Blue Skies over Belltown!

Here's a weird-looking partial Belltown skyline from 6th & Blanchard:

Ain't that pretty? You know, the last two days have been really nice. The general gloom has subsided. The air is warm and as fragrant as possible under the circumstances, birds are chirping over the traffic noise and the leaves are returning to the trees that haven't died of depression during the winter. That doesn't mean there's a whole lot to do in Belltown. As a rule, there's generally very little to do here - even less if you don't want to spend any money. I'm always a little surprised at how little things change once the weather turns. It's not like the entire neighborhood moves outside and hangs out on the stoop. There are precious few stoops in Belltown anyway. No, things pretty much stay the same until high summer, then we see just a teeny-tiny bit of outdoor culture. The reason for the delay is probably because the weather is so friggin' unreliable. Two weeks ago, we had similar niceness going on; blue skies, chirping birds, trees in bloom, etc. Then it clouded up, the temperature dropped by 20 degrees and things were miserable. That week and a half in particular really enhanced Belltown's ugliness. Conversely, good weather mitigates it.

Although I'm looking forward to warmer temperatures, one thing I'm dreading is Belltown's annual ritual: shirtless guys wandering around the neighborhood. Almost all of these fellows have no business in that condition; they're either hopelessly out of shape with giant saggy man-boobs or crack/meth thin with random terrible tattoos and scary scars or some mixture of the previous two. Of course, there are guys who have the build and youth to pull shirtlessness off, but I'm always like, OK, I get it, you've got a decent bod, enough already. I guess my tolerance to those with no shirts is zero.

In the last several days, I've seen two guys in such a condition, neither of which had any call to be in such a state. And they have inspired me. Since this venture is all about ugliness in general and Belltown in particular, I vow to you, the little people who read this big, big blog, that in the coming months, I'm going to take pictures of every inappropriately shirtless guy I can find. Wish me luck!