Are you walking around with a head full of Pokemon knowledge? Pokemon Showdown is the ultimate Pokemon battle simulator - and there's no need to catch 'em all!

EARLY RELEASE DAY, YAY!

Whether or not you had a chance to join us for the International Hunger Games Tournament on International Games Day, you can present yourself as a tribute in this local area tournament hosted on AADL's MineCraft Server, Home of "MineCraft:Ann Arbor" minecraft.aadl.org Check us out online or in real life.

Ann Arbor's biggest little indie arts & craft fair is back! After a few years of hopping around to different locales, Tiny Expo will land at the Downtown Library.

Just what IS Tiny Expo? It's a fun local, and handmade shopping experience that began with a small group of artists in 2010. As the initial group of creative folks banded together to hold a fun, informal little fair, expo-goers responded, and the show grew just a teeny bit each year. Finding a location that could fit everyone was a perennial challenge, though, and so Tiny Expo jumped around town — from Kerrytown to Felch Street and back again.

Join us for Tiny Expo Saturday, December 13 from 11-5:30, and shop from 38 artists and crafters selling their wares in a festive library space where you can shop local and handmade! It's a great way to support your community and find unique gifts. Check out the vendor list!

Fresh brewed, local coffee will also be on sale by Roos Roast!

For the last year and a half, crowds have gathered each month in the early evening - in bars and venues around Ann Arbor. Around 7pm, it begins: three boisterous speakers geek out up front. What is this? Some secret club?

Nope! It's Nerd Nite Ann Arbor! And it's open to anyone and everyone who loves to learn or share what they love.

For the uninitiated, Nerd Nite (NN) has been described as “...like the Discovery Channel™…with beer!” Sounds fun, right? It is! NN is held monthly in 70+ cities, giving several folks the opportunity to give 18-21minute fun-yet-informative presentations across all disciplines. Imagine learning about everything from the science of the Simpsons to the genealogy of Godzilla. Fun stuff!

Doors open at 6:30, and speakers start at 7pm.

Nerd Nite welcomes 2015 with a roster spanning history, sound and action!

We all like a good story now and then, right? All the better if that story is something from our city’s collective past. Local history geek & author Patti Smith will take us on a tour of the Good the Bad and the Ornery in Tree Town’s past. Like the sound of that? Carl Engelke will expose us to different sounds — heroic trumpet fanfares — as he considers music and physics in the natural history of the trumpet.
Finally, who couldn’t use an extra boost of self-confidence? Martial arts trainer Sal Sanfratello will illustrate how direct action and experimentation may help us become a little more balanced and courageous in our everyday lives.

Ponder some of our past, consider your favorite fanfare, and take action — grab a beer and say hi to your fellow nerds!

Want to see past topics and a little more info? Check NNA2's site.

AADL is sponsoring this month's event, so there will be NO COVER!

Mark your calendars and spread the word! Any and all nerds (and non-nerds!) who love learning and having a great time are welcome to join us!

AADL presents a special concert event on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, featuring the acclaimed percussion group Biakuye, featuring Mark Stone, Chinelo Amen-Ra, Lesley-Anne Stone, and Ambyr Amen-Ra.

.....wooden keys suspended over gourds and spider webs….
….seed pods spun like a yo-yo
… goat-skin drums, flattened tire spokes, and discarded oil barrels

These are the sources of Biakuye’s captivating sound—a sound that is both deeply grounded and cutting-edge. The resulting music reflects the unique journeys of its members, which have taken them from the U.S. to Ghana, Uganda, South Africa, Trinidad, and Haiti. In Akan languages of West Africa, biakuye means unity. Biakuye’s energetic performances bring together a wide range of African and Caribbean music and dance.

Baritone Emery Stephens and accompanist Alvin Waddles explore African-American history from 1898 – 1976 through this interactive lecture/concert honoring the legacy and musical achievements of African-American classical composers and arrangers such as Harry T. Burleigh, John Work, Margaret Bonds and Moses Hogan. Musical highlights include: “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”, “It’s Me, O Lord”, “Didn’t It Rain?”, “This Little Light Of Mine” and more.

Baritone Emery Stephens has sung with Arbor Opera Theater, Ann Arbor Symphony, Main Street Opera, Orchestra Canton, Carolina Ballet, Cape Fear Chorale, Boston Lyric Opera, Opera New England, Boston University Opera Institute, University of Michigan Opera Theater, Prism Opera, Cambridge Lieder and Opera Society, Opera-at-Longy, and Operafest.

In addition to his solo engagements with the Wilmington Symphony in Handel's Messiah, Copland's Old American Songs, and Orff's Carmina Burana, he was a professional chorister with the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston for ten years with Christopher Hogwood, artistic director. He premiered the role of the Male Speaker in performances of Dan Welcher's oratorio, JFK: Voice of Peace with conductor Daniel Beckwith at Boston's Symphony Hall. Stephens is an Assistant Professor of Voice at Wayne State University in Detroit, and music director at the Unity of Farmington Hills.

A native of Detroit, Alvin Waddles studied at Interlochen Arts Academy and the University Of Michigan School Of Music. He has worked in the Fine Arts Departments of the Detroit and Ann Arbor Public School systems. Since 1994, he has served as Director of Music for Hope United Methodist Church in Southfield, MI. In addition to regular appearances at local venues and events such as the Dirty Dog Jazz Café, the Detroit Festival of the Arts, the Michigan Jazz Festival and the Detroit International Jazz Festival, he has traveled across the country and abroad both as a solo artist and as musical director for Cook, Dixon and Young, formerly of the Three Mo’ Tenors.

Morris is a traditional, energetic dance from England where dancers frequently leap into the air! Dancers wear bells on their shins and hold either handkerchiefs or sticks to enliven their performances.

For this event, Corey O'Sullivan and Sam Nolan of Morris Dance will demonstrate and teach an easy dance or two.

For the last year and a half, crowds have gathered each month in the early evening - in bars and venues around Ann Arbor. Around 7pm, it begins: three boisterous speakers geek out up front. What is this? Some secret club?

Nope! It's Nerd Nite Ann Arbor! And it's open to anyone and everyone who loves to learn or share what they love.

For the uninitiated, Nerd Nite (NN) has been described as “...like the Discovery Channel™…with beer!” Sounds fun, right? It is! NN is held monthly in 70+ cities, giving several folks the opportunity to give 18-21minute fun-yet-informative presentations across all disciplines. Imagine learning about everything from the science of the Simpsons to the genealogy of Godzilla. Fun stuff!

Doors open at 6:30, and speakers start at 7pm.

So show up, have a drink, meet other nerds, and learn a bunch of awesome new junk!

This month's topics:

What the $X#! is the anthropocene? An extraordinary moment in Earth and human history
James Arnott

This talk will introduce you to the extraordinary moment in Earth and human history that you (yes, you) are living through. We’ll look at why now is different than before and why the future is dependent on a unlikely species that grew out of a cave into a skyscraper and now shapes the future of earth, wind, and fire. The anthropocene is now—and here to stay—so come learn what we know, what you should know, and what we all must do!

The microbiome: good for what ails you
Pat Schloss

I’ll discuss what we currently know about the human microbiome, but mostly I’ll point out a lot of really cool things that we don’t have any explanations for and how we’re going about trying to understand what’s going on.

Want to see past topics and a little more info? Check NNA2's site.

AADL is sponsoring this month's event, so there will be NO COVER!

Mark your calendars and spread the word! Any and all nerds (and non-nerds!) who love learning and having a great time are welcome to join us!

Wild Swan Theater presents a stirring musical play about immigration, following the journeys of four children from different parts of the world who make their way to a new life in America.

'Coming to America' is an original production based on the lives of children who came to the U.S. from around the world. This multicultural production interweaves the adventures, songs, humor, hardships, and triumphs of the people who built our country.

With music by Laz Slomovits of Gemini, the play follows the adventures of children from four countries: Russia, the Dominican Republic, Vietnam and Lebanon as they leave their homelands and journey to America. Their stories are filled with the courage, hope, dreams and laughter of our collective immigrant histories as they overcome huge obstacles in their quest for a better life.

Enjoy the African sounds of Sankofa Ensemble, led by Kofi Ameyaw. Sankofa translates to "retrieve the goodness from the past."

This music and dance group performs only traditional music from Ghana, West Africa, using authentic traditional instruments.

This event replaces the Pan African Youth Orchestra event, which was scheduled for this date, but was regrettably cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances. We apologize for any inconvenience, but hope that you enjoy this excellent performance by the Sankofa Ensemble.