Is a Storm championship dollars to doughnuts?

Admittedly, few things in life are guaranteed: death, taxes and another Seattle Mariners 100-loss season. However, Seattle Storm fans anticipate their home team capturing the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) championship this evening in Atlanta. The Storm is ahead 2-0 in the series and looking for a sweep in the Peach State.

Somebody in this town needs to win a title.

Storm fan Damager (an alias) has ordered his season tickets for the 2011 season. Damager attended the Storm game Tuesday night reports that several referee calls against Seattle were "questionably bad. When the alleged foul was replayed on StormVision (the Jumbotron screen hanging above the court), the true badness of these calls was replayed multiple times life-size for the crowd of 15,000-plus to jeer at." An angry crowd switched from choruses of "DE-FENSE!" to "NEW-REFS!"

A fan created "the best fan-made sign I've ever seen" that read 'Even Chuck Norris is afraid of Lauren Jackson.' The fan won a box of doughnuts."

According to Damager, if presented with a box of doughnuts, his pooch Clarence the Retriever AK9 (another alias) would "eat the frosting off the top of all of them and then get to work on whatever's left until: 1) It gets too boring, 2) He runs out of water, or 3) He gets tired to chew any longer." Clarence once ate around the crust of a freshly baked loaf of challah -- a braided Jewish egg bread that requires three different rising periods -- and left only the chewy middle as evidence of his feat.

If you want to satisfy your canine's craving for doughnuts, local Top Pot has created a commemorative confection in honor of the WNBA team... which is all good unless the doughnuts are frosted with chocolate. In which case, it's an old-fashioned for Fido. Boring, yes... but that's a given in life and preferable to caffeine poisoning.

Go, Storm.

ESPN2 airs Game 3 of the NBA Championship at 5 pm.

Happy birthday, Brick!

We know that you don't read blogs. But the Dog Denizens of Genesee Park (DDGP) nonetheless wishes you a happy birthday.

In search of an appropriate birthday cocktail, we unearthed a relatively unknown beverage that combines the flavors of brandy, fig, cranberry and lemon. Sounds wacky... but so did combining the great tastes of peanut butter and chocolate decades ago.

Armagnac Fig Soul

• 2 oz. armagnac
• 1 fresh fig
• ½ oz. fig liqueur
• ¼ part lemon juice
• 1¼ part cranberry juice

Shake all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice.

Strain into glass tumbler.

Garnish with wedge of fig.

O'Doul the Collie salutes American laborers

Weather prognosticator and labor spokesdog O'Doul the Collie took a break from his busy schedule to offer his words of wisdom related to the Labor Day holiday.

Roughly translated from Mount Baker resident Tony, O'Doul postulated: "Labor does all the wealth, right? How come we don't get to keep it? Somebody must be taking it away, because we ain't wealthy."

Tony took exception to the perception of Labor Day as the the end of summer and a reason to sell ski equipment and clothing. (Remember "Ski Bonkers" Labor-Day-weekend sales of the 1980s?) "People who think that way probably don't do much thinking, period," Tony said. "People should have a holiday, but people should remember that there are problems, things aren't right and you should fix them and kick butt."

As the Peach Margarita seems far too frivolous for Tony and O'Doul's Labor Day celebration, we offer an alternative cocktail for the holiday, the Boilermaker -- a workingman's drink in honor of trained craftsmen who create steel fabrications. We can guarantee with Joe Namath certainty that you would never see Tony sipping a peach margarita.

Boilermaker

• 2 oz. whiskey
• 10 oz. beer

Fill a shot glass with whiskey.

Drop the shot glass into a mug of beer.

Chug-a-lug.

Bully for Old Purdue.

Addendum: Tony was aghast that a recipe would suggest that an imbiber mix the beer and whiskey... much-less drop a shot glass of bourbon into perfectly good beer. He suggested that bloggers posted recipes simply to see if anybody read the item. Wikipedia offers this thought on the boilermaker: "Generally speaking, the Boilermaker is merely a glass of beer with a shot of whiskey served on the side. The shot goes down in one, and the beer follows, being sipped rather than quickly downed.”

People, it's beer and whiskey. Don't over-think the matter.

Here's a shout out to the working class dogs of America

Happy Labor Day from your friends at the Dog Denizens of Genesee Park (DDGP)!

While you are preparing a Jell-O mold for your picnic or stowing away your white wardrobe, you may not know the origin of the holiday for which many working Americans enjoy. According to the Department of Labor (DOL), the holiday is "dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers."

Labor Day started as a result of a push to the now-ubiquitous eight-hour workday. In the 1880s employees in the manufacturing industry began organizing protests and strikes to protest unsafe and unjust work conditions... the eight-hour workday, for example. Tension between laborers and management grew increasingly hostile

The first "Labor Day parade" took place September 5, 1882 when 10,000 protesting employees took unpaid leave to march from New York City's city hall to Union Square. On May 11, 1894, employees of the Chicago-based Pullman Palace Car Company went on strike in opposition of wage reductions and the termination of a union representative. The federal government sent United States marshals to break the strike. The predictable result? Riots, violence and the deaths of workers. President Grover Cleveland signed legislation two years later to create a national Labor Day holiday. The holiday was scheduled for the first Monday so as not to appear to link the federal holiday with international labor celebrations on May Day.

Fast forward to more than a century later. Maybe you're preparing for a Labor Day gathering like a picnic in the 1955 movie Picnic with William Holden and Kim Novak. Here's a clip from the seductive love dance between Holden and Novak, who swoon to the tune "Moonglow":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpD5ZkjCoGI&feature=related

Or maybe you're staying home and overdosing on all-day marathons of Pawn Stars or Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations. You'll need a beverage to deaden the prospect of the end of summer and returning to work Tuesday. A peach margarita seems in order.

Peach margarita

• 1 cup of ice
• 1½ oz tequila
• ¼ oz. triple sec
• ¼ oz. Peach Schnapps
• ¼ oz. lime juice
• 1 fresh peach, skinned
• Peach slice for garnish

Pour the ingredients into a blender... or the blender-wannabe that you purchased during a moment of weakness while watching an infomercial.

Blend until smooth.

Pour into a chilled margarita class.

Garnish with peach slice.

Kirby Beagle, Your Enthusiasm is Showing: Beef... real food for real beagles

Kirby Beagle here.

The health-conscious among you must find it puzzling that people in Seattle are knocking themselves out -- some to the point of cheating -- to lure a burger joint to their neighborhoods.

Somebody asked me, "Kriby Beagle, shouldn't we stop the establishment of grease-laden food? Shouldn't we encourage businesses that sell healthy food to the Rainier Valley?

I say, "Go chase a car."

I'm a dog. I don't understand cholesterol counts, blocked arteries, and human obesity. But I know what I like: food. While I'm always happy to find the ubiquitous chicken bone during a walk in the Rainier Valley, I also enjoy variety. I've tasted a couple Dick's cheeseburgers in my lifetime, and I wouldn't mind a more consistent supply. We don't get out to Broadway or Wallingford very often. A trip to Lake City Way more likely stems from an emergency visit at Access than a burger feeding a burger fix. I've never been to Queen Anne or Holman Road.

Locate a Dick's Drive-In in the Rainier Valley - maybe near Hillman City or that stretch between the commercially challenged area between the Silver Fork restaurant and Franklin High School -- and I know there'd be an influx of cheeseburgers and hand-cut fries in the Genesee Dog Park. It cracks me up when people bring food to the park, and then get mad when I want a bite. Awhile back some yum-yums set up an agility course at the park with a buffet table full of doughnuts and dog treats -- and then got nasty when a pal and I investigated. Another time, a young woman climbed on a log in a panic and hurriedly downed her sausage-and-egg biscuit rather than share breakfast with her new friends. Do any of you chuckle heads remember that you're at a dog park?

We're dogs. We think we're entitled. A local Dick's Drive-In would make many dogs -- maybe yours -- in the Rainier Valley happy. Think about that when you vote on the new Dick's location.

Later,

Kirby Beagle

Rainier Valley Dick's Drive-In would be so beautiful to local cockers

While Seattle-area humans apply full-court pressure to lobby for the new Dick's Drive-In locale, local cocker spaniels Biff and Zeke (aliases) issue a canine throw down in making the case for a restaurant in Lovely Rainier Valley.

"They would love it, frankly," said owner and long-time Seattle resident Sally (alias), "because their mama likes it."

A Rainier Valley locale would offer only one setback, the Mount Baker resident said. "They can't order on their own," she said. "They don't know how to say, 'Give me a plain burger without onions.'"

But in true Southeast Seattle fashion, Sally doubts that the Dick's chain would build open its doors in the Rainier Valley. She described hearing a story on a National Public Radio (NPR) station reporting that the Dick's organization would prefer to set up shop near the University of Washington.

The proprietors of the Seattle burger establishment suggested that they would give due consideration to an online poll that asked voters to choose from one of three locations: "North" (Shoreline, Mountlake Terrace, Lynnwood, Edmonds, South Everett), "South" (West Seattle, South Seattle, Renton, Burien, SeaTac, Tukwila) and "East" (Bellevue, Redmond, Kirkland, Bothell, Mercer Island, Issaquah, Sammamish). The brain trust at Dick's later announced that the results were "scrubbed to eliminate tens of thousands of extra votes added by a handful of talented but ethically challenged computer hackers." The number of votes for the "South" magically shrunk.

At present the online survey shows the "East" leading at 46 percent, followed by the "South" (29 percent) and "East" (24 percent).

For those who want to see Dick'w Drive-In locate in the Rainier Valley, go to:

http://www.ddir.com/

Don't you want to keep our fast-food profits in Seattle... instead of Oak Brook, IL (McDonalds' corporate headquarters), Miami (Burger King), San Diego (Jack in the Box), Irvine, CA (Taco Bell), Dublin, IL (Wendy's), or Sandy Springs, GA (Arby's)? Think local.

If we find that the survey results are suspicious and potentially invalid we can hire Al Gore's legal team from the 2000 election and challenge the election. Or not.

All-American dogs celebrate Presidential visit

President Barrack Obama's visit to the Jet City Tuesday generated interest from local humans and canines alike. Mount Baker resident Sally (an alias) was home when two Air Force F-15 fighter jets broke the sound barrier to intercept a rogue pilot who flew his Cessna into the no-fly zone. The sonic boom, Sally said, sounded like an explosion coming from the direction of the Darigold dairy plant. Sally's cockers Biff and Zeke (also aliases) barked when the sound barrier broke.

Later in the afternoon, Sally, Biff and Zeke went outside to watch Air Force One whisk the American-born, Christian President away. According to Sally, the two cocker spaniels stood at attention and waved American flags in their paws. "They thought the presidential pup was on board," she explained.

USA! USA!