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Weekend Primer

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Your guide to the weekend, SIOC style.

"Bull Durham" 20th Anniversary Celebration, Durham Bulls Athletic Park

Durham isn't merely the city the Duke basketball team returns to when it gets knocked out of the NCAA tournament; it's also a city rife with minor league baseball history, both real and fake. On Friday, Kevin Costner and his band Modern Westwill play a concert at the Bulls' stadium to honor what's surely one of the top 20 minor league baseball movies of all time.

Central PA 4thFest, State College, Pa.

If I had the ability to instantly transport myself to different places for 20-minute increments, I'd take a trip to State College to see the Independence Day fireworks. Why? Because the Penn State Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics is giving out free "special eyeglasses," which let viewers see the individual atoms which make the different firework colors. According to one of the event organizers, "When viewed through the eyeglasses, the colors of the fireworks will spread out in a rainbow, and will be superimposed by discrete lines of color." Neat. Sounds like the glasses might cut into local marijuana sales for the night. And don't worry, the school made a special three-inch thick pair of glasses for Joe Paterno.

(On another note, if you're looking for something mindlessly addictive, scroll down to the bottom of this 4thFest page and start clicking.)

2008 AVP Tour, University of Colorado, 1 p.m.

The winners of Saturday's men's final could soon find themselves playing beach volleyball in Beijing. At the very least, they'll make Colorado residents angry about not living near the beach.

Goat Trimming, University of Connecticut, 8 a.m.

Stuck at school for the summer? Look on the bright side -- you can trim goats! If I were A.J. Price, I'd take a day off from the gym and go test my surgically reconstructed knee with some strenuous goat trimming.

13th International Workshop on Quantum Systems in Chemistry and Physics, Michigan State University

Quantum chemists living in East Lansing can hardly contain their glee. Personally, I think it's comforting to know all the quantum systems people in the world get together once in a while. Perhaps this year they can build a website that doesn't look like it was designed in 1997.

U.S. Track & Field Olympic Trials, University of Oregon

After a trying 10 days, Phil Knight managed to place a record amount of swoosh stickers on the backs of unsuspecting athletes. By the end of Sunday's competition, those athletes will know whether or not they'll be headed to Beijing.