It’s easy to focus on the negatives of Labor Day Weekend. Pools and parks close for the year. The days are getting alarmingly short. If you are a kid, you’re probably already back in school or pretty close to it. Even Labor Day barbeques tend to lack the joie de vivre of their Memorial Day cousins. But there’s no reason to dwell on that stuff. Seriously, sweatshirts and Elliot Smith albums can wait for a few more weeks. Friday night, high school football is back. Spotobe has compiled the Friday night and Saturday afternoon schedules for every week of the season, so if you need directions to an away game at any time this year, come back and visit us. Friday is also the first day of the Long’s Park Art & Craft Festival in Lancaster, which is one of the biggest events of its kind in the country. I’ve never been, but people tell me that it is absolutely massive. The event runs through Monday, so you have all weekend to check it out. The Senators also open their final series of the season. It appears as though the Sens are going to fall a little bit short of the Eastern League Playoffs, but they just clinched their first winning season since 2002, which is a step in the right direction. Saturday, Penn State opens its schedule against Coastal Carolina, which is not close enough to here to be on the calendar, but is close enough to my heart to be on the Spotoblog. I’ll be there. With bells on. Or a white t-shirt. One of the two. Kipona also starts on Saturday, and you can find the full schedule of events for each day on the calendar. There are two more noteworthy festivals on Saturday as well, the annual Folk Festival at Moon Dancer Winery and the McLain Celtic Festival at the historic Two Mile House. On a weekend dominated by sports and festivals, I think the Public Astronomical Observation looks like something a little bit different. Sunday, Kipona, Long’s Park and the Folk Festival all continue. The Kipona Grand Fireworks Display, is Sunday night. There are also fireworks in Boiling Springs. More fireworks Monday, this time in York. Kipona and Long’s Park wrap up during the day, and you can also tour Shoaf’s Mill at Little Buffalo State Park. I’ve done it, and it’s worth seeing. You can get some corn meal to make cornbread. Friday, I’ll be out to eat somewhere, but I won’t be out late because I’ve got to get up super early to head to Happy Valley. I’ll check out Kipona Sunday or Monday and hopefully catch at least one of the fireworks displays. Enjoy the long weekend and have fun kids.

I was just remarking to Dori the other day that I couldn’t remember the last time I had a tetanus shot. Funny I should bring it up, because I just walked the whole way from Bricco to Spotobe headquarters on Locust with one foot shoeless. I spend most of the summer barefoot, but not walking down the streets of Harrisburg. Ick. I was walking down the street listening to Coconut Records on my iPod, when a woman waiting to cross the street backed up into me, stepping on my cheap flip-flops. Naturally, I pulled the thong part straight through the bottom when I tried to raise my foot. She didn’t even apologize, and now I have 67 diseases. Lovely. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, because I can always buy more 99-cent sandals, and nothing is getting in the way of my optimism this weekend. Maybe it’s the weather, but right now, I’m feeling very festive. I wish I could go sit outside somewhere and have a beer (yeah, you all make fun of Sawyer's but isn't it nice to spend happy hour outside during the summer? Forget the astroturf and the ugly outside bar, doesn't that look like a place you could have fun?). Instead, we’ll go over the weekend. Obviously, the biggie is the Harrisburg Street Festival. You should all come out, say “Hi,” and take your best shot at winning fabulous prizes in the two contests I posted about earlier this week. There are two bands playing this weekend that are definitely worth a listen. Power-pop/punk outfit Safari So Good is at Gullifty’s tonight. Loving them. Also The Good Things, who sound vaguely like a poppier White Stripes are at Suba on Saturday night. Going back to Friday, you can catch some fireworks in Newville if you didn’t get your fill last weekend. You can also take the kids to see Bee Movie outside in Camp Hill’s Seibert Park. If the kids are afraid of bees or are space junkies (or space cowboys. Or just like Steve Miller) head to Pinchot Park for a little astronomy talk and some telescope time. Saturday, you’re going to spend all day at the Street Festival, so you’ll probably be exhausted. If the kids have any energy left, you can catch Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory at Shank Park in Hummelstown.  That’s the original one, not the one with Johnny Depp acting like a complete nutcase eerily similar to Michael Jackson. Sunday, you’ve got Senators baseball, roller derby (yep) and the Keystone Concert Band live in Reservoir Park. I’ll be going to bed early tonight in preparation for a long day Saturday. Hope to see you at the Street Festival. Have fun kids.

We’ve got a lot of Spotoballs. Seriously, when we stage our Friday afternoon battles here in the office, it is complete and utter chaos. That’s using one box. We’ve got a lot of boxes. Trust me, we’ve got plenty of Spotoballs. This weekend, if you can figure out how many, you could win four passes to Hersheypark. Simple enough right? Spotobe’s pals at the Harrisburg Downtown Improvement District have graciously offered us space at the Harrisburg Street Festival, which takes place this Saturday between noon and 6:00pm on the streets surrounding the intersection of 3rd and Walnut. We’ve responded by putting together two pretty fantastic and completely free community contests (and we’re modest too!). The first is pretty simple. We’ve built an eight-foot tall container and filled it with Spotoballs. We’ll be taking guesses at exactly how many it took all throughout the event and the closest guess wins four passes to Hersheypark and a pair of passes to Hershey’s Really Big 3D Show. The second is a community art contest, and the winners will be getting some quality, quality prizes. Basically, we are going to provide you with some paint, some brushes and a blank coaster, and let you go to town. Fun stuff. From there, our distinguished panel of judges which includes me (no jokes necessary please), Wendy Sweigert from the Susquehanna Museum of Art, Jason Piper from the Arthouse Lounge and Sara Bozich from the Patriot-News, will narrow down the field and select finalists. Those finalists will then be posted on the site for voting, and the coaster that receives the most votes wins the prizes. If you’re under 17, you could win some free art instruction and a custom art kit from Blick Art Supplies in Camp Hill. If you are over 17, you could win more than $200 worth of restaurant gift certificates from Café Fresco, Carley’s, Blue Bistro & Wine Bar, Hilton Harrisburg and Alfred’s Victorian. The finalists will also be displayed at the Harrisburg Welcome Center on 2nd Street. Dori and I will both be there, so stop by and say what’s up, and participate in both of these great events. It should be a really fun afternoon, and if you don’t think you can win the art contest, paint anyway. First of all, painting is fun. Second of all, since it all comes down to online voting, all you have to do to have a shot is be a finalist and then rock the vote. It’s just like American Idol except it’s not unspeakably lame (sorry Idolites, Idolaters, whatever). Anyway, we’re very excited and we hope to see you Saturday.

First off, my apologies for slacking on the spotoblog/twitter front this week. Bad job by me. This blog will normally be updated more than once a week. As for this weekend, there’s a lot happening beyond Sex and the City and Indiana Jones. On the music front, the Central Pennsylvania Friends of Jazz Festival runs all weekend long, and kicks off with some live performances at the Hilton’s Patio Grill Friday night. If that’s not your style (it’s not really mine, I try to like jazz, I really do, but…)