A FESTIVAL OF STRENGTH >>>

With strength similar to wine, the barleywine is one of the strongest beer styles in the world. They can range from malty-sweet to fruity, dry to hoppy as hell, and everything in between - but they're always big, bold beers that can range from 8 percent alcohol by volume to 15 percent or more.

Those of us in the Tacoma area are damn lucky. Right in our backyard we have a tavern so in love with barleywine that it will throw 32 of them on tap over two days. I, of course, refer to the Parkway Tavern and its Barleywine Festival, which kicks off today at 2 p.m.

The TNT Diner has the full scoop on this year's festival, which includes a Sunday morning brunch. The blog also has a list of the barleywines that will be served. I don't care who brews them as long as there are lots of glasses of glorious, glorious beer. Don't forget your ID, and I highly suggest leaving your car in your driveway.

[Parkway Tavern, April 24-25, 2 p.m. to closing, no cover, 313 N. I St., Tacoma, 253.383.8748]

LINK: Esquire named the Parkway one of the best

THERE'S TALENT IN THIS CITY >>>

Sometimes I leave poetry readings feeling like I just attended a grade-school piano recital. That wasn't the case last night at the "Mouths & Mics: Poetry in the 253" that featured seven Tacoma poets hand picked by outgoing Tacoma Poet Laureate Antonio Edwards, which took place inside the Washington State History Museum. Poets Emilie Rommel Shimkus, Josh Rizeberg, Ariel Zimmer, Korama Williams, Zeek Green, Elliot Trotter and 15-year-old Kiah Lee - literati gliterati, if you will ­- presented the emotional equivalent of a victory lap for the artsy, literary-y, near capacity crowd. Even thought the seven poets knew they were not Urban Grace's next Soul of the City Tacoma Poet Laureate, each performed as if they would carry the torch for the next year.

But maybe "reading" is too loose of a term, so if you're envisioning a bunch of gray-haired professors sitting in an auditorium reading Dickinson and Shakespeare in low, expressionless tones, you've got it wrong. The majority of the work at this reading were backed by visuals, performance art and music. The crowd could feel the exhilarating rush of emotions right along with each performer.

All seven poets - eight including Poet Laureate Edwards - gave strong, emotional performances that took listeners from soft whisper to enraged yelling in less than 10 seconds. Their poems were enhanced by the people in the audience, who clapped, encouraged and shouted out affirmations. The poetry covered the gritty (sex, relationships, drugs) - which never reached depressing levels due to the poets' upbeat deliveries - as well as humor, especially from the clever Rizeberg. Edwards gave the performers poet carte blanche; the only similarity was the sharing of flutist Donnel White who stood on the stage many times.

"Mouths & Mics: Poetry in the 253" was an impressive, amazing night of poetry.

Talk about burying the lead

After the Magnificent Seven, Urban Grace Director of Worship Arts Kali Kucera took the stage to announce the 2010 Urban Grace Soul of the City Tacoma Poet Laureate. The five judges - Edwards, 2008 Tacoma Poet Laureate William Kupinse, UW-Tacoma Prof. Emily Noelle Ignacio, PLU librarian and artist Holly Senn, and UPS Prof. Grace Livingston - chose Tammy Robacker as the new poet laureate for Tacoma.

"We finally have a poet laureate who wears panty hose," Robacker said as she approached the podium, referring to the preceding two male poet laureates.

Robacker thanked those she believed helped her reach the level worthy of being poet laureate, especially Kupinse. She read several poetry pieces from her new book, The Vicissitudes - including a hilarious piece about wanting to sleep with the sheriff from Mayberry - and announced her poetic plans for the upcoming year, which will include poetry classes for those eager to learn the craft.

You may follow Robacker's poetic journey on her Web site. Click The Community button as she is all about community.

THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT >>>

What's a Wayzgoose? Back in the day it was the end of summer bash thrown by the master printer for his shop underlings and apprentices. Wayzgoose in Tacoma began six years ago as collaboration between King's Books public relations guru sweet pea and Jessica Spring, a professor at Pacific Lutheran University. They both had a desire to recognize Small Press Month and local printers.

I dropped by the sixth annual event today at King's Books and mingled with the type nuts, artists, letterpress printers, typographers, graphic, type designers and letterpress enthusiasts. Hundreds were in attendance.

Tacoma artist Chris Sharp manned the steamroller letterpress. Here's a pictorial of his handiwork:

LINK: More photos in our Photo Hot Spot

MONDAY, APRIL 26, 2010 >>>

1. They've impersonated Dow Chemical execs on BBC, and posed as Exxon representatives at oil conferences. And tonight at 7 p.m., Andy Bichlbaum and Mike Bonanno — better known as "The Yes Men" – will be at the Capitol Theater in person.

2. Childhood End's Gallery in Olympia has a new show featuring Alfred Currier's oil paintings, Kristen Etmund's woodblock prints, Lisa Sweet's oil paintings and prints, and ceramics by John Benn, Colleen Gallagher, John Haris, Chris Knapp, Susan Lochner and Reid Ozaki - from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

3. The 16-piece jazz swing band S.R.O. performs from 7-9 p.m. inside the Imperial Dragon restaurant on sixth avenue.

4. Hip Bone plays The Swiss at 8 p.m.

5. DJ Jason Diamond and friends spin roots reggae beginning at 9 p.m. inside O'Malley's Irish Pub.

LINK: Movie showtimes in the South Sound

COMING THIS WEEK >>>

Rainier beer fan. New York Times bestselling non-fiction writer. Corner Bar patron. Magician. Father. Fox News Network endorsed wacko.

Depending on whom you ask, University of Washington Tacoma professor Michael Allen is many of those things - if not all of them.

The truth, of course, is not as cut and dry. It never is.

Allen, a professor of history and American studies at UWT, with his signature Yosemite Sam mustache and matching belt buckles - has become quite a story, and it all starts with a simple 800-plus page book, A Patriot's History of the United States.

Published in 2004, A Patriot's History - written by Allen and right wing religious conservative Larry Schweikart, a professor of history at the University of Dayton - is a seriously right of center leaning rebuttal to liberal Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States, an equally massive work published in 1980 that took a view on history that few had bothered with up until that point (or shortly before it, as Zinn and many likeminded liberals were coming to control academia after the '60s). A People's History showed the formation of our country from a working class perspective, history from the eyes of those who were trampled, lost or purposefully forgotten - and it's a monumental work. There's a reason - whether Allen and Schweikart like it or not - why A People's History helped redefine and focus our country's complex story, and why it's now part of high school and college curriculums across the country. There's a reason Matt Damon takes his shirt off every time he reads it.

Allen and Schweikart are rebels of sorts. In the world of academia, non-liberals are hard to come by. Allen is as Libertarian as they come. I have never met Schweikart - and he and Allen have only hung out on a few occasions, once watching Team America World Police in a small hotel room (picture that shit and tell me it's not funny!)- yet Schweikart comes off like your stereotypical, delusional, Fox News blowhard ... at least from my liberal perspective. If you didn't know any better, you'd expect pretty much the same from Allen.

And, really, those last two sentences are the key to all of this. We wouldn't be having this blogular conversation if it wasn't for Fox News, perspectives and perceptions -  liberal and conservative, right and left.

You see, a funny thing happened one day. After selling modestly, as you might expect an 800-page history book with an agenda to, Schweikart appeared on Glenn Beck's show. Soon, after being handed a copy, Glenn Beck had endorsed A Patriot's History, saying, "This book has taught me more about our history than any I've read in years." Naturally, Schweikart made return appearances on the show.

The rest, of course, is New York Times bestselling history. In scared, misinformed, government hating, Fox News worshipping households across the country, Beck is gold - and anything he touches shares the wealth - including little ol' belt buckle wearing, history teaching Michael Allen, right here in Tacoma. Our Libertarian man in T-town doesn't have any reservations about accepting the Beck bump.

Over the last month I've gotten a chance to know Allen, interviewing him at length on two separate occasions in his UWT office. He's even showed me a few magic tricks.

That story is coming in this week's Volcano - and it's one you're going to want to catch.

The Weekly Volcano follows the people you're too embarrassed to >>>

Just like most good, new-age, social media applications, Twitter allows people to share and be privy to once personal, almost wholly pointless information about peoples' lives. It's seemingly endless. While Twitter is mostly full of everyday, ho-hum people - just like you and me, sharing info about what type of oatmeal we ate for breakfast and where we get our hair cut - Twitter is also a magnet for the moderately-famous.

Stars of yesterday, illiterate millionaire athletes, former cast members of Saved By the Bell - you can follow them all, intimately, on Twitter.

But, you've got standards. We get that. Following @MatchBox20 on Twitter isn't going to look cool (#RobThomasMakesYouHot).

That's why we'll do it for you, in a feature we like to call Weekly Volcano Twitter Stalker.

This week, checking in with...

New Kid on the Block Jordan Knight

April 22: Jordan Knight tries to remind Joey McIntyre to use some goddamn manners

"Tisk tisk...no eating with your fingers Joe!" via Twitpic, 10:40 p.m.

April 22: Jordan Knight loves the media

"it was like she was feeding me the recorder!" via Twitpic, 10:25 p.m.

April 15: Jordan Knight still has it

"Chillin..." via Twitpic, 10:41 p.m.

Tune in tomorrow for more tweets from the life of Jordan Knight

WHAT WE HAVE FOUND TODAY >>>

Stephen Hawking urges us to avoid aliens.

National Public Radio Music has your back. You can listen to three albums free before they're released onTuesday, May 4: The New Pornographers Together, Kris Kristofferson Please Don't Tell Me How the Story Ends: The Publishing Demos 1968-72, and Josh Ritter So Runs the World Away.

Democratic Senators will push a financial reform vote today that will limit greedy Wall Street firms.

Spock has a new hand signal.

Sixty-one tornadoes hit the South this weekend.

FUTURE THINGS ARE COMING >>>

The Lakeside Group, Live Nation and STG announces the following Marymoor Park concert will go on sale Saturday, May 1, 10 a.m., through Ticketmaster:

Read more...

IF YOU KNOW IT, GO FOR IT >>>

Exquisite Disarray Publishing, a Tacoma-based literary arts organization, has launched its First Book Poetry Contest with a call for poetry manuscripts this spring.  The deadline for poetry manuscript submission: May 15, 2010.  

This contest is open to all Washington state residents 18 and older who have not yet published a full-length book of poetry. 

Full contest guidelines can be found at www.exquisitedisarray.org.

Tammy Robacker, our new Tacoma Poet Laureate, is the vice president at Exquisite

NOSH PIT >>>

Spring Drink: Raspberry Smoothies are back at Cutter Point Coffee in downtown Tacoma.

Last Day: Today is the last day for half-price wine bottles at Pacific Grill. It was an April promotion held every Monday.

Future Things Are Coming: The Den @ urbanXchange holds a grand opening party for its new Tea Bar Sunday, May 2 at noon.

Grab Your Chopsticks: Thursday, April 29, restaurants in Pierce and Thurston counties will donate 25 percent of their food revenue to local AIDS service organizations as part of Dining Out For Life, including Pierce County Asian restaurants: East & West Café, East & West Proctor, Happy Dragon Chinese Restaurant, Indochine Asian Dining Lounge, and TWOKOI Japanese Cuisine.

Food Matters: Taking a closer look at one of the most popular "healthy" cereals on the shelf.

LINK: Wine and beer tastings, dinners and events

LINK: South Sound Restaurant Guide

LINK: Send us your restaurant and lounge news