Don't be angsty like this lady...go out tonight! / Photo by Plankton 4:20 via LAist's flickr pool. FILM “Animation Nite: From Halifax with Love” is a program at the Echo Park Film Center that features short animated and semi-animated films by women who’ve all lived in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, eh. The screening includes work by host Siloën Daley and six others. Music by local band Foot Foot follows. 7:30 // Echo Park Film......

Family, the great little bookstore on Fairfax is celebrating its one-year anniversary with a huge art show that opens tonight at 8pm and you're invited. The show is a "Thank You" to all those who've made Family's first year a success. And what a Thank You it is - the 26 artists they've assembled for this celebratory art show are impressive and reflect everything about the store that we love - eclectic and slightly off-kilter,......

Artist: Beck Album: Odelay Deluxe Edition Label: UMe Release Date: January 29th, 2008 I wish I could put a promo track up with this post but UMe won't let me so it's their loss. Just hum "Devil's Haircut" while you read. It's been a dozen years since Beck Hanson put out his best album, Odelay, and listening to this expanded reissue just confirms that this release was his peak (to date). This is not to......

It’s easy to forget that there’s a thriving literary scene here in LA. It’s also easy to lose sight of the fact that there are people who are committed to doing good, making change and making the city a better place for the next generation. 826LA manages to combine all of these things at once. The brainchild of hipster deity Dave Eggers, the family of non-profits now known as 826 National was originated in......

Protest over national vs. regional chains, the never-ending debate over the place of cars and bicycles in our metropolises, professional sports scandals, remembering a solemn day, and being issued a search warrant - it all happened across our sites this week! Another banner week at Chicagoist started off with daily reports from food writer Lisa Shames on her attempt to eat only locally grown and raised foodstuffs all week as part of a farmers......

Monday Calvin Trillin discusses About Alice 7pm @ Vroman’s Norah Vincent presents Self Made Man 7pm @ Borders Century City Tuesday David Ulin, LA Times book editor, talks with Calvin Trillin 7pm @ Central Library Rachel Ballon signs The Writer’s Portable Therapist 7pm @ Dutton’s Brentwood Deborah Eisenberg presents Twilight of the Superheroes 7pm @ Hammer Museum Wednesday Chris Abani presents The Virgin of Flames 7pm @ EsoWon Books Felicity Huffman & Patricia Wolf......

Look. We know how it’s going to go down. By this time tomorrow, Oscar nominees will be announced and madness will ensue. There will be the campaigning amongst friends. The mad dash to see the films you haven’t seen. The endless questioning about who should win, who shouldn’t win and who should never be allowed to direct again. In certain circles, the mad “What will they wear? Who will they wear?”debating will also begin.......

MONDAY • At Largo, show up around 8 PM to witness the Greg Proops Chat Show with Dave Eggers. • Ludovic Lefebvre, chef at Bastide on Melrose, signs his new book Crave: The Feast of the Five Senses at 7:00 PM at Vroman's in Pasadena.......

Tonight at LACMA, see a screening of the 1969 Marlon Brando film Queimada. Previously released only in a shortened, dubbed English version titled Burn!, the museum will be showing the full, original Italian version with English subtitles at 7:30 PM. Also at 7:30 PM, Skylight Books is hosting a free conversation between writers Stephen Elliott and Joshua Bearman. Both are known for their socially and politically charged fiction (and that they are published by......

Aside from the Vice Presidential debates, there are some events going on around town. If you decide to go out rather than remain home, glued to the TV as Cheney and Edwards duke it out, you can always catch the highlights on the radio while on your way to one of these fine events. At UCLA, "Where's My Democracy?" comes to Royce Hall. Downtown For Democracy has brought together a group of writers who......

Some guy named Dave Eggers was in town recently. We think he's a writer or something. Literary blog The Elegant Variation has published Katherine Darnell's report of Tuesday's Book Soup event. She enjoyed the show but was a bit dissatisfied with Eggers & Co's hard sell. According to Ms. Darnell, Eggers plans to open an LA-branch of his nonprofit writing center, 826 Valencia, which provides tutoring and writing skills workshops for kids. They're seeking......

As the Domino's commercial on TV last night pointed out, Tuesday is the least popular night of the week. It isn't the dreaded Monday, nor that Happy Hump Day Wednesday, nor even the nearly-Friday Thursday. It is just a day where we all sit around contemplating the better part of the week left ahead and all the commuting, laundry, car washing, marketing and other inanities that need to be taken care of during the......