Over Labor Day weekend, the AJC Decatur Book Festival launched its weekend-long tribute to all things bookish, artsy and Atlantan. It was my first time attending the beloved event, and finding the Theatrical Outfit table (shared by the lovely Georgia Shakespeare, who need your help) was no easy feat: I wandered past a farmer's market, stopped for a moment by a giant green lizard-monster, mulled over the tables of arts associations and literary leanings, and forcefully wrenched myself away from a $5-book stand.

There, in the midst of the melting masses in the 96-degree late-summer heat, my associates Jenn Dwyer, Daniel Schroeder and I grabbed cardboard AJC fans (smart marketing!), our season-wide postcards and T.O.-emblazoned balloons and invited the community to come visit the Balzer Theater at Herren's.

We marked children with brightly-colored balloons so parents wouldn't lose them. We provided postcards for those who had yet to find a cardboard fan. For those who felt, in the mood of Cameron Frye, that they had not seen anything good today, Jenn did quite a bit of old-timey dancing in front of our table. She also said my favorite thing of the day, when she invited a kid to A Wrinkle in Time: "You should come see it. It has it all: puppets! Lights! SCARVES!" After returning to our table, she asked, "Why did I say scarves?"

We may never know why, but we can only hope that book-lovers got a sense of our theater on Luckie Street, and will be trekking over in the year to come to visit our own vortex of the arts.

Moral of the DBF: If we don't have scarves, we should at least invest in a green lizard-monster.

-Hally