http://vimeo.com/35766523

I've made some significant changes to the pieces of the blog's software that deal with events and the calendar, upgrading to a significantly more powerful and complicated set of modules. These are supposed to make it possible to do some things like post an event that happens every Wednesday for a month in one step, etc. (We'll see...)

For now, I think I have the basics working properly. There's a somewhat different upcoming events block, which I'm only showing on the home page at this point; and there's a somewhat fancier calendar (which is supposed to get fancier still...) Any events that happened before today are still archived on the blog, and can be searched for and read - but they are now called Archived Events. You can't create any new archived events and can't edit the old ones.

You can create new upocoming events in pretty much the same way you used to, except that you can now click on the date area and get a pull down calendar to choose and date, and that you can click on the hours, minutes or AM/PM areas to type in new values or use the arrow keys to cycle through the options. (I currently have it set so you can only assign times every 15 minutes.) The calendar will look better if you make a guess and assign a rough estimate of the ending time for things like performances and lectures, even if you don't know exactly how long they'll last. Otherwise, at least so far, the software gives them a one line entry instead of showing the whole title, and its hard to read them...

Please let me know by way of a post or private message if you discover something that's not working properly, or if there are improvements you'd like to be able to use.

In which, following in Emmett O'Connell's footsteps, I comment on the Council packet for the week. I make no effort to cover everything; the full packet is available, as usual, from the City's website.

The postponed report to the Council on the City's financial condition is now scheduled for 7:00 PM Tuesday in Room 207 at City Hall.

The Council's annual retreat replaces its usual meeting this week; it's in the LOTT Conference Room, and open to the public as observers - Friday from 12:00-6:45 (followed by dinner together), and Saturday from 9:00-5:00, beginning with "Bagels/Cream Cheese/Fruit - Healthy". (They'll spend a good deal of time on process - teambuilding, roles, responsibilities, expectations, operating protocol, and commitments...) Substantively, they'll decide on a list of the City's priorities for the year, and on Councilmembers' assignments to committees and interjurisdictional groups.

From today's inbox -

The Womyn's Resource Center would like to invite you to join us in welcoming speaker Rebecca Walker to the Evergreen State College on February 1st, 2012.

Rebecca Walker, daughter of Alice Walker (Pulitzer-Prize winning author of The Color Purple), is an author, speaker, and activist. She was named by Time Magazine as one of the 50 most influential American leaders under 40 and by the League of Women Voters with the Women Who Could Be President Award. Rebecca Walker is most known as the original leader and founder of Third Wave Feminism. Her transformative views on race, gender, sexuality, and power, expressed through her memoirs, anthologies, articles, essays, and talks, have earned her world renown. Check out her official website.

Rebecca will be speaking at noon in the CAB conference room about her latest memoir, Baby Love. She will also be speaking again at 4 pm in Lecture Hall 3 featuring her book What Makes a Man, discussing masculinity and male allyship to women.

Please feel free to contact the WRC at tesc_wrc@yahoo.com if you have additional questions regarding this event.

[I've edited this to include the correction that followed the original message.]

From today's inbox -

The Womyn's Resource Center would like to invite you to join us in welcoming speaker Rebecca Walker to the Evergreen State College on February 1st, 2012.

Rebecca Walker, daughter of Alice Walker (Pulitzer-Prize winning author of The Color Purple), is an author, speaker, and activist. She was named by Time Magazine as one of the 50 most influential American leaders under 40 and by the League of Women Voters with the Women Who Could Be President Award. Rebecca Walker is most known as the original leader and founder of Third Wave Feminism. Her transformative views on race, gender, sexuality, and power, expressed through her memoirs, anthologies, articles, essays, and talks, have earned her world renown. Check out her official website.

Rebecca will be speaking at noon in the CAB conference room about her latest memoir, Baby Love. She will also be speaking again at 4 pm in Lecture Hall 3 featuring her book What Makes a Man, discussing masculinity and male allyship to women.

Please feel free to contact the WRC at tesc_wrc@yahoo.com if you have additional questions regarding this event.

[I've edited this to include the correction that followed the original message.]

From today's inbox -

This presentation will offer an overview of the LOTT reclaimed water and groundwater infiltration program, reclaimed water quality, how recharge sites are evaluated and selected, the design and function of engineered recharge basins, soil aquifer treatment, and relationship to constituents of emerging concern. To assure protection of local groundwater supplies, LOTT is about to begin a 4-year Groundwater Recharge Scientific Study. With continually increasing public and regulatory scrutiny, one of the key study objectives is to quantify the efficacy of soil aquifer treatment to limit fate and transport of pollutants, including constituents of emerging concern. Plans for initiating the scientific study will be discussed, including opportunities for participation in the scoping process for the study.

From today's inbox -

Beginning in February, Science Café of Olympia will meet at Harned Hall in Saint Martin's University at 5300 Pacific Avenue SE, Lacey.

Map and Driving Directions

"Reclaimed Water and Groundwater Infiltration: How Wastewater Becomes a Resource"
7:00 pm, Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Harned Hall, Saint Martin's University, 5300 Pacific Avenue SE, Lacey, Washington

This presentation will offer an overview of the LOTT reclaimed water and groundwater infiltration program, reclaimed water quality, how recharge sites are evaluated and selected, the design and function of engineered recharge basins, soil aquifer treatment, and relationship to constituents of emerging concern. To assure protection of local groundwater supplies, LOTT is about to begin a 4-year Groundwater Recharge Scientific Study. With continually increasing public and regulatory scrutiny, one of the key study objectives is to quantify the efficacy of soil aquifer treatment to limit fate and transport of pollutants, including constituents of emerging concern. Plans for initiating the scientific study will be discussed, including opportunities for participation in the scoping process for the study.

Last week, Evergreen Graduate and nationally recognized portrait photographer Annie Appel visited Olympia as part of a tour to document some of the people of the movement. Here's a short OO video, and you can also find much more information on Annie's website, here: http://www.annieappelphotography.blogspot.com/

Portland's creating them... now Seattle's creating them. According to the Seattle Bike Blog, the city plans to convert 11 miles of regular streets to greenways, "to make streets safer and more pleasant for people who live, walk, bike, and drive in Seattle’s neighborhoods." They'll limit cut-through traffic and add "park-like amenities" on streets a block or two away from major arterials to give people who want to walk or bike an alternative route. (According to the article, the City can build ten miles of greenway like this for the cost of one mile of dedicated bike trail, and 45 miles of greenway for the cost of repaving one mile of street.)

There's a video of City Council member Sally Bagshaw discussing the project too.

From today's inbox -

The application deadline for City advisory committees' spring recruitment was extended another week.  The applications are now due Friday, February 3rd at 4:00 p.m.