Sometimes, while living in Lawrence in the past, I've felt like I never know where the readings are, when the readings are, or even what the readings are. This isn't Lawrence's fault. (Don't worry, baby; I still love you, and your Kaw River, and I'd never speak ill of you in public). I think there are a few simple institutional and social reasons for my frequent befuddlement. Part of my frustration (and this doesn't pertain to Lawrence specifically, but pretty much any university town) is that I seem to get trapped in some kind of hyphenated world. I imagine this to be sort of like the phantom zone that Superman villains are sent to, where I'm spinning in a constant prison of the "university-reading" as opposed to the "bookstore-reading" or the "library-reading" or the "Hall-Center-reading," or the "reading-at-a-local-gallery-hosted-by-one-sexy-m*********er," or the literary-arts-center-reading, or even the "unstable-guy-standing-on-the-street-with-a-book-reading."

I think part of the problem (actually, it's not really a problem, so much as the state of things) is that libraries, universities, bookstores, etc., can become quite large entities, or at the least, extremely busy entities, and they're focused on things other than communicating with other reading-hosting entities. Also, some universities don't like to talk to other universities, or bookstores sometimes don't like talking to universities (who could blame them?), bookstores maybe don't like to talk to other bookstores (particularly if there's an independent bookstore and a chain bookstore), etc., etc., ad nauseum. SO, here is the skinny, and my ultimate (perhaps farcical) dream:

I wish there was a list of all the different readings happening in and around the place where I live, regardless of institutional affiliation, etc., so that I could decide which readings I would genuinely enjoy the most and then go to those readings.

That's all. I had some grand scheme for actuating that, but I'm not so sure it would work. Any ideas?