Free Concert at American Tobacco

If you still haven’t been to Durham’s American Tobacco complex, you might consider checking it out on Labor Day. There will be a free concert in the lawn from 5 to 7 p.m. Monday featuring John Brown & The Groove Shop Band, an R&B and funk band that are likened to Earth Wind and Fire, Stevie Wonder and KC and the Sunshine Band.

It’s a good opportunity to explore the restored tobacco warehouses while enjoying some free music. Bring a blanket or some lawn chairs, a cooler with snacks and make a Labor Day evening of it. American Tobacco is a must-see for Triangle residents who don’t visit downtown Durham as often as they should. My favorite part is the urban stream that runs through it and the strategically placed concrete slabs that allow you to cross it.

A new cute creature at the Duke Lemur Center

My heart melted a little bit this morning, and I thought you might want yours to do the same. I watched the video Duke University’s news service produced to introduce the world to Ichabod, an aye-aye.

The extremely rare aye-aye is a goofy looking creature that looks like a cross between a bat and a ferret. It hails from Madagascar, where it is endangered and is thought by some to be an omen for death for the village it shows up in.

Ichabod was born July 23 at the Duke Lemur Center.

I haven’t been to the Lemur Center yet, but I so need to take a tour. The center offers tours by appointment only. Yet another fun, unusal thing to do in the Bull City. For more on Ichabod, click here.

So do you think this aye-aye is a cutey or a little creepy?

Check out BMX racing in the Triangle

So I was dog sitting a couple of weeks ago and I took the pooches for a walk at Raleigh’s Lions Park. It’s there that I happened upon a BMX track. I thought it was strange that a track would be allowed at a city park in these litigious times. But there it was. For the next few days I walked the dogs past the track, and finally managed to catch some BMX racers.

Pardon the shaky camera, but I was holding onto the leashes for two dogs who weren’t as interested in the race as I was.

So it turns out the track is run by Capital City BMX Association, a volunteer organization made up of the parents of local riders and adults who race at Lion’s Park. It looks like this may be the only BMX track in the Triangle (correct me if you know of others).

Coincidentally, I’ve received several e-mails in the past couple weeks from the Amerian Bicycle Association saying BMX racing made its Olympic debut this year. I watched some of it on TV last week and it was a little exciting, especially when riders fell. I couldn’t help but think how disappointing it would be to make it all the way to the Olympics and then fall of your bike. Or worse, have the rider next to you knock you over on their way down.

If you want to check it out for yourself there are races scheduled for Sept. 7 and Sept. 14.

So anyone want to give BMX racing a try? I’m not sure my beach cruiser would do so well on the track.

A look at the new Marriott in downtown Raleigh

I was wandering around downtown Raleigh Saturday afternoon and decided to pop into the newly opened “Raleigh Marriott City Center Hotel” (which no one will ever call it). It was built to complement the soon-to-open Convention Center.

I entered through the lobby, which is both elegant and modern.

Then I wandered back to the Posta Tuscan Grille and picked up a copy of the lunch and dinner menus. Lunch prices range from $5 soup or salad to $19 for Beef filet mignon sauteed in a balsamic vingear reduction. Most of the pizzas and pasta dishes cost $10. For dinner, appetizers start at $10 (for the eggplant parmigiana) and rise to $30 (for the bow tie pasta with fresh Maine Lobster). Dinner pizza and other pasta dishes range from $12 to $20.

Next I headed to the top floor to take in the view. Of course you can see the Convention Center:

And other downtown scenes from a different angle:

And, as you might expect, there’s a Starbucks, which is convienent for guests. But hopefully if you’re downtown looking for a cup of Joe you’ll shop local. If you want to see bigger versions of my pics, go here.

A sneak peek of Raleigh’s shimmer wall … lit up

Workers were testing the LEDs that will back light the shimmer wall that adorns Raleigh’s new convention center on Monday night. They appeared to only be testing one panel, at least when I stopped. So I snapped the photo below.

The plan is to officially light up the entire waving Oak Tree on Sept. 5, when the convention center officially opens.

When fully lit, the wall can shimmer in tons of colors. They can even tailor the colors to match holidays (say green for St. Patrick’s Day) and special events (say red if the Hurricanes win the Stanley Cup).

Here’s a sneak peak of a single panel.

Can you imagine how beautiful this will look when it’s all lit up?

I learned to play Guitar Hero and I liked it

I used to think Guitar Hero was stupid. I tried it a couple of times and it was too hard. The notes were falling so fast. I felt like I was going cross-eyed. So I wrote it off as a silly fad and forgot about it.

But then I went to visit my family in southern Illinois, where an actual source of entertainment for local teens is going to Super Wal-Mart. Luckily for this city mouse, my 13-year-old sister just got Guitar Hero. She kindly showed me how to play it, and with a little practice, I was on the medium level in no time. It was addicting.

Check out one of my first attempts at the game (includes some creative camera work from my sister):

After my trip, I spotted an article in the N&O about a North Raleigh teen who dropped out of school so he could devote more time to perfecting Guitar Hero. I read that Fox & Hound in North Hills offered free Guitar Heron on Sunday nights, so I went to check it out. I was hoping to spot Blake Peebles, the local Guitar Hero whiz. Instead, a friend signed me up to play.

Before I knew it, I was standing on a small platform in front of a restaurant full of people playing Guitar Hero on a projector screen. I played “Ruby” by the Kaiser Chiefs on medium and lost (though I contend the green button wasn’t working properly).

Fox & Hound offers free Guitar Hero from 8 p.m. until 2 a.m. on Sunday nights. They have two guitars, so you can square off against strangers. It’s fun. And if you’re not into Guitar Hero, it’s completely amusing to just sit there and watch (especially when the bracket pairs up a tween with an adult).

Fun in the Bull City for $6 (kind of)

The Setting: Durham, NC.

The Time: From 6 to 11 p.m. Friday night

The Goal: Have as much fun as possible on a budget.

Here’s how it went down: One of my friends had tickets to the Durham Bulls game. I accepted his invitation. Then I got an e-mail from another friend reminding me the Bulls game was on the same night as the final concert in the Warehouse Blues series. What to do? How about both.

I’ve told you about the city-sponsored Warehouse Blues series before. It’s held on Friday nights during the summer at West Village. Anyway, the performers are top notch and it’s completely free. You can even bring your own beer.

Even though the concert series is over, it’s still worth heading over to West Village if you’re around downtown Durham. The developers have done an outstanding job transforming the shuttered Liggett & Myers tobacco factory into a gorgeous place to live, work and even play.

After the concert, we walked along the railroad tracks to the Durham Bulls Athletic Park, at which point we realized we had forgotten our tickets in the car. Oops. No worries. For $6 you can buy yourself a spot on the lawn behind center field.

The Result: So for $6 we had five hours of outstanding entertainment and people watching on a Friday night.

The Bonus: I got to meet Lucky AND Friday nights at the DBAP always end with fireworks.

(OK, technically, I spent more than that b/c beer and dinner was involved, but I could have easily opted to eat before going out and not drink).

The Question: Any suggestions of other inexpensive ways to spend a Friday night around the Triangle?

A trip to the Skylight Exchange

I took a step back in time recently when a friend introduced me to Chapel Hill’s Skylight Exchange. This hole-in-the-wall is enthralling. It’s part cafeteria, part record store, part used book store and part music venue.

I could spend hours in this old-school place browsing titles and thumbing through records, looking for the perfect ironic cover to hang on the wall.

And the sandwiches. Oh the unique sandwiches. I ordered the BBQ chicken salad, and it was the best sandwich I’ve had in recent memory. I’ve heard that the shakes are stellar, but I didn’t get one. I need to make another trip there so I can try one.

I don’t know much about the history of this place, but it’s pretty well hidden. When I asked two of my chick friends, both UNC grads, if they’ve ever been there, neither had heard of it. It’s tucked in an alley off Rosemary Street.

Certainly, some of you have been there before and can share some details I’m leaving out about this eclectic venue.

I’m pleased to present 30THREADS.com

I feel like covering the screen with a hundreds of OMGs. OMG OMG OMG … But I will spare you of such an annoyance. But please realize that’s how incredibly excited I am about this announcement: Check out 30THREADS.com.

It’s a project that I’ve been working on for months (here and there) with my co-worker Wayne Sutton. For a while, it seemed as if it would never come to fruition. But on Wednesday, July 30, we unveiled it to the public at the Blogger Bash (that’s the news you missed if you were unable to attend).

The site features the best Triangle-area blog posts, news articles and other random online information that Wayne and I think fellow Triangle residents may find intriguing.

We will introduce the articles with a little commentary, provide a blurb from the post or article and then share the full link so you can click over for more information, if you’re interested. Our goal is to entertain, inform and introduce you to new local sites that you never knew existed.

You know that feeling when you stumble upon a new local blog that you never knew existed. That “I can’t believe I’ve been missing out on this” feeling washes over you. (You probably experienced this the first time you found my blog, j/k). Well, I hope that starts happening to you more often once you start exploring the blogs that we feature.

But it won’t always be blogs. Sometimes we’ll feature interesting news and feature articles, as well as content from other random web sites. The only thing all of our posts will have in common is that they will either always be written by someone who lives in the Triangle area or they will be about the Triangle area itself (like if the New York Times writes an article featuring something Triangle-iffic we may choose to highlight that).

Anyway, if you head over to the site, you can see our introduction video, which provides a decent rundown of how the site works.

But don’t worry, I am not in any way abandoning Ginny from the Blog. I so love sharing my Triangle experiences with you and the comments and ideas you all share with me.

If you have any questions, let me know. And thanks to everyone who made it out to the Blogger Bash. It was so fun to meet so many of you. The energy in the room was high that night.