What to Do After Church

The best way to spend a Sunday afternoon? Eating chicken and baked beans on the back porch, washing it all down with an ice-cold glass of sweet tea. 

Then all that's left is to work off the two days' worth of calories you just put away. There's no more productive way to do that at this time of year than get down and dirty in the garden. 

Tomorrow afternoon, the whole community can find a new place to burn off those extra handfuls of fried okra and biscuits at the opening of the Haven of Harmony Community Garden opening celebration. 

The party, which will feature live music, locally grown food and plenty of other entertainment from Tulsa's garden societies, will get started at 2 p.m. at 920 S. New Haven, on the grounds of the First Seventh Day Adventist Church of Tulsa. Admission is free and, of course, open to the public. 

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As if you needed any more fuel for the garden fever that threatens to overtake your life. But, hey, what am I here for but to help you drive yourself crazy by enabling you to let your passions consume you, right in your own backyard? Literally this time.

Rock & Rescue at RiverWalk

Need yet another excuse to be near water this Memorial Day weekend? Well, get along, little doggies, to Rock & Rescue at RiverWalk Crossing in Jenks. 

The event, hosted by Oklahoma Alliance for Animals, a local nonprofit committed to reaching a day when no healthy, adoptable dog or cat is destroyed simply because it does not have a home, promises to be a doggone good time. Twitter is already hoppin' with updates from RiverWalk, and from the sound of things, everyone's rocking out to live music, snagging some mad noshes and ooo-ing and ah-ing and scooping up the pets available for adoption there. 

If you're in the market for a new dog, there's no better way to find one than through an adoption. Not only are you giving a homeless animal love, care and a place to call home (an act that I'm pretty sure earns you extra stars by your name in that little book the gatekeepers of gatekeepers lugs around), but you're also voting with your actions against some of the unsavory practices going on in the pet breeding industry. 

Rock & Rescue got started at 10 this morning and will finish up at 4 this afternoon, so there's plenty of time to get out there and experience some puppy love. Until you arrive, follow along on Twitter by following @billhandy, @dogdish, @mattgalloway and @HomemakerHero.

More Than Fair Food

Ever wonder how the hundreds of emergency utility workers who braved the 2007 ice storm – remember, the one that froze the entire state under a three-inch slab of ice, immobilizing the greater Tulsa area for more than a week – found time to eat?

Thanks to EXPOSERVE Food & Beverage Management Services, with support from Expo Square’s management team and community volunteers, some 4,000 of those men and women managed to catch a bite for breakfast, lunch and dinner as they worked through the blackout. Add it up, and that’s 75,000 meals served by EXPOSERVE over the course of more than a week.

Read the rest of this story on the Food page in Tulsa Business Journal.

Our Famous Skyline, From the Inside

Go downtown, only to be confused by one-way streets and parking? Convinced you'll be mugged if you set foot within the IDL? Maybe the whole urban grit scene just rubs you the wrong way. 

Let the folks at Tulsa's Owen Park change your mind about all that.

EDIT//NOTE DATE CHANGE. Art deco lovers and the downtown ambivalent alike will gather at 9 a.m. Saturday, May 30 at New Centennial Park at 6th Street and Boston Avenue for a stroll on the downtown Tulsa streets hugged by the buildings of oil barons' dreams. The whole family is welcome; just make sure to wear shoes made for walkin', because that's just what they'll do. 

Grab some coffee Saturday morning, head downtown and prepare your hearts for the inevitable: an irresistible urge to enroll in architecture school. Also, love - sweet love.

To be sure you don't get left behind, call 596.1485 to register for the walk. Or, register on the page for this event on Facebook. And don't pay the meters - downtown parking is free on weekends.

Photo by beatnik, member of the Tasha Does Tulsa group on Flickr.

BYOB: Brew Your Own Beer

This economic crisis has brought many things: scares about nationalized banks, too-big-to-fall auto manufacturers talking bankruptcy and enough pink slips to do a decent job of redecorating Wall Street with paper mache.

Despite what other media outlets might say, it's not all bad. After all, the craft beer industry is experiencing a revival. Though it's not the cheapest choice on the market, more and more beer lovers are veering from the "big three" corporate beer giants and choosing bottles of artisan and craft brews. In fact, growth of the craft brewing industry was nearly 6 percent by volume and almost 11 percent by dollars last year. Try to name anything that has experienced that type of growth for that time besides the lines outside the unemployment office.

But, at a local midrange of about $8 for a six-pack, the thirst for craft beer can get pricey. The good news? Beer lovers can brew their own booze, and it's good enough to serve even to the snobby neighbors who are still trying to pretend they're current on their mortgage.

Read the rest of this story in Consumer Watchdog in Urban Tulsa Weekly.

Summer's 5th Night 2009 @ Utica Square

Looking for the 2010 schedule for Summer's Fifth Night at Utica Square? Check out this updated post.

There's no question that Tulsa's Utica Square, on 21st Street between Utica and Yorktown, is a beautiful place, even when my 15-month-old son does his little break dance on its freshly manicured lawns that, as marked, are not to be walked upon.

Oh, well. Whatareyagonnado.


If you're tired of the Thursday night bar scene, consider heading to Utica Square this week for a change. The 2009 season of Summer's 5th Night, the Utica Square outdoor summer concert series, will start at 7 p.m. Kicking off the season will be Light Opera Oklahoma, Tulsa's very own opretta and classical musical comedy company.

If the classics aren't your thing, dig out your calendars (does anyone actually keep a pocket calendar anymore?) and block off next Thursday from 7-9 p.m. Mid Life Crisis, a T-Town based classic rock band, will be rocking the socks off Utica Square that night.

Other acts this season include Admiral Twin (June 11), the Red Dirt Rangers (July 2), Annie Ellicott with the Brian Haas Trio (Aug. 13) and the master of romance himself, Grady Nichols (Aug. 27).

Plus, Summer's 5th Night attendees are eligible for drawings and giveaways. And there's dancing. And picnic dinners. And soft breezes to cool your skin as you sprawl across your favorite blanket, loosing yourself in the music and some of the best scenery that Tulsa has to offer.

Sorry. I'm writing a romance novel, and I switched gears rather involuntarily back there. Happens to the best of us.

Not really on the romance novel. I prefer to stick to the real smut - you know, blogs.

This all sounds like high-quality entertainment, right? The kind of fun honest people pay for? Well, guess what. It's free. But you knew I was going to say that, didn't you?

See you all out there - bring an extra antihistamine for me.

Diary of a Bus Rider

Before I left on my bus trip with Metroplitan Tulsa Transit Authority general manager Bill Cartwright this morning, TDT reader and blogger Ron Hudson made the brilliant suggestion that I make a video of the experience.

Ta-da! See? I'm not completely technologically inept. Just partially. Moderately. Okay, significantly. Just try not to get seasick watching that video.

Some quick thoughts:

• The downtown station on Denver Avenue is a beautiful, lively place.
• The buses are very, very clean, much contrary to what I'd heard.
• It's not hard at all to catch an MTTA bus. They're on-schedule, even if at some stops they don't come but once per hour.
• Bus riders make up a diverse group of Tulsans, from the mother and her small child out to do some shopping to the woman on her way downtown for work to the guy who rode his bike to his stop and loaded it up to the front of the bus in order to get to class.
• MTTA has a number of perennial obstacles to tackle - lack of funding, low service, our Midwestern love of the automobile and the stigma of public transportation, to name a few - as gasoline prices are set to climb through the summer months and ridership promises to continue increase. It's already up about 9 percent from this time last year.

I'll write more about what I learned on my ride this morning in some shape or form, so be on the lookout here and as you flip through the pages of Urban Tulsa Weekly looking for free karaoke nights (my favorite is at Joe Momma's Pizza in the Blue Dome District in downtown Tulsa - gotta love that big stage).