Train arriving at the cursed and badly designed Mount Baker Station.
Train arriving at the cursed and badly designed Mount Baker Station. Charles Mudede

Mount Baker Station still stands as the worst-designed station on the Link line. I have said this before. I will say it again. It failed to accommodate pedestrians by connecting with the walking bridge. It takes forever to get into and forever to understand if you are new to it. It's poorly integrated with a major Metro hub. I cannot stop listing the failures of this place. Visit UW Washington Station to see a stark difference for yourself. Rainer Ave and Montlake Blvd are horrible streets, but Mount Baker Station surrenders to Rainier, whereas UW Washington puts Montlake in its place. Lately, there has been a lot of calls from, particularly, the residents of Artspace Mount Baker Lofts to deal with these issues, which, predictably, have resulted in a situation that's described by the theorist Hal Foster as "crime and design." Crosscut has the story.

King Inslee Announces a return to American freedom on March 21. On that day, conservative KOMO reports, with a feeling that approximates a Pyrrhic victory, "masks will no longer be required in most places, including K-12 schools and childcare facilities." You will have your freedom in the gym, in the bar, in a restaurant. Many of those devoted to the memory of the late Trooper Robert LaMay will certainly wish he had lived long enough to see this day, which to them has something of the significance of Washington crossing the Delaware.

What happened? Guns. Where? Belltown. When? Last night. Are you surprised? No. Will you ever be surprised? No. Will you ever love your country? Ask your country to love you, not yourself to love it.

I think the local political mover and shaker Sandeep Kaushik would describe this opinion as "woke." Hannah has the story.

"Investors" feel they were mislead by Silverback Therapeutics, "a Seattle-based drug company," because of some reason that ultimately comes down to one of two things "investors" feel very strongly about: losing money. Seattle Times: "Such claims ["We were swindled!" "We were misled!"] are often brought against newly public biotech startups, particularly those that see their stock price soar and then drop." Can you feel their pain? Can you? If not, just imagine the tragedy mask. That's exactly how they feel inside when money is lost. And when money is made? Imagine only the other mask, the one for comedy.

Area thieves, there's a new Sheriff in town: The drone. KIRO7 must have this story: "A suspect seen running from a burglarized convenience store in Lake Stevens was quickly found by an officer operating a drone."

Chase opens a branch in the Metaverse. It is not the kind of branch you have in mind, but it is seen by analysts of the industry as a step in the right direction. In a future that's providing fewer and fewer surprises, virtual branches will replace real ones. "Imagine never having to take a break during working hours and wait in a line at the bank," explains IBS Intelligence. "Now imagine getting personalized banking service at the comfort of your home, when it’s convenient for you while enjoying a cup of coffee.”

Some astronomers believe that our galaxy "has consumed at least half a dozen other galaxies during its roughly 13-billion-year history." These same astronomers can even "identify the remains of its meals," which are "smeared across the galactic halo." This gastronomic galactic story, which is in Science, recalls a passage in Alfred North Whitehead's Process and Reality. It goes like this:

Thus, all societies require interplay with their environment; and in the case of living societies this interplay takes the form of robbery. The living society may, or may not, be a higher type of organism than the food which it disintegrates. But whether or not it be for the general good, life is robbery. It is at this point that with life morals become acute. The robber requires justification.
And so does our galaxy, it seems.

Give it up, Nicholas Kristof. Oregon has said no to your gubernatorial dreams again. This time it's the Oregon Supreme Court. It ruled you, a former columnist for the New York Times, were not eligible because, face it, you are not really a resident of that state. If you want to talk about it with me, I can pop by your place when I next visit relatives in the Yamhill area. There are excellent white wines there, some of which are even grown by my relatives. We can have drinks while you wait for your time to come, which is not now.

Something to do with Trump. Meaning, something happening in some court. Meaning, something that's neither here nor there.

Ethan Linck, a scientist who specializes in the ups and downs of the feathered kind, and who also once wrote a science column for this paper, posted on Twitter a pic of Missoula that is too beautiful for words. Images must always come first. "Words are very unnecessary, they can only do harm."

Juvraj Jabal, I just learned you were shot to death on my birthday, Feb 8. You were only 24. I did not know you were so deep in Vancouver BC's underworld, as the Vancouver Sun reports. But I do recall seeing you in Seattle as a bright-faced boy, and also eating with you and your welcoming family at the Sikh temple in Surrey, and drinking vodka with you and your father at your grandfather's house. Death is always too real to believe. But I will say that I'm no longer so certain that we never ever return to life or something else like it. We have been here once. Why can't we become again?

We will end in Deep Space with Model 500's techno classic "Starlight":