CITY WEEK

Art
Forgetting to remember
Local artist Patricia Patterson captures what some might consider the mundane side of life-a man reading the newspaper with his dog by his side or an old couple fiddling with a stove. Yet, by including reoccurring details like paperboy hats on men and particular types of kitchenware or furniture in domestic settings, Patterson's collection of digital prints use the mundane to capture an interesting and unique way of life. In Scenes from a Receding Past, an exhibition opening at Quint Contemporary Art, 7739 Fay Ave. in La Jolla, from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 23, Patterson gives her audience a peek into rural life in the Irish village of Kilmurvey on the island of Inishmore off the coast of Galway. The artist has been traveling to Ireland for more than 30 years, so viewers can be assured that the images are authentic. www.quintgallery.com.

Message getting: With so many competing messages circulating through people's spheres every day, it takes skill to create a lasting impression. Local artist and designer Chickle is one such talented individual. His posters and T-shirts mix simple but dynamic images with bold, confrontational slogans, making political, cultural and social statements that the brain can retain. His first solo exhibition of poster art opens at 8 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 24, at the Voz Alta Project, 1544 Broadway in the East Village. www.vozalta.org.

Theater
The test of time
Captain Wickett and Miss Pickles need all the friends they can get, so they'd better start wising up to the fact that underneath it all, they're the best of buds and have been for a quarter-century. They've been everything from legal adversaries to bickering spouses to cantankerous roommates in a nursing home, all the while under the watchful eye of a gay observer who chides the two amid his take on heterosexual mating. But the time has come to chill and face each other's truths. They pull no punches in sharing their observations with the audience in a play called The Uneasy Chair, which opens Saturday, Feb. 24, at North Coast Repertory Theatre, 987-D Lomas Santa Fe Drive in Solana Beach. $29-$39. 858-481-1055.

Spoken Word
You like this
When local wordsmith Ted Washington takes the stage, he takes over the stage. He's a big dude, which helps, but Washington's size becomes an afterthought once he opens his mouth. The man's poems are witty, funny, sexual and, more often than not, interactive-let's just say that Washington's not afraid to leap off the stage, grab a listener and make poor, frightened bystanders recite lines right along with him. From 6 to 8 p.m. Monday, Feb. 26, Washington will be doing his thing at the weekly poetry and spoken-word gig The Drunk Poets Society at Winstons, 1921 Bacon St. in Ocean Beach. He'll be reading from his new book, 22, a collection of his best, most provocative love poems. www.punapress.com.

Workshops
Back to life
Billy Neal Moore was 22 years old when he got drunk and shot his friend's uncle. He pleaded guilty, spent 16 years on death row and came within seven hours of execution when, suddenly, his sentence was changed. The last-minute request from Mother Teresa probably helped. Forgiven by the victim's family and freed for exemplary behavior, Moore is now a Pentecostal preacher. He'll be talking about the death penalty on Saturday, Feb. 24, during one of four ACLU Civil Liberties Workshops. The other workshops cover a broad range of issues, from immigration and end-of-life and reproductive rights to presidential abuse of power. Registration begins at 2 p.m. at the California Western School of Law, 225 Cedar St., Downtown. 619-232-2121 or www.aclusandiego.org. $15-$45.

Books
An exciting San Diego
The first thing you'll notice about San Diego City College professor Jim Miller's new novel, Drift, is the descriptions. Miller's got a descriptive knack that starts with the easy and obvious (sights and sounds) and expands to the historical and intellectual (explanations of why things are the way they are). The coolest thing about the descriptive prose in Drift is the subject matter-the book is about San Diego and Tijuana, the region's present and, perhaps more interestingly, its past. Miller will be reading and discussing Drift at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 23, at D.G. Wills Books, 7461 Girard Ave. in La Jolla. 858-456-1800 or www.dgwillsbooks.com.

Film
Get swept away
There may be no place like home, but the chance to see The Wizard of Oz on the big screen comes along about as often as a flying monkey. Follow Dorothy, Toto and the yellow brick road on down to the Birch North Park Theatre, 2891 University Ave., which will be hosting both Kansas and Oz this week. The family classic will be screened at 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 22, and 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb 25. $7-$9. www.birchnorthparktheatre.net.

Found film: It's almost impossible to find a copy of Wise Blood, John Huston's Southern gothic creepfest based on Flannery O'Connor's novella. It's out of print and unavailable on DVD, but Citizen Video is screening it across the street at the Whistle Stop Bar, 2236 Fern St. in South Park, so you can catch the film-about a poor boy trying to make good via the Lord-and tip a couple back at the same time. Wise Blood plays at 3 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 25, and is followed by a set of sweet, sweet soul music from Friend of CityBeat (FoCB) DJ Claire. www.whistlestopbar.com.

Nightlife
DJ fighting
Washington, D.C.-based DJ collaboratives Thunderball and Fort Knox Five carry with them a long list of potential namedrops. Let's just go ahead and get that part out of the way: Rob Myers, one-third of Thunderball, is the sitar player for Thievery Corporation, and the Fort Knox Five crew was recently called upon to record with hip-hop legend Afrika Bambaataa. More important than whom the DJs have played music with, however, is how they play music. From 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 24, at the Kava Lounge, 2812 Kettner Blvd. in Middletown, let the D.C. kids excite and maybe even overwhelm your ear-holes when Thunderball's signature dub takes on the Fort Knox Five's funk in what Kava, Merge Events and RE:UP magazine are calling Thunderball vs. Fort Knox Five. $10-$12. 619-543-0933.