An article in today's Olympian, "Constant evolution in the arts", doesn't even mention the monthly art walks that have been occurring since January. Interesting. The last one was around 15 or 16 houses and lit up the whole neighborhood with people of a variety of ages.

I do wonder if maybe the house party art walks aren't promoted along certain avenues (for instance, press releases to the Olympian) because certain segments of Olympia society just "aren't invited." Or maybe the Olympian knows that its main audience does not include greeners.

Thoughts?

I'm an ex-Seattlite and current Floridian moving back across the nation. I will land in Olympia.

I'm giving notice to my employer in early December, then shopping around for an office job and, ideally, a 2-bedroom house to rent. Then I'm taking off about 4 days before Christmas, and landing my station wagon in the Pacific Northwest just in time for New Year's Eve.

Escaping the conservative torpor that I live in will be the easy part, just requiring a little bit of patience and time. I'm much more worried about what to do when I get to my destination.

Hopefully I'll have a job and a place to live lined up, but if I don't, my savings are going to be dwindling quick. And even if I can take care of both of those things, there will be only one person I know within 40 miles... which doesn't seem like much, but I am a little afraid of having to travel that far just to see another familiar face. And yet, what I've experienced of Olympia and what I've heard about it both seem to suggest that I should have an easy time making friends—or at least acquaintances—and feeling at home. Whatever the case, Olympia will be a much easier home to acclimate to than the place I'm stuck in now.

So there's my hodgepodge escape plan. I'll post periodically here about how it's working out.