5 creative Valentine's Day date ideas in Seattle
OK, so maybe you — like me — didn't get your act together in time to book a reservation at some fancy restaurant for Valentine's Day.
Or, maybe you and your sweetheart prefer to avoid that scene and its prix fixe menus altogether. (Fair.)
Good news: We've got a few other ideas for how you can celebrate.
Valentine's Day improv
In " Comedy of Love," real couples from the local improv troupe Unexpected Productions will take audience suggestions, then turn them into off-the-cuff adventures in romance and heartbreak.
6pm on Friday, Feb. 14 and Saturday, Feb. 15. Tickets are $25.
Arcade romance
For competitive types, there may be nothing more romantic than utterly crushing your partner at pinball or Street Fighter II.
Try Ice Box Arcade, Jupiter Bar or Georgetown Pizza and Arcade.
Candle pouring
Create custom candles as you enjoy light snacks and raise a glass of Champagne at Noir Lux Candle Bar in Queen Anne.
6:30pm, Feb. 14. $60.
Play Cards Against Humanity
Join others who want to be irreverent on Valentine's Day by playing what event organizers call "possibly the most offensive game ever created."
Attendees are advised to bring a Cards Against Humanity deck from home if they have one.
6-10pm, Feb. 14 at Joyale Seafood Restaurant. Free.
Roam the aquarium
Reserve an after-hours spot at the Seattle Aquarium, where you can peer into marine habitats while dancing to a live band and DJ.
7-10pm, Feb. 14. Tickets are $41.
Cocktails and snacks will be available for purchase.
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New York Times
11 hours ago
- New York Times
Champagne shades: The NBA-inspired trend that's taking over soccer celebrations
Trophies and rings are the renowned physical marks of success in American sports, but there's an accessory that has become just as prevalent in championship-winning locker rooms as the shine of platinum or gold: 'champagne goggles'. Champagne has a long-term association with sporting glory. A bottle of Moet & Chandon, from one of the world's most prominent champagne houses, was passed to Italian motorsports driver Tazio Nuvolari after winning the Vanderbilt Cup in 1936. By 1969, honouring success with a bottle of champagne became part of the formal victory celebrations in Formula One, establishing a relationship between triumph in the sporting arena and sparkling wine. Advertisement It turned out to be a lasting one, with this niche motorsport tradition spreading across the sporting sphere in the United States and Europe. During the Premier League era, it was standard practice for man-of-the-match recipients to be handed a large bottle of champagne as a prize until 2012, when the league switched to a trophy in acknowledgement of the multi-faith diversity of its players. Still, drinking and spraying champagne to mark sporting success has remained, with soccer clubs Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool even bringing non-alcoholic versions into the locker room to ensure everyone could participate in celebrating their respective Europa League and Premier League successes. Until recently, the 'champagne goggles' phenomenon was an entirely American one. However, it's inspired a trend that has been adopted by some of soccer's biggest names — and sometimes, champagne isn't even involved. It's unclear where the trend started but baseball hall-of-famer David 'Big Papi' Ortiz is probably the first influential figure to bring goggles to the locker room. The designated hitter was a star of the famous 2004 Boston Red Sox team that swept the St Louis Cardinals 4-0 in the World Series to end their 86-year wait for a title. As is customary in the MLB, they celebrated that triumph with champagne but long before ski goggles became the champion's eyewear du jour, Ortiz protected his eyes with swimming goggles. According to former team-mate Torii Hunter, Ortiz learned a lesson from their divisional title in 2002 with his previous club, the Minnesota Twins, where they celebrated without eye protection. As reported on the MLB website, 'their eyes burned enough from the champagne that they still hurt the next day'. Corks flying around the locker room at up to 30mph present a real danger, too. In 2022, Eritrean cyclist Biniam Girmay suffered an eye injury when a prosecco cork hit him after he won the 10th stage of the Giro d'Italia. The injury forced him to withdraw from the competition. As players looked to avoid the sting of the sparkling wine in their eyes or protect themselves from flying corks, 'champagne goggles' became common in World Series-winning locker rooms. However, the key crossover moment, perhaps the watershed juncture in its eventual international appeal, wouldn't happen until 2013. Despite falling well behind the NFL in viewership and interest in the United States, the NBA is comfortably America's most influential league internationally. There is arguably no greater driver of fashion and culture in world sport than the NBA and its superstar players. Follow the Club World Cup on The Athletic this summer… As the Miami Heat's 'Big Three' (LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh) celebrated their first title together with a locker-room champagne shower, veteran Ray Allen protected his eyes with a pair of Oakley ski goggles. Allen, who won championships with the Heat and the Boston Celtics in a hall-of-fame career, is often credited as the player who popularised goggles in NBA locker-room celebrations. Advertisement Now, they're essential for any equipment manager whose team are on the verge of a championship. After lifting the Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy in 2022, Steph Curry celebrated while wearing ski googles from Under Armour, the shoe and sportswear company he has been signed to since 2013. Some of his Golden State Warriors team-mates wore Moet-branded goggles, while others donned black-and-gold variations designed by the NBA for the occasion. Giannis Antetokounmpo and James celebrated their recent championship successes with the Milwaukee Bucks and the Los Angeles Lakers, with pairs made by Nike. Last year, Jordan Brand athlete Jayson Tatum had a custom-made pair with 'champ' written behind a large Jordan logo on the lens as the Boston Celtics toasted becoming NBA champions. Primarily associated with basketball shoes and apparel, ski goggles made by Jordan are not available to the public. What started as a way to protect athletes from the hazards of champagne celebrations has become a prominent way for brands to advertise in the most significant moments. Now, the trend is spreading to Europe in the form of 'champagne shades'. While Ortiz and Allen were the pioneers of baseball and basketball respectively, Barcelona and Spain's 17-year-old prodigy Lamine Yamal (main image) is leading a generation of players wearing sunglasses in title celebrations. Celebrating Barcelona's Copa Del Rey final win over arch-rivals Real Madrid in April, Yamal donned two pairs of sunglasses at once as he carried the trophy on the pitch at the Estadio La Cartuja. In recent weeks, Serie A MVP Scott McTominay was pictured with the Italian trophy wearing a pair of sunglasses, as were Napoli team-mates Andre-Frank Zambo Anguissa and Romelu Lukaku. Many of the Tottenham group brought ski glasses to Bilbao for the Europa League final and wore them as they celebrated with the trophy in the locker room afterwards. Most recently, Paris Saint-Germain duo Desire Doue and Achraf Hakimi were pictured holding the Champions League trophy wearing sunglasses after hammering Inter 5-0 in the final last weekend. Advertisement Perhaps the most illustrative example of the NBA's impact on European soccer was Bayern Munich star Michael Olise not only putting on a pair of sunglasses to celebrate their Bundesliga title win but pairing them with a set of 'grills', a type of dental jewellery worn over teeth popularised by American hip-hop artists. NBA and hip-hop is a marriage that has transcended eras and generations, from Allen Iverson's rap-inspired attire to nine-time All-Star Milwaukee Bucks guard Damian Lillard, who has released several studio albums under Dame D.O.L.L.A.. Yamal, born four years after 50 Cent released Get Rich or Die Tryin' in 2003, cites the New York rapper as his favourite. Even before Yamal's professional debut, Barcelona were one of the first high-profile soccer teams to document players arriving at the stadium in their pre-game outfits, taking influence from American sports. The trend has evolved from Ortiz's swimming goggles to luxury shades, with players sporting them in moments of celebration — and not necessarily always when the champagne corks are flying, with footballers wearing sunglasses both on the pitch in the immediate aftermath of a trophy win or during post-victory parades. The custom is a way to show off a slice of their personal style, similar to Iverson's popularisation of the shooting sleeve or Jimmy Butler's ninja-style headband. Butler, who now plays with Curry on the Warriors, is a big soccer fan and is friends with Brazilian star duo Neymar and Vinicius Junior. In an interview with the Associated Press, he described soccer players as 'the coolest people in the world'. Led by Yamal, these 'champagne shades' are yet another example of how soccer's new generation is unashamedly taking inspiration from the American sports' swagger and adding their own style and flavour to it.
Buzz Feed
16 hours ago
- Buzz Feed
Toddler Parenting Trends Parents Are Sick Of
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Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Jonathan Joss' Husband Reveals His Heartbreaking Last Words to the Actor as He 'Held' His 'Face Together' After Shooting (Exclusive)
The husband of actor Jonathan Joss opens up to PEOPLE about the final words he told the Parks and Recreation actor after he was fatally shot on Sunday, June 1 Tristan Kern de Gonzales says that as Joss lay dying, 'I held my husband's face together as best I could' Kern de Gonzales claims the alleged gunman 'mocked' him and was 'laughing' at him as he said his final goodbye to JossJonathan Joss' husband is sharing heart-wrenching details about the King of the Hill actor's final moments. In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, Tristan Kern de Gonzales fights back tears as he recalls the final words he told Joss just before he died at the age of 59. 'Everything happened very quickly,' Kern de Gonzales, 32, says of the fatal shooting at their San Antonio, Texas, home on Sunday, June 1, that allegedly resulted from a dispute with one of their neighbors. 'Everything was very close range and due to the severity and the trauma of the various head wounds, I knew that there was no hope of saving Jonathan's physical form, and he was struggling so hard, trying to stay alive,' he notes. 'It was just really, really close range,' Kern de Gonzales remembers. 'I held my husband's face together as best I could, and I told him how much I loved him, and that none of this was his fault. I told him he needed to cross over easy. He didn't need to keep fighting.' Kern de Gonzales continues, 'I told him that no matter what, and in some way, shape, or form, we'll always be together, and he'll always be my husband.' He claims that while his husband lay dying, 'the [alleged] gunman was still in [his] car' and 'still had the gun pointed over me.' 'He was laughing,' Kern de Gonzales alleges. 'He mocked me for telling my husband that I loved him and used the same homophobic slurs' that the gunman allegedly used before shooting Joss. 'I was just really looking down at my husband, focused on him, making sure that he had completely crossed over,' Kern de Gonzales says. San Antonio Police arrested one of Joss' neighbors, Sigfredo Ceja Alvarez, shortly after the actor was fatally shot and charged him with first-degree murder. Police have said Alvarez, 56, admitted to shooting and killing the Parks and Recreation actor. He was released on Monday, June 2, on a $200,000 bond. The shooting has left Kern de Gonzales in a state of 'shock.' 'The flashbacks are very, very intense, and they affect my whole body,' he tells PEOPLE. Kern de Gonzales, who previously wrote on Facebook that Joss pushed him out of the way and saved his life, says his late husband's final act of self-sacrifice has given him strength as he grieves. 'I know that I have to keep going and not let go of this because he saved my life, and I can't just let that go,' he explains. 'I have to use the gift that he gave me wisely.' Kern de Gonzales adds of Joss, who he met in 2023 and married on Valentine's Day 2025: 'He will always be my husband and the love of my life. He really gave me a lifetime's worth of love in the short time that we got together.' Kern de Gonzales has maintained that Joss was the victim of a hate crime and that they suffered repeated harassment and homophobic abuse from their neighbors prior to his husband's murder. 'It does hurt whenever people try to say that it wasn't a hate crime,' he says. The day after Joss died, the San Antonio Police Department said their investigation had 'found no evidence to indicate that Mr. Joss's murder was related to his sexual orientation." However, at a Thursday press conference, SAPD police chief William McManus walked back that statement. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. 'That was way, way, way, premature,' McManus said. 'We shouldn't have done it. It was way too soon before we had any real information. And I will own that.' He added, 'I want to apologize to the LGBTQ+ community for the tragic loss of Mr. Joss, which has been heavily felt." McManus continued, "Our homicide detectives are continuing to pursue every lead in this case to ensure that we understand the full picture of what led up to the senseless murder of Mr. Joss." Read the original article on People
