I recently finished reading Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food", and I couldn't wait to get out to the Studio City farmer's market this morning. I stuck a couple of twenty-dollar bills in my back pocket and threw a "Ventura County Fair!!!" tote bag over my arm. $22.50 and about half an hour later, I lugged this load home: one bunch of sweet carrots, one large head of cabbage, one bunch rainbow chard, three......

Monday Michael Pollan and Barry Glassner discuss In Defense of Food 7pm @ Central Library Cindy Pierce and Edie Thys Morgan presents Finding the Doorbell 7pm @ Book Soup Tuesday Traci Slatton presents Immortal 6:30pm @ Metropolis Books Joe McGinniss and special guest Bret Easton Ellis present The Delivery Man 7pm @ Book Soup Terri Cheney discusses and signs Manic: A Memoir 7pm @ Vroman's Gary Goldberg presents Sit, Ubu, Sit 7pm @ Dutton's......

Cellos take center stage at the Colburn School tonight | Photo by Lachlan via flickr. FILM Before Alan Alda brought the character Hawkeye Pierce to homes everywhere in the M*A*S*H television series, Donald Sutherland (Keifer’s dad) played the role on the big screen in the Robert Altman-directed film (MASH). In both, though, the plot remains the same: the men who lived in “The Swamp” didn’t care much for military decorum during the Korean war.......

The LA Weekly's Jonathan Gold names his "Top Ten Dishes of 2007" and curious palates all over the Southland take note. His picks include the porcetta at Brentwood's Vicenti (a rotisserie-cooked piece of pork where the "loin and belly are wrapped into a spiral, seasoned with fennel, and spit-roasted to a crackling, licorice-y succulence"), Donut Man's Strawberry Donut, and My Taco's Barbacoa (lamb), which we fell in love with too, when we checked out Garvanza.......

Could you do the 100 Yard Diet? Oakland blogger YourCityFarmer spent the entire month of July eating only things she grew, raised, and made herself: and that includes meat. New Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food, coming in November! Also, he shares some of his favorite reads with Newsweek. EaterLA is reporting that the kitschy German restaurant Lowenbrou Keller will be closing "when the food runs out" - but the owners plan to reopen......

Monday Anne Fadiman presents At Large and At Small: Familiar Essays 7pm @ Vroman's Susan Kandel presents Christietown 7pm @ Book Soup Lori Andrews signs The Silent Assassin 7pm @ Dutton's Tuesday Todd McCarthy presents Fast Women: The Legendary Ladies of Racing 7pm @ Book Soup Lauren Kessler presents Dancing with Rose: Finding Life in the Land of Alzheimer's 7pm @ Central Library Wednesday Armistead Maupin presents Michael Tolliver Lives 7pm @ Central Library......

Good morning LAist readers, are you already taking a break from working? Sounds good to us! Here is what you missed over the Holiday weekend. Enjoy! News & Community A look into Metro's internal newsletter. We read the weeklies so you don't have to. What do you think of the NoHo Arts District new crosswalks? New owner of the LA Times, Sam Zell, doesn't know much about newspapers or the internet. Extra Extra: Entourage,......

When the LA Alternative Press asked LAist to write 400 words "In Defense of Blogs" for a sidebar for their Blogs vs. Zines article, I did, somewhat reluctantly. I was once a Zinester: I spoke on zine panels, a zine sent me to SXSW (twice). But I stood up for blogs. Well, the paper didn't print my sidebar; instead, they used parts of it in the article; the issue is not yet online. Here......