I’m off to Michigan for a few days of family time and snowy reminders of why it’s nice to live in Atlanta. Your Weekend To-Do List is already up, and Daily To-Do Lists will continue to post every day, but regular posting will resume late next week.

To amuse you till then, 14 seconds of a sleepy kitten:

Continue reading Save some of the fun for when I’m back! »

Here, Megan Gogerty tells the story about that time she met Hillary Clinton. (If you can’t see the video, click on the blog headline.)

That meeting became a monologue, a 10-minute piece she performed for an Iowa theater festival audience, despite the exhausting truth that Gogerty was 11 days into motherhood.

Megan Gogerty: Hillary Clinton got her pregnant.

They loved it and spoke so fondly of it that Gogerty, 34, thought she could make it into a longer piece, a one-woman show. When she approached the Riverside Theatre in Iowa City, they responded with an enthusiastic “Great!” and the request for a title within two weeks. The one she came up with, “Megan Gogerty Loves You Very Much,” was fine. “A fine title,” she even calls it now.

When she really bore down on what the show was about, she saw awakenings in politics and family life, her personal journey — with some fictional tweaks. She saw her life between Sept. 11, 2001 and November, 2008. She saw her young son, and the …

Continue reading ‘Hillary Clinton Got Me Pregnant’ makes its Atlanta debut »

Continuing this trend of multi-venue, personalized season tickets, Broadway Across America announced this week that theatergoers can make their own  season package of Broadway shows coming to the Fox Theatre and Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre this year and next.

I understand there’s no discount for buying tickets this way, but because single tickets haven’t gone on sale for most of the shows, package buyers will have access to better seats. Ticket buyers must select at least three of the eight shows included. Tickets are available starting Nov. 8 at www.broadwayacrossamerica.com/atlanta or 800-278-4447.

Here are the shows available for purchase:
“The 39 Steps,” Cobb Energy Centre, Dec. 1-6, 2009
“Young Frankenstein,” Fox, Jan. 26-31, 2010
“Mamma Mia!” Fox, Feb. 9-14, 2010
“Spring Awakening,” Fox, March 9-14, 2010
“Fiddler on the Roof,” Cobb Energy, March 16-21, 2010
“South Pacific,” Fox,” April 6-11, 2010
“Mary Poppins,” Fox, April 29-May 16, 2010
“Avenue Q,” Cobb …

Continue reading Broadway series ticket packages for Fox and Cobb Energy »

Henok Demisse continued the week-long task of cleaning the 10 Murano glass chandeliers at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in 2008. AJC file photo

For this week’s Access Points photo game, shazzzzee was the first to name what it was and where you can find it: it’s a chandelier at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre. I think CJ wins, too, for the category I just invented, “Best Abstract and/or Romantic Response,” for saying it was like a  cloudy sky over Lake Lanier.

Chandeliers at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center. AJC/Jamie Gumbrecht

There are 10 of these Murano glass chandeliers, each about weighing nearly 600 pounds. They’re made of 150 individual pieces of hand-blown glass, colored with silver and gold. They were designed for the center by Andromeda International, which also did work for the W Hotel in Atlanta.

You can get a lot of views of them: through the glass wall in front of the buliding, strung high above you on the ground floor, or relatively close if you …

Continue reading Access Points 15: Cobb Energy Centre chandelier »

Art: First Thursdays Downtown Art Walk, 5-8 p.m., various locations, downtown Atlanta. FREE.

Books: Panel discussion of “Habits of Being:  Flannery O’Connor and Sally Fitzgerald,” 4 p.m., Emory’s Robert W. Woodruff Library, Atlanta. FREE.

For families: Treasure Hunt lecture with Lance McAfee, 7 p.m., Tellus Northwest Georgia Science Museum, Cartersville.

Music: Metalocalypse’s Dethklok, Mastodon, Converge, and High on Fire perform, 6:30 p.m., The Tabernacle, Atlanta.

Sports: Atlanta Thrashers vs. Columbus Blue Jackets, 7 p.m., Philips Arena, Atlanta.

Stage: “Hillary Clinton Got Me Pregnant” opens, 8 p.m., 7 Stages, Atlanta.

Stage: Karen Finley gives a lecture as Jackie Kennedy in “The Jackie Look,” 4:30 p.m., Rialto Center for the Arts, Atlanta. FREE.

Got an event, venue, restaurant or performance in and around Atlanta? Add it to the AccessAtlanta.com calendar.

For instant updates, follow @insideaccess on Twitter.

Continue reading To do list: November 5 »

Cesar Salinas at the Indian Festival and Pow Wow in 2002. The festival returns to Stone Mountain Park Nov. 5-8.

This weekend is all about sports, stage and a few really fantastic festivals. I’ll be away in Michigan, visiting the family, but Atlanta will clearly have a grand old time while I’m gone. As always, keep an eye on the Atlanta Music Scene blog for more live music picks and ticket info. If you’ve got more suggestions for this weekend, feel free to share them in the comments! – Jamie G.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6

Art: Final weekend for “On the Flip Side,” 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Spruill Center Gallery, Atlanta. FREE. Read more.

Books: Atlanta Queer Lit Festival continues through Nov. 8, various locations, Atlanta. FREE.

Festival: 10th Indian Festival and Pow-Wow continues through Nov. 8, Stone Mountain Park, Stone Mountain.

History: “All Roads Lead to DeKalb” exhibit continues, 10 a.m.-4 p.m., Old Courthouse, Decatur. FREE.

Movies: Pirate Night at Martinis and IMAX, 5:30-10 p.m., …

Continue reading Weekend to do list: November 6-8 »

For this week's Access Points game, can you guess what and where this is?

For those who haven’t played our photo game before, every week I post a photo of something fun in the Atlanta area, and ask readers to guess what and where it is. The next day, I’ll post the answer and the story behind it. For examples, check out our earlier Access Points games.

If you know what it is and where to find it, share in the comments, or on Twitter @insideaccess! I’ll reveal the answer at 4 p.m. Thursday!

Continue reading Access Points 15: Can you guess what and where this is? »

Leona Davis and Carl Black visited the 2004 Decatur Wine Festival. The festival returns Nov. 7. AJC file photo

I went to a wine tasting at Tiny Bistro the other night, before I remembered how little I know about grapes, noses and oak barrels. My occasional wine purchases are usually made by selecting bottles with bicycles on the labels because, hey, I ride a bike, too!

It felt a like a Tupperware party where you leave a little warmer than you came. A grand time was had chatting with our table neighbors and sipping on whatever was put in front of us, but I left wondering what guidance I could possibly offer you for this weekend’s Decatur Wine Festival.

There’s the obvious stuff: it’s a fund-raiser for the Decatur Arts Alliance, and in its eighth year, it’ll feature more than 350 wines and food from local restaurants. Organizers recommend you use MARTA — just hop off at the Decatur station stop, and you’re there.

But for the real wine info, I direct you toward the Random …

Continue reading Sip wisely at this weekend’s Decatur Wine Festival »

How do we know the seasons have changed? The Pink Pig opens soon at Lenox Square. AJC/Phil Skinner

On one of those cold, windy, October-but-feels-like-November days of a few weeks ago, we planned to mark the change of seasons by adding a few pink azaleas to the dirt patch in front of our house. Considering the ground is already half-frozen where I grew up, this felt like a very Georgia thing to do.

But I was swiftly out-Georgia-ed (and out-pinked) by an offhand comment, the kind that only makes sense in Atlanta. In line with my shrubs, a burst of wind and raindrops led the woman ahead of me to say, “Can you believe it’s almost time to ride the Pink Pig?”

I’m still not sure I understand it — pig trains and Christmas and Rich’s/Macy’s and Atlanta mix together…how? — bu the words “pink pig” mean more here than a meal at Abattoir or a reading of “Charlotte’s Web.”

And indeed, it’s almost here. Photographer Phil Skinner shot photos of the traditional Pink Pig holiday ride while it …

Continue reading Macy’s Pink Pig is under construction, opens Nov. 7 »

Books: Author Augusten Burroughs discusses “You Better Not Cry,” 6:30 p.m., SCAD Atlanta’s Ivy Hall, Atlanta. FREE.

Books: Atlanta Queer Literary Festival kick-off reception, 7-9 p.m., Charis Books, Atlanta. FREE.

For families: “Planet Shark” exhibition continues, 9 a.m.-6 p.m., Georgia Aquarium, Atlanta.

For toddlers: Music, Mommy and Me classes, 9 a.m., St. Francis Preschool, Roswell.

Lecture: KSU Activities Board presents AJC cartoonist Mike Luckovich, 7 p.m., Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw. FREE.

Music: “From the Top” records a live show, 8 p.m. Emory University’s Schwartz Center for Performing Arts, Atlanta.

Music: Lenny Kravitz performs, 8 p.m., The Tabernacle, Atlanta.

Got an event, venue, restaurant or performance in and around Atlanta? Add it to the AccessAtlanta.com calendar.

For instant updates, follow @insideacess on Twitter.

Continue reading To do list: November 4 »