Serves Up at Tennis Center

On Saturday, Jan. 28, the Vineyard Tennis Center is hosting the Falmouth Sports Center for men’s, women’s and mixed doubles matches throughout the day. The teams are set but the public is invited to watch and cheer the home team on.

On February 3 through 5 the center will hold a fundraiser for the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. This is their sixteenth year hosting this event that features mixed doubles matches for players of every level, including juniors.

The cost is $60 per player.

Admit it, you're an American Idol fanatic. Well, even if you're not, have never heard of the show perhaps, there is reason for Vineyarders to tune in to the current season.

Last week, at the Pittsburgh auditions for the show, Erika Van Pelt scored a yellow ticket to Hollywood with her rendition of Carol King’s, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow.

Poet Laureate

Just one week left for West Tisbury poet laureate nominations. On Wednesday, Feb. 1, the ballot box closes and then the waiting begins. Final appointment is made in April.

Nominations forms are available at the West Tisbury Library. All forms require the nominator’s name and contact information along with the nominee’s name and contact information.

Comedy Night

Tonight Mike McCarthy is one of the headliners for a night of comedy at the Harbor View Hotel in Edgartown. Who knew the guidance counselor at the regional high school moonlighted as a funny man, roaming the clubs of New England for a buck a joke payback?

Oh, wait a minute, different Mike McCarthy. Same name, totally different career track.

Good Food, Good Behavior

On Tuesday, Jan. 31, behavioral specialist Jeanine Fitzgerald will give a talk entitled Food For Thought: The Impact of Nutrition on Behavior. The talk takes place at the regional high school’s culinary arts dining room.

Ms. Fitzgerald is the author of The Dance of Interaction: A Guide to Managing Children’s Challenging Behaviors.

She is a frequent visitor to the Island, lending her expertise to Island families through community services.

Susan Johnson Exhibit

Oil paintings by Susan Johnson are on exhibit this month at the Chilmark Bank. Ms. Johnson studied en plein air painting in Tuscany with Boston University last summer. She has since utilized this style with a focus on Beetlebung Farm. Eighteen landscape paintings will be on display.

This winter Ms. Johnson will continue this project with the Vermont College of Fine Art, and she has been accepted into the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts, a distance learning program with international residencies.

Big Red Dog on-Island

Clifford the Big Red Dog is coming to the Vineyard this week. In a sense, he is always here, as his creator, Norman Bridwell, is a resident. But now the fluffy red dog himself, bigger than a house and twice as nice, is making visit to all of the local libraries.

No word yet on how the big dog plans to get inside the libraries. Perhaps the librarians have been given special shrinking toys.

Hot Time at Big Chili

They come from on-Island and off, the common denominator being they bring with them five gallons of homemade chili. It may be hot, super hot, incinerate-upon-inhaling hot, vegetarian or otherwise.

Who are these people? The entrants of the annual WMVY Big Chili contest, that’s who.

This is the 26th year of the festival, hosted by WMVY and benefiting the Red Stocking Fund charity. This year’s festival takes place tomorrow, Jan. 28, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the P.A. Club in Oak Bluffs.

On Friday evenings during the winter, Pauline Speed and Loretta May phone each other to check on their dinner plans. “You feel like cooking tonight?” one friend will ask the other. Often, they said, the answer will be no and they’ll walk over to Grace Church to partake in a Vineyard winter tradition: the community supper.

Mystery writer Cynthia Riggs and photographer Lynn Christoffers have teamed up to create a guidebook of Martha’s Vineyard from the viewpoint of Victoria Trumbull, Ms. Riggs’ 92-year-old, fictional super sleuth.

The duo will celebrate and discuss their new book at the West Tisbury Library on Thursday, Jan. 26, at 4:30 p.m.