Weekend Poetry and Cycling

For those of you located in the area, I should mention two events close to my heart that are taking place this weekend. One is the Dead Poets’ Slam, this Saturday at 7:00pm at the excellent Skylight books. This is one of the always great Smart Gals events, organized by Christine Louise Berry. She’s got together an excellent collection of readers to throw down against each other under this year’s theme, “Monarchs vs. Minions”.

You should know that these annual slams are slammin’. They are not simply people sitting around reading poetry, but animated passionate people really breathing living flame into the poetry and throwing it at each other for points and glory! There’ll be judges* giving out these points, famous victories, and fragments of the defeated left lying twitching on the floor afterwards. (Event details here or here. See earlier posts such as this one or this one for other Smart Gals events.)

The other event is the second CicLAVia!! It is on Sunday, starting at 10:00am I think, with a similar route to the last one, which I talked about here (with photos). It was a huge success the first time around, and people who had not seen their bikes since the 1970s oil crisis tell you how pleased they were to drag them out and have a lovely day of cycling the car-free route… So get out your bike,or borrow one, and join in the thousands of LA people in a fun event. Or just come and watch and eat… (Event details here.)

-cvj

*Hmmm… Apparently one of these judges is a “well-read physicist”. I’m guessing this means “well read, for a physicist”…? Not sure about this descriptor at all… 🙂