Alec Clayton 
The paragraphs above are from the opening of Dawud H. Al-Malik memoir, (a work in progress, as edited by James O’Barr) published in Mud Flat Shorts (mostly fiction), a collection of thirty-one great stories by nineteen magnificent writers published by Mud Flat Press. Gabi met Dawud when he and she were attending the Olympia Friends …
Jack Butler, author of Living in Little Rock With Miss Little Rock. JuJitsu for Christ, Nightshade, is a great writer and a great friend. Also published by us at Mud Flat Press are Jack’s books: Practicing Zen Without a Licence and Christmas on a Distant Planet (illustrated by Gabi Clayton.) We met Jack at Mississippi …
My hair, where I have hair—a patch like a medieval monk’s tonsorial—was a madly matted yellow mess. The yellow comes from medicine during surgery and medicine infused tape. When I was finally able to take a shower, that got much of the yellow out. Now I can wash my head and get rid of some …
We got home from a day and a night in Overlake Hospital in Bellevue Sunday afternoon, the third hospital and fifth or sixth medical facility this year—the year is only two months old. Coincidentally, our three-year-old granddaughter who is far too young to understand, spent the same night in another hospital with Parainfluenza and Coronavirus …
by Alec Clayton I’d like to say a word or two about my wife, Gabi Clayton’s art. Her paintings and drawings—the difference being more a matter of attitude than of media; i.e., whether they’re done with paint and brushes or pencil or pixels on an iPad—are as unique and as substantial as any you’re …
After having been postponed earlier in the season. Lauren Gunderson’s Silent Sky opened at the newly remodeled Tacoma Little Theatre Friday, July 8, stunningly directed by Pug Bujeaud with an exceptional cast and a set and video projections by Blake York that are as unique and stunning as any this reviewer has seen locally. …
“… I had bought a summer suit which I thought looked pretty nice, which had been altered for me, and which I decided to wear home. … the minute I stepped outside, two policemen grabbed me for hard questioning. Then they let me go with an apology, explaining that a man had just robbed a …
About forty years ago I read an article about Eudora Welty in which the writer praised her sense of place. That’s it! I thought. A sense of place. It needs to be a strong element in any fiction worth reading. Welty did it with accents, quirks of speech, and descriptions of houses, towns, the land …
People who were here in Olympia, Washington in the early days of LGBTQ activism might recall the Smithfield Cafe and Hands Off Washington and Pride parades when they were tiny and it took guts to march or even stand on the curb and cheer as the courageous ones passed by. And a bit later the …
by Alec Clayton I don’t know what triggered these memories from when I was young and single and perpetually horny. First, when I was living in Nashville I had a girlfriend who was six feet tall and gorgeous. I claimed to be five-foot-four at the time, but I might have been stretching it a bit. …