How well do you know Olympia? Here's the game: Each Saturday Tuesday I post a picture from somewhere around Olympia and people try to figure out its location. The first person who gets it correct gets a Creative Commons Winner photo. If that doesn't get you excited then you've obviously taken too much diazepam.

The TOPS (The Olympia Paranormal Society) Project is looking for "stories of the strange and unexplained from Olympia".

Here on OlyBlog we've talked about at least two of the stories they mention:

• Greenwood's Ark
• Little Hollywood

There is an thoughtful post today on ourpdx.net out of Portland, Oregon: Plan B, or not Plan B…that is the question. Comments are turned off here since they are enabled there.

There’s an interesting case going to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals today. Attorneys for an Olympia, Washington grocery store chain and two pharmacists will be back in court trying to maintain a preliminary injunction imposed by a judge last fall. The injunction prevents a set of Washington State Pharmacy Board rules from taking effect in that state.

The question of the day is: What world famous food item/recipe had it's first commercial appearance in Olympia and what was the name of the restaurant. In order to be the correct awnser'er you must get both parts right.

I hope this one stumps you all.

taken from Thad Curtz's comment in the Prius Co-op? thread

At first I thought there wasn't much to tell - we just did it... But that's not quite right.

• We did it with people we've known for thirty years.
• They live about seven houses down the street from us.
• We've shared a number of other things with them over the years. We shared a lot of child care with them when our kids were little. We split a CSA share with them for a few years. We've co-owned a freezer with them for years - it's in their garage, so it's easy to get to. We've owned a several lawn mowers with them (one after another, not all at once). We're working (really slowly) on putting a mesh wireless network on our block to share a high speed Internet connection with them and other people.
• They own another car, so there's a backup when two people want to drive at once. There's also somebody else on the block with another car that it would be easy for us to borrow, if we ever had to.
• When we started this, my wife was retired and I was riding the bus to work. One of our friends was retired and one was car-pooling to Shelton, so she drove the Prius three days a week, but we knew in advance when it would be gone. Now I'm retired, and the one of us who's still working usually takes the bus. Bottom line - the four of us have probably been driving less than many people do.
• Sometimes, we schedule ahead - when somebody's taking the Prius off on a trip, or when they want to use it for some regular, repeating event. For a stretch, one of our friends used it to go visit his mother in Lacey every Wednesday morning. Usually, we just call up a little ahead of time or at the last minute; I actually can't remember a single time when I've wanted to hop in the car and do an errand and it's been a problem, but having a backup car helps insure against that.

I've just started fishing, and I'm terrible at it. Does anybody have any personal (ie., not just read from somewhere else) experience fishing in the Olympia area that can recommend some good places around here, as well as some tips on how to catch the good stuff? My only experience fishing is off the Steilacoom Docks, and the only fish I ever catch are the trash-fish bull-head that you can only use for bait to catch more trash-fish bull-head.

So... any good fishing tips? Good times to catch fish? Good bait to use? I've also got a crab pot... so any tips on crabbing (best times to do it, best bait, best locations, etc.) would be appreciated.

On the way to the Eastside food co-op, from the Olympia woodland trail, under the I-5 bridge, there are many chunks of clear broken glass.

Ride a bicycle slowly under the bridge if you don't wish to have a flat tire. If you do wish to have a flat tire, disregard.

It is my belief that this broken glass was placed in this darkened area, purposefully, by gremlins.
The same gremlins responsible for the razor blades and nails commonly strewn in the bike lane. After all who else could be throwing razor blades out of the windows of cars? Only gremlins. Or possibly perennial presidential candidate Ron Paul, who is three quarters gremlin on his mother's side.

There is a group in town that will be lobbying the city council to add Public Campaign Financing to the ballot.

If it gets on the ballot and passes with a majority vote of the people, then it would be available for use in the next City Council election.

What would that look like? If you or a friend (or both) wanted to run for the Olympia City Council and could meet a certain set of requirements (something like 300 signatures with a $10 donation from each), then you would qualify for public money for your campaign. This would take the burden of fundraising off of you and allow you to focus on the campaign, as well as give you a competitive chance against your opponent.

If this is something you would like to see happen, send an email to the city council asking them to put public campaign financing on the ballot in November. The city council can be reached at: citycouncil@ci.olympia.wa.us

If you have any questions about public campaign financing, please post them here and I will answer them as soon as I can.

This is a teaser calendar: today and tomorrow. For the month of July.

For a closer view of any given poster, left Mouse-click the poster. Sometimes there are mouseovers, so if you're into that sort of thing just kind of sloooowleeee move your mouse pointer over the pictures. If you're interested in movie or Theater times their posters are (usually) hyperlinked to their respective schedules.

If your event is not on here I apologize. I do not always see every flyer and sometimes the pictures fuzz up and are illegible. I look preferentially upon flyer distribution at places which are not your store. I encourage mingling, or hiring a distro team. Hiring local artists to design eye catching posters and flyers is good.

If you find yourself inclined to bliss poetic about some just seen show please feel free to leave a comment (or have discussions) on that show's date. History is nothing without its people.

Tuesday:


Wednesday: