So we have this Portland Music Awards show coming up on Wednesday (yes, this Wednesday, June 3), at 5:30 at Asylum, 121 Center Street, in Portland. Admission's free - but it's strictly 21+ (it's no use begging - we've heard 'em all, and we're not buying any of them).

We have a ton of artists performing, including Gypsy Tailwind

Recently, Megan Grumbling wrote about Creek Man: The Unforgettable True Story of the Accordion-Playing Merman, a play written and performed by its subject, Gary Sredzienski, known in Seacoast-land as "Creek Man."

Harbor Light Stage, which produced the play, has announced there's another run of the show, this time not in York, but in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, at Strawbery Banke, the local-history museum and arts center.

It's official - McNallica defended her New England air-guitar title on Wednesday night in Boston - including her second all-perfect round (with a 6 from each of the three judges) - and will head to the national competition in early August.

UPDATE: McNallica's Boston win is the first time in US air-guitar history that someone has won the same city three times in a row.

Maine native Buck Edwards, who has been writing and performing country songs around the country for what we'll generously call "a while," just landed a gig at the Comcast Center in Mansfield, Massachusetts, opening for George Strait on May 30, as part of the Colgate Country Showdown. (Semi-ironically sponsored by a toothpaste company, it's a country-music talent search.

This Friday, one of my new favorite artists will play at Empire Dine and Dance - Jenny Owen Youngs, a young singer-songwriter from Brooklyn. (When I ask how old she is, she kindly-but-firmly responds: "Old enough.") She's on tour right now, with bandmates she describes as best friends, promoting her new album, Transmitter Failure (Nettwerk).

Portland champ and two-time New England champion air-guitarist McNallica will go for a three-peat on Wednesday at the Paradise in Boston, home to the northeast regional finals for the US Air Guitar national competition. Tickets are available online, and cost $20, unless you buy a four-pack, in which case they're $16.

UPDATED WITH LINK TO THE UNION'S SUMMARY OF THE CONTRACT.

After months and months of trying to put together a deal (and after years of preparation on the part of the Blethens), it appears that Richard Connor, the union-busting Bangor native who runs the Wilkes-Barre Times-Leader newspaper in Pennsylvania, may be close to actually getting ink on paper to buy the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, the Central Maine Morning Sentinel, the Kennebec Journal, and associated Web sites and - most importantly - about $30 million in real estate

Last time Portland got a city "poet laureate" (Martin Steingesser, whose one-year term mysteriously doubled in length), the choice was made by a tiny self-appointed group of people purporting to represent all Portlanders - despite the fact that two of them lived in other towns. And once they made their pick, they pushed the Portland City Council to make it government-approved-official.

Paula Michaud, from up in Aroostook County, called yesterday to ask us to write a story about a book she's working on, called Dirty Decisions. At the moment, she's blogging about her efforts as part of a provocatively named group, JAIL for Judges. (It's an acronym for "Judicial Accountability Initiative Law," an idea that would make the judicial branch "answerable and accountable to an entity other than itself."

It's "Commuter Challenge" week for GoMaine, the better-transit partnership between the Maine Department of Transportation and the Maine Turnpike Authority. (Yeah, yeah, we know, they're all roads-people, not bike or rail or hang-gliding promoters. They're trying, though, which is better than we might have feared.

We received a particularly outstanding letter in the office today. It's addressed to Brian Brown, executive director of the National Organization for Marriage, and the return address reads: "(Miss) Petunia DeWitt / [Street Address] / (the trailer out back) / Falmouth, ME."

I'll allow the highlights to speak for themselves:

New Coalition in Maine Files for People’s Veto of Same-Sex Marriage Bill

Augusta -- A coalition of faith-based and pro-family groups today filed for a People’s Veto to overturn Governor John Baldacci’s signature of the same-sex marriage bill. The Maine Marriage Coalition is being led by Bob Emrich and Marc Mutty who have worked together resisting the bill in the legislature.

Maine wants to crack down on texting/eating/rooting around in the glove compartment for CDs while driving. (I'm guilty of all of these activities.)

From a press release sent out this morning:

AUGUSTA-The long awaited LD 6, An Act to Establish a Distracted Driver Law, sponsored by Senator Bill Diamond, (D-Cumberland County) passed in the Maine Senate yesterday.

Last evening, after the historic day on which Governor John Baldacci became the first governor in the nation to sign into law a same-sex marriage act, there was a medium-sized gathering in Monument Square to celebrate. (It would have been bigger, we're sure, but the Maine Civil Liberties Union annual dinner was going on at exactly the same time up in Freeport.