Arts & Culture

On the heels of their star turns in the 500 Festival parade today, celebrities in for the "Greatest Spectacle in Racing" took to the checkered carpet outside the Indiana Roof Ballroom. On the docket: the 2012 Snakepit Ball, with headlining performer Rick Springfield.

The stars aligned for the 500 Festival parade, which promised a fairly high celebrity quotient and did not disappoint. Floats and cars, bands and marchers—they all moved swimmingly along the route that started on Pennsylvania Street downtown, wounded around Washington Street and Monument Circle, and then proceeded up Meridian Street.

Last night, music-industry icons, Indianapolis 500 stars, and other big-name notables put their well-heeled feet forward at the Indy 500 Soiree to help raise money for Riley Children’s Hospital at IU Health. In attendance were country-music star Garth Brooks and Motown legend (and Dancing with the Stars contestant) Gladys Knight, as well as two-time Indy 500 champion Dario Franchitti, 2008 winner Scott Dixon, and popular former Indianapolis Colt Dallas Clark. Lucas Oil owner Forrest Lucas and wife, Charlotte, graciously hosted the event at their 35-acre Hamilton County estate.

Editor's Note: We must be sadists. IM intern Myrydd Wells had never been to a Carb Day concert. So today, without mercy, we sent her—alone—to the Lynyrd Skynyrd concert at IMS. When we cautioned that it might get rowdy, and asked if she was sure she wanted to go, she reassured us. "I went to IU," she said. "I've seen it all." This is what she brought back.

The eagerness of brilliantly hued lorikeets as they stretch their necks to reach nectar. Long, curly eyelashes that lend a touch of flirtatiousness to the otherwise formidable southern ground hornbill, a 13-pound meat-eater that uses its enormous beak to skewer prey.