We sat in a circle trying to make each other laugh. The tent at the Yard in Chilmark provided a writers’ den for the 11 fledgling or developed comedy writers who signed up to take Anne Beatts’s comedy workshop last week.

Singing the Stories

Ulali, the Native American a cappella singing group. has performed nearly everywhere: the Smithsonian’s Folkways 50th Anniversary Gala at Carnegie Hall, Woodstock 94, the Hollywood Bowl, the New Orleans Jazz Festival, Madison Square Garden, even the Olympics. They have traversed the world too. From Fiji to New Caledonia; Portugal to Brazil.

And on Wednesday, August 25, at 5:30 p.m. they play the Aquinnah Cultural Center.

This week Island swimmers were greeted by the three worst words a vacationer can read: CLOSED NO SWIMMING. While sharks have garnered the regional headlines this has been a summer increasingly interrupted for beachgoers by much smaller animals: bacteria.

A number of beaches were closed in Oak Bluffs and West Tisbury on Wednesday due to bacterial contamination.

As a four-piece horn band serenaded the crowd to the tune of America the Beautiful yesterday morning, kids hurried over to the booth to buy ride tickets, parents applied sunscreen and food vendors began to fire up the grills. With a clear blue sky backdrop, the 149th annual Martha’s Vineyard Agricultural Society fair opened for fun times and long-lasting memories.

Driver’s Safety Class

An AARP driver’s safety class is offered on Tuesday, August 24, from noon to 5 p.m. at the Tisbury Senior Center. Melvin Thornhill will teach about new signage and traffic rules. If you are insured out-of-state, class certification may qualify you for a discount on your premium. Preregistration is required at 508-696-4205.

A free educational seminar on multiple sclerosis (MS) will be held Monday, August 23, from 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at the Howes House, on State Road in West Tisbury.

The program, Ask the Doctor: Symptom Management in MS, is presented by the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, and features Ann Cabot.

Dr. Cabot practices neurosurgery in Lebanon, N.H. where she is involved in MS research and focuses on the treatment of people with MS.

Uncovering Carnal Knowledge

Carnal knowledge is a legal euphemism for sexual intercourse. It is also the title of a movie made in 1971 that included this bit of dialogue: “Boys begin life not liking girls, later they don’t change, they just get horny.”

Rough stuff but that’s the world so many movies of that era dealt with. Unflinching in their portraits of the human condition, many say it truly was, if not the golden age, then definitely the slap in the face, punch in the gut decade of cinema.

The second annual Martha’s Vineyard Dog Parade is August 22 at 6:30 p.m. in Oak Bluffs’ Ocean Park, and its slogan is Welcome Back Bo, for First Dog Bo Obama.

Everyone is invited, dog or no dog, for a walk in the park.

The opportunity to have your dog marshal the parade was sold to the high bidders at the Possible Dreams Auction, Karen Weitz and Jim Kopf. When they learned they might not be on Island for the parade, the couple passed their dream to a child in the Early Childhood Program at Martha’s Vineyard Community Services.

Smooth Jazz

Enjoy an evening of contemporary chamber jazz in Vineyard Haven on Sunday, with a new jazz ensemble consisting of professional musicians from West Tisbury and Chilmark: Eric Johnson on electric and nylon-string guitar, Tauras Biskis on percussion, and Boaz Kirschenbaum on fretless bass guitar.

The concert is on August 22 at 7:30 p.m. at the Katharine Cornell Theatre on Spring street in Vineyard Haven. The program will feature the music of Pat Metheny and Jaco Pastorius.

All Islanders are invited to the Yale Day in the Sun at the Harbor View Hotel and Resort on August 21. Organizers promise an afternoon of intellectual stimulation, reconnecting with old friends and meeting new ones.

At 1 p.m. Yale’s Jonathan Holloway, professor of history, African American Studies and American Studies, will present a lecture titled, The Right Kind of People: The Silences in a Civil Rights Narrative.