Today was a really great day in Olympia. It didn't rain at all, and I had plans throughout the day, which changed but with plenty of notice. I slept in a bit, and then ran out the door. On my way to the bus stop, I took a short video talking about what I like more about this city, and as a magical emphasis a deer ran by during it. The nonprofit I had committed to help last night turned out to be an awesome operation redistributing pallets of products through a bargain outlet and to the local unhoused community. I unloaded a bunch of hair dye and soap from boxes, and made a few friends. I have been trying to include more mutual aid in my activism, and be a follower rather in this new place, and it’s going well and feels good and is quite relieving. My afternoon plans had woken up with a fever, so we canceled, which opened up the rest of my day. I checked out a piece of land I had been looking at online, and talked to one of the neighbors confirming the neighborhood is typically that quiet and then went grocery shopping at the local discount store - I expected my basket to come to 100, and it was 65 for about a week and a half of food for me and a new bodywash. Back at the house, I hung out with my roommates for a little bit, and then saw a message in the city general signal chat about a Gaza Soup Kitchen Fundraiser cover concert I’d forgotten about. My phone was low battery, so I left it home, going to catch the bus without it, just my fidget and some cash for the show and food. On the bus, I realized I didn't know where the venue was - I’d been there a few times and knew the general vicinity, but didn’t actually know which street it was on. I roamed a few blocks where I thought it was, and found it rather quickly - downtown here isn’t that large, but I’m still figuring out where everything is in relation to each other. The venue was a former funeral home, then a Buddhist temple, at one point a game shop, and is now an art space/venue with an anarchist library in the back called The Mortuary. I talked to someone who turned out to be the first performer about their Light Phone, it was my first time seeing one in person. He was pretty good but I didn’t know the band he was covering, nevermind the songs. The next guy, Sullivan and Smoke (smoke is his guitar) was also great, did a few songs from people whose names I recognized, and songs I must have heard before. The next people were covering Kimya Dawson, who is from this city, and apparently they were in a choir run by her that performed around this area. They played a few I hadn’t heard before including a song that Kimya (They were on first name basis, of course) wrote specifically for their choir. In “Loose Lips” they replaced "fuck Bush and fuck this war" with “Fuck Trump, Fuck Netanyahu, Fuck ICE and Fuck this war” and the audience lost it. I left after their act, and got a few slices of cheese pizza at the New York style restaurant down the street, and then caught a bus back to where I’m staying on the outskirts of the city. They cooled off on the ride, and I ate them on the walk. 

Three timezones away back in Worcester, red rope stanchions blocked public access to where they anticipated me placing signs and cameras at the mayoral debate.