Submitted and authored by Emily Lerman Photo by Jasmic is back in the building via Flickr Los Angeles is a big city, which means there are lots of ways to get involved in the community and lend a helping hand. Here are just a few ideas... TUTOR A HOMELESS CHILD: Since 1993, School on Wheels volunteers have traveled to homeless shelters, foster homes and libraries around the city tutoring homeless children from Kindergarten through 12th......

Photo by S.C. Asher via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr READING Janet Sarbanes and Marisa Silver read excerpts from their new short story books Army of One and Babe in Paradise. Both authors will be available for signings after the readings. 6 p.m. // The Hammer Museum // 10899 Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles // (310) 443-7000 // $5 TEA If haven’t finished celebrating Mother’s Day, stop by Vroman’s Bookstore for a special......

I'm actually a little hesitant to tell you about Junot Díaz's reading, scheduled for Monday, March 17th at the Hammer Museum -- I mean, yeah, "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" was one of the best books of 2007, he's been nominated for a Los Angeles Times Book Prize for fiction, and he's a fantastic speaker and reader. But then half of Los Angeles will show up to hear the Dominican-born, Jersey-raised professor......

Many LAist staffers, contributors and readers were deeply troubled by the news of Dutton's closure. We all have a favorite memory of Dutton's - a particular book we discovered there, an admired author we met at a reading, a certain afternoon spent browsing. We'd like to honor the many unique memories of Dutton's that we all share with a series of posts about what Dutton's meant to us and what it meant to you. Our......

Is this the best seat in the house? | Photo by neonspecs via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr TV: WATCH THE OSCARS LAist's own TV Junkie has already given us the deets (and some alternatives), but in case you missed it, the 80th Annual Academy Awards are tonight, live from our very own Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Settle into your favorite spot in front of your tee vee and tune in along......

Jason Williams the Star of 1974 Porn Flick, Flesh Gordon ("not to be confused with the original Flash Gordon") is looking for a Writer to Tell His Story. Aside from being an incredible source for houses, hookers, haikus and everything in between, Craigslist can also a great source of entertainment. Reading through the listings under the personal section, especially "casual encounters" and "missed connections" can serve as a much needed distraction on one of......

Sometimes too much holiday cheer is a very, very bad thing. Especially the liquid kind. Hence, the lateness of today's column. But here's the down and dirty on what's happening around town tonight: SPECTACULAR: The Super Sexy Christmas Spectacular takes place at El Cid tonight with Terry Beeman's Hollywood Pin-up Girls' burlesque dance showcase. Tapas. Drinks. Flamenco. Sounds like a very dangerous combo. We're in. 10 pm // El Cid, 4212 Sunset Blvd., Los......

LA is a gadget kind of town. We’re also, it seems, swiftly becoming quite the literary town. And so, as the year draws nigh and you scramble around the city trying to score the latest whatever for your loved ones this holiday season, it would be wrong of us to ignore Kindle. Amazon’s Kindle has been out for a month now. Many in the book world deemed it a failure from the outset. Many booklovers......

My brother is a wine snob. What I love about him though, with all his tattoos and his refusal to wear anything other than shorts and flip-flops regardless of weather, is that he isn't a real snob. He knows good wine. He seeks it out. But he's all about finding the best wine at a great price. When he's in town, he wants to visit every wine bar, wine boutique and wine warehouse in LA.......

Monday William Shatner presents Star Trek: The Academy - Collision Course 7pm @ Book Soup Janet Fitch presents Paint it Black 7pm @ Vroman's Robin Maxwell presents Mademoiselle Boleyn 7pm @ Dutton's Memorial Reading for Mutanabbi Street with Chris Abani, Beau Beausoleil, Laila Lalami, Suzanne Lummis, Majid Naficy, Marisela Norte, Sholeh Wolpe & Terry Wolverton 7pm @ Centraly Library Tuesday Judith Freeman presents The Long Embrace 7pm @ Dutton's Anthony Hernandez signs Waiting, Sitting,......

Making the fight that "Los Angeles is not Manhattanizing," William Fulton of the School of Planning, Policy and Development at USC lays down the groundwork on what LA was supposed to be and why it never happened in one of the single most informative articles about Los Angeles that we've read in recent months:In the 1970s, when L.A.'s suburbs began sprouting, the city adopted, in 1974, an innovative general zoning plan that called for......

For the third week in a row, the Cycling Community will be massing at the Pasadena City Council speaker’s podium, protesting the City’s efforts to pass an ordinance (.pdf) that will prohibit bicyclists from riding more than two abreast in any public street. The City of Pasadena, who earned the title of "most bike-friendly city in Los Angeles County" in 2004, claims that the ordinance is a simple attempt to manage the user group......

Monday Chuck Palahniuk presents Rant: An Oral Biography of Buster Casey 6:30pm @ Vroman's Tony Cohan signs Mexican Days 7pm @ Dutton's Donna Hogan (Anna Nicole's Sister) presents The Life and Death of Anna Nicole Smith 7pm @ Book Soup Rick Riordan signs The Titan's Curse 7pm @ Borders, Torrance Joan Didion discusses The Year of Magical Thinking 8pm @ Music Center Tuesday Tish Cohen & Rex Pickett present Town House 7pm @ Book......

Monday T.C. Boyle reads and chats with David Ulin 7pm @ Mark Taper Forum Jennifer Kaufman & Karen Mack present Literacy and Longing in L.A. 7pm @ Studio Branch Library Denise Hamilton & contributors signs Los Angeles Noir 7pm @ Borders Torrance Pat Montandon discusses Oh, the Hell of It All 7pm @ Vroman's Tuesday Barry Glassner discusses The Gospel of Food 7pm @ Central Library Kirk Douglas signs Let's Face It 7pm @......

A Word or 36: Baseball season is just starting up folks, am not sure how comprehensively I should be posting gametimes on TV Junkie. Weeknights I will be putting gametimes for the Dodgers and Angels here. Any feedback is appreciated. Tonight - Friday - April 6th, 2007 A's @ Angels (KCOP, 7:00 p.m.) Lakers @ Sonics (KCAL, 7:30 p.m.) Ghost Whisperer/Close to Home/NUMB3RS (CBS, 8-11:00 p.m.) From the paranormal to terrorists, all new stuff.......

One Man: No War No War No War No War! A Crowd of Kids enters, watches the Man who goes from chanting to ranting Teacher (Crowd Leader): Look closely and listen up, kids. This is an antiwar protester. 1st Kid: Ancient History. 2nd Kid: Old School. 3rd Kid: Heavy. The Crowd watches the Protester as he works himself into a lather, repeating: "No War!" in as many different ways and with as much passion,......

It looks like neighborhood councils are back in style with two new hires for General Manager and Assistant General Manager at the city's Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE). Their first "whirlwind" week on the job has come on the heels of two new neighborhood councils: Panorama City and Rampart (making a total of 89 councils in LA). In their first letters to the public and neighborhood council members, General Manager Carol Baker Tharp shares......

Monday Barney Hoskyns presents Hotel California 7pm @ Book Soup Christopher Nyerges discusses How To Survive Anywhere 7pm @ Vroman’s Robert Crais signs The Watchman 7pm @ Borders Torrance Dennis Cooper in discussion with the writers of Userlands 7:30pm @ Skylight Books Tuesday Chad Kultgen presents Average American Male 7pm @ Book Soup Jane Smiley discusses Ten Days in the Hills 7pm @ Vroman’s Allison L. Bailey, Frances A. Butler, Margaret Heritage, and Norma......

Friday was the 50th birthday of Dr. Seuss' Cat in the Hat. A few area schools honored the occasion with special events including the release of "THE SEUSS IS LOOSE!: Young Lil' Hats, Writing All That," at The Watts Learning Center charter school. Cabrillo Elementary in Hawthorne went all out for the good doc with a Read-a-Thon and a Green Eggs and Ham Cookoff, and the Monterey Park Bruggemeyer Library served birthday cake while hat-wearing......

It's the beginning of the year and we haven't even cracked a new book. Have you? Instead of feeling guilty for sitting on your lazy duff, go check out a reading. It's free, it's easy -- and they'll read to you! All you have to do is show up, sit back and heckle when the mood strikes. Actually, heckling during a reading is really kind of lame. That's more for Laugh Factory types. If......

At LAist, we believe in literacy and we believe in the power of the printed word. And, we love books. If you feel the same way and want to meet others who share your feelings, head on over to the West Hollywood Book Fair tomorrow. From the official site: Join more than 300 authors, 100 exhibitors, and 25,000 guests at the 5th Annual West Hollywood Book Fair. This year’s Book Fair will include an......

As you may already know, LAist likes to showcase neighborhoods that are unique, interesting and fun to go to. There are a lot of those in LA and we are lucky because of it. We also like to highlight places, restaurants or stores that go the extra mile to ensure that the customer gets what he or she wants and leaves happy. This time around its a store that caters to the comic book......

Mon 6/12 - Boy Kill Boy / Monsters are Waiting @ Spaceland (Free) – Spaceland's always a safe bet on Monday night. London’s Boy Kill Boy play that catchy dance-rock that you might like if you’re into Bloc Party and Franz Ferdinand. They’ve been on tour with Charlatans and Echo & the Bunnymen, so take advantage of seeing them for free. They’re also playing Lollapalooza and the Reading and Leeds festivals. Their first single,......

Completely by accident, Mr. Postman put this month’s issues of AARP in LAist’s mailbox. So, we decided before we returned it to our neighbors, we’d have a little look through. It happens to be their SUPER July/August 2006 issue. We know it just turned June, but then again when we were at an 11AM graduation this weekend, grandparents started showing up at 9AM proving they like to be early. So we sat down last......

Monday: Chill with Winos It’s Blue Monday at Silver Lake Wine from 5:00 – 9:00 p.m. No RSVPs required for tonight’s triptych wine tasting with cheese from the Cheese Store of Silver Lake. Tuesday: Weekly Poetry in the Valley Hosted by Kirk Lumpkin, every Tuesday night is open mic night with the Cobalt Poets at the Cobalt Café in Canoga Park. They promise a very welcoming crowd for newcomers, but just wait until your......

Our foodbloogers were called away this week so we're late to the table of the ruckus that's been caused by an article in the March issue of Food & Wine. Columnist Pete Wells looks into food blogs and finds, more often than not, "tiny empires of boredom." And what happens? The emperors get pissed! Responding to Wells' accusation that "eating a cheese sandwich qualifies as a hot scoop for legions of bloggers," they declared......

LAist was at The Comedy Central Stage at The Hudson last night and Illeana Douglas read aloud: Los Angeles is Magic. It's yellow-orange-red and the smog makes everything blurry in a good way. I hate when people come to Los Angeles and just bitch, bitch bitch. I know it's not New York. I know it's not Chicago. Yes, some of the people here are fake. Shut up and go home. Those are Jill Soloway's......

The ability to “read” customers is a pleasant attribute in a neighborhood bookstore. A gentleman, whose name we did not catch, at Chevalier’s Books on Larchmont Boulevard helped us select a birthday present for a friend. Armed with basic information — likes nonfiction, considering a career move to teaching or counseling — he made entirely appropriate suggestions. The first, Regarding the Pain of Others, by Susan Sontag, would have been relevant given our friend’s......

We wish we had known about this last week. The Library Foundation of Los Angeles honored Harper Lee with the Literary Award at their awards dinner last Thursday and she actually showed up! The famously reclusive author was compelled by Gregory Peck's widow to attend the ceremony which also celebrated the tenth anniversary of The Gregory Peck Reading Series. The cost to attend the 10th annual awards ceremony, held at the City National Plaza......

• Tonight the Fahey/Klein Gallery presents the opening reception for "Unbounded Youth," an exhibit of photographs by David Drebin, Mona Kuhn and Nathaniel Welch. The reception is from 7 – 9 PM, and the show runs through March 12th. • At Tower on Sunset, meet film legend Ray Harryhausen at 5 PM, when he makes an in-store appearance. For more information, call (310) 657-3344. • Tonight the Aero Theatre screens the epic and beautiful Lawrence......