Members of Grandparents Raising Grandchildren – Jamie Farlow, Carollyn Smith and Margaret Curtis — engaged in a protest this week at the Department of Human Services office on Vancouver Avenue.
Smith, the group's founder, accuses the Department of Human Services Child Welfare Department of improperly separately families and merely paying lip service to their mandate to give custody to willing relatives . . .

When the beloved House of Sound music store building was demolished on Dec. 31, 2008, decades of memories came crashing down with the wood, metal and glass. Now the sign is the only remnant of a once-vibrant North Williams Avenue scene of jazz clubs, shops, and homes. Award-winning filmmaker Vanessa Renwick has launched a show about the building, at the New American Art Union, 922 SE Ankeny St. through April 19 . . .

Black Electro is a night of electronica featuring Thavius Beck, Rasheeda Ameera/ De Angelo, Cheetah Finess, Ayam Music and DJ Adiva with host Deena B from KBOO's The Soundbox. There will also be live art by the Sub2mit Crew. The event takes place at Friday, April 3 at 9 p.m. at Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison, $10-50 sliding scale, and is a benefit for KBOO Community Radio.

It was nearly 9 years ago when PassinArt first produced the play "A Sunbeam." Now, with three actors from the original production returning to the stage, the controversial and emotional play about family, mental illness and tough choices is back. The play runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays through April 25 at the Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center.
"A Sunbeam," by John Henry Redwood, tells the story of . . .

Today, Freedom Watch announced the filing of a class action lawsuit by shareholders of AIG to force the directors of the company to themselves pay back the millions in illicit bonuses, dividends and other perks they paid out to themselves and other officials who destroyed the company's financial standing. The lawsuit, filed in the federal court in Los Angeles, is wide reaching and will accomplish what Congress cannot, given the patent illegality of its taxing scheme, which violates the U.S. Constitution as it would tax ex post facto and discriminately. . . .

http://www.addictinggames.com/trilliondollarbailout.html
Trillion Dollar Bailout

http://www.addictinggames.com/supergrannywinterwonderland.html
Supergranny Winter Wonderland

The 2009 Rose Festival Court's first public appearance is at the 82nd Avenue of Roses Parade,
April 25, 9 a.m.
Each selected Princess will be awarded a $3,500 scholarship courtesy of The Randall Group.
Pacific Power provides a mentoring program of female executives who are matched with the court members as well as sponsoring the Queen's Coronation.
The 2009 KeyBank Grand Floral Parade is Saturday, June 6, at Memorial Coliseum.

Watch the documentary, "Life in Iran with Rick Steves" and meet the film's photojournalist, Abdi Sami.... "Life in Iran with Rick Steves" is a travel documentary about Iran and its people. Hosted by travel expert Rick Steves, the documentary explores Iran's history and modern-day Iran. Sami has worked in the film industry for more than 20 years.. . . .

Walter Mosley, returns to Seattle after a year and a half, an event occasioned not by his first new book since then, but his fourth. Since taking Easy Rawlins to the brink . . .
Mahmood Mamdani, an eminent professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, will be speaking about his new book "Saviors and Survivors . . .
The 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Wangari Maathai is returning to Seattle to discuss her new book "The Challenge for Africa." Here in the U.S. from her home in Nairobi, the Kenyan activist who first became known for her work in starting the Green Belt Movement. . . .
The 2009 Seattle Reads title, Nancy Rawles' novel "My Jim," is a novel narrated by a woman who lived as a slave in the U.S. in the 19th century. The continued existence of slavery now  . . .

John Hope Franklin, a towering scholar and pioneer of African-American studies who wrote the seminal text on the black experience in the U.S. and worked on the landmark Supreme Court case that outlawed public school segregation, died Wednesday. He was 94. ... Born and raised in an all-black community in Oklahoma where he was often subjected to humiliating racism, Franklin was later instrumental in bringing down the legal and historical validations of such a world . . .