MATT DRISCOLL: HAD TOO MUCH TO THINK LAST NIGHT >>>

Sometimes, even with the best intentions in mind, lawmakers get it wrong.

An example of this can be found in a law, slated to go into effect in December, that’s currently wreaking havoc on local music venues around Tacoma. In the aftermath of the Great White disaster of 2003, when second rate pyrotechnics mixed with flammable insulation and killed 100 people in a small nightclub in Rhode Island â€" lawmakers from states near and far, including Washington â€" began a quest to prevent such a devastating event from happening again.

The result, at least in our state, is the nightclub fire sprinkler law, passed in 2007.

It's the subject of this week's Volcano editorial. Click here to check it out.

MICHAEL SWAN: YOU CAN SIT IN THE DEN NOW >>>

urbanXchange has added vintage furniture to it’s music space, The Den. “Our new space has a great backroom where you can find groovy, swanky or just weird furniture and accessories such as lamps, cookie jars, dishes and more,” states its press release. “Have a CD release, birthday party or meeting in our back space room. Only $100 per night (7 till 10 p.m.).”

To rent the space, give them a buzz at at 253.549.6400.

Also, if you have a cool piece of furniture you would like to sell, give them a call.

PAUL SCHRAG: READY FOR AN AWESOME VISION ? >>>

Steve Rodrigues is on a mission. If he has his way during the next several years, the current owner of the MV Kalakala will transform the discarded, historic vessel and a prime piece of waterfront property into a crowning jewel on Tacoma’s waterfront.

Plans for the Kalakala would involve complete renovation and dry docking of the ferry at a site secured along the Thea Foss Waterway, between the now defunct Esplanade Condominium project and Thea’s Landing. Rodrigues has already secured seed funding for all phases of his dream, which he has dubbed the Columbia Gardens and MV Kalakala Project. The name honors both the vessel and a theme park in Rodrigues’s home town of Butte, Mn. The theme park was wiped out in the early 1970s to make way for a copper mine. And while Rodrigues laments the loss of Columbia Gardens, he is dead set on saving the Kalakala. Listening to him talk about it, you’d be hard pressed not to believe that he’ll do it.

“It’s been serious since the day I bought the Kalakala,” says Rodrigues, who purchased the vessel in a bankruptcy sale in 2003. “I have a different mindset that all things are possible if you believe.”

It may be that faith that has carried Rodrigues through nearly 10 years of struggle to find a home for the wayward ship. The ferry has bounced around Washington for years, and docked in a small inlet near Taylor way in Tacoma, awaiting renovations. His new plan would involve complete renovation and mounting of the ferry on a site currently owned by Seattle Inn at the Market owner Bob Thurston, who has abandoned plans to build a hotel there. Rodrigues has secured a deal with Thurston for transfer of the property for an undisclosed sum. The renovated Kalakala would become a multi-use attraction, and would include a 130-room hotel; some condominiums; an indoor winter-themed amusement park, complete with plenty of snow; restaurant; observation tower and corporate skyboxes. Rodrigues says he is prepared to complete this project as an entirely private venture, and has worked hard to remove all political barriers to it completion. His project team, meanwhile, boasts some big names, including London-based design firm S333 Architects, Economic Research Associates and PCL Construction, currently best known as builders of the new Seattle Monorail. Rodrigues will go before the Foss Waterway Development Authority tomorrow (Tuesday, March 3) to pitch the project, and hopes to begin moving forward with the agency’s blessing.

Meanwhile, Rodrigues is battling to get his hands on four additional ferries that were part of the state’s original fleet. Those ferries have been sold to a Mexico-based scrap metal operation, and currently stand to be cut up and resold or discarded. Rodrigues says he would like to purchase them himself, use scrap from two of the vessels to help renovate the Kalakala, restore the other two, and put them back into service. He has drafted a petition, which he hopes to use to convince state lawmakers that the historic vessels are worth saving.

“Our project is designed around historic and community values that will also stimulate and attract other economic developments for other private projects that are currently delayed,” says Rodrigues. “Our project can bring more than just monetary value into the community.”

JOE MALIK: IT'S LONELY OUT HERE >>>

So being unemployed is a lonely venture. Scratch that. Being employed is a lonely venture and being unemployed makes it starkly evident just how alone and alienated the average American workplace can be.

Until I was summarily booted out of the place, I didn’t realize how much I had come to depend on my workplace for social connections. And that’s the really pathetic part, because most of the people I worked with were generally annoying, or downright despicable human beings.

So why do I miss some of them so much?

Well, the people you work with â€" whether you like it or not â€" are kind of like your surrogate family. You see them every day. You know about what goes on in their personal lives - whether you want to or whether you want to run away screaming to wretch up a breakfast-lunch gut omelet every time they start blathering on and on about their insipid lives. Sorry. But most of all, the workplace seems to be one of the few places that many of us have a chance to make any sort of deep, personal connection with people. I know people that I worked with better than I know some of my so-called friends.

When it comes down to it, they were the best the world had to offer, as long as I was stuck there with them.

Now that I’m no longer there, I have this horrific, looming need to connect to people. But I’ve spent so much time working, while pretending to be someone else so I can fit in at work, that I don’t have the slightest idea where to begin.

It’s utterly terrifying.

A study published by Duke University suggests that it’s not just me that’s ended up in this pathetic boat. According to the report, our connections to one another are eroding on a massive scale.

According to the study, which was published right before the economy began its nosedive, Americans are far more socially isolated than they were 20 years ago. A sharply growing number of people say they have no one in whom they can confide. A quarter of people interviewed said they don’t have anyone to talk to about their daily struggle. That’s more than double the number measured in 1985. You’d think the so-called “Me Generation” would feel more isolated than any. But we’ve got it worse. So much worse that Duke University researchers said their study “paints a sobering picture of an increasingly fragmented America, where intimate social ties - once seen as an integral part of daily life and associated with a host of psychological and civic benefits - are shrinking or nonexistent,” according to a researcher quoted in a Washington Post article by staff writer Shankar Vedantam.

One researcher suggested that the weight of professional responsibility has left people too exhausted to interact even with their own families in many cases. Many of us are so beat that social interaction is limited to things we can do passively â€" sitting together in a room watching Lost or American Idol. Or going to a movie, sitting with people absorbing mythical reenactments of the kind of lives we’d like to be living, if only we weren’t so exhausted and drained from our pursuit of the almighty dollar.

So I’ve forced myself to peek out of the shell I’ve built around my being, and have been spending time with people I’ve lost touch with. It’s harder than you might think, but worth ever awkward moment. It feels so good, in fact, that I may end up deciding to stay unemployed forever.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For those of you who may have missed some of Weekly Volcano writer Joe Malik's jobless musings, here are a few links to previous "Unemployed in Tacoma" columns, which appear every Friday on Spew.

LINK: Unemployed in Tacoma #1

LINK: Unemployed in Tacoma #2

LINK: Unemployed in Tacoma #3

PAUL SCHRAG: COMMUNITY FINALLY GOBBLED UP BY DEVELOPERS >>>

Light a candle for Country Aire Manor Park in Puyallup, a mobile home community where residents have been displaced to make way for another multi-million-dollar shopping center.

In January 2008 more than 150 Country Aire residents received word that the land underneath their homes was being sold so local representatives of a national development company could build a retail center, which will be anchored by Kohl’s Department Store. Expanded shopping options come as cold comfort to residents such as the 93-year-old woman who was forced to move into an apartment where the bathroom and bedroom are too far apart, and where she shattered her ankle trying to get to the toilet. There’s little comfort for the Donery family, all of whom shared a home at Country Aire, all of whom have debilitating illnesses such as cancer, and all of whom weren’t sure how they were going to survive forced relocation. Nor is there any comfort for several residents who had to abandon the homes they owned because there was nowhere to move them, or because they couldn’t afford to.

The story continues of the Weekly Volcano Web site.

MICHAEL SWAN: COSTCO SAYS IT WILL BE GOOD NOW >>>

Federal prosecutors told Costco Wholesale Corporation bigwigs today that they can walk their massive air-conditioned aisles and ogle their giant slabs of beef and their economy packs of adult diapers and their enormous jars of peanut butter (crunchy style) and their two-gallon bottles of gin, and their large drums of hand lotion and their 12-foot plasma TVs and their 60-packs of frozen cream puffs in a state of zen as the Fed’s two-year investigation of backdated stock options wrong-doings at Costco is done â€" without charges being filed.

LINK: Read a press release here

UPDATE: Uh oh. Look what just arrived at the Weekly Volcano World Headquarters:

MATT DRISCOLL: I WONDER WHO CHOSE THIS ONE? >>>

MATT DRISCOLL: A VIEW WORTH FIGHTING OVER >>>

As much as many in Olympia seem to hate it, things in our capital city cannot remain the same forever. Things change. They always do. As populations continue to rise, the downtown core of Olympia faces a decision. Should it allow this growth to happen in the strip mall-heavy suburbs, increasing the toll on the environment and ignoring the Comprehensive Plan? Or should it do something proactive â€" likely changing Olympia’s downtown forever and maybe even opening the door for hated developers in a town built on saying no?

Near the Fourth Ave Bridge, across from the Bayview Thriftway and between Capital Lake and Budd Inlet, there’s an area of land known as “the isthmus.” The fact that it’s not technically an isthmus doesn’t matter. What does matter is people’s vision for what the land should be now and into the future. In Olympia, it’s an issue worth fighting over. The land and the view that surrounds it are enough to stoke the passionate and often fierce emotions of many in this left-tilted college town.

The vocal majority wants a park. People such as Oly 2012 want high-density housing. Triway Enterprises, a development company that owns the land, wants condos â€" 141 condos to be exact, that, at least at the time of the company’s original proposal, were to go for one million dollars a hit. Since Triway asked the city of Olympia to rezone the area of land in question to allow 65- to 90-foot buildings over a year ago, the debate has raged, often degenerating into shouting, name-calling and vandalism.

To check out my cover story on the subject in the current issue of the Weekly Volcano, click here.

Art: Mary K Johnso

SIMON MOON: JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT YOU KNEW EVERYTHING THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT LUBE >>>

OK everybody, it’s time to talk about lube. Not the kind you put in your car. The kind you put …well, you know where to put it. We hope.

Personal lubricants have become a booming market in recent years, with aging, sexually active baby boomers â€" nearly 40 million of whom are women â€" stoking sales in increasing numbers. Studies indicate that 95 percent of women will need a personal lubricant at least some of the time. Thankfully, America seems to be getting over a sort of Victorian-era sexual hangover characterized by pervasive body hatred and denial of the assertion that women should enjoy sex as much as men do. In a nation becoming increasingly comfortable with the idea that it’s OK to bone for more than a few minutes â€" and maybe even enjoy it â€" annual sales of products such as Astroglide and good ol’ K-Y have topped $120 million in recent years.

Contributing to the lube boom is Puyallup-based Wallace-O’Farrell Inc., makers and distributors of products such as Slippery Stuff, FemGlide and HerGel. If McNeil Consumer Healthcare’s K-Y brand is the Budweiser of lube, Slippery Stuff is a nice, micro-brewed Belgian Ale. A seminal contribution to the lube lineup (…yeah, start counting the puns), Slippery Stuff and its cousins are marketed as milder, gentler lubricants, catering especially to the needs of women.

“There are a lot of women that find Slippery Stuff and won’t use anything else,” says Michael O’Farrell, general manager and nephew of Wallace-O’Farrell founder Nancy O’Farrell, who founded the company 1984.

Slippery Stuff falls in a class of lubricants that are made without glycerin, which can contribute to dreaded lube stickiness, hasten dryness, and increase chances of developing yeast infections, adds O’Farrell.

“It’s one of the most benign products on the market,” he says.

The flagship product and its counterparts are used in a variety of applications â€" from facilitating carnal marathons to helping people get in and out of wetsuits. On the brink of a growth spurt, Wallace-O’Farrell will release a new product this year called Sensiglide, which will be marketed for use in medical applications. FemGlide is already used by surgical and medical equipment manufacturer the Prometheus Group in physical therapy seminars. The company also sells a re-labeled version of Slippery Stuff called Lice-Out, which was developed after researchers discovered that smearing a little lube on lice combs increased their effectiveness. That’s right, if you get lice, there’s a distinct chance that your doctor will end up combing lube through your hair. Far less creepy to think about, HerGel acts as a lubricant and a sensitizer, increasing blood flow to critical areas with the help of amino acid L-Arginine. Reportedly, a little L-Arginine has been shown to help some anorgasmic women get over the hump.

O’Farrell says that the company is currently researching several new products, which will trickle into the market during the next several years. The company also plans to step up distribution and marketing efforts. Most of O’Farrell’s products have been popularized by word of mouth, and are sold as a private label product on select Web sites and at partner stores such as Lovers (formerly Lovers Package). That is likely to change in coming years.

“Were really getting ready to grow again,” says O’Farrell.

LINK: Wallace-O’Farrell Inc.

JENNIFER JOHNSON: HE SAID HAIRMONY >>>

Another wickedly smart idea Tacoma can benefit from has, not surprisingly, sprung from two women who possess the much sought after Midas touch. Patricia Lecy-Davis and Julie Bennett own Embellish Multi-space Salon and urbanXchange respectively and have added the exciting element of Embellish Style Annex to Bennett’s buy-sell-trade clothing store.

“The Annex idea came about when Julie reminded me that we’d discussed Embellish putting in some sort of a ‘Beauty Bar’ if they ever moved into a bigger space,” Lecy-Davis shared via e-mail. Sadly, after intense scrutiny she decided there didn't seem to be a way to make it happen. Then barber Tristan Marcum showed up in Patricia and Julie’s lives and their passing conversation bore fruit with the opening of the satellite cutting annex inside urbanXchange.

Barber Tristan considers himself a mystic haircutter and is dubbed The Mystic since he cuts by harmonics. “I look at it like sounds … like every hair has sounds in it and there’s a perfect haircut at any given moment for every person.” He relates this method and hair itself to that of sculpting and sculpture, and feels he’s “HAIRmonizing by bringing hair closer to what it really wants to be.”

Tristan’s truly organic, involved relationship with all of his endeavors is inspiring. Receiving a degree in Creative Writing from the University of Washington, performing live (currently in The Vells), and starting a record label (Destiny City Records), Tristan is coalescing all of this past and present experience and energy into his current passion â€" instant gratification for men and women’s hair needs. “True HAIRmony brings you that closer to being your ideal self.”

Looking forward to meeting more people, Tristan extends an invite to everyone to take a spin in his tricked-out shiny antique barber chair. “I’m ready to bring ‘HAIRmony’ to every person in the city.” The tiffany teal Annex will be open late while Tristan does cuts during the opening party for new performance space and tea room, The Den, in the back section of urbanXchange on Saturday, Feb. 7.

Regular Annex hours are Friday-Monday noon to 7 p.m. (Sundays until 5 p.m.)
All cuts, shampoos, styles are $20; $5 attitude adjustments (bangs, steps, lines, etc.)

[Embellish Style Annex inside urbanXchange, 1934 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253.572.2477]

Photo: Julie Bennett