Olympia Time

History, politics, people of Oly WA

Author: Emmett O'Connell (Page 57 of 179)

One Billion by Congratulations (in which I try to become a music blogger)

March 21, 2011 / / 0 Comments

From Congratulations on Bandcamp:

Congratulations is a four piece band from Olympia, Washington. The group consists of Jordan Ingram on piano and lead vocals, Abigail Ingram on bass guitar and backing vocals, Matt Buscher on guitar, and Chad Austinson on drums. The band has been described as “moody indie rock with occasional meanderings into jazz and country, jumbling it all together and spitting forth a sound uniquely their own”.

Uniquely their own is probably over-selling it a bit, but they do have a good sound.

I especially like the single “Two of Us,” which has a change of pace about 2/3s of the way through that is very cool.

You can download two albums by Congratulations free at Bandcamp. I suggest you do, its good listening. And, when I mean “free,” its name your own price, which could be more than $0 if you’re not like me.

So, onto explaining what this music blogging thing is supposed to be. Basically, just all local bands. I think there is enough in the Bandcamp Olympia tag category to keep me going. I’ll be honest, this is more about another way to approach the Olympia topic than about music.

Yes, some of it, I really do like (like Congratulations), but some I won’t at all, but I’ll use it to talk about something else.

Also, this is a way for other folks who might not know about this local talent to get out and support it.

American Celtic clubs (Happy Saint Patrick’s Day)

March 17, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Celtics and Celtic hoops are not an uncommon soccer team name across the world. Most popular obviously is Glasgow Celtic, but there are even some American Celtic teams sprinkled across the Northeastern United States.

Jersey City Celtics lasted five games.

Brooklyn Celtic lasted several years (eventually transforming into Brooklyn St. Mary’s Celtic) and even won a U.S. Open Cup.

Kearny Celtic is the most famous and succesful, lasting from the Great Depression well into the post war period. And, now there is a bit of rebirth of the Kearny club, playing in the Northern Jersey Soccer League as the Kearny Irish FC. They even draw their history direclty from the historic Kearny club and play in the same facility.

These folks really need to sell some t-shirts.

There are even Celtics in England and Spain.

Olympia Time #2: Tumwater Roads (or how I-5 really didn’t kill Tumwater’s downtown)

March 12, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Here’s the new zine:

Mostly like the first issue I put out, this is generally a collection of the posts I just did about Tumwater. But, there is some new material as well to tie it together.
When I put it together, I did it in a manner so it could be printed out and then folded in half, stapled and then read. So, keep that in mind after you take a look at your downloaded version.
The downloadable version is also pretty choppy because of its scanned nature. If you want a clean version, taken directly from the scissor cut and paste master, just let me know, and we’ll arrange me getting one to you.

Olyroads.com, certainly bigger nerds than I am

March 2, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Their response, certainly parsing it more than I did. Point taken though:

It appears you’re describing the differece between a native app (compiled and installed on a device) compared to hybrid and web apps. All three as classified as mobile apps. Wikipedia describes a mobile app as “…software which can be used on a mobile device. It also refers to the creation of special web and applications for mobile devices.”

Many of Google’s mobile apps are web apps running in web browsers on mobile devices, and Apple has a large collection of web apps on their website. Of course, Apple has popularized native apps and focus all their energy on their App Store, which only contains native apps which they can monetize better than web apps. But it wouldn’t be accurate to say web apps cannot be mobile apps.

Olympia Roads was designed specificially to be used on mobile devices and was first released for the iPhone. Then it was modified to become a website. No further development is planned at this point since it serves the purpose it was designed for, but there may be enhancements in the future based on user feedback and the number of people utilizing the app. Let us know if you have any suggestions or ideas for improving OlympiaRoads.com and maybe we’ll decide more development is in order.

Thanks, and take care!

– Olympia Roads Team

Who are these guys, though?

Book pictures from my Powells trip

March 2, 2011 / / 0 Comments

I go to Powells every few months, and this time it was to spend down some Christmas giftcard money. In addition to three books (Content, The Laurels Are Cut Down and The Good Rain), I got these off dust jackets of books I didn’t buy:

Archie Binns, the sailing pimp:

And, the only photo evidence I’ve ever seen of Gordon Newell, probably the best historian of Olympia ever:

Olyroads.com, a really decent try

February 28, 2011 / / 0 Comments

During the snow storm last week, someone (not the city) put up olyroads.com and olympiaroads.com, which showed weather related road closures across town. It seems to be a simple trick of pulling information from olympiawa.gov and republishing it on a mobile friendly website, but its interesting enough.

Aside from calling it the wrong thing (its not a mobile app, its a mobile friendly web page), it does show the need for some services that in a very simple way and on a local level, let you know what is going on out there. I sent an email to their contact address, asking if they were thinking of branching out into other road related information (construction updates).

One thing does bug me, there’s no information about who set the site up. No name on the site itself, no name on the email I got, and the domain registration is anonymous as far as I can tell. That’s weird.

Snapshot Olympia (circa 1999): “Having money is less important than doing something”

February 28, 2011 / / 0 Comments

This is a VHS to Youtube quality video is really worth the watch, a lot of good stuff to take from what this video calls the DIY culture in the late 90s. Here’s just a few other thoughts:

1. Strange b-roll shot of the Spooner Berry farm at around 2:20.

2. This movie is like a first cut of a portion of “Go with the Flow,” which if you haven’t seen, is awesome. You can check it out from the library here.

3. There is a quote at about 9:15 where someone is talking about how they approach a new project. The first step is going to the library and researching as much as they can about it. I like that sentiment.

4. What ever happened to the Olympia Film Ranch? I saw some references to it on the OFS site today, but nothing at all direct as if it was a happening thing.

2011 Northwest Book Mission: On second thought with The Big Burn

February 24, 2011 / / 0 Comments

Me over on Goodreads:

What struck me most about this book was the discussion of the political debate at the time. This will sound as more naive than I am, but nothing has changed in terms of how political debate happens. 

Towards the end of the book, Egan points out that Pinchot understands how events need to have a narrative, and the side that succeeds in creating the most compelling narrative wins.
My only criticism would be that the end of the book seems a bit disjointed when he tries to tie up lose ends. Otherwise, great book.

(UPDATED 2-24-11) On second thought: I think this book missed some major points of view. Well, maybe not missed them, but I think Egan messed up by focusing too much on Roosevelt and Pinchot and not enough on Ed Pulaski. 

In the book, the constant coming back to Roosevelt and Pinchot took away from the history of the fire itself and made it more about their personal history. If Egan had focused more on Pulaski, I think he could have a much more fruitful narrative on the relationship between East Coast and Mountain West. Pulaski seems to embody the well meaning but frustrated attitude towards the East that almost embodies the Moutain West. By making too much of Roosevelt and Pinchot, Egan makes Pulaski seem unreasonable. Even, when in the actual history, he is the most reasonable of all the players.

2011 Northwest Book Mission: my Northwest Shelve

February 24, 2011 / / 0 Comments

In the past few years I’ve been in the habit of noting a book of local interest and then filing it away for later reading. While they’ve been a large part of my reading list for years, since my time to read has been narrowed, they’ve been falling by the wayside.

So, this year, for no other reason that the list of books to read has gotten to long, my book mission is to polish off as many of these as I can. Here’s the list of read and to-read books so far. The big ones I’ve tackled so far have been Winter Brothers, Breaking Blue and the Big Burn. I was actually surprised by how good a read Winter Brothers was the second time around (didn’t even get through the first chapter on the first try).

Also, I should be posting my reviews here as well as Goodreads. I have a “on second thought” review of the Big Burn, which I’ll try to post today.

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