Don’t forget, today is the last day of Scarecrow’s 25th Anniversary Sale, which includes a free rental for all customers and 50% off their used titles.

Perhaps the largest independent video store in the country, they’re feeling the effects of Netflix, iTunes and Amazon and could use your support. Stop by and say hi!

(Scarecrow is a long-time Wallyhood sponsor.)

Another month, another $2,000 for non-profits in the neighborhood, thanks to the Waste Management Think Green Recycling Challenge. You and your neighbors took part in eight outreach activities in November which earned the Friday North route* the cash award for completing the most outreach activities in November.

You may have heard about the Recycling Challenge at the Wallingford Community Council meeting, at the Meaningful Movies, or at a recycled crafts party at Mosaic. Perhaps you were one of the 200+ folks to have recycling information attached to your garbage can. Or maybe you were one of the deep green neighbors who donated newspaper bags for the cause. You all helped us meet the Challenge.

Friday North not only won the $2,000 this month, but continues to be in first place in reducing pounds of garbage per household. Take a look here for the current neighborhood standings in the Recycling Challenge.

Wallingford Community Council, sponsor of the Challenge in our neighborhood, will award the money to selected non-profits based on proposals received after the contest ends in April 2014.

So, to keep our prize-winning momentum, check out the Waste Management waste reduction tips for December. And if you recently found holiday light strings that no longer light up your life, don’t throw them in the garbage! Support the Recycling Challenge and take them here for recycling:

Maple Leaf Ace Hardware:  9000 Roosevelt Way NE  206-522-3324

Girl Scouts of Western WA:  601 Valley Street, just west of Aurora

Barb writes:

We live in Wallingford and are putting out a plea for gently used adult coats, gloves, hats, scarves and/or anything to keep folks warm in cold weather. Looking for new adult socks too. We’ll be collecting these until December 20th. Then on Saturday, 12/21, Steve and I will distribute them around to homeless folks, living on the streets, in the Seattle area. If we have anything left (and we doubt we will), we’ll drop them at the usual spot which is the office of “Real Change” in Seattle, to be given to their street vendors. In past years, we’ve taken all to Real Change but now want to try and get some coats and gloves directly on those folks that are out in the cold.

This is a great opportunity to clean/clear out gently used winter items to make room if you are expecting or giving these items for Christmas.

In the past, I’ve put out a box in my office at work to collect, but I recently change my work structure and now I’m a traveling consultant, without an office. So, now just posting where we can and asking for help. I posted on facebook last night and got a response from a lady in sunny California who is sending a box to us!

It’s not a charity, so no tax deduction, but come on, that’s not why you’re donating right? Barb says to call if you have any questions. She can be reached at 425-344-5383 or bparnell3@comcast.net and is happy to pick up if needed.

Apropos of nothing, it’s suppposed to drop to 23° tonight and snow on Monday.

(Photo by André Kongevold)

“Something sad has happened,” I told my five-year-old son yesterday morning.

I hiked him up on my lap, he leaned into my chest, and we spent the next hour slowly tapping through the New York Times’ photo essay on Nelson Mandela on my iPad.

As I’ve mentioned, we named our boy, Zevin Rolihlahla Schwartz, after Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, in the hopes that Mandela’s legacy might inspire and guide him. Rolihlahla was the name given Mandela at birth and means “tree shaker” or “he who bends the branch” in Xhosa. And so, our house felt Mandela’s death more so than we might have otherwise.

There’s lots of room for debate between the “Great Man Theory” of history versus the notion that the general course and trajectory of culture is guided by inevitable sequences and diffuse causes. But when you look across the many, many nations in the world riven and decimated by civil war, it’s hard to imagine how the relative peaceful transfer of power in South Africa could have been achieved without the singular influence of Mandela. A nation of millions saved from bloody massacre by one man’s studied dedication to justice.

How do you explain apartheid to a five year old? How do you explain non-violent resistance? How do you explain 25 years in prison?

We looked at the pictures, and read the stories that went with them, and I answered his questions as best I could. It’s a day I hope he’ll remember when he’s older, and always.

The world is less one great man today, but I believe that the greatest contribution anyone can make is to inspire those who come after them. His greatness lives on in all those who aspire to live by his example.

Let’s shake some trees.

Steven from Wally Pets (4411 Wallingford Ave N) writes:

Santa will be at Wally Pets on Sunday, December 8th for free photos of your four pawed buds with Mr Claus and a stocking stuffer full of treats to boot 11 am to 4 pm.

This will be a memory your pet will treasure forever.

(Photo by KatieBread)

Continuing the parade of options for interesting holiday shopping in the ‘hood, Om Culture (2210 Pacific Ave) will be hosting the Bizarre Bazaar this Sunday from 1 – 5:30 pm, and featuring the work of 26 local artists and artisans.

Barges have set up and are getting ready to dredge the bottom of Lake Union just  west of Gas Works park. Larry Altose, from the Washington State Department of Ecology, writes about the work on their blog:

The contamination we’re about to remove existed before the present owner purchased the property in 1994. At that time, Northlake Ship Yard and Ecology signed a legal document called a Prospective Purchaser Consent Decree (PPCD). It’s a cleanup agreement for someone who buys already-contaminated property.

Many commercial and industrial sites have such agreements, but this one has an unusual twist. Normally, a property owner – current or past – conducts the required cleanup work. Northlake Ship Yard opted instead to deposit funds into a bank trust account over several years. Ecology is using that account to conduct the cleanup. This is our first cleanup under such an arrangement.

What’s down there

A previous owner used ground-up slag from the Tacoma Smelter to sandblast ships. The slag was inexpensive and plentiful many years ago. It also was rich in arsenic, a toxic metal. Sandblasting also produces other residue from ships’ metal and paint. Today it is illegal to sandblast over the water.

We estimate that our contractor, Redside Construction of Port Gamble, will haul away about 8,000 cubic yards of this material all told. That may take about three months. Unless we find the contamination is much higher than we’ve seen in our sampling, we expect it all can go to a regular landfill.

A clean cleanup

If you have ever had to clean up a big mess, you know that cleaning up is itself messy. That’s true for this project. This will look like what it is: dirty work. Here’s what we have to deal with:

Wet muck

Each scoop of mud is up to 60 percent water. We can’t haul that in our trucks. It’s too heavy. And, we don’t want water from this muck on our streets. So the mud lands first on a barge so that water can slowly drain back to the lake.

About every three days, we’ll have a truck-out day. Covered trucks will haul moist, but not soaking, mud. There might be 20 to 30 truckloads on each of these days.

Silt, and plenty of it

We’re going to raise clouds of silt in the water from digging and from the water draining off of the muck-drying barge. To keep this silt from getting into the rest of the lake, we will surround the project with a fine-mesh silt curtain. It hangs from floats and is weighted at the bottom.

The curtain will stay in place until the work is done and we have tested the water to make sure all silt has settled. Also, we monitor the water outside the curtain continuously, so we can stop work and fix any problems we find.

Oily sheen

We expect our mucking with the lake bottom will release some oily substances that will float to the surface. The work area may contain sheen, a thin coating of oil on the surface of the water.

To keep that out of the rest of the lake we will add another barrier: a bright yellow or orange oil-spill containment boom.

We’ll have spill response equipment on hand. Often, though, sheen is so thin that cleanup materials cannot remove it from the water. We will clean the sheen whenever possible.

Many people keep an eye on the busy waters of Lake Union and the Ship Canal. Ecology follows up on reports of oil slicks and sheen in this area on a regular basis. We’re making every effort to keep sheen from this cleanup out of the rest of the lake.

Odds and ends

We expect now and then to pause our muck picking to remove the odd log, barrel or whatnot. We know of some such objects from surveys of the lake bottom. Still, the mud may hide any and every kind of object, so we’ll see what turns up.

That’s another good reason for the silt curtain and the spill gear. You can never know.

Before we leave

We expect to dig down about two feet to remove the contaminated mud and grit. We’ll close by covering the area with a half foot of clean sand. This will make the lake bottom more suitable for nature’s return.

The work should begin any day now, and you can follow the progress on their Twitter feed and their Flickr site.