Local choreographer and dancer Joel Myers wants to move you. Along with a cadre of professional body-movers, he will do just that when he presents “The Joel Show II” at the Annie Wright Theater Saturday.

For those wondering, “The Joel Show II” is all about its creator, Joel Myers. Well, sort of. The seven-piece dance extravaganza features his choreographic creations and two individual works by the man himself. But the rest find their expression in a crowd of local movers, including two performances by Myers’s students. The first, entitled “Drop,” is a beautiful, frantic joke at the expense of those giddy pep-squad queens we all remember from high-school. The second, “Where Hope Begins,” requires Myers’ students to sync body, mind and soul, and express that unity in movement.

“I’ve seen it a million times, and every time, it moves me,” he says.

“The Joel Show II” kicks off MLKBallet’s “Move” series of summer performances, which will help raise funds for the organization’s tuition-free dance program. It was organizations like MLK that helped Myers start dancing, he says. â€" Paul Schrag

[Annie Wright Theater, Saturday, Aug. 11, 2 and 7 p.m., $14, 827 N. Tacoma Ave., Tacoma, www.brownpapertickets.com]

Everything the Weekly Volcano really needed to know we learned from the Ramones. In "I Don't Wanna Go Down to the Basement" they warned us about the unspeakable horrors that lurk there. In "I Don't Care" they extolled the joy of apathy. In "We're a Happy Family" they suggested how you could be happy in your family even if it were, say, wildly dysfunctional. In "Somebody Put Something in My Drink" they sang "Tanqueray and tonic is my favorite drink/ I don't drink nothin' colored or pink."

Yeah! we said.

Now, we must reconsider.

The Tacoma Art Museum’s Glitter, Glisten, and Gleam! party will serve sparkling drinks. Well, that’s cool, as are the steel drummers, Iron Artist competition and sparklers. The museum asks everyone to dress in their best sequins, tinsel and glittery attire. Hell, that’s how the Weekly Volcano rolls. â€" Suzy Stump

[Tacoma Art Museum, Friday, Aug. 10, 6-8:30 p.m., free admission, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma, 253.272.4258]

Taste of France â€" A Gascony Picnic class would make a Frenchman say, “The food is beaucoup good, but I still hate you because you’re an American and you won’t let me bring my dog into this cooking class.”

Oh well, time will heal.

In the meantime, the acclaimed Bayview School of Cooking offers a class on preparing French food for picnics Thursday, Aug. 16. â€" Suzy Stump

[Bayview Thriftway, Thursday, Aug. 16, 6-8:30 p.m., $55, 516 W. Fourth Ave., Olympia, 360.352.4897]

There's nothing cuter than a big ol' wet dog. Well, OK, cats wearing sunglasses are pretty cute. A baby with creamed corn on his face, cute too. Pig in a tutu â€" check. And an iguana in a sombrero? Dios mio â€" the cute-o-meter is gonna blow!

But big ol' wet dogs are still up there. And Saturday’s McKinley Street Festival is gonna serve up a fat, stanky plate of canine cute as it hosts the Dugan Foundations’s Animalocity Pet Parade where dogs, cats, birds and other cuteness parade down McKinley Avenue around 3:30 p.m.

The festival will feature a kiddie carnival (cute), a school supply giveaway, food, and music by Larger Than Life Band, Stacey Jones and the Wulff Tones, Angela Jossy and Sammy Barrett.

What about the wet dogs?

A art auction titled Drink will be held to raise funds for the Dugan Foundation and the street festival.  Donated, hand-decorated doggie drinking bowls will go to the highest bidders.  And the Weekly Volcano has money on water added to those bowls immediately for the dogs in the parade.  After all, parading is hard work.

Oh, and leave Cujo at home: All aggressive dogs will be banned immediately.

One more thing. Don’t let your dog drive a motorized parade float. Not even if they're wearing sombreros! â€" Suzy Stump

[McKinley Street Festival, Saturday, Aug. 11, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., free, 35th and McKinley, Tacoma, www.myspace.com/topoftacoma]

THE DAILY WORD
Learn it, use it, spell it

Transmogrify \trans-MOG-ruh-fy\, transitive verb:

To change into a different shape or to transform, often with bizarre or humorous effect.

USAGE EXAMPLE: A long time believer in transmogrify, Bobble Tiki often sites the recent documentary “Transformers” as proof of his views. But Bobble Tiki’s beliefs go farther than that. If all goes as planned, some day soon Bobble Tiki will transmogrify into an ’89 Chevy Lumina with the ability to fight crime and drive through brick walls.

TODAY’S NEWS

BROOKLYN: Stayin' alive.

TACOMA: Fallen Crown.

PEARL JAM: AT&T ticked off.

NEW ZEALAND: Superman now 4Real.

HUSTLER OF CULTURE
You can stand atop the mountain and scream your naked desires to the universe or shed that synapse epilepsy and hug the South Sound today with your fellow man:

MUSIC: As has become somewhat routine, Bobble Tiki is climbing to the top of the highest hill in the land to proclaim for all to hear the beauty of Olympia’s music scene. If you listen closely you can here him…

“It it it, is is is, the the the, bomb bomb bomb!”
(Echo added for effect)

On Friday, Eddie Spaghetti will play the Fourth Ave Tavern (and Doyle's parking lot Saturday at 8 p.m.), Rocky Votolato will play the Capitol Theater, and Hornet Leg will play Le Voyeur. If Bobble Tiki knows anything, he knows Oly sounds like the place to be tomorrow.

Fo Sho!

MORE MUSIC: What's on tonight.  What’s on Friday.

THE ARTS:  Dance the night away at the Prom.

THE DRINK: Drinking under a boot.

BOBBLE TIKI'S THREATS AND PROMISES COLUMN

If Bobble Tiki was to start his column with “Canned Heat to play Jazzbones,” technically, he wouldn’t be lying. Canned Heat will play Jazzbones this Saturday, Aug. 11. There’s really nothing but a few dead guys and Bobble Tiki’s conscience keeping him from giving into temptation.

As always, Bobble Tiki doesn't care what you do today because he doesn't even know you.  And unless you check out the Weekly Volcano's Web site, Bobble Tiki doesn't want to me you.  Besides, it's time to blow this joint because it's so obvious you are becoming further and further removed from all that is genuine and real and visceral and virtuous and Bobble Tiki doesn't play that with his lunch.

OK, Bobble Tiki apologizes.  Please be his friend here.

Breakfast with Bobble Tiki runs Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.  Deal with it.

Mirah. She of the little big voice. She’s Olympia’s tiniest explosion, and by tiny I mean, like, quantum, man. If you know her music maybe you know what I’m getting at.

With a voice that might be called cute if she wasn’t constantly ripping the listeners’ and her own heart to shreds just to reassemble the pieces in a richer configuration, Mirah is, quite simply, a pop shaman with her finger on the pulse of the great Northwest’s dream consciousness. Seriously, I’ve had better REMs listening to one of her CDs while puttering around my apartment with a cup of coffee in my hand than some complete nights sleeping off a day’s worries in my silent bed.â€" Andras Jones

[Capitol Theater, “Share This Place” CD Release Party with Rocky Votolato, 8:30 p.m., all ages, $8-$10, 206 E. Fifth, Olympia]

Thanks to recent dramatic advances in the laboratorial processes for the extraction of botanical/herbal alkaloids and glycocides, the Weekly Volcano is able to function after a late night on the town so we may bring you this good news:

Tacoma Art Museum now offers free Internet access

Puyallup Fair to only use trans fat free cooking oil. â€" Suzy Stump

Tacoma artist Teddy Haggarty recently painted a Picasso-like mural on the south exterior wall of JJ's Pub & Grub (formerly the Cat Box Lounge and Cloud 9) at 5431 South Tacoma Way.  While the paint dried Haggarty hopped a plane to Houston for business reasons.  Upon his return Thursday afternoon, he found his work of art tagged with spray paint.

"In a weird way, I'm not mad," says Haggarty via phone.  "There's a golden lining around that cloud somewhere."

Driving past the Merlino building, my eyes caught a guy sitting with my favorite newspaper, kicking back on a  sweet-looking red Adirondack lounge in the sun.

I had to slam on my brakes and take a second look, and found out that the second One Heart Café location is up and running their “soft open.” 

It’s bright, beautiful, and welcoming in there with computers, tables, a variety of edible and drinkable goodies, great reading material, and comfy looking spots to just hang out.

I like it, I like it a lot. â€" Jessica Corey-Butler

Sushi Revolution will inhabit the vacant liquor store space close to the Tacoma Mall.  By the looks I'd say its two months away from opening.  The sushi bar will be twice the size of Twokoi's.  â€" Suzy Stump