Ellen Van Slyke, best known in restaurant circles as one of the previous owners of beloved Boccata and current food and beverage manager for Loews Ventana Canyon Resort, is on her way out of town to follow her dream and live at the beach (Can I come?) in San Diego.

She's transferring to Loews Coronado.

What a lot of people don't know about her is that not only is she a consumate foodie and trend maker, but also an artist. She opens up her studio Saturday, Aug. 26 from 2 to 6 p.m. Gallery paintings that would fetch $1,200 will be selling for $300. All oil paintings will sell from $175 to $900. Watercolors will sell for $75.

Her studio is in the Drew Julian Building located at 118 S. Fifth Ave, No. 131 at Broadway Boulevard and Fifth, behind Barrio Grill and around the corner from Hotel Congress.

If blogging is light from me, personally, over the next two days, it's because I am in beautiful Anchorage, Alaska, visiting our new sister newspaper, the Anchorage Press. We got in late yesterday afternoon, and the sun went down around 10 p.m. Tres cool. Anyway, hopefully the other good Weekly bloggers will pick up the slack in my absence. Meanwhile, enjoy this week's issue, and kisses to y'all.

OK, you've all been eagerly awaiting the numbers from the Tucson Weekly/Wick Communications Poll. Without further ado:

Democrats:

Gabrielle Giffords: 45 percent

Patty Weiss: 27 percent

Jeff Latas: 6 percent

Alex Rodriguez: 1 percent

Bill Johnson: 1 percent

Francine Schacter: 1 percent

Undecided: 20 percent

OK, so the numbers add up to more than 100 percent. We rounded Francine Shacter's .3 percent upward.

Republicans

Randy Graf: 36 percent

Steve Huffman: 13 percent

Mike Hellon: 10 percent

Mike Jenkins: 1 percent

Frank Antenori: 1 percent

Undecided: 39 percent

The poll, conducted by Margaret Kenski of Arizona Opinion, surveyed 300 Democrats and 300 Republicans in CD 8. It has a margin of error of plus/minus 4 percent.

Look for more details in today's Tucson Weekly, available online later this afternoon. [Details online now here.]

As the Tucson Greyhound Park investigation wheels turn slowly, a $1,000 reward has been posted for information about the 100-200 missing greyhounds. How can so many greyhounds go missing? Well, they can be disposed of and sold for a profit at research labs, used as wolf bait, sold to dog-fighting enthusiasts and other gruesome ways. When the greyhounds stop being useful as money-making machines ... they have to be disposed of because they are considered as livestock, not pets. Sad.

Anyway ,if you hang around the Tucson Greyhound Park in South Tucson or know someone who does, you could maybe profit by providing some helpful information.

We want to know what happened to those dogs, and we don't want any more to disappear.  

Yes, the rumors are true: The Tucson Weekly/Wick Communications Poll makes its debut tomorrow with a survey of who's in the lead in the Democratic and Republican primaries in the Congressional District 8. The poll, conducted by Margaret Kenski of Arizona Opinion, is the first of three polls TW and its Southern Arizona sister newspapers will undertake between now and the general election. Check in around noon tomorrow (Wednesday, Aug. 23) here at the TW Blog for initial results and back with us later in the day, when the paper goes live, for a more in-depth look at the numbers.

-- If you're handicapped or frail, and you want to mail something at the Post Office without standing in line ... well, you're screwed.

-- Gosh, the topic of this Star story looks stunningly familiar.

-- George W. Bush takes a swipe at Democrats. Meanwhile, the American casualty count in Iraq approaches the number of people who died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The last we heard, Scott Merk, the veteran facing an uncertain future due to crushing medical expenses arising from his degenerative disc disease, had not been evicted from his home. The Merk family blog said the eviction deadline came and went, and then Scott left a comment on the Tucson Weekly blog on Saturday about his struggle to get proper access to military medical records.

Calls to the Merks' telephone number today went unanswered, but the line and voicemail are still functioning. The blog also said the Merks had been contacted by the offices of Sens. Jon Kyl and John McCain, as well as Rep. Jim Kolbe.

So news reports are floating around the Internet that some Islamic religious fanatics may try to pull something big tomorrow.

Of COURSE they pick a deadline day to do this. Thpppth.

-- Snakes on a Plane isn't bringing in the box office everyone expected. But who cares about that? You want to know how James DiGiovanna feels about it, don't you? Well, you have something to look forward to in this week's Weekly!

-- Saddam's on trial. Again.

-- The Star has taken the original, edgy position of giving a thorn to society's obsession with celebrity romance. We expect the Star to any day soon dare to say child molesters are bad.

I hate chocolate, but I couldn't help thinking that there are probably people out there who really wish they could experience something like this.

Plus, the man was rescued with the help of cocoa butter. Sweet.