Pia Hallenberg

When Ryan Volsen was in college he decided he didn’t want to drive a car. It seemed simple enough to just ride a bike. Soon he realized it would probably be beneficial for him – and the bike – if he knew a little bit more about bike maintenance. “I was bike commuting and when I started I didn’t know anything about bikes,” said Volsen. “I figured I needed to know more about the machine I was riding, and how to fix it, if I was going to make it last, so I set about learning all I could.”

One thing the city of Spokane’s code enforcement officers have no control over is the weather. Monday, the rain was flying sideways down Sprague Avenue, pushed by winds strong enough to knock out power and trees, but not strong enough to deter a group of East Central Neighborhood Council volunteers from touring their neighborhood looking for code violations.

It’s like trivia night on steroids. It’s like “Jeopardy!” without categories. It’s like all the teachers got together and created a monster of a test including every possible topic from chemistry, to history, to literature and astronomy – so what’s your answer? It’s Knowledge Bowl, and Dave Jackson’s Lewis and Clark High School classroom was crammed with students getting in one last practice round before they headed to the Washington State Knowledge Bowl Competition at Hanford High School in Richland last Saturday.

For Paul Fuchs, the battle against underage drinking s personal. As a first responder and an EMT, he’s seen his share of car crashes with deadly and debilitating outcomes. He also lost a sister to a drunken driver. And his hometown is Tekoa, Wash., a small farming community that lost two high school students in car crashes last year. “When your total student body is very small, and you lose two students in crashes, it’s a really hard hit for everyone,” Fuchs said.

Steven Gering, the principal at North Central High School, has been known to bother some of his students so much they hide when they see him in the hallways. He’d seek them out at assemblies. He’d sneak up on them in lunch lines. Take Lindsey Schaefer, a 17-year-old junior, for instance.

Toward the end of the Vietnam War, Laos had been devastated. The country, sandwiched between Vietnam to the east and Thailand to the west, had been bombed by the United States and neighboring countries, at the same time as it staggered through a horrific civil war. In 1975, the royalist government was overthrown by communist forces, turning Laos into a single-party communist country. That’s when Yangtoua and Yingtoua Xiong fled Laos hoping to find a better life somewhere else, far away from the war and political conflict they’d grown up in.

Say “martial arts” and most people think of flying Ninjas or big grunting men breaking bricks with their heads. Judo is not at all like that. Actually, on this Wednesday evening at Spokane Judo’s practice at East Central Community Center, giggling can be heard more than anything else.

Jefferson Elementary School has been sitting the corner of South Grand Boulevard and West 37th Avenue for about 100 years, and it’s getting a little tired. The school has been expanded and updated a couple of times, and now it’s time for a major overhaul, paid for by the school bond passed last year. On Feb. 23 neighbors, parents and teachers got to look at the plans for the school update at an open house held in Jefferson’s gymnasium.

Maurice Smith spends his days surrounded by food. He’s the executive director of Feed Spokane, an organization that collects leftover food from area restaurants and food businesses, then delivers the food to one of 40 meal sites in town. Smith usually has something edible in his car, and he’s known for passing out wrapped sandwiches to hungry people he meets on his daily travels. Feed Spokane kicked off its annual fundraiser – Dine Out to Feed Spokane – Monday, with the Davenport Hotel’s restaurants, among many others.

It’s Wednesday night and the men’s dance line is rehearsing on stage, but not a single member is wearing tights. Instead many are wearing washed-out dad jeans and Dockers. There are a few ball caps. One man is in athletic training pants. It’s the night where the entire cast of this year’s Ham on Regal show goes on stage, all 250 of them, in a somewhat orderly fashion. The cast consists of Ferris High School parents and staff and they are getting ready for their biggest fundraiser of the year.

First rule of the science competition: don’t touch the piano. Second rule: there’s no time to get lattes at the coffee stand in the lobby. Third rule: have fun. More than 170 middle school students from all over Spokane piled into Gonzaga University’s Cataldo Hall on Monday morning, ready to test their skills as windmill operators, foil boat floaters and straw tower builders.

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church is located at the heart of the Manito Neighborhood, and like many other neighborhood churches it’s surrounded by single-family homes. Two of those homes disappeared last fall, as St. Mark’s got ready to expand its parking lot toward 25th Avenue. Some trees were cut down, too, and the parking lot expansion took some neighbors completely by surprise.

It’s an uphill battle that’s been going on for years. Last year, cleanup sessions on Beacon Hill headed by the Fat Tire Trail Riders Club led to 37 abandoned cars being hauled off the mountain. Yet more cars keep coming, along with piles of used tires, old carpet, the occasional used couch and plastic crates filled with all kinds of garbage. “It’s just awful. There are at least half a dozen cars back up there by now,” said Penny Schwynn, a member of the Beacon Hill Trails Advisory Board and a longtime member of the Fat Tire Trail Riders Club. “We have a big problem with illegal vehicle access – people just go up there and dump stuff.”

Sadie has some German shepherd in her, but no one knows exactly what else went into creating this perky and friendly medium-sized dog. At 8 years old, she’s no spring chicken, but when her owner, Kathleen Dale, gets out the tennis ball for some play time at Lilac City Dog Training Club, Sadie takes off. “I’m the perfect owner for her, and she’s the perfect dog for me. We are a match made in heaven,” said Dale, while Sadie took a post-ball-chasing nap on the floor.