million cases reported in the US and around 860,000 deaths. President Biden held a press conference yesterday where he admitted they should have ramped up testing sooner—but, hey, testing is getting better!!!! He says. We have not heard anecdotal reports that testing is getting better, but Bruce did announce these new testing spots so, hey, we're, uh, getting there... one day...

In Germany they have these little tents where you can (and have to!) get rapid tested before going to bars and clubs. They're not perfect, but look around—it's hard to complain when our approach is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A week ago, I asked

The best response I got

But Margo is being modest: She wrote a whole-ass feature about the old people sport-cum-all people sport for Crosscut today.

An apartment fire injured three people in Everett last night: Two of those residents were rescued from a back room, where a crucial move possibly saved them, reports Everett Herald:

A "closed bedroom door provided protection for the residents by isolating the fire’s flow, reducing room temperatures and keeping carbon monoxide levels down,” Everett Fire Marshal Kurtis Brown said. “The action of keeping the door closed to the bedroom provided valuable time for the occupants to be safely rescued by the firefighters.”

In the recent Bronx fire that killed 17 people, broken doors that wouldn't shut on their own were a significant reason behind the high number of deaths.

This



has been your hole report for today.*

*Twitter is being funky. If that embed doesn't work, just click here. Sorry. Tech does what it does. Blame it on the supply chain.

Another hole is Washington's arts funding. Jas Keimig has the report.

Elizabeth Warren says she's not running for president again. She's all-in for the Senate, though.

The brakes have been pumped on Washington state's WA Cares tax. Lawmakers in the House approved bills that would delay the tax collection until 2023, reports the Seattle Times. Lawmakers delayed the tax so they could "address the issues we’ve heard about, to ensure that the program is effective and as efficient as we can make it," said House Majority Leader Pat Sullivan. The tax would create a much-needed safety net for older Washingtonians through a state-run long-term care insurance program, but there have been plenty of criticisms about how the tax is applied and who the program benefits. Melissa Santos has a piece in Crosscut about what's next.

Vulcan is trying to sell its Google campus in South Lake Union on Valley Street: Puget Sound Business Journal has the story:

The Google office space totals approximately 623,000 square feet with about 12,500 square feet of ground-floor retail space. There also are 149 luxury apartments in the project. The apartments are not part of the offering.

Again, paging Callan Berry: Let's bring back Police Reports Illustrated. A headline needs your attention: Police search for suspect after reported Bellevue Place crossbow assault

The 45th president's adult daughter has been asked by the January 6 Commission to voluntarily cooperate in their investigation of just what the disgraced twice-impeached president was up to that day. The AP reports that: "The committee says it wants to discuss what Ivanka Trump knew about her father’s efforts." Ivanka's spokesperson responded with "Ivanka did not speak at the January 6 rally," which is not a response to the question. It's just different information.

Are you ready? 'Tis time.

Another movie to put on your calendar: Critics fucking loved Junta Yamaguchi's Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes when it swept through festivals last year. The single-shot "micro-budget" thriller was shot in a week, following on the heels of the massively popular Japanese single-shot One Cut of the Dead (2017). The Guardian called Two Minutes "the breakout success of the year," but most US audiences haven't had a real chance to see it until this month. Next Tuesday, it drops on many streaming and cable services, including iTunes and Amazon. I got a DVD of it from Third Window Films that I still need to watch. While we wait, a trailer:

The Portland Mercury's Elinor Jones contributed to this round-up.