MONDAY [11] film • Patton Oswalt live with "Ratatouille" sneak preview at Alamo Downtown film • Music Monday: "Harry Nilsson's Birthday Party" at Alamo Downtown food • Central Market Cooking School Class: Sushi 101 with Chef Timothy Thomas at Central Market Cooking School, 4001 N Lamar ($70, 6:30-9:30pm) music • Maserati, My Education, Lazar Wolf at Emo's music • Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Cheer Accident, Oh, Beast at Emo's music • Manu Chao at Stubb's......

MONDAY [9] books • Jillian Robinson presents Change Your Life Through Travel at BookPeople (7:00pm) comedy • 22nd Annual Funniest Person in Austin Contest, hosted by John Ramsey at Cap City Comedy Club dance • Spank Dance's "4Red Lines" at Secret Location, Check Austinist's Clues (5:30pm) film • "Harold and Kumar" with All-You-Can-Eat Mini-Burgers at Alamo Downtown film • Music Mondays: "Times Square" at Alamo Downtown film • Jim Jarmusch Film Series: "Dead Man"......

That's right: it's time to heat up your winter nights again, with the 14th season of FronteraFest. The Short Fringe, the Long Fringe, or Mi Casa es su Teatro -- FronteraFest is five weeks of alternative, offbeat, new, and just plain off-the-wall fringe theatre presented by Hyde Park Theatre and Austin Script Works. For complete FronteraFest 2007 information, including times and locations for the Short Fringe, the Long Fringe and Mi Casa es su......

How's this for a recipe? To make Slapdash Flimflammery: (1) Toss six playwrights into a deserted theater at 10pm on a Friday night. Simmer all night long. (2) At 7am, add six directors. Blend for an hour with playwrights. (3) At 8am, remove playwrights and add eighteen actors. (4) Bake for 12 hours. Serve piping hot for $10/pop to an eager, curious audience. The wacky kids at Loaded Gun Theory start this process a......

[Update: Lucky reader Margaret was quick on the trigger and snatched these babies up pronto! Better luck next time, theatre fans. -Ed.] Austinist Theatre Central is happy to announce a ticket grab! Be the first person to send us an email (as usual, be sure to take the () off the @) and we'll set you up with two free tickets to Loaded Gun Theory's Empty Bowl. This is for any of the remaining......

You know, we just don’t go to the theatre nearly often enough. It’s one of those things – we really mean to, but like, other stuff happens and then plans get made and liquor is drunk and suddenly we’re stumbling into our apartment saying to ourselves, “Hey, we still haven’t been to the theatre and, um, where are our pants?” But fortunately for us, this weekend we saw The Grind, The Loaded Gun Theory’s......

When we started college, everyone told us that we were going to graduate at the most opportune time, promising sign-on bonuses, stability, and the chance to apply our overpriced degree. Fast forward seven years later and there’s only one way to describe our current occupation: soul-crushing. Luckily, the folks at Loaded Gun Theory Productions can commiserate. Their newest play (written by Timothy Thomas, author of other LGT productions such as "Copyright Denied", "Spawn of......