Eugene Weekly : Calendar : 06.01.06

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehaw! Howard Dean is here! You gotta admit that even though the man sticks his foot in his mouth every ten days or so, he's a lot more compelling a reason to go to the Oregon Democratic Party State Convention than would be, say, a certain senator from Massachusetts, not to mention a certain Oregon governor. Local and state pols like Darleen Hooley, Ron Wyden and Peter DeFazio will be there too, and if you're so inclined, you can get trained in things like Faith Outreach or you can kick it with the LGBT caucus (or both, of course!). For details, take a look at www.dpo.org and get ready to help write the platform, take back Salem — and then we're goin' to California, and Texas, and New York, and then we're goin' to … er …. oops, we got a little carried away there. See Calendar.

No, they didn't Nair the cat, and no, it's not E.T.'s younger sibling. It's a Peterbald cat, said to have "chamois-like skin," and you can see not only this breed but also a gazillion others at the Sassykatz Championship Cat Show this weekend. We stumbled into a cat show a year or so ago, and we're still dreaming about the mouthy seal point kitten that had the tiniest, most articulated paw ever. We mean it, ever, and we're not even going to talk about the various mongofluffball cats because they were alarmingly adorable. And so what if your cat isn't a (snooty) purebred? You can show Pussmdoodleslovekitty in the Household Pet Category! Also, you can buy cat jewelry, and though we don't know if that's for the cats or for the cat lovers, it's the kind of … unique … thing we appreciate. See Calendar.

Beach books! Lolling around in the garden hammock reading! Catching up on Henry James! Well, okay, maybe we're the only people ever to have wasted spent a summer on the latter. We're excited that it's time for the Eugene Public Library's Summer Reading Programs. Kids get Paws, Claws, Tails, Scales and Tales; young adults get Creature Feature; adults get … adults get … okay, we're unthemed. But adults get prizes too, for reading and reviewing, so everybody's a winner. (Yeah, we know, reading makes you a winner: we read about that in Lisa Yee's Millicent Min, Girl Genius, D.L. Garfinkle's Storky and a few other books.) Sign up starts June 3; if you want the swag, get there ASAP! See Saturday Calendar.

First Friday ARTWalk! From Lee Highway Bluegrass at the Downtown Library to Mood Area 52 at Café Perugino, the music's coming fast and fun as June opens with the Lane Arts Council Summer Soirée. There's a lot of art too! First stop with host George Evano of the Oregon Bach Festival: Jacobs Gallery, where Lane County Cultural Coalition awards will be presented just before the Walk, and where hangs the 2nd annual YouthARTS Celebration. Second stop, Society of North American Goldsmiths, 540 Oak, for a bee-yootiful UO metalsmithing students jewelry exhibit; then you can trip the light fantastic to La Follette down Oak a bit (931, to be exact), and view the work of Jani Hoberg (whose Pears are pictured to the left), Sadie Smith, Cyndy Duerfeldt and Beau Gordon. For the final stop (perhaps just before you hit Perugino for one of those wicked pieces of tiramisu?), White Lotus presents the gorgeous "Asian Art in Scroll Format" with Chinese and Japanese scrolls from the 19th and 20th centuries. The Summer Soirée theme means that downtown businesses will entice ARTWalkers with hors d'oeuvres, music, and, well, nice stuff. As always, many galleries and shops downtown are open late but not part of the walk. See Friday Calendar.

Get down with the more than 60 local DJs, dancers, breakers and more at Down 4 It: A Hip Hop Variety Show. A benefit for Womenspace, which does so much with so little that we can't even fit it all here (but we will say that the youth outreach, crisis services and rural outreach are but scratching the surface), this second annual event looks like a real winner. Let's give Womenspace a little breathing room, hit ourselves with a jolt of jealousy when we think, "Yeah, I coulda been a dancer," and definitely give the artists their props! See Saturday Calendar.