I notice a lot of conversation going on in the comments about the merits (or lack thereof) of the "Community Values" Ordinance. I wonder if the commenters wouldn't mind consolidating their thoughts into a post for the front page (I'm thinking of TFI & Rob Richards, but anyone would be welcome to contribute). Waddaya think?

Do we really need a third Lowe's in the area? The Olympian:

The home improvement chain has a store on Martin Way and submitted plans for a 166,000-square-foot store at College Street and Yelm Highway in Lacey. A west-side Olympia site would be its third in the county.

Newsday.com reports on a new book by Olympia resident Jim Lynch.

We're eating lunch at Seattle's Pike Place Market, high above the life-choked waters of Puget Sound, talking about Lynch's debut novel. "The Highest Tide" (Bloomsbury, $23.95) tells the story of Miles O'Malley, a 13-year-old boy who discovers a lot of misdirected sea life near his house in Olympia, Wash. Miles, a marine biology prodigy, knows what belongs in his part of the sound - sand dollars, clams, crabs - and what doesn't belong. For instance, a giant squid with a single eye the size of a dinner plate. When he finds just such a rare squid on a midnight reconnaissance, Miles becomes a local hero, a media attraction, and then even a kind of minor-league environmental saint.

Meet the author: Tacoma Public Library AUTHOR Series Jim Lynch, author of “The Highest Tide,

Read about families that have landed in the Olympia area from the Gulf Coast here, here, and here.

He is the author of "most pieces are scattered: Reflections of a High School Shooter, an intense and provocative blend of prose and stream-of-consciousness, the memoirs of a despairing teenager driven to carry out the unthinkable: a school shooting. An unconventional work that challenges form, the novel captures the chaotic, traffic-laden street that is the psyche of the modern day teen in America." - http://www.auburnpublishing.com/

hope you all can make it...