The other day, I went to Cafe Fiore at 11 a.m. to enjoy espresso and my newspaper. Unemployment can be a treat in this way. I was immediately drawn to the frontpage Seattle Times article "Hundreds of kids flock to state's new online schools".

According to the article, "Insight School of Washington, the state's first fully online high school, stopped accepting students after 650, and has 1,000 more who've expressed interest. The Washington Virtual Academy, a K-8 based in Steilacoom, has 652 students registered, and another 500 in the application pipeline."

Now you might call me old-fashioned, but I think there's a certain social value to attending school. I've never been a fan of home-schooling either, but that's the suprising thing about this online-education phenomenon -- only about one-quarter of Insight's students are coming from home-schooling. Close to 500 of Insight's enrolled students and their parents were so unhappy with brick-and-mortar schooling that they chose the new alternative? That's a little scary.

I think young people need to be in an environment where they can interact with each other. Eventually they will need to gain some social skills or otherwise be ill-prepared for higher education and/or employment. No doubt, high school in particular can be a tough time for many people, but parents should encourage their children to overcome challenges, not avoid them. Fear of potential hardships should not outweigh the potential for success.

Today is the fifth anniversary of 9/11.

There's plenty of blame to pass around about why the event happened and about the mistakes that have been made since.

Yes, the war in Iraq is a disaster, the world thinks a little less of the U.S. than it did five years ago and, in that time, we haven't been able to capture or kill terrorist poster-boy Osama bin Laden.

Still, we have been able to prevent any further attacks on U.S. soil, and that is something that should be applauded.

Matt was in town this weekend, and on Saturday night we met Sarah and Jeanna in Queen Anne. They wanted to go to a couple bars on Capitol Hill. They offered to pay for the taxi. OK. We're game.

Well, at the end of the night, everyone got scattered. Matt and I lost the girls and needed to get back to Ballard. We didn't want to pay a $35+ cab fare, so we decided to walk back to Queen Anne and catch a taxi from there.

And so the long walk began. Our route is detailed in the map above. By the time we got to Queen Anne, few taxis were still on the road and we couldn't stop the few that we saw. They were probably driving home for the night. So, we continued our trek to Ballard. We actually jogged for a while because it was getting so late. I don't want to see 4 a.m. like that again.

In the city that's been waiting to blow since "Big Butts" and "Teen Spirit"...

...I've been making music. You'll soon hear it. I'm going back into the studio with the band tomorrow, which should be a nice break from the stress of the job hunt. I thought I actually had some marketable experience, but I'm coming up short like Shaq at the foul line. I do have a lead with Amazon.com, so I'm crossing my fingers that I'll be employed in Dot Com Land again soon.

In the mean time, I've been hanging out with Katrine non-stop and working on photographs (like the one above) for a gallery that I will be displaying in our hallway. Exciting stuff. I also went out to Mona's (in Fremont) for half-off bottles of wine with Sarah and Jeanna the other night. I particularly enjoyed Sarah's observation that she often finds her drinks "either full or completely empty" and Jeanna's story about a new gay bar where straight men will work and wear colorful shirts that read "Forbidden Fruit."

People in Seattle I still need to see include:

• Shelter girls
• Chris Brown
• Theanne
• Willoughby

If I haven't seen you and your name is not on the list, then it is of the utmost priority that you contact me immediately, for I have not seen you in some time and have forgotten about you. I'm off to band practice. Hooray.

I just completed my second, final day at Bumbershoot. The people were crazy. The food was questionable. Good times were had. Before I hop in bed, here's my concert review...

Blondie was an act that I originally forgot to include in this list. Why? Everything about the show was horrible -- so horrible that my journa-buddies and I left after a few songs. Grade: F

Hawthorne Heights was like every other emo band I've heard. Little musicianship was displayed. The lead singer kept telling the crowd what to do without really earning it. Everyone played the same riffs and every song sounded the same. Grade: C+

Yellowcard was basically a step above Hawthorne Heights. The band members showed some actual talent, especially the drummer. I thought I'd be annoyed by the fiddle player, but I wasn't, and he actually had a decent voice. Grade: B-

AFI put on a solid show. The entire set was white, which added a neat visual appeal. The band's performance was a little too glam-rock for me, but it worked. I could do without some of the soap-opera acting during the singing and the constant jumping off the drum kit. Overall, the showmanship was a little too much for my tastes, but the music was solid. Grade: A-

Common Market brought gave Bumbershoot a much-needed dose of Northwest hip hop. It was rad. A couple years ago, Ally and I saw Ra Scion (Common Market's MC) perform a cover of "Come Together" by the Beatles. We were wowed, but I hadn't heard the cover since. I've been waiting for that damn cover and, finally, my day had come. That along with a cover of "Crazy Love" and the Common Market standards made Paolo a happy boy. Grade: B+

Blue Scholars is the truth. I said this jokingly about AFI the previous day, but I really mean it here. Geo and Sabzi were on point and ran a marathon of songs, including a new cut and the remix of Modest Mouse's "Float On." The crowd was feeling everything they heard and so was I. Grade: A-

Kanye West was interesting. He produces a lot of songs for big name artists, but even on his own albums, he doesn't rap a lot, so he could only really play half of his songs. The crowd, warmed up by the Blue Scholars, was definitely in the groove as Kanye basically went through a chronological greatest hits. Kanye was off stage in between songs, I'm not sure why, but his orchestra and DJ were tight and kept the set rolling strong. Grade A-