It’s a beautiful Saturday morning in spring and I know all of our minds are starting to turn to VegFest 2013.

They are, right?

Well, if they aren’t, chop chop folks.

So, as you know, the NCVA isn’t hosting the event this year, so I’ve just been observing the organizational shenanigans from a safe and comfy distance thus far. However, since the NCVA is going to have a pretty big presence there, we’re now seriously gearing up our own organizational activities.

I thought I’d let you all know how it’s going so far, just to get you all excited and ready to leap into action as soon as I start begging for volunteers.

First, I should tell you to head over to the VegFest/YogaFest 2013 website since I’m only going to be talking about the stuff I’m helping organize – ’cause I’m self absorbed like that. I should particularly point out that they’re still taking vendor applications and presentation applications. So if you know someone who wants to vend or present, send ’em on over there – veg-related presentation applications will be passed on to us.

Okay, so cool thing number 1, we’ll have an auditorium inside St. Paul’s University building. We will have some speakers. Confirmed so far is Élise Desaulniers. She’ll be giving both an English and a French presentation on her new book Vache à lait: Dix mythes de l’industrie laitière. We’ll also be having a mini film festival on vegetarian and animal protection issues. Confirmed so far are Fork over Knives and Vegucated. Also under consideration are Earthlings and Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead. Suggestions for other films are welcome!

Oh, and if any tech savvy lady or gent out there wants to volunteer to run the films and speakers’ tech, please let me know. You will be revered evermore as the awesomest volunteer in the known and unknown universes, and so beloved that we’ll probably ask you to do it again next year!

Cool thing number two: the NCVA’s table. I know that a table sounds kind of boring, but this table is going to kick the collective ass of all the other tables there. There will be costumes (worn by you), food bribes (made by you), literature (handed out by you), all culminating in a stampede of new vegans (converted by you – way to go!).

Cool thing number three: food demos. This is kind of all being worked out still. Anyone who wants to do a vegan food demo should fill our the “presentation application” on the VegFest/YogaFest website. Just to make sure they’re all in the same place so I don’t schedule a tempeh marinating demo at the same time as the principal organizers do, because wouldn’t that be embarrassing!

There are many more cool things to come, of course. I’ll keep ya’ll updated as things progress.

In the meantime, may the fourth be with you!