Dedicated to the citizens of Mason County, Washington since 1886
Dedicated to the citizens of Mason County, Washington since 1886
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This past week delivered a season finale, a series finale and a season premiere of a recently revived series, so join me as I reveal some MAJOR SPOILERS while reviewing all three shows. "The Mandalorian" wrapped up its eight-episode third season on Disney+ on April 19, and was followed by "Picard" completing its 10-episode third-and-final season on Paramount+ on April 20. While both shows' most recent seasons were entertaining, well-made and mostly satisfying, I've seen comments online that...
The Port of Allyn had a special meeting April 14 to talk about its credit and its progress on the Sargent Oyster House. Port commissioners agreed to increase the port's credit line with Kitsap Bank after port Executive Director Lary Coppola said the port already had a credit line for $220,000, which it has used to pay lawyers and part of last month's vouchers. "What I wanted to to do was draw more off of that credit line - because we can't draw any more off of it after April 20 - and put it in...
Port of Hoodsport officials agreed they need to address some matters as they work to renew the lease on its dock. Cailan Neeler, ports program manager for the state Department of Natural Resources, contacted the Port of Hoodsport in July about the impending expiration of the port’s 30-year lease of the dock from DNR. Port of Hoodsport Commission Chair Lori Kincannon said current port officials had been unaware of the upcoming need for a dock lease renewal from DNR, given that the original lease...
I had intended to see "Renfield" last weekend, with Nicolas Cage and Nicholas Hoult, but since it's not screening at a theater near me yet, I decided to take advantage of this "happy little accident" by seeing "Paint" instead, starring Owen Wilson as fictional pastoral painter Carl Nargle, who is very obviously based on legendary real-life artist Bob Ross, who died in 1995. More than a quarter-century after his death from cancer, it's a testament to Bob Ross' artistic legacy and his aesthetic...
The Skyline Drive-In Theater is presenting a free screening at 8 tonight of a locally made documentary film, "We Speak for the Forests." The film's director, Mason County Climate Justice co-founder and CEO Zephyr Elise, talked to the Shelton-Mason County Journal about the filmmaking process, which began when Union resident and fellow MCCJ member James Bell spent four months documenting the clear-cut logging near his home. Two years after Elise took over the film that Bell started, "We Speak for...
The North Mason Food Bank recently won a year of free internet from Astound Broadband as part of the company’s effort to recognize small businesses for contributing to their communities. “We believe that smaller locally owned organizations like the North Mason Food Bank are integral to the success of the communities in which they reside,” said Patrick Knorr, chief commercial officer for Astound Business Solutions, a broadband service provider. “We wanted to help make a difference for small l...
The Friends of Foothills Dog Park (formerly Friends of Lake Cushman Dog Park) is getting ready for the grand opening of its dog park in Hoodsport, just off of state Route 119, on April 22. The group has invited Mason County and Port of Hoodsport commissioners, as well as the Mason County Parks Advisory Board, Mason County Parks and Trails Manager John Taylor, Parks Maintenance staffer Carol Olson and Program Support Technician Anne White, all of whom the group credited with supporting their...
The approach of Easter had me in a kind of contemplative mood, so I finally got around to seeing a documentary I'd first heard about when it debuted in 2012, but which, for whatever reasons, I simply never managed to watch at the time, until I found it on Amazon Prime Video. It's a story for the ages, as an oppressive despot wages war in Eastern Europe, and a decidedly unserious actor suddenly becomes the unlikely voice of an opposition movement fighting for freedom. While it has parallels to...
The Port of Allyn’s scheduled state audit for the period from 2019 through 2021 was “overall quite positive for us,” Port Executive Director Lary Coppola said. The auditor commended the port for scoring a “clean audit,” Coppola added. “There are no findings, no management letters issued, and the auditors found we fully complied with all state laws, rules and regulations, as well as our own policies and procedures,” Coppola said. “This is the third clean audit we’ve had in the eight years I’ve...
The biggest mistake the 2000 "Dungeons & Dragons" movie made, even a year before the 2001 release of Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring," was to try and compete directly with the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien was a scholar who researched and curated his own awe-inspiring mythos, but "Dungeons & Dragons," the game, was created by nerds like Gary Gygax, who simply knew they wanted Tolkienesque fantasy, but more of it, so its mythology plagiarized from any set of...
Forest McCullough of Hoodsport-based Northwest Land & Tree recently told the Port of Hoodsport Commission that “snow has put a damper on our progress,” but he still expects work on the Hoodsport trail park to be complete for the port commissioners’ planned opening around Memorial Day weekend. While the early part of March still saw onsite logging work continue, McCullough said work on the parking lot had to be suspended at times while he waited for snow to melt. When Port of Hoodsport Commi...
All hail "John Wick, the most perfect unplanned action film franchise ever. With every other series of action films whose sequels were propelled more by the previous installments' unexpectedly outsized and enduring popularity than by any premeditated plots their creators might have had in mind, there is always some misstep, however minor, that the series has to either retroactively erase or else compensate for in the later installments. The "Fast & Furious" franchise has made an admirable art fo...
Port of Grapeview Commissioner Jean Farmer, citing her “long history of interest in broadband” for rural communities, will join Port of Allyn Commissioner Ted Jackson on the task force charged with expanding broadband in Mason County. “As a port commissioner and a business owner, I personally saw the lack of connection for many of us,” Farmer told the Herald. “I hope all of us coming together will have a positive impact on our communities.” As with Jackson, Farmer was invited by Dan Teuteberg, a...
North Mason School District Career and Technical Education Director Alexia Hadfield enlisted two CTE students to discuss the district's new CORE+ Maritime and Culinary Arts programs before the school board March 16. Student Alex Landreth credited the CORE+ Maritime program with giving him an "incredible experience." His yearlong course covered how boats are manufactured, which he said gives him a head start toward a career in boat-building. He'll be heading off to West Sound Technical Skill Cent...
A bus is now available to North Mason School District students who want to be involved in extracurricular activities. North Mason School District Superintendent Dana Rosenbach said her schools’ partnership with Mason Transit Authority and the North Mason Teen Center of the Boys & Girls Clubs of South Puget Sound stemmed from Mason Transit and the Teen Center striking up a collaboration. Rosenbach credited North Mason School District Director of Transportation Maurine Simons, Mason Transit A...
The ides of March yielded great fun for nerds, with intriguing developments in the third season of "The Mandalorian" on Disney+ and bombastic, mostly all-ages adventures in the sequel "Shazam! Fury of the Gods." Three episodes into its third season, there's less of a sense of urgency to the ongoing plot arcs in "The Mandalorian," which is, I suspect, why they're getting resolved more briskly, to ensure the viewership doesn't succumb to what's already been alleged in the entertainment press as...
Katherine and John Yackel, co-owners of the YSS Dive Shop in Hoodsport, addressed Port of Hoodsport commissioners March 8 about the shop’s third-annual scuba expo and “Dive Against Debris” event May 6. “The underwater world is so amazing, and it needs all the help it can get,” Katherine Yackel told the Shelton-Mason County Journal. Through a separate correspondence to port commissioners, she vowed YSS Dive’s returning cleanup event would also impart to the public “why people should not po...
In the end, they pulled it off. The problem with measuring any sequel to Mel Brooks' "History of the World, Part I" against the film that inspired it is that Brooks' original film in 1981 somehow managed to feel like much more than the sum of its somewhat uneven parts. In one sense, Hulu's "History of the World, Part II" streaming miniseries, whose debut ran March 6 to 9, learned the best lesson possible from its predecessor's mistakes, because while it spans eight episodes, each one lasts less...
Port of Allyn Commissioner Ted Jackson was appointed to the Rural Broadband Task Force on March 6. Jackson was invited by Dan Teuteberg to take part in the task force’s work in Mason County on behalf of the United Way and the Port of Allyn. Teuteberg is an associate professor and 4-H youth development regional specialist, and is the director of Washington State University Extension programs in Mason and Grays Harbor counties. Teuteberg told Jackson that WSU Extension is joining with the W...
The Port of Dewatto bid farewell to winter by reiterating that its campground cleanup is still scheduled for Saturday, March 25. Campground coordinator Joe Newman reported several inquiries from prospective participants this year. Port Manager Jeana Crosby estimated 25 to 30 volunteers will take part this year, which led Port Commissioner Ted Edwards to request that logs be removed from the water. Edwards said he believes the logs are a safety hazard, which he’d had removed years ago. Port C...
'Star Trek: Picard' Three episodes into the third and allegedly final season of "Star Trek: Picard," and too much of it has already been wasted on recreating the hide-and-seek fight inside of a nebula from "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan," which seems to be the all-too-obvious inspiration for other key aspects of our protagonist's intended character arc this time around. In terms of pacing overall, this season has already introduced two new adult children of core cast members from "Star Trek:...
North Mason School District's CORE+ Maritime program recently received a $40,000 grant that will help pay for the program's supplies and equipment as it expands from woodworking into metalworking and body shop operations, using lumber, epoxy composites and molded fiberglass. The grant was provided through the Legislature's allocation for the CORE+ Maritime programs. Gavin Forseth teaches woodworking and CORE+ Maritime, and is the district's Career and Technical Education Department leader. Lexi...
The HUB Center for Seniors revival of what had traditionally been a semiannual runway show has settled on the theme for its Patio Party in May: Fashions inspired by the late 1960's through the 1970s. Barbara Treick, manager of Belfair Self-Storage and creator of its art wall, received emails of interest last year from people who wanted to participate, and then received their fashion designs by Feb. 28. Treick said the event would feature two runway shows, one before lunch and the other...
Last week saw two compelling releases from Netflix, plus a friend's recommendation of a streaming release that premiered last year, in which the ghost story was the most lighthearted and family-friendly. 'The Strays' The racial commentary of "The Strays" is as confrontational as "Get Out," but stripped of Jordan Peele's satirical edge, while also infused with a distinctly British flavor of internalized racism. Ashley Madekwe plays a dual protagonist role that takes cultural code-switching to...
Port of Grapeview Commissioner Mike Blaisdell shared his findings on having the port use social media, one of several online matters commissioners addressed at their Feb. 21 meeting. A recent port workshop included a suggestion that the port create a Facebook page, but no action was taken on it. Blaisdell has since discovered the port must adopt policies on how it would administer and manage such social media accounts. Due to open public meeting laws that cover government entities such as...
