Getty Center Garden Now in Bloom | Photo by pcphoto via Flickr Monday Junot Díaz presents The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao 7pm @ Hammer Museum Martha Sherrill presents Dog Man: An Uncommon Life on a Faraway Mountain 7pm @ Vroman's Gene Wilder signs The Woman Who Wouldn't 7:30pm @ Barnes & Noble, The Grove Tuesday Sue Miller discusses The Senator's Wife with Michelle Huneven 6pm @ Central Library Micheline Aharonian Marcom presents......

- Attention Blacks - Dreamworks wants you to audition to be Donkey for the Broadway production of Shrek - Defamer - Was Mayor Tony up to the same monkeybusiness that the Frisco Mayor admitted to? - LA Observed - Now that we know where the Westside of LA begins (La Cienega), has the Associated Press determined that Toluca Lake is in the Hollywood Hills? - LA Brain Terrain - Muslim man in Van Nuys......

Is Indio the new Austin? Over two back-to-back weekends this spring, scores of the best indie, rock, pop, electronic, and country music will play to tens of thousands outside Palm Springs. The last weekend of April will bring three days of Coachella, and the following weekend will see the first Stagecoach country festival. Voici: Saturday, May 5, 2007: George Strait, Alan Jackson, Sara Evans, Jason Aldean, Eric Church, Willie Nelson, Lucinda Williams, Neko Case,......

So if you don't feel like driving that hour+ to some party in the Valley, or to some party anywhere in Los Angeles, you can always turn on the TV. There's nothing like watching the 3-hour tape-delayed disco ball drop to reaffirm your existence. Tomorrow - Sunday - New Years Eve "Twilight Zone Marathon" (SciFi, ALL DAY) "Seinfeld Marathon" (TBS, ALL DAY) "Marx Brothers Marathon" (TCM, starting at 5:15 p.m.) (other marathons include "Ace......

Because you really can't get too much of a good thing, the good people of Goldenvoice announced last night that this year's hugely successful Coachella music and arts festival will grow to a three-day-and-night affair on the sprawling polo fields in Indio outside Palm Springs. The Miracle Mile concert promoters also announced that the weekend after Coachella they will throw a two-day country festival that will include stages for alt-country, bluegrass, and even storytelling.......

Longtime LA Times pop music editor Robert Hilburn has taken the Tribune company's buyout package and will be leaving the paper, LA Observed reports. It was kind of nice to have a stiffening baby boomer still going out to concerts and writing about new musical acts like they were as relevant to his generation as, say, visiting LACMA or seeing Garrison Keillor at the Hollywood Bowl. Recent changes at the paper, including the current......