Thankfully yesterday was sunny again.

Days of straight sun then grayness and sweeping rain Saturday until right before the Procession of the Species started was a shock.

My roommates started a garden awhile ago and yesterday I helped them lay down hay to kill the grass around the beds of potential eatables.

I've noticed the semi-religious importance of food here in Olympia. Maybe its just the folks that I interact with, but when people talk about growing food in this city its like they're talking about something sacred.

In the neighborhood where I live on the Westside almost everybody has a garden. Some are quite large with a variety of vegetables. Some appear to produce year round.

A number of people I've met who, for a variety of reasons and to greater and lesser extents, believe that an economic collapse is eminent and when it happens local gardens will be the savior of mankind.

It would be interesting to do a count of all the gardens in Olympia to figure out how much each one produces and if the city could support itself when this collapse occurs-when and if it does.

If any city has the capabilities to support itself with self-grown food Olympia probably does.

I'm curious to learn more about gardening in Olympia. If anybody has any information or would like to show me their garden please get in touch.

Since then, General Administration has been back-pedaling on the rule under which Livingston was ticketed. They added signs that indicated that pedestrians should yield to vehicles (duh) and should not actually go to the powerhouse. In addition, they added a crosswalk across the road to the hillside trail up to the Temple of Justice.

Yesterday, while walking along the lake trail, I noticed another enhancement in the campaign for clarity: a stripe, the length of the road, indicating a pedestrian zone on the pavement. Now, I think that the rule that reserved the road for vehicles was too much, but if that rule is still in place, then how is a pedestrian lane in the road itself consistent with it?

Since GA has now painted a pedestrian symbol on the road, I hope they let Livingston off the hook for being a pedestrian on the road.

You are invited to welcome Sister Jackie Hudson back to Washington after completing her sentence in prison and to engage her and the filmmaker, Brenda Truelson Fox in a question and answer session following the film.

The back of Eli Sterling's white pick up truck is filled with Procession of the Species gear: Long poles, banners, and the rhino head he wears every year in the Procession.

His tape deck is playing "Stand By Me" and he seems to be in a hurried and somewhat forlorn mood as he drives downtown.

"There'll maybe be 800 people," he says. "We'll see what kind of a turn out we get."

A pole in the back of the truck is in danger of falling out. Eli pulls over so a Procession supporter driving in a car behind him can get out and throw Eli's rhino head on top of it for weight.

"Would you treat your costume that way?" Eli laughs as he starts driving again.

The paper mache rhino head, Eli tells me, is the first piece of Procession art ever made. "A boy scout who came to one of the first Procession workshops told me he wanted to make a rhino," Eli says. "I said ok we'll curl up some cardboard for the nose and kind of do it like this. After awhile he stopped coming back, but I kept making it, hoping he would. Now I paint it a different color and wear it every year. Its the oldest piece of Procession art."

Eli, the founder of the Procession and the recipient of a year of the very definition of sensationalized and unclear press, seemed depressed and genuinely disheartened at the prospect that this year's Procession of the Species might be smaller than those in the past.

"You should have seen this place in past years," he told me a few weeks ago standing in the Procession's art studio in the empty Madison school building. "It was like a Santa's workshop, but not this year."

Downtown Eli parks behind the tables where people are registering to walk in the Procession. He grabs his rhino head and hurriedly walks off to help people get their carts and costumes ready to walk.

This is a documentary about three Dominican nuns convicted and sentenced to Federal Prison for their non-violent protest at a Minuteman III missile site in Northern Colorado. It's a 48-minute film that evokes important conversations about the role of religion in politics, the role of nuclear weapons in national defense and the role of International Law in the Federal Courts.

Sister Jackie and the filmmaker will engage in a question and answer session after the film is shown.

A flyer with all the details is attached. Print and post the flyer liberally and tastefully!

Before the film showing there will be the Town Photo Event at 5th and Water across from Traditions at 5PM! Come one come all with your banners and love on your sleeves, we will shine for the camera, order our own pictures and then go see the documentary with Jackie and Brenda! What fun! The film shows at 6:30 pm.