7:00 PM – Dave Cullen: Columbine
UW Bookstore, U-District
10 years after the Columbine shootings, we’re still trying to figure out WTF happened? Cullen provides the most complete account to date. Maybe he can even answer the Why?
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Laila Lalami: Secret Son
Elliott Bay Book Co.
Debut novel from the Moroccan-born author of Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits: “The tragic loss of hope is the theme of this powerful debut … The culture and politics of contemporary Morocco are well displayed in this beautifully written tale, with the talented Lalami deftly portraying [protagonist] Youssef’s struggles for identity, work and family. A brilliant story of alienation and desperation that easily transports readers to hot, dust Casablanca.” – Library Journal.
[LINK]

2:00 PM – Mende Nazer: Slave: My True Story
SPL Central Branch, Level 1, Microsoft Auditorium
A harrowing true story of the modern slave trade. Presented as part of Seattle Reads.
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Hedgebrook Writer’s Series: Women Authoring Change
Town Hall Seattle, Downstairs, $5-10
Ruth Forman, Suheir Hammad and Uchechi Kalu
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Seattle Poetry Slam’s Annual Grand Slam: Poetry Reading
Neumo’s,
$15-$18
Featuring Patricia Smith, award winning author, journalist and slam legend.
[LINK]

10:00 AM – WPA Spring Festival: Workshops in poetry & translation
Richard Hugo House Cabaret, $60-$100
Workshops with poet laureate Sam Green, literary translator Andrea Lingenfelter and Beat poets David Meltzer and Michael Rothenberg.
[LINK]

10:00 AM – Writer’s Block Literary Festival: Student-run literary festival
UW Seattle
Workshops, readings, open mic
[LINK]

11:00 AM – Dr. Sam L. Sebesta: Response to Readers’ Theater
Barnes & Noble, University Village
Reading literacy interactive conversation group and choral reading.
[LINK]

2:00 PM – Knute Berger, Steve Scher, et al: Political Spin: A conversation about Frost/Nixon and the role of media in politics
SPL Central Branch
Seattle Theatre Group and Seattle Public Library host a lively conversation on the role of media in politics from Frost/Nixon to Couric/Palin.
[LINK]

4:00 PM – Food & Culture: Poetry Reading
SPL University Branch Library
Sharon M. Carter, Susan J. Erickson, Marion Kimes
[LINK]

4:30 PM – Brenda Miller: Blessing of the Animals
Elliott Bay Book Co.
The editor-in-chief of the Bellingham Review will read from her new book of essays. Elliott Bay calls them “luminous.”
[LINK]

7:00 PM – WPA Spring Festival: Around the World in Poetry
Richard Hugo House Theater, $10
Keely Isaak Meehan, Linden Ontjes and Christian Swenson will perform one poem in multiple mediums; then you’ll be asked to translate it back into a poem.
[LINK]

This is likely my final post on Seattle Metblogs regarding the Hunger Challenge. It’s been a pretty good week.

A friend left this comment earlier and I wanted to address it in full here.

I personally think using any kind of kitchen machine is cheating. If we are doing this hunger challenge to bring attention to low income families and their eating dilemmas, I wouldn’t expect most of them to have such machines or the will to want to make such foods.

I disagree with this assessment for a variety of reasons. First off, used pasta makers can be found for fairly cheap. I’ve also seen many kitchen machines for free on Freecycle and or for cheap on local Craigslist posts.

Second, not everyone currently on food stamps have always been poor. With the downturn in the economy, visits to area food banks and applications for food stamps have increased, showing the need from many who previously did not need these services. My household for example, has the funds right now to buy kitchen appliances with cash, but if say my husband was laid off and neither of us could find work for a year, we would still have our kitchen appliances (if we hadn’t sold them for food).

Third, just because someone is poor doesn’t mean they do not have the inclination to cook. Consider this: many in the cooking industry do not pull in large salaries, but maybe they just love to cook so much that they make it happen at home. There are also those who are going to school and working only part time (or receiving unemployment) who are eligible for food stamps.

I think there are many different types of people who can be considered poor, due to different circumstances. Those living in poverty very well likely have not always lived in poverty. All in all, these are a few of the reasons why I do not consider it cheating to use kitchen appliances during a hunger challenge.

12:00 PM – Kevin Kling: The Dog Says How
Elliott Bay Book Co.
The actor, playwright, and author stops in to read and sign during the lunch hour.
[LINK]

1:00 PM – Writer’s Block Literary Festival: Student-run literary festival
UW Seattle
Workshops, readings, open mic
[LINK]

7:00 PM – Joseph Weis: Just the Facts, Ma’am: Investigating Murder Myths
UW Club
“Drawing primarily on research on murder in Washington State and from a national study of child abduction murders, the accuracy or illusion of many apparent “facts” about murder will be examined. This is the third offering of the UW Sociology Tri-Lecture Series 2009: Genocide, Lynching, and Murder”
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Mark Rudd: Underground: My Life with SDS and the Weathermen
Elliott Bay Book Co.
The former activist is out of hiding and on a book tour. Hopefully, he won’t bump into Sarah Paln on this junket.
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Michael Cunningham: Reading
Town Hall Seattle, Great Hall, $26-40
The author of The Hours will read, accompanied by the NW Sinfonietta, and joined by special guests performing music inspired by Cunningham’s writing. MAS warning.
[LINK]

The National Film Festival for Talented Youth (NFFTY) is a festival of film screenings, film making panels, concerts by young bands and networking opportunities for young filmmakers (age 22 and under) from all over the world. It takes place here in Seattle with events at SIFF Cinema, Cinerama, and EMP/SFM. Screening include both feature and short length films in such categories as narrative, documentary, animation, experimental and music video. NFFTY runs April 24 through April 26; check out the site for full schedule. The carbon neutral festival includes a selection of 113 films by filmmakers aged 7 through 22 from 20 different US states and eight countries.

The Seattle Jewish Film Festival opened April 23 and continues through May 3. Some of the choices this weekend include Lemon Tree, a story of conflict between a Palestinian woman and her Israeli defense minister neighbor who wants to chop down her beloved lemon grove because he thinks it compromises his security (Saturday, 9:30pm at Cinerama); and One Day You Will Understand (Sunday, 6:40pm at Cinerama) in which the incomparable Jeanne Moreau stars in a drama about “Holocaust memory, reconciliation, and family”.

Northwest Film Forum offers you two choices of full length films each accompanied by a relevant short: Examined Life uses a moving camera to accompany some of the greatest thinkers of modern times (including Martha Nussbaum, Kwame Anthony Appiah and Cornel West) as they stroll or row across a lake talking about the things that are on their minds. It is paired with Portrait of a Ghost, “A portrait of a lost and decomposing jazz musician who struggles to face his past, present and future.”

Bird Song at NWFF is a luminous rendition of the tale of the Three Magi turned into a study of landscape and the human body; it’s paired with Eros, a view of a mysterious man getting ready to go out accompanied by a recording by Beat Poet Rod McKuen. And if you really like Bird Song, you’re going to want to see Waiting for Sancho, a documentary about the filming of Bird Song, director Albert Serra, his professional crew and his nonprofessional actors.

The Langston Hughes Film Festival wraps up this weekend with an excellent selection of films, workshops and presentations. If you missed Medicine for Melancholy the engaging drama about a one night stand turned into a thoughtful conversation on class, identity and urban life when it was at NWFF, you should jump on the chance to see it Friday at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center. Saturday’s highlights include a Flash animation workshop, a workshop on production values in independent cinema and Spirit of My Mother, the tale of a woman who leaves Los Angeles for Honduras to learn about her family’s culture and appease her mother’s ghost who is haunting her dreams. For complete schedule check the site.

The Grand Illusion hosts the Social Justice Film Festival, a program of film and video work done to promote social change around the world. Friday’s opening gala features Mr. Big about the eponymous undercover sting by the Mounties that would be considered entrapment in most countries, including the US. The full series of shorts and feature length films continues through Thursday; for a complete list of films see the online schedule.

Join the Grand Illusion 10pm Friday and midnight Saturday for two nights of explosive exploitation programming brought to you in conjunction with Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse Cinema programmers Lars Nilsen and Zack Carlson who will be on hand to introduce rare and unseen grindhouse epics from their extensive vaults.

Central Cinema spices things up with a Kung Fu Double Punch double feature with The Black Samurai and The Street Fighter, films whose titles tell you everything you need to know about them. Perfect with pizza and a beer or two.

Midnight at the Egyptian: Party on, dude, with Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, the stupidly wonderful comedy starring a young Keanu Reeves.

We’re heading into the 5th and final day of the Hunger Challenge here and we’re still under our $60 budget. Today’s dinner consisted of homemade pasta (1 cup flour, 1 egg) and cheater’s spaghetti sauce. We use cheater’s spaghetti sauce when tomatoes are out of season; start by sauteing onion, garlic, broccoli (stems and crown), bell pepper, and zucchini, a teaspoon of thyme, salt and pepper to taste. Add jar of sauce (I found a jar of organic sauce at Madison Market for $2.89) and simmer down. Add water. Simmer down. Repeat. As it reduces, it gains a complexity that the regular jar of sauce does not have on it’s own.

Homemade pasta is so cheap, coming it at under $0.35 for 4 servings. It requires a pasta maker though, as well as the time to produce it. It is so easy to grab packaged pasta at the store that I almost picked up a pack (we have enough left in our budget to afford it) but we had the flour and the egg on hand anyway.

When we are not taking this Challenge, we normally attempt to adhere to a diet that is predominantly vegetarian. It saves money and also can be healthier in many respects. Our diet this week can be compared to the vegetarian food pyramid, though we did have bacon and turkey sausage in small portions on a few days.

Overall, this challenge really helped us get back on the “bandwagon”, so to speak, for a healthier diet. One of the biggest fears I had going into this was the chance that I would get really cranky. When I don’t eat right, my blood sugar tanks, and I get a bit irrational. The term I have heard is “hangry”. Earlier I did write a letter to my stomach, but it was mostly in good humor. Usually if I don’t take a snack or eat a healthy breakfast, I will grab something at one of the numerous cafe’s on the UW campus or just head to a restaurant for lunch. I haven’t been able to do this all week and I didn’t have a single instance of being “hangry”.

Lastly, I have been browsing my favorite food sites looking for the very first thing I am going to make on Saturday after the challenge has ended. It’s currently a cross between Lemon Cake or grilled cheese sandwiches w/ a bowl of tomato soup.

Be sure to check out the week’s worth of blog roundups and other information related to the Hunger Challenge here.

By now we’ve all heard of the Snuggie, the “blanket with sleeves” which I like to think of as continued proof that P.T. Barnum’s most famous business maxim was completely on the money.

Proof that the Snuggie has reached mass pop culture saturation level can be found in events like the Seattle Snuggie Pub Crawl. Inspired by similar events around the country, the Seattle Snuggie Pub Crawl invites you to put on your Snuggie and join in a tour of Ballard bars. For extra excitement, be extra creative with your Snuggie by making it the centerpiece of a more elabortate costume. Don’t have a Snuggie? A “slanket” of any sort is still welcome on the crawl, but people showing up without any sort of Snuggie/slanket apparel will meet with severe disappoval and won’t get any of the advantages that go to the Snuggie wearers, like drink specials (Ballard Loft is offering happy hour drink specials to crawlers between 7 -9 with a free drink for the first 50 crawlers to turn in a donation for Northwest Harvest).

Why walk around Ballard wearing a Snuggie? “Why not?” asks Seattle Snuggie, who are upping the ante by asking participants to bring non-perishable food items to donate to Northwest Harvest. From the starting point at Ballard Loft the crawl continues on to Moshi Moshi Sushi, Wingmasters and Conor Byrne. To RSVP or just get more details, visit the Seattle Snuggie site.

We’re all interested in a little savings these days, whether you’re patronizing happy hours instead of those slightly-less-happy-full-priced-hours or walking more than driving, if you’re in West Seattle this weekend, you can save your sales tax and find some discounts at 30 different merchants at the West Seattle Junction on Saturday.

Participating businesses will have a red balloon on display.

Mountainfilm is a 31-year-old environmentally focused film and culture festival held high up on the Rockies in Telluride, Colorado. Nearly a decade ago, the festival’s organizers decided to expand their reach by sending part of the festival on the road in a tour across the nation. This year a selection of the 2009 festival’s films will be arriving in Seattle for a showing on Friday, April 24 and Saturday, April 25.

Presented locally by the Outdoors for All Foundation, screenings take place at the Magnuson Park Community Center and Theater, Magnuson Park Building 47 (7110 – 62nd Ave NE) with doors at 6:00 pm and films at 7. Buy tickets online or take your chances at the door.

A ten minute segment of Play Gravity (two Swiss skiers perform crazy, scary stunts in the mountains of Alaska) opens both programs, but otherwise the selection of films varies. Friday nights films include a kayak tour of the stunning and dangerous Pandi River in New Guinea, rehabilitating elephants and a young woman boxer. Saturday take a look at a small town barbershop, a metaphorical examination of the world’s water cycle and a couple’s bicycle trip from Mongolia to India.

Festival ticket sales go to support the Outdoors for All organization whose admirable mission is to provide year-round instruction in outdoor recreation for people with physical, developmental and sensory disabilities; among the activities they offer are showboarding, snowshoeing, skiing, cycling, rafting, hiking, canoeing, kayaking, rockclimbing and camping.