Don’t let the dreary weather keep you inside tonight. There’s Sippin’ in Seersucker at Canal Place, theatre in City Park, CD releases, and more. On this day in 1837, Louisiana Governor P.B.S. Pinchback, the first person of African-American descent to become a U.S. governor, was born. Now, more to do this Friday.

June 16th, when Lord Byron read Fantasmagoriana to house guest Mary Shelley, which inspired her to have a go at a ghost story of her own, Frankenstein (1816), when Abraham Lincoln delivered his House divided speech in Springfield, Illinois (1858), when James Joyce started going with Nora Barnacle, a date later used to set the actions for Ulysses, and formed what is now an Irish tradition celebrated in Dublin known as "Bloomsday” (1904), and when IBM founded in Endicott, NY (1911); it’s Femi Kuti (1962) and Tupac Shakur’s (1971) birthdays, and the day of the dead for ‘Superman’/’Gone With the Wind’ actor George Reeves, who took his own life in 1959. On the upside, it’s International day of the African Child, and jour d'art/musique/cinema a New Orleans (say we):

June 9, when the "Philadelphia Spelling Book"  was the first book copyrighted under constitution (1790), when five hundred mormons left Iowa City and headed west to SLC, Utah (1858), when the first Automat restaurant opened (1902), when Jelly Roll Morton recorded "Jelly-Roll Blues” (1924), when Donald Duck made his cartoon debut (1934, and when Bruce Springsteen signed a record deal with Columbia (1972). It’s Cole Porter’s (1891), Michael J. Fox’s (1961), and Johnny Depp’s (1963) birthday, Charles Dickens’ last day (1870), and National Heroes’ Day in Uganda. How to celebrate...go to Disney World, watch Back to the Future (and/or What's Eating Gilbert Grape, and/or 'Big Love'), or realize there's too much to choose from right here (as per usual): 

April 28th, when Muhammad Ali refused to be inducted into the army and was thereupon stripped of his boxing title (1967), when Charles de Gaulle resigned as the president of France (1969) and the birthdays of three beautiful people: Jessica Alba (1981), Penelope Cruz (1974), and Shreveport, Louisiana’s Hal Sutton (1958), Golf Magazine’s 1980 College Player of the Year, and a top-10 ranker in the Official Golf Rankings (1986-1987). That would be enough for us to be proud of, if it weren’t for today's Hornets holdin’ down the Hive, and a  Pre-Jazz fest celebration to bring the BayouWear out in full fierce force:

The visual arts continued their resurgence in 2010. Events such as Prospect 1.5, PhotoNOLA, and the suddenly hot monthly art walks have propelled those putting brush to canvas to a stature equal to those putting brushes to skin... feet to canvas. Right now, we are seeing incredible art coming out of this city; the works span all mediums, and convey themes still tinged by the Storm, but no longer pigeonholed by our dark days.