The Mezzanine

My annual fundraising campaign at the Y is off to a great start! I talked about it in a friends-only post here and immediately got my first donation, one day before the campaign officially launched on Thursday. Now it's Sunday, and I have five donations total. Three are $25, one is $50, and one is $100! With my annualized $5-per-paycheck pledge totaling $120, that puts me $345, 69% of my goal. The sunglasses I gave away Thursday and Friday in baggies with my donation URL definitely paid for themselves already.

That's one way to make a fundraiser so much more enjoyable; take a little bit of money you could donate and use it market the campaign in a fun way instead.

And it turns out I came across a fundraiser yesterday that I might not have simply donated to, but they came up with a great way to market the campaign that was a perfect way to get me to donate. There's a very cool vegan cafe and bar here in Everett called The Bayside Cafe which I wrote about when they opened downtown. It wasn't long before they moved around the corner into a much larger space, but then they learned they'd lose their lease because we're getting a new stadium downtown.

That was terrible news at the time but everything turned out for the best. They recently took over the old Knights of Columbus lodge near the waterfront and have built something truly special there. The lower level is Everett's new queer community clubhouse Charm & Strange, opened by Adair who used to operate Catalyst Cafe, which I managed to write about three times over the years. Catalyst Cafe is no more, but Charm & Strange has so much more potential and space.

The top floor of the building houses The Attic Aurora, a private tattoo studio. If you don't know what I mean by that, the distinction is that there's no availability for walk-in tattoos, so you have to get in touch with one of the artists there and make an appointment. I might have heard of it in passing, but ended up going there yesterday thanks to a social media post from Bayside about a fundraiser they hosted last night benefiting Rooster Haus Rescue. I wasn't interested in the event, but The Attic Aurora was offering this great sheet of flash tattoos, splitting the proceeds with Rooster Haus.



I liked several of the designs, but the one with the antlers inspired by a rooster named Moose reminded me of the mythical jackalope, which we heard a lot about back in New Mexico because of the stores named after them. It wasn't clear what time the tattoos would be happening, but I shared the post in case anyone else might be interested. Then when Garrett found out about a cool aviation event yesterday, I decided to have lunch at the cafe and see if I could get a tattoo.

I'm not vegan, but I absolutely adore well-executed vegan food. It takes a lot of skill to mimic grubbin' bar food without any animal products, and Bayside really pulls it off. Like I said when I wrote about them, it's food vegans don't normally get to have and it's good enough that meat eaters shouldn't mind the substitutions. I had a fake chicken/bacon/swiss sandwich and it was great, though I wish I would have had a burger so I could try the Impossible patty. Guess I'll have to go back!

A big reason I was excited to go there yesterday is that Garrett's allergic to soy and can't eat there. And that's too bad, because he helped me sample all their food for my blog post and loved it. But now we know why he constantly had terrible stomach aches; soy is everywhere, even in meat products more often than you'd ever realize.

As I hoped, getting lunch there was the exact right call because the Whitney the tattoo artist who drew all those roosters got there about when I did and the person working in the cafe let her know I was around and interested. We went upstairs to the beautifully-remodeled space and after a fun chat and easy session, I walked out with Moose on the lowest part of my left shin.



This is my first fine line tattoo and I'm excited to see how it heals up. There's a lot of chatter online about them and how well they age, but this one has as good a chance as any to look good for a long time. The spot it's in never gets any sun, after all.

Before I headed out to lunch I decided I really wanted to get tattooed yesterday and had two backup plans for somewhat-spontaneous ink if that didn't work out. In spite of getting one yesterday, I'm trying not to get too many flash tattoos since space is at a premium, but Nathan at Lion's Paw has one I want. If he wasn't available for a walk-in, Kaya the apprentice at Burial said she would still be offering the deals from yesterday's Friday the 13th flash sheets all day Saturday. I didn't see any absolute must-haves but I like to get apprentice tattoos when I can because I feel it's important for the industry. I also liked that they had a bonus sheet of silly little designs that could be added with any other F13 flash for an additional $26.

But I got the tattoo I wanted, when I wanted, and had a fun time doing it. I also ran into Adair from Charm & Strange and asked if they'd be interested in a post on one of the blogs I used to write for. I pitched that to its new owner when I got back. I'm mostly done with local blogging for the time being but when he reached out to me a while after taking over the blog, I said I'd let him know if I found something I felt I needed to cover. Charm & Strange definitely counts, and I decided that in the spirit of community I may as well join. I just did a year as a member and can decide in a year if I want to stay a member, switch to the supporter tier, or find a different cause to support.

I'm not exactly flush with cash at the moment, but Rooster Haus and Bayside caught me at just the right time with an incentive that worked for me. And Charm & Strange is providing something to the community that I think is extremely important. Buying myself a piece of another "third place" is a pretty great opportunity, especially since as a remote worker, I don't have the traditional second place.